Bare with me - I have a lot to say but sometimes I have a hard time organizing my thoughts, wall of text may be incoming.
First off, I'm 20 years old electrical engineering student and currently run a small service/ecommerce business. The purpose of this post is looking for feedback and help taking my business to the next level. I have a couple ideas that I will touch on later. (www.SouthernCurbside.com - my site)
My small business does local mailbox repairs and restorations (cast aluminum mailboxes). It has been fairly successful (especially before winter came around) given the fact that it is not scalable, meaning I do one mailbox service and then their mailbox is fine for years to come (there is no repeat customers if that makes any sense). When the winter came around, it was too cold to paint and work, so I began brainstorming a way to make additional income and I saw an oppurtunity. People always came to me asking if I sold mailboxes, some of the big name mailbox companies refused to work with me on giving me distributor pricing for their mailboxes (I could not make any money selling at retail price) since they had a vendor in the area already (the business is terrible and does not have any business).
Im going to sidetrack for a minute. Most of the middle class neighborhoods in my area of the country all have cast already mailboxes that are powder coated, the paint fades quickly and people want them restored (I also paint other varioues exterior things). Their door hinges wear out and they need new brass address numbers. The big player in the industry is imperial mailboxes and they pretty much have their mailboxes in every neighborhood. These are the ones I am working on.
Back on track. Since people were asking me if I sold mailboxes, I decided over the winter to find a supplier for my own cast aluminum mailboxes to sell. I did, but unlike most dropshipping websites my product is amazing and I have a really good relationship with my manufacturer/foundry. (family owned and U.S.A. foundry). Since launching, I have made one sale on amazon and one sale locally. My margins are about 20-30 percent depending on the platform. One advantage that my product has over the competition is that is semi-gloss enamel coated and I am a good bit less expensive than the others.
Now that the background is out of the way I want to talk about marketing and my website. I ran a facebook test ad for a day and a half ($5 a day budget)(i know shouldve ran it longer) towards my potential target audience - i had 112 post enagements (boosted post) with a 6 cent cost per engagement. I did not even get one add to cart. I think a reason beacuse of this is due to the facebook automatically running the ad on instagram, which I think is not the most optimal place for my type of product. I think the reason I sold a box on amazon so easily is that it is a trusted site with tons of traffic. I would love any feedback on the best way to market. I think one of the biggest obstacles is that my product is expensive - impulse buys are not really common with an item over $200. What types of ads are going to be best for this type of product? Should I use constant sales? Is my website landing page not optimized enough? I tried to use a similar style to the successful online mailbox retailers (www.budgetmailboxes.com)
A couple of next level ideas I had: -Get in with a local garden and hardware store, talk to them about selling my product in their stores. -Get in with a home builder/contractor company. One of my close family friends develops a lot of the organized neighborhoods in my areas. I haven't got up the nuts to talk to him yet because I'm not sure if I am prepared yet. I think getting my mailbox massively installed in new neighborhoods is the best profitable way to get a huge customer base - when its in new neighborhoods, homeowners have to come to you for replacements parts ect. -sending a free sample mailbox to a home and garden blogger/influencer
I'm sure I've left out some kind of vital information but I'm just looking for some general guidance. I really believe this can be super successful due to my experience talking with homeowners and serviving the mailboxes myself for the past year. I could write a book on why I believe it can take off but i would be here a while.
Any questions just leave a comment I will get back to you, thank you!
Edit: We also do custom street signs for neighborhoods.
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