The 5 Things I’d Obsess Over If I Were Starting a New Ecommerce Brand Today

In this episode of the Ecomm Breakthrough Podcast, host Josh Hadley shares five strategies he would prioritize when launching a new e-commerce brand today. Drawing from over a decade of experience scaling his own brand to eight figures, Josh covers: building recurring revenue models for compounding growth, identifying products with TikTok Shop viral potential, securing favorable manufacturer payment terms to optimize cash flow, prioritizing TikTok Shop as the primary sales channel over Amazon or Shopify, and developing a mission-driven brand that commands trust and premium pricing. The episode delivers actionable insights for entrepreneurs seeking scalable, sustainable e-commerce success. Bullet Points: Importance of recurring revenue models for sustainable growth in e-commerce. Strategies for identifying products with viral potential on TikTok Shop. Building strong relationships with manufacturers to secure favorable payment terms. Prioritizing TikTok Shop as the primary sales channel for new products. Developing a mission-driven brand that fosters trust and allows for premium pricing. The impact of subscription or membership models on customer lifetime value. Leveraging TikTok Shop's unique algorithm for effective product-market fit testing. Utilizing pre-orders as a cash flow strategy to fund production. The shift in e-commerce dynamics away from traditional platforms like Amazon. Creating a cohesive brand narrative to enhance customer loyalty and brand value. Timestamps: 00:00:54 Recurring Revenue is Key The importance of building a brand with a recurring revenue model, like consumables or subscriptions, for compounding growth. 00:07:55 Viral Products on TikTok Shop Focus on finding or creating products that have viral potential on TikTok Shop to unlock success across all sales channels. 00:09:57 Strong Manufacturer Relationships Prioritize building relationships with manufacturers to secure favorable payment terms, creating a negative cash conversion cycle for infinite scalability. 00:14:10 Prioritizing TikTok Shop First Launch new products on TikTok Shop first, as success there proves viability and drives traffic to other channels like Shopify and Amazon. 00:17:08 Building a Mission-Driven Brand Focus on creating a true brand with a mission and values to build customer trust and command premium pricing. 00:19:28 Recap of the Five Strategies A summary of the five key focus areas: recurring revenue, TikTok virality, manufacturer terms, TikTok Shop first, and mission-driven branding. Links and Mentions: Business Models & Revenue "Reoccurring Revenue": "00:01:54" "Reoccurring Revenue": "00:19:28" Products & Tools "Intake Breathing": "00:04:04" E-commerce Platforms & Sales Channels "TikTok Shop": "00:08:56" "Sales Channels": "00:19:28" "Viral Products on TikTok": "00:19:28" Supplier & Manufacturer Relationships "Manufacturer Relationships": "00:09:57" "Manufacturer Relationships": "00:19:28" Business Strategies "Pre-orders": "00:12:09" Branding & Mission "Brand Mission": "00:17:08" "Brand Purpose": "00:19:28" Transcript: Josh Hadley 00:00:00  I'm going to share with you the five things I would focus on if I had to start a brand new e-commerce brand from scratch today. Welcome to the Ecomm Breakthrough Podcast, I'm Josh Hadley. I've scaled my own ecommerce brand from 0 to 8 figures, and I'm actively building towards nine figures in sales. This podcast is where I document that journey and share the systems, the strategies, and the lessons learned in real time so that you can learn what actually matters and scale your own business. My name is Josh Hadley. First and foremost, I am a man of faith. I'm a husband to a beautiful wife and the father of four children. I've been selling you the e-commerce space for over a decade, doing over $20 million in annual revenue and selling multi-millionaire on Amazon, TikTok, shop and Shopify. And I am also the host of the number one business strategy podcast Ecomm Breakthrough. Today, I want to share with you the five things that I would really focus on if I had to start a brand new eCommerce brand from scratch. Josh Hadley 00:00:54  And this is honestly coming from a point of identifying like the weaknesses within my own brand things I would wish I could change if I, you know, could have any dream or wish in the world. But also, after having run my own e-commerce brand for the past ten years and having pivoted that brand a whole number of times, and we've pivoted the brand multiple times in order to keep it afloat. And with all of that experience, here are the top five things that I would be actively working on if I had to start a new brand from scratch. So number one, the holy grail of all things I would be looking for in any new e-commerce brand is do they have reoccurring revenue? Okay, that could be two different things. I could have a consumable item and it could be like a razor blade as an example, right. For shaving if I needed. That's why Harry's Razors, All Dollar Shave Club, etc. like we're all very familiar with them because they are able to spend a lot of money up front to go acquire a customer because they know the lifetime value of a customer, because they know that customer is going to come back and reorder the cartridges to refill their razor blades on their razors, etc. that is the holy grail of e-commerce. Josh Hadley 00:02:06  And so it's the same thing with supplements, right? That's why there's the supplement space is heavily crowded, but there's so much opportunity because if you get it right, you now have a compounding vehicle. And this is the biggest mindset shift that I've had to go through. When I first started in e-commerce, I was excited whenever I got that first sale, even on Etsy, right? And on Shopify, you hear the catching sound and you love that sound and you're just like, yes, I got a new customer. And yes, it gives you a good boost of dopamine. However, I'm getting really tired at this stage of my career in just being so front end acquisition heavy, and that's one of the most disappointing things. If I were to look back over the past decade, is I have not compounded my growth. We have sold millions, millions of customers have purchased our products. That's great. Sounds impressive. However, I wish that those millions of customers would have compounded over the past decade. Josh Hadley 00:03:07  But instead we were so front end acquisition heavy and focused that yes, we could go generate a sell for a new product on Amazon. But then what? Every day we start at zero. Every month I start at zero. And that is one of the biggest challenges in business if you want. It's all about having the right money model that sits behind your brand, and that is ultimately the biggest e-commerce brands that are able to scale more quickly and rapidly have either a consumable product that customers need to come back and repurchase, whether it be a supplement, whether it be, you know, maybe you're selling soda or its candy food, or it's even something like we talked about the refillable cartridges, which, by the way, here's a new brand that I was actually very, very impressed with. They took this and they said, hey, how do we how do we invent reoccurring revenue into a business where, more often than not, it's just kind of like one time purchases. So this is coming into it's called intake breathing. Josh Hadley 00:04:04  And what they have are these nas...

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