Is it worth it??

[xhale2007]

Evening guys.

Im after some words of advice

I set up in january, selling mainly via ebay and now slowly via a website.

My first month turnover was £270 and i made £17 after all expenses

Now 8 months in, and last month (aug) i turned over £1200 and made around 180 after all expenses.

My sales/profit show a gradual increase month on month, and im happy with that.

I spend about 30-45mins a day packing and posting parcels 5 times per week. So roughly 2.5hours per week / 10 hours per month

Is it worth sticking at? People keep telling me is it really worth it for such a little income?

I should add, i work full time on shifts, so have tonnes of spare time each day and dont mind doing it.

My aim has always been to make £600 after all expenses per month, which i think will be acheivable if i carry on adding products etc to help generate more sales. It will mean i need to turnover in the region of 5-6k per month to do this.

 

[freshpurple]

Sounds like you're doing OK to me. If you think about it - £180 for 10 hrs work works out at £18/hr, which is pretty good for your first year in business. And hopefully you have something that will scale pretty well as the business grows? (So if your orders double, the amount of work you have to put in doesn't)

I guess it depends on what you think the future holds - how much effort do you think it will require to grow the business to achieve your aims and, are you prepared to do it?

 

[Vintage06]

Agree with freshpurple.

As it's in your spare time and as you say you've plenty of time. It's extra money on top of your wage.

What do you sell?

 

[That Guy]

Worth keeping it going for the little amount of time you are putting in

 

[kangke]

I think you should going on for this,if the goods your selling are high quality and competitive price,there would be more and more customers buy from you again,even if,the customers recomment their friends to buy form you,just do as good as you can to service your customer,hope your business will blooming.

 

As others have said for the hours not to bad,try expanding your range of products for a better income.

Earl

 

[xhale2007]

Thanks for your wise words guys!

I have more than enough time on my hands to process/post orders, i do it on my way to or from work as its on the way, so its even easier.

Im going to pre bubble wrap each individual item i sell as i receive it, so all i will have to do, is slip it inside a postal bag, add the invoice, stick a label on and job done. Thats going to save me lots of time over the month.

Im more than happy to earn even 150 a month for 1 hour a day. I know thats a lot less an hour than im doing now, but its an hour i would only waste, and 150 is a nice little extra.

I dont take that 150 out, its getting re invested in further stock, so i can continue growing. I assume thats the ideal method.

Thanks again!

Dan

 

[Deleted member 61074]

I would also look at sourcing new products that you can sell with a higher markup

 

[sysops]

I spend about 30-45mins a day packing and posting parcels 5 times per week. So roughly 2.5hours per week / 10 hours per month

How long do you spend sourcing products, writing them up on eBay, replying to customer emails etc?

 

[xhale2007]

I currently only buy stock from one supplier, i have a fair few i can use but at present i do not use them as i do not have the money to buy too much of a variety, and keep it in good stock.

I spend around 10mins max listing an item when i get it as i have it set up with templates etc, so its simple. Customer emails are fairly rare, probably 2-3 a week, and these are sent via my iphone when im at my full time work, so not really an issue.

Most things like feedback etc is all automated, so its not taking any time.

I obviously spent alot of time at the start getting all the listings up, building a website, sourcing products etc etc.

 

[sanjiv]

What is your product? I would say it is worth carrying on because you don't need to put much time into it.

 

[HTMLHugo]

good to see there is somebody else in the same boat as me.

i started in january with a small amount of my redundancy money and i must admit its got busier and busier. I wouldnt say im making any profit however i've expanded the range of stock from about 10 items to about 60-70 and the sales have been flying in.

Ive also managed to source stock from other places now, and be a bit more shrewd in my choices regarding packaging, postage for example a lot of my items now go in packaging bags instead of boxes as there is 80p difference in cost plus the savings on postage because of weight etc.

for me it takes an hour most night to pack and post adverts etc but i must admit to spending longer sourcing / ordering stock and listing on my own websites.

however it averages out about 10 hours a week for a decent amount of cash, which will pay for the expanding stock range.

I'd say if you enjoy it even if you make no money keep it going. If its interfering with your life or making you unhappy, or making a loss then its time to reconsider

 

[Rolo Tomasi]

As everyone else has said I think that if you can bring in an extra couple of hundred pounds each month by working in you spare time then stick with it. However I would comment on your aim to earn £600 (net) per month. If your turnover to achieve this will have to be £6k then this puts you into the VAT bracket which will add significantly to the time you spend managing the businesses.

I think that rather than setting a turnover target you should be trying to increase your profit margins as a 10% net profit rate is very low. Most retailers would try to mark up their stock by 100% (giving a 50% gross profit). Ebay/Paypal fees generally account for approximately 14% of turnover and if you allowed 6% for other costs then you would be making a net income of 30% which means your turnover would only have to be £2k per month for you to earn £600.

 

[sanjiv]

As everyone else has said I think that if you can bring in an extra couple of hundred pounds each month by working in you spare time then stick with it. However I would comment on your aim to earn £600 (net) per month. If your turnover to achieve this will have to be £6k then this puts you into the VAT bracket which will add significantly to the time you spend managing the businesses.

I think that rather than setting a turnover target you should be trying to increase your profit margins as a 10% net profit rate is very low. Most retailers would try to mark up their stock by 100% (giving a 50% gross profit). Ebay/Paypal fees generally account for approximately 14% of turnover and if you allowed 6% for other costs then you would be making a net income of 30% which means your turnover would only have to be £2k per month for you to earn £600.

VAT threshold is not £6k. It's £70k.

 

[Rolo Tomasi]

To earn £600 per month turnover would have to be £6000 per month - £72k pa

 

[sanjiv]

To earn £600 per month turnover would have to be £6000 per month - £72k pa

Sorry misread it.

 

[xhale2007]

Thanks for the advice!

After all fees, postage etc etc, most of my items on ebay have a margin of between 6.5%- 21%, most sit around 13%

On the website however, i have a margin of between 15 - 41%, with most items around the 25% mark

If i could just generate £2k worth of sales p/m via the website, i would be looking at profits (after all fees etc) of around £500 p/m, bringing my profit up to the target i set myself.

I just cannot get myself any traffic I want to do it all myself, but i just cannot get into the search results. (yet)

 

[movietub]

Thanks for the advice!

After all fees, postage etc etc, most of my items on ebay have a margin of between 6.5%- 21%, most sit around 13%

On the website however, i have a margin of between 15 - 41%, with most items around the 25% mark

If i could just generate £2k worth of sales p/m via the website, i would be looking at profits (after all fees etc) of around £500 p/m, bringing my profit up to the target i set myself.

Margins sound about right, all you need is growth. It sounds like this is happening anyway so you should inevitably hit that target. In fact you should smash it with a little effort - certainly you could replace the shift work with extra packing!

I just cannot get myself any traffic I want to do it all myself, but i just cannot get into the search results. (yet)

Rathar than concentrate on the techie side of SEO, you could concentrate on content. Many people start a search for a product by entering a question into google. So writing a Q&A piece of copy for each product can work very well. Just look at each product, what would a customer ask? Then write the question, and write the answer.

Not just Q&A, look at each product page from the customers point of view and make it as good, and as content rich as is possible. The more relevant content you get on one page the higher google etc will rate it. Sounds like you don't have that many products, so just spending an hour on a page each night will quickly start to improve the ranking of the whole site. So many ecommerce sites concern themselves with price, style and ease of use - but completely forget to sell the product to the viewer.

As has been said earlier, add more products once you know the current range is presented online as well as can be.

 

[Rolo Tomasi]

Do you list your products in the Google Merchant Centre? I have found this to be a good source of traffic to my website.

 

[jewelrystreeta]

Hi Dan,

You just spent little on it and profited,it's a good start.Well done.

As HTMLHugo above mentioned,you should add as many items as possible to increase the traffic. If you're selling the hot products,with few seller,at very competitive prices and good service,you grow fast. Always keep an eye on the purlse and look for better resources.

I am in China,the international shipping is very high,but i supply product to overseas ebayers and small business,they do the retail domesticly. i am in jewelry field.

Ethan

 

[Chris Kaday]

In the final analysis only you can say if it is worth it but however this might be helpful going forward:

Revenue target
At the outset you need to set a target for the revenue you wish to earn over say the next year. You wouldn’t work for a business if you did not know what you would earn and it is the same with yourself.

Activity target
You say you are working a lot of hours right now – be very clear about how many that is – write them down at the end of each day and divide into your target. You will then get your current hourly rate – this can be quite a shock

Hourly rate target
Now consider what you think is a reasonable hourly rate and divide into the revenue target. You will then get something like £5,000 and 500 hours at £10 an hour – only an example. You also need a strategy for getting those hours down and/or the revenue up – obvious I know

Review
So at then at the end of say 6 months or a year you will see how many hours you have put info what return at what value per hour against target - the last bit is the most important

Decision
If this is way out negatively then maybe you should pack it in. In fact I would set a figure say 20% or below of requirement where you have already made that decision – makes it much easier when you get there to decide

Get real
I know from engaging with many in here masses of people are working at well below the minimum wage in their business. They are also kidding themselves on the hours they put in and have a real shock when it is set out accurately.

witnessing
Last point. When you have your target send it to someone (actually anyone) who can witness this and hold you to account. This is most important. Lots about this in my book and happy to send you a free copy if you send me an address.

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This is a process others might like to try too - I am happy to witness your targets or we can set up a thread where you can post them.

Regards to all

Chris