The Definitive Guide to Find Dropshipping Products to Sell in 2023
Taking the initial step of sourcing products is essential to building your first e-commerce enterprise. In other words, finding dropshipping products is a pain.
But only if you don’t know how to go about it.
When it comes to product research, entrepreneurs find themselves in a fix.
You see, crafting the ideal online store can be tricky due to all the rabbit holes and time-consuming searching involved.
In addition, eCommerce entrepreneurs face considerable competition with an estimated 12 – 24 million online shopping websites worldwide.
Fortunately, by understanding what’s out there and investing in a solid strategy for product research, you can set yourself up for success!
With that in mind, online retailers are shifting their operations to dedicate more time and resources towards marketing and branding their stores for a competitive edge.
A great way of achieving this goal is by adopting the dropshipping model with eCommerce.
Why choose dropshipping?
If you choose this order fulfillment system, stock-keeping and the handling of picking, packing and shipping can become a thing of the past.
In fact, third-party suppliers can manage all that for you, meaning orders placed on your eCommerce website can be shipped directly to customers without any additional effort from you.
If you’re starting out as a dropshipper, finding high-quality and affordable products can be difficult.
This guide is here to help make sourcing items for your business much simpler! By following the steps outlined in the guide, you’ll have no trouble launching a successful dropshipping company with great products.
Here’s how you can source products for your online store. Lets find out.
Finding Dropshipping Products for business
Your online store will be relying on dropshipping products that you can sell online. Your process begins with a simple question:
Define what you mean by “finding products”
It is important to remember that the process of uncovering products for dropshipping differs vastly from traditional retail.
With dropshipping, you are searching for suppliers who offer no-risk items that you can sell directly to your customers without having to buy and store inventory.
In this article, we will provide you with some top product-sourcing tips to help you build a successful dropshipping business.
With these strategies in place, it’ll be easier for you to concentrate on essential facets like constructing effective marketing campaigns and scaling your business instead of worrying about the back-end operations.
Find a Niche Market
A niche is a well-defined subset of the larger market, where customers have distinct desires, interests and needs.
By targeting this smaller audience, you will effectively address their individual requirements more precisely than if you were exploring the whole category.
Niche eCommerce stores allow you to pay attention to a specific group of potential customers, thereby reducing competition and saturation.
With that in mind, by selecting one niche and focusing on the needs of this audience, you can quickly become an authority in your field as well as fulfill their requirements with ease.
To showcase the energy of marketing to a limited audience, let’s consider influencer promotion. It is worth noting that nano-influencers with just 1,000 – 5,000 supporters often achieve an engagement rate of 5%, which is usually higher than what larger influencers have – those with several hundred thousand followers!
Why choose a small niche?
As you focus on small niches, it becomes easier to establish more substantial relationships and engage directly with your audience. Some of these niches have become go-to dropshipping products – because they will always be in demand!
Examples of evergreen niche product categories include:
- Tech
- Fashion
- Beauty
- Watches
- Garden accessories
- Jewelry
How to choose a profitable dropshipping niche?
Consider these questions:
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Will your niche open up possibilities for seasonal product offerings?
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Is the potential niche continually introducing successful, new products to captivate buyers?
To give yourself the best chance at success, compile a shortlist of five or six dropshipping products.
Ensure that your area of expertise provides you with the potential to make substantial profit margins.
Useful Advice: To begin your dropshipping journey, selling popular or trending items is one option. But if you’re looking to invest in a long-term plan, investing in steady sellers would be more optimal.
Alternatively, you can combine the two. Capitalize on the latest trends while simultaneously stocking products that have recurring demand.
Remember though – no matter how hot a product may be right now, fads eventually die out, and it’s essential to devise an alternate scheme for engaging with your customers down the line!
To recap, successful dropshipping products fall into two distinct categories:
- Find products that serve as a solution to your customers’ needs.
Reusable water bottles, backpacks, mobile phone cases and laptop stands are all great product ideas that provide solutions. Once you identify your niche market, pinpoint the exact items they require to solve their problems successfully.
- If you’re looking to grab customers’ attention, how about some eye-catching products?
Think along the lines of dazzling toys or comfy pet beds. These intriguing items are likely to be shared on social media due to their uniqueness, but keep in mind that these trends will eventually die down and become unprofitable afterward.
Find Profitable Dropshipping Products with online tools
Now that you’ve identified a possible niche to explore, it’s time to start your product research and identify those winning items. Luckily, there are some excellent product research tools available to make the process easier:
Use Google Trends
Google Trends is an invaluable tool for those researching products. With its easy-to-use graphs that display search interest over time–all free of charge!
Google Trends provides instantaneous data with the simple act of searching potential products to sell.
To put it into perspective, we looked up the search interest for “lipstick” on Google Trends in their Fashion and Style category for 12 months. Surprisingly, searches have stayed relatively consistent throughout this entire period. This suggests that lipsticks won’t be going out of fashion soon since they maintain steady popularity instead of sudden spikes in demand.
Google Trends can pinpoint sellable items, making it a wise and reliable tool for product research.
Look at Best Selling Product Lists
Unclear where to start searching for dropshipping products?
Platforms like Spocket make it easy, providing insight into the items other sellers have been successful with. To help premium users even further, Spocket has dedicated a whole product category solely to their bestsellers list!
This is immensely helpful for those looking for top-notch quality and popular products to sell instantly.
Check out Online Communities
If you’re looking for profitable dropshipping products, don’t forget to take a peek at some of the online communities.
For instance, check out Pinterest to see what’s trending or go over Facebook pages with popular items such as ‘Best selling toys.’
Ask the Local Community
It’s time to get out there and explore! Visit your local markets or check out community events such as craft fairs.
See what items are in demand, then find sources of similar profitable products for your dropshipping business. Taking this step will provide great opportunities that may lead to success!
Use Ubersuggest to find dropshipping products.
This free keyword tool, developed by Neil Patel and tailored explicitly for product analysis and identifying high-value products is a must-have. With this amazing set of features, you can:
- Find search volume for any keywords
- Use specific keywords to generate data
For example, we typed in “Playstation 5.” We ended up with popular keywords such as “Playstation 5 controller” and “Playstation 5 game.”
This way you can find more items to sell easily with Ubersuggest. Its a great dropshipping product research tool.
Check Out Your Competition
To gain invaluable insights on what products are successful, take a page out of the playbook of your rivals and other Shopify stores who use Facebook and Instagram to advertise.
Monitor their ad engagement levels for an in-depth look at how each product is faring. Additionally, explore various product research tools to deepen your understanding further.
Strategically “flood” your social media with competitor ads and drive potential customers to a large dropshipping store. Have them add items to the cart, but then encourage them to abandon it before they check out!
Retargeting ads in a successful dropshipping store is essential. Once you spot those ads on your social media account, click them to inform Facebook that the presented content intrigued you and compel even more similar posts into your newsfeed. This will ensure maximum visibility for potential customers!
After the ads have run, review how they did in terms of engagement. Are there a lot of comments and likes?
Remember that if a dropshipping business isn’t earning money from their ads, they won’t keep investing in them. This way you can find if there is customer demand for these items or not.
Use The Best Dropshipping Suppliers
It is time to find the best dropshipping supplier for your products.
Spocket is well-known and provides access to thousands of suppliers worldwide while integrating with popular eCommerce platforms such as Spotify and Wix. Their expansive inventory will cater to nearly every niche imaginable, so find what your business needs today.
But keep these things in mind when searching for reliable dropshipping suppliers:
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Please ensure they are easy to get ahold of and respond quickly to inquiries.
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See if your supplier gives you the choice to order sample products so that you can check the quality of each item.
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Make sure you know the supplier’s return and refund policy. They may offer money back for damaged, wrong, or misplaced items.
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Get a glimpse into what others are saying. Read reviews and ratings to make an informed decision.
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Find out if your supplier can do swift delivery in locations where you conduct business.
Decide Your Prices
Once you have identified your supplier, be sure to compare their base price with the prices of other online sellers.
Can you set a competitive rate and still make money? This is an essential step in developing healthy profits while maintaining customer loyalty.
When setting product prices, you must take into account the wholesale purchase price and all associated costs such as shipping fees, taxes, and marketing expenses. Considering these things, it will be easier to calculate a good markup for your products.
Setting prices too low means minimal profits, and customers might balk at the thought of poor quality. On the contrary, setting your prices too high is a surefire way to drive away potential customers in favor of competitors with cheaper options.
No matter what you do, it’s critical to ensure that pricing aligns with product value.
Prior to setting your rates, identify your minimum retail value depending on your wholesale cost, shipping fees, taxes and marketing outlays. Compare the pricing of competitors to take into account their strategies when you set yours afterward.
Understand your customer base. It is imperative to analyze their spending habits, browsing behavior, and other relevant data.
To get a more precise idea on this matter, consider using advanced website analytics or studying rival business strategies. You could even take advantage of direct engagement with prospective customers by way of conducting surveys in Facebook Groups and Forums!
It’s time to build your Dropshipping Store
You will need to choose the best eCommerce platform for developing your dropshipping store.
Before settling on an eCommerce platform for your online store, ask yourself this:
- Does the platform provide integration with dropshipping apps/suppliers?
- Is there a free account option available on this platform to keep your expenses low?
- Is this platform user-friendly for those just starting out?
- Is the platform reliable when you need help troubleshooting any issue?
After you’ve opted for the platform that best suits your needs, create an account to get started on building a remarkable website!
Crafting your website is one of the most enjoyable elements when constructing an online presence. That said, it’s imperative to limit the time spent designing your store since prosperous marketing strategies lead to success in business.
Luckily, countless eCommerce platforms provide free themes for you to use that make your shop appear professionally designed without overworking yourself.
Optimize your Copy and Descriptions
Now that you have devoted your energy to constructing a website and securing items for sale, it’s time to make an impression on the industry.
Crafting unique copywriting for both your website and product descriptions is one of the best routes to distinctiveness!
Remember that, if you stick with the supplier’s original copywriting for your product description, Google may flag it as “duplicate content” and prevent your website from ranking on search engines.
An easy way to avoid this is to craft SEO-optimized descriptions of your own.
When choosing a name for your successful products, avoid using people’s names such as “Paul’s Suit” and opt for descriptions of the product itself. This aids customers in finding what they are looking for on Google Search more efficiently – think: “V-necked T-shirt”.
To get the most effective results, we suggest leveraging Google Trends and other keyword-optimization tools like SEMRush for market research and optimized descriptions.
Get the word out about Your Store and Products
If you want to generate sales, the quality of your products isn’t enough; customers need to be aware that you exist.
To make sure this happens, it’s essential to spread the word about your business and promote yourself. Here are some approaches for marketing without breaking the bank!
Adopt a Buyer Persona
Visualize the ideal purchaser for your business. Consider their income level and whether they are likely to be a one-time or recurring customer?
Understanding what experience your desired client wants is critical in determining how you should proceed with your dropshipping stores.
Invest in SEO
If you want your eCommerce business to dominate the search engine rankings, optimizing for SEO is not a one-time task.
You must ensure that each of your product descriptions, titles, alt texts, and website content encompass the specific keywords which should be ranking on those platforms.
To better optimize search engine results, you can use various tools such as Google Keyword Planner and the ever-popular Google Trends.
Post and Promote on Social Media channels
With the current market being saturated with social media, it is important to stand out among the noise. Take the time to research which platforms your consumers are using and craft a comprehensive strategy for maximum visibility. Additionally, consider utilizing tools such as Buffer or Hootsuite that can manage your channels concurrently. A well-thought-out plan will help ensure success for your eCommerce store!
Frequently Asked Questions
What is dropshipping and how does it work?
Dropshipping 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. This allows for lower upfront inventory costs and the ability to offer a wider variety of products.
How can I find dropshipping products to sell on my ecommerce store?
There are several ways to find dropshipping products to sell on your ecommerce store. Some popular methods include:
- Using a dropshipping supplier directory
Many online directories list dropshipping suppliers, such as SaleHoo, Oberlo, and World Wide Brands. These directories allow you to search for suppliers by product or industry, and often provide information on the supplier’s pricing, shipping times, and minimum order requirements.
- Researching your competition
You can research the products your competitors are selling and see if they are dropshipping. This can give you an idea of what products are in demand, and you can reach out to the same supplier as your competition to sell the same products.
- Sourcing products on AliExpress
AliExpress is an online marketplace that allows you to purchase products directly from manufacturers. Many merchants use AliExpress to find products to dropship on their stores.
How can I verify the quality and reliability of a dropshipping supplier?
Verifying the quality and reliability of a dropshipping supplier is crucial to ensure that you are providing your customers with high-quality products and timely delivery. Some ways to verify the supplier include:
- Checking reviews and ratings: Look at reviews and ratings of the supplier on directories or marketplaces. Reading reviews from other customers can give you an idea of the supplier’s reputation and quality of service.
- Contacting the supplier: Reach out to the supplier, you can contact them using multiple supplier websites, and ask them about their products, shipping times, and return policy. This can give you a sense of their customer service and level of professionalism.
- Testing the products: Purchase a small test order from the supplier to inspect the product quality and packaging. This can give you an idea of what to expect from the supplier in terms of product quality and packaging.
Are there any risks associated with dropshipping?
Yes, there are some risks associated with dropshipping.
Some of these risks include:
- Long shipping times: Since the products are shipped directly from the supplier, shipping times can be longer than if you held the inventory yourself. This can lead to unhappy customers if they have to wait too long for their order to arrive.
- Quality control issues: Since you are not physically handling the products, it can be difficult to ensure the quality of the products you are selling. This can lead to customer dissatisfaction and returns.
- Limited control over stock: Since you do not hold the inventory, you have limited control over stock levels, which can lead to out of stock items and lost sales.
What are some best practices for dropshipping?
Some best practices for dropshipping include:
- Researching and vetting suppliers: Carefully research and vet your suppliers to ensure they are reliable and provide high-quality products.
- Setting clear expectations with customers: Be transparent with your customers about shipping times and product availability.
- Having a detailed return policy: Have a detailed return policy in place to handle any issues that may arise with the product or shipping.
Wrap up
Searching for the ideal products to dropship can be a daunting task. Yet, it is critical to get this step correct if you want long-term success with your online stores. It’s unlikely that randomly deciding on which items to sell will result in as much success as using effective product strategies and conducting thorough market research. Trending products have a short shelf- life; therefore it is crucial that you take out time to find dropshipping products, calculate shipping costs, identify the best-selling products, and then order them for your online business.