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Lex's Digital/Physical Product Group Accountability Thread

A detailed account of a Fastlane process...

kr8nt

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I just got my first ever sale online this morning. I can't believe it.

It took me about a month to develop my product until I was able to publish it on Etsy. Nothing was happening for a week or so and then today I checked my email and found out that someone purchased it. The best part is that I spent less on Etsy Ads, than the product is selling for, which means that it's profitable. This feels unbelievable.

Thank you a lot for your posts, Lex! Without your posts I don't think I could've done it.

What could I do now, to speed up the process of getting sales?
 
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StrikingViper69

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I just got my first ever sale online this morning. I can't believe it.

It took me about a month to develop my product until I was able to publish it on Etsy. Nothing was happening for a week or so and then today I checked my email and found out that someone purchased it. The best part is that I spent less on Etsy Ads, than the product is selling for, which means that it's profitable. This feels unbelievable.

Thank you a lot for your posts, Lex! Without your posts I don't think I could've done it.

What could I do now, to speed up the process of getting sales?
Give it a day or two to see how it goes, then start increasing your ad budget.

If you keep getting sales, keep increasing the budget, keeping an eye on your “cost per sale”.

Start engaging with customers and try to find their likes/dislikes so you can improve the product and find out what additional things you can do to help them
 

kr8nt

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Give it a day or two to see how it goes, then start increasing your ad budget.

If you keep getting sales, keep increasing the budget, keeping an eye on your “cost per sale”.

Start engaging with customers and try to find their likes/dislikes so you can improve the product and find out what additional things you can do to help them
Thank you a lot for the tips!

Should I better contact customers by manually writing them an email asking about what do they like/dislike, or will it be enough to create some form and send them asking to fill it out?

Also, at what point should I consider getting a website for the store?
 

Lex DeVille

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I just got my first ever sale online this morning. I can't believe it.

It took me about a month to develop my product until I was able to publish it on Etsy. Nothing was happening for a week or so and then today I checked my email and found out that someone purchased it. The best part is that I spent less on Etsy Ads, than the product is selling for, which means that it's profitable. This feels unbelievable.

Thank you a lot for your posts, Lex! Without your posts I don't think I could've done it.

What could I do now, to speed up the process of getting sales?

To speed up sales on Etsy, you need more traffic to your store. Increasing your ad spend will bring more people to your store. Likewise, adding more products that target different keywords will also bring more traffic. Those are the two main ways outside of investing time in SEO and social media to increase sales on Etsy.
 
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StrikingViper69

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Thank you a lot for the tips!

Should I better contact customers by manually writing them an email asking about what do they like/dislike, or will it be enough to create some form and send them asking to fill it out?

Also, at what point should I consider getting a website for the store?
Email manually to get started.

If you’re getting a few sales every day, consider a website. Then you have to think about cost, different ad platforms etc. see if current sales are steady before putting time and money into that
 

kr8nt

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To speed up sales on Etsy, you need more traffic to your store. Increasing your ad spend will bring more people to your store. Likewise, adding more products that target different keywords will also bring more traffic. Those are the two main ways outside of investing time in SEO and social media to increase sales on Etsy.
Thank you for the tips, Lex!

If I create a lot of different products that are not related at all, this should potentially increase the sales for other products as well, because more people will be finding the store and by checking it out they could potentially decide to buy other products that are not even what they were searching for?
 

kr8nt

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Email manually to get started.

If you’re getting a few sales every day, consider a website. Then you have to think about cost, different ad platforms etc. see if current sales are steady before putting time and money into that
Thank you, StrikingViper69!

Is it allowed to just take the customer emails directly from Etsy and start sending them emails, or do I have to ask the customers for their email first?
 
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StrikingViper69

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Thank you, StrikingViper69!

Is it allowed to just take the customer emails directly from Etsy and start sending them emails, or do I have to ask the customers for their email first?
I don't know, I've never used Etsy
 

Andy Black

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Just a tip @kr8nt...

These are good questions, and should be easy enough for you to figure out:

Thank you for the tips, Lex!

If I create a lot of different products that are not related at all, this should potentially increase the sales for other products as well, because more people will be finding the store and by checking it out they could potentially decide to buy other products that are not even what they were searching for?

Thank you, StrikingViper69!

Is it allowed to just take the customer emails directly from Etsy and start sending them emails, or do I have to ask the customers for their email first?
 

kr8nt

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Just a tip @kr8nt...

These are good questions, and should be easy enough for you to figure out:
Oh, you are right, Andy, thanks for pointing this out! I was a bit tired and sleepy after the gym and didn't notice that the answers to these questions are quite easy to figure out.
 
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Lex DeVille

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April was a good month. Things tapered off the last few days. I didn't quite make it to $2,000 in net sales. Still, WooCommerce sales doubled from the previous month, and total profit nearly doubled.

I expect May - July (and possibly August) to be the slowest months of the year, followed by a strong holiday season, but I went ahead and placed my largest order of physical products yet.

April Sales: $1763.40
- Thrivecart: $489.55
- WooCommerce: $1273.85

April Expenses: $603
- Google Ads: $355.00
- FOMO: $75.00
- ActiveCampaign: $75
- Physical Inventory: $98

April Profit: $1160.4

1714565623926.png1714565530427.png

For May
My big focus for may is to narrow my physical products to those that sell the fastest.

My $49 - $54 products sell faster than the $149 products. I'll have an increased ad spend as my current spend was $10 per day for most of April and there were still a lot of impressions and potential clicks missed.

I don't plan to make any huge changes to my funnels or process. I didn't build out anything elaborate last month. I am creating blog posts as people definitely read them on my site.

Return customers spend a lot more with me compared to first-time customers.

I still have inventory from last month that needs to be listed. I roll physical products out slowly because I only keep a few of each item on-hand. This leads to many products selling out fast, and creates scarcity.


Store 2
I haven't had other stores running, but I've had an idea for a store in the back of my mind. I researched the products, search volume, and market this week and decided it's worth it.

The store is a physical product e-commerce store. There is room for digital products as well. I think the potential is so great for this idea that I'd be stupid not to at least give it a try.

So I set up a basic website, and I'll bring in some test products from Temu. Once I have a bit of inventory, I'll run some ads and see what happens. Depending on the results, I'll decide how much focus to give it.

I'm 99% sure this one will be a huge hit around the holidays if nothing else.
 

Andy Black

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I'll have an increased ad spend as my current spend was $10 per day for most of April and there were still a lot of impressions and potential clicks missed.
What were your impressions and impressions share metrics?
 

Lex DeVille

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Andy Black

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Andy Black

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Andy Black

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Those aren't the columns I use.

Can you set them up as I did in this screenshot (apologies for linking out... I'm on my phone and this is the easiest way to find a screenshot):


EDIT: This is a better post showing how I read those metrics:

 
Last edited:

Caminsky

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I had a few websites for side hustles and dipping my toes in the water. One I have given up as I was in a way too saturated market. The other one I'm currently using more like a portfolio for knowledge related to my actual profession. Other than that, I honestly haven't done much lately as far a business development.

Back to the drawing board.
 
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