Veronica Jeans, an eCommerce expert, responds from Texas

This interview took place on May 15, 2020.

Connecting in person with Veronica at the Social Media Marketing World conference every year is a highlight for me. We both support businesses with online marketing know-how, but Veronica focuses mainly on e-commerce clients who use Shopify to sell their products, while I focus more on sales funnels and Facebook advertising for service-based businesses that use Kajabi or Wordpress. I reached out to Veronica to find out how things are going these days in the e-commerce world.

Guest bio:

Veronica Jeans is an eCommerce Business Consultant & Shopify Expert. With a passion for following online sales trends, she can tell you all about turning an initial investment of $100,000 into a company with a return above $2.5 million annually within 2 years, because she's done it. Long story short, she built a successful business supplying IT professionals to some of the US's most significant and successful companies. Now she coaches and teaches eCommerce business owners on how to build and negotiate all the intricacies of running an online store.

Originally from Namibia, Africa, she has lived in South Africa, The Netherlands, and now Houston, Texas. Her family has expanded by two wonderful daughters-in-law, their families, and her grandchildren. She has been living on a motor yacht (not just a 'boat') for the last eight years and has a fantastic time running her company from the boat, planning her future, while cruising in the islands.

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Transcript:

Sally Hendrick (00:40):

Hello Veronica Jeans. This is Sally. How are you doing today?

Veronica Jeans (00:44):

Oh, I'm doing absolutely bloody marvelous.

Sally Hendrick (00:47):

Bloody marvelous. I love it. Well, it was great seeing you earlier this year. I saw you in early March in San Diego at the social media marketing world conference.

Veronica Jeans (01:00):

It was marvelous.

Sally Hendrick (01:02):

It was marvelous. And it was also so early in this COVID-19 game that they really, the only thing we were doing was getting hand sanitizer at every entry and, but people were still hugging and talking and we didn't really know what was going on.

Veronica Jeans (01:23):

Yes, yes, exactly. That's what a month. Maybe a month later. It started a month later. Right?

Sally Hendrick (01:32):

Well, sort of serious, seriously serious case. We're start, the cases were starting and there was actually the first death while we were in San Diego. But that was the first, I mean, so it was as far as like the buzz and the talk the responses that were happening, it was really not until mid-March when it was kinda like, Oh, maybe we should pay attention.

Sally Hendrick (01:59):

And then by the end of March, a little bit of chaos going on.

Veronica Jeans (02:04):

Because I had my birthday on the boat by myself or with my, with my husband. So, Oh yes, exactly. Yes. And it's funny, you know, so we had all this marketing information and cool turfs and you know, we now in just such a different situation that some of that stuff doesn't work. Right. So some of this stuff works, some of this stuff doesn't work. Yeah, no, that's very, very interesting. And so I've been, I've been chatting to people as well about, you know, how they're pivoting their businesses and that's the most interesting thing is that people are hopefully doing things differently. Right?

Sally Hendrick (02:46):

So speaking of business, give us a little background on what you do and cause you and I dabble in this in a similar space, but we both, very different types of clients. Yes.

Veronica Jeans (03:00):

So mine are all about e-commerce. So I'm totally niche e-commerce and I'm even more niche than that. And I do only a Shopify. And now I have clients and big commerce and magenta. But you know, I'm always, I'm always moving, I'm moving them along, I'm moving them along, moving them over to Shopify. I've, I've yet to see a client that was not happy with it, but and some of them can't move, you know, or it's too much of a big transition, but it's just building that, building that business on the online, your online business and retail clients. So there's point of sale and con and you know, hardware. And I love hardware. I'm lord. Nothing ever goes right with hardware. But, but so yes. And then so building up their businesses and then trying to get sales. Now that's what we're all doing, trying to get sales, trying to get more clients.

Sally Hendrick (03:57):

So as far as getting sales, what industries or what types of products do you feel like are still okay out there? And what about your clients that aren't doing okay right now? What's happening?

Veronica Jeans (04:09):

Well, it seems like toilet papers still. I, I to mention that I still don't understand the toilet paper fiasco, but you know what, and here's the thing is I have yet to have a client that is not doing well and even, yeah, and it's, it's so diverse from skincare to puzzles to actually industrial. We haven't, we haven't properly launched, but we still getting sales. And then who else is there sports? They're doing well except the school sports, but they're also getting sales, which is really, I mean, you would think that school sports equipment and hockey and stuff, it would, it would be dead. They still getting sales on Amazon and so we've just relaunched their store.

Veronica Jeans (04:58):

So that's going to be an interesting transition to see what's going to happen because you know, the schools are not opening up now. And so, yeah. So you have to think outside the box. So we've been thinking about ways of, of actually what can they do to, to still entertain their clients, right? What can they do to still make sales? And now we told me about teenage girls and obviously coaches, but teenage girls mainly. And you know, I said, you know, just create a competition between the teams, you know, to to design the best t-shirt or something like that. Get the, get the girls involved so that they get that team thing going. And so every single business has been a little bit different of, I guess, how can we do? And so one of the big things was, and this is a huge change, a lot of retail stores where, you know, I'm online, but you know, it's not so important. You know, I'm getting a lot of sales in my store, you know, I'm okay. And it's, it's been that switch that everybody is going, going online, getting things going and, and, and really concentrating on the eCommerce. But for all of them, you know, the retail, because I mean, yeah, yeah. It's not, it's not going to work. I think that's going to be the biggest change in e-commerce is going up because everybody has to be online.

Sally Hendrick (06:29):

I can say I agree with you. I feel like, you know, I feel like there's been a slow uptick into the e-commerce for a while, but yeah, right now it's about to hit this whole new level. And then just keep going because it, the same thing has happened to me. All of a sudden people who have, you know, fitness studios or maybe they have a client here in their online that they deal with, but then suddenly they're like, Oh, I need a membership. Oh, I need a course. Oh, I've been working on this thing over here and I've never put the effort into the marketing side of it. And so they've been knocking on my door on that regard.

Veronica Jeans (07:11):

Yes. Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, and that's the last thing you want to do is, is, is, is, is take away your marketing. I mean, large companies mainly that's what the first thing they do is dumbed down on the marketing. But as a small company, you have to literally step up your marketing because you have to be in front of your customer and you can't sell. You can't just sell. It's not about selling anymore. It's about relationships. And I mean, we talk about relationships for years, right? And it's now it's even more important about relationships. And I think, you know, and you know, I've, I've and, and you know, try and get that brand awareness as well on the line. It was a normal, people can do the schmoozing online, right? Because they, you know, they have an eCommerce store and then they learn to be behind the scenes.

Veronica Jeans (08:03):

You know, I don't want to use the personal, you know, it's too much personal stuff and I'll go, now you've got to push that person to stuff. But yeah, they have to get to know you. Right? I mean, these people have to feel like they get to know you because, so I had a friend it was scam, unfortunately Shopify store, but I mean, it'll probably in any of the other store, none of the other shopping platforms as well. She bought this hardware, whatever it was. It was $90 in the store and it was $300 on Amazon, which already there's a ding, ding, ding, right? There's something wrong here. And so you know, and was scam. They took the money, goes to the store and moved on.

Sally Hendrick (08:48):

It wasn't even real. It was just this is to be personal.

Veronica Jeans (08:56):

It's as important to get your, to get your information on your about page and tell your story.

Veronica Jeans (09:02):

And the telephone number is that little thing like telephone number, you email, you know, people are going to call me. No they're not. No, they're not. No more comfortable texting you or chatting with you then calling you off. Right? Yeah.

Sally Hendrick (09:19):

So as far as getting people to realize that they've got to have some brand awareness and that this is the reality TV generation we're dealing with these days, what's the best piece of advice that you can give an eCommerce store owner about making that happen? What are, what are like a couple of things they could do? Well, one of the biggest things I think that can do is a, have a video, a thank you video on their thank you page. Just natural the wall behind you and say thank you very much for shopping with us personal video. Okay, two. They can actually have more behind the scenes, right?

Sally Hendrick (10:07):

Getting videos and blog posts and things like that.

Veronica Jeans (10:11):

Videos write blog posts. Blog posts are so important because you want to get, you want to get customers to come to your store, but so how are they going to get to know you? Instead of just looking at your, at your products, they get to know you by your stories, right? By your information that you're going to give. And then and then so think about how not everybody's comfortable in front of the camera. So think about how can you give them, so one of my lingerie ladies, she actually made a video of how to clean out your closet, right? And we all need that, right? We'all got an old lingerie that we never used me someday going to fit into, right?

Sally Hendrick (10:51):

So I signed up on that.

Veronica Jeans (10:55):

when I was 20. Right. So anyways, I'm going to be [inaudible] again.

Veronica Jeans (11:01):

But anyways, so she does made a little video, little handout really with us with a phone about getting out of closet. Brilliant. Right? Yeah. another, another one of my clients did Oh, he sells these mats and I haven't got one in front of me, but they're knotted mats right. So I said to him, do do behind the scenes. So what he did is he put the mat down and, and he took his cup and he went, this is how you use the mat, put the cup down, took the cup off the mat it says, do I have to show this to you again? You had the best engagement on that stupid video. Right.

Sally Hendrick (11:39):

My goodness. I've got a client who he's blind and so I've been really, it's been a challenge for me because the way that I teach him, it has to be so different than the way I teach other people. He's made

Sally Hendrick (11:54):

His own website, he's done all these things. I mean, he is amazing. He can, he gets these little, I don't know, some sort of sound that he gets. And he also, if he knows what keyword to search within a piece of software, he can find things and then do what needs to be done. And so, but when it comes to Facebook ads, Oh my gosh, it's really hard because that system is so big and clunky and so it's really, he doesn't know what to look for. So when I get on with him, you know, he's doing all these things. But anyway, he is a coach who helps people to crush their mental blocks, to get over their nightmares, to get over these situations in life, anxiety, whatever. And he has this really creative way of thinking about things. And of course he does because he's blind.

Sally Hendrick (12:44):

He has this, he has this innate talent to be able to see things from a completely different perspective. But you know what I mean? And so I was talking to him about, I was like, you know, you really need to like tell some of these stories whenever we have our group calls, the stories that you tell us, we all just go, Oh wow, that's interesting. I like the way that you said that you're a kind of a funny guy, you know? And so I'm like you need to be telling these stories. So he goes to get his camera set up and he puts on a shirt or whatever. And I told him, I said, no, whatever you got on that back wall. And of course I can't really say anything. I haven't really fixed anything here lately. But unlike that thing you've got on the back wall, it looks kind of weird and your angle on your camera's not right.

Sally Hendrick (13:39):

Don't go from the belt up. Come like from here up and you know, and so his girlfriend helped him get all that situated and so he gets online and and I said, just come in here and practice and show us different shirt colors and all that. Cause that one you did last time just blended right into the wall and we couldn't even see your shirt. It was weird. And so, and he hasn't seen those visual things so he doesn't get it. But we're telling him what to do. And finally he comes in and he does this really hilarious video and, and every time it would like switch to the same guy saying, you know he wears his little dark glasses but it would be a different color shirt. But it was the exact same pattern shirt like he had, he probably has like 10 of them in that color in different colors. And so he just kept doing it and the shirt color kept changing and he goes, well what about this one? And I was like, we're using that one in your marketing because that video is the funniest thing I've seen in a long time. And that's what we're going to do.

Veronica Jeans (14:40):

Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean they come up with this with, you have to, you know, my cousin said to me yesterday, it's business unusual. He's got a show in the Movio that they, according business unusual,

Veronica Jeans (14:52):

Which I think is brilliant. This is not just normal. Think outside the box. You got to think unusual about your business, which I totally agree with. We normally say, Oh, you've got to think outside the box. You know, it says there's a way beyond the box right now. So I know, right? This is beyond the box. That's another good name coming. It's coming out. It has to, you have to start thinking, okay. And you know, people are giving stuff away and not say, you know, she couldn't always give things away. Everybody has to survive, you know, and you can't always expect everything for free because again, we all trying to make money. Yeah. So yeah. So you have to just expect to pay a little bit at least, but be in a, you know, as, as I said, you know, in courses and stuff, I love courses and and because you always learn, you always doing something different. So yeah, I dunno what I was going to say, but anyway,

Sally Hendrick (15:49):

Yeah. But the whole outside of the box and doing things differently. So I mean, this show is COVID-19. The world responds, which is under the shout your cause name, which is one of the arms of my business. And when I first started it, I was like, you know, there's gotta be some sort of nonprofit in here. There's gotta be something where causes and ideas and other things that I personally care about could be shared through that. And then I could help people with the advertising, maybe, you know, collect donations, do some sort of thing, you know, to shout somebody's cause, whatever that may be, because they don't know how to do it otherwise. So when I first started, I did like I helped sell tickets for nonprofits events. And I did their ads for them. And I was like, you know, I did it from my page and they ended up selling out very early and it was, it worked out really great.

Sally Hendrick (16:55):

And I got an exchange, a couple of tickets for their really fancy dinner and that was great, you know. But then I went into, okay, I'm going to help some entrepreneurs who have started these nonprofits and they're tiny. They're really small, or I'm going to help an entrepreneur like Mike, the one that who's blind. And so I raised money at an a fundraiser and I, and I gave that money, not to them directly, but I used it to help them to leverage something. Yes. And but then when the COVID-19 situation hit, I was like, this is really something, it's content that I personally have huge interest in. Because my past, before I started my Facebook advertising marketing business, I was an actuary. So I did all of the numbers for those curves. Yeah. I did that for a living. I read them, I wrote stories out of them for big companies.

Sally Hendrick (17:59):

I mean, yeah, believe it, you can believe it or not, you can tell stories out of those, out of those things. And so it became like this huge thing for me. And so I just started doing presentations. I taught a couple of schools, a couple of business groups about how to read the charts and what they were looking at and what was valid, what wasn't, how to discern the news, how to look at what they needed to, to be able to tell what's, what's real, what's not and what it all meant. And that was completely different than talking about Facebook ads and marketing and all these other things. So here's my product over here, but this content has actually gotten me more work in the last couple of months than anything I've ever done before. Somebody in the eCommerce world create something out of a passionate con, you know, a subject or, or content that they have. How can they use that to be able to sell, to eventually sell their products?

Veronica Jeans (19:13):

That is the million dollar question. So I mean, you know, a lot of people are, if they're sick, you know, they have to have, first, they have to have an interest to do something else. So I have, my nose is running. So I have a lot of, a lot of we've got lots of allergy things going on. It's not COVID.

Sally Hendrick (19:34):

Yeah. I always say that I cough and I'm like, it's not a dry drug. Oh, so, so

Veronica Jeans (19:40):

First I have clients that are no interest in teaching anybody else. You know, they, all they want to do is build a business and it is a business, you know, so unless they have like, okay, I need to both something else to move my business forward. There's not that, there's not that, that urge because building your eCommerce business is a totally different animal to say phones in the us that are teaching people how to do stuff, right. Because they, on a, on a daily basis, they have to think about, you know, they do shipping and they do buying and they have to think, okay, so what else can I buy? What else can I take off? You know, I'm constantly helping my clients taking their stuff down. You know, something's not working. I get taking this stuff down, moving, they're moving, they're moving their information around.

Veronica Jeans (20:33):

Putting their stuff up and then thinking about, okay, so how are we going to, how are we going to advertise? And so the only way that that I think that if you're in e-commerce, and so a lot of e-commerce clients are not blogging. So I hate to call it blogging because it's writing articles and I call that as well. But it was everybody goes, Oh my God, I can't write anything. It is news. It is information that you need to give your customers. So first what they don't do is they don't communicate with their customers. They, all they do is they sell. And then so they don't create that relationship afterwards, that's off the care that are caught off the care. So teach, teaching them, okay, you need to do, you need to add things extra blocks to your business. So what I teach them literally is just add more blocks to their business that can grow their business.

Veronica Jeans (21:26):

And that is customer service. And you know, it's like, Oh God, that's so boring. You know, customer service. But in it is huge. So just, just a sample. Yeah, I get, I get you know, I, I do exchanges with my customers as well. I get free skincare so much. She packs it beautifully, right? So her whole packaging is like an experience, right? Because everything beautifully packed. You've got your 10% discount. She sends me a note, right? So a handwritten note, not something that she's printed out. She is a personal message to me. So as she says, it takes that those little bits take time, right? So as I sit in an eCommerce, so you you're, you are shipping and you are thinking, okay, how am I going to get more customers? Then you have to set up your emails, you know, which is hugely important to get those emails out, which is, and then you need to blog and write information and you've got to improve your site all the time.

Veronica Jeans (22:27):

So there is not that amount of time to say, okay, I think I'm going to create this business here that is going to push my, my, my products. It's all part of the same, same bucket where you're just putting extra, extra little tools and the bring your customers back to your site because that's the ultimate aim is to bring those customers back to your site, entertaining them. Right. And no way because there's 3000 of them coming in and only 30 buy if it's like 1% conversion. So you need to get those, I guess back in the game so they can come and have a look again. Yeah. The way you do information right, or being funny or, or performing on on Facebook or I don't know, posting cat videos.

Sally Hendrick (23:15):

Well, so one of my clients, one of my clients is an eCommerce client and she actually has she sells elderberry syrup and bee pollen and preserves or something like that. All from recipes, not the bee pollen, but all from recipes that she made herself. And and she's in a bunch of stores in the area. She's only been in business a little over a year, but she's getting ramping up the E commerce and she did more in e-commerce in the last couple of months. Then she did all of last year, so that was crazy. But she's just now getting into the whole situation where she's tacking on other things like landing pages and so on and so forth. And so are there any tools that you recommend from the shop for the Shopify people? Are there like two or three tools that you're like, you have to have these. Two or three or whatever?

Veronica Jeans (24:11):

Oh, absolutely. There's one tool that and it's, you know, Amazon has those, if you buy this, if bought together, you've got to have that app. You know, it just, it just, it gives that extra 10 to 20% conversion and just do an Amazon like Amazon does. If you buy this and you can get this, this for this amount of money. Oh, right, right, right, right. The packaging. Yeah, the packaging. But this is more like Amazon where they have the one product plus the other product plus the other products. It's not like a, you know, buy one, but if you, if you buy two, this is a better deal, but if you buy three, it's even a better deal. You know? It's actually combining and we just set it up on the one in the one children's boutique and I mean she has, it's all random right down random stuff.

Veronica Jeans (25:04):

I mean she's got like 3000 products, random stuff, you know, she changes up all the time and she's actually, she's actually had sales just because, because of that. So when she starts manually enhancing but she knows the customers, right. If she manually enhances it, she's going to get more sales. So that is an excellent. And obviously you have to have the reviews and everything that's without saying reviews, but yeah,

New Speaker (25:30):

About the landing page stuff is like, is there software you have to add to it to make it the same website so that the URL doesn't change or, I think so. So was Shopify, you have a website, you have a blog, you have your store, it's all in one. So for, so I always think that your, I've got to have this fan on me because I put my air conditioner off. It's hot here in Houston, in Texas, very humid. But, so you know, so e-commerce and the landing page is, is your product page normally. So if you are, if you are going out selling your product, they should be landing on a product page. They shouldn't be landing on a collection page or your homepage. It should be your product page because it has to be very specific of what people are buying because you're doing the advertising. Then you're going to say, do you want this? And boom,

Sally Hendrick (26:33):

Go and get it. And there's no confusion. You don't land that. Like if you're going to look at a coffee table, you're not going to land on the one with all the beds.

Veronica Jeans (26:44):

Yes. So you can do that in the store because, and then no sidebars or any, any distraction you'll want people to buy. So the the landing page is a block you can create. You can create a landing page out of a blog and make it an make it interesting and add your products and add your CTA is on there. It's information that's the landing page for, because you know, if you give, if you give people that are, want to shop too much options, they're going to get it. It's going to go boom. There you really want to be very specific. So you have to be very specific. What do you want to do when people come to your website, right? Do you want to get to know you? Then you go on your, on your, on your my story page. You know, if it's, if it's a specific product or if it's, how do I use my product when you have a video with the blog, right?

Veronica Jeans (27:42):

How do I use my product link, link, link. So I, you know, e-commerce people tend to think, Oh, I've got a landing page. This, that I get to if I, I mean, if you think about thinking about shopping when you shopping, if you don't land on that page, you get distracted because you go, Ooh, look at that. Ooh, look at this. Right? And you're not going to go searching. You'd not going to go searching, right? You're not going to trip. So I have my, again, my boutique, she has, she has flat lays where she has, where she has different products on it and that every specific product goes to a product page and that's how she sells, you know? So but then she has an she also has an established clientele. They know her, she's been in business for 10 years, so she knows her client and she's now starting to get plants out of the state, which is very exciting for her outside of Houston fact, which is very exciting for, but again, you know she, so it depends here again, it depends on what are you selling.

Veronica Jeans (28:56):

Clients are looking for that specific designer, right? Or products are designer somebody else. They're looking for something else. Again, like my, like my the one athletics lady, she has, I mean that come for the t-shirt, but you know what, they'll, they will be interested in the pants, right, on the shorts and the headband or something. Right? So if she puts those together. So you've got to, you've got to really know who your customer is. And you know, that landing page is your product page, you know, and there are apps that are there's upsell app. Yeah, can't remember what it not. Who sells it, who sells, Firestone sells it. It's high app and you can, so you can create your page, just your page information in Shopify. But again, you know, I, you know, it's so, there's so much cost to having a stall besides, you know, the your apps that you need and your and your options apps that you need or maybe your upsell apps or down sell apps that you need, your emails that you have to pay for.

Veronica Jeans (30:09):

You know, there's so many things that that goes into your overhead. I like to keep things simple, really. You keep it simple and your overheads keep your overheads down and start and sell more.

Sally Hendrick (30:22):

So what would be your advice to somebody who is struggling right now and really hasn't gone towards this e-commerce? What, what's the first thing they need to do? Call you?

Veronica Jeans (30:36):

Yeah, absolutely. Hello?

Sally Hendrick (30:38):

Veronica Jeans, everybody. veronicajeans.com.

Veronica Jeans (30:43):

so, so the, I mean if you need somebody who hasn't been, hasn't gone online yet.

Sally Hendrick (30:49):

Yeah. Like maybe they're having to pivot a lot of things in their business and get something for sale online because otherwise they've been maybe shipping things from their factory or whatever it may be and they're just having to get into a whole different side of the business. So Shopify is giving 90 day free trials as well. That's good to know.

Veronica Jeans (31:12):

Yes, yes. So anybody can contact me. I will make sure that they get it. And then and so, so, but it always takes a little bit longer. You know, I've got a, I just finished my five day challenge and somebody said, Oh, I can set up Shopify in a day. And I go, yeah, we can set it up, but it's got nothing to do with your product photos and all this other stuff that you need. Yeah. There's a whole write your story and write two product descriptions and all this other stuff. So my best advice is for somebody that wants to go online, start, just get started with one product. I don't care, just go.

Sally Hendrick (31:48):

all the way through the process so you know everything that goes with it. Right? Because otherwise you could just be putting a bunch of stuff up there and then it's just junk because you don't have any descriptions.

Sally Hendrick (31:59):

You don't have all the categories, right. You don't have all these little details that are really important. Okay.

Veronica Jeans (32:06):

So if you don't know what you want to sell, Hey, you got to test it. Right? And see if people actually want to buy it. Because not everything that we think people want, they get to buy. So you go to do some testing, see what you know, go on Amazon and see what's, what's the best, the best products that are selling on Etsy. See what's selling, what's good to know. How do you know what's selling? I think that have the best features, the best stores, if you've got just gone Etsy. Okay. But I mean, the first, I think the first couple of layers are ads. And then after that, you know, those stores are selling because they are putting more into their advertising. They're putting more effort into that, into the under their marketing and marketing and the groupings and all this.

Veronica Jeans (32:57):

It seems all about SEO, really. Literally keywords. Yeah. and then, I mean, Amazon is fabulous, you know, so if you want to see what's selling on Amazon tests, you can test it out on Amazon. See if it goes, you can actually sell your products through, through Shopify on Amazon. Test it out. I mean, you know what, I don't know what goes, you know, I mean, people come to me with products, you know, let's set it up and see if it sells and then take it for another year. You know, obviously if you're selling but you hitting a peak, now there is something that's missing, then you have to reevaluate. You know, but you really don't know. You know, I can't, I had another question from some lady in Australia. She says, you know, I've got these hundred glasses, you know, sunglasses that are like Bluetooth, you know, like the Bluetooth for, for for your phone, which is amazing.

Veronica Jeans (33:52):

So you can be cycling and exercising and with your sunglasses on and, and answering your phone. And so she has a, but it is not easy to do that. Right? But listen, yet everybody loves to, I love gadgets. I love gadgets. Right. So, but you know, again, you know, I don't know if it's going to sell or not. I said put it up and see if it sells. I mean, that's all I can tell you. She ordered a hundred before China closed. I said, you know, I can't tell you if it sells or not. And it all depends, again, is, is to grow your eCommerce store with everything else that you need to do. You're not going to get anywhere if you don't advertise. Yeah, that's true. It's what, what's the, what's the organic growth is 2% on Facebook and it takes forever.

Sally Hendrick (34:43):

I just tell people it's such a waste of time. You just need to figure out your paid path and make it work.

Veronica Jeans (34:50):

You know, you've got to, you got to advertise. It got to retarget, you got to remark it. You got to got to do ad ads. I don't care how little it is. If you have $20 to spend in a month, you do those bloody ads, you know, because you're not gonna get, you're not going to get any traction. And believe me, I don't do ads. I've started, so I started in doing ads, then I'm going, Oh my gosh, now you know, I've got people popping in, you know, so I, you know, so you, you have to, you just have to, well,

Sally Hendrick (35:23):

I've got a client who helps a lot of people with comment sold. They use comments sold. Have you heard of that software? You can integrate Shopify with it. And it integrates with Facebook and

Sally Hendrick (35:38):

There's something to do. It's kind of like a chat feature. If somebody names of product or says a certain word in the comments underneath the Facebook post, then it connects them to the store

Veronica Jeans (35:54):

Oh wow.

Sally Hendrick (35:57):

Hi. It's cool. I'm telling you, she was having trouble connecting it up with Facebook and making sure everything talked to each other. And so I was like, all right, let's get into here. We gotta we gotta troubleshoot this and figure it out. Cause I didn't know, I never used it, but we figured it out because she had several clients who have it and they sell, they have clothing stores and that's how they sell. They literally put the clothes on and say, look at this. Isn't it cute? I love how this does whatever better, dah dah, dah, dah. And it's like an auction and people will comment below and then the thing will sell out.

Veronica Jeans (36:34):

Wow. Isn't that crazy? That is crazy. And so Facebook also is get, so it's in beta in Shopify, Facebook marketplace, you know, the market place to be like, so you know, my secondhand furniture, they, they trying to turn that into an eCommerce eCommerce option. It's not perfect right now because my, went on, I mean it was beta. So we jump on anything that's beta pop that on. She immediately got 11 sales. She lost a couple of sales, but she was not on, she didn't realize, she didn't realize she had sales. So the communication between the software and Facebook, you know, that's always a little bit iffy. You gotta keep the eye on it and Shopify we'll bomb you, if you don't immediately, if you don't answer them in a certain amount of time. I can't remember. But she got sales from that.

Veronica Jeans (37:35):

So you know what my, my advice as well is sell on several different platforms. So Shopify is a shopping platform, a big commerce. Magenta is a shopping platform, but you got to sell on Amazon. You've got to sell on eBay, you gotta sell on anybody. It seems just Etsy. You know, if you have handmade the Facebook, you know there's messenger now as well. You can sell a messenger have it, have a chat, you know, have a chat on your, on your website so you can check your customers, right? Yeah. So just try out the shopping platforms because you really, really don't know whether you're going to sell or not. I mean literally hopefully prospective client is selling mainly wholesale millions. Okay. Mainly wholesale. So their margins are super, super slim, but they're selling a lot of stuff, right?

Veronica Jeans (38:42):

Very small. Yeah, but they are selling, you know, so they're selling wholesale. So selling on these different platforms where boutiques, well now, right now it's not going to work that well, but it will, you know, when you start, when you going onto this wholesale platforms where you can market platforms where you can actually sell your product, like a marketing you know, if it, my, several of my clients go to marketing events, you know, with just sell the products. So you've got to get out there. It's like, it's like, you know, when you start, you started online store it used to be used on a retail store in your city. You know, you go, okay, people come on,

Sally Hendrick (39:25):

Okay, you walk in the door. Yeah. But no, you've got to work on the eCommerce.

Veronica Jeans (39:31):

But it's the same thing with e-commerce. You know, if you have an eCommerce and you don't do anything about it, it's a brochure. It's like a website. If you don't do anything to get people to the website, it's a brochure, right? So you got to do something about it.

Sally Hendrick (39:46):

They call it an online file folder until you figure out what to do with it. Cause otherwise you just put all the stuff you know up there on, on in your files. And

Veronica Jeans (39:55):

Yes, yes. And there's so many ways, you know, people get on LinkedIn. Linkedin is brilliant, you know, not a lot of people have discovered it. Hello, these are people that are actually earning money. They're on LinkedIn or maybe getting a job, you know, so you gotta be on LinkedIn. Not everybody has money that's on Facebook, although, you know, exactly, you have to play with a big, with the big boys want us to play, but B and B on different, different platforms, you know, don't just be, I've had several customers that, so Shopify or e-commerce or magenta, it's your own business. They don't control it. As I said to this friend of our that got scam, I said they don't control the store. You can sell anything in Shopify. They can't tell you. Obviously if you're selling, I don't know. No, you can sell alcohol and everything, but they can't tell you you can't do that.

Veronica Jeans (40:52):

Right. They can't even tell you. You should have privacy things and terms and stuff. They can't tell you anything about your store. But Etsy, Amazon, Facebook, all the rules to follow. Yeah. And they can actually shut your store down. I've had a lady that made 150,000 a year. She woke up in the one morning and her store was closed. Her daughter's store because she was an administrator was closed as well. Yes. So if you can't control your business, if you aren't, if you playing in somebody else's, you got to make sure you have your own sandbox. Right? Yeah. So from your own sandbox, you can go and clown everybody else's sandbox. Right. Cause that's where your customers are. So yeah. I mean, so many, so many apps, you know, that, that, that are good or not. It depends on what you're going to sell, really.

Sally Hendrick (41:55):

So to wrap this up, what about your hopes for the future of this whole e-commerce thing and Shopify. Is there anything that that with the COVID-19, what do you think is going to happen?

Veronica Jeans (42:12):

Oh, it's going to just skyrocket. It is just going to go absolutely nuts. I think so. Which is, it's a good thing for me. It's not such a good thing. If you, if you're selling something, if you want to sell something, you have to start now because when we out of this and people have more money because you know, 50 million people out of work and worldwide is even probably worse when we out of this. People have more, have more money, disposable. You already on that traction up where you're starting to attract customers and everything. You've already done your homework, you've already built your cost, your customer base, and you can only grow, but you have to do it now.

Veronica Jeans (42:57):

You know, you can't wait for this whole thing to disappear and it's, you know, we're going to look back at this news to come and go, you know what, that's six months. If you had to stay at home, you know, it was a blipping out and now history, right as we, as we talk about everything else. So you've got to start now. But if, in fact I am going to start selling something online. I've always wanted to, this is how I got into this mess, obviously. Seriously. So I'm a, I'm launching a book and how to set up has set up a Shopify store, but I am actually going to start selling something. So I'm going to design something. I'm going to sell something and I'm just going to exactly. You know, so if you don't start something, I'm telling you already, I'm challenging everybody to start selling something online.

Sally Hendrick (43:45):

I might need to talk to you about that myself because I've got a passion that I can easily talk about and write about and, and whatever all the time. And I think that I could parlay that into some sort of store. And so I really, I really want to think about that because you, you have hit the nail on the hammer, on the nail or whatever the nail on the head that they love the hit get. I'm from Namibia. So it's a bit strange. You know, I've heard like three languages, I think about four languages. But it's a, so you got you, if you selling anything, you gotta be passionate about it because you have to talk about it. You have to persuade somebody to come and buy from you because you love your product. So I mean, if you, I mean, why not try this is what I'm saying, why not try, you know, I've had several careers in my life only because I'm always jumping in.

Veronica Jeans (44:39):

If you're not going to try, you're going to look back and say, man, I should've tried that yet and then this would have been a great time to do it. Right. I'm telling you, I mean, we have the time right now, things on the influx, you know, customers are sort of there and they're not the, and, and so, and it's, it's, it's like, okay, so how are we, how are you going to get more customers is a problem I think for everybody, right? Because a lot of people are out of work, you know, the things are, and we, an election year never goes well in an, in an election year anyway. So, so, and the, I mean the gas prices are down to one 33 down here and I have an electric car. So you're lucky you're lucky, but you know, so, so things are only going to get going next to it.

Veronica Jeans (45:27):

Covid or no covid, right? Yeah. So, so, but you know what, you've got to start, you've got to start. I mean, there's a lot of small business that are going to give in and, and a lot of businesses going to start, you just gotta be more [inaudible] and more consistent and hang in there baby, because you're the goods. You know what, when you wake up and you go and you have that little sale, it doesn't matter how much you've made. It's the most exciting thing to yeah, it is. I make my, I make it some affiliate stuff and every now and again I get my husband. Yeah, I made $17 I can buy a bottle of wine, you know, so yeah.

Sally Hendrick (46:15):

Anyway. Sounds good. Well thank you so much for talking with me today. I've loved getting to know about your business and about what you see in this e-commerce world and I love the fact that you're right in front of it because I mean this is the cutting edge way, way things are and and with COVID-19 situation we have to respond to what's happening.

Veronica Jeans (46:36):

Yep. Yep. Absolutely. Absolutely. And we will chat. Thank you very much for having me on. I absolutely loved and I can talk about this all day.

Sally Hendrick (46:47):

I know. Me too. Love it. Thank you so much, Veronica. Bye.

Sally Hendrick (47:00):

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