Hey everyone,
It's been a few months since my last guide on eCommerce, and I wanted to give some more value back to the community, as some information on here really helped push me to seek a better life; including becoming location independent.
Needless to say, I’ve achieved that, quit my job, and now travel 365-days of the year.
This guide is updated, and current. I run a few online businesses not related to dropshipping, however, I still maintain an online eCommerce store, which still generates upwards of 5-figures a month in revenue, and high 4-figures of profit per month.
There's a lot of information on the internet regarding dropshipping, so hopefully this will help cut out some noise. It’s tough to explain a subject such as dropshipping over text, without videos, text etc..but I’m going to do my best. My hope is that you can use this as a general guide, then ask questions in this thread, and I’ll respond more detailed. Hopefully this can be a comprehensive guide and thread!
I’ll be doing this in parts, over the course of a week or so. The sections will be as follows:
Part I.
The platform
The process
Choosing a niche & products
Part II.
Creating your store
Product descriptions
Applications I recommend
Part III.
Facebook Targeting (the ins & outs)
Instagram
Launching your first ad
Monitoring ads + which metrics to look out for
Part IV
Scaling
Selling your store
POD (Print on Demand)
Part One
I. The Platform
Nothing has changed from the previous installment of this guide. The best platform to use, is Shopify, combined with Oberlo for order-fulfillment. Shopify will cost you $29/month for the basic account, and Oberlo is free for less than 50 orders orders.
Shopify was designed for two purposes:
Keep startup costs low &
Create a low barrier to entry, by allowing people to set up their stores QUICKLY.
This means that your learning curve will not be steep. You’ll be able to learn the ins and outs of Shopify very quickly, so I won’t really cover that here. You can't go wrong with the free themes. The one thing to keep in mind, is that you should find themes that are optimized for Mobile devices.
One such theme, that I recommend is Brooklyn. For paid-themes, Retina is my go-to. In any case, you're fine with the free themes, at least until you prove that your idea works.
Payment Gateways:
If you're in the US/Canada/UK/Australia, you can use the payment gateway prebuilt within Shopify, that offers the lowest rates (Stripe), as well as Paypal. If you're outside the above countries, you'll likely have to use Stripe (but outside Shopify), or another gateway such as authorize.net, 2checkout etc...If you have any more questions about this, just ask below.
II. The Process
Traffic (Facebook, Instagram, Google) -> Platform (Shopify) -> Supplier (Aliexpress)
The process for getting started is actually quite simple. Even beginners can create their store in less than a day. The above flow sequence, is as basic as I can get.
Once you've created your store, you drive traffic to your store by using either; Facebook, Instagram, or Google (you can use others, but for the sake of ease, I'll stick with these).
After driving traffic, and selling your product, you order from the supplier and ship directly to the customer.
Some quick FAQs that I always get..
1. No, you don't hold physical inventory. You can, if you want, but there's no need.
2. Yes, it's legal.
3. You order the product first, with your own money, then you can 'capture' the customers payment, thus depositing it into your account after 7 days (or less if you're using paypal).
Voila. You're a dropshipper.
I just wanted to get everyone familiar with the process before I move on to niche selection, so thanks for being patient.
III. Choosing a Niche
This is often the most frustrating part for most people, and the most time-consuming which is why I'm leaving Part One after this point. Broken down, you're basically looking for a niche that fits this criterion:
1. Is a solution to a problem/pain-point, or is a want
2. Has demand
3. Has products
4. Is a passion niche (Cats, dogs, nurses)
Seems simple right? It is, and it isn't. People can overcomplicate this step very easily. The best advice I can give is to use all available resources to determine if people want a specific product within a niche. Some of the ones I use (and you can ask me more specifics in the comments to this thread)...
- Etsy (items with >1k orders)
- Google trends (an upward 12-month trend, or a consistent 5-year trend)
- Google keyword planner (high suggested bid = customers in this niche pay good money)
- Wanelo (items with >1k orders)
- Ebay Watch Count (you want a 2:1 buyer-watcher ratio)
- Searching other shopify stores
- FB Search (search what competitors are selling)
- Amazon
- Pinterest
- Instagram
You should want to disprove your idea, not try to prove it. If you try to prove it, you'll look for what you want.
At the end of the day, you can be in a saturated niche as long as you differentiate yourself. My best-selling store was in the fitness niche (leggings, etc). So don't focus too much on the niche, but instead, focus more on the products within that niche.
So how do you pick your products?
Well, use the above websites to find in-demand products, firstly. Secondly, we'll try to find these products on the site below.
For this, we'll be using http://www.Aliexpress.com, a Chinese wholesaler/retailer site (sister to Alibaba).
You want products to fit specific criterion...
1. The product offers ePacket to the USA (your main market). ePacket shipping is the fastest (12-20 days), and fairly cheap (usually less than $2), so it won't affect your margins too much.
2. The supplier offering a specific product should have a rating exceeding 4.5 gold stars (for reliability & product quality)
3. You'll want to look at the reviews for specific products, and ensure good reviews from normal countries (i.e canada, usa, australia, uk etc), and look for product pictures to ensure product quality.
4. Good pictures. Part of the reason my stores are so successful, is that I look for products/suppliers with excellent quality pictures (which we can use for ads).
Again, broken down to the fundamentals you want...
1. A product that is in demand.
2. A high-quality supplier.
3. Excellent promotional material (pictures)
4. Fast shipping (ePacket).
Part One is done. This was brief, but as I mentioned, I want this to be more a Q&A thing!
Hope this part has helped!
It's been a few months since my last guide on eCommerce, and I wanted to give some more value back to the community, as some information on here really helped push me to seek a better life; including becoming location independent.
Needless to say, I’ve achieved that, quit my job, and now travel 365-days of the year.
This guide is updated, and current. I run a few online businesses not related to dropshipping, however, I still maintain an online eCommerce store, which still generates upwards of 5-figures a month in revenue, and high 4-figures of profit per month.
There's a lot of information on the internet regarding dropshipping, so hopefully this will help cut out some noise. It’s tough to explain a subject such as dropshipping over text, without videos, text etc..but I’m going to do my best. My hope is that you can use this as a general guide, then ask questions in this thread, and I’ll respond more detailed. Hopefully this can be a comprehensive guide and thread!
I’ll be doing this in parts, over the course of a week or so. The sections will be as follows:
Part I.
The platform
The process
Choosing a niche & products
Part II.
Creating your store
Product descriptions
Applications I recommend
Part III.
Facebook Targeting (the ins & outs)
Launching your first ad
Monitoring ads + which metrics to look out for
Part IV
Scaling
Selling your store
POD (Print on Demand)
Part One
I. The Platform
Nothing has changed from the previous installment of this guide. The best platform to use, is Shopify, combined with Oberlo for order-fulfillment. Shopify will cost you $29/month for the basic account, and Oberlo is free for less than 50 orders orders.
Shopify was designed for two purposes:
Keep startup costs low &
Create a low barrier to entry, by allowing people to set up their stores QUICKLY.
This means that your learning curve will not be steep. You’ll be able to learn the ins and outs of Shopify very quickly, so I won’t really cover that here. You can't go wrong with the free themes. The one thing to keep in mind, is that you should find themes that are optimized for Mobile devices.
One such theme, that I recommend is Brooklyn. For paid-themes, Retina is my go-to. In any case, you're fine with the free themes, at least until you prove that your idea works.
Payment Gateways:
If you're in the US/Canada/UK/Australia, you can use the payment gateway prebuilt within Shopify, that offers the lowest rates (Stripe), as well as Paypal. If you're outside the above countries, you'll likely have to use Stripe (but outside Shopify), or another gateway such as authorize.net, 2checkout etc...If you have any more questions about this, just ask below.
II. The Process
Traffic (Facebook, Instagram, Google) -> Platform (Shopify) -> Supplier (Aliexpress)
The process for getting started is actually quite simple. Even beginners can create their store in less than a day. The above flow sequence, is as basic as I can get.
Once you've created your store, you drive traffic to your store by using either; Facebook, Instagram, or Google (you can use others, but for the sake of ease, I'll stick with these).
After driving traffic, and selling your product, you order from the supplier and ship directly to the customer.
Some quick FAQs that I always get..
1. No, you don't hold physical inventory. You can, if you want, but there's no need.
2. Yes, it's legal.
3. You order the product first, with your own money, then you can 'capture' the customers payment, thus depositing it into your account after 7 days (or less if you're using paypal).
Voila. You're a dropshipper.
I just wanted to get everyone familiar with the process before I move on to niche selection, so thanks for being patient.
III. Choosing a Niche
This is often the most frustrating part for most people, and the most time-consuming which is why I'm leaving Part One after this point. Broken down, you're basically looking for a niche that fits this criterion:
1. Is a solution to a problem/pain-point, or is a want
2. Has demand
3. Has products
4. Is a passion niche (Cats, dogs, nurses)
Seems simple right? It is, and it isn't. People can overcomplicate this step very easily. The best advice I can give is to use all available resources to determine if people want a specific product within a niche. Some of the ones I use (and you can ask me more specifics in the comments to this thread)...
- Etsy (items with >1k orders)
- Google trends (an upward 12-month trend, or a consistent 5-year trend)
- Google keyword planner (high suggested bid = customers in this niche pay good money)
- Wanelo (items with >1k orders)
- Ebay Watch Count (you want a 2:1 buyer-watcher ratio)
- Searching other shopify stores
- FB Search (search what competitors are selling)
- Amazon
You should want to disprove your idea, not try to prove it. If you try to prove it, you'll look for what you want.
At the end of the day, you can be in a saturated niche as long as you differentiate yourself. My best-selling store was in the fitness niche (leggings, etc). So don't focus too much on the niche, but instead, focus more on the products within that niche.
So how do you pick your products?
Well, use the above websites to find in-demand products, firstly. Secondly, we'll try to find these products on the site below.
For this, we'll be using http://www.Aliexpress.com, a Chinese wholesaler/retailer site (sister to Alibaba).
You want products to fit specific criterion...
1. The product offers ePacket to the USA (your main market). ePacket shipping is the fastest (12-20 days), and fairly cheap (usually less than $2), so it won't affect your margins too much.
2. The supplier offering a specific product should have a rating exceeding 4.5 gold stars (for reliability & product quality)
3. You'll want to look at the reviews for specific products, and ensure good reviews from normal countries (i.e canada, usa, australia, uk etc), and look for product pictures to ensure product quality.
4. Good pictures. Part of the reason my stores are so successful, is that I look for products/suppliers with excellent quality pictures (which we can use for ads).
Again, broken down to the fundamentals you want...
1. A product that is in demand.
2. A high-quality supplier.
3. Excellent promotional material (pictures)
4. Fast shipping (ePacket).
Part One is done. This was brief, but as I mentioned, I want this to be more a Q&A thing!
Hope this part has helped!