This episode is brought to you by my sponsor, Sitelock. E-Commerce is one of those things that I've thought about jumping into on and off since I started my business (in 2008), but never pulled the trigger. I started looking into more seriously this past year when I realized I needed to shift the way I was doing business. My overall arching 'theme' has been to stop trading time for money. I've already created some recurring revenue streams but they were more of an after thought than a well planned strategy. Then I hit a wall. I knew it was time to pull the plug on the amount of services I offered and provided (I still do them, but it's more about who I want to work with and whether or not I feel I'm the best person to provide the value someone needs). And then of course there's my motto...."If it's not fun, I'm not doing it." I found Chloe Thomas after getting her recent book, Customer Manipulation (which we talk about in the show). Of course I purchased her other books after getting this one. I'd love to tell you that I've started my new e-commerce site and store, but that's not happening yet. At this point in my life I've finally gotten smart about not taking too much on at once. What I can tell you is when I do launch my e-commerce store I'll be following Chloe's steps! Chloe went deep with me in terms of the brand [Tweet "I'm a big fan of keeping your e-commerce store simple @"] Questions I Asked Chloe There are SO many places I wanted to start with for this interview... but I think it makes sense to start with your background because you have an extensive background in eCommerce. Can you share your background with the listeners? You've worked with people from solo entrepreneurs to big companies. This is a two-part question.... can you give examples of each and share a little bit of their journey/success? Shopify vs. Woocommerce or another self-hosted commerce solutions. Where do you begin? Who should do what? Dropshipping? FBA? Teespring? T-shirts? Gearbubble? Determining profitability of a niche? Is there such a thing as a crowded market? Subscription model? Customer Manipulation: Latest book, what it's about, etc. Best place to connect with you? What You're Going to Learn Where you should start if you want to launch an e-commerce store How the owner of an electronic cigarette e-commerce store has achieved massive success Why you need to have some level of passion for what you're selling (or you may struggle) Which platforms you can use for creating your e-commerce store Why you don't need to have an individual personality behind your store How you can bring in a personality to your store (be humans behind it) without having to be a personal brand   Where to Connect with Chloe Website | Podcast | Twitter | Facebook Links from this episode Chloe's Books: Customer Manipulation eCommerce Master Plan eCommerce Marketing Get the first chapter of Customer Manipulation FREE here! CrateJoy The Automatic Customer (book) GearBubble TeeSpring