How to dropship with Shopify?

E-Commerce Setup

Using Shopify for dropshipping is a popular strategy for eCommerce businesses of all sizes. It offers several benefits over traditional retail, including lower start-up costs and fewer risks. However, it comes with some challenges you’ll need to overcome if you want your dropshipping business to succeed.

For those unaware of drop shipping, it is a retail fulfillment method where a store doesn’t keep the products it sells in stock. Instead, when a store sells a product, it purchases the item from a third party and has it shipped directly to the customer. As a result, the merchant never sees or handles the product.

The merchant will place an order with their dropshipper (or “dropship supplier”), who then ships that item directly to the customer on behalf of your business. Once your customer receives their order and pays for it (by credit card), you’ll be notified by email that you can pay your supplier—which means no worrying about having enough cash flow to cover inventory or holding onto unsold inventory at home!

What is Shopify Dropshipping?

Shopify Dropshipping is an eCommerce business model that allows you to add and sell products without having them in stock. Instead, your dropshippers will take care of the shipping and customer service while you focus on marketing and making sales. Shopify has built-in support for dropshipping, which means all you need to do is set up your store with one of their themes and plug in some information about your business.

In Shopify Dropshipping, we have already connected with suppliers who can provide products for you to sell in your store. All you need to do is add their products to your Shopify store and start selling them!

Things to consider before dropshipping with Shopify

Shopify is a great way to get started with dropshipping. You can try it out for free, and there are no long-term contracts or hidden fees, after your trial, there are cost-effective plans to help you get started. But there are certain things that you need to take care of before:

1) Research your suppliers and products

Before selling anything, it’s important to know who you’re working with. You need to find out if the supplier is reliable and has a good reputation in their industry. There are many research tools out there, you can try free methods such as making use of Google Trends or checking what’s hot on Amazon & Alibaba/Aliexpress. There are also a large amount of paid tools such as Sell the trend.

2) Look out for a specific niche

As with any business, it’s important to choose a niche. That will help you find suppliers who can supply products that fit that niche. Common niches include beauty, tech, and sports. 

3) Consider the quality of the products

You’ll want to make sure that the quality of your supplier’s goods is high enough for your customers. It will help them to keep coming back and buying from you. A popular way of testing quality is to ask your supplier for a ‘sample’ product. The supplier is often happy to send a sample you will just need to cover the cost of the item and postage. If you do not wish to wait for a sample and rather get things moving faster another great way to check the products is by referencing the reviews. 

4) Look at the prices

It’s important to know what your competitors are charging so that you can price your products accordingly. You can research this simply by searching for your product on Google and viewing the prices of competitors. Generally speaking, Amazon prices will be lower but remember part of the dropshipping model is to run ads directly to your store to help convert at higher prices. 

How Does Shopify Dropshipping Work?

Shopify dropshipping is a fulfillment method that allows you to buy products from suppliers and sell them on Shopify without worrying about inventory management or shipping.

Shopify dropshipping works by using a third-party service that acts as an intermediary between the buyer and supplier, allowing you to import the product data directly into your Shopify store without worrying about inventory management or shipping.

Let’s examine Shopify’s dropshipping process.

Step 1 Purchase on your Shopify store

On your Shopify dropshipping site, a consumer places an order and makes a payment for the merchandise.

Step 2 Speak with your provider

You give your supplier the order and delivery details. It would be best if you had a reliable supplier you could rely on to deliver the service you offer because you are not responsible for selecting, packaging, or shipping actual products.

Step 3 Receiving a bill

You get charged for the purchased goods as soon as your Shopify dropshipping provider receives the order.

Step 4 Paying for the services

You pay your supplier, who often receives a payment that covers both the product’s wholesale cost and the dropshipping fee.

Step 5 Supplying the products

The supplier for you handles the product’s packaging and shipping.

The dropshipping process on Shopify is straightforward – you have to choose the products you want to sell in your store, and the supplier will handle the rest! You can either opt for manual fulfillment or automatically based on the app. 

What are the pros of dropshipping?

Dropshipping is an easy way to start and scale your business. You don’t need to worry about upfront costs, managing inventory, or the quality of products you sell, as the supplier does this for you. Some of its benefits are:

• You don’t have to worry about inventory or storage space.
• It is easy to start and requires little investment in time or money.
• You can focus on marketing and sales instead of managing your store.
• You can sell a wide range of products without purchasing them first.
• You don’t need to worry about returns or customer service issues, as this is the supplier’s responsibility.

What makes Shopify different from other eCommerce sites?

Shopify is a hosted eCommerce platform, which means you don’t have to install any software on your computer. It is easy to use, with a great support team and plenty of themes and plugins in the Shopify App Store.

What tips should you follow when running your Shopify dropshipping business?

Shopify has made it easy to run a dropshipping business. You can easily set up your store and start selling products in minutes. But it is important to follow these tips:

• Determine if it’s the right fit for you and your business (before taking action).
• Plan an exit strategy to avoid getting stuck with inventory you can’t sell.
• Stay organized using Kanban boards, project management software, etc.
• Keep an eye on your margins and research what other retailers charge for their products.
• Use Shopify’s built-in reports to monitor your sales and inventory levels.

List of helpful apps & websites to get started with Dropshipping

The Shopify app store houses some great apps to help you set up your dropshipping store and automate your sales process, below we have listed some of the best apps from personal experience.

DSers – DSers is one of the most popular dropshipping apps on the Shopify app store. Boasting thousands of five-star reviews and three plan levels starting at $0 to $49, it is one of the best apps to get started with your Dropshipping store. From product importing to automatic fulfillment DSers is a great all-in-one solution.

Ali Orders – Ali Orders is a free product importing and auto-order fulfillment app on the Shopify app store. Specifically designed to integrate with Aliexpress, Ali Orders is a great option for getting started.

Printful – Printful is a very popular dropshipping app aimed at Apparel and clothing. Printful actually acts also as the end supplier. With the app, you can automate the process of the orders and set a difference/markup on your T-shirts & clothing to make a profit.

Fiverr – Your new store will need a logo, perhaps even a Shopify agency if you would like to go for high-end dropshipping. The fastest and most cost-effective way to help get your business set up is by using Fiverr.

ECOM King – Ecom King Youtube’s channel is an excellent source of information for developing and growing your Shopify Dropshipping store. Ecom King’s channel offers up-to-date advice including hot and trending products.

Conclusion

Dropshipping still goes strong late in 2022 and going into 2023. We know from experience after working with many successful drop shippers within different niches. So if you are looking to start an online store, Shopify is a great option. It is easy to set up, has many apps and integrations, and offers excellent support.  Our recommendation would be to focus on design, high-quality branding, and imagery to make your store stand out when running Google and social advertising.