I’d like to start this article by sharing a valuable lesson:How a student of mine handled a fifty seven thousand dollar order.He owns a dropship store where he had a business contact him, and they said they want to buy multiple pieces of a product, basically, the order total came out to almost $60,000.
Preston put together an invoice sent it to them and basically what happened which always happens when you’re selling b2b is that they wanted to make a deposit, rather than paying 100 percent upfront it’s totally normal that’s the way business the business sells work but Preston being you know a little bit nervous that it’s that much money didn’t want to actually have to lay out cash of his own right – there’s risk involved there 100 percent is even though you could be selling to an established business there’s always risk when you’re putting your capital out there – what shopify theme is that?
Preston it was asking for feedback on how he handled this and what he did was reach out to the supplier tell them about this potential order and then have them take on the risk.So the way that he did that is by earning a commission for referring this huge $57,000 order to the supplier.
Now, the one thing that I’ll comment on this well let me say two things one is that I do think asking for a commission and letting the supplier take on that risk is a great idea if you’re not comfortable with that kind of tolerance putting that much cash out there, so I do think that’s totally fine you didn’t do anything wrong there.My one piece of advice would be that you should have asked for a higher Commission so if you want to read this thread guys I’ll link to it it’s a great thread it’s like a 10-15 minute read so I’m not going to share too much, but Preston got a commission for referring the sale, I think you could have got a lot more probably double, but either way great job that’s a nice payday.
Another important question to consider iswhethersalehoo is good for sourcing dropshippers.Salehoo is a supplier directory, you pay them a yearly fee they give you a list of companies that are mostly dropshippers. Here’s the problem withthat.
I’ve signed up for it I think I still probably have an account(aliexpress product analysis)- it’s not worth it. you know your best bet to find suppliers – do the research yourself, the suppliers are not going to charge you any money, you’re going to find a lot more than you would somewhere like salehoo or any other supplier directory and the ones that you find when you do research yourself are the real type of suppliers we want – they’re not the middlemen that call themselves drop shippers they’re the real deal they’re companies that manufacture and produce products that look for people like us to sell their products, so don’t sign up for it it is a waste of money it’s it’s not going to help your business that’s the bottom line in my opinion it’s not going to help your business.
Now on to the crux of this article – niche selection– picking products to sell.Now listen, I get that it’s scary and I get that you see some people succeeding right away but it’s not because of the product they picked, just picking a product isn’t going to make you successful or not .
Some niches that have been proven to be successful in the past that I can literally see around my house:Wall art we have coffee tables we have computer chairs we have accent chairs we have a microphone stand, we have a desk, we have headphones, we have computer, chairs, we have more desks we have here a bookshelf right and we’ll walk around and see what else there is you know more different types of wall art, there’s just so many different options what do we have out here we have large file cabinets right we have smaller file cabinets we have a kitchen table with dining chairs we have water coolers, we have coffee machines ,we have microwaves, we have refrigerators and listen I’m not saying all these things are going to be great for products that sell but they’re going to give you ideas that you can then at least research right.So out here we have you know more desks we have whiteboards we have computer stands we have there’s just so many things this is one office that as you could tell is empty right now we still don’t even have all our stuff in here but there’s plenty of things right.
So don’t think that like finding a niche is impossible – there’s plenty of things, so listen – here’s the deal: Don’t think that you have to pick one product and when you see other people succeeding and posting their screenshots and saying they did all these sales – it’s not because they found one product that is better than yours, it’s not because they found one thing that’s so amazing, I mean these floor tiles I could sell them or you could sell them or who else someone else in the world could sell them and maybe one of us is going to make no money and maybe someone’s going to make a few hundred dollars a month and maybe someone’s going to make twenty thousand dollars a month right it’s not because of the floor tiles it’s because dropshipping product research, of what comes after you choose a product – that’s this whole business step niche election product selection that’s step one doing the right market research finding your competitors finding the best suppliers setting up a website that people actually want to buy from, you know actually talking to the suppliers and working out deals with them when you could sell for them, optimizing your site for conversions getting the right kind of traffic that’s what matters.
Then once your site’s live, obviously taking care of the people that are already hitting your website track them with lucky orange– see what they’re doing are, they not buying if not why right have live chats they can engage with you and ask you if they’re stuck like what why aren’t you paying like what do you need help with answer the phone when someone calls you check the emails and respond quickly okay niche selection is important – I’m not going to try to say you don’t need to do it right, it’s very important, but once you get past a few basic criteria – it all comes down to what you do from there it’s only step one that’s not going to make you money that’s not going to make your business that’s going to get you started.
