5 Genuine Pieces of Advice for New Online Sellers - A 5 Part Series

Posted by Big Brand Wholesale.com on 4th Mar 2020

Sales do not come overnight… until they literally start coming overnight, every night. But how do you get there? Here’s some really simple advice to help you grow faster...

PART 1: Time Investment / How much time is needed for an online business?

You will only get out what you put in. If you look at it like this: there’s 24 in a day. How many hours each day are you giving to your business? If you give 2 hours a day, that’s less than 10% of the day. You should expect to get very little out of your efforts. In fact, no company can survive on 10% effort because it isn’t a “business”, instead it’s a hobby - which is totally fine, if you want a hobby. BUT if you want a hobby, don’t expect amazing results. Hobbies are more so for self enrichment and learning new things. Selling online definitely is not a bad hobby because unlike building model cars or collecting ceramic dolls, having an online business generates money instead of only spending it.

On the other hand, if you are giving 8 - 12 hours a day you can expect much more success, much faster.

Then there’s people like me who essentially make the business their life. I work an average of 15 hours per day, 7 days a week. Most of the time I don’t mind, but like everyone else in the world there are those days I don’t feel like it… then I choose to buckle down and plow through it anyways. I think this is really what makes a difference in overall success; are you the person giving 2 hours or are you giving 15? IT IS ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE TO FAIL IF YOU ARE TRULY GIVING 15.

You might be thinking “Ok that sounds nice, but I work a 9-5 so I CAN’T give 15! Now what?

Well, what is your long term plan? Do you want to keep your 9-5 in 10 years? Or is your goal to make online selling your full time job eventually? If you plan to keep your traditional employment and retire from that company then you give what you can to your online business. This likely means getting a couple things listed each night, shipping an order or two and responding to a couple customer inquiries. Super part time work that allows you to maintain your security net of your “real job”. This is a perfectly fine option that can likely generate a couple hundred extra dollars every month!

If your goal is to leave your 9-5 within the next 5-10 years, you gotta go all-in during your off-hours. This will absolutely mean giving up your evenings and setting your alarm an hour or two early so you can get some listings in or bang out shipping.

And if you’re like “Ok, that doesn’t work either because my kids have sports at night and I am on the church decorating committee, so now what?” Since your schedule is really packed you are going to have to make some tough choices. What can you give up to create time? Lay out your schedule on a piece of paper and see where any time exists. It simply isn’t possible that you have activities 24-hours-a-way, 7 days a week. So, this means you have to sacrifice sleep (cut down to 4-5 hours), give up weekend Netflix binge watching and cancel your gym membership. The Church committee has to go too. Canceling kids sports isn’t cool, but can you find a fellow team member who can rotate driving days with you? Be creative! Yes, its HARD! If it was easy everyone would do it!

NEXT: Part 2 Bad Inventory vs Investments

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