Top 7 Things To Know Before You Start Drop Shipping

In this blog we are going to be sharing our top 7 things you need to now before you start drop shipping in Australia.

Drop shipping is a fulfilment method in which the retailer does not keep goods in stock. Instead, when a retailer receives an order from a customer, they forward that order to either the manufacturer or a wholesaler, who then ships the items directly to the customer’s home.

In this blog post we will take you through 7 things you should know before starting your drop shipping journey. From what to sell and how much cash investment is needed, all of your questions will be answered.

1. Know what you are selling.

The first step to starting your drop shipping business is to know what you are going to sell. Of course if you are looking into drop shipping opportunities, the first thing that will come to your mind is e-commerce. However, if you plan on selling in other channels such as Shopify, eBay or Amazon, you may want to consider their rules on drop shipping and whether they will allow it.

You should decide whether you want to sell physical or digital products. If you want to sell physical products, there are several things that you need to know. You have to choose a niche and do market research so that you are able to understand the product well enough and determine what exactly customers in your niche want. After choosing your niche, you also need to figure out how much you will have to invest in order to sell the products since drop shipping can be costly.

2. Find a drop shipping company.

After you have chosen your niche and figured out how much you are going to invest, the next step is to find the right drop shipping company for your needs. There are many such companies online that you can choose from. However, with this comes the risk of choosing a bad one since there are scam companies out there who will take advantage of your greed and inexperience in order to make a quick buck.

There are four main factors that you can consider for choosing a good drop shipping company: reliability, reputation, expertise and cost. You need to consider all of these factors before deciding on which drop shipping company would be a good fit for you. So before joining any of the drop shipping suppliers in your niche, make sure that they have been around for more than a few years and have been giving good customer service to their customers. We have 9 Australian dropship suppliers you can start with here

3. Price your products.

Since drop shipping does not require you to keep inventory, you are free to price your products however you want. However, there are some things that should be considered in order to make your decision. Cost is the first thing. If you decide on making a very high margin, this could be considered unethical as customers may feel that they are being ripped off and it can cause the risk of losing future customers.

Another factor that needs to be taken into account is competition. If you price too high, there is a chance that your competition will take over and use it to their advantage. Therefore, it is recommended that you price your products the same as your competition. Another important factor is the cost to ship the items. In order to keep your cost low it is recommended that you find a drop shipping company which will ship from a warehouse close to you.

4. Decide how you will promote your products.

After deciding on how much you are going to sell your products for, the next step is deciding on what platform you will use to market them. You can choose direct marketing or indirect marketing to promote your products For direct marketing, you could do collaborations with bloggers in your niche or make a YouTube channel to help promote your products. As for indirect marketing, the most common method of promotion is social media. Other methods include paid traffic and SEO.

Google and Facebook ads can also be used as a form of promotion for drop shipping the benefits of these platforms are that they are fairly inexpensive and you can target customers who will purchase your product.

5. You need great customer service

In the process of trying to get as many sales as possible, it is very easy to forget what it is that you are selling. When you drop ship, customers will be demanding and this can be a problem if you have a bad customer service. However, there are some steps that can help you avoid this problem. The first one is to provide detailed descriptions of your products on your website.

This way customers will know exactly what they are buying and there would be less chance of misunderstandings. Furthermore, you should use a secure checkout. As a drop ship merchant, you will be dealing with lots of different customers and so it should also be easy to place your orders with paypal or other methods of payment.

6. The use of apps

The drop shipping business is a never ending hustle which can be very taxing and stressful. To make your life easier there are a number of great apps that can help you get through your daily tasks with ease. Most good drop shipping companies will also have their own app which can help you to easily check the status of your orders.

You should also consider using an accounting app to keep track of the money you make as well as expenses. Also, there are a number of great apps that can help you to manage your inventory in bulk and automate the whole process.

7. Be patient and be prepared to encounter problems.

Starting an online business may sound easy, but in reality it is not as simple as it may seem. There are several challenges and pitfalls that you will have to face. There is a chance that you may not be able to get the first order, your sales may go down or your customers may be unhappy with your products. In other words, there are possibilities of failure. If you fail once, make sure that you learn from it so that it does not happen again in the future.

The key is to keep pushing on. Keep learning and keep meeting new challenges. In time you will find yourself on top. The world of dropshipping is not necessarily an easy one, but it is a lucrative career option if you are willing to put the work in.

Conclusion

In this blog post we have taken you through 7 things that you need to know before starting your drop shipping business. We have covered many aspects such as deciding what niche you will be in, finding a drop shipping company and understanding when to price your products. You can use our FREE Australian dropship training to find more detailed information on exactly what you need from each of the topics we have covered.