🚨 The Fix for Vague Marketing 💸

What we'll cover this week

• New Look – We’ve restructured the sections a bit

• Target Audience – Try this ChatGPT prompt

• Dream Business – Pet lovers, this one’s for you

Quick Tip to make you better

Competing on price is a losing game

One of my clients was stressing out because a competitor kept undercutting them by $1. Every. Single. Time.

At first glance, that might seem threatening—until you realize what’s actually happening.

That competitor:

• Has less sales volume

• Gets worse pricing from suppliers

• Makes less per sale

• And is probably losing money just to stay in the game

In other words: they’re panicking.

So when a competitor starts undercutting by pennies, don’t match them—just watch. Because when they’re squeezing already thin margins even tighter, they’re not winning. They’re bleeding out.

As Napoleon said: Never interrupt your enemy when they’re making a mistake.

Short Disclaimer

Online Acquisition Weekly is for informational purposes only and should not be considered financial, investment, or legal advice. We do not endorse or guarantee the accuracy of third-party listings. Always conduct your own due diligence or consult a professional before making any investment decisions.

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Target Audience > Everything

99% of companies I work with have no real idea who they’re actually selling to.

When I ask who their target audience is, the most common answer:

“Someone who has problem X.”

Technically true. But completely unhelpful when it comes to actually marketing anything.

Defining Your Audience (For Real)

This is the unsexy part of marketing—where the real work begins. You’re staring at a blank screen, trying to reverse engineer a human being. It sucks.

Let’s make that easier.

Here’s a ChatGPT prompt you can use to start crafting real audience personas that feel like people, not bullet point robots:

Prompt

Hi ChatGPT, I want your help creating a set of audience personas for [insert your niche, e.g. coffee roaster]. Please guide me through the process using the following structure:

Persona Story

Write a 250–300 word story that brings the persona to life.
It should describe:

• how they engage with the product or topic

• what motivates them

• how they make decisions
  Make it vivid, emotional, and human—not just a list in paragraph form.

Character Sheet

One-slide style summary with:

• Name, age, location, income

• Background and how they found the product

• Behaviors and preferences

• Emotional drivers

• Pain points and frustrations

• Goals and motivations

• Best marketing channels to reach them

• One quote that sums up their worldview

Avatar Prompt for DALL·E

Create a visual prompt to generate a comic-style avatar:

• Include clothing, expression, and subtle emotional tone

• Suggest a style (e.g., dreamy manga or bold western comic)

• Match the mood to the persona type

Example to Kick It Off

Say you’re running a coffee brand. You could start with:

“The person is a true coffee connoisseur with high expectations. They’re tired of cheap, sour coffee and want to take their at-home brewing to the next level.”

That’s it. Two lines. From there, ChatGPT can build an entire persona that actually helps you write, design, and sell better.

Why It Works

These types of personas aren’t pulled from some dry research deck. They feel real. They help your team start asking better questions:

“Would Jane love this email?”
“Would Marcus click on this offer?”

You start marketing to people—not abstractions.

Finally, you stop guessing. Your offers hit harder, your messaging gets sharper, and your conversion rate starts creeping up, just from a bit of strategic clarity.

It’s simple, but it works. Using the same concept, a client of mine just increased their revenue by 130% year over year (low to mid-6 figures/months).

What would such an increase mean for you and your business?

This Week’s Dream Business

Let’s be honest—some pet owners are unhinged (in the most profitable way possible).

This week’s dream business, Pets Own Us (yes, that’s really the name) [listing on Flippa], is an eCommerce store selling pet travel accessories—strollers, harnesses, beds, etc. The niche is gold... but the execution? Total amateur hour.

That’s exactly why this caught my eye.

TL;DR

• UK-based pet accessories store with decent fundamentals

• Hugely underutilized social media (1,182 Instagram followers, 4 on TikTok… yes, four)

• Products made for visual marketing but with zero effort in content or branding

• Supplier base is thin—only two vendors

• Traffic plateaued, likely due to failed PPC campaign

• The current price is way too high; the real value sits closer to $31K–36K

Why This Listing Stands Out

Normally, I ignore listings that scream “potential,” but this one is different. This isn’t a fixer-upper—it’s a business waiting for someone competent to enter.

The products are practically built for Instagram and TikTok. Yet somehow, they’ve managed to get 7 likes per post. You could get more with $10 and a half-decent caption.

They’ve left so many low-effort wins on the table, it’s genuinely exciting.

What Could Be Improved

Double Down on Instagram & TikTok

This is a passion niche. Pet people love showing off, and social platforms are where they live. Instead of doing everything poorly, pick one channel and go all in. Instagram first. TikTok next.

The existing email subscriber count is most likely inflated from auto-enrolled buyers—don’t get too excited.

Once you clean that up, start with:

• UGC from customers

• Short reels of pets using products

• Light influencer outreach

• Boosted posts with small daily budgets

That alone would outperform their current approach 10x.

Let these stats soak in:

Expand Your Supplier Base

Right now, they’re working with just two suppliers, which is a bottleneck waiting to happen. There’s an entire world of pet gear vendors—both domestic and international—who would love to partner with a store like this.

Cast a wider net and onboard more SKUs.

Pro Tip: More SKUs = more search engine traffic.

Aesthetic Overhaul

Pet owners don’t want to shop in a sterile B2B-looking shop. Add color. Add playfulness. Gentle green, light blue—anything with warmth and energy. Match the mood of your customer, not your supplier’s spreadsheet.

What to Watch Out For

• This isn’t beginner-friendly. If you’ve never run a store before, look elsewhere. This one comes with baggage.

• It’s UK-based. That means registering for UK VAT or setting up a local company. This is not a dealbreaker—it's just more admin.

• Traffic has flatlined. There was a big drop last October, and now it has plateaued. It doesn't look like a Google penalty—it's more likely bad PPC spending. Confirm that those losses are included in the P&L.

• Revenue in March jumped. Could be a good sign, but needs to be verified and not just a seasonal bump.

Due Diligence Checklist

Before making an offer, confirm the following:

• Seller identity – Video call, LinkedIn profile, some sign they’re not a ghost

• Revenue verification – Walk through Stripe and PayPal from the past 30 days

• Traffic quality – Ask for Google Search Console access (not just BigCommerce stats)

• PPC activities– Are those included in the profit calculations? Confirm if a failed ad campaign caused the traffic drop.

• Supplier relationships – Who are they? Are they reliable? Can you talk to them?

• Product margins – Look around for other suppliers who might offer better margins or try to renegotiate terms with the current suppliers.

• Operational setup – Who’s doing order fulfillment, customer support, returns?

• Tech stack & automation – Is the store easy to run or duct-taped together with janky apps?

What’s a Fair Price?

They’re asking $65,000 (2.6x profit) with a starting price of $57,000. That’s laughable for something this undercooked.

If you’re interested, make your move now. If everything checks out, offer $31,500 (1.5x) with a cap at $36,000. This isn’t a turnkey operation—you’ll need to put in the time.

But if you’ve always wanted to work in the pet niche, this could be your in. Just don’t overpay for someone else’s missed opportunity.

Final Words

That’s it for this week. This week’s dream business requires work, but it’s not too complicated to improve. Its passionate niche might give you extra fuel.

Got something on your mind? Hit reply and let me know—I’ll get back to you ASAP.

See you next time,
Tim