I found an opportunity to start an online store and I'd like to ask the DT brainstrust on some feedback. I'll mark it all as spoilers because people may not want to read my full ramblings or some of the subject matter:
Business talk
So I've been looking at business where I work to try boost my other business offer, selling marketing software subscriptions, and I came across a lingerie wholesaler.
They just had an open submission to sign up as a stockist so I thought I'd check it out. I have an ABN and a registered company so I could just do it, and there was very little vetting on their side.
Once approved I had access to their entire catalogue and they do dropshipping, where you don't need to stock the product yourself. Essentially someone buys the product from you, then you buy the product from the wholesaler and they ship it to the person for you.
These guys have way more than lingerie. You can stock a whole sex shop with what they have. But I've decided to keep it simple, try focus on a few core products I think would move, and have picked more socially acceptable things that you could actually advertise on social media.
Instead of uploading everything, I'm focusing on things that could target the rave, festival, club scene. So it can still be seen as fashion instead of getting labelled as a sex store and getting banned from every online platform. I'm offering a few best selling items in the hope they will have a broader appeal to try get some cut-through.
I came up with an idea for a store name and a design, here's the URL, the store is up and running: https://lxix.store/ LXIX is the number 69 in Roman Numerals so it looks fancy but is a sex joke over two thousand years in the making.
Let me know what you think of the website. It's a little rough in areas and doesn't have everything, but I'm hoping it looks trustworthy enough someone might click through from a Facebook ad and trust it enough to convert and buy.
It's almost impossible to grow a social media following organically these days, so I'm expecting to put a bit of money into ads. My only problem is I have no assets aside from the so-so product images from the wholesaler and the brands themselves.
I'm hoping the way I can make this work is I'm hooking up every tracking pixel to just about every social media account I can find. My plan is to eventually get to know my target audience enough I can create ads and remarket to them effectively enough I can build a mailing list, introduce new products as if it's a 'launch' to capture previous customers again, and just grow the database of customers and like customers.
But I need actual sales to keep this going and achieve any of that. I only took the 'Coming Soon' off the website last week so it's still early days, but I want to make sure this website looks like it will work. The marketing software and business consulting was a slog because I don't have a network or capacity to follow up with people effectively. If I get things right here I could just run an ad and get returns.
I'm also considering reaching out to people and sending free product for content. But that's also a case of choosing the right people, as it still costs me money when I have no cashflow at the moment.
Also, I've searched for the most popular products on the wholesaler's store to find other websites selling the same stock. A lot of them are basic and ugly websites that don't look all that maintained. You can upload a CSV of the wholesaler's catalogue to your store, and I think a lot of people just do that. So they have basic images and descriptions, and are hoping for more of a 'build it and they will come' approach.
I also want to do a lot of SEO work and try be the top rank for a few keywords. That can supplement ad spend and helps with building a following long term. I don't think anyone but the big stockists are doing the same.
I'm just worried I could have a theoretically perfect online store, but can't realise any actual sales because my ads aren't good enough or I don't have enough capital to spend on advertising to figure it out. Any feedback is recommended because I feel like I could make this work.