Reddit: Your Next Business Opportunity?

Find out how to leverage Reddit's engaged communities to build your next side hustle                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 February 17, 2023 | [Read Online]( Reddit: Your Next Business Opportunity? Find out how to leverage Reddit's engaged communities to build a loyal customer base [fb]( [tw]( [in]( [email](mailto:?subject=Post%20from%20Ecommerce%20Dispatch&body=Reddit%3A%20Your%20Next%20Business%20Opportunity%3F%3A%20Find%20out%20how%20to%20leverage%20Reddit%27s%20engaged%20communities%20to%20build%20a%20loyal%20customer%20base%0A%0Ahttps%3A%2F%2Fecommercedispatch.beehiiv.com%2Fp%2Freddit-next-business-opportunity) Hey friends! 👋 Welcome to Ecommerce Dispatch where we help you build a profitable business on the side, without quitting your job or breaking the bank. In this new newsletter you’ll get one actionable business idea, learn marketing tactics to build your own ecommerce store along with great examples from people who have done it before. Let’s get cracking with this week’s idea and steps to generate revenue! 👀 What we've seen Reddit has been severely neglected as a social media that people use to sell products. In 2022 the site had 50 milllion daily active users & was the 10th most popular site in the US. Despite this, many people fail to recognise the opportunity the site presents. The most important thing about the platform is the trust and reputation people place on it. instead of searching on Google for ‘best office chairs’ they search, ‘best office chairs reddit’. Immediately they are transported to a thread in the subreddit r/buyitforlife where they can see a breakdown of the most popular chairs real people recommend. The powerful upvoting/downvoting feature means that the most valuable information is pushed all the way to the top, whilst the irrelevent information is filtered away. Users can consume information which has been socially validated, making it an extremely powerful tool. Not only this, Reddit is a reflection of underlying consumer beliefs and values. Fast growing communities pop up daily and the origin of many of the trends you see on other forms of social media can be directly attributed to Reddit. Each of these communities are filled with people who are enamoured enough with a topic that they will discuss in great detail with strangers. This makes it a perfect user base to farm. ℹ️ Why this matters The fantastic thing about Reddit is that you can validate demand for your product extremely efficiently. By experimenting with different types of posts, you can see what resonates with people in the community & what does not. There is no marketing cost as all posts are created equal, meaning that if you are strapped for cash this is a perfect avenue to explore. The trust that people place in the site means that you can easily become a domain expert in a niche community & eventually create a business which directly addresses a need that these people face. A great example about how this was done successfully is [Starter Story](. The founder Pat Walls discovered r/Entrepreneur and realised that the stories being published were similar to case studies he published on Starter Story. He then decided to post transcripts of his interviews on Reddit & quickly built awareness about his website. This post called ‘[10k/mo selling a bidet product](’ gained almost 400 upvotes & directly contributed to users signing up to his newsletter. Nowadays, Starter Story has over 1.4 million monthly visitors and accrues over 500k in ARR. Similarly, [Short Story](, a styling company specialising in petite apparel used Reddit to rapidly grow their brand. r/PetiteFashionAdvice had over 400k members when founder Isabella posted a question ‘What’s your biggest pet peeve when it comes to clothes shopping?’. The post became one of the most rated in the community & Isabella was able to immediately validate the demand for her business. So how can you use the above playbook to create your own successful business? 💡The idea Use reddit to find niche underserved communities & provide them with products they will love. 👣 Steps to execute Estimated time to revenue: 2 weeks - Use [Subreddit Stats]( to find fast growing subreddits in various niches for example [r/drunkencookery]( is growing rapidly. (See graph above). - Take a look at the top posts of the week/month and identify trends. In r/drunkencookery it looks like simple foods combined together in an odd combination does extremely well - Work on finding need in these communities. In the example above, we have lots of great recipes and extremely tasty looking food but no real collection. I would work on creating a cookbook with a compilation of the most popular drunken foods in the subreddit. - Find related subreddits that you can market to as well. r/foodporn (5.4m members) & r/recipes (3.4m members) are tangential subreddits you can target - Validate demand by creating a post in the various subreddits & see if it is a viable solution - Create basic landing page for your product. I like using [Carrd](. - Continue to add value in these subreddits, occasionally linking out to your landing page. Note that reddit despises people who self promote, so make sure you do this in moderation and tastefully. Grow For those of you who are thinking of starting a new business here are a few resources which I think would be extremely beneficial. [How to Become a Reseller in 3 Simple Steps](: Reselling is great way to start your first side hustle. There is minimal barrier to entry, low overhead & minimal know how. This article is a great resource for those looking to get started. [TikTok Promote](: TikTok promote is a new way for users to turn their organic content on TikTok into ads. This is great news since it means you can transform previously popular videos into ads & help gain eyeballs on your business profile. Good Reads & Resources - [Neal.Fun]( drops you into a random place in the world. It’s super fun to move around and view life in a coffee shop in Austin, Texas to a fancy Mcdonald’s in Porto, Portugal - Live streaming commerce is set to be the next biggest thing in retail. This [article]( assesses whether it is a viable marketing strategy for US stores. - If you love Geoguesser, you might love [Chronophoto](. You’re presented with a random photo and need to use clues to guess what year it was taken. Store of the Week Each week we highlight our pick for store of the week. We source this from [Ecomm Design](. If you have a shop, send it in for a chance to be featured on[Ecomm Design]( & the newsletter. Today’s pick is… drumroll please.. [Surely Wines]( This store sells non alocholic wines. I love the fact that they have a wine quiz which helps pair you to ‘wines’ you will enjoy. Their tagline ‘Wine without the hangover’ is catchy and tells you the companies mission in one sentence. PS: If you have any questions, please send them in. We look at each of them & will publish them in next weeks newsletter. See you next week 😃 Rohit @ Ecommerce Platforms Emails going to spam? Here's how to whitelist our email address: First, reply "hello" to this email so your email provider knows we're real. Next - Gmail users: - On mobile? Click the 3 dots in the top right corner, click "Move to", then "Primary" - On desktop? Return to your full inbox view, then drag this email into "Primary" tab near the top left corner. Apple mail users: - Tap our email address at the top of this email (beside "From:" on mobile), and click "Add to VIPs" All other users - follow these [instructions](. 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