In 2020, the estimated value of the drop shipping market was 128.6 billion U.S. dollars globally. According to forcast and experts, between 2021 and 2026, the value of the market size was forecast to increase to 476.1 billion U.S. dollars.
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First of all, I want to make it clear that I do not consider myself an expert in dropshipping.
I would like that when you finish reading this post you have a much more complete and realistic vision of everything behind dropshipping so that you can decide for yourself if it is the eCommerce model you are looking for.
I will try to be completely transparent and honest with you. I am going to tell you the good and the not so good of dropshipping.
But above all, I am going to explain to you how I would explain what is Dropshipping, and some extra spice.
Do Dropshipping with Little Investment
If there is something that makes dropshipping especially attractive compared to other online business models, it is, without a doubt, is low or almost zero barrier to entry.
That is, to START with dropshipping you do not need a large financial investment or very advanced technical knowledge. What you will need most is time.
But since you probably still don’t know what dropshipping is all about, I’m going to explain it to you quickly before delving deeper into the subject.
What is Dropshipping?
Dropshipping is an eCommerce technique in which the owner of the online store (also called dropshipper) acts as an intermediary between the customer and the real seller.
The actual seller is usually a large product provider that works with multiple drop shippers at once.
And what benefit does the owner of the online store get? You may be wondering…
Well, here the dropshipper has the freedom to put the price they want on the products and thus define the profit margin with which they want to work. That is, the supplier does not impose a minimum PVP (Public Sale Price) to work with him.
To make it easier to understand, I show you below an image of how the order would be managed in an online dropshipping store:
The great advantage of dropshipping is that you do not have to invest anything in buying the stock of products, so you do not need to physically have a warehouse to store them, or even take care of shipping orders. All of this is done by the supplier.
All the dropshipper has to do is collect the orders and notify the supplier.
Where to Find Product Suppliers for Dropshipping?
Finding good suppliers of products is vital for an online dropshipping store to become profitable.
So here are some best dropshipping suppliers:
- AliExpress
- SaleHoo
- Wholesale2B
- Doba
- Spocket
Driving Traffic to Your Woocommerce Dropshipping store
You may have hit the niche, found the best supplier of products, and have an online store with the best design in the world and still not sell ANYTHING.
The real challenge begins when you have to make your online store known to the public and drive traffic to it.
Once you have reached this point, you should be aware that it is no longer enough to just dedicate your time, but that you will have to invest money in advertising to capture your first traffic and start selling as soon as possible.
If someone promises you that you will get sales in a couple of weeks without investing a single dollar, they are probably lying to you.
In dropshipping -as in any online business-, a minimum investment is needed to have any chance of success. At least I don’t know how to do it any other way.
And now yes, we are going to see the 2 main ways of attracting traffic that you have.
SEO vs Paid Traffic
The first thing I want to make clear is that neither is better than the other, both have their pros and cons. But luckily, both are complementary and in fact, I recommend that you work both in parallel.
Starting with Advertising to Gain Attraction
During the first month of any eCommerce project, it will be practically impossible to get direct sales from organic traffic through SEO. Therefore, at the beginning I recommend 100% pulling paid traffic through the public so that the store gets the first sales.
The ideal thing to grow fast is that during the first weeks (I would say at least the first 2 or 3 months) the profits are reinvested in paying the advertising and creating new campaigns or raising the budget for those that already work if we can afford it.
So from now on when I talk about advertising campaigns, I will refer to campaigns on Facebook and Instagram ads. (It could also be done with Google Ads, but I don’t recommend it to start with because it is more complex to manage and more expensive).
I’m not going to go into the details of how to create FB and Instagram Ads campaigns because that alone would be enough to write a series of 10 posts like this.
What I am going to show you is the advertising strategy that I would follow, taking into account that we started with a low budget.
Conclusion
I honestly believe that there are still interesting niches to be exploited in dropshipping and I still believe that it is a good option if you want to start in the world of eCommerce and you don’t have products to sell and you can’t afford to invest a lot of money.
I hope it has helped you to have a more complete vision of everything involved in starting an online store with dropshipping. So if you were thinking of creating a dropshipping project, go ahead!
Have a question or suggestion? Don’t hesitate to leave them below in the comment box.
