Loading summary
Transcript125 lines
- [00:00]
A
You know, there's this arc that you have have in running a business where you climb the mountain and you get to the top and then you're like, I should be happy. Like, everything's going right. Like, you're, you know, there's a point in time where it's like, I'm making more money than I ever expected to ever make. And you look at yourself and you're like, I'm just not happy. Like.
- [00:19]
B
Welcome back to Built Online, the podcast where we dive into everything online business. Here we explore the minds of of creators who are building online businesses to power their dream lives and ultimately transform economies. I'm your host, Cody McGuffey, and if you're new here, I'm the founder and CEO of Everbee, a creator commerce platform where we believe that everyone deserves the opportunity to pursue their passions and to live life on their own terms. We're on a mission to make creator commerce accessible to everyone throughout the world, no matter where they are, and to make a positive impact in our families and our communities. And we believe that everyone that truly commits to a vision and pursues it with an undeniable force of will, that they will ultimately succeed. I'm really excited about today's show. Thank you for sharing your time with us. Before we jump into today's episode, I'd like to ask a quick favor for anyone that's listened to the show before. If you haven't already, please let us know if these episodes and these conversations are helpful or not. Share your feedback in the comments and. And review it if you. If you would. It truly helps the podcast, it helps our team, it helps me personally understand what types of guests that we should have on the podcast that really just helps us improve the show to make it better. We need your feedback. We would not be able to operate without your feedback. So be sure to follow the podcast, subscribe to the channel wherever you're watching this. So you really never really miss out on that. That one nugget that can really change your business and change your life. Enough of that. Really excited to have you here. Let's jump into today's show. David. What's up, man? How are you doing?
- [01:49]
A
Good.
- [01:50]
B
I'm fired up to have you here, man. Thanks for coming on.
- [01:52]
A
I'm glad to be here. Should be fine.
- [01:53]
B
Totally. You have an interesting background. We've already started a little bit of having this conversation before we hit record, but to give everybody some some context, do you mind if I kind of share a little bit about what I know about you and Then you can kind of fill in the gaps after that.
- [02:07]
A
Yeah, for sure. I feel like I sent you a book because it was like the whole.
- [02:10]
B
Story, so I'm really happy that you did. So I'll probably butcher some of this so again, we can go back and fill this in. But you're living in Texas. You're originally from Southern California. You moved your family out to Houston area. You have background in all kinds of stuff, but specifically Amazon, fba, Etsy. You have experience being a graphic artist at a sign company. You're newly married. Oh, no, no, this is. You were newly married in 2013.
- [02:35]
A
Yeah, I backed up the story quite a bit. Yeah.
- [02:38]
B
Beautiful. You overcame this huge lump sum of student loan debt and you basically. That's what kind of got you into this side hustle game of starting your own business, essentially. It sounds like.
- [02:51]
A
Yeah.
- [02:52]
B
And now you're crushing on Etsy. I know. That's why we invited you on. And you guys are have over 20, 000 sales in your Etsy shop. You started that shop, what, in what year?
- [03:05]
A
It was in 2014. And then we had switched to Amazon FBA and then now we've gone first full circle, which I can fill in the gap of why that is. But yeah, now we're back on Etsy and I'm really excited about that.
- [03:19]
B
So in revenue this year and we'll go back to again. But this year alone on Etsy, your Etsy shop, how much revenue have you guys grossed for this year?
- [03:28]
A
It was a partial year and honestly, I haven't even totaled it up because we're running Amazon still and Etsy, but I would say in the last six months, yeah, it's in the revenue, probably 120,000, something like that.
- [03:42]
B
Exactly. Right. Yeah, that's. What exactly would I have to. I have a data in front of ME and yeah, 119. Almost 120,000, basically in gross revenue, over 4,000 orders. You guys are crushing. Especially for a partial year.
- [03:54]
A
Yeah, no, it's. It's been exciting to try Etsy again and jump back into it after so long because we had started in 2014 and that was. That was a totally different ballgame back then. It was, you know, a new. A new frontier for us. And with Etsy, it's awesome because you just post a product and just get instant feedback and you pack it, you figure it out, you make the product, package it. We do handmade, so everything we do is handmade. So we want to tell the story about like how we started our first product.
- [04:27]
B
Now let's go ahead and jump back into the story. Yeah, exactly. Fill us in.
- [04:30]
A
Yeah, for sure. Yeah. So we, you know, I worked at the sign company, and I had access to our shop at the sign shop. And we were getting married, and we were just dead broke. We had a large sum of student loans. And just 10 years ago, by the way.
- [04:44]
B
Just 10 years ago.
- [04:45]
A
This is like 10 years ago. Yeah. So we needed to make our own wedding decorations and basically DIY our wedding. And so I set a budget for what we needed to do, and we started making all these wedding decorations. My wife's on Instagram and Pinterest and stuff, sending, you know, sending me things every day. And. And I'm like, all right, let's. I think I can make this stuff. And so we went and cut the wood and stained it and put the stickers on it, and. And then after the wedding, we. We started realizing, oh, this is real life now. Like, we now have bills, and these student loans start coming due. And so we're looking for side hustles to.
- [05:21]
B
How much student loan debt did you have?
- [05:23]
A
We had close to 120,000. And they just kept ballooning, too, because, you know, you're deferring it and. Interesting. So it was like this. I kept calling it my dragon that I had to slay. Cause it just felt like this ominous presence in our house at all times. So that was really one of the main factors for, like, how do we. I want to just go headfirst and just tackle it and figure out, like, any way we can. We can't avoid it. And the career path that I was in with graphic arts, it was like, doing the math on it. It was like, I'm making 13, $14 an hour at the time. Like, how many promotions do I need to get to get to 25 bucks an hour?
- [06:02]
B
And then I look at 27,000 a year. It sounds like $30,000 a year salary.
- [06:07]
A
Yeah. And then. And you start doing the math. You're like, okay, so I need this many promotions, this many job changes. And then that wasn't even enough, because then you're thinking house and kids. And, you know, for, you know, three, four years down the line, it just. The math wasn't adding up. And so I was like, I've got to supplement my income.
- [06:23]
B
So was any of that your wife's, or was it just yours?
- [06:27]
A
Yeah, it's both of ours. So we both had student loans. My wife was in grad school, and she was wanting to be a marriage and family therapist. And a lot of the work for that is getting your license and before you can really get the job that you need to get with that. And so she had to do a lot of intern work, which was unpaid. And then we had a really tough conversation. We had to talk about, like, is this, you know, because kids came up and we're like, you know, talking about if we want to have kids, like, how is this job going to mesh with that? Like, how much. How in love with this job are you? Because this is a difficult job where you're dealing with people, serious problems. And she was already doing this intern work where she's getting text messages that are like, serious, you know, crisis in people's lives and pretty heavy stuff. And then at the same time, it's like, how do you raise kids and have a job? And this is a thing that everybody that's married and has kids is dealing with is what, you know, how do you manage careers and family life? So she, we talked about it. She's like, I'm not, like, I'm more passionate about being a mom than being, you know, this career path. And it was such a long process of getting your license and doing all these intern hours that she decided to pause that while we started selling some of these wedding decorations that we had made. And it really didn't make any sense in the beginning because it was like a few hundred dollars that we were making every month. But I'll tell you, that few hundred dollars was just enough to like make the payments and balance our budget. And it was like we were so happy with that few hundred dollars that we were making. And what was awesome is too, is like from the wedding, it's like we had all these awesome photos and the photographer just by chance had taken pictures of all those decorations. So we had these professional photos. And so that's how we launched. That's how we launched the store. And we were cutting and staining in our. This little one bedroom studio apartment and the fumes were all in there and we were just hustling, you know, and.
- [08:27]
B
Bought this little entrepreneurial story. Like, this is like a classic and also classy, just classic, just entrepreneurial story of just hustle and grit and taking an opportunity where there probably was seemingly no opportunity. Like, for a lot of people, we just pass on that opportunity. But you guys somehow crafted a way to turn something into. From nothing into something.
- [08:48]
A
Yeah. And it's funny, when you put your back against the wall, like a lot of times you figure it out. And like, I posted the pictures. I didn't even Know where I was going to get the wood, like how we were going to make it. I didn't even have the machine to do it. And so I just posted the pictures because we had the pictures already. And you know, once we made our first sale, it was like, oh, we got to figure this out. So it went to Home Depot and I convinced the Home Depot guy to cut the wood for me. And then, you know, we bought a little can of stain and we stained it and just figured it out from there.
- [09:20]
B
So similar, man, a very similar story. Like, I'm seeing so many commonalities between my story, my wife and I story, and yours too. We just did stuff like this too, all the time. It actually always comes back to there was a big dragon. I guess I'm using your words like a big dragon, kind of you're going up against. And for us it was like student loan was one of them. And then I really wanted to quit my job. And it's like, how do I do this? Like, it's not going to be doing what I'm doing now, I can tell you that. And then you want to help your parents. Like, for me, a big thing was like I wanted to be able to help my family financially and there would just never be enough doing what I was currently doing. So I almost, like you start questioning what do I need to be doing in order for that thing to be a reality. Oh, it seems like almost everyone that's pretty wealthy around me, or at least I'm listening to, they all own businesses of some sort and not many of them are employees. There are some of them, but you know what I mean? And so then it's like, oh, I need to be a business owner. Got it now. What type of business owner? Then it's like, then you have the whole options of that, of drop shipping, hand making stuff on Etsy, just hustling, Amazon, FBA and all this stuff too. But that's. That was kind of similar to our story too, man. It's very similar.
- [10:31]
A
Yeah, no, I hear that all the time. And you know, I always kind of for a while resented working for small businesses that were, you know, three to 10 employees. And I thought, man, I'm missing. I'm not getting the experience I need. I'm not getting the, you know, the growth opportunities and all this stuff. And then later on now in register, I'm like, oh, wow, I learned so much by being around these guys. Because once you're working, you know, closely with the business owner, realize that they're just normal Guys. And honestly, like, there's not a. I'm not a super high IQ guy. Like, I'm not the smartest guy in the room.
- [11:05]
B
Like, I'm.
- [11:06]
A
I'm just, you know, figure things out. And I kind of. I'm like a lifetime learner kind of thing.
- [11:12]
B
And.
- [11:12]
A
And that. That's all you really need. And. And so I was actually really grateful for that experience.
- [11:17]
B
Pause you there for a second. Like, that is. That is not normal, probably. So. It's funny you say, like, you're a normal guy, and I appreciate that modesty and I appreciate the humbleness, because I would identify this very similarly. But I would say the fact that you even think that way, the figuring out by yourself, figuring it out on your own, just the ability to kind of be clear on your goals and reverse engineer where you want to be in in order to, like, what you need to do today to make that happen, that's pretty much not normal actually today. Should it be normal? Yes. Like, we want this to be normal.
- [11:49]
A
But, you know, that's true. Yeah. Because you think about the school.
- [11:52]
B
Very abnormal.
- [11:53]
A
Yeah. The way. The way that you're raised. I mean, thinking of my own kids, I'm like, wow, like, they're already, you know, so stressed out about, like, the format that school is in. And, you know, you kind of learn that. I do remember leaving college and thinking, oh, my gosh, it's like there's no template now. It's. I mean, there is a template of like this corporate. Corporate ladder. And it's like, okay, that's the only option. And you do start to realize that, oh, wow, you've got to expand your horizons because are form. I mean, you are trained to, like, just follow the. The path. And then all of a sudden you're like, real life hits you. Like, there's bills and there's kids and there's marriage and all this stuff.
- [12:29]
B
Yeah. Which again, nothing is wrong with that. That traditional path. I would just say it's the majority of people listening to this, they're called for something different. They're called to do something greater for their life. And typically it's in. Maybe it's a supplement. Like a side hustle is like a supplement to their current, current corporate job. Which is great, by the way. Nothing wrong with this at all, especially if you love your job. But it doesn't have to only be one or the other. It can kind of be the mixture of both. And then if you want to kind of go all in on being a business owner, you can absolutely do that too. Yeah, totally.
- [13:01]
A
Because people have, you know, vacations they want to do or they have things that. It's like they just keep putting it up, putting it off. It's like, I'll start a little side hustle, assign that money to that, that goal that you have, and then go, go do that thing, and then you don't have that stress, keep your day job and, and that's just as exciting. And there's just not hardly any risk in doing a side hustle like that.
- [13:22]
B
Completely agree. I want to ask you about your specific businesses that you have today. So you have Amazon fba. If you could, like, almost like list them for me. Like, what are your income streams online today?
- [13:33]
A
Yeah, well, I mean, I'll be completely honest with you. And you know, it's. I mean, it's more of a cautionary tale at this point. I wish I could tell you that I'm crushing it. And there's an Etsy. We're seeing growth and we're. But I'm at the. I'm at the startup stage again. I'm back to where I was in 2014 and doing it all over again. And, you know, there's this arc that you have in running a business where you climb the mountain and you get to the top and then you're like, I should be happy. Like, everything's going right. Like, you're, you know, there's a point in time where it's like, I'm making more money than I ever expected to ever make. And you look at yourself and you're like, I'm just not happy. Like, and you become complacent and things kind of just flattened. And so I hit that point. And at the same time, you know, the businesses, Business also. Well, I can go into Amazon FBA because it's been super frustrating. But, yeah, I'm back to the kind of the exciting startup phase. I mean, it's a little bit more stressful because we have, we have kids and we've got, you know, it's not just me and my wife in a little apartment anymore, but at the same time, like, we leaned up our budget and I'm back in startup mode. So I'm one. You. Yeah. So to kind of explain the story, like, we're winding down our Amazon FBA business. So. And that's why I'm so excited about Etsy. And it's a cautionary tale for folks. And I know that you, I believe you and some other folks that are associated with. They talk about having an email list Owning your customers, having some direct contact with them. And that's the main issue that I had. I added it up and over the last 10 years we've had over a million customers on Amazon FBA and I don't have a single email address. And it drives me crazy because it's like at the beginning it was like, oh, we have the listing up on Amazon and we're ranked. And that ranking just seemed to stay there and it was like, wow, we found this gap on the marketplace and then you also fall into listening to the wrong people. And there was these gurus and these guys that tell you, you know, get this many reviews and that's going to help you hold your position and all this stuff. So we're like thousands of reviews and all this stuff and you're like thinking that this is like digital real estate, like I've got my space locked in. But the truth of the matter is if you don't have emails or you don't have some, you don't actually own that. Like it can all get taken away. And so slowly over time it's like Chinese factories are coming in on Amazon and people are, you know, they're lowering their prices and then, and then demand shrinks a little bit. But, but for us our main issue has been the Chinese competition. They just saw like, you know, in the beginning there was hardly any handmade style items on or Amazon and it was this awesome opportunity and so we jumped in and it was just explosive growth because you know, once you get it into their system, you know, you get two day shipping and the prime badge and all that stuff. And so it was a great opportunity and it was a fun ride. But at the same time, in the back of my head it was always like, why, you know, I need to find a way to own some of this? And it just never really happened because it's so addictive and you get that, what is it? Platform capture. So you're just stuck on there. And I wish I would have kept Etsy shop running. I wish I would have kept our online store running.
- [16:50]
B
Was it a separate brand? Was it a separate brand or same type of. Same company, same brand, same product, same brand.
- [16:56]
A
We changed the name because we went from wedding products and expanded into home decor, which is another cautionary chair too. Is like making sure you really niche down and find a space that you're in. And we had wanted to even out our seasonality so we created a, you know, we changed more to a home decor brand and it got really broad because you know, you're just finding gaps on Amazon and you're just putting products everywhere and none of it started getting less and less cohesive. And so all that just kind of came, you know, it was working while it was working. And then, you know, when things start getting more lean and more competitive, that's when you really rely on that. Those assets that I didn't have at.
- [17:37]
B
The time, the main ones. So you are, today, you are winding Amazon FBA down, so you're not going to focus necessarily on that one anymore. Um, you're doubling down on Etsy, it sounds like. And you're also, you're gonna be creating a site as well for yourself just so you can like email lists and all that stuff.
- [17:53]
A
Exactly, yeah. And it's been so much fun because I love being able to communicate. Like there's things that when you're an Amazon FBA seller, it's like, it's very impersonal with your customers. Like, I love getting. Yeah, a lot of people complain about the customer service on Etsy and all this, but I'll tell you, it's like you get awesome feedback. Customers are asking for products and you're like, oh, that's my next product.
- [18:12]
B
You're a great customer.
- [18:14]
A
Yeah. And you're just like, I miss that so much. Like I get feedback from people, just compliments and then even problems. I can. If somebody has an issue and you give them a full refund and they didn't expect that, you get a positive review. And it's like on Amazon, it's so impersonal, like the review system and everything. I have no chance to contact them before they write that review. And you know, a lot of times customers on Etsy will contact you first and then you can resolve it. And if you, if you over deliver, like they'll give you a positive review. So this is negative experience. And yeah, maybe it cost me. You know, our products are in like 20, 30 range, maybe cost me 20, $30. But it's like I just got a review like I would say 50% of the time. Those negative ones, like those negative experiences that have, for whatever reason, maybe the package was lost or something, like they turned into a review. So I'm like, I'm paying for reviews in a roundabout way and, and it's so organic and I love it.
- [19:12]
B
So anyway, for the customer, yeah, I completely, I get that your customer centric brand, which is beautiful and that's, that's kind of where I think the market is probably going to, is like this close. Like E Commerce is I think is going to transition into. This is my own personal opinion, by the way. Transition from more of a transactional based brands to more like a customer relationship with the seller or with the brand owner or with the creator of the, of the product. Like that communication is going to become more and more and more important. That's why we're seeing personal brands become so important. A lot of times when people are like creating content and it's like, hey, it's David. And it's like, oh, he also, David also owns this brand and you know, and they're communicating directly with David kind of about this thing and they feel like they have a relationship with David and they happen. He happens to sell home decor. So that's why Etsy is thriving, I would say because a lot of other buyers actually value this too. They want direct contact with that, with that seller. My question is. Well, not really a question, it's actually just an observation. It's funny that you say that you're in startup mode, which totally relate to that night. I love that a lot of people listening to this is like David's crushing it though. So it's funny expectations, but this year you've made 100, almost 120,000 gross revenue on Etsy alone, over 4,000 orders. In the last month you guys have done over over 14,000 in revenue. This is a handmade product, is that correct? Handmade, yes. What's your profit margins look like after ads and everything?
- [20:49]
A
Probably 30%.
- [20:51]
B
30% super healthy. And then before ads, probably 35, 40% or something like this.
- [20:55]
A
Yeah, a little bit higher. Yeah.
- [20:57]
B
Cool.
- [20:58]
A
Yeah, we've been exper. Because coming from Amazon, like you focus a lot more on ads than most people would on Etsy. So I was able to use some of that experience on Etsy and I think, you know, it's, it's a missed opportunity that I think a lot of folks are missing is matching up ads with your organic sales and averaging those together and finding out what that profit margin is after ads, combining your organic and your PPC sales. Because it's like, yeah, maybe if we have a product that maybe we're only making 10%, 15% profit margin on the ad sales. But combined with our organic sales, it's like it works out where we're still profitable still in that 30% margin, whatever we need. And you know, that's that what happens is the ads are a flywheel for your organic sales. And if you can get the conversion rates where Amazon or Amazon, where Etsy is happy with those conversions on those ad sales, then your organic starts going up. And if you can get that going, then you can really keep that, you know, that flywheel running. And that's why, you know, I think in a short period of time we were able to. To grow this brand, was keeping the ads running and then making sure that conversion rate's good. And then the organic sales have sort of stayed. Stayed where we wanted to stay.
- [22:20]
B
When did you join? When did you join Everbee?
- [22:25]
A
Probably a year or two ago. I'm not totally sure because I was also using Everbee for my Amazon research.
- [22:32]
B
A lot of people do.
- [22:33]
A
Yeah. So we were doing that for quite a while, so I probably got in pretty early, but I don't remember.
- [22:39]
B
I'm curious because, like, I haven't had a whole lot of conversations with conversations with others that do that, but basically, were you using Everbeat to kind of like identify niches on this platform, which is Etsy, and to like, kind of sell stuff, sell stuff on Amazon fba? Is that kind of the strategy that you were using?
- [22:53]
A
Oh, yeah, exactly. Yeah. There's even like YouTube guys that are offering that as a, you know, showing how to use Everbee to sell on Amazon. So is that really.
- [23:02]
B
Oh, cool.
- [23:02]
A
Yeah, yeah. Because yeah, you could. With Etsy, people are constantly testing and trying and they'll hit things and then you can capture that a little bit early. I actually saw one really fun story was, have you heard a native deodorant? They're like, yeah, so they're in Target. They just got sold for $100 million a while back. Yeah, but the guy that started it, I heard this story where he was researching on Etsy and he saw that natural deodorants were starting to rank high. And I don't know if he was using your tool or some other tool and like, he was starting to realize this trend and that's what was his catalyst for starting this natural deodorant brand. So a lot of times people don't realize what they're sitting on. Like, you know, you start seeing all these sales on Etsy and you're like, oh, this is awesome. But the thing is, it's like you're innovating. Like, you're. You never know. Like, even with our niche, which I shared before the conversation, I don't mind sharing it. Like, we're in the baby shower niche. So, like in the baby inherent team kind of space and the demand is, you know, because it's a pretty broad niche. But like that, that is, you know, an area where the Demand is outpacing the supply. So, you know, if you can find those areas where you're like, oh, customers are out there searching for it, and you're starting to see those sales, even if you have a, you know, pretty basic product, but you're seeing this demand. It's like that's actually very important data that you don't realize that you just captured with your. With your product that you just threw out there. And, you know, I really. You know, you can scale these things. And that's what I did with the wedding products, too. It's like I saw this opportunity to see how much people are shopping for their weddings, and then you just keep expanding from there.
- [24:48]
B
Isn't it so crazy?
- [24:49]
A
Yeah, you don't.
- [24:50]
B
You don't know. Yeah, it's so crazy. I mean, it takes a little bit of vision and a little bit of experience to kind of identify certain opportunities like this or. And really to capitalize on them, of course. But that's. Hopefully the point of this podcast is for someone to take that away and see the opportunity. Like, you can look at native deodorant, for example, and let's say that they're looking at deodorant on Everbee and. Or on Etsy, and then they're using ever be to validate. Oh, yeah, like, natural deodorant is. This thing's doing, like $10,000 a month in this. This product. Okay, cool. And they started thinking, well, what if I sold on Etsy? Cool. But what if I also had a website also and started to scale it with Facebook ads? And let's assume I put a great product together, of course, and great packaging and great branding and all this stuff, of course you need this. But that decision that. That I forget his name, that they did, that they sold the company for, like, you said, $100 million, which is bonkers. Right? And it's. It sounds crazy, but actually happens all the time. All the time. Companies are built or they're started with, like, some sort of niche idea, maybe with some data validating it. Then it takes a founder and a team to actually execute on it, and then they grow the revenue to a certain point, and you have now built something that's very, very valuable for somebody else to purchase from you. And I didn't know this when I was starting in business. I didn't know that you can really sell businesses. I was so unexpected.
- [26:10]
A
No, neither did I. Yeah, I'm like.
- [26:12]
B
What do you mean you sold a business for $100 million? Like, my dad owned a business and he wasn't selling anything like he was working on the tractor, you know, and, and so it was insane to me. And for anyone, it's never heard this before. Google literally how to sell a business or how to sell an E commerce business or multiple of a E commerce business. And there's such thing called multiples. For anyone hasn't heard this before on your revenue or on your profits. And typically it's depending on the industry there's a multiple. And if E commerce for example, it would be, let's call it re. Multiple on revenue was. Let's call it 2 or 3x. I don't know David, if you know this, but yeah, something like that. Yeah. So if you do a million dollars in a year in sales, your business is probably worth just $3 million in value adjust.
- [27:00]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [27:02]
B
Which is crazy, right?
- [27:04]
A
Yeah. One thing, one fun hack you can do too that I started doing a while ago was there's a website called, I think it's Biz Buy Sell. But anyway, there's a bunch of these websites like broker sites for selling businesses. And if you go in biz by sell and you go to their advanced search, they actually have a keyword field. And what I put in there, I put Etsy in there. And then you search and you can see all the businesses that either are selling on Etsy or they'll put in the comments, you know, growth opportunity on Etsy. And what's awesome about that for like a business starting up or you know, thinking about what they want to do with their business in the future is a lot of times even in just the paragraph or two that they give you on there is usually pretty broad because you need to sign an NDA or something like that. But they'll give you some information about what, where, like their distribution channels, like what social media accounts they're using. And then you'll see that the number that they're selling the business for, you'll see their revenue and their profit. And it gives you just an idea of like what you can do with these types of businesses and what kinds of products. A lot of times like you'll get an idea of the niche even from that search on Biz Buy Sell, you'll see, oh like furniture, you'll see, you know, what they're doing. And if you wanted to be a little bit more sly, you could, you know, even contact them and act like a buyer and get the prospectus and get the information and, and go a little further. But, but yeah, so like it's really helpful to get into that because you'll see what profit margins and things that you need to have to really scale and it gives you an idea.
- [28:33]
B
Totally.
- [28:33]
A
It's exciting too. I love, I love.
- [28:36]
B
Yeah, dreaming a little bit, kind of seeing what's possible. Yeah, totally. I have a couple questions I want to kind of bang through just because I know that a lot of people are curious. First of all, how do you use Everbeat today for Etsy, your Etsy brand?
- [28:49]
A
Well, I use it with. We've got these few products and it's sort of swallowed up our time right now, so we haven't been thinking about new products. But yeah, I use the search bar most often. So we're looking for keyword volume. And then what I did was I created a Google sheet for building listings. And I go through all, I go through all the root, all the root words first. And then I start expanding from the root words and make sure I'm not doubling up on certain words. And, and then, and then, you know, I'm plugging them into where I think is right for the title or the title description and the tags.
- [29:27]
B
Mostly using keyword research because you're not really doing product research anymore because your products are crushing it. So you're not really expanding your product line. You're mostly just using it to build those things, essentially.
- [29:36]
A
Yeah. And then if I were, you know, to start adding new products. Yeah. Mainly using the search bar function. And then, and then I'll do some broad, you know, research with, with the product searches and, and you know, start looking at what, what stuff's ranking, what's selling and that sort of thing. But once I've got kind of our first few products, you know, I'm, I'm thinking a little bit more about like customer avatar, like who's my main customer? And trying to expand my catalog that way. Cause that was one of the traps that I fell into with Amazon FBA was what's a hot keyword? Let's sell a product.
- [30:08]
B
Okay.
- [30:08]
A
What's the next hot keyword? Sell a product. I mean, it got really not very cohesive. And I think Etsy's a lot better at creating more of a branded experience for people where your store feels more like a store run Amazon, like nobody goes to the stores on Amazon, we're on Etsy. You'll get sales where people will buy multiple products. And it's a lot easier for people to stay with your store even though, yeah. Their other competitor products are everywhere on the page. Right. Once they. Yeah, there's a little more loyalty on Etsy and I think it translates a lot better to having your own online store too. So you know, if you have a handmade or an Etsy style product, I encourage everybody to start on Etsy, test it out because you have this free traffic and then, and then build your store because it's just so quick and easy to test products.
- [30:54]
B
I agree. Next question. How many listings do you have?
- [30:58]
A
We only have three.
- [31:00]
B
Three. And you guys have done 4,000 sales on Etsy. My three listings, I love this and I already knew the answer to that but I wanted everyone to hear it because people think they need 3,000 listings and not that's bad. It's just like you don't need that in order to just crush it. You need a great product serving a specific customer and they just rinse and repeat. Agree with us.
- [31:19]
A
Yeah, yeah, totally. I think if you can find a product that is that you're differentiating like. And it's good too because the two, we have two products and I was experimenting with a digital product which honestly like every time I get a digital product sale I'm like way more excited about that. Even though it's only like five bucks here and there, it's like I didn't have to work at all for that one. I didn't have to worry about that at all. So I've got two products and one of them, it's the price is more competitive and so that one's selling I think because the price look more competitive. But now that we're selling more like a lot of people are buying both the products and then the other product, it's more. The product is differentiated. So it's good to see like both are having demand and they're both selling for different reasons I think. I'm not totally sure.
- [32:00]
B
I can't.
- [32:01]
A
I don't know. There's not really data to back that up but at the same time kind of tell just based on competitors.
- [32:06]
B
So cool. I think it's the perfect transition into rapid fire. Questions? Sure. You ready?
- [32:13]
A
I'm ready. Let's go for it.
- [32:15]
B
What's your favorite business book?
- [32:17]
A
Favorite business book? I like Extreme Ownership, but Jocko Willink.
- [32:21]
B
I haven't read that yet. It's on my list though.
- [32:23]
A
Yeah, that's a good one.
- [32:24]
B
What's the one thing that you wish that you knew before starting your business?
- [32:29]
A
I mean, I already said it. It's like own your data, have, have. Have contact with your customers, own assets in your business and build assets over time.
- [32:37]
B
Curious how you're Doing that with Etsy because Etsy can remove that ability to have emails from, you know, basically extract emails from them. How are you viewing this? Is that just like you're going to build a brand on Etsy and then build your own site and then kind of like do both?
- [32:52]
A
Yes, that's exactly what I want to want to do is test products on Etsy and have that a little bit more free flowing and then move products onto, onto our online store. I do put an insert into our boxes on Etsy and offer a free gift or whatever like a digital download and then we're capturing some emails that way. But yeah, that's going to be the main focus.
- [33:11]
B
Yeah, completely agree with this like strategy too. It's not that you have to choose between Etsy and your online store. It's more just like use Etsy as a sales channel or your online store. Like your online store is like your real estate. It's like the thing that you own. You own all the customer data, it's your email list. Etsy is a beautiful thing because they bring you traffic and you can fulfill this. And some people just like to buy on Etsy so it's perfect, it's an opportunity. So just treat that a sales channel versus the only sales channel. Yes, absolutely.
- [33:39]
A
And I was so surprised. I had like a half built website for our brand and I don't even know how customers found the store but like just having it built like a customer went on there and they spent like a hundred dollars and I was like this is like a half built. I don't even know how you found the product page because it wasn't on the homepage and so I don't know.
- [33:58]
B
Yeah, so you know your margins are better too. Like typically your margin you could usually charge higher amount because you're not competing with other listings on the page, which is cool. It's interesting. My margins have always been higher off of our, of our online store. Like they're always like wow, they spent 50 on here where on Amazon or on Etsy they would be spending, I'd be having to price it at 25. It's like, it's crazy, right?
- [34:19]
A
Exactly.
- [34:21]
B
Next question. How many hours do you typically work on your business per week today?
- [34:27]
A
Well that's tough because I'm, I'm like winding down our business so I've got multiple tasks going on. But, but to operate our business as it is like just the Etsy side of it, it's like two hours a day and then on the, on the Amazon side that's typically been. I've built teams out, so like, you know, 10 to 15 hours we got it down to. But then now that we're kind of winding things down, I'm working a lot more on it.
- [34:54]
B
Cool. What's the worst business advice that you've ever received?
- [34:59]
A
Worst business advice ever received? Oh, that's a tough one. The worst. Okay, dude, I've heard some terrible Amazon FBA guys, like, share some stuff. I mean, it's all the hacky stuff. So, like, buying reviews, like, doing stuff that's black hat. Like, it never works out. Like, there's people that will swear by certain things that are, you know, this is, you know, because for a while on Amazon, you could go into a Facebook group and basically hire people to write reviews for you. And then they also had some other hacky stuff, like hiring people to buy products from you. So then your rankings would go up and it works for a while and then it doesn't work. And then it's. But it's not really like a standard operating disease that you can keep forever. Yeah, it's hacky. It's like, it works and it's like. Yeah. Sometimes in some spaces, it's like everybody's doing it, so they feel like they have to do it. But I would rather just. Just do it straight and play by.
- [35:58]
B
The rules and win the legit way. Right?
- [36:01]
A
Yeah.
- [36:01]
B
Yeah, I agree with that. Last question. If your family and your friends and your customers, they all have to get together without you, and they had to write like an honest article or a book or something about you characterizing, like, all of your traits, your characteristics, all this stuff, good and bad. What are things that they would say?
- [36:21]
A
Oh, my God, dude, that's deep. I don't know. Oh, man.
- [36:26]
B
You know you're signing up for this, huh?
- [36:28]
A
Shoot. No, I didn't know. This is gonna be like therapy. No. You know, on the more, like, native side I know about myself is I'm scattered. I'm pretty scattered. Like, I'm a shiny object guy. Like, I got that, you know, and the plus side, that's. That's a, you know, sort of an entrepreneurial, like, superpower too. But it's just about reining that in. But. But yeah, definitely can. Can get a little off track. The. I guess. Yeah. I don't know, man. I mean, I like building things. Like, people always. I'm always building things. So, like, you know, like, if it's customers and family stuff. I don't know, man. This is a tough question. Oh, man, you. Yeah. I mean customer service centric. Like I definitely empathetic to people's needs and what they want. So I guess if, you know, what.
- [37:17]
B
Would your wife say about you?
- [37:19]
A
My wife, I mean I'm a hard worker. I don't have any problem getting up and facing whatever needs to be faced every day. It's tough right now. I don't wish this on anybody, but I do consider it a growth opportunity. You know, I, I think learning how to wind down a business is way less fun than building a business, you know. So I think yeah, she'd probably say it out like that kind of growth mindset. So hard working kind of person that doesn't really quit, which can be to a fault sometimes.
- [37:58]
B
I love that. I could totally see that. By the way. Completely agree. From just the 40 minutes that we've talked. Where can people find you, man? Where can people find, learn more about you, follow you, follow your brands, follow your growth, anything.
- [38:13]
A
That's a great question. And that's, that's the, that's the stage I'm at where I don't have any of that. You know, I, that's, you know, running an online business has always been a lonely pursuit. So I really appreciate this conversation and I think I've just started going to some conferences and things like that. But that's, that's top of mind right now is, is putting myself out there more, you know, because it's so much more fun doing, doing this in community like sharing stories about business and connecting with people to get inspired and all that. So, so I don't really have.
- [38:47]
B
You have an Instagram LinkedIn anything that people at least can be like follow even if you don't post.
- [38:54]
A
Yeah, it's Instagram. It's, it's me, David Anderson.
- [38:58]
B
Beautiful. It's me, David Anderson. And we will by the way, anyone listening to this, we'll link to the. In the description below or in the podcast show notes. Cool. Fair enough. Yeah, that's awesome. There's so much more I wanted to cover but it's funny how just time flies by so quick. Thank you.
- [39:14]
A
I got some good tips and stuff if you ever want to come, you know, talk Etsy and talk about some strategies and some fun ways to expand business. I'd love to talk about it. So let me know anytime.
- [39:23]
B
Beautiful. What can you leave with somebody with right now? Maybe one of those tips Right now?
- [39:28]
A
Yeah, for sure.
- [39:28]
B
Trying to build their Etsy store and let's see because this is mostly what. And you're doing really well there. What's one tip that you can really leave them with.
- [39:35]
A
Well, one thing I'm really excited about is I realized a while ago that Etsy shares publicly people's favorites. So when they favorite items, you can go to a customer's profile and see all their favorites. And I had already been thinking about like, what's my customer avatar? Trying to research, like what it would be like to put together like my ideal customer. And I was like, wow, I've got a picture of my ideal customer with all their favorites. And if you go through and I've got all these customers with this brand that we have and you started looking at multiple. And I started putting them in spreadsheets. What are the common products that I'm seeing between these different customers? And then you like, wow, I've got my next 10 products. Like they're all like 50 of these customers. And I could keep going. It's like 50 of these customers are all buying baby blankets. Well, it's like, why am I not selling baby blankets? I could probably get that, you know, that customer to buy two or three items or more if I just offer the things they're already buying from other people. But that, that to me was like, I open. I was like, oh, wow, I've actually had. And sometimes I'll find a customer where you see like their whole, their whole experience. Like you see all their products they bought when they got married and then you see, oh, they're traveling and vacationing and their honeymoon and they're, you know, doing stuff and then they're buying, you know, anniversary gifts and then they have their kids and you see like this picture of a customer. And then, you know, the idea with a customer avatar is you're always picturing that customer when you're creating products and you're contacting them and you're writing your copy and all this kind of stuff. So I thought that was a really cool way to do that. So if you have a store and you got one sales and you're in the niche, it's like go through all your customers favorites and see who your customer is and get a clearer picture of them.
- [41:16]
B
I love that. David, thank you, man. I really appreciate you. We'll have to have you on again and maybe the next three months or something like that to get an update on where you're at. Be fun, dude.
- [41:23]
A
I love it. Yeah, that'd be great.
- [41:25]
B
Awesome. Thank you, man. Talk to you soon.
- [41:27]
A
Talk to you soon. Bye.