People often ask me what keeps me motivated to sell handkerchiefs online. And it’s a fair question to ask because…
I’m not particularly into handkerchiefs, linen napkins or linen towels.
I don’t use any of my own products on a regular basis and I’m definitely not the target demographic for my store.
But here’s the thing.
What I sell online doesn’t really matter to me at all. I could be selling fertilizer or manure for all I care, I’d still be excited to do it.
For me, the interesting part about running an ecommerce store is the psychological aspect of selling online.
It’s all about finding out…
- Who your customers are
- What your customers like and what they are looking for
- Where your customers hang out
- Why they behave a certain way
In fact, it’s like trying to solve one big puzzle. Based on facts and real time data, you have to design a high converting website and a marketing plan to attract as many customers as possible.
The other reason I like running my online store is because ecommerce changes so quickly and it forces me to stay on my toes.
Every single year, there are new ways of marketing your business that you have to learn and adapt to whether it be Pinterest, Facebook, Google, Reddit etc…
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Advertising And Social Media Are Evolving
Google, for example, recently removed all of their right hand sidebar ads in favor of more ads at the top and bottom of the search results.
How does this affect you?
For one thing, advertisers are now competing for far less spots on the front page of search. As a result, business owners must either pay more for clicks or focus more effort on optimizing their ad campaigns.
In other words, if you don’t know what you are doing, you’re far more likely to get your butt kicked and lose money on your ads.
Furthermore, the increased number of ad spots on top of the main search results have pushed the organic listings far lower on the front page. As a result, you now have to rank in the top 3 just to make it above the fold of organic search.
Meanwhile, Facebook continues to lower the organic reach of its fan page posts in order to focus more on news from friends and family.
According to Hubspot, your posts on Facebook are now only reaching 2% of your fans which means that you MUST pay to play on Facebook in order to get any visibility.
In other news, Pinterest advertising is gaining traction as well with more and more shoppers using Pinterest over Google as their search engine of choice.
As you can see, ecommerce is rapidly evolving and most of the changes described above have occurred in just the past 6 months!
The Amazon Marketplace Is Drastically Changing
There have also been some pretty drastic changes in the Amazon landscape.
For one thing, Amazon has really been cracking down on paid reviews. Practically overnight, thousands of sellers have had their reviews removed and Amazon has been going after companies that offer or facilitate “paid” reviews.
Note: Services like Snag Shout don’t violate Amazon’s terms because customers are NOT required to leave a review.
Nonetheless, Amazon is taking major action to clean up the integrity of their review system.
Amazon is also quickly becoming saturated. I mentioned this a year ago, but the number of sellers on Amazon are accelerating at an exponential rate.
In fact, as evidenced in this post on how Amazon counterfeiters are wreaking havoc on artists and small businesses, both the number of knockoff sellers and cheap Chinese sellers are getting out of control.
Copycat versions of popular products can often be found on Amazon within a mere hours or days and almost everyone I know who is doing reasonably well on Amazon is getting piggybacked left and right.
The amount of sabotage and evil selling tactics being employed is also increasing at an exponential pace as the market becomes more and more cutthroat.
Prices are spiraling downwards as well. Once one of your cash cows gets discovered by popular tools like Jungle Scout, it’s just a matter of time before other sellers hop on and undercut you on price.
What Does This Mean For You?
So with all of these changes to the ecommerce landscape, what can you do about it?
What can you do to combat the legions of copycats and counterfeiters and the ever changing volume of tools to market your business?
As many of you know, I gave my first ever keynote speech at my conference, The Sellers Summit a few months ago.
And in that speech, I presented an outline of what is required in today’s environment to create a long term profitable ecommerce business.
Today, I’d like to share that speech with you. Enjoy the video!
Note: In my keynote, I also reveal the exact strategies I used to convince my wife to go out with me on a second date:) Don’t miss it.
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If you enjoyed my keynote speech, then you’ll love the rest of the content for the Sellers Summit.
Right now, tickets are on sale at the early bird price so grab yours today before the price goes up!
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Steve Chou is a highly recognized influencer in the ecommerce space and has taught thousands of students how to effectively sell physical products online over at ProfitableOnlineStore.com.
His blog, MyWifeQuitHerJob.com, has been featured in Forbes, Inc, The New York Times, Entrepreneur and MSNBC.
He's also a contributing author for BigCommerce, Klaviyo, ManyChat, Printful, Privy, CXL, Ecommerce Fuel, GlockApps, Privy, Social Media Examiner, Web Designer Depot, Sumo and other leading business publications.
In addition, he runs a popular ecommerce podcast, My Wife Quit Her Job, which is a top 25 marketing show on all of Apple Podcasts.
To stay up to date with all of the latest ecommerce trends, Steve runs a 7 figure ecommerce store, BumblebeeLinens.com, with his wife and puts on an annual ecommerce conference called The Sellers Summit.
Steve carries both a bachelors and a masters degree in electrical engineering from Stanford University. Despite majoring in electrical engineering, he spent a good portion of his graduate education studying entrepreneurship and the mechanics of running small businesses.
Some great tips in here Steve. It really is about taking the time to build out something valuable for customers and being in business to make a difference in the lives of those you serve. Fly by nighters simply can’t compete with someone who’s putting in the sweat to be the best. Awesome post.
Hey Steve,
You should have went for the hook shot in the post. Your wife’s block game is “A”.
Nice post brother! I always get valuable info when I visit your blog