Q4 Plans and More

Today marks the beginning of my e-commerce journey.

I honestly don’t know where this will take me, but I’m trying my best to stay on the positive side. I certainly am not one who gives things up without giving it a try — which explains my multipassionate, spread-too-thin self. 🤷

A few months ago, I urged my father to enroll in a local e-commerce course and that I would help him. He resigned from work (didn’t last very long though; I think he stayed home for about a month but gave in when his former employer asked for his help — and he couldn’t say no to him — plus he became anemic. lol!) but told me that the new venture was too steep of a learning curve for him. Plus he no longer wanted to feel that much pressure in life considering that he is a year away from (optional) retirement age.

So the course opened up for enrollment again last month but alas, I had too many bills to pay so I didn’t exactly have the cash to spare. I contacted the owner anyway and asked if I could pay for the difference or have some sort of arrangement just so I could join the exclusive Facebook group.

Honestly, I probably would have still made it with my access to the online course but nothing beats accountability plus access to direct coaching, in case I have questions. Thankfully, the owner allowed me into the group without having to pay anymore. Good move for me because it’s super motivating inside!

I just spent the last 5–8 hours listening to the videos inside the course and doing product research. Ads start next week but I probably need to make a few small purchases this week to get product samples.

I still need to juggle all this with my freelance business in order to fund the new business.

Currently, I am thinking of focusing on products that I can tie with my 6yo blog, which already gets some organic traffic. Maybe 2–3 products there first.

I have also considered marketing the products that a former colleague sent me from Japan.

Because this is my online diary and this isn’t really read by anyone lol, I’ll outline a few niche stores I may want to explore in the future:

• travel
• stationery
• coffee / tea
• yoga
• bamboo / sustainable products (this is a little tricky as I need to work with a supplier and courier that doesn’t use plastic)
• home products

Of course, my HMA blog will also be branching out into other sources of income so this is my order of priority:

1. e-commerce
2. affiliate income
3. ebook
4. course (which will be tied to my MMB website)

From here on out, I will be posting *hopefully* daily progress based on my action plan, which I posted here.

Wish me all the best!