Days 1 to 3: pick the platform.
You only need three options on the table:
- Stripe payment links if you have one product, or one bundle. Free to set up. Takes an afternoon.
- WooCommerce on your own domain if you have between 5 and 50 products and want to keep ownership and avoid monthly platform fees.
- Shopify if you have 50+ products, plan to sell on TikTok Shop or Amazon later, or you genuinely cannot face the technical setup of WooCommerce.
Do not get stuck here. The platform you start on can change. The momentum cannot.
Days 4 to 7: photographs and prices.
The single biggest reason small online shops underperform is bad product photography. Phones are perfectly good now. Take photos against a plain wall by a window. Get one square photo for the listing, three lifestyle photos for the page, one with a hand or face for scale.
Price the product properly. The cheap default is wrong nine times out of ten. Add up: cost of materials, cost of time, cost of packaging, cost of postage, payment fees, returns. Add 30% on top for being a small business. That is your floor. Most beginners price 40% under floor and wonder why they are losing money.
Days 8 to 14: build the page.
One page per product. Each page needs:
- A clear, specific title (not "Beautiful candle", but "Hand-poured beeswax candle, 8 hours, lavender")
- One square photo at the top, three more below
- A two-line description that says what it is and why someone wants it
- Bullet list of materials, dimensions, weight, postage time
- The price, and the buy button, above the fold on a phone
- One sentence on returns
That is enough. Write it like you would describe it to a friend. Save the poetry for the about page.
Days 15 to 18: payments, postage, the boring stuff.
- Connect Stripe (and Apple Pay/Google Pay) properly. Make sure the shop displays prices including VAT if you are VAT-registered.
- Set up a Royal Mail or DPD account at the right tier for your volume. Print labels at home.
- Write the three emails: order confirmation, despatch, "how was it?". Keep them human, short, signed by you.
- Set up a returns address (your home is fine) and a 14-day return policy. UK law requires it for distance selling.
- Get a Google Business Profile so the shop shows up on the map for local searches.
Days 19 to 24: tell people.
Now the work changes from setup to selling. The first ten orders almost never come from random Google traffic. They come from:
- Friends and family. Yes, really. Charge them full price. They want to support you.
- The Facebook group, WhatsApp group or Discord where your customer hangs out. One post, properly written, with a photo and a link.
- One physical place: a market stall, a pub noticeboard, a card in a local shop. Cheap, surprisingly effective.
- One Instagram or TikTok post a day for a week. Behind-the-scenes works better than glossy.
Days 25 to 30: deliver, learn, repeat.
By now you have a handful of orders. The most valuable thing you can do this week is not "more marketing", it is:
- Pack the orders properly, with a handwritten note. The unboxing experience is your second sale.
- Three days after delivery, follow up. Ask what they thought, and ask for a Google review with a one-tap link.
- Note every single question someone asked you. Add the answer to the product page. That FAQ is your best SEO.
- Open a simple spreadsheet: orders, costs, profit per order. Update it weekly.
Day 30 you should have something real. Maybe ten orders, maybe two, maybe forty. Whatever number, it is now an actual business that needs deciding on, not an idea you keep mulling over.
Mistakes I see every time.
- Building the shop before knowing the customer. The shop should be the last thing, not the first.
- Pricing for fairness rather than for profit. Customers do not know what is "fair", they know what feels right next to alternatives.
- Skipping the boring legal stuff (returns, VAT, terms). The day a complaint lands, you will wish you had not.
- Buying ads in week one. Do not. Talk to humans first.