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If you're selling online or in person, you're familiar with this challenge. You need people to find your products, which usually means paying for ads or hoping they stop by. Whatnot flips that this is the live shopping platform that's exploding right now. On Whatnot, you go live and sell directly to real people in real time.
I've seen whatnot climb to the top
of the app store. I've seen the seller earnings everything from
small part time projects to multi million dollar businesses.
Whatnot is the largest dedicated live shopping platform. They see what you've got, they can ask you questions and then they buy. And what's fascinating is they keep coming back for more Whatnot. Buyers are spending more than an hour a day in the app. And all that is great news for sellers. In fact, sellers on whatnot sell 10 times more than on other major marketplaces. That's because you're not just listing products, you're building real connections with buyers. From collectibles to cookies, from resale treasures to vintage fashion. People just like you are building real audiences and real businesses on and for a limited time, Whatnot will match your first $150 sold in the first month. Visit whatnot.com sell to start selling. That's W-A-T N O-T whatnot.com sell whatnot.com sell okay, by month five, this side
hustle was generating more profit than his corporate salary. And it wasn't just the monthly cash flow. The business was an asset on its own because two years later, he sold it for $700,000.
This is the power of starting a side hustle.
This is why I'm so fired up about this topic. Because it can truly alter the trajectory of your life. Just like it did for today's guest, the business in question. We're not talking about rocket science here. We're talking ecom.
Selling products that people want.
Only the unique twist with this one is he did it without having to buy any inventory upfront from 1% E Comm club. Jaden Clark, welcome to the side Hustle show.
Jayden Clark
Thanks for having me. I'm excited.
Host
Me too. Stick around. We're covering idea generation, product research, building supplier relationships, marketing, profit margins, all of that stuff. But Jayden, I got to hear what led you to dropshipping. Specifically this flavor of dropshipping as a potential side hustle.
Jayden Clark
I guess like a quarter life crisis maybe. I think I was 27 at the time when I started this. So we're going back like four years now. I had a holiday that I'D been looking forward to for like a year. It was probably the nicest vacation me and my wife had ever been on. And I got so excited and then we went and it came to an end and I came back and I was just thinking, oh, this is the next 40, 50 years. I just have to live for this one week a year or this one thing that I'm kind of like trying to get me through. And that felt like a really miserable way to live. And that was kind of the first time I had gone off the path. Like I left university, got a corporate job, had everything I could have wanted. And then, you know, the kind of glass shattering moment, I was like, no, I can't do this. So I decided I have to do something. And I started researching ideas and I kicked around the standards like Amazon, FBA physical products. I kind of knew I liked the idea of selling something that, that made sense to me, excited me, but I needed to work out like what could I actually do here? Because I was pretty, pretty risk averse. I was never going to be the person that was just going to chuck my job in be like, okay, tomorrow I'm going to go and do this and it doesn't matter if we lose the house or we struggle, whatever. I was always going to be slowly. And so you had to work out what that thing was. But I knew there had to be a thing.
Host
Yeah, first of all, there's got to be a better way to stare into these cubicle walls for the next 30, 40 years. And second, you're attracted to selling a physical product. It's a simple buy low, sell high. I'm going to make the margin in between. But what's the model that allows for maybe some low risk startup costs and kind of this potential to scale without necessarily driving a ton of volume because you're kind of attracted, you're leaning towards these higher priced products where it's like I only need to sell 20, 30, 40 of them a month to, to make a good living here.
Jayden Clark
That was exactly it. I was happy to work, I was happy to put the hours in the sweat in, but I was pretty hesitant to put the money down. And then also it was kind of like the glass shattered and then I was just desperate to get out the job as quickly as possible. So like two things. The first was the idea of putting 2, 5, $10,000 down to buy a product and then potentially not sell it.
Host
Go into inventory.
Jayden Clark
Exactly. And then potentially not sell it. The embarrassment of that, the shame, like letting my wife down, etc, that really scared me. Then also thinking, okay, how many of these am I going to have to realistically sell to replace my income? I kind of knew my, my like nut, so to speak was I wanted to try and get to about, about 7 or 8,000 in income that I could take out the business and have that consistently.
Host
In pounds.
Jayden Clark
Yeah, so about 10k USD sure was what I kind of wanted to get to. So like a reasonable size and some consistency as well. So I was thinking, I did in the math in my head thinking, okay, how many of those, you know, whatever $30 products would I need to sell? And then I'm also thinking, geez. And then a thousand customers that I got to deal with alongside my job, demanding. And then I'm also thinking, well, even if it all goes well and I do sell those first, whatever thousand units, then I need to make a bigger stock order, I need to pump all that profit back in. So how's that going to start coming to me to start living off so I can get out this job? And it just felt a bit impossible. And then as you quite rightly said, the idea of high ticket dropshipping, I can do all that work. I just have to obsess over like learn paid ads, learn conversion rate optimization, learn how to do SEO, basically get traffic, convert traffic. But I can do, you know, I can do a 10k profit month off 50 sales of 70 sales, which is only 50 or 70 customers and I don't have to put the inventory down. And then at that point I was like, okay, I'm unleashed. Like that is the thing. And I'm going all in there.
Host
Did you have any experience in that digital marketing world before?
Jayden Clark
I thought I did. So I used to work in, in E commerce for like, like a really big business, one of the probably 50 big biggest businesses in, in the UK and I, I basically ran E commerce for that company. And I was like, yeah, I'll pick this stuff up really easily. And then I realized that the difference of doing something with like billions of pounds and dollars behind you and a team of, you know, 10, 15, 20 people is very different to doing it. You're on your own in a completely new market. So. So yeah, actually I think it helped me in almost no ways. I think the only thing I will give myself credit for is I think I got my preconceptions out the way. Ironically, with the students I work with, often those who have a background, they struggle the most for some reason because they almost come in with these preconceived ideas and they struggle to shake that for the formula of what's been proven in this particular kind of business model with businesses of this size. That are new. So luckily, I think I, I came in thinking, cool, my experience is going to help me. If anything, it hindered me, but at least I got that out of the way fast.
Host
I think, yeah. Give us the 30 second elevator pitch for dropshipping because it has a mixed reputation online where some people will say, look, this is a total scam and other people are like yourself. No, look, I'm living proof that it works and maybe the truth is somewhere in the middle. Why do you think it has that reputation?
Jayden Clark
Dropshipping gets a really bad name because it can feel like a scam. And if you are selling cheap products off Alibaba, Aliexpress, basically Chinese factories, then it feels like a scam to the customer and to the business owner. The customer gets something that you have no idea when it's going to turn up. It can't be returned. The quality control is like less than zero. So the business owner is miserable because they're dealing with really unhappy customers, bad reviews etc. The customer's unhappy. And so, yeah, in my opinion, whilst you can make money there, it's not really a long term viable business. Whereas the style of dropshipping I did, in my opinion, the dropshipping piece is only the fulfillment model. Like Wayfair for example, like are the biggest dropshipper that pretty much everyone will have heard of. So much of their stuff is dropshipped.
Host
Yeah.
Jayden Clark
And you know, no one thinks of Wayfair as a scam. Right. Wayfair is an E commerce business, principally. What they are great at is acquiring customers, getting them products that they want to buy, you know, getting them on product pages and collection pages, helping them find products and helping them buy them. Right. It doesn't matter to the customer. They come direct from somewhere else's warehouse in the US because they're still buying through Wayfair and on a minor scale, that's basically what you're doing in high ticket dropshipping. But it's that domestic supplier. So if you're selling in the US from brands in the us, proper brands with, you know, reputable ways of doing business, warranties, return windows, quality control, that's the real distinguishing piece.
Host
Yeah, and there's some pieces of the puzzle that you got to put together. First you got to find your niche, then you got to find the suppliers and you got to build this site and make it compelling. Then you got to figure out the Marketing piece of it. So there's kind of all this stuff that has to fit together. Were you targeting, in my understanding is the first site was kind of in the outdoor, you know, home, patio, garden type of space. And was this an undying passion of yours? Like what led you, what led you to that niche?
Jayden Clark
Yeah, yeah, not at all. Actually. I don't think I'd ever spent more than £100 dollars on my own garden in my life. So I was a complete fraud in that regard. Whereas the person we were selling to is the person who might spend 10, 15, $20,000 on their garden. So they buy, you know, the fancy fire pit or the furniture set, the pergola, the gazebo, all that sort of thing. The outdoor kitchen. Right. And so that's the, the passion avatar that we were selling to. And I didn't choose that because I loved it or I was really passionate about it, nor do I think you need to be.
Host
Okay.
Jayden Clark
But I could appreciate it. Right. I could see what the emotion was behind it. I could see the 50, 60, 70 year old male with a lot of purchasing power who wanted to have the grill that when his brother comes over or his neighbor that he feels like really great. Or I could see the, the mom who wants to have the great space so that her kids and the grandkids come over and they spend more time. Like I could see who I could sell to and I could see they had money. So I was happy with that.
Host
And were you targeting US audience or UK audience?
Jayden Clark
My first store was with the UK audience and now I've got stores in both.
Host
Okay, got it. So trying to figure out, like you said, those local manufacturer supplier relationships to have just for the shipping logistics to be able to target that audience.
Jayden Clark
Yeah, definitely. And the nice thing about High Ticket is actually dropshipping is probably more prevalent there because if you've got a massive gazebo and it's three, four meters or I don't know, I don't speak imperial.
Host
That's okay, we can, we can translate after.
Jayden Clark
It's huge. It's really inefficient because a lot of your suppliers are still bringing this stuff in from China. Right. But they are a UK or a US based business and therefore they have a warehouse or multiple warehouses in the country. They have relationships with that Chinese factory. They're sending over designs, quality control, etc. So right now a lot of those suppliers, they'll send like one gazebo out to a nursery or to Home Depot or, you know, and it will be shown as one Example display unit. Right. But everything else is actually just dropshipped in the background because a customer might come into, you know, wherever and say I really like this wooden gazebo, I'd like one of these but actually I want a different size or a different color.
Host
Yeah.
Jayden Clark
And often it's very, very expensive to store these, ship these because they're huge. There's loads of different variants. So it's very common for even physical retail spaces to be drop shipping a lot of their orders. So it means that you fit into their existing business practices or really nicely.
Host
Yeah, that makes sense. The fewer times you have to move this huge bulky item around, the less likely it is to get damaged, the less expensive it's going to be for the end customer. I can be on board with that. But tell me about the product research process. Are there different metrics or tools or rules of thumb of like you know, price points of the products, you know, search volume, like what are you looking at to arrive at okay, I'm going to sell pergolas and outdoor kitchens and gazebos and stuff.
Jayden Clark
It always starts with a brainstorm ideation and I always say to people like try and cast the net as wide as possible because I've seen people who dropship like toilet supplies like public toilet sinks and urinals and things like that and do really well. So it doesn't have to be sexy and it isn't always going to be the, the drones, the E bikes, the things that immediately spring to your mind. There are so many high ticket products, that is products over US$1,000 out there and some of the like small B2B niches and stuff can be absolutely amazing. So I would say like the first thing is having a really good ideation session with something like ChatGPT, Claude, whatever you want and you know, kind of just prompting it and saying like talk to me about some of the small businesses that we could, we could target here. Talk to me about some of the really, really intense passion and hobbies. What about sports? Like all these different areas where there's high ticket products and get a big list and then I would try and get that big list down to a short list that you can interrogate. And that's when I start getting into the actual, the metrics, the search volume, etc. And I generally just do that kind of, let's say down from 100 to 5 just purely by eye. And what I'm looking for there is firstly how many different product types can I sell to one avatar. So for example, for me it Was great that if someone wanted to spend a lot of money on having an ultimate kind of like garden backyard set up, that I could sell them the grill, I could sell them the gazebo, the furniture, the fire pit. Like that helps me keep my cost of acquisition lower. It helps me get my average order value higher. Like that's a great perk. So if I can see, oh, that person needs to buy, especially if they need it for their business. If it's like, okay, they're setting up a barbershop and they need 3, 4, 5, 6 different high ticket products, that sort of things can stand out to me. And then the next one is just like, could you see yourself existing in that niche for the next 1, 2, 3, 5 years? Right. If you look at it and think, I absolutely find that as dull as anything. I can't really imagine writing content, product description speaking to customers. Probably don't go near it because like, why make your life more miserable? But then again, the guy who sells public toilet equipment doesn't hate it because it pays the bills. So maybe that is an important to me. So you've got that shorter list. And then that's when I get quite quantifiable with the data and how we choose. So from there I'm completely removing how I feel in my gut and I'm looking just at the data. And so I essentially, Data for SEO is a tool that kind of the API, the data feed that sits behind like ahref, semrush, a lot of those big tools. And so I grabbed the API and I put it into a custom GPT so that I can basically prompt and call that custom GPT and have it directly connect to that kind of data source. It's incredibly cheap. Like you could do this for less than a dollar.
Host
Wait, wait, wait, what's this called? So instead of an AHREFS subscription, you can kind of backdoor it?
Jayden Clark
Yeah, pretty much, yeah. So you're kind of just getting access to the raw data feed rather than. And obviously you're not going to get all the nice pretty like filters and everything like that. I still use AHREFS for other things, but for keyword research I think this works so well because I can actually prompt the custom GPT and tell it what to find and pull for me rather than having to sift through rows and rows of CSVs. Basically.
Host
What was the name of the data feed that you were pulling Data for?
Jayden Clark
SEO.
Host
Okay, cool. That's a new one that's like, that's super deep and nerdy.
Jayden Clark
I love It I love this. Like I would say I use this probably every day, okay, for something or other. So then I'm in my custom GPT and like, let's say one of the things that's stood out to me in my long list of research is that I like the idea of selling to people who work on cars. Like they've got their home, workshop or in their garage and they work on classic cars or whatever it might be, right? And I like them because I could sell them like the car lift, the thing that lifts it off the floor. I could sell them like expensive pumps. Like they probably got workbenches and tool storage that's expensive. And they're also like obsessed as well. And they probably in their head are like, well if I restore this car and I make like 30 grand on it, what does it matter if I spend ten grand setting up the workshop, right? So I'm liking, sure, I'm liking the principle there. But from there it becomes all data. So I'm going to put in, okay, here are the products that I would like to sell to this ideal customer and then I'll ask it to pull me 50 of the kind of like tier 2 commercial keywords that are associated with those products. And the reason I'm interested in those is because on a brand new site I'm not going after like car lift or welding machine or tool storage. I'm going after like X capacity of Carlift or two post hydraulic car lift. Like the sort of things that are a bit longer tail. They might be a thousand monthly searches rather than 50,000 monthly searches. But I know that as a brand new domain I can compete there from a paid ads perspective and SEO perspective if I go this kind of more moneyball approach of stitching together these higher intent, more long tail keywords rather than the parent keywords. So what I'm really interested in is finding the sort of top, roughly 20 to 50 per product category that I want to sell and then basically finding out how difficult are they to a rank for organically because I've got one eye on ranking organically for the slightly longer term and B, what are the CPCS look like, how many people are currently advertising and Google shopping for these sorts of keywords. And I'm trying to get a picture of through a keyword lens, how easy is it going to be for me to come into this niche and start trying to dominate as quickly as possible through paid ads? Because that's where my injection of profit comes from. And then in a year or 18 months also having that SEO piece of kind of commercially intended traffic, putting those two together because I kind of know that's the foundation of getting my business to kind of seven figures in revenue as quickly as possible. So that is why I kind of take that niche process through that and then finally the final step I do is just like a raw competition.
Host
Can I pause and ask if the data for SEO is also giving you that CPC estimate or organic difficulty or is that coming through Google's keyword planner? Is that coming through Ahrefs?
Jayden Clark
No, I use the data for SEO API for that as well. I don't find it amazing at CPC estimates, but I don't really find many keyword tools or are that strong for it. So what I do as a proxy for like a secondary data source for shopping competitiveness is I also, I get Gemini in deep research mode to look at how many other online retail businesses are advertising the top 20 brands for those product types in Google shopping. So it's kind of like a layer on a layer. So the data for SEO API is giving me the keyword competitiveness. It can give me what the average doctor is in the top five or 10, for example. So I know what sort of domain ratings am I up against? What's the keyword difficulty, what's the difficulty to rank? And then also what is ranking? Is it other e comm sites or is it, you know, sites that are completely different styles to mine that I'm going to struggle to compete with? So it gives me a good picture there.
Host
What do you like to see? If you see, you know, it's all Dr. 80s and above or you're like red flag, full stop, not going to touch it or what would be like green flags in those CPCs and some of the difficulty metrics.
Jayden Clark
Yeah, I'm happy if I'm seeing a couple of like Dr. 20 or 30 and belows in the top five and I'm seeing quite a high population of like niche e commerce sites in the top five, then I'm kind of getting a feel that this is a niche I can come in and have a good shot at. If I'm seeing like the top five is dominated by big box stores that I know are going to have huge domain ratings. It's also dominated by like really high powered blogs that are like writing listicles based on their experience of these cold plunges that I'm just never going to be able to outrank because it has a level of kind of like firsthand experience and domain rating that I'm just not going to be able to compete with. Okay, I want to see like this is right for lower domain rating niche style e commerce sites essentially.
Host
Okay, yeah. And if there are a couple of those already in the mix, you say, well, Google has some track record of ranking sites like what I want to build, so that's kind of an open invitation to take a crack at it.
Jayden Clark
Exactly right.
Host
More with Jayden in just a moment, including evaluating the brand landscape and retail environment for your niche, getting your first
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Jayden Clark
then the final thing is that I just want to see that. I want to see there's enough brands working with retailers that it's clear that the model, it's not too D2C essentially, but I don't want to see so many that it's clearly saturated. So, like, if you go and run this with E Bikes, for example, if you go and ask Gemini, right now, I'm looking to sell E Bikes in the United States. Can you find me the top 20 or 25 brands of E Bike that are sold and how many different retailers are selling each of those brands online? You will see big, big numbers. I'm talking like 30s, 50s, probably some over 100, because, like, it's a hugely competitive market for this sort of thing. I'm looking to see, like, in the region of between about 5 to 15 or 20. I kind of know that my approach to paid advertising, to SEO, to conversion rate optimization, etcetera, Is going to fall in sort of the top, let's say even top 10%. And I would say the same to someone who's going to, like, diligently work at this. So, like, if you've got 20 in the niche, you kind of know, okay, I've got a good chance at being in the top one or two. And I know that these brands do work with people, so I know there's a chance me to land them as a supplier. But I also know I can get in the top wherever it's like 100. There's going to be some players have been in the game for such a long time, and there's going to be so much noise as well. It's going to be hard for me
Host
to cut through at this point. We're talking about the brands that are selling, like, the brand names the customers would recognize. You're talking about the, the dropship retailers that are selling those products, those brands.
Jayden Clark
Yeah, I'm talking about anyone who's actually selling the brand. So, like, if we kind of do this for an example of, like, if it was, you wouldn't dropship Televisions. But let's imagine you would. It's like how many people are selling Samsung? Is Samsung direct to consumer? Is it 5? Is it 15, is it 20? If I'm seeing loads of direct consumer, that's a red flag. Because if like half the market doesn't sell through retailers, I know that there's going to be half the market. When someone's looking to buy something from me, that there's half the market, I can't even offer them. So I'm going to lose some there. So I want to see not too much D2C, I, E. No retailers selling them, just the brand itself. And I also don't want to see 100 different stores. I want to see that sort of sweet spot of like, and it doesn't just have to be dropship stores, but anyone who's selling online, that brand, I want to kind of see that Sweet spot of five, five to 20.
Host
Okay, got it. So there's some level of proven validation. Like if other people are doing, I could do it too, but not too much. Right. I don't want 100. I don't want 100 competitors. Because right now I'm still like very low commitment here and I'm still kind of choosing my lane and all else being equal, I'll choose the lane with seven cars versus 100 cars.
Jayden Clark
Exactly, right? Yeah, completely.
Host
Okay, what happens next? Are we good on kind of the validation stage? Do we now we're looking at kind of the, the supplier landscape too to say like, well, who might be my potential suppliers or partners here?
Jayden Clark
At that point the best thing you can do is, is go all in. And like that is actually something I see people slip up on a fair amount is they get paralyzed, which I can understand they get paralyzed at this point and they think, oh, this niche looks good on paper. And everything that I've been told to look for in the data is there. But they get concerned, is it going to impact their business? Essentially, could there be a better one? Etc. Now if you've chosen a viable niche, then essentially the worst thing you can do is not start executing because that's only going to slow you down. So from here it's now like, okay, let's get my Shopify store up and running. Let's get a demo store that I can start calling suppliers that start getting some suppliers on board uploading their products. Because now I would say it's like a, it's not a race, but it's a momentum game towards being able to take your first sale. Because that's when things really start to change and you start to get that, like, addiction that's going to drive you on to the big numbers.
Host
Yeah. It starts to feel real. Yeah. You could always talk yourself out of a niche or an idea and the grass is always going to be greener. What if there's this other thing that I hadn't thought of, but if you found something that kind of checks the boxes for you, electrolyte, the best thing you do is go all in. So this is something that comes up on all the dropshipping episodes is, well, I need suppliers to have a working website and I need almost a working website to have suppliers. You kind of mentioned I need to set up this Shopify demo store to make it look like I already am in business, but I'm not quite yet. And it's kind of this chicken or the egg dance here. How did you address that?
Jayden Clark
It's the worst part of the entire business. It's almost frustrating because being out the other side, it becomes so easy to get suppliers when you've got skin in the game and you're just desperate for a few to give you a chance. Because how do you get skin in the game without the few giving you a yes? So the best advice I can give to anyone here is just volume and numbers. Like, you need to get to a stage where you can get enough suppliers to take a sale, to get live, to get skin in the game. And let's say that's five, right? There is no magic number, but five is probably enough to give yourselves a reasonable chance of going live with some ads and making some sales and getting moving. Now, what happens often is people kind of choose 10 gold suppliers and they're like the ones I really want and they then maybe only land one of them and they get disheartened. Whereas, like, if you've done your niche research right, and let's continue on with the example of, like, my original site, I can go and contact 20 different brands that manufacture grills and outdoor kitchens. I can contact 20 different brands that manufacture gazebos, 20 different brands that do furniture, 20 different brands that do fire pits. And so I'm starting to build a list of suppliers that I can contact that even if I have a 10 hit rate, I'm going to have five to 10 suppliers on my site that I can upload their products and get moving. And that is probably the biggest hurdle you've got to get over. So casting the net wide and becoming a little bit immune to the fear of, let's face it, Doing something that isn't very pleasant, which is essentially calling someone out of the blue and trying to convince them to give you a chance. But there will be, if you cast the net wide enough, enough suppliers that either decide to give you a chance or to be completely honest, just have a fairly low bar for onboarding retailers. Like some suppliers, just take the example of like, look, doesn't cost us anything to onboard you. If you make some sales, great. If you don't, nothing lost. And yeah, you're going to land some of those and then others you're convinced, but it's a numbers game.
Host
Well, there's a couple things here. The first is probably somewhat important is instead of going for a site called Veranda's direct to you or being more specific, he kind of went a little bit broader. He said, yeah, we'll sell you the outdoor kitchen, we'll sell you the fire pit, we'll sell you all this stuff. My kind of gut would be like, no, I'll be the go to guy for the pergolas and I don't want to mess with anything else. It's like if you go a little bit broader all of a sudden you, you open yourself up to being able to have more potential supplier relationships and kind of build maybe more of a brand. I don't know. That was an interesting one. But what was the outreach like? So you've identified this niche, you've identified the suppliers within that niche and now is it picking up the phone trying to find somebody in business development like who do you look for and what do you say?
Jayden Clark
And you're absolutely right by the way of serving a person rather than a product is exactly the right way. Rather than saying I've got a store that's going to sell verandas or pergolas, I've got a store that's going to serve someone who wants to make an incredible entertaining space in their backyard. The Second one is 100% the best way to go about it. So that's the first thing and that did help me. My experience was very much, I had to call a lot. I got a lot of no's, but I got enough yeses. I think I got four to launch my start my site and that was probably off the back of calling 50 now when I called then I was very much like classic cold call style, like hi, I'm Jayden, I'm from this store and probably speaking like quite quickly and quite nervous and very timid and they're just thinking, oh geez, cold call. Like how do I get this guy off the phone. I got stopped by a load of gatekeepers. Those who didn't like, just, just send an email that I'm never going to reply to. Like, how do we just get this guy out the way? And, and you know, some of them gave me the time of day and some of them, I was persistent enough and I called back enough times, they're like, oh geez, okay, fine, come on then. And that, and that did the job. But now the way I do it is I call up the company, I always phone because I find it much, much easier to. The hit rate is much higher that way, even though it's uncomfortable. And the first thing I do is I ask them, can I speak to someone who deals with commercial sales? Like essentially deals with partners who place bulk orders or commercial orders. Right. Because straight away that gets me in the door. I've not said anything untrue. Right. That is the fundamental business model. Over the next year, I plan to place 5, 10, 15, 20, 50 orders with them. Right? So I am a partner who places bulk commercial orders or places multiple commercial orders. But in their mind, that's just gone from a conversation where I'm there to cold call them and pitch them, where they're trying to get me off the phone to potentially something that hits their KPIs, right? Whether this is the company owner of a small brand or the trade sales manager or business development, whoever it is, like all of those people will have some sort of target or vested interest in making business to business sales. Like straight away, that gets me in the door.
Host
Yeah, it's almost a mindset shift from asking them for a favor. Oh, please. I need a supplier so I can launch my site. It's like, look, I'm trying to help you make more sales. Right? We all win here.
Jayden Clark
Exactly, exactly. And so that gets me to speak to the right person. And then the next thing I'll do is just genuinely be really inquisitive about one of their products. I'll do a quick bit of research, I'll find one of their products. And I might say I was really, really interested to chat to you about one of the gazebos you've got there. I see that you guys have got this new electric design that's pretty cool and it's got the LEDs built in and like it's remote controlled. That's awesome. And I might ask a couple of questions about how that works. And you know, that makes sense, right? Because I'm a potential buyer of these products. And so now We've got a conversation going, we build a bit of rapport. And then I might say, well, the reason I ask is because we're a retailer of these products, we retail high end pergola products for people who are kind of building these outdoor living spaces. And if I've already got one, I might say we're actually working with brand B and their product is quite similar to this one. So we're anticipating we might get some questions from customers of how this one compares with that one. So I thought I better just, you know, call and make sure I've done my research and completely understand how those two compare. Also, if we were able to offer your product as well, that would be great because then, you know, when customers come in for brand A, we can also talk to them about your brand and, you know, might open you up to some, some additional eyeballs, some incremental customers, that sort of thing. Because we're trying to create, you know, a space where our customers who are coming in to buy these things have got as much choice as possible.
Host
Okay. And nine times out of ten they say, yeah, thanks, but no thanks. So what do you think? Tips the scales in your favor to get a.
Jayden Clark
Yes, I think persistence is one. The number of times you call. There is definitely some hazing. Ultimately, if you make it to the point where you make a first sale, it's not particularly hard, but it does require dedication that, let's face it, just most people don't have. So there's definitely a lot of these people have been burned by the first 10 people they spoke to. They signed up and they never even kind of got their site live or never even made a sale. Right. So there's definitely some hazing. And if you call enough times and stay persistent enough, they'll be like, okay, that's kind of all I was looking for. I'll give you a go because you clearly seem to be sticking out this.
Host
Yeah. And so we're kind of avoiding the, the D word. We don't want to say drop shipping. We say, I'm a retailer of these products and would love to have you on board for our, for our launch.
Jayden Clark
Yeah. And also, like, you know, silly things. But if they say, do you hold stock?
Host
Yeah.
Jayden Clark
Which is a common one because naturally they want to know, can I sell you 30 units today? And you know, you can say things like, you know, look, we don't hold stock out of the gates because ultimately you've got 30, 30 different SKUs. If we take one of each, you know, there might be three that sell brilliantly. But then we've ended up tying up our capital, so we actually focus more of our investment on, you know, paid advertising, on essentially things that bring the customers in to make more sales from you for you. You know, down the road, if we have a few SKUs that are selling really well, sure, we'd be open to taking some stock, but we'd start by essentially doing like, direct to customer delivery just so that we can kind of get some data and work out what sells. And that sort of handles that objection quite well. You can also say, like, look, we're happy to organize the logistics. Like, we can send a courier to come and pick it up from your warehouse and deliver it to the customer.
Host
Okay.
Jayden Clark
That's the easiest thing in the world to organize.
Host
Right.
Jayden Clark
Like, that's. But it's kind of makes you feel like, okay, taking more of the onus off them.
Host
Yeah. Do you ever get the question of, well, what kind of sales volume do you expect?
Jayden Clark
Yeah, sometimes. And I would actually, ironically say, like, going low is a good thing here. You know, maybe saying, like, look, to begin with, we. We're just looking to maybe sell one or two units a month. Like, we'd be really pleased with that. But we're really confident the longer we work together, the better we get to know your product line, etcetera, that we can increase those volumes. But I think almost if you try and go too lofty there, even if you might achieve it. But I think they start to think, oh, how realistic is this person? Whereas, I think, you know, most. Most businesses that you work with would be happy if you sold an extra few units a month. They'd be delighted if you sold 10 units a month. So, you know, starting there and saying, look, couple a month to begin with, and then maybe in six months, if we can get it up to double figures, that'd be awesome. They're gonna be like, yeah, that sounds realistic. And we'd like that too.
Host
Okay. And so they say, okay, we're on board. Let's try this out. Because again, you know, what do they have to lose, really? They're giving you access to a product catalog and maybe some images that you plug into your Shopify store. Right. It's no skin off their back. And then now you have. You got four or five companies to say yes, and you've got your store built out, and you can say, okay, now if I. If I build it, nobody's coming. I still got to drive some traffic. And maybe starting with paid ads in this case, is this the longer tail, organic style, you know, this brand versus I guess even that would be more bottom of the funnel. But what kind of ad strategy or marketing strategy comes in out of the gate to try and validate to these new suppliers, like, hey, we're legit. We're going to drive sales and to prove to yourself, like, oh, this is real, this is going to work. Jaden's response plus how most new sellers waste a ton of money on ads. His transition to quit his job and what drove him to put the business
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Jayden Clark
paid ads is definitely the lifeblood of this business model. For the first probably at least three to six months, there are some lower competition terms you can start to rank for organically. But realistically when it comes to traffic that converts, it kind of hinges on those paid ads early on. And it's going to be important for you, like you say, to get that proof of concept, the initial profit and then also for your suppliers. The big thing here is making sure that you are funneling as much of your ad spend behind high propensity to convert keywords as possible. Google sets you up a little bit to fail here. And also a lot of people kind of, I guess maybe don't completely understand kind of buying intent and how a keyword translate to buying intent. Because if we use my store as an example, I might look in an average ads account for that and see a huge amount of clicks and traffic for terms like pergola, gazebo, veranda, you know, wood gazebo, etc. Which to someone who's just started a business looks like good traffic. Well, that's what I sell and that's, you know, terms related to it or it might be, you know, informational terms. Which one should I buy? How can I install it? You know, can I put it on grass or my patio, whatever, right? And the problem with those is that in this space, the cost per click, so what you pay for that click on that keyword and essentially the conversion rate, like the relationship is not linear and therefore you might be paying $1 a click for a thousand clicks on gazebo. And it might take you that to get a conversion because a real top of funnel term like gazebo, it probably is, you'll be lucky to be honest if that converts at 0.1%. And so if that's $1 a click, I've just had to spend a thousand dollars to get a conversion off that. Whereas I might have a longer tail, higher intent keyword like oak, gazebo, 10 foot by 16 foot. Now you can see the difference there. There's a customer who's browsing who knows roughly what they might be interested in versus a customer who knows exactly the product type they want. Now, the cost per click over here might be $3, but it might convert 1% because it represents a customer who really knows what they want. Has a really clear idea. And so now you can kind of see how the relationship I have to spend $300 over here to get a conversion, whereas a thousand over here. And the problem is there's a lot more of this style of generic traffic. And so if you aren't deliberately funneling as much of your spend behind those high intent keywords and as many of them as possible, you're essentially going to be burning a lot of ad budget on a lot of generic traffic. And a lot of people say, I've got a conversion problem because people aren't converting my conversion rates. Really. It's actually a traffic intent problem.
Host
Right. Somebody just looking for gazebo. They're not, they're not ready to buy yet. They're just in research mode.
Jayden Clark
The leakage from there as well, like the leakage out your funnel, like that person may well buy, but they might still be 15 touch points away from buying. And so like for a new business that doesn't have much in the way of retargeting or, you know, they're not really adding people to their email list, they're not doing any of that sort of nurture stuff that gets people down the funnel. The amount of leakage you're paying for the clicks, and then they're all leaking out the funnel. And so you're kind of, you're kind of there thinking, geez, I'm paying all this ad spend and it's not turning into conversions. And it's because you don't really have the mechanisms to deal with generic traffic and you're not getting enough high intent bottom of the funnel traffic that's ready to buy to kind of get that conversion rate and therefore that return on ad spend that you need.
Host
Okay, so starting out, we're focusing on those high intent buyer keywords. They're looking for specific dimensions, specific material types, maybe even specific brand names if the brands are going to let you bid on their branded terms. And do you have a first sale moment or, you know, maybe even the first month where it's like, okay, people are buying, like somebody bought a thing. This actually works.
Jayden Clark
Yeah. So my first sale happened about a week and a half in. Customer called me on the phone they wanted to buy like a big barbecue outdoor kitchen thing was about £2,000. It's like genuine high ticket sale. And yeah, that was, that was cool. But to be perfect, I'd put so much pressure on myself that it felt more like relief than joy. So I would actually say, I think it was month five that was the first time that the profit the business generated got to that, that, that nut of 7K. And that is actually, in my mind that was a much bigger moment. And maybe that was because that, you know, one sale for me, it, whilst it proved the concept, it didn't feel like it changed anything. If anything, I was like, oh my gosh, now I have to replicate this 5, 10, 15, 30 times. But it was that, that first time that I'd done and I could see the progression towards that happening and I could see that the curve was continuing upwards. I was like, okay, I've just got to replicate this or keep the growth going at this sort of rate and like this could be a reality. I could get out my job here.
Host
Yeah. Was it fairly common for customers to want to talk to somebody on the phone for these products that are 2, 3, $4,000?
Jayden Clark
Yeah, it's a customer service business model. Like anyone who tells you that high ticket dropshipping is a sit behind computer, like four hour work week style gig is in my opinion selling you a bit of a dream. Like it doesn't have to be you forever and it doesn't have to be at the time. Like I had a job that meant I couldn't answer the phone when I was at work. Right. So I had to use my lunch break, use evenings, etc. To call customers back and I had to have like good voicemails and I had to make sure that when I finished work, I called every customer that caught you. I might have, it's early days, so I don't have that many, but I might have three customers that called me. I call them back and I try and do the best job from there. And sure I miss some sales early, but now, for example, I don't answer the phone at all. I have a team that do that. But you kind of have to earn your stripes there. And that's one of the balancing acts that you have to, to juggle before you kind of go from side hustle to full time.
Host
That makes sense and I appreciate you saying that. Look, this is a customer service business. Anybody can go through the legwork of the research and the supplier outreach and build a website. But what separates you from Everybody else who's working with the same suppliers is that willingness to pick up the phone, have the conversations to really make it a branded customer experience and a positive customer experience to make that sale.
Jayden Clark
Yeah. And to be honest, you need the information as well. Even if someone came to me tomorrow and said, I'm going to start this business, but I've actually already set aside the money to hire someone right away to the customer service, I would say it's a risk. I think you should do it yourself, at least for a little while. Even if you want to say, as soon as I'm profitable, as soon as I make my first, whatever, 1,000, 2,000, if first 2,000, I'm going to hire someone. Even if that's part time, fine. But at least answer the calls to begin with because you need to understand what excites these customers, what objections do they have, what concerns, what problems, what information do you need to put on the product page? What do you need to put on the product page to make that product sell better? What content do you need to create and write for these people? What retargeting ads can you create to try and get people over the line? Like all these things do come from knowing your customer better and the level you'll do them at will be that much higher. So I think it's also an essential part of kind of plying your trade with one of these businesses.
Host
Yeah, you get that firsthand experience of, well, what is this customer really looking for? What are their holdups? I think that does make sense. It's hard to outsource from the very first moment unless you have somebody on your team or somebody you know, who just lives and breathes outdoor patio furniture. They know how to speak this customer's language already. And then maybe they could kind of dictate that strategy going forward. But isn't it such an empowering moment when this is the dream to have the side hustle, I mean, still part time, working lunch breaks, working evenings, to have it replace your salary in just five months. I think that's a really incredible milestone and probably worth noting there. So what happens next? Very next month, you give your notice at work. What happens after that?
Jayden Clark
No, I was scared. So I quit in month nine and the business had £70,000. So that's probably about US$90,000 literally sat in the bank account before I was comfortable going full time because for me at the time that was basically I had a year's income and I, I knew that if I went for it right at the beginning, I would just worry the whole time like was I going to be back in that job in three months? Was it going to dip down and you know, dip below the salary and panic? And I also think financially stressed business owners typically aren't the best business owners because you focus on the wrong things. I wanted to keep building so it was sustainable. So yeah, so I went, I went an extra. Luckily the trend kept going up and I started earning profit months that were far above what I needed for my salary. It was pretty much coming up for a year just after nine months where we had about a year's worth of income in the business. And it's cash flow positive.
Host
Right.
Jayden Clark
Because we don't buy inventory if we're doing it right. Our ads costs are covered kind of by the sales we make in months. So I don't really need to reinvest that profit. So it could sit there as a nice little sort of buffer and nest egg for me to feel confident to go full time.
Host
If you're doing it right, what's the target profitability on, on your ad spend? Because it's cool model where look, I don't have to buy the product until I sell it, but my main cost is driving that. Customer or cost of acquisition.
Jayden Clark
You need big roas to be profitable in high ticket dropshipping. Margins vary, but I would say your average trade margin, so essentially the discount your supplier gives you will normally be in the region of 20 to 40%, let's say 30 and your net profitability will normally be in the region of 15 if you're doing things well. And that will typically scale up and down. So essentially let's say we sell a product for 3,000, we might buy it for let's say 2,000. We might need to spend 200 shipping it. So we've got 800 worth of customer acquisition cost, you know, and in there needs to be our customer acquisition cost and also whatever it costs in terms of our time or our team's time etcetera to make that sale, which you know, obviously you're happy to kind of, you know, sweat that work a little bit in the, in the outset. But that is why getting that cost of acquisition, you know, you kind of want your cost of acquisition to be $300 maybe on a 3, on a $3,000 purchase. So you know, we're talking 8, 10, 15 x ROAS, which you know, that's, it's tough in low ticket markets but very achievable in high ticket if you have your account set up in the right way. And the nice thing about High Ticket is again, the relationship between CPC and cost of product is not linear. Like if I go and look at a mushroom tea, for example, that might be $30 a bag. The CPCs for a lot of the keywords, there will still be 1, 2, 3, $3 for a CPC of cost per click. Right. And I might also be paying $3 per click for a $3,000 pergola. So luckily the greater gross profit in pound or dollar value gives me more customer acquisition cost.
Host
Got it, got it. That's helpful to know. So, yeah, where the dollars or where the pounds get kind of sliced up on a transaction of that size, we've got the acquisition cost, we've got shipping cost. Is that. So you advertise free shipping for the customer?
Jayden Clark
I would just follow whatever's done in your niche. So it's important to have a competitive offer. There will where like it's the done thing to charge for shipping. And there will be niches where the done thing is free shipping. And you've just got to work out where your margin sits basically net of these things. And to be perfectly honest, like, it's relatively immaterial because often suppliers who charge you for shipping will give you a slightly better trade margin. And so the net impact is often very similar because ultimately these suppliers need to make it work for their retail partners because they rely on them as a route to market. And so like, you know, I find most of these niches we go into are pretty well established. They've been there for a while, so they've kind of found an equilibrium with their retailer program. So you, you don't need to worry about margins as much as you think you might going in. I would say the real key is managing your costs and your ad spend because that's the variable bit and the bit you can control.
Host
Right.
And so ROAS was the acronym Return on Ad Spend. So if I spend $100 to make an $800 net profit customer, that was an 8x ROAS. So it's something to think about as you're scaling this thing. So as time goes on, we're adding more suppliers. We're working on building out kind of the organic content pages. If, you know, if we can acquire a customer for free through Google, that sure is better than spending $100 through, through the ad campaign. We're setting up retargeting campaigns. Is this on Meta or is it still on Google?
Jayden Clark
I like to do, to do both with retargeting. I find that Meta doesn't Work particularly well for acquisition marketing for high ticket because you know you're kind of in meta, we're scroll stopping. We don't have a search term to give us an idea of their intent. Whereas in Google we have a search term which gives us a proxy for intent. So we can be really targeted. But in terms of when the customer's already been to my site and I want to, you know, without sounding creepy, follow them around the Internet and kind of help them to convert, help them to come back, then I kind of want omnipresence. So like for some niches, Pinterest remarketing is great as well. If you're in like quite a visual niche, like if you're selling fireplaces, often people will be on Pinterest looking at media wall designs and you might want to show your retargeting ad there and that sort of thing. So it's a little bit niche dependent. But for customer acquisition, Google Ads is kind of king and SEO is king. But then when it comes to re marketing, multichannel can become quite effective.
Host
Yeah, just kind of a gentle reminder. Hey, we noticed you didn't check out quite yet. You know something else. Maybe a content piece to help get you over the edge and kind of be top of mind because like for a $4,000 purchase it's going to take multiple touch points. It's going to probably get taking that customer or getting that customer on the phone too. So things are going well, it is scaling, it's growing. If quit your job, you're full time selling patio furniture and pergolas and fireplaces and then you say what if I don't have to run this thing anymore? Like where is the day to day going in the operations and kind of this transition to setting it up for a sale.
Jayden Clark
Okay. So unfortunately I would love to say that I sold because I was just like riding the wave and I saw the big payout and I was like, yeah, nice, let's cash in. But actually my first business transpired to me being very bad at outsourcing and delegating. So I grew this business fast. I got out of work and that was great. And then I got my wife out of work and that was awesome. And then I essentially just kept focusing on growing the business and doubling down on all the things I'd done that got us there and completely neglected the operational side of the business. And frankly me kind of doing my best effort operationally as a one man band was fine when we were doing 50k a month, but when we were doing 150, 200k months and, you know, over 100 purchases and big, complex items like this crack started to show. And I was trying to do the sales, the after customer service, everything all together. And so I just basically kept pouring fuel in the fire. You know, money solves all issues kind of thing. Let's grow it as big as possible and kind of neglecting that side until I completely burnt out. And yeah, it's funny looking back, but I. Me and my wife got married. We had a massage at like a nice fancy spa afterwards. 90 minutes and like that, 90 minutes in silence, alone with my thoughts. At that time, two years roughly into the business was like torture because I was so, so stressed and burnt out. And I came out of it and I was like, I need to sell, I need. I've learned loads, I've developed loads. And also, you know, financially I've benefited loads. I know this is because I always had an eye on the exit. So I was always kind of working out based on where we were, how much it was worth. I kind of know it's worth high, high six figures. I want to take the exit.
Host
Did you go through a broker or how do you do it?
Jayden Clark
Yeah, we went through a broker, US broker. Really, really good. And yeah, found like a small private fund. Essentially. They buy e commerce businesses and kind of group them together. They have like one customer service team, one ads team, et cetera. We were their fifth acquisition, I think. Good to work with. And I had to stay on for three months, which is longer than usual, but because I'd kind of made such an operational mess of this, like, a lot of it was in my head. So I had to stay on for a bit longer. But that was good because I got to see how they took my business and its strengths and then distilled that out to a team. And that was big for my development for future businesses of how, like, I can do this bit where I grow it, but then I also need to do the team bit and the processes and everything like that to make sure they can support it.
Host
Yeah, it's tough as a solo founder because you're like, well, every person that I hire, that I bring on, it takes more time. It eats into my margins that always feel a little bit thinner than you'd like. And it can be tough. But this is an interesting way to almost get paid to get kind of an entrepreneurial education for the next project, for the next phase. So congrats on that exit. I think that's really cool to. Even though you kind of are self Described as being the bottleneck in this business's operations. It still is an asset that has huge value. Like you said, high six figure value to the next acquirer who can keep
Jayden Clark
it running for sure.
Host
Are you actively building new sites? I know you've got the 1% Ecom club. What's the portfolio look like today?
Jayden Clark
Yeah, so right now I've got two high ticket dropshipping sites. One that has been going about 18 months. It's on track to do sort of like mid seven figures which is awesome. And then one that's only six months old. So we're in like the early stages. It's really fun. Yes, I've got those two and then I'm also kind of like a fractional CMO for a third one. So that's a nice portfolio for me. I've got like all ones at different stages, different revenue. And then I've also got the 1% Ecom club which is a school community where essentially we have about 150 high ticket E commerce business owners from people who haven't even chosen a niche yet to people who are doing seven figures. And essentially we have like a support community in there. We have all the strategies I've talked about and more. We have the kind of ins and outs of these are the tools, these are the AI processes, these are how to think about it, how to set it up, all that sort of thing. And I really like that balance because I really enjoy working with those people and I also have an immense amount of gratitude for what this business model has done for me. And you know, I see someone, I'm only four years back from this point where I started. Right. So I still remember how much I wanted out of that 9 to 5. I still remember how much I wanted to build one of these things. So seeing other people do that in the community is awesome for me. We have a mission to try and create 30 new like seven figure businesses from zero. Haven't picked a niche to like seven figures in the next two years. So that's what the community's for there. But then I also like that I'm still actively in the game. So I kind of get to like teach all my strategies over here and see them implemented, but then also implement me, my own businesses and feedback what's working and feels like a nice sort of 360. Yeah.
Host
If you're looking at a million dollars in gross revenue, you're at those 15% margins. That's $150,000 business, probably enough to get you outside of your job. And off to the races. Plus it's an asset that could be worth several hundred thousand dollars to the next buyer. So that's interesting to hear. Like, okay, I'm going to take a load off my shoulders. I'm going to get out of this one, but then I'm going to dive back in, baby. I'm going to do it better this time and I'm still in the game and taking what I learned from the first one to build out these other sites, I can build them better, faster, more operationally efficient and help others do the same thing because there's almost unlimited niches here, which is super exciting.
Jayden Clark
Absolutely.
Host
Well, you can check Jayden out at 1% Ecom Club. Join the school community over there to take a deeper dive into this really unique, life changing business model. I think that's the power of the side hustle to say I was willing to work for it and you kind of bore the brunt of it on your shoulders. It sounded like. We talk about these moments of sprint and rest where it's like you can't sprint forever, but you also can't rest forever. You can't do nothing and expect something to change. So it's like I was willing to do the sprint part and to set yourself up with the kind of nest egg that you did at a young age. Really, really cool. So again, 1% Ecom club. Jaden, I appreciate all of that. I appreciate you saying, look, this is a customer service business. If you are out there for passive income, this might not be it, but it could still work for you. And I really like the call to serve a person instead of a product. Yes. We're starting with product research and you know, what are the different things that somebody might want to buy but taking
it one level higher and thinking about,
well, who is that buyer Persona and in Jaden's case, it's this like person trying to set up this epic backyard experience for their whole family and kind of putting yourself in that mindset of what are they really buying at the end of the day and what are the other products I could sell. I think that's really interesting versus, you know, I'm gonna be, you know, niched down and I'm only gonna do pergolas or whatever the product is. So I think that's really interesting. We've got a handful of other E commerce related episodes in the archives. I'll link those up for you in the show notes, including some other dropshipping examples. So be sure to check out the show notes for that big thanks to Jayden for sharing his insight. Thanks to our sponsors for helping make this content free for everyone. Sidehustlenation.com deals is where to go to find all the latest offers from our sponsors in one place. Thank you for supporting the advertisers that support the show. That is it for me. Thank you so much for tuning in. If you're finding value in the show, the greatest compliment is to share with a friend. So fire off that text message. Somebody in your life I know needs to hear this and can benefit from it. So appreciate you spreading the word. Until next time, let's go out there and make something happen and I'll catch you in the next edition of the side Hustle Show. Hustle on.
Replaced His Salary in 5 Months and Set Up a $700k Exit
Host: Nick Loper | Guest: Jayden Clark (1% Ecom Club)
Date: April 30, 2026
This episode features Jayden Clark, founder of multiple high-ticket dropshipping businesses and 1% Ecom Club. Jayden shares how he replaced his corporate salary within five months and sold his first business for $700,000—all without holding inventory or taking on significant risk. The conversation dives deep into high-ticket dropshipping, niche and product validation, building supplier relationships, scaling strategies, and honest reflections on the challenges and rewards of this business model.
First sale in week 1.5—great, but true relief came in month 5, when profit met ‘salary replacement’ target (42:43).
Customer Service Is Essential:
Quitting Corporate Job:
Jayden waited until business had a year’s worth of salary in cash (month 9, ~£70k/$90k) to reduce stress and ensure sustainability.
Profit Margins:
Retargeting:
Operational Burnout Led to Exit:
The “Glass Shattering Moment”:
“It just felt a bit impossible...but the idea of high ticket dropshipping...I was unleashed. That is the thing. I’m going all in.” – Jayden (04:47–05:55)
On Dropshipping’s Reputation:
“Wayfair is the largest dropshipper that pretty much everyone has heard of...No one thinks of Wayfair as a scam. On a minor scale, that’s basically what you’re doing in high-ticket dropshipping.” – Jayden (08:03)
On Product/Niche Research:
“There are so many high-ticket products out there. Some of the small B2B niches can be absolutely amazing.” – Jayden (11:58)
Supplier Outreach Strategy:
“The best advice I can give...is just volume and numbers...if you cast the net wide enough, enough suppliers...have a fairly low bar for onboarding retailers. Some suppliers just...‘if you make some sales, great; if you don’t, nothing lost.’” – Jayden (27:04–29:03)
Paid Ads Pitfall:
“A lot of people say, ‘I’ve got a conversion problem’...it’s actually a traffic intent problem.” – Jayden (41:39)
First Sale vs. Salary Replacement:
“That was more like relief than joy...month five...profit the business generated got to that nut of £7k.” – Jayden (43:41)
Honest Self-Assessment:
“My first business transpired to me being very bad at outsourcing and delegating...when we were doing 150, 200k months...cracks started to show. I just basically kept pouring fuel on the fire...until I completely burnt out.” – Jayden (52:47)
Find Jayden at 1% Ecom Club, and browse additional e-commerce episodes via the Side Hustle Show archives.