Is a dropshipping business a good start up?

I'm looking for a small business opportunity. If I can find a niche, would this be a decent start up depending on the niche I go for?

 

Oh yeah, I'd like to know that too. From what I've read in the past, it sure was a good deal back then, but I don't know if it's still viable these days. Looking forward to an answer.

 

I started drop-shipping a specific type of electronic cigarette(lavatubeecig.com) as well as blogging a little bit about the product, I made 2 sales then it all died, I got a chargeback from one scammer and lost money on the whole ordeal, If you are going to start drop-shipping you better do it right, be sure to write a solid terms of service and to have a NICE looking website that is functional as well as provide the user with multiple payment gateways, Paypal is not enough.

It's easy to start drop-shipping, throw a site online with an opencart(or whatever e-com system you like) with a theme from themeforest and then advertise it around the web, be sure to actually have some knowledge of the product that you're gonna sell.

Go for a niche that is not already blasted to hell by amazon, ebay and all the other big players, if you live in a city, focus on your locals.

 

Depends on the niche, the drop shipper, your marketing skills, lots of factors.

 

Nice tips! It really is easy to start drop-shipping, but the hardest thing is promoting your store. If you are on eBay, you already get millions of users browsing, but when you make a separate website, someone's got to access it. Maybe paid advertising in some websites of the niche?

 

It really depends on you as a person. How willing are you to put money into this – how much effort can you honestly put into it? If you expect to get rich overnight, drop shipping is not the option. I have found that the most frustrating aspect behind the whole situation is having to find the right product that you can sell in your market.

 

I'm not as familiar with this as I am with other systems. It usually helps to market products/get involved in affiliate programs of items you've actually touched, tasted or used.

 

I wouldn't recommend it, at least not as your only source of income. Too many variables can mess with your plan, better to try and sell things that are insubstancial, than deal with products sent by a third party, you end up having no controlk over your logistics.

Hope it helped!

 

Drop Shipping sucks. Your entire Name, Reputation and Quality of Service depends on a company you have 0 relationship with. Your customers will hate you when the drop shipper fails to deliver.

 

we had a client that is into dropshipping after a month of trying to put her business into ebay ranking she suddenly gave up. Im not sure if this is really working or there is something wrong with the marketing strategy.

 

Hi HungryForSuccess,

Indeed, dropshipping is a viable yet wealthy business, not quite suitable for start-up. It is an expert type and it is definitely not recommended to do till you are a professional.

 

It really depends on how discounted your pricing is and how well you can market it. The problem with dropshipping is that you usually do not get the most discounted pricing, usually around 15% on the low end and 35% - 40% on the high end; and then there is the handling/shipping fee charged by almost all dropshipping companies when an order is placed, which can easily eat up around 10% of your profit margin. Then there is the cost of marketing online. If you're using Amazon or eBay, you'll be competing with other vendors selling the same products but getting better prices and you'll also be paying around 15% of the sale to Amazon and 10% to eBay. Once all these expenses are factored in, you may not have anything left for yourself and may actually lose money!

If you can factor all these expenses into your products and still have a profit, then yes, I'd say this is a good business plan.

 

I belive drop shipping is very good concept. If you connect physical thing to online place You can get good margins also. But you must find reliable dropshipper.

 

I believe it's a great way to start making money, and you can start by selling on eBay and Amazon before purchasing and building a website. When you want to expand and run your own website to sell products, you can get traffic from Adwords and blogging. It will take money to make the site successful, so that is why you should start by using eBay or Amazon.

There are also shopping engines you can advertise on, basically PPC advertising. Places like ShopZilla and Nextag.

 

How much time and effort do you want to invest in promoting someone else's products for low margins, instead of developing your own products with high margins?

In many cases, you can make more money being an affiliate for a product than you can by drop shipping the exact same item.

First choose a market you wish to pursue. Then determine the REAL needs of your market. Only then start trying to figure out how to provide the product to them. That is the point you will know what the potential price point is, the demand, and how much competition you face. You will be ready to make an informed decision, instead of speculation.