7 Figure Ecommerce

[Ashlyn Robello]

Despitethis alarming statistic, building a six-figure e-commerce company is far from impossible. This became abundantly clear during my recent interview with Levi Feigenson, cofounder and CEO of Mushie.

Feigenson launched the eco-friendly infant accessories brand in July of 2018 with his wife and generated $27,800 in revenue during their first month of business. The brand has seen incredible growth over the course of the past year, and this month, they're set to do approximately $450,000 in sales.

Whether working with a big influencer or a smaller micro-influencer, looking for individuals who can make a more authentic pitch for your product and have a relevant target audience is essential for a successful collaboration.

In the wholesale market, retailers buy products in bulk, typically at a discounted price in comparison to what the products would be sold for individually. While the discounted price is beneficial for the retailer, the potential exposure (and upside for repeat customers) yields great dividends for the brand.

Jon has been selling on Amazon for one year and during that time he has build a 7 figure ecommerce business along with his business partner. The neat part about Jon's story is that he still works a full time day job. If you're looking for a bit of motivation this episode should do the trick.

Get involved and ask a question about selling on Amazon and Chris may answer your question live on a future episode of Sellercast. Also, if you think you'd be a good guest for the Sellercast podcast feel free to tell us more about you and your company here.

Jon: Yeah, I kind of have a unique story tied to your blog actually. I started reading your blog probably, gosh, about four or five years ago when blogging was big and how to drive traffic to websites and what-not. And so I decided to start my own financial blog.

So, for me, blogging was just not working out. And honestly, I got tired of writing. So, I honestly started researching, reading blogs. Your blog I think got me started on the road towards the Amazon world. I just couldn't believe your revenue figures. I honestly thought I was reading a scam.

Okay, so the other question then was a lot of people talk about wanting to start an ecommerce business. And sometimes, they have that same problem where they either lack the money to really invest in the business, and so they try and partner up with others.

We use a third-party warehouse company in the United States. How do I get it from there to the warehouse to the Amazon warehouse. So, I wanted to use a really cheap, easy product to test the whole system.

I did an order of 250 units and found a fantastic supplier who actually is the same supplier for some of the name brands that we see in the United States. He was open to it. We did an order and we took it through the entire system, getting it to Amazon and started selling immediately.

Jon: I would say I am the ads, marketing and website tweaking. My business partner is everything financial, website development, a lot of miscellaneous items, making sure that we have everything in line. He does all of our cost tracking which I personally hate. So, he does all of the expenses, the shipping cost. He deals with DHL and UPS. He deals with the sea shipping companies. So, we kind of just split up the work naturally for what makes sense right now.

So, I would take a class. I would really look at revenue numbers. There are multiple software tools that are out there. We use one that plugs directly into Chrome. But I would jump in. I would jump in, and I would really focus on, in the very beginning, going slow.

In the talk, he introduces the golden circle, which consists of what, how, and why. Sinek suggested that every company knows what they do; some can even articulate how they do it, but few get to Why they do it.

One last word of caution: while having your C-suite on board might be enough, wanting something new or shiny is not enough to sustain your project over the long run. Your Why is likely to be multi-faceted, and the better you can get to the bottom of it and get transparent with all stakeholders, the more you will set yourself up for success.

I worked on a re-platforming project to implement headless commerce. We needed a high-level strategic resource to design the system, then an architect for the front-end work, an architect for the commerce work, and two or three developers for both the front- and back-end work. Requiring a headless commerce system added overhead to the project. You may have an excellent Why for using more complicated architecture, but make sure you know what you are gaining and what it will cost you.

Starting with the Why, getting clear about your requirements, resisting the urge to over-/under-engineer, and selecting the right technology platform are crucial to having a successful re-platform project. Hopefully, this will help you understand the importance of firmly setting the foundation for your project.

Dale Edman is an independent adviser on B2B and retail ecommerce and digital transformation. He has held ecommerce executive positions at companies including West Marine, Newell Brands and The Wasserstrom Co. He posted an earlier version of this article on LinkedIn.

Sign up for a complimentary subscription to Digital Commerce 360 B2B News, published 4x/week. It covers technology and business trends in the growing B2B ecommerce industry. Contact Mark Brohan, senior vice president of B2B and Market Research, at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @markbrohan. Follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.

Josh Hadley is the Founder and CEO of an eight-figure e-commerce business called Hadley Designs. Hadley Designs is an online graphic design boutique where customers can choose, design, download, and print home decor and invitations. Josh is also an e-commerce business consultant and the host of the eComm Breakthrough Podcast, which is dedicated to helping brands exceed eight figure profits. Before starting Hadley Designs and eComm Breakthrough, Josh graduated with an MBA from the Lassonde New Venture Development program at the University of Utah. Josh then took his talents to Dallas, where he honed his business, marketing, and project management skills as an executive for American Airlines.

I made mistakes along the way that made the path to 8 figures longer. At times I doubted whether our business could even survive and become a real brand. I wish I would have had a guide to help me grow faster and avoid the stumbling blocks.

As a seller, there comes a time when you are most interested in scaling your customer acquisition channels to grow your business. Sometimes it can be a tall order knowing the best platform to bring traffic to your site; traffic that you can convert to actual customers.

Sounds interesting, right? One thing is for a fact; eCommerce is all about generating sales. Artificial Intelligence can be of great help when it comes to prospects conversion- from finding the potentials to providing after-sale services. It sure has its flaws as well, however, the effects of AI in helping you become a 9-figure eCommerce company cannot be underestimated;

AI technology creates a fantastic framework for achieving personalized customer experiences. Notably, this is achievable through taking feedback mechanism seriously, capturing data correctly, and training the system on unbiased data. Customers who enjoy personalized service delivery are most likely to share the amazing experience online. This leads the company to naturally build their online reputation by investing in Artificial Intelligence technology to serve customers better.

Launching a new product is a tricky affair for most companies due to the high uncertainty encountered during the development stage. In an attempt of eliminating the risk, it is crucial to evaluate new product initiatives systematically keenly. Moving on, you can then make pin-point decisions and eliminate the uncertainty.

Integrated decision-making based on AI technology techniques will be vital through the entire process and boost confidence during a new product launch. AiHello has an intelligent approach that allows sellers to roughly and quickly experience and analyze product ideas by making use of previous customer experiences. AI techniques are used to accelerate new product development, taking into account factors of uncertainty that affect product development.

In short, AI techniques can be used to predict new product launch success in more than one dimension. However, it is worthy to note that the accuracy of results relies on a number of factors. Examples of such factors are like the number of available data relative to the given variables of interest, and the quality of data from the questionnaire.

If you are an Amazon seller, then you already understand that effective inventory management is one of the essential factors for the success of your eCommerce store; especially following increment of long term storage fees for slow-moving inventory, the new Inventory Performance Index, and the increased FBA fees.

Inventory forecasting and analyzing current industry trends could help you get a rough idea for what to expect in Q4. Remember to factor your advertising efforts into the overall inventory management plans if you want to avoid running low/out of stock on popular items.

It can get quite challenging trying to find the perfect balance for Q4 inventory; however, applying some wits as an Amazon seller to understand demand, trends, and previous sales data could help you avoid overstocking or running out of stock.

When delving into Q4, be ready for anything; in as much as you should have clear predictions that consider previous demand, sales uplift, and marketing initiatives, sometimes you can later come to realize that an item you may not have imagined performing excellently, literally turning into a top seller. This is where AI could come in strongly and be a game-changer!

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