advice for my e-commerce journey

1. Don't start an ecommerce business

Starting an ecommerce business is the worst idea ever. You're selling things that are made in China. You have to ship them. You have to deal with angry customers who didn't get their package on time. You have to deal with angry customers who got a broken product, or products they didn't order. And you're competing against Amazon, which has unlimited money and resources, and can do all of the above better than you can.

2. Do something else

Do a service business where you help people make websites for their ecommerce businesses. Or do affiliate marketing (selling other people's stuff). Or write books (like this one!) about how to start an ecommerce business so you can make money off of people trying to start an ecommerce business and failing. You don't need a website to sell your services as a designer or developer or whatever. Just use SquareSpace or Wix or something to create a simple site that says "I'm so-and-so and I make websites" and then list some of your clients or projects you've worked on. Use Squarespace's SEO tools to optimize your site for Google searches for whatever services you offer (don't forget "themes" as well). You don't need Amazon Affiliates either if you want to be an affiliate marketer because there are plenty of affiliate networks that don't require any Amazon affiliation at all (for instance, JVZoo is one that lets you sell pretty much any digital product). And write books! Even if it's just one book, publish it on Amazon KDP, give it away for free on Kindle Unlimited and then use the Amazon Affiliate program so if anyone buys anything from Amazon after reading your book, YOU get paid! This is how I make most of my income these days since I stopped doing consulting work years ago. All I do is write books like this one!

3. Do something else...and another thing!

If someone comes up to me at dinner and says, "Mark, I'm thinking about starting an e-commerce store." My response would be "Great! Can I tell everyone here what products we should sell?" And then I'll tell them what products I think will be successful based on my past experience selling similar products online. Then they don't even have to start an e-commerce store since they already know which products will be profitable without having to figure out logistics or customer service issues or finding suppliers etc etc etc .