Ecomcrew and ChineseImporting are Merging
I have some exciting news – on August 21 ChineseImporting.com will merge with EcomCrew.com and will continue under the name EcomCrew. Here's a summary of why this is happening and what is changing.
Why the Change?
When I started this site way back in late 2013 my goal was simply to help people import products from China as there was hardly any information on the topic. Over the last couple of years though the focus of the site has shifted away from strictly importing from China to importing from China and selling online. For better or worse, importing from China and ecommerce now go hand and hand. In other words, ChineseImporting.com has grown beyond the name ChineseImporting.com.
Enter EcomCrew.com.
My good friend Michael Jackness has run the podcast EcomCrew since 2015. The EcomCrew podcast has become one of the more popular podcasts for people running real ecommerce businesses. The EcomCrew podcast focuses on giving real actionable advice – not just rah rah rah motivational pick-me-ups. Best of all – Mike is a hardcore importer from China. He runs a business that will near 8 figures next year importing from China, he makes multiple trips to China a year, and he even has a Chinese wife like I do (believe it or not, having a Chinese wife is not a requirement for importing from China!).
When Mike's partner for EcomCrew left his podcast earlier this year our worlds aligned. Mike needed someone new to run the podcast with and I wanted someone to help me grow this site to an all encompassing ecommerce blog and podcast with a focus on brand owners. Mike's strength is in podcasting and mine in blog writing so our skill set compliment each other very nicely. Blogs are great for attracting new readers through search engines and podcasts are great for building sticky audiences.
Me and Mike debated for some time whether to continue our sites on the EcomCrew name or rebrand the sites under a completely new name. After a failed bid on buying ecommerce.com (let's just say the price we offered to the owner was met with mad hysteria) we decided to keep things on the ecomcrew.com name.
What's our plan and vision?
Our vision for ecomcrew.com is to make it the top content site for small and medium sized ecommerce businesses. Me and Mike both have a shared disdain for the websites out there that do little more than sell people a dream of quitting their jobs and making money online (and worse, they normally charge you for this dream). We want to create a website with real, actionable advice to help readers and listeners start, run, and grow their ecommerce businesses.
Our immediate goals in the first 2 months consist of the following:
- Merge all content from ChineseImporting into EcomCrew
- I will be a monthly guest on the EcomCrew podcast
- We are hiring a full time staff member, Abby, who will immediately help with all of the transition and thereafter help to grow the EcomCrew community and also adding content contributions
- We will be posting new blog articles at least twice weekly along with the weekly podcast
- We will be hosting at least a couple of in-person events throughout the year
- We will be focusing more on our Social Media presence – more Facebook (including a Facebook group), more YouTube videos (including Podcast interviews and tutorials), and a regularly updated Instagram account
- We will be launching several high level and high quality courses over the next 6 months
Our immediate plan is to merge all of the content from ChineseImporting into EcomCrew. All of the top blog posts will now redirect to the same posts on EcomCrew.com. There will continue to be a China & Importing based section on EcomCrew. Importing from China and product development will continue to be a focus of the content on EcomCrew.com but it will also have a broader ecommerce focus as well.
Conclusion
Deciding to give up the ChineseImporting name as well as partner with someone else was an extremely hard decision but a decision I've been working towards for well over a year now. I have no doubt though that the merge will result in a way better experience for everyone involved. I can't wait to continue our ecommerce businesses together over on ecomcrew.com on August 21, 2017. If you haven't already subscribed to the EcomCrew Podcast, do it now! See you there!
