ZERO TO HERO #5. Finishing up Shopify Store

(or back to Zero haha)

𝐀. 𝐇𝐄𝐋𝐋𝐎 𝐀𝐌𝐈𝐆𝐎𝐒,

a. Another one of my posts. I’m 50 hours into this project and I finally finished building my store. I think there are a bunch of things that could be done better about my store but going live and starting as soon as possible is much more important right now IMO. That’s the trade-off that must be made, though I did my best to make my store as decent as possible. Soo, without further ado, let’s get into my review.
𝐎𝐔𝐓𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐄 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐏𝐎𝐒𝐓.
𝐴. 𝐼𝑛𝑡𝑟𝑜
𝐵. 𝑅𝑒𝑣𝑖𝑒𝑤 𝑜𝑓 𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑡 10-ℎ𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑠 ℎ𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑘
𝐶. 𝐾𝑒𝑦 𝑇𝑎𝑘𝑒𝑎𝑤𝑎𝑦𝑠
𝐷. 𝑀𝑜𝑠𝑡 𝐼𝑚𝑝𝑜𝑟𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑡 𝑇𝑎𝑠𝑘𝑠
𝐸. 𝑇𝑎𝑠𝑘𝑠 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑛𝑒𝑥𝑡 10 ℎ𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑠
𝐹. 𝑁𝑜𝑡𝑒𝑠
Below you can see the whole structure →

𝐁. 𝐑𝐄𝐕𝐈𝐄𝐖 𝐎𝐅 𝐋𝐀𝐒𝐓 𝟏𝟎-𝐇𝐎𝐔𝐑𝐒 𝐇𝐎𝐔𝐑𝐒 𝐎𝐅 𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐊

𝑎. 𝐷𝑖𝑑 𝐼 𝑐𝑜𝑚𝑝𝑙𝑒𝑡𝑒 𝑠𝑒𝑡 𝑡𝑎𝑠𝑘𝑠?
i. Not all of them
𝑏. 𝐻𝑜𝑤 𝑚𝑎𝑛𝑦 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑚 𝑑𝑖𝑑 𝐼 𝑐𝑜𝑚𝑝𝑙𝑒𝑡𝑒?
i. Amazon reviews research is done
ii. Compelling copy for the product is written
iii. Shopify store is finished and live
iv. App — didn’t have much time for apps, so I deleted some of the apps I had (to increase page speed and not waste time tinkering with them)
v. FB pixel is set up + Google Analytics is set up
𝑐. 𝑊𝑎𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑡𝑖𝑚𝑒 𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑜𝑡𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑒𝑎𝑐ℎ 𝑡𝑎𝑠𝑘 𝑒𝑛𝑜𝑢𝑔ℎ?
i. No, it seems I underestimated the amount of time needed for all the tasks set last week. I spent a lot more time on the product page than I had expected.
𝑑. 𝑊𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑦 𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑖𝑚𝑝𝑜𝑟𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑡?
i. I think I’ve spent a lot of time researching apps, trying different apps, trying to get as many cool features to my store.
ii. It is better IMO to get the absolute must-have ones like checkout abandonment, upsell/presells/cross-sells, chatbox First. Start your ecom. And then add all the other ones if needed. Otherwise, you won’t get past first base. Here is the thing, our main goal is to get started as quickly as possible no matter how imperfect everything is. Start quickly, fail quickly, learn quickly
𝑒. 3 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔𝑠 𝑡𝑜 𝑏𝑒𝑐𝑜𝑚𝑒 𝑚𝑜𝑟𝑒 𝑒𝑓𝑓𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑣𝑒.

1. Forget about small things and focus on what gives the greatest output. (during my 4th hour I caught myself buying Photoshop CC to put my logo on a product image, then I came to sense haha)
2. At the beginning of every hour spend 5 minutes setting mini-tasks and planning out how that hour would go.
3. Write down tasks worked on in more detail for later review

𝐂. 𝐊𝐄𝐘 𝐓𝐀𝐊𝐄𝐀𝐖𝐀𝐘𝐒

a. 1 — Go with fewer apps. I found a secret app(VITALS) that will be a game changer for my store. It’s a 40 in 1 app, comes with so many features, and its only 30 bucks
b. 2 — Analyzing product reviews on Amazon will help a lot to write a product page copy. Now I see clearly the difference between salesy copies full of lavish/motivational/inspirational phrases that mean nothing and copies written in simple words that convey a story. The latter ones are written by people who use those products.
c. 3 — Facebook analytics is going away in 2 months. Don’t know how that gonna affect dropshipping/ecom business
d. 4 — Ad copy is important but not as important as I used to think. In my mind, I was picturing writing a copy as something hard and effort&time-consuming. However, upon seeing what ads my bigger competitors are running I realized that it’s a few hours of work. Just sit tightly, focus, do your best and write 5–6 copies. Those bigger players all have 5–6 copies they use in all of their posts, and they’re running those ads for months.
e. 5 — Creative is the king. That’s the name of the game — creating a viral video. Create a cool video and product place your product. Just like what Nike does. Nike’s commercials are never about the shoes. They are about athletes, how they are competing, doing sports, etc. For my product, I’m planning to hire models/actors, shoot a cool video with them, and product place my product in a subtle way. This way, it won’t be about selling the product as people don’t like ads(my assumption)

𝐃. 𝐌𝐎𝐒𝐓 𝐈𝐌𝐏𝐎𝐑𝐓𝐀𝐍𝐓 𝐓𝐀𝐒𝐊𝐒

a. What is the One Thing I can be doing such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?
i. Get a monthly subscription to InVideo and create 3 creative for the product
b. What is the second most important thing?
i. Add content to social media accounts

𝐄. 𝐓𝐀𝐒𝐊𝐒 𝐅𝐎𝐑 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐍𝐄𝐗𝐓 𝟏𝟎 𝐇𝐎𝐔𝐑𝐒

a. 1st hour — Setting up Abandoned checkout email sequence + testing
b. 2nd hour — Creating 3 creatives for my marketing campaign
c. 3rd hour — Creating 3 creatives for my marketing campaign
d. 4th hour — Creating 3 creatives for my marketing campaign
e. 5th hour — Adding content to social media accounts
f. 6th hour — Adding content to social media accounts
g. 7th hour — Checking FB pixel events
h. 8th hour — Checking Google analytics events, etc
i. 9th hour — Testing the website + whole customer experience
j. 10th hour — Buffer time

𝐅. 𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐄𝐒 (𝐌𝐀𝐗 𝟏𝟓𝟎 𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐃𝐒)

Hey amigos,
It’s a sunny Sunday noon right now, it’s getting warmer these days, and I’m in my garden with my dog watching me blogging. I wanna share my 2 cents on dropshipping and business in general. Sometimes we get caught up in an endless stream of tasks that we forget the whole picture, why we are doing what we are doing. Ecom is not just about making money. It’s not about the net profit you put in your pocket. It’s about building a system or learning how to build a system. And that is the essence of having a business. Ideally, a system that works on autopilot makes you money when you are sleeping. Something that people find valuable. If you provide something of value to people, there will always a buyer for your business. So, if you build such a system… nice job… you have mini jackpots monthly and a bigger one when you successfully exit.