Dip Initiative

The Dip Initiative

Life is an ocean of possibility, just try to take a dip.

We’re not saying you have to swim but at least dip your toes, we’ll drive you there.

Background

Utilizing the internet for making your talent public or reaching out is easy enough if you try. But if you don’t know at all or simply can’t imagine how it would be, why would you even try?

No way that water looks cold!

Most people can find a way to utilize their talent, but few can do much at all lest they have a little push.

Purpose

Greycastle has experience, we meet people, see things, hear things and know things. We see a gap between ability and possibility and we want to help fill it. Why? Because we can. We’ve got a hammer and we can see someone’s building something potentially amazing they just need to hit the nails. It’s a minimal effort for us but may make a big difference for them.

How

There are of course numerous different talents but to begin with we wish to focus with those we have seen previous success, those we have a possible solution for.

This is currently the crafts. Someone is creating something that might be sold. The problem with selling commercial goods is usually to reach out to people (TAM/SAM/SOM), it can be summarized as: how many people could possibly want the product, how many can you reach and how many of these will possibly buy?

In making your service global through the internet, or at least marketable outside your local vicinity these three figures change immediately. Instead of reaching a few hundred people in your direct vicinity you can reach fifty thousand in your town or to go extreme, 9 billion people across the globe.

A marketplace solution

We would like to begin by reaching out with marketplace solution. Since this is an initiative and not a finished concept the methods described will of course change in the course of time but initially these are the things to apply:

Marketplace

Any product requires a place for the meeting between client and provider. A marketplace. There are numerous possible solutions for this but we strongly believe that focus and quality are governing factors in attracting customers.

Therefor we suggest creating a dedicated marketplace for a product series/creator. Using website tools such as WordPress, Elegantthemes and Paypal an easy enough webshop can be created. As the traffic will be extremely limited hosting such a thing is basically without cost for Greycastle and should therefor scale well. Greycastle can also sponsor with initial costs for website design and domain names as these are in relation to other costs very small.

Payments

In the internet at large one of the best things to have is adaptability. Being to deal with anyone on their terms, that is, in this case, accepting payments in whatever way the client can in fact manage. The problem with this is that payment solutions are seldom free. The best place to start therefor is with what is free and still widely adopted, Paypal in this case. The seller can easily setup a paypal account if they don’t already have one and use this for payments. Paypal is also easy enough to create for a client and does not require registering a business.

Shipping

In order to truly reach a global market being able to ship is important. This is the area in which Greycastle as of yet has the least amount of experience. However, it has been done by many before and mentors will be taken in to fill this gap. To dip into the creation of a business is the aim of this initiative though and for that just addressing the home country market should be enough.

IRL to Binary transformation

It is vital to present the items for sale in a qualitative manner. It is important to remember that the individual buying the product has only the description, reviews and photos to influence their choice. As such these three things will have to be of highest quality.

Textual content

Aside from pictures description is king. Many are not well versed in the art of writing but something can always be said and if given a basic description Greycastle can help expand this and proof read in order to achieve a high quality presentation of the item for sale.

Reviews

The major marketplaces on the internet such as Amazon and Ebay strongly advocate review systems. It is seldom wise to trust a seller as no seller can be impartial. Getting reviews and testimonials are therefor vital to the sale of a product. The seller must get friends or previous clients to write a few words for the product or merchant. Anything is good and the best testimonials can be picked. If none exist thus far, give something away and ask for a review back.

Photos

Greycastle will provide tools and experience in making sure the items for sale are displayed in a manner that will truly bring forth their quality. This includes camera equipment, lighting and photo backdrops.

The catch?

This all sounds very big of Greycastle doesn’t it? Will we actually give stuff away for free, mentorship, platforms, designs, inspiration et al?

Yes we will. How will we get it back? By expanding our client base. If your marketplace works out, you start making money, start making a business, that’s when we have just found ourselves a new customer.

If you can pay for your expenses we will charge you. And when you wish to expand we hope that the help we have given in the past will now be worthwhile paying for.

You cannot reap what you haven’t sow.

But we see seeds everywhere and we just want to help sow them.