New Ecommerce Website A new venture I am working on is another ecommerce business which will be based on a Yahoo Store Ecommerce platform. It will be called www.BodyMonkey.com The name came from a body jewelry store I was going to create, but my lack of interest left the domain for dead. I then needed a temporary domain name to let the Yahoo designers build the site, so I used BodyMonkey and then started to really like the name. It’s catchy and can eventually become a brand. ……and the name just makes me laugh! A setback on this business is of all the shopping cart platforms out there, the one I know the LEAST about is Yahoo Stores. Another setback to the process is the limited number of Yahoo Store designers out there, because Yahoo uses their own custom programming language called RTML. This means a specialized designer must be hired, and “specialized” always equals “more money.” I’m not a fan of spending a lot of money on a business until its proven itself….but I had to suck it up on this one. So far the rough shell of the site has been posted, and work is about 30% done on the site. Currently the site is a duplicate of my House Of Rave business, but that will somewhat be changed in the coming weeks. I will focus more on the design and layout in the coming weeks. BodyMonkey will work much like my first online business, but this time I can correct a lot of the mistakes I’ve made in the past, and implement new features the HoR software doesn’t have. Something I’ve been having a lot of fun doing is making product videos and taking product photos for all the products that will be on the site. The supplier carries over 2,000+ products which I will eventually also carry, so this is no small undertaking and will be an ongoing process. ——————— I’m trying to find some sort of logo for BodyMonkey, and maybe even a character. When the site is running I want to rotate the logo every two weeks. Customers will be able to submit their logos, and if they’re used on the site, they get a free t-shirt or something like that. This will be the first time I’m commissioning art for a website, which should be interested. It’s interesting to watch a talented artist use their creativity. So far, this is all I’ve come up with on my own: The reason I think this business will do well is because I have so much fun doing stuff for it. Getting artwork done by caricature artists, learning a new ecommerce platform, taking product photos, playing with the products myself, making product videos etc… The reason BodyMonkey never turned into a body jewelry store is because I don’t care or know anything about body jewelry. The whole project would have been half-assed and therefore never become anything big. I wrote about taking product photos a short while ago which is challenging and fun, but even harder is making product videos. My first few were horribly cheesy, and I realized the need for proper camera techniques and proper editing. I may eventually invest in some expensive video editing software. Here is one sample of a product video for these really neat Luna Candle things: I’m sure I’ll get better at these product videos as time goes on. So over the next few months, BodyMonkey.com will be transformed from just a simple shell of a site, to a fully functional Ecommerce store. 19 Comments About Neville NevBlog.com - Tracking the road to financial success from the age of 22 (now 27). View all posts by Neville →
Jared December 4, 2006 at 4:17 am That video was actually pretty nice. Great job. I can’t wait to see the developments in the BodyMonkey site!! Reply ↓
Ted December 4, 2006 at 5:57 am I looked at the body jewellery market a while back. There are great margins if you’re doing your buying in bulk and doing your own shipping. However I don’t agree with changing your logo every two weeks. You said in your post that you were hoping to brand the domain name, but if you change your logo every two weeks then you’re going to lose impact from the whole branding experience. When was the last time McDonalds changed there logo ? Reply ↓
Fuser December 4, 2006 at 1:30 pm I agree with Ted, changing the logo every 2 weeks causes you to lose cohesion. Although changing the masthead can be fun. Check out dooce.com. She changes the masthead every month but retains the logo. http://www.dooce.com/archives/mastheads/index.html Reply ↓
Wiseguy December 4, 2006 at 4:23 pm BodyMonkey.com – sounds great. Catchy too. I’ve noticed recently that there is a trend to pick domains with meanings that are comletely different from the sites content. And interestingly, everyone seems to remember those domains and what those sites are all about. So, BodyMonkey.com – very very good domain. P.S. Great video.But sounds are scaring me =)sounds like an old movie about space ,aliens and stuff. Reply ↓
Anonymous December 4, 2006 at 5:16 pm Cool site. I like the ways you are always thinking profits, it’s good to have multiple streams of income. But I have to agree with wiseguy, the music is too techno! a little creepy Reply ↓
P John December 4, 2006 at 6:19 pm The candels appear to be marketed with an intention for romatic settings. As the above ppl have mentioned the song seems to have some horror undertones. I think the music that will fit it best is techno with romantic qualities. I dont know if theres a lot of music that fits this or not. Good luck on your venture. Reply ↓
Web Enterpriser December 4, 2006 at 9:24 pm I’d concentrate more on improving House of Rave. The website design needs a lot of work…more of a professional design. A more professional looking site = more money! Free WordPress Themes!Download 100% Free WordPress Templates, Themes, and Styleshttp://www.icravewordpress.com Reply ↓
Anonymous December 5, 2006 at 12:12 am Nev, how did you manage to get the rights to that music? You did get permission to use it, right? Loopyhttp://www.betathetapi.net Reply ↓
Anonymous December 5, 2006 at 12:13 am Nev, how did you manage to get the rights to that music? You did get permission to use it, right? Loopyhttp://www.betathetapi.net Reply ↓
Peter Cooper December 5, 2006 at 2:04 am Video is generally pretty good.. however, too much writing! Show, don’t tell. You can cut out the color morphing bit since we can see it happening.. you can still say speeding up 4x though (so people don’t think they really change that fast). Videos are for seeing rather than reading (ideally!) and since these should end up on a Web page, you don’t need to be too infomerical-like. Anyway, can’t wait to see if this is a success! Best of luck. Reply ↓
Anonymous December 5, 2006 at 3:36 am Great job Nev, I liked the video alot, the song was not bad to me, probably could find something a little bit better but its not a bad song, its still very house/trancyish type stuff. Keep up the good work and hopefully more posts! -Marco (San Antone) Reply ↓
Chief Show Officer December 6, 2006 at 12:16 am Why did you move to the Yahoo! platform? You obviously have a platform for HOR that works which I assume is not Yahoo!. Reply ↓
AG December 12, 2006 at 12:27 pm Video’s not bad. I actually like the domain name. Start early…start fast Reply ↓
George December 15, 2006 at 3:28 am I am glad you are sticking with the E-Commerce thing. I guess your ideas keep the site going. But did you know nev blog itself increased from am average 20,000 to 60,000 day hits in the past week,Dec 7 – Dec 14.At this rate I know your hitting over a half million hits per month. Based off your current traffic alone you could sell the site between $300,000 to $500,000. You are getting a little more traffic then Myspace.co.uk,which has received offers that have been more than a $100,000. It is funny your books say you have only made $40,000 odd thousand, but I know you can make more. My advice to you would be to leverage your traffic to other entrepreneurs. Ask for a cut of their profits, maybe parnter with people you think can make you a lot of money. Or charge at least people for sponorship or promotion of their product. A lot of people are try to take advantage of your site through comments. Use your celeb status as a selling point. People will check out things out if you tell them too. I know you have a enough readers. I know for myself I have a lot of creative of ideas that will make me rich, some that go hand in hand with your ideas, but one thing I lack is your popularity. If you like what you hear get hold of me. I am one of your friends from facebook.com. The only male friend you have from Chicago. Lets see how much free advertisement I get from you. Visit my url address:http://www.ChicagoHolding.com Thanks Neville and Good Luck! Almost forgot I know some tricks about video promotion as well. Reply ↓
paul December 21, 2006 at 7:06 pm hey that was a nice video.best of luck to you.and as you posted a youtube video did you know that you can rip or download videos from : YouTube.com, Google.com, Myspace at KeepV.com. Reply ↓
Anonymous January 16, 2007 at 2:22 am Just a comment about earning cash online. See MillionDollarScience.com – it’s about this guy that pretend to be someone whose name is Mark Davis.. and he actually earns about 10% of the revenue on this page.. meaning about 70 grand a month!! How I know? Because that weird guy is ME. You should check it out, my english sucks but I make money, and that’s all I need to know. Reply ↓
C.Carl January 19, 2007 at 5:47 am Hi, your domain is really very informative i tried this site also for all secured loans information and give ur review on it Reply ↓
FastCommerce.com February 28, 2008 at 10:07 pm Why set it up on Yahoo? http://www.fastcommerce.com has a single system e-commerce platform that is not only awesome, it’s FREE for the first fify products. Reply ↓