Finding Products to Sell: How and where to Find Dropshipping Products

Finding the right products to sell in your online store can be a difficult process, especially if you are just starting out. You want to build your online store on a solid foundation of products that you know will be easy to source, easy to sell, as well as highly profitable. It’s vital that you populate your product pages with high-quality and affordable products that your specific target market will want to purchase.

One of the most popular and easiest methods to date in selling online is called the dropshipping method, and it has been revolutionizing the way many of us entrepreneurs think about business. It is certainly a turnaround from the traditional brick-and-mortar method of business, where it was previously necessary to construct and run a physical store. Thanks to the internet and the booming popularity of online shopping, this is no longer the case. Now we can construct and open the virtual doors of our online businesses with the use of our laptop computers, from the comfort of our own homes.

With the dropshipping method of ecommerce, there is no limit to the possibility of success. It is a low investment business model that has the potential to generate high returns when performed correctly and with lots of perseverance.

We have written this article to help you in one of the most important aspects of your dropshipping business and journey, which is in selecting the perfect dropshipping products for you to sell in your store. This article will let you in on the things you will have to consider before deciding on the best dropshipping products that will suit you and your business.

First Off-What is Dropshipping?

For those of you who are still in the dark on what dropshipping actually is, then this little snippet is for you. Dropshipping is a model of business where you can run a fully functioning online store from your computer without the need of keeping an inventory of the products you sell in a backroom somewhere. You will not have to think about shipping or keeping the products on hand, because this will all be taken care of by the product manufacturer or the product supplier.

While you will be marketing and selling products from your suppliers on your online store under your brand, it will be the job of your suppliers to deal with the logistics of keeping a supply of products and shipping them out to your customers all over the globe.

Starting a dropshipping business is not in any way as demanding in terms of time and money as running a brick-and-mortar store. The whole process of dropshipping also happens to be conveniently automated, and all you need to do is build the foundation that is your online shop and populate it with dropshipping products.

Here is where you get started on deciding which products to sell in your online store:

How to Find Dropshipping Products

Unlike conventional retail stores, the dropshipping model allows for some more experimentation. After all, you haven’t invested in a stock of products that are sitting in boxes right now in a back room that you need to stick to until they sell.

With dropshipping, you could go ahead and test the market. If something doesn’t work out quite as well as you would have hoped for, then there isn’t much reason to despair, because you didn’t make any considerable investments. But as the saying goes: Time is money, and not many of us have a lot of time to waste, so you’ll be wanting to get things right from the get-go.

Here are some things you must keep in mind before you should choose your dropshipping products:

1. Your products must be profitable.
2. There has to be an existing market and demand for the products.
3. The products should be easy to ship.

So with these three to consider, here’s what you can do to help you find and choose the best dropshipping products for your store:

1. Track the Trends

Tracking trends is important when you are running or planning to run an online business. It also happens to be a natural place to start when considering what to sell in your online store. However, you must take note that when you deal with products that are trending, it usually also means having to deal with more competition.

In spite of this, we maintain that it always pays to be well informed and to be familiar with what’s hot this year, also because it can help you predict the products that can rise in popularity in near future.

So, if you are still on the fence on which products to sell online this year, you can always turn to the bestselling lists of products from popular online stores. Here are some good resources for you to consult and check for products that are selling like hotcakes:

When you get an idea of products you might want to sell from viewing these sites, we recommend that you use Google Trends, an online search tool for you to use to check on the rise and fall of a product’s popularity online over a specific period.

Tools like Google Trends can help you track the nature of growth and decline of the popularity of the potential dropshipping products that you want to explore and could help you make your decision by showing you a handy map of the landscapes of the level of people’s interest over time.

You can also check out our list of 20 Best Selling Products to Sell in 2019 to get a well-researched idea on what’s hot this year and a forecast on products that may be profitable in the years to come.

2. Pick a Niche

Aside from checking out bestselling products, picking a niche is also a helpful and crucial choice that you have to make that will determine the success of your ecommerce and dropshipping venture. Finding a niche you feel like you can work with will also really help you determine which products to dropship.

Your niche falls into a narrow category of products you’ll be selling to target the specific needs of a certain group of people who share a common interest. For you to find your identity as a brand or as an online seller in the competitive world of ecommerce, you have to identify the industry and the niche that you want to focus on.

With the near-limitless possibilities that the internet and online markets provide, you’ll be faced with so many possible niches and business opportunities to get into, so you have to choose carefully.

Picking a niche could allow you to tap into the vast potential of not-so-universally-popular dropshipping products that also happen to sell well to a targeted audience. Not everyone may want them-but you will have a sure group of people who will.

For instance, women’s clothing is an all-time popular product category and you will find many stores to contend with in that arena. However, you will find less competition in the narrowed down niche of environmentally friendly yoga gear. You will also find that there is an ever-increasing market for this niche that you could potentially capitalize on.

If you are still looking for a suitable niche for your online business, you can also check out our guide on choosing a niche to get a better idea of how to pick the right niche for you.

3. Scope Out the Competition

Whether you like it or not, your dropshipping business will have to deal with competitors. There are going to be other stores out there who will be selling the same products or working around the same concepts as you. This may not necessarily be a bad thing, especially if you have the habit of scoping out the competition, determining what it is they do and coming up with ways to do better and outperform them.

So, take a look at your competitors and the products that they are selling and look at their pricing strategy. If your competitors are selling a product that you would like to include in your store, try to see if you can source and sell the same product at a similar price or lower to stay competitive. If you can’t do this without making a decent profit, then this product may not be viable for you to sell at the moment.

Scoping out the competition should be in no way difficult for you to do. A quick Google search and some notes on their pricing should afford you all the information that you need to get.

4. Pricing

Remember when we said that the products you settle on should be profitable? Well, this comes down to how much you can retail your products and how much you can profit out of each sale. You need to make a profit with your dropshipping business for it to be sustainable and for you to be able to have an income off of your business.

After you have done your product research and taken note of your competitor’s price ranges, you will also have to determine how much your suppliers charge and how much you can mark up the price of your products. All this you must do to ascertain that your business is going to be profitable.

You’ll find a lot of advice online talking about ideal pricing, but to keep things simple, we maintain that you should at least be able to sell your product at a $10 profit- at least. For instance, if you were sourcing a car vacuum cleaner for $15, you should be able to sell the item on your online store for $25 so that you can get a sizable cut to make a profit as well as cover the other necessary costs and expenses of your business.

5. Finding Suppliers

Thankfully, finding suppliers for your dropshipping business should be easy! There are many reputable merchants out there that can import products automatically to your site, where products will be displayed and ready to sell.

Oberlo, a dropshipping app for Shopify, does precisely that. It’s a favorite among dropshippers because it is so easy and convenient to use. Oberlo offers users a Google Chrome extension called the Oberlo Chrome Extension (OCE), which allows you to add products from AliExpress to Oberlo. Just add the Chrome extension, visit AliExpress, and you are good to go.

When exploring for products on AliExpress with the help of the OCE, you can add products to your Oberlo account straight from AliExpress. From Oberlo, you can manage your products and add descriptions and other relevant information before importing to Shopify. The OCE also helps users determine the availability of ePacket shipping and clearly shows the average processing time for each product.

You will still have to make your research on your suppliers from AliExpress, just as an extra precautionary step to determine their reputation and how well they work to fulfill your customers’ orders. You want to make sure that your business goes smoothly without a hitch and that your dropshipping suppliers are professional enough to carry out smooth transactions.

Back to You

Nothing is stopping you from starting your own dropshipping business venture today from the comfort of your own home or any place around the world. With the highly promising ecommerce business model of dropshipping, you have virtually limitless options in products to sell and a chance to run your own successful business at last.

It’s simple to get started. Once you have decided what products you want to sell in your store from careful product research, finding a manufacturer and deciding the ideal price point should not be difficult. Adding products to populate your online store should also be quick and simple with Shopify apps like Oberlo.

What you finally decide to sell on your online store is ultimately in your hands, and therein lies the beauty of dropshipping, the near limitless options to choose from, the various niches, and the revolving doors of opportunity that you can build your business upon.

Your Thoughts

Are you in search of the best dropshipping products for you and your ecommerce business? Choosing ideal dropshipping products may seem like a tough choice, but it’s an important one that you’ll have to dedicate some time and research to. If you’re still undecided about what products are best for you and your online venture, contact Ecommerce Pro today. We love to hear about your dropshipping ideas and projects. Together, we will come up with the best solutions to help you run a successful dropshipping website.

Originally published at https://ecommercepro.com on December 8, 2019.