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Auctions InformationDropship Your Way To Ebay Success
by:
Tim Knox
Dropshipping is a topic that I 1st self-addressed
in my column way back in April, 2003, which is decades ago in Cyberspace years. But with the continued
growth of eBay and it's positioning of itself as a viable way for anyone looking to launch an ebusiness, the topic of dropshipping is now hotter than ever. It is as well now much misunderstood than ever.
Dropshipping has been about since Sears 1st started commerce goods from its mail order catalogs over a hundred years ago. However, the idea of dropshipping still confuses many a folk who don't understand exactly how the process works.
By definition, dropshipping is a know-how
of commerce and distributing goods wherein the distributor or bourgeois of the product (the dropshipper) ships the product directly to the end user (your customer) on the retailer's behalf (that's you).
The process of dropshipping involves three parties who take a product from manufacturing to market. They are a manufacturer, a distributor, and a reseller.
Let's use a blue contraption as a sample product to demonstrate the process:
* Blue Contraption Manufacturing (manufacturer): This is the institution that manufactures blue widgets. Blue Contraption Manufacturing makes not sell directly to the public or supply the retailers who ultimately sell the blue widgets to the end user. They prefer to use distributors to handle the task of taking their blue widgets to market. Blue Widgets sells blue widgets by the truckload to distributors who pay $5 per blue widget.
* A1 Distributing (distributor/dropshipper): A1 Distributing is the institution that purchases blue widgets in bulk from the manufacturer and supplies them to resellers at a cost of $7 each. The distributor makes not ship blue widgets to the reseller, but ships orders directly to the reseller's customers as the widgets are sold.
* Big Bob's eBay Contraption Store: Big Bob sells blue widgets to the public from his eBay store. Bob orders the blue widgets from A1 Distributing as he sells them (usually one at a time) and has A1 ship the blue contraption directly to his customer. Bob sells blue widgets to the public for $10 each, which means that for every blue contraption sold-out
he nets $3.
How The Process of Dropshipping Works
Here are the seven steps involved in starting a dropship ebusiness:
* STEP 1: Choose A Product To Sell The really 1st step in any sales process is deciding what product to sell. There are many a factors that should be considered before deciding on a product to sell, but for now let's say that you decide to sell CD players on eBay.
* STEP 2: Locate A Bourgeois Who Wish Dropship For You Mistreatment a research tool like Google, Thomas Register, or an industry-specific resource like The Ultimate eBay Dropship Power Pak. You search for and find a institution who wish dropship CD players for you. The institution offers you a 35% mark up over cost, which means that they wish supply the CD players to you for $100 each and you should be able to retail them for $135. You do sure that the dropshipper has a nice stock of CD players on hand so you don't end up commerce a product that must be back-ordered.
* STEP 3: Set Up An Account With The Dropshipper You contact the institution that can supply the CD players and set up a reseller account with them. This can often be done online or by phone, but several companies wish require that you complete and return a reseller application to open an account. Several companies may as well require a tax ID and business license.
* STEP 4: Advertise The Product For Sale On eBay Now that you have your bourgeois lined up and cognize that the product is in stock, it's time to do a sale. You advertise the product mistreatment an eBay auction. Since you cognize what you must pay the dropshipper for the product, you cognize what the minimum numbers you wish take for the product. In this case you start your auction at $100 since that is your cost. If you are confident that you can get much than $100 for the product you can start with a lower price, but remember that if the product goes for less than what it cost you to fill the order, you wish lose money. As well remember that the dropshipper wish charge shipping, so you should numbers that into your sale.
* STEP 5: The Product Sells Great news: your CD player sells for $135 and your consumer
pays you with a PayPal instant payment. I extremely
recommend that if you are commerce on eBay you use PayPal or several different online processor to accept instant payments. This allows the consumer
to pay you faster, which lets you place the order with the dropshipper faster, which gets the product to your consumer
faster.
* STEP 6: Place The Order With The Dropshipper After your consumer
pays you, you should contact the dropshipper at once to order the product on your customer's behalf. The dropshipper then ships the order to your consumer
under your institution name and address.
* STEP 7: Follow Up After The Sale This is wherever
many a new ebusiness folk drop the ball. Simply because your consumer
has paid you and you've placed the order with the dropshipper makes not mean that you are out of the loop. Quite the contrary, if there are problems with the order you are the one that wish be command
responsible in the eyes of your customer.
Be active
in your consumer
relations. Follow up with your consumer
to let them cognize that the item has been shipped. Offer yourself as the personal contact for any
Many folk are afraid to use dropshipping as a know-how
of sales due to the horror stories that fill the Cyberspace just about unscrupulous dropshippers who take the money and don't fill the orders, merchandise that is evermore back ordered, unscrupulous middle men motility as dropshippers, etc. Do no mistake, the dropshipping industry - like most different industries - makes have its share of shady characters who would-be rob you blind given the chance, but there are as well hundreds of honest dropshippers who can help you build a profitable eBay dropship business.
Simply just about the Author
DropshipWholesale.net, an online organization dedicated to the success of online and eBay entrepreneurs. http://www.dropshipwholesale.net - http://www.30dayblueprint.com - http://www.prosperityandprofits.com
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