Forum Moderators: buckworks

Message Too Old, No Replies

what can i expect from a venture of this kind?

         

valeria_vi

11:05 pm on Dec 4, 2002 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



it will probably be a little long, but i hope you will finish reading the whole thing and will give me some feedback.
my mom told me about this company that makes aloe-based products. the company functions as one of those mlm schemes that i absolutely do not beleive in. (you know, you sign up as a distributor, sell door to door, sign up more distributors, get a percentage of what they sell, etc). my mom was the one to try some of their products and she liked them. i was very sceptical, but decided to sign up as a distributor anyway, 'cause you get 30% off their retail price. i have to admit that some of their products are really good. i bought them a couple of times for myself, but never tried selling anything. Recently I started thinking abut selling this stuff online. i never owned an online store, have no idea how to market one (but i am reading up on articles from ecommercebase.com *lol*).
let's say if i build an online store and make sure it does well on search engines, what are the realistic chances of something like this to at least make enough profit to cover hosting (which seems like if i want to have a shopping cart would be about $20 a month)?
there are those huge web sites like, say, mothernature.com, vitaminshoppe.com and others i would be competing against. while they do not sell products of this particular company, they are most likely selling similar stuff from other companies. besides people who are familiar with this company and are specifically looking for its products, who would want to make a purchase on my web site?
i do not expect to make millions out of this whole thing, but i am wondering if it is worth it and what can i expect out of this venture. realistically.
any feedback?

mack

12:14 am on Dec 5, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Administrator 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



It all comes down to how well you run your venture. You are right to be cautious, for every ecommerce site that gets off the ground you can bet there where about a hundred that failed. What you need to try and do is forget the history of how you got involved and just think along the normal lines of wholesaler, retailer and customer. You said none of the other sites sell your brand so right away you have a good opertunity to rank well for the product keywords. You may also want to give google adwords a go for terms like "buy (product) here" that way you are being specific in your advert and this could increase your click to sale ratio. what you should think about is make your website a good sales person. Dont just have images that you click on and get sent to a shopping kart. offer content, make then stick around and read and you may just get a buyer. If the product is specialised them when not try getting an advert in a topic related magazine. the ROI is a lot lower for print advertising but just might be enough to make you turn a proffic on the campaigne. you just need to see what works for you.

all the best

:)

You may need to acuire permision from the brand owner to sell the product online. Some products have exclusive distrobution processes. This is just something you may wish to enquire about.