How do I go about finding a mentor for my new drop-shipping venture?

Angel List (www.angel.co) is a good resource - people and entities are gauged on their 'signal' rating so you can see who's most active, and that's a pretty good hint as to who is most likely to have leadership/influence in a particular area. You can search by one/many of filters such as Market, Location, Size etc. to help narrow in your search. It's also worth looking at complementary/competitive companies and have a look at their path and investors - an example would be Pact Coffee in London, or perhaps a chain of coffee shops who have been recently funded such as Philz Coffee in San Francisco?

I'd ask Rocco Baldassarre. He is the best online marketing consultant I've ever seen and can surely give you concrete advice. Said that, my advice would be a) your own e-commerce store so you can drive traffic to it without losing money on commissions b) learn from best selling products (you can see sales ranks of competing products if you register as an amazon affiliate marketer; it's free) and copy their structure, split test regularly Hope it helps!

Hi, I specialise in eCommerce strategy and marketing, helping eCommerce people make better decisions, and run more efficiently and effectively. The short answer is 'no'. Your target market isn't "subscription buyers" it's "cigar lovers". So unless there's a lot of subscription programs targeting the cigar lover, you're fine. However, if your market strategy is to go after people who like subscriptions - then I think you're not going to do so well! A cigar is a tough first sell! If you're coming at this from the "I love cigars" point of view first consider if Subscription is the best way to serve that customer base. If you're coming at this from the "I want a subscription business" point of view - then make sure you've researched cigars thoroughly before going down that road. Not least the legal restrictions on advertising - these differ from country to country, but it can be pretty hard to market tobacco online. Hope that helps. Chloe

Yes. https://docs.woothemes.com/document/configuring-woocommerce-settings/

Apple specifically precludes anything that can't be delivered via the app from using in-app purchases. So you're free to tie a credit-card to services and real-world fees (think Uber) without paying Apple any transaction fees. Here's Apple's documentation on what they support (and don't allow) for in-app purchases. https://developer.apple.com/in-app-purchase/In-App-Purchase-Guidelines.pdf Happy to help in any way I can. I run a mobile-based startup myself.