The Ultimate Shopify Dropshipping Guide

The Ultimate Shopify Dropshipping Guide

Here is the ultimate Shopify dropshipping guide for the entrepreneurs. No doubt Shopify dropshipping store is an awesome way to step into e-commerce.

Creating an e-commerce store that uses drop shipping save your time and money as you don’t need to carry any inventory. You can focus on growing your online store, and making more sales.

Dropshipping is flexible and simple way to run your store. This ultimate Shopify dropshipping guide to help you start your own successful Shopify dropshipping business.

We’ll walk you through the step by step process of starting a Shopify dropshipping website.

What is Dropshipping?

Dropshipping is a retail fulfillment method where a store doesn’t keep the products it sells in stock. When a store owner receives an order from a customer, they simply contact the supplier, who will then ship the products directly to the customer.

As a drop shipper, you’re free from inventory management headaches. The rest of the work will be done by the third party (i.e Supplier). You don’t have to touch the product and you only pay for what you sell.

There are several dropshipping tips you can apply to drive traffic to your store. 

What is Shopify?

Shopify is simple to use and one of the leading e-commerce platform. With Shopify dropshipping store, so you’ll be able to build your own store even if you don’t have any technical experience.

Plus, Shopify has everything you need to sell online, on social media, or in person. It lets you start, grow, and manage a business.

Why Use Shopify?

Shopify is designed to help people build their own, scalable online store with hundreds of built-in features, and tons of apps. You can sell products directly on your website, and across multiple marketplaces and social media.

Easy back end administration, thousands of payment gateways, Professional support and much more to do when you sign up with Shopify.

How Does Shopify Work? 

Shopify is a cloud-based, SaaS (software as a service) shopping cart solution. Shopify also offers a limited free trial. A monthly fee gives you access to an admin panel where you can enter store data, add products, and process orders.

Moreover, Shopify works as the foundation for your ecommerce business. It’s an ecommerce platform that provides entrepreneurs with the skeleton that they need to start and design their store, and its backend lets you run your business without any hosting fees.

Advantages of Dropshipping

Dropshipping means that the store owner completes the order directly from the supplier or manufacturer you don’t have to maintain the inventory. It is a great business model for aspiring entrepreneurs to start with because it’s accessible.

Starting a business always required hard work. Dropshipping isn’t the perfect stress free way to start your store. No doubt it has some definite advantages yet it comes up with some built in complexities too.

Let’s discuss them in detail below.

1. Less investment is required

Instead of purchasing an extensive inventory and hoping that it sells, you can start a dropshipping business with zero inventory and immediately start making money.

When customers place orders in your store, you can contact the supplier and provide product-related information, and then allow the supplier to ship directly.

Launch an ecommerce store without having to invest thousands of dollars in inventory is only possible with dropshipping.

2. East to get started

With dropshipping, you don’t have to worry about:

• Managing or paying for a warehouse
• Packing and shipping your orders
• Tracking inventory for accounting reasons
• Handling returns and inbound shipments
• Continually ordering products and managing stock level

It’s much easier to run an online store when you don’t have to deal with physical products.

3. Low overhead

When you don’t have to purchase inventory or maintain a warehouse your overhead is low. Many Shopify dropshipping stores are run as home based business requiring little amount of expense.

As you grow these cost will increase but will still be less as compared to those of traditional brick-and-mortar businesses.

4. Flexible location

Dropshipping store can be run from anywhere all you need is an internet connection. As far as you can easily communicate with the suppliers and customers you can manage your business smoothly.

5. Wider selection of products to sell

Since you have not purchased any product. You can offer any trending product, it will not cost you a single penny.

6. Easier to test

The main benefit of dropshipping is again the ability to list and potentially sell products before committing to buying a large amount of inventory.

7. Easier to scale

Most of the work is looked after by the supplier allowing you to expand with fewer growing pains and less incremental work.

Growth in sales will bring additional work. Businesses that utilize dropshipping scale particularly well relative to traditional ecommerce businesses.

Disadvantages of Dropshipping

Dropshipping a very attractive model for anyone getting started with an online store. But here are a few shortcomings to consider.

1. Low margins

This is the biggest disadvantage of dropshipping. Many competing stores will set up shop and sell items at the lowest possible prices in an attempt to grow revenue.

2. Inventory issue

When you have stock in hand its simple to keep check on the inventory. Where as in dropshipping it’s difficult to check if the product is still in stock or out of stock.

Oberlo also lets merchants take automated actions when a supplier’s stock hits zero. For example, when a product is no longer available, you can automatically un publish the product, or keep it published but automatically set the quantity to zero.

3. Shipping Complexities

If you work with multiple suppliers this complicates your shipping costs.  For example; if a customer places an order for three items, all of which are available only from separate suppliers. You will have to give three separate shipping charges for sending each item to the customer.

4. Supplier Errors

Order fulfillment by the supplier can damage your store image. Even the best dropshipping supplier can make a mistake in dispatching the order. But none of your customer knows the supplier everyone just know you and you will have to face the blame.

Low-quality suppliers will cause endless frustration with missing items, failed shipments, and low-quality packing, this can ruin your business reputation.

5. Limited customization and Branding

Usually, the product drop shipped is designed and branded by the supplier. Any changes or additions to the product itself usually require a minimum order quantity to make it viable and affordable for the manufacturer.

Why Would I Start Dropshipping on Shopify?

Dropshipping makes it incredibly easy for sellers to launch ecommerce stores because they don’t have to manufacture products, maintain inventory or handle shipments.

Shopify is the simplest platform you can use to create and run your store and Dropshipping is the best business to start with the little amount of investment.

While you start dropshipping on Shopify, you’ll never need to worry about excess inventory. Oberlo is the greatest dropshipping app that works exclusively with Shopify.

7 Steps to Start Dropshipping on Shopify

In this section we will see a step by step guide to start Dropshipping on your Shopify store.

1. Naming Your Shopify Dropshipping Store

In the first step you need to open your Shopify Dropshipping Store. Name your online store. Here are some tips for naming your store:

• Keep it simple.
• Be creative.
• Make it memorable

To make it easy for you to pick your Shopify dropshipping store name there is platform which is Oberlo’s online Business name generator.

All you need to do is enter any word that you would like your business name to include, and click on Generate names. A list of business names will be generated for you to choose your favorite Shopify dropshipping store name. Using this can save your time and its free of cost too.

Once you are done with choosing a name from the list provided now you need to check if the name is available or already in use. You can check this by using Google search, and also searching if there is a .com domain which is already being used.

Whereas, it’s not necessary to use a new name you can use a general business name and register a general domain name to get started. 

2. Creating a Shopify Account

Creating an account for your Shopify dropshipping store is a simple and quick process. To start, you’ll need to visit Shopify’s homepage. Once you’ve loaded the page you’ll see an empty field at the top of the screen where you’ll need to enter your email address.

Now, enter your email address into the field provided. Then you’ll be asked to create a password for your account and enter the name which you’ve decided on for your Shopify dropshipping store.

Next you’ll need to fill out a couple of questions about your experience with ecommerce, along with a few personal details. Once you are done with this, your Shopify account will be up and running.

3. Optimizing the Settings for Your Shopify Account

This is the most essential step to receive money from your customers. Create your store policies and establish your shipping rates.

Payment Information

This is a necessary step to set up a payment method to your Shopify dropshipping store. If you don’t add payment method options you won’t be able to receive money from your customers.

To add payment information you’ll need to access Shopify’s “Settings” page. From here, simply select the “Payments” tab on the left and add your payment information.

We’d recommend that you add a PayPal account here. If you don’t have an account you can sign up for one in just a few minutes – it’s a simple process, even if you’re not technically proficient.

Store Policies

When launching your own Shopify Dropshipping Store, you need to make sure that you have created the necessary policies.

Shopify has created a helpful tool that automatically generates a standardized privacy policy, refund policy, and terms and conditions for your store.

This tool can be accessed from Shopify’s settings. Click on the “Checkout” tab and scroll down to the bottom to find the fields which were mentioned.

Click on the “Generate” button and you’re ready to go.

Shipping Rates

Always offer free shipping, as this is the easiest option. If you offer separate shipping rates for various regions it can become confusing. Therefore simply include your shipping fees into the price of your products and make shipping free.

For example, if you’re planning to sell a T-shirt for $20, raise the price to $25 and offer free shipping.

Using FREE SHIPPING! As part of your Shopify dropshipping store’s marketing will help you sell your products. You can set free shipping on your store by accessing the “Shipping” tab in your Shopify settings.

4. Launching your Shopify Dropshipping Store

Once you have added all the necessary information to your Shopify Dropshipping store. Now to launch your store, simply access the “Sales Channels” option on your Shopify settings. From here select the “add an online store” option.

Once you are done with this your store will be up and running.

5. Designing Your Shopify Dropshipping Store

Design of your Shopify store is the most important thing as it will be how you’re presenting your store and your brand. 

Your website is a user’s first impression of your business, and first impressions count.

When it comes to design, there are two main aspects that you’ll need to take into consideration while designing your Shopify dropshipping store

1. Your theme
2. Your logo

Picking a theme for your Shop

Shopify have plenty of built in themes available at their theme store both free and premium.

Take a look around and decide on the best theme for your store based on your financial resources. If you’re starting your store with a tight budget we’d advise choosing a free theme.

It can be tricky to decide which theme you should choose for your Shopify Dropshipping Store.

Creating a Logo for Your Store

Your logo helps your customers to remember your brand. Creating a logo might sound like a tough and time-consuming task.

But with Oberlo’s free online Logo Maker you’ll be able to generate your preferred logo in a few minutes. All you have to do is experiment with fonts, colors, icons, and positioning for you to develop the perfect logo for your brand.

Whereas, if you want to create a logo by yourself than use graphic design software like Photoshop. You can also outsource high-quality graphic designs from freelance platforms, like Upwork or Fiverr, at an affordable price point.

6. Dropshipping on Shopify with Oberlo

After designing your Shopify Dropshipping Store you need to start adding products. To add products you need to install the Oberlo app, which is one of the best Shopify tools for ecommerce entrepreneurs who want to have dropshipping store.

Oberlo and Shopify are seamlessly integrated, so you’ll be able to start importing and offering products from the start.

Then you’ll need to add a category onto your Shopify store. Name this category after the type of products which you’ll be selling. If you’re thinking about starting an online T-shirt business, then simply name this category “T-shirts.”

Click the import button on any products that you’d like to sell and they’ll be imported directly into your Shopify dropshipping store.

7. Making Your First Sale

Everything is completed, now it’s the time to start selling with your Shopify dropshipping store. It’s clearly not possible to generate a huge amount to traffic to your store by simply launching it. You need to use marketing campaigns to draw potential customers to your store.

Do some research to find out which marketing channel will work best to drive traffic to your Shopify dropshipping store.

The most important thing is to keep testing, and you’ll soon find out which marketing strategies work best for your ecommerce business.

Final Words

Starting a dropshipping business with Shopify is surprisingly easy, and requires very little upfront investment.
This “The Ultimate Shopify Dropshipping Guide” will help you a lot in starting your own website.
To summarize, take a day or two to find a product and then create a site using Shopify’s easy-to-use platform. From there, experiment with different marketing methods and see which tactics successfully drive traffic and sales.

When all these steps are implemented correctly, you’ll be able to run a profitable dropshipping business in a matter of weeks or months.

Congratulation, you’re now the owner of your own Shopify dropshipping store.