What advice would you give me if I wanted to start selling hand felt hats online?
A typical Czech creator starts shopify management by setting up a profile on Fleru or posting some photos on Facebook and then wraps it up because “it’s not going to sell”. This is a form of business that I call “cross and jump”. If you want to build an online business that really works, you need to sit down and do some honest work in the beginning.
What does such “honest work” entail?
Think carefully about who you are going to sell to. If you make handmade hunting dog collars, you will be offering them to owners of hunting dogs. This is an interest group that is relatively easy to find both in the real world and online. If you have just started making felt hats because you are interested in the production technique, but you do not know anything about who would buy such hats, you need to test sales in practice.
So go literally “with skin to the market”?
Exactly. You will get the most information from live sales events. There you will find out very precisely which people like the process of pcb production your products so much that they are willing to pay for them. You will learn what kind of people they are, what age group they are, what interests they have, where they are from, what social class they are from and so on. Once you have an accurate idea of what your typical customer looks like, you can find them in the online world as well.
Where can I find information about which events are right for me?
If you’re making wooden beer tanks, you’ll be making the rounds at beer festivals. If you create avant-garde leather jewelry, you go to sell at a rock festival. If you are not clear about who your customers are, try a few “general” events with a lot of traffic and gradually “pick up” your customer.
Tip: Look for the right opportunities in the database of sales events . You can get it for cheap, including contacts to the organizers.
Coming back to your felt hats: let’s assume you don’t know anything about the people who wear them. You make a few pieces in different styles and go out with a stand to sell them at some city festival. Nothing much will sell, but a Hickory golf lover will come to your booth.
Hickory golf, that means nothing to me at all.
Well, you see. At live events, you’ll learn es phone number about opportunities you wouldn’t even think to look for.
Hickory golf is played the old-fashioned way, with wooden clubs in costumes in the style of the 20s-30s. years of the last century.
And a lover of this sport shows you a photo of a hat on her mobile and asks if you could make it for her.
You will find out from the call that the customer does not care how much the hat will cost.
And if you can make such hats, she will want three at once and will also bring her friends from the Hickory Golf Club to you. By the way, where are you going to sell hats next?
From an average creation to a blockbuster
Let’s stay with hats. What can I do to make them sell?
You have just discovered that there is an interest group that will be very interested in your hats. I would start studying fashion around Hickory golf right now. I would try to create hat designs that Hickory golfers would go crazy for.
How do I know what my customers will be raving about?
Listen to your customers. They will tell you what they need most. You might find out that a famous actress played Hickory golf in the 1920s.
Today’s female golfers could buy a hat in her style, it would be the experience of the year. You also need to check if the target group around .
Hickory Golf will be large enough for you. You may then be faced with a decision whether you should focus only on .
Hickory golfers, but reach this community worldwide, or sell only here, but expand your scope.
For example, the entire hipster swing subculture that thrives here and also enjoys the period clothing.
The first steps in selling online (and Fleru’s pitfalls)
How do I verify that selling hats will work for me online?
Should I try multiple channels in parallel to see which one “takes” or put all my energy into one and do it properly?
It is ideal to build at least two reliable sales channels. In our case with hats, you can combine live sales with online sales. You can start simply with a Facebook page or even better with a group. It is also a good idea to try a small e-shop for free, such as Shoptet , and try to make a well-targeted Facebook advertisement for one of the products. When you see that sales are working, you can invest and buy a larger, paid version of the e-shop.