• New financing products every business owner should know about
• The dangers of predatory Merchant Cash Advance (MCA) companies
• Shocking tactics used by some lenders to take advantage of small businesses

If you're a small business owner looking for funding options or trying to avoid common pitfalls, this is a must-watch! Don’t forget to check out our last episode with Evan on the SBA Bolt Loan—link in the description.

💡 Stay informed. Protect your business. Build your future. 💡

🔔 Subscribe for more small business tips and advice!

Welcome to another enlightening episode of Material Retail Dumps! Today, we're unraveling the mystery of Shopify metafields—what they are, why you should care, and how to implement them to elevate your eCommerce store.

💡 In This Episode, You'll Learn:

• What metafields are and their role in Shopify's ecosystem.
• Scenarios where metafields can make a difference in your customer's shopping experience.
• A quick and simple guide to implementing metafields on your Shopify store.

🎯 Who Should Listen?

• Current Shopify store owners looking to customize and optimize their shops.
• Aspiring eCommerce entrepreneurs planning to use Shopify.
• Anyone interested in understanding Shopify's more advanced features.

💡 What You'll Learn

• The untapped potential of Google & YouTube for eCommerce.
• Why Facebook & Instagram are essential platforms for brand exposure.
• How the Shop App can serve as a game-changing asset for your business.
• The advantages of using Shopify Inbox for customer service.
• The power of Pinterest as a sales channel for your Shopify store.

🎯 Who This Episode is For

• Shopify store owners looking to diversify and grow.
• eCommerce enthusiasts wanting to explore different sales channels.
• Business owners planning to venture into Shopify.

SEO for Brick-and-Mortar Businesses - Discover easy-to-implement SEO strategies tailored for businesses like yours. From local SEO to content creation, we've got you covered.

 Time Investment Expectations - Learn what kind of time commitment you're looking at for meaningful SEO results.

 Avoiding SEO Scams - Stay one step ahead of fraudsters with our guide on common scams and red flags to watch out for in the SEO world.

Don't miss this power-packed 6-minute episode for a crash course in making SEO work for your business. 🚀

Join us as we dive deep into the fascinating topic of using data to bring customers back into physical retail stores. In an age where e-commerce dominates, it's crucial for brick-and-mortar retailers to leverage data effectively to create personalized experiences and drive foot traffic.

Isabelle Groper, a seasoned expert in customer data and marketing, shares her wealth of knowledge and experience in harnessing data to engage customers and increase in-store sales. We explore the strategies, tools, and techniques that retailers can employ to better understand their customers, deliver targeted marketing campaigns, and optimize the in-store experience.

From leveraging customer segmentation and predictive analytics to implementing loyalty programs and leveraging social media, we uncover actionable insights that retailers can implement to thrive in today's competitive retail landscape.

If you're a retailer looking to revitalize your physical stores, or simply someone interested in the intersection of data and retail, this episode is for you. Tune in to Material Retail Dumps Episode 41 and join us on this enlightening conversation with Isabelle Groper from Klaviyo.

Product Descriptions: Learn how you can use ChatGPT to draft detailed, engaging product descriptions that can turn visitors into paying customers, all while saving you time and resources.

Negotiating with Vendors/Software Providers/Landlords: We'll show you how to leverage ChatGPT to draft effective negotiation emails that could potentially save you thousands of dollars.

Starting a Blog: We explore how ChatGPT can be your new digital assistant, helping to brainstorm, draft, and polish engaging blog posts that will drive traffic and build your brand's online presence.

Writing Job Descriptions: Hiring for your business? ChatGPT can help write clear, concise job descriptions that attract the right talent.

By the end of this video, you'll have a clear understanding of how AI, specifically ChatGPT, can revolutionize your retail and ecommerce business, helping you cut costs, drive sales, and elevate your brand in the digital landscape. Don't miss out on these insider tips and tricks - tune in now! 💼💻🚀

And remember, if you enjoy the content, don't forget to like, share, and subscribe to our channel for more insightful ecommerce and retail tips.

Welcome to Material Retail Dumps episode 4. My name is Elliot and I’m very excited to be the host today. This is the third and final episode in our gross margin series. In this episode, we will talk about how you can improve cash flow and gross margins using markdown money.  If you haven’t listened to the first 2 episodes in this series, I suggest doing so as it will put a lot of this into context. 

This episode and the execution of these ideas may be a bit uncomfortable for some. But, you know the saying, no pain no gain. 

So let’s get to it, what are we talking about? 

Very simple, when you have a bad style, you know that you need to mark it down quickly and aggressively. So now that we’ve marked the item down and are looking to get our money back as quickly as possible, let’s take another route towards recouping the money. 

Pick up the phone, call your sales rep to explain to them that this style is not working for you and politely ask them if you can return the style. They will very likely say no, guess what, that was the plan. Now you can pleasently accept the no on the return and ask them to discount the item after the fact. So say you bought the item 6 pieces of the item for $20 each, maybe they give you $4 for each item. That’s $24, that phone call likely took 3 minutes.

If you haven’t paid for the item yet, you’ll just pay less when paying the invoice. If you have paid for the item already, just ask for a credit on the next purchase. 

4 Tips to make it work. 

1 - Don’t be shy - This is business, as a customer you are expecting your vendors to provide quality styles that will perform in your store. I am sure the sales rep was not shy in telling you how great the jacket you bought was performing when she came to make the sale. 

2 - Don’t be mean - You need to keep the relationship strong, everyone needs to be respectful. You are simply coming as a buyer, explaining that the item you bought is not selling and you need help getting rid of it. 

3 - Make sure to ask for a return first - It’s best to just get rid of the item and return it. Most vendors will reject you. That’s okay, once they say no, they already feel bad for you, now they will be more likely to give you money off. 

4 - Be careful not to keep going to the same vendor over and over - 2 reasons, 

A - They’ll get sick of you

B - If you need to keep asking them for markdown money because their products don’t sell, you should probably just stop buying from them. 

Well, that’s it for today, thanks for listening! I am very excited about next week, we will discuss branding with a very special guest. 

Retailers have high fixed costs such as rent, payroll, utility bills, and more. One thing that most people don’t take into account is that a large portion of your cash will be tied up in inventory, after all, you need a product to sell. Being a small business, you may not find many vendors who are willing to give you credit, and even when you get to that point, sometimes the 30 days of credit is not long enough to sell the product. Most times, you’ve been forced to lay out cash for a product before you sell it.

Some owners will resort to carrying balances on credit cards when buying merchandise, which then brings interest payments into the equation, making the cost of goods even more expensive.

This brings us to the importance of selling your products quickly, or maybe, more importantly, knowing that you are stuck with a “dog” and when it’s time to dump it.

It’s a product that you bought that just isn’t selling. Say you’ve purchased 6 pieces of 5 different styles from a vendor, and in the first month you sell through half of 4 of the styles but in one style you’ve sold 1 or 0, that’s your “dog”. Every business needs to identify when to consider a product a “dog” a good rule of thumb is if something is selling half as quickly as average.

For example, if your average inventory turn is 6x per year, it should take you 2 months to sell through a product. If after 1 month, you’ve only sold 1 of the 6 pieces you’ve purchased in that style, you are on pace to sell through the product in 6 months, which is 3x worse that your average product.

Well, now here is where retailers run into trouble, many retailers make excuses for why the item isn’t selling. Sometimes they are valid, for example, you bought sweaters in August and it’s still 85 degrees on the east coast, in that case, you can wait. However, sometimes the excuses are emotional and not valid, for example, ‘my good customers haven’t come into the store yet’ or ‘if I just put the item in the window it’ll sell forsure!’ Thinking like this and creating excuses for why items haven’t sold yet can be keeping money out of your pocket.

Mark the product down, be fast, and be aggressive. Go straight to 50% off. Just get your money back.

Wrong, let’s look at the math and see what you can do. First, for a dog, you’ve sold slowly.

• First, you buy 6 pieces of an item for $20 each costing you $120
• In the first month, you sell 1 at full price — $50,
• Then in the second and third months, you sell another 2 for 10% off — $90,
• Then in month four, you sell another 1 at 20% off — $40
• Then in month six, you sell another two at 50% off — $50
• So in 6 months, you’ve done $230 in sales and made $110 in gross profit dollars.

Now let’s look at a product you’ve identified as a dog and aggressively marked down.

• First, you buy 6 pieces of an item for $20 each costing you $120
• In the first month, you sell 1 at full price — $50,
• In month two, you sell the next 5 at 50% off — $125
• So in two months, you’ve done $175 in sales and only $55 in gross profit.
• Now you take that same $120 and go buy another 6 pieces of a style for $20 each, this style happens to be a decent seller.
• In month 3 you sell 2 at $50 — $100
• In month 4 you sell another 1 at $50
• In month 5 you sell another 2 at $40 — $80
• Finally, in month 6, you sell the last one for $25
• In total for the second style, you’ve done $255 in sales and $135 in Gross profit dollars.
• In six months you did $430 in sales and $190 in Gross profit dollars.

Let's focus on gross profit dollars, in the first example, when you were hesitating to aggressively mark down the dog, you did $110 in gross profits in 6 months, in the second example, you did $190 in gross profit dollars, that's a 72% increase. Do that 100 times a year and you’ll notice a big difference when you look at your income statement. I guarantee it.

• Don’t get emotionally invested in your inventory, it’s all about numbers. If the numbers are not showing strength, you have your signal to start taking markdowns aggressively.
• Once you identify a dog, be very aggressive in marking it down and getting it out of your store
• Just because you sell something cheaper than you wanted, doesn’t mean you’ll make less money, it means you’ll be freeing up cash and space in store to get a new good style that you can sell at a strong margin.

Looking to learn more about running a retail business profitably? Schedule a call here https://calendly.com/elliot-9/shoptiques