Drop shipping can be a good source of online money. There are some points to note however. More on that later…
So what is drop shipping?
The name says it: Others drop and ship the products for you.
Take this example – You want to open an online shop – but where do you source your products? If you cannot produce them yourself, you buy them online and sell them with a profit online. A supplier that accepts drop shipping will pack the products for you (some even put your company name on it) and send them directly to your client. Your client will think the items comes directly from you.
This can be done with several suppliers and the products can be sold on several platforms.
Here are some Suppliers /platforms that accept drop shipping:
Aliexpress
Alibaba
Ebay
Amazon
There are benefits and disadvantages to drop shipping. More on that below.
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First lets see what advantages Drop Shipping has over other forms of money making methods online:
- No big starting capital needed
- This often has high turnover
- No need for inventory or warehousing
- No need to buy stock upfront
- Often suppliers are willing to put your logo on the item
- Dozens of products to sell
- Dozens of platforms that products can be resold on
Some disadvantages of drop shipping:
- Returns
- Products are often low quality – but that can be avoided
- Products are often sold with long shipping times
- Legal implications
- Possible unreliable suppliers
As you may have noticed there are some disadvantages that can be overcome or better avoided altogether, if you do your due diligence and research.
Here are some exclusive tips from onlinemoneygroup.org when starting your drop shipping store:
Look out for verified suppliers with good ratings. Choose quality products and maybe try a sample. If you like the product, others might like it too. Research!
Don’t worry too much about shipping times – most people are actually willing to wait – just be very clear about the shipping times. Do not try to deceive customers!
One simple but in my opinion very important step before starting to drop ship is to create a company. Drop shipping in your own name can become costly if products prove to be dangerous/hazardous for any reason. Rather register a company in your country and drop ship products through this company.
Use drop shipping automating tools. Keeping up manually with hundreds of orders, shipping, payments, inventory is a sure recipe for chaos. There are very good automating tools many being provided by drop shipping platforms.
Which product niches are the best?
- Fashion, cosmetics, beauty
- Health, sport (together about $532.43B worth in 2017)
- Accessories of consumer electronics (worth near $100B )
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We should also talk about the drop shipping platforms:
Aliexpress
Aliexpress is a chinese platform that is widely used to source products for drop shipping. Their products are cheap & produced mainly in china. Aliexpress is the retail platform and Alibaba is the wholesale version. They are huge. Shipping times are long, but they have excellent buyer protection measures in place.
DHgate
Also a Chinese platform, very similar to Aliexpress. Offers discounts for wholesale orders. Provides Buyer protection.
Note: These are just some of the Asian platforms. Of course others are available Asia, but also in Europe and Americas. This doesn’t really matter as long as you have access to quality products, reliable suppliers and some kind of buyer protection. Check out some supplier directories.
Here are some of the best drop shipping supplier directories:
Click on the name of the drop shipping directory (in blue) to get more info…
SaleHoo
This is a directory of suppliers of 2.5 million products from 8000+ suppliers. Sign up costs $67/year. If you cannot find the product contact them or get a refund. Verified suppliers. Great support. No free trial.
Alidropship
WordPress plugin that does all updating of products, inventory, order fulfillment and tracking automated. Works only with Aliexpress and WordPress. $89 one time payment.
Worldwidebrands
Millions of products from 9000+ suppliers. Access 100% verified top level directory of wholesalers and suppliers. Lifetime membership for $299. No automated listing tools etc.
Wholesale2b
Here you can choose plans that are linked to your selling platform (ebay, amazon, shopify etc) from $29.99 to $39.99/month. Apart from giving you access to their directory of drop shipping suppliers, these plans include a lot of benefits such as automated inventory updates, price markups, automated tracking codes etc. Or Do all yourself for $67/year.
Inventorysource
Integrate directly to your selling platform. Inventory automation $50/month. Inventory +Order automation $175/month.
How to drop ship:
So you would typically research and choose your products from a suitable supplier, contact the supplier about price, availability, shipping and branding. List the item on your selling platform or website with a higher price. If it sells you order it from from your supplier. Keep an eye on the shipping process. If your customer is happy you have made your first successful sale. Profit made!
Be careful though – make sure you calculate all costs involved, bank/payment fees are often overlooked. Also note that it may be required to pay for some products upfront, because platforms like ebay (paypal) hold onto your clients money until they (the buyer) have received the product. In that case you would have to buy the product from your supplier pay him/her with your own money and would only receive cleared payment for the item once it is delivered.
So where would you sell you products:
Ebay
Although ebay is somewhat of a platform for out of the ordinary or antiquated products from individuals, there are still a million other new products on ebay from merchants and drop shippers. It is really easy to sell on ebay and but make sure you put in a buy it now or reserve price. Selling your item in an auction listing could be either very lucrative or very costly.
Amazon
Amazon offers mostly new items, so this is ideal for drop shipping. You might want to check out Fullfillment by Amazon (FBA) where Amazon handles all dropping and shipping – but only from their warehouses. That would be useful if you buy wholesale quantities of your product beforehand. Click here for a great start…
If you would like to see a great website that sells Amazon products, go check out techsstock.com
Your own website
There are very successful drop shippers that sell from their own websites. For this you will need a website, a domain and hosting.
Ready made ecommerce websites with domain and hosting can be acquired through:
- Shopify
One of the most popular website builders for drop shippers. Quality automating and other tools. Everything you need. Best for beginners, but also ideal for experienced drop shippers. From $29/month.
Create your own basic website for drop shipping free. Free hosting. Upgrade to get full benefits. From $20 only
Wixstores start from $16.50/month. Hosting included. A lot of ecommerce benefits. Very customizable websites. Popular website builder.
- Godaddy
Very well known hosting company. Ecommerce ready. Free trial, thereafter $29.99/month. Full benefits and tools for ecommerce. Very good for mobile devices.
Visit our products page for other or related products. If you really do not know how and with what to start, contact us and sign up to become a member of onlinemoneygroup.org
We will assist you as good as we can and will prepare a tailor made starter pack for you, to get you earning as soon as possible.
If you need additional hosting, we recommend Bluehost, they are cheap and reliable. Well known company. You could also try Godaddy for hosting. Very good.
So now you have your products, suppliers, automating tools, website or drop shipping platform – what else do you need? TRAFFIC and lots of it. Read more about it here….