What is Dropshipping?
what is Dropshipping, and how you can get started.
I’ll also give you four actionable steps to start your own dropshipping business today. And stick around until the end of the article, because I’ll give you a few personal suggestions and things to keep in mind as you’re getting started.
operating, and growing your own dropshipping business.
If you have any questions, or want to share your experiences with drop shipping, drop them in the comments below, and I’ll be sure to answer them.
Let’s say you’ve been thinking of opening up your own online business, but you don’t know where to start.
You don’t know what you should sell, you don’t have the money to invest in products, and looking around, you don’t have any place to store inventory.
That’s what drop shipping is all about.
You see, with dropshipping, you can sell stuff online without the products ever being in your hands. All you need is a computer, an online store, and a basic understanding on how to market and sell online.
Here’s how it works.
First, you find what you want to sell from a supplier then list that product on your own website at a price you set.
Next, when someone places an order for that product, your customer pays you the retail price you’ve set, and you make a profit.
Then you’ll place the order with your supplier at their wholesale price and have it shipped directly to the customer.
So, let’s say you’ve found this watch on a supplier’s website for $10 You would then list it on your own website for $30 When the order comes in through your website, you then place your order with your supplier using your customer’s shipping information, keep the $20 profit, and have the product shipped directly to your customer. That’s it!
Now, I know what you’re thinking, why wouldn’t somebody just order the watch directly from the supplier’s website?
Well, a couple of reasons.
First, it’s a very big internet and customers may not know about the supplier to buy from them directly.
Second, when people buy things, they’re not just buying products. They’re buying into the marketing, positioning, trust, brand and lifestyle those products represent. With dropshipping, you can focus on marketing your products and saying the right things, at the right time, and on providing real value to the right people because you’re not warehousing any inventory, or dealing with most of the other challenges that come with running an ecommerce business,
Now, a couple of big challenges that need to be considered with dropshipping are finding credible suppliers with good quality products, and making sure you have visibility into your customer’s fulfillment process.
Honestly, you can find suppliers on your own -. However, when you’re dropshipping completely on your own, you can end up spending a lot of time researching and negotiating with suppliers to guarantee your customers’ satisfaction.
Another option is a tool like Oberlo, which with a few clicks gives you access to millions of products to sell, and has dozens of other features to make your life easier… like monitoring inventory levels, automatically calculating profit margins, fulfilling and tracking orders, monitoring shipping status, measuring delivery performance and more.
Oberlo Supply is also a part of the product, which helps you partner with vetted, trustworthy
suppliers of great quality products, faster shipping times and awesome customer service with thousands of different products available for you to choose from.
Want to get started?
All you have to do is start a Shopify store, install the Oberlo app, find products and start selling online.
So why do people get into dropshipping?
First off, it’s really fast and easy to get started and you can dropship with incredibly low investment costs.
You also don’t need to have an established business entity when you start, though it’s smart to have one once you grow.
You don’t have to worry about managing inventory, packing or tracking, which means you can focus almost exclusively on marketing, promotion and merchandising.
You have access to millions of products instantly that suppliers are constantly researching to determine what’s trendy and what will sell.
You set the retail price, so you control the margins. And dropshipping is really easy to scale because you can hire virtual assistants as your order volume increases.
Of course, there can be some challenges with dropshipping too:
First off, because it’s really easy to get started, there’s a higher potential for competition.
That is why you’ll find a lot of advice out there recommends you start off finding a niche audience – like cat lovers, or gamers – so you can operate with less competition.
Next, there are supplier errors.
Though uncommon, it is inevitable that a supplier will mistakenly ship the wrong item to your customer.
If this happens, don’t take it personally and handle the return like a professional – either order a brand new product from the supplier or offer a complete refund. Also, since many dropshipping suppliers are based on China, shipping times are generally longer, turning some consumers off.
ePacket makes it easier, delivering some orders in as little as two weeks, but generally speaking,
if you make your shipping times clear throughout the buying process, many visitors appreciate the clarity – especially if you’re selling an item or in a niche where delivery times are less crucial.
Ok, so how do I get started?
Step 1.
Start a free 14 day trial on Shopify.com
Step 2.
Go to Shopify.com/app-store and install the oberlo app
Step 3.
Find products from the app you’d like to sell and add them to your store.
Step 4.
Enable a payment gateway so you can start accepting money.
Shopify Payments is a great default option if you’re in one of the supported countries though you may want to enable a few other gateways like Paypal, Apple Pay, Amazon Payments or any of the 100+ payment gateways that Shopify is integrated with.
Once you have all that, you’ll need to create a plan for sending traffic to your store.
I won’t go into great detail about that here, but you can find a great resource for building traffic by clicking on the card above, or in the description down below.
Finally, try to produce quality content for your store.
From eye-catching photography to engaging product videos to great posts for your blog,
your audience loves to know more about your products, how they can be used, and the story behind them.
Now that we’ve covered all of the things you need to get started, here are a few additional
things to keep in mind:.
Dropshipping is pretty easy to learn, but there is a learning curve, and you will experience challenges along the way.
However, mistakes can become learning opportunities, and if you can develop resilience along the way, there are plenty of people out there finding a lot of success dropshipping products.
While there is a significant advantage in terms of capital investment over traditional ecommerce, dropshipping isn’t free.
You’ll likely have to spend money to drive traffic, market your products, and handle returns.
There is no overnight success, and this isn’t a get rich quick scheme.
Dropshipping still requires you to work consistently for your store.
True, you will need to dedicate less time compared to a traditional ecommerce businesses,
but it’s not going to succeed without your hard work.
You’ll always need to invest time improving your business.
Don’t source copyrighted items.
This is illegal all around the world and can cause you some serious trouble.
My advice: choose products from Oberlo Supply – a network of trusted suppliers who make it a priority to avoid copyright infringements.
This way, you can rest assured that you won’t infringe any copyright laws If you’re completely new to dropshipping, start small with a single product or a small handful of complementary items from a single supplier.
You can always add more inventory as you become comfortable, but it’s better to start small and build than to start big and become overwhelmed.
And my final tip for once you’re feeling comfortable with dropshipping – diversify.
Many dropshippers don’t rely on a single store for their entire income stream, but operate a series of stores targeting various niches to build multiple sources of income.