MrSeth
New Contributor
- Joined
- Apr 26, 2015
- Messages
- 11
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$135
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User Power: 145%
Hello everyone,
This is my first post on the forum. It has been a wealth of knowledge for me!
This is my first time putting our business plan in front of others. Though I am pretty confident about what we are doing, I also know that there is a ton that I don’t know. This is only a very general overview of our plan. If you want to know any specifics, feel free to ask.
My wife and I have a jewelry business. I have a plan for the next stage of our business, and I wanted to put it out there for critiques/advice. Though we have seen some success, we aren’t even close to tapping the true potential of our product in the target market.
I will be a bit vague about our markets/product, for obvious reasons.
Our Business
We sell high-end jewelry, ranging from $500 to $500,000+. In 2014 our revenues were about $3,500,000. We have been building the business for about 5 years. None of this revenue has come via the internet. It is all from doing private shows, trade shows, visiting clients, selling from out office, etc.
Almost every piece that we sell is one-of-a-kind. We don’t buy from manufacturers. We buy from auctions, estate sales, wholesalers, public, etc. We also have access to dozens of wholesalers who will give us any amount of jewelry to broker, and basically sell as our own. We have built a lot of of trust in the industry. This would allow us to have hundreds of unique items online.
The Next Step
Currently almost all of our business is done in a foreign market. My wife was born in the region and speaks the language, which has been a major advantage. We travel there regularly and do various shows, and through that we have amassed a strong following of customers there.
There is a huge opportunity for us in this foreign market. There is a growing interest in the type of jewelry we deal in. The competition is very sparse. There are basically no online sites that sell this jewelry in the native language of the market.
My plan is to build an e-commerce site in the native language, selling our jewelry. I have a lot of background in Wordpress, and plan on setting up a WP site with WooCommerce. One of the reasons I want to use Wordpress is because I plan on having a ton of content on the site, and I know that WP is great for that. Also, I know WP inside out, which is a plus. I plan on hiring a developer to customize and clean up the site after it has grown. One of the sites I am referencing a lot is TheRealReal. They have been hugely successful for a number of reasons. I am working on analyzing their operations in detail.
With a little effort in content generation in the native language, it will be very easy to get a decent amount of organic traffic. I will also do a lot of PPC advertising, and the rest of the gamut. I am also going to pay a firm to run our SEO and SEM, and a lot of the social media.
One of the biggest obstacles is establishing trust. I have a whole plan around that.
Here is our N-E-C-S-T analysis. (I found this very helpful to write out)
NEED What need am I solving?
Providing xxxxx markets a trusted way to conveniently discover, learn about, and purchase xxxx type of jewelry. Trust is one of the major issues we have to solve.
ENTRY How crowded is this market? How high is the entry barrier?
It is very difficult to enter this market with this type of jewelry, for many reasons. It isn't a very crowded market at all.
CONTROL Are we in control of our business?
We own our business and make 100% of the decisions.
SCALE What is the scale & magnitude?
The scale and magnitude are both exceptional. The market is massive, and if we are successful online we can reach a lot of customers. The magnetite is also limitless. A lot of our customers start with buying a smaller piece from us (less than 20k), but start to buy bigger items. As an example of magnitude, we could sell a ring for $500k, with a profit of $80k. The more customers we reach, the more often we will make these types of sales.
TIME How much time do we need to put into the business on a daily basis? Can the business run itself at some point?
This is one of the sticking points, as we both need to work on sourcing the jewelry. Because we aren’t buying from a manufacturer, it is hard to have this be automated. However, because of our location and relationships, it is very easy to get merchandise. If we start to see real success, we will have people actively giving us items to sell.
Here are a few of my questions:
What are your general thoughts about the plan?
Are there any people on here with an expertise in selling luxury items online?
I am planning on using a woo commerce on wp for the reasons above. Any thoughts on this?
Any tips for establishing trust online, especially with such high ticket price items?
Thanks again for anyone who spends the time to read this and respond. And a big thanks to MJ!
This is my first post on the forum. It has been a wealth of knowledge for me!
This is my first time putting our business plan in front of others. Though I am pretty confident about what we are doing, I also know that there is a ton that I don’t know. This is only a very general overview of our plan. If you want to know any specifics, feel free to ask.
My wife and I have a jewelry business. I have a plan for the next stage of our business, and I wanted to put it out there for critiques/advice. Though we have seen some success, we aren’t even close to tapping the true potential of our product in the target market.
I will be a bit vague about our markets/product, for obvious reasons.
Our Business
We sell high-end jewelry, ranging from $500 to $500,000+. In 2014 our revenues were about $3,500,000. We have been building the business for about 5 years. None of this revenue has come via the internet. It is all from doing private shows, trade shows, visiting clients, selling from out office, etc.
Almost every piece that we sell is one-of-a-kind. We don’t buy from manufacturers. We buy from auctions, estate sales, wholesalers, public, etc. We also have access to dozens of wholesalers who will give us any amount of jewelry to broker, and basically sell as our own. We have built a lot of of trust in the industry. This would allow us to have hundreds of unique items online.
The Next Step
Currently almost all of our business is done in a foreign market. My wife was born in the region and speaks the language, which has been a major advantage. We travel there regularly and do various shows, and through that we have amassed a strong following of customers there.
There is a huge opportunity for us in this foreign market. There is a growing interest in the type of jewelry we deal in. The competition is very sparse. There are basically no online sites that sell this jewelry in the native language of the market.
My plan is to build an e-commerce site in the native language, selling our jewelry. I have a lot of background in Wordpress, and plan on setting up a WP site with WooCommerce. One of the reasons I want to use Wordpress is because I plan on having a ton of content on the site, and I know that WP is great for that. Also, I know WP inside out, which is a plus. I plan on hiring a developer to customize and clean up the site after it has grown. One of the sites I am referencing a lot is TheRealReal. They have been hugely successful for a number of reasons. I am working on analyzing their operations in detail.
With a little effort in content generation in the native language, it will be very easy to get a decent amount of organic traffic. I will also do a lot of PPC advertising, and the rest of the gamut. I am also going to pay a firm to run our SEO and SEM, and a lot of the social media.
One of the biggest obstacles is establishing trust. I have a whole plan around that.
Here is our N-E-C-S-T analysis. (I found this very helpful to write out)
NEED What need am I solving?
Providing xxxxx markets a trusted way to conveniently discover, learn about, and purchase xxxx type of jewelry. Trust is one of the major issues we have to solve.
ENTRY How crowded is this market? How high is the entry barrier?
It is very difficult to enter this market with this type of jewelry, for many reasons. It isn't a very crowded market at all.
CONTROL Are we in control of our business?
We own our business and make 100% of the decisions.
SCALE What is the scale & magnitude?
The scale and magnitude are both exceptional. The market is massive, and if we are successful online we can reach a lot of customers. The magnetite is also limitless. A lot of our customers start with buying a smaller piece from us (less than 20k), but start to buy bigger items. As an example of magnitude, we could sell a ring for $500k, with a profit of $80k. The more customers we reach, the more often we will make these types of sales.
TIME How much time do we need to put into the business on a daily basis? Can the business run itself at some point?
This is one of the sticking points, as we both need to work on sourcing the jewelry. Because we aren’t buying from a manufacturer, it is hard to have this be automated. However, because of our location and relationships, it is very easy to get merchandise. If we start to see real success, we will have people actively giving us items to sell.
Here are a few of my questions:
What are your general thoughts about the plan?
Are there any people on here with an expertise in selling luxury items online?
I am planning on using a woo commerce on wp for the reasons above. Any thoughts on this?
Any tips for establishing trust online, especially with such high ticket price items?
Thanks again for anyone who spends the time to read this and respond. And a big thanks to MJ!
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