Start a profitable Drop Shipping business in 5 easy steps

Drop Shipping

Many people think to start their own business but they take their feet back because of high capital investment. No matter you are starting a big showroom, a manufacturing business or just a small shop you need a good amount of money to invest in rent, godown rent, buying products, workers etc….

But today in this internet era you don’t need all these to start your business all you need is a Laptop with a good internet connection and some basic knowledge of computer and internet. You must be thinking how? Here I have an answer to your question. I think you must hear about Drop shipping, if not then stick to this blog post till end here I am going to take you from the whole process of starting a Drop Shipping business from scratch.

This Business model doesn’t require lots of money but if you have a creative mind then you will get success. Drop Shipping is a very popular business model in the USA but it’s a new concept here in India. Many people are earning good money from this. Drop Shipping is booming in India for 4-5 years so, here you have great business opportunities.

What is Drop Shipping?

It’s a retail fulfillment method. Drop Shipping is a business modal in which seller (you) don’t need to store products in your store you have a deal with supplier/wholesaler who sends the product directly to the customer instead of you, isn’t this great? In this online business, you don’t need to maintain inventory, no headache of stock clearance, no big investment required, no tension about Shipment.

Basically, you just need to do marketing of the product and when you get an order to send the shipping and order details to your Drop Shipping supplier or wholesaler they will take care of rest of the process. It’s a great way to make money online.

How does it work?

Understand with the help of this image. Keep in mind that here your customer buys at retail price and you buy at wholesale price. Let’s understand this in steps

1. First, you find a product from a supplier whether it’s eBay, Alixpress or any drop shipping companies.
2. Now you find the product which you want to sell and listed it on your online store. For example, you are selling a keyboard for 500₹
3. Now, a customer buys the product from you. He goes to your web store and buys a product from you.
4. The next step is you take that order and send it to the supplier. You pay your supplier 200₹.
5. Now the supplier has the order they directly ship the product to your customer
6. You’re net. Profit is 500₹ – 200₹ = 300₹.

Here what happens is you are not going to touch a single piece of inventory you are just doing is marketing the product and getting customers for it that’s all you have to do.

How to start?

Now you know what is it and how it works. The next question is How to start so; you can also make money online. Here I have step by step process for you. Follow these steps and you are good to go. Many people stuck here because of the lake of information. There is much information you will find on the internet but most of them miss lead you.

1. Find products to sell

The first step in building your online Drop Shipping business or any other business is choosing a niche. Niche is like a category means you select a category of product in which you want to do business. There are many categories in the market like clothing, electronics, home appliances, kitchen appliances, cosmetic items, etc…. Choose one of any.

You can’t dive into all niches that will end up with a great failure especially in the beginning. Take an example of Amazon in starting Amazon was just a book selling website then after slowly they analyzed the market need and started with different categories and today it is the largest Online shopping website in the world.

So, how will you find the niche that is perfect for you? Here are some tips which will help you to select a niche.

• Choose the niche based on your interest. If you randomly select a niche in which you are not interested you will lose your interest soon in the business and it will take you to the failure. So, make sure while choosing the niche in you are interested.
• If you are not clear with your interest and not getting the idea for your niche do some market research for that you can take help of Google, use Google keyword planner and Google trends which are free tools by Google. Search your keyword related to your product and see how many people are searching for that product this will help you in selecting your niche.
• You can also check bestselling products on Amazon.
• A select niche which has higher price rate product. If you are selling a product of 500₹ and you are just getting a profit of 200₹ on another side if we assume you are selling a product of 3000₹ then there will be a chance of high-profit-margin than 500₹ product and both require the same amount of effort to sell.
• Try to avoid products which are big in size because if you choose big size products it will raise your shipping cost and decreased your profit on that product. Take care of size too.

2. How Do I Find Drop Shipping Wholesalers?

Now it’s time to find a trusted drop shipping supplier or a whole seller or a manufacturer who can do Drop Shipment for you. There many of them who can do Drop Shipping but you have to find the most trusted and reliable Drop Shipper whom you can trust on. After all, you are not going to touch and see what product he is delivering to your customer.

If he is not reliable and he sends a defective product to your customer then this will definitely affect your business. So, here are some points you must keep in your mind while selecting a Drop shipping supplier.

• He has a good brand image in the market. Your supplier must have a good image in the market. So, here is the point is Do a complete Background check of your Supplier.
• Make sure he is delivering the product within 2 or max. 3 days. If he takes more than 3 days then, maybe your customer cancel the order because people can’t wait. They have more options in the market.
• Are they delivering the product safely? How they pack the product? Which courier services they are using?
• Most important point cost. Calculate what price you are going to pay to your drop shipper and at what price you are selling to your customer so, that you can make a good profit from it.

If the supplier has all these qualities I mentioned above then he is the right person to start with.

How to find

In 2018 there are too many companies in India for drop shipping. But still, you are not getting any then I have some methods which you can use to find.

• Take help of Google to find. Simply go to google.com and search for keyword “Drop Shipping companies in India” or, “drop Shippers in India” you will get the list of many companies.
• Another way to find is Directories. You will get the list of Drop Shippers in Directories like HotHaat, India mart, Just dial etc… you can also search for Directories on Google.
• You will find many ads for Drop Shipping companies on Facebook, Instagram, and Google. This way also you can find a Drop Shipper for you.
• You can also find Drop Shipper through Online Shopping websites like Amazon, Flip Kart, eBay etc….go to sellers account and you find contact info. Or their website link.
• Referral, this is the best option to find a supplier. Contact someone who has knowledge about this or he had done or doing this business.

I can give you a reference, you can start your Drop Shipping with Homeekart.com I had a very good experience with them. They have a good plane, a quick response team, good enough product list basically a very good company to get started with.

3. Where to Sell?

There are plenty of options where you can sell your products online. But all options are not for everyone.  If you are new in this industry and don’t want to invest then you have some other option and if you have enough money and you want to invest then you have some other options.

If you don’t want to invest money then you can sell on unorganized marketplaces like;

• Facebook – Yes, you can sell products on Facebook and earn money. There are three ways to sell on Facebook.

1. Facebook Buy and sell groups – There are too many groups on Facebook where you can sell your products. Just join these buy and sell groups and add your products and if anyone interested in buying they will contact you.
2. Second option to sell on Facebook is Facebook Page. There is an option of add products on Facebook pages where you can add your products which you want to sell and people will order there.
3. The third option is my personal favorite Facebook Market Place. It is something like Amazon and other e-commerce websites. It is the best option on Facebook to sell your products. Here you will get more orders than Facebook groups and pages.

• You can also sell on websites like OLX and quicker. You can list your products on these websites for free but at a limit. When you reached their free limit they ask you to pay for the listing. So, I will not highly recommend you but you can use the free listings.

If you have some money to invest then I recommend you to go with these options.

• Create your Shopify store. Shopify is a platform where you can create your e-commerce store and sell whatever you want to they allow to customize your store, they also provide you with some tools like analytics and many more. But this is not free they charge for a monthly subscription. Shopify have three plane

1. Basic Shopify – 29 USD per month
2. Shopify – 79 USD per month
3. Advanced Shopify – 299 USD per month

You can start with the basic plan and if you grow then you can upgrade your plane to advanced.

• Start your own Ecommerce Website of your brand name. If you want to build your brand value in the market then this is the best way. But here you need some money to invest in a domain name, hosting plane and other many things.

4. Make Plan

Yes, you need a plane and strategy to focus on your business and your customer. Every business needs a plane and without a plan, they fail. In this business, you can’t survive without a great plane. For example, you must have plane how you will retarget your customer, how to get them back to your web store, how to make a brand, how will you manage your time, how will you grab the attention of your targeted customers.

It’s very hard to create your own brand, it’s hard to get the first customer, and it’s hard to retain the previous customer.  Make a plane execute it stick to it for a while analyze is it working or not? If not spot the weak points try to fix them and create another this way you can get success.

Advantages and Disadvantages OF Drop Shipping

There is always something good and something bad about any business. You must have known about it. Here I am pointing out some of the pros and cons of Drop Shipping for you.

Pros

• Low startup cost.
• Easy business method
• Minimum risk factor
• No need to maintain inventory
• No specific location required. You can start anywhere.

Cons

• Not easy to find a reliable supplier.
• No command on packing and shipping process
• Hard to retain customers
• High competition
• Low margin

5. Take Action

Now I assume that you have selected your niche, you get your supplier, selected the platform where you want to sell and you also have a plane ready for your business. Now it’s time to take action. Start this from today after reading this blog post. Don’t think too much. You will learn how to handle day by day once you start.

Final Words

In my opinion, it is good to start if you want to earn money online without investment or you want to analyze the market in your niche to start your own e-commerce website. Now the big question is “ is drop shipping profitable in 2018” then I will say yes, if you have selected a profitable niche, you have a good supplier and a well-defined business plane then yes, it is profitable in 2018.