Jeff Kohl

Week 3 of Whatnot in the books. Still tough to see the numbers knowing this would have been a weekend on Tiktok. (One day well be back until then I keep grinding it out) First day off going live in 17 days. Week days were slow weekends were great. This week will run second shows in different categories trying to expand my reach. Anyone have any best practices on give aways. Seeing only 25-30% of viewers enter. Should I dump all funds into a larger buyers giveaway at the end of the show?

Spotted this guy at the grocery store. I really hope there is a wii in there and he is going to a buddies house link up with 3 other wiis and run a 16 man Mario Kart and Smash Bros tourney this halloween. Or its just a convenient bag to carry stuff in. But hoping for my first thought.

No matter what happens or how you’re feeling. Take action.

After the viral video with the @redbaronpizza employee. Id really like to see the sales impact that has over the next month. According @grok they generate roughly $1.4 Billion in annual sales and have roughly 20% market share So far they have handled it perfectly. Virality and the positive response, could it be 9 figure impact?

Had my first call with Whatnot yesterday super nice reps and gave me some good ideas to keep things moving in the right direction. First was change up our show thumbnails. Don’t keep reusing the same ones. Second was get more specific. Its ok to run shorter shows with a more specific niche. On TikTok I would go live 4-5 hours provide a huge variety of items and it worked. Now I am planning more themes shows and will run them shorter 1-1.5 hours. Third keep a set schedule of shows. Something I am not great at, I prefer to work around my schedule vs have my schedule work around show times. Last double down on the times that are successful. If weekend mornings are the best time the use your promotion $ during those shows not the slower times. Will be trying all of these next week. Keep you posted.

Chik Fil A opens in my town tomorrow! If you wear cow print you get free food. Who the heck owns cow printed clothing? Couldn’t they have gone with an easier promo?

One of the worst days of live selling I have had in a while. 2 shows 3.5 hours total. $1700 in sales. For that amount of time I have been closer to $2700-$3000 I haven’t dove into the numbers yet but there is no doubt I lost money on both shows. The one thing with live selling is every show is a step forward. New buyers, New followers. I am still building it. Tomorrow is a new day and a new opportunity to keep growing. 9:00am show.

One of my favorite things about fall in Upstate NY. Apples, go to a grocery store 15 different kinds apples. Love a good hybrid like Sweet Tango or Pink Lady.

One huge mistake I made while building our TikTok live business was ignoring all other platforms. I sourced only for TikTok. I spent 95% of my time on TikTok. Did it grow like crazy?! Yes. I went from 20k a month in May to 125k in a month in September. 6X in 4 months. But when it got cut off in an instant, I am scrambling more than I should have been. In that time Ebay dropped from 50k a month to 15k a month. And Whatnot from 20k a month to 0. Regardless of what happens with TT while it is still pending. I will be more diversified in my revenue streams.

Second full week on Whatnot here are the results. $19k in sales Almost 25 hours live 3,318 items ran Another difference I started to notice. The engagement on Whatnot is way less, the relationship with your audience is less, viewers say less and its more transactional vs entertainment. Makes me enjoy the shows less. I really like chopping it up with people its what makes it fun. Lets see what week 3 will bring.

$15 order of boneless wings. Is this an appropriate portion? I feel a little shorted. Should at least be a dozen right.

A supplier reached out. 3 of the most profitable items I sold on TikTok live are back in stock and available. Only catch is I have to buy 2000 of each. And I have not tested them on Whatnot. Whats the play? Im leaning buy them, may even be able to flip cases.

Another difference between TikTok and Whatnot is the shipping expectations and discounts. On TikTok they provide discounted flat rate to sellers for 1-5lbs. Sellers have the option to pass that down to their buyers or keep it. Our last few weeks I was profiting $1000 a week on shipping. And buyers were still happy with the bundled shipping and free shipping on any item $20 or more. Whatnot the buyers expectation is “discounted shipping” or capped shipping which eats into margins as well as it is almost needed to stay competitive. There may be a way to see what we truly pay vs what is charged but haven’t found it yet. I am going to keep sharing the differences between the two platforms based on my live selling experience. Follow along.

Settle a debate. I currently bring my dog to my office everyday. As we hire streamers I am being told that having dogs in the warehouse is “unprofessional” I dont know he sits pretty professional. I do want to be considerate and understand some people may not like dogs. Do I keep him home after 3 years of coming into the office everyday?

Live selling is always about testing trying new things and seeing what works or doesn’t. For some products Ill buy a small quantity test them out then rebuy the remaining lot if they do well. Or mix it up between sudden end/death or time added. On Whatnot we have been running sudden death and brought our “bundles” every 50-75 items getting absolutely smoked $30 in cost selling for $9/10. Today I tried adding them as a separate item time added bids. Lowest sale $34 and highest sale $66. As they say “test everything”

While we have been off of Tiktok I have been trying to come up with other ways to use the relationships I have built with suppliers and access to deals. My plan or thought is provide case pack/ smaller sized offers to smaller new resellers who are just getting started. Most suppliers want to flip an entire brand or have MOQs of 5k, 10k to play. Outside of auctions it is not easy to find reliable inventory that provides room for profit. This would also be a way to help support and get others in the game. Whatnot is great place to start as a lot of customers are resellers. Will this work, what am I not thinking about?

Im so used to being with my kids. Yesterday at the grocery store a lone. I dropped an “excuse us” to a guy. Got a weird look and kept it moving.

One full week of Whatnot after our shop was suspended on TikTok. Roughly 17k in sales (does not include shipping like GMV) with all the negatives said about whatnot, myself included. It is still possible to be successful. Some of the biggest differences: You need “buyers” in the chat: less people are scrolling whatnot so having a buyer or two buyers can make a huge difference. We had two buyers combine for 104 items yesterday. Discounted shipping is not passed on to the seller like TT. On Tik Tok they provide flat rates to sellers we were profiting $1000 a week on shipping a lone. Long show sustainability requires a large following on Whatnot. Weekdays we are lucky to keep a show for 1.5-2 hours. Weekends are better but feels like 3.5-4 is the cap with our follower count. A good portion of buyers on Whatnot are resellers, so they are looking for a deal and will shop smart. TikTok you’re likely selling to end buyer. We are going start selling case pack and cater to resellers on Whatnot.