looking for advice on becoming a seller/business man

Market
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First and foremost thank you for your post. Prob the best one so far that I’m looking for.
In my marketing class we did a swot analysis project. It’s been along while since that was years ago as a freshman and for some reason only one marketing class was required. I enjoyed marketing class very much.
Sad to say i only had that 1 class.

As far as niche is concerned
well that is my plan with youtube to make a pokemon youtube channel ie a niche channel. I started one years ago under the same name but then stopped making youtube videos once i got too many harassment messages on videos i already answered once before.

The current plan is to build up my pokemon channel on youtube. This is why i was thinking the china approach since I’m seeing a market for chinese items here in NY.
There is a china town here in brooklyn and since pokemon go that market is booming.
Not to mention with youtube uploaders showing off anything and everything pokemon related (either it be real,counterfeit, fan made etc) i figure i do the same since apparently it’s easy traffic to bring in.
even showing off items on youtube and not selling them can still bring in traffic.
Even if its a couple of each item it’s not really a loss if the traffic is good.

I’m not the type to deceive people
if you look on ebay alot of people who sell have in their listings as “not an official product” or “non authentic” in their listings. I dont see any of them getting shut down and its probably because they are honest.
That would be my approach from the get go. This thread should confirm I’m being open and honest or else i would just do it and not say anything.

People jump pokemon ship every year and we dont notice then they come back and catch up what they missed.
One thing i learned in 18+ years of pokemon is you cant go wrong with pokemon.

The main question is not to make profit right now, as more to sell everything or at least get rid of everything and making sure it was worth it.
For instance if worse case scenario i can’t sell, i can just give it away on youtube and the traffic/subscription/views will be well worth it.

This is why I’m thinking outloud on what chinese items might be successful because I’m more focused on viewership than profit at this time.
I’m not doing full big size inventories. But they do sell alot of items for cheap which can be used to bring in traffic.

I never did say i was going to invest big in this. I was just considering what my options were and how far does those options last.

One item i think will always do well is stickers because people put stickers on their card binders.

Let me ask you this? What about items i design myself to be printed ie T-shirts, sneakers, anything wearable.
My own designs. Should i do it? if so where should i have it done?

I have seen people on youtube come out with their own “youtube pokemon” products that they made themselves as fans. But they also used professionals to make the finished product.
They use their channel name on their own custom made items.

Right now I’m focused on the numbers of people. If i can get alot of subscribers on my youtube then i can generate revenue with partnering up with youtubes adsense.

I have my own original ideas to make on youtube but am trying to build up subscribers before i make those videos.
I need to know i have a certain amount of fan base before i put in all that work on the original videos.

Thanks for the links. I will check those out now.

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Myself, deriumsccg and everyone else on youtube is doing the exact same thing. Pokemon related youtube content.
No one needs a store or brand to be on youtube.
Youtube is about being a fan of the uploader.
However with stores it is much easier to buy,open, then resell and repeat.
Everyone is doing that. Not knocking it but what exactly did you contributed in this thread?

To tell me they have more subs then me?
I’m not focused on them.
I’m focused on my channel not theirs.

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You should begin then by starting to broaden your youtube viewer base. Create great videos that are informative, educational and catchy. From there, your viewership will grow before you “make it big”. Once you get a lot of subscribers and youtube takes you under their wing, that’s when you begin selling merchandise.

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To say that they’re doing the same thing as everyone else is reductive and short-sighted. I don’t think you understand. They have the channel which they are using to promote their store, they can pick up sales and shift huge amounts of product that other stores wouldn’t be able to. They also use it as a way to buy bulk from people. No local hobby store has established themselves like DeriumsCCGs has. They can sell out of product in hours while it takes other stores weeks.

They can use all this attention to grow their business but you’re the business major so I shouldn’t have to tell you this…

Nobody needs a store or brand but you just keep saying you want to make money and you’re going to be a Youtube partner, etc. That’s not really saying much. You need to tell us how. What will make people want to buy a T-Shirt from you?

You can’t discuss this stuff if you yourself haven’t begun your own creative process, you just have to start producing your content. If you have no content then you’ve got no audience to sell something to, giveaways are not the prerogative, the content is. A 30-120 second video of you doing or saying or showcasing something awesome on facebook is going to get you more mileage than giveaways.

3D printing is expensive, the only way to make stuff that’s cost and time effective is to order it from a third party. Getting a mould made for plastic injection in china is prohibitively expensive unless you want to order more than 10,000 units of something.

And why wait a year? Just make a page on fb and start posting pokemon/video game memes or something if you don’t have time to make real content. It’s never too early to start, I think you’re underestimating how easy it is to build an audience.

No matter where you go in this discussion it comes down to you just needing to sit down and begin the creative process.

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We’re not being emotional or rude.

You’re being extremely general, you’re far from concise and dismissive.

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I meant emotional on the chinese topic.

I’m just gonna ask the youtube community what they want
i was trying to avoid that because most likely they will be biased in wanting that.
I came here to get an unbiased opinion to think of everything but mostly everyone has the same biased opinion.
Too many emotions against the chinese product.
We can discuss without all that emotion.

I wanted to talk to people with an open unbiased discussion.

So I’m done with this thread.
only 1 or 2 advice post that was helpful.
Most of other post was about them being against the product or asking about my collection.
So I’m leaving this thread now as all i can see is pokemontrader being the last one with sound advice.

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BTW budget the reason why i say a year from now
is because i like to plan in advance.
I’m not doing it this year as im still in school but i like to plan ahead of time and get into the mentality.

So this way i know what I’m doing upon graduating.
This is why I was asking now.

I’m the type that like to have ideas and think, some ideas i have years before i do it.
I like to give myself time to make sure i have everything to make an informed decision.
I have a year anyway til graduation figured i plan now.

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YouTube
China items
Fakemon
:thinking:?
PROFIT

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After reading more into this, you basically want to be unique in the niche pokemon market, by doing similar things. You have no capital or product, but want to sell and/or create items to sell to…no one. You don’t have much of a plan besides “Giveaway chinese product to get viewers and then become like derium”. listen to some of the sound advice in this thread that you created, for advice. ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS listen to all feedback, especially when you are very inexperienced.

Oh and stores that open and sell product, are not only buying them at wholesale costs (which requires massive orders) but also usually lose money on the product they open for youtube and supplement the income with views and exposure. You are looking at this very one dimensional and that will 100% burn you. Take time and listen to others. Get out of your own way.

Hostile because you come here asking for advice, then ignore and complain about it because it doesn’t match your views.

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GENIUS

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I dont know why you ask for advice when you dont wanna listen.

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So are you going to share your collection or no?

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Mass product Chinamade Pokeman Uncutsheets for pennies and sell it to people who are willing to burn them.

I would love to burn a 1st edition uncut base sheet with Charizoid, Blastate, and Venosores.

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I would watch and subscribe to a youtube channel showing off collections of uncut sheets and giving information on the various sheets out there. It is a niche in the market that very few have experience in, or knowledge on. I think it would be very interesting to see.

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He has a video but I don’t know where to find it.

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www.youtube.com/user/ThePokemonuncutsheet

He never uploaded his sheets.

Only Rusty uploaded 1 uncut sheet video

(I used to own a few uncut sheets myself) ;D

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has a photo of something as his picture. no uploads in 5-6 years… shoulda kept that going decent view counts I think for a dead profile

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Profile photo looks like a fake Venusaur judging from the holo, rare sheet confirmed

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I’ve seen the sheet before in photos. I think there is disagreement on fake vs. rare production test sheet. There are various versions with various parts missing like the evo boxes, attack costs, attack points, etc and some even with different foils. Some claim it was back before base set when they were testing different templates, layouts, color palletes and such.

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