How to Start Dropshipping -Five Biggest Hurdles & Best Solutions

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How to start dropshipping business is more important than before, considering its popularity is on a sharp rise for the last few years and will soon be a 5 trillion industry soon.

Nevertheless, I will discuss in detail the five biggest roadblocks and strategies to counter them. Hence, you will not face fear or fret about failure.

Let’s Get Started,

Low-Profit Margin (Biggest Intimidator of How to Start Dropshipping)

One of the major problems associated with how to start dropshipping is the low-profit margin. Cheap products lead to low-profit margins. Therefore, increasing the burden on the number of sales that will be required to earn sufficient profit.

The Solution

Increase the price in a manner that boosts the customer’s perceived value of the product. Customers should find a price increase is a result of the increase in product value. Therefore, the increase in the price should only be by just the right amount to ensure the product appears more desirable.

How to Increase Product Perceived Value

• Overhaul the design aesthetics with sharp, sleek, and organized design. It creates a strong positive first impression. As a result, a significant increase in the perceived value. 
• Another way to raise conversion rate due to high perceived value is the implementation of charm pricing.
• Extending product warranty and highlighting it on product pages and in ads is another clever technique to boost perceived value.
• Negotiate a better price with the product supplier by making him understand that you are targeting the right audience. Hence, I will soon have tons of orders arriving at the store.

Niche Selection Goes Wrong

Another issue most dropshippers have to deal with while starting out dropshipping is choosing the right niche.

The Solution

In-depth research is required to differentiate a profitable niche from an ordinary one. Going for a niche with minimum competition and maximum opportunities is like striking the right balance.

• The major market players in your niche, and how much business do they occupy?
• What are marketing techniques are used by successful merchants in the niche?
• Currently, how broad is the customer base of your niche? And how big can it grow in the near future?
• Can most of your customers be convinced easily to spend money for a product during the entire year (usually when demand is low)?
• How much opportunity is there for upselling and cross-selling?

The above questions will help you decode and decide will the particular niche be suitable for your dropshipping business or not. This will help you debunk many myths regarding how to start dropshipping.

Customer Service Not At Par

One of the often overlooked criterion by how to start dropshipping enthusiasts. It is really nice if you have listed high quality and in demand products on your story and have smartly customised the marketing strategy. This is still not a moment of joy, what about customer support to deliver impeccable customer experience.

Another critical thing I would like to point out is that customer service ain’t limited to resolving customer issues. It also includes preparing a strategy to make customers feel their decision to shop on your website was correct.

Moreover, the customer journey doesn’t end upon successful order delivery. A passionate team of skilled professionals is must to keep customers happy and give them a reason to keep coming back.

The Solution

• Tailor customized offers based on customer purchase history. Therefore you can impress them with appealing offers.
• Analyzing data makes it easy to figure out the most profitable customers. These guys deserve rewards, and you should not let it go like that. Rewards will boost loyalty to the next level.
• Be a pro and leverage opportunities to enable a good customer experience as below
  • Use best practices of packaging to avoid product damage.
  • Leverage real-time inventory and price sync to avoid denying order delivery after taking the order.
  • Respond to customer queries with lightning-fast speed.
  • Return policy needs to be flexible and easy to understand. Also, no use of jargons in return policy.

Do you know, customers very well remember being treated good by brand as it is quite rare. Therefore, responsive customer support is a fantastic opportunity to showcase they are an integral part of your brand.

The vision of an excellent customer support team should be making customers feel appreciated and connected. As a result, the customer will prefer your store over any other brand in the future.

Low Sales Despite Good Traffic on Store

Several factors collectively contribute to low sales figures despite the sufficient volume of the target audience in your store.

The Solution

Maybe customers find it hard to navigate different parts of the store. Hotjar recordings will help you find the not so easy to navigate part of the store.

The Pro Tip: Do not let users take more than three clicks to reach the page they want. Even better if you

Instead of big annoying pop-ups, better add a link in the footer to capture visitor email. Moreover, you will not disable customers from browsing the store unless the email is submitted.

Ask yourself

• Is the language of the product page complex?
• Are the product features only elaborated, and benefits are missing
• Is CTA missing

If you get answers as yes for any or all the above questions. It’s time to fix it

• The missing trust factor can be another significant reason for the high bounce rate. Upon finding trust signs like awards, product reviews, social media presence, SSL encryption, press coverage, and more, customers will feel they are on some high authority site, not a fraud one.
• Some visitors will abandon the site during the checkout process upon feeling it’s a tiresome and a damn long process. Therefore, either mention the number of steps for checkout or let a progress bar reveal how close the customer is to complete the checkout process.
• The shipping price is sky-high. Customers of all categories and under all scenarios consider shipping rate as a decisive factor for deciding. Offering free shipping will help you win back such customers.

Fear of Failure (Major Roadblock for How to Start Dropshipping)

Last but not the least, the fear of failure has discouraged many ambitious entrepreneurs from taking the first step of success. But, here is how to fight the fear of failure.

The Solution

Failure will never stop you, but your fear of failure will definitely stop you from success.

• View failure as an opportunity to reconsider your plans before going into the final battle. Another important thing to look into is that there is no single formula of success, so there is no need to worry about failure. Because failure is normal and something routine.
• Update your mindset to believe that it is acceptable to be comfortable with being uncomfortable.
• Be courageous like an entrepreneur and exhibit the ability to survive against all odds.
• Instead of taking all the steps at once. Believe in yourself and take tiny steps.
• Keep yourself updated with the latest know-how of the industry. The more you know it means less is the fear of failure because knowledge brings confidence.

The Pro Tip: Don’t be kid and associate failure with an insurmountable amount of embarrassment.

Summing It Up – How to start dropshipping is Easy

Dropshipping is a lucrative business model owing to different reasons. But lucrative doesn’t mean a cakewalk. Owing to the high competition above mentioned are some of the major challenges with their respective solutions. Therefore, you have a better chance for seamless business expansion with dropshipping.