Make Free Shipping Profitable with Jonathan Price, Owner of Down4Sound

Key Facts:

Jonathan Price’s LinkedIn
Down4Sound website
Jonathan started his eCom journey from the ground up and hit $7.16 million in revenue in 2021
Down4Sound is an online recruiting company that sells car audio products and services at an affordable rate, with fast and free shipping

Key Takeaways:

[00:30-01:30] Jonathan has been infatuated with car audio since he was thirteen years old. His first system was 2-12s on an average 900-watt amp that he later improvised to 78 speakers and 100,000 watts
Jonathan would fly to various vehicle shows throughout the US and drive with his intense audio system, fascinating the audiences. That is when he came up with the idea of selling audio systems and equipment to people
[01:50-04:10] Jonathan started with an online store called “Down4Sound” that sells t-shirts, stickers, and bassbudz (earbuds). To get more people to buy from his company, he leveraged BigCommerce
Before exploring BigCommerce; Jonathan had already experienced shopping cart services with a company called Wallisian. The reason Jonathan transitioned to BigCommerce was that Wallisian was charging higher for a certain volume of orders when the revenue generated was low
[04:40-06:15] As the business grew, Jonathan attached Big Commerce with a shipping company called Shipping Easy. This shipping company allowed Jonathan’s business to streamline all its orders from various sources to only one shipping platform
Jonathan also tried to start a new brand- Certified Bass, to launch the best earbuds, but it did not do as well as Down4Sound. He realized the only way to get more orders and revenue was to transition the products of Certified Bass to Down4Sound and focus on the success of one brand
[06:25-14:40] Jonathan believes in the physical and online marketing mix. He used to drive and even fly to different parts of the countries to showcase his car audio system and equipment and to connect with a bigger network
However, through online marketing via his YouTube channel, Facebook, Instagram, and now TikTok and Snapchat, his audience grew massively. Mostly due to this online marketing, his eCommerce business grew from 5-10 to 150-200 orders per day
Jonathan believes in leveraging as many social channels as you can. “Sticking to only one social media platform will not get you as many customers and sales as you expect”
[15:00-20:30] Jonathan’s experience working with different dropshipping services made him realise that he was shipping the wrong way. He created a small warehouse for his products and goods and started to stock it himself
This allowed him to resolve and fix any discrepancy that surfaced with the sales. On the other hand, the drop shippers will simply excuse themselves from resolving such issues, resulting in a loss of orders and customers. Moreover, the transition from drop shipping to stocking the products cut down many costs and even got discounts from the supplier companies as well. Consequently, Jonathan experienced a massive increase in the profit margins
For anyone starting their eCommerce company/website, or creating an online presence for their brick and mortar store, it is important to personally interact and engage with the audience. It allows you to get more sales, understand the real customers’ feedback, and increase your “online fame”
[23:25-30:00] Jonathan diffuses the negative connotation revolving around “fast and free delivery” by explaining that it does not decrease the revenues, but instead multiplies your sales. When a customer exits the shopping cart and learns that you offer “free delivery”, they are likely to buy more from you and even recommend your services to other people
Jonathan also explains that the key to accelerating your eCommerce growth is to re-invest all of the money from sales back into the business. At times, the sales will be low, but you need to keep going and investing back into your products because according to Jonathan, “it cannot be sunshine and rainbows all the time!”
[31:00-34:00] Jonathan elaborates on the importance of automating the entire business, especially the stocking and shipping process. It can save the manual effort of labeling, packaging, and delivering the orders
Jonathan advises the audience, especially the ones trying to start eCommerce, to take time to figure out everything. Make your online shop or store perfect first, and then expand to bigger marketplaces like Amazon and eBay

Jonathan’s no.1 eCom operation’s hack

To grow your eCommerce business massively in revenue and organic traffic, it is important to get mentorship, add valuable members to your team, and come up with original ideas

Fast and free delivery aids in eCommerce sales, growth, and profit maximization

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