In five years, I made $20,000 a month

Introduction:

I am a 28-year-old e-commerce entrepreneur from China, and I have been in the business for five years. Initially, I ventured into various product categories such as clothing, watches, and pet food, all of which ended in failure. Over time, I realized that in these saturated markets, I lacked competitiveness. Large players easily defeat smaller businesses through strategies like paid advertising, price reductions, promotions, and even selling at a loss to dominate market share.

Strategic Shift:

To explain, selling at a loss refers to a strategy used for consumable goods with short repurchase cycles. This approach can crush competitors while quickly capturing market share, with profits recovered through customer repurchases. Of course, this requires careful optimization of the product SKUs.

As a result, I shifted my strategy to avoid such cutthroat competition and started looking for "blue ocean" products. Previously, my product selection was based on intuition, and any success was merely due to luck and couldn't be reliably replicated. I began an in-depth analysis of data from the "Taobao" platform and realized I was constantly battling in a "red ocean." Before, I would only consider a product's trend charts (search popularity, conversion rates), thinking anything on the rise was good, but I overlooked other indicators like "online product count." For instance, the keyword "casual men's clothing" had a search popularity of 240,000 but faced over ten million competing products. That was the moment I understood my constant failures.

I subscribed to several data analysis platforms and began vigorously searching for products, eventually discovering a niche product with a search popularity of over 3,000 but only 180 items online: "shoes for elderly people with swollen feet." I contacted the supplier, obtaining the shoes for $11 per pair, or $12.50 if they handled shipping. The leading seller on the platform priced them at $29. Observing the mild competition, and poor quality of the product images in the listings, I bought a few pairs of the shoes, had a designer create exquisite images, and listed them at the same price but included three extra pairs of comfortable socks as a bonus. Orders began trickling in a week later. As autumn progressed and winter approached, search popularity for the shoes climbed to over 7,000. In winter, many elderly people suffer from swollen feet due to varicose veins or poor circulation, prompting their children to buy these adjustable shoes as a sign of filial piety.

My sales surged day by day, and that winter, I sold over 1,900 pairs of shoes, experiencing the thrill of earning over ten thousand a month and a deep sense of achievement. This success showed me that such outcomes are replicable, prompting me to collect more "blue ocean" products and open multiple shops. Some of these included post-surgery pillows, luxury cosmetic samples, and foot-soaking medicinal packages, most of which turned profitable.

Reflections:

This journey taught me that "one cannot make money beyond their understanding." Once you truly comprehend and deeply understand certain aspects, the path to success is less crowded. The key for the average person is to understand differentiated competition—sometimes, choice is more important than effort. Running an online business is actually simple; just manage your customers and suppliers well.

Looking Forward:

Recently, inspired by numerous cross-border e-commerce posts on TikTok, and considering my small company’s good performance with a profit of about $20,000 a month after paying six employees—a considerable income in China—I continue to explore new directions and profit opportunities, focusing on the European and American markets. Here, I hope to meet like-minded friends.

That's all from me for now. I welcome your comments and discussions. Thank you very much.