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There are many things you need
to consider when starting your own online T-Shirt business. Simply
creating a design, putting it on a blank T-Shirt, and expecting
it to be a big seller isn't going to do the trick and bring you
many sales, unless of course, you are a very lucky person, whom
I can assure you, there aren't very many of them around. If you
want to start a T-Shirt business just to make easy money fast
like many other schemes on the internet claim, then you're looking
at the wrong business. There is no such thing as easily making
money fast and you're always going to have to put in the effort
to get the results you are looking for, especially for a T-Shirt
business.
Now, I'm not trying to scare
you from owning your own T-Shirt business, as there are many
successful individuals who have started their business in the
T-Shirt industry and are doing very well. I just want to give
you the facts of reality so that you're not disappointed when
your business isn't doing as well as you thought it would. You
may succeed at one aspect of the business, but fail in another,
or you just might be that person who is successful at all the
aspects of the business, which will obviously make your business
a success. Either way, you're still going to have to spend the
time and work very hard to achieve success.
Below I've listed some of the
things you need to consider before you setup or start your own
T-Shirt business:
Business Goals
Before you start your own T-Shirt
business, you need to think of your business goals. These goals
should be realistic and they should point you in the direction
you would like your business to go and what you hope to accomplish.
An example of a goal would be to have 100 visitors visiting your
shop/website a day or to create two new designs a week and put
them up on your website. Whatever the goals may be that you have
set for yourself, you then need to strive for them and once you
have accomplished your goals, then you know you're on the right
track.
Passion
You have to have an interest
in what you are doing or you're not going to enjoy spending the
time and effort your business requires. Everybody has a passion
in one thing or another whether it is creating the designs, promoting,
or any other aspect of the business, but you should have an interest
in it. If you're not passionate about a certain subject, then
you need to think of another theme that you would be more interested
in doing. Remember, you are going to spend a lot of time on the
subject/theme that you choose, so if you aren't passionate about
it, then you're going to get bored very fast and it's not going
to be enjoyable.
Subject/Theme
This is very important in the T-Shirt industry as some subjects/themes
do much better than others and receive more customers, but like
all styles, they come and go. It's possible to have a general
subject/theme, but it makes it harder for you to market/promote
your shop/website. I suggest choosing just one subject/theme
to begin with as you can start adding other subjects/themes later
when you are established. You should by all means choose a subject/theme
that you are knowledgeable about and have a passion for, like
I mentioned under the passion paragraph.
Target Audience
Who are you targeting? Will
you be targeting a certain age group, occupation, style, general
public, etc. Finding out who your primary target audience will
be or is, will help you with marketing/promotion. This will also
help you with creating and designing your T-Shirts and shop/website
to suit your target audience. Once again you can choose to go
for a general audience, but this will only make it harder for
you to market/promote your shop/website.
Research
You need to always do your research
and find out what's new, what's not, what's in style, what kind
of designs people are looking for, etc. You also need to keep
up-to-date with your subject/theme as some change on a regular
basis (Example: Politics). Keeping informed and up-to-date will
give you the leading edge over your competitors, bring back customers
time after time, and most importantly it will make sales.
Third Party shops Vs. Your Own
Website
Should I invest in my own website
or use a third party website to host my T-Shirt designs? If you
are thinking about doing every aspect of the T-Shirt business
yourself (including making the T-Shirts), then I suggest you
invest in a website (not a free website hosting service), but
first try out a third party website that makes the T-Shirts for
you (no risk involved or investment needed) to see if you can
make your business a success. Once you're confident in your business,
then you can upgrade to making and owning your own website.
There are many online third
party websites available on the Internet that you can choose
from that will create and ship the T-Shirts to your customers
(risk free with no money invested) and therefore, save you the
hassle of actually having to deal with the customer aspect of
your T-Shirt business. There are as many cons as there are pros
when using a third party service. Some of the cons are: You don't
get your own website and you are in some way connected to them,
you don't make as much profit (you have to pay them to do all
the work, like printing the T-Shirts and shipping), and they
make all the rules (Example: not providing you with the E-mail
address of your customers or refusing any designs that you create).
When you sign up with one of these third party services, you
are actually working for them and that includes promoting their
site. The customers that purchase your T-Shirts are actually
their customers meaning they have full control and every time
you make a sale, they make a profit. In other words, these third
parties depend on your success and if your business goes under,
theirs doesn't because there'll always be someone else to take
your place.
Marketing/Promoting
This will be your biggest enemy
in the T-Shirt business and many businesses fail because of this.
I suggest you do your research on the web for SEO (Search Engine
Optimization) and about how the basic search engines works, as
there is a lot of information about them. Do not just resort
to search engines as being your source for traffic as there are
many other websites that can help bring in quality targeted traffic
to your website like T-Shirt ranking sites (Example: www.T-ShirtShowdown.com).
The major search engines (Example:
Google) are complicated in how they work and many people have
been trying to figure out how they work for years. The search
engines change their algorithms on how pages are ranked every
once in a while so you're better off not focusing your attention
on just getting to the top in the search engines.
If you do manage to make it
to the top and are very successful, then your marketing/promotion
shouldn't stop there. You have to always be marketing/promoting
your site one way or another because it won't take long before
someone else over takes you, simply because links can die and
you need incoming links from other websites to get traffic.
T-Shirt Ranking Websites
Do ranking sites work? Yes,
ranking websites are a great way to market/promote your T-Shirt
designs and shops/websites. Many people don't want to waste their
time searching all over the web trying to locate websites that
sell specific designs that they are looking for. This is where
T-Shirt ranking websites come in handy and allow customers to
view thousands of different T-Shirt designs and styles from many
different websites. Ranking sites are a great way of bringing
many unique and different T-Shirt websites/designs together and
help to bring the buyers to the sellers. www.T-ShirtShowdown.com
is a great example and offers many different categories to choose
from including: Animal, Artistic, Attitude, Automobile, Biker,
Computer, Floral, Funny, Holiday, Kids, Logo, Misc., Movie, Music,
Novelty, Occupation, Offensive, Patriotic, Pets, Political, Religious,
Sports, Unusual, Vintage, and Western.
Many T-Shirt business owners
think that they can just upload their T-Shirt designs to a ranking
website and expect to receive sales. This is a myth and it's
not true. Ranking sites, like www.T-ShirtShowdown.com, bring
high quality targeted traffic to your website, but it's your
T-Shirt designs in the end that have to convince the customer
to buy/purchase the product. T-Shirt ranking websites only make
it easier for you to market/promote your site/designs and to
get the high quality targeted traffic that every business wants.
The next article in this two-part
series outlines some advice, problems, and solutions from other
T-Shirt businesses that they encountered when they were starting
their own T-Shirt business.
Article: How To Start A T-Shirt Business, Part Two - Case
Studies For Success |
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