DROPSHIPPING WALKTHROUGH

thanks a lot man, going to take a look and see if i can figure it out. so this oberlo site can directly integrate with shopify? without you having to code or program stuff?

>mistakes I made so far, so you can avoid them

Well, here's one:
I only planned products based on shipping to Australia. When I tested purchasing a product, the ONE product I happened to test turned out to only ship to America. Lesson 1)
>ensure your chosen product ships worldwide

Here's another one that cost me a shitload of time and duplication: Shipping details aren't stated at the checkout page. Hence, lesson 2)
>for every item, you need to include shipping details in the description

This one was a pain in the ass. Not really a mistake, but can be avoided: heaps of sellers on AliExpress put their stupid fucking logos or store names on product display images. This leads to lesson 3)
>ensure you can remove logos and store names. If a product image has "CHINKY CHINK LUXXXE SUPER HAPPY FUNFUN STORE NO. 322342241" across every image, just fucking forget it unless you can remove it easily. It looks way too fucking tacky, unprofessional and untrustworthy to your customers. A customer seeing that will immediately bail on the rest of your site.

Another issue that caused me problems: Sizing. This isn't applicable to everyone, but if you end up selling clothes, it'll happen to you (pic related). 99% of the items on AliExpress simply say "S - L" (if you're lucky, the majority of clothing items are minimum of XL"). An Asian "S" is a standard "XS" for the rest of the world. Similarly, bra sizes aren't standard for your country, leading to lesson 4)
>get good sizing charts, and incorporate them onto every single one of your product descriptions.
>feel free to rip my sizing charts straight off my site: lakelace.com/pages/sizing-charts
(Not shilling, just cannot remember the original source of these pics & text chart)

I must admit I'm hypocritical as fuck on this, as I'm yet to put the sizing chart on every single product once I realized this issue.

More issues will come as I discover them.

Yep, literally not a single ounce of coding required. It's the most simple, fucking brilliant time-saving dropshipping application you can use. Also, it's free. It'll be suggested on your shopify dashboard but, in case it isn't, look at the very bottom left of your shopify admin (www.myshopify.whatever.com/myadmin) and click "appstore", and search for "Oberlo".

Thanks for all the info so far. Much appreciated.

I was wondering regarding the sellers from Aliexpress... Do you use a single seller and just relist all his or her stuff on your site or do you list products from multiple sellers? Is it easy to configure Oberlo to send orders to different sellers?

what type of shopify account do you recommend for a beginner? the basic seems alright to me

this looks like it will be a bit of a learning curve for me so im going to play around and start really simple

Nice work so far. How many products have you sold?

Where did you get your website theme

>Tips & tricks in general that are useful to me

When reviewing products to buy, you should make sure that other buyers have had success. This leads me to Tip No 1:
>only buy products that have had at least 200 orders

Often, sellers will sell a product properly and legitimately for a few months so as to gain good reviews, then completely fucking abandon the item and get free money by scamming customers. I've nearly bought items from sellers of 99% satisfaction, on products with 5 star ratings. Here's how you can avoid it, Tip 2:
>Check the LATEST reviews. Make sure there aren't recent reviews (within last 2 months) saying that no order was received

Please understand; there are fake. fucking. reviews. everywhere. Avoid these sellers like the plague. I've seen products with literally 200+ 5 star reviews, ALL of them fake. Most of them come from Russia, Ukraine, or Pajeetistan countries and are generic (i.e., "good seller, product arrive fast, high quality, excellent, not first time buying, my wife loved it." etc. etc. This leads to tip 3:
>Conduct vetting on the reviews. If there's fake reviews in general, avoid the seller like the plague. You WILL get scammed and there's nothing you can do about it, apart from fuck your own asshole for a little while to make the butthurt seem a little less in comparison.

Often, sellers will conduct the bullshit scamming as described in Tip 2, and then setup a new shop with fake reviews, leaving them with 100% satisfaction rate. Understand; a 100% satisfaction rate is impossible. Hence, tip 4:
>If a seller has a 100% satisfaction rate, it's a scam - just fucking forget it and move on.

Lastly, for now, be aware that sellers who have only been open for a year or less, are more often than not scammers. The following tip is a rule I follow. Tip 5:
>If a seller has been open for less than a year, just fucking ignore it and move on

More tips to come, I hope they save you some time, effort, money and stress.

thanks agian for the tips. also kind of a dumb question but do you use your personal bank account when you start off, or did you make a new business account to receive the money?

does shoppify report your sales to IRS and at what point should i make a business registered with IRS?

I use multiple sellers. With Oberlo, this is a painless, simple process with absolutely no additional effort required. Oberlo also has a great chrome plugin which lets you 'Import' (importing products lets you then customize and change them for integration with your shopify site, as a finished product ready to sell) multiple products from any seller you'd like, with literally one click of a button.

For information on Oberlo, see this post: For information on how to get the best suppliers, see this post: I used Shopify's 14 day free trial to get my site up-and-running. I decided that I'd need to be able to fully process orders and refunds, fully customize my site, and be able to apply discounts/coupon codes.

Shopify's basic account ($29 USD p month) allows me to do this. I would recommend it to anyone starting out: It's just not necessary to pay for any more.

Zero sales.
The site launched (i.e., is ready to take orders) yesterday. I haven't announced the launch to any of my followers on instagram, and haven't advertised the live site yet. I'm going to do a little more marketing before that. The reason it's live now is so that you Veeky Forums guys can check it out, and so that I could get feedback from my friends.

The theme I used is the "Debut" theme from Shopify. I think it's the one that's applied by default, and it didn't cost me anything.

I used my personal bank account. I'm based in Australia, and only had to register an ABN - but this wasn't checked or verified (though I did use my legitimate details).

From what I've heard so far, it's completely unnecessary to register an LLC/open a business account etc. etc. for the rest of the world. Again, as stated in the original post, take this with a grain of salt against your own research, but at least everything I've read and seen indicates that there's no issues with just using your personal bank account and not bothering with the rest. The IRS has bigger fish to fry.

By the way, for those wanting to see exactly how I've marketed the brand, see the instagram page: instagram.com/lake.lace
(again, not shilling, just trying to help others with this whole process - most of you are never going to buy lingerie anyway, you're not my target demographic so there's no business benefit in shilling here)

thanks for posting quality OC user, ill help spread you on insta

also another question, do you buy shit to test it out check quality for yourself? or just hope the product delivers? do the chink sellers give you good pics on ali?

Went to website. Seems creepy as fuck for some reason. I guess knowing the back story. Fuck it, looked good though

also are you worried about copyright laws with your pics of models and shit

>Specific, little details that will save you a lot of time to learn now

Pt. 1/2

If you follow what I did, and ensure that shipping costs no more than around $4 to $6, then you should set your standard shipping price to $5.99
Any few cents that cost you on shipping will (or at least they damn well fucking should) be made up for in your profit margin. Configure shipping here:
>Navitage to Shopify Admin (whatever.myshopify.com/admin)
>Click the cog-wheel at the very bottom left of the screen
>Select Shipping from the pop-out menu
>Scroll down to "Zones and Rates"
>Click "edit" under "Standard Shipping"
>Change the value from the default $10.00 to $5.99

When you're working with product descriptions on Oberlo, there's a simple way to make details stand out (see pic related), and a common format that I've copied from major clothing sellers (your product may differ, but the same kinda concept applies. If it's not clothing, replace 'Colour' with 'Style' or 'Type', replace 'Size' with 'Size' or 'Weight' etc.)
>put categories in bold, followed by the description in regular text

Pt. 1/2

Thanks.

Do you contact the sellers on Aliexpress whose products you're listing? I've heard some people recommend you get in touch with the seller first to ensure that they do drop shipping. Is this necessary?

Thanks bro! Any feedback or help is welcomed and appreciated. If you ever need any help marketing or spreading your own dropshipping stuff, message me on the instagram account and I'm happy to help.

I'm glad you asked: Most dropshippers swear by holding the product in their hand. I've found that good product vetting can eliminate that need. Read for more details, and here's an extra tip:
Many legitimate reviewers will post photos of the items in reviews. You can filter AliExpress reviews to those with pictures - it's a great way to assess the real quality of the item.

My original plan was to:
a) Get a friend who pays for lingerie and photographers
b) Get a photographer student friend
c) Buy 1 of everything from the store
d) Give it to her for free, plus a free modelling shoot, on the condition that I use the pics for the site & instagram, and that she posts her favourite pics on instagram and tags the brand's instagram

I figured that ( this is relevant to you) it'd kill marketing, advertising, branding and quality testing with one stone. However, it would have cost me too much and I'll save that plan for when (or if) the site turns over enough to make it viable.

Nah, not necessary. I don't think the issue is whether they'll do dropshipping, the issue is whether they'll actually deliver the product they advertise. To them, it just looks like "John Doe at 42, Wallaby Way, Sydney" has ordered another product again.

However in the description, I include a note that says "This is a dropshipping product - please, no promotions, thank you cards or marketing material". In regard to your point, this is probably something I should reconsider.

If I ever get a seller refuse to sell because of the dropshipping, I'll report back here and describe their issues, response, and my solution. Thanks for bringing it to light!

How do you deal with wrong sizes and people wanting to return it or exchange it?

Instead of including a note about how the clothing doesn't look purple in real life, why don't you just use Photoshop or GIMP to color correct it?

Thanks for the positive feedback. As for the 'creepy as fuck' part, do you think that's because of any of the particular imagery/text/branding that's used?

So, how exactly does customer get the product?
You are stocking this item or not?

Is it all automated or you "order" again at chinese vendor and act as agent?

Thanks user, good tip. I'll go ahead and do that now.

I think that the time I figured that it'd just save me time and effort.

>1729420
lol im curious about this too. not just because of the used underwear aspect, but because shipping back and forth from china would take like 2 months

I have not a single item, or piece of stock in my hands, or premises, whatsoever, at all.

The way it works is that the customer places the order, and essentially believes that my site is the main supplier.

My site (or more precisely; Shopify) captures the customer's order data and payment. The order data gets sent directly to the seller on AliExpress, and the customer's payment lands directly in my bank account, through my site (Shopify). My credit card is charged the original seller's cost.

So say I'm selling Glass Ashtrays
>I find a supplier on AliExpress selling ashtrays for $5
>I start a website, selling Glass Ashtrays for $50
>A customer buys a Glass Ashtray from my site
>$5, and the customer's order details, get sent to the supplier
>$45 goes straight into my bank account
>The supplier makes, packs, and ships the Glass Ashtray straight to the customer

I hope this explains it, lemme know if there's any more details you'd like or if I went off on on the wrong tangent

he explained above, no he doesnt stock the item its a chinaman vendor

No, not really. Just knowing what is actually going down gave me a chill for some reason. Not putting you down, is what it is. I think my wife would shop at a place like this. Not all the time, but for a special occasion.

>tfw lace lake might one day be on my bank statement

See
Remember; the seller ships directly to MY customer. I never once have to handle any items at all. If my customer wants a return or exchange, I tell them (in the Returns policy) that they'll have to sort it out directly with the manufacturer. The way I've worded it goes something like this:

>Please understand that our business model connects local and international designers, manufacturers and suppliers with our site. Therefore, when you purchase a product from our site, the corresponding supplier is responsible for shipping and quality. If there is an issue with an items delivery or quality, returns will have to be negotiated with the supplier directly. In the case that the supplier is uncooperative, we can help you. Should we decide to accept that the product is damaged or not as described, and the supplier is uncooperative, we may choose to issue you with store credit, or accept a return. Please note that when we accept returns, we charge a $15 shipping, handling & re-stocking fee. Please keep in mind that this means products bought for under $15 may not be viably refunded or returned if faulty.

It's a reeeeal shitty policy, but as stated in , I pretty much don't have the time to deal with returns/refunds etc.

>My credit card is charged the original seller's cost.
this brings up another question, i think if i start doing this type of shit i would want a separate credit card just for fraud protection, sure as hell wouldnt use a debit card

i think the biggest problem i see with dropshipping is the risk of getting fucked by the random sellers in china

since you use a personal bank account to get the money from orders, can customers see your real name and info on the order statements? i could see pissed of customers trying to hunt you down

Thanks for the positive feedback!

In the off-chance that your wife does want to order something, here's a discount code: CAMEFROMBIZ

Also, if there's ever any issues with the order, lemme know at: [email protected] and I'll refund the order, and throw in a free pair of underwear next time you buy something.

So your happy with your customers recieving their goods in chinese packaging? That seems like a deal killer for any successive orders from a customer

This is why I would have thought it would be better to contact the seller, ask if he/she does drop shipping. Get an email address/phone number/whatever so you can contact him/her and build a business relationship.

It seems like this would lessen the chance of getting chinked.

So, for fraud protection, there's a solution called: SecurePay which is excellent, but I don't think it integrates with Shopify. For Shopify fraud protection, you'll need to consider getting a 100% Chargeback Guarantee app, such as this one: apps.shopify.com/signifyd

What it does is flag orders as suspicious (i.e., address and IP don't match, email looks suss or is blacklisted, for orders over a certain amount or by some other condition) and requests that customers agree to a 100% chargeback guarantee. That means that they won't be able to charge-you-back and scam you (at least, this is how I understand it - please do your own research and don't take my word for it!)

I currently use one of my other business' visa debit cards, can I ask why you wouldn't use a debit card?

I've tried to ensure (by looking through product photos and customer review photos) that the packaging isn't some chinese branded thing.

I also know that 89% of women don't care at all about the branding, or packaging of their lingerie. What they care about is (primarily) whether it looks good, and (secondly) whether it will last for a month.

It's a good point though, and something I considered, but there's not much work around that issue. This is a problem faced by many dropshippers. If you think of a viable workaround, share it with us!

debit card is money straight out of your bank account. if you get over charged/scammed by fraudulent sellers on aliexpress in china or eastern europe, thats straight cash you lost. which means less operating capital, and a hassle to go to the bank to get it back. and some banks might have different policies, like only giving your money back when they recover it. with credit card, you can dispute with company like visa, and say no, my order was only for $300 not $895 and say you got robbed and they will refund your credit line

no point in risking your own money when a huge company is willing to risk theirs for you

Chinks are the jews of asia, just remember that. As noted in this post: , plenty of sellers will build legitimate customer/seller relationships, just so they can get away with a few months of scamming. They'll then close the original store, and start up again.

Also, ALL AliExpress sellers provide their names, email, phone number, and other (QQ [some chink social media thing], facebook etc. accounts) contact details - but it doesn't mean shit when they simply don't reply to you.

If you look through the customer reviews that are negative, for shitty products, you'll see them say things like "texted seller, they laughed at me and called me stupid when I asked for my money back after they didn't deliver"

The BEST way to prevent this shit is to simply vet the seller/supplier first; see this post: For example, if you see a seller with a 98% satisfaction rate, selling a product with 3,000 orders and nothing but 5 & 4 star reviews, with customer reviews including photos showing good quality product, it's a safe bet you're not gonna get scammed.

But if you see a seller who's been around for less than a year, with an 85% satisfaction rate, selling a product with 30 orders with two 1 star reviews saying "product never arrived, seller never refunded money", you're gonna get scammed. And I bet that if you called and emailed the 1 star seller, they'd still be just as polite and seem as 'legitimate' on the phone as the 5 star seller.

Anyway, that's just my two cents - and your caution and risk aversion is a GOOD thing my friend, it will (and probably already has) save your ass a lot of time, effort and hard earned dollars. Good luck with it all.

Nah, you nailed it, tnx.

As for website feedback, try to uniform images somehow. Some have borders some not. The stock/insta pictures are ok imo.

I am getting started in cosmetics but its saturated af.

GL

the only workaround i can see would be flying to china and working out a deal with them where they use some western looking packaging, but the return address is always going to say guangoungxhiaou, cn lol so not much you can do

Oh, just realized, mine's a pre-loaded debit card. Still the same risk as you just described though.

I guess that the way I see it, the main risks are as follows:
1) >sellers don't actually ship products
This can be mitigated with returns policy
2) >fraudulent customers result in chargebacks
This is shit, and as you said; money out of your pocket. I suppose this can be mitigated with something like the app mentioned here: and something like SecurePay.
3) >shit quality results in a beatdown on social media/online, which kills customer purchases for a while
This can be mitigated by quality testing and stringent product vetting, one of which I've employed

Thanks for bringing that issue to my attention. I'm going to explore more solutions for chargeback/fraud prevention - particularly because Lingerie is really lucrative for fraudulent purchases (dunno why. This was noted by a prominent luxury Australian lingerie vendor).

Will report back on this thread when I have solutions for you and all readers.

Thanks, funny you mention the uniform images, I'm currenlty re-sizing all display images to be the same size. Great minds think alike.

If you ever want a shoutout on cosmetics stuff if you have an instagram page for it, message me on my insta account @lake.lace and I'm sure I can make something work. Good luck to you too bro

What if your customer gets a call from tax/customs office?

Let me explain.
The value of goods you can bring into EU from China is 22eur. Everything above that is subject to customs procedure (usually they let it through, but they still surcharge the procedure cost).

Since all your stuff goes directly from HK/China to end address, aren't you worried about that?
IE, you pose as an EU/aussie based shop, so client bona fidei order $100 or more stuff. They will get a letter from customs office 100%.

Yeah, not many *viable* solutions that I can think of.

I know one guy who dropships and gets custom boxes shipped to his suppliers, who then charge him extra in fulfilment costs to ship to his customers in the box.

I checked out the viability of this. For a nice looking box, with a logo sticker and custom colours, you're looking at around $17 AUD not including shipping. Including shipping to China is around $25 AUD each box. Including the shipping of whatever item you sell, this makes it around $29 AUD each item. So not much room for good margins unless you sell a luxury product, or some expensive shit (which is hard to sustain if you're using chinkware through AliExpress).

well its not without risks but i guess thats the tradeoff with this business model. its cheap and easy to start so you just have to accept you will lose a certain percent of profit to fraud

do you know if the sellers provide tracking or if they even have order tracking in china? or is it just a random waiting game for the buyer?

i feel like your site will do pretty well user, you definitely put some work into it. much better than the other user's store on one of the dropship threads where he sells 5 types of pineapple peelers and has a plain grey background

hey another question: about your domain name, did you buy it separetely and port it over to shopify or register it through them? what are the yearly fees on that?

Wasn't aware of this. So, a couple questions you can maybe help me with:
1) How the FUCK do customs know the value of the item?
2) If customs sends this letter to the recipient, then isn't this mean that the costs are inherently incumbent on them? and;
3) If I include a clause in my terms and conditions that all import taxes are the responsibility of the customer to pay, then shouldn't that cover it? If not, then are you aware of how other companies are dealing with this? The way I understand is that the customer received the 'invoice/bill/pay-up letter' from customs; so do they scan/send it to the seller of the item they've ordered? I've never heard of this before.

shit that guy brings up a good point i didnt even think about that

they dont know the value but its supposed to be written on a customs sticker or form on the package. im assuming the chinks will usually chink their way out of that by writing false statmeents like "for gift" or "value under x dollars" but customs will also randomly open shit to inspect. and if they see a false customs declaration form they will seize the item and require the person who the package is addressed to, to come pick up the package and pay the customs fee before releasing it

I think the small barrier to entry is a plus, perhaps one thing I should have considered is performing a real risk assessment (or at least spending some time assessing the risks against business outcomes, and how they can be mitigated, the cost of mitigation, or whether they should be ignored).

When you use Oberlo, you choose the shipping option upon checkout. By default I select E-Packet, which I think includes a tracking number. If you use China Air Mail Standard/Express, it includes a tracking number. If you use China Post Ordinary Small Packet Plus, I do not believe it includes a tracking number.

Oberlo will also automate the delivery of tracking numbers to customers, once received - which is handy!

Thanks for the feedback on the site! I'm glad it passes the 'common sense' test as to whether it looks shit or okay.

As for the domain registration; I registered the domain with GoDaddy (shit shit shit registrar, please go with BlueHost if you register a domain. I host 6+ websites with GoDaddy and the only reason I haven't transferred is because I'm certain they'll fuck my shit up accidentally during the process of migration).

Attached is a pic of costs associated with website hosting.

yeah the costs are incumbent on your customer to pick up the package, but you will have an angry customer who probably wont do repeat business with your store

but i guess the chinkshit model is not really based on repeat customers, more about tempting new ones into the risk with the rock bottom chink prices

Also, all costs are in AUD.

And when migrating from private domain with Shopify, there's a reeeally simple one-click utility that Shopify provides for GoDaddy customers (There were around 6 other providers who had this integration system, too). All I had to do was click a button, wait 10 seconds and it was done.

So I've just realized that larger orders can be mitigated if they purchase a number of seperate items, as they come from seperate suppliers.

I would assume that chinks would chink their way out of it.

However, in taking this advice, I will now include a clause in my terms and conditions that "all import/custom/inspection/tax fees, fines, costs etc. are the responsibility of the customer to pay. In no way will we be liable for these costs."

Thanks for the headsup and for raising this issue

So what about major brands like Nike, Target, Adidas, Victoria Secret, or any other major company, do they automatically cover the costs of import taxes? I'm sure they'd still require customers to pocket those costs, right?

Dont know how it is in AU, but the jist of it is this.

1) they try to curb the knock-offs
2) the HK chinkshit i ordedered (usually dx and aliexpres) was under 22eur

How our customs (slovenia) determines value, they take it face value on the package (chinks write the value of the package on the box), then if suspicous (value too low, not "real" even tho that's what you paid) they go online and search for similar items. Then they mention in a letter, that this package is waiting for you, but please declare (=prove by receipts, placed order etc) to us its "real" value. If you dont do that they aribrarily determine the value of the item and surcharge you 22% percent on top of that.

If you do you what you described in 3) you should be covered, but depends how it will reflect once angry customer lashes out.

Again, look around for AU specific, perhaps you guys have some trade deal with HK/China and this does not affect you as much.
Try googling import duty china/hk australia or similar.

holy shit $300?

i think they pay the import taxes when they bring their shit in on large cargo ships, they ship and sell locally from america or australia. when you buy shit on adidas.com they arent shipping the shoes to the customer from china, they are coming from some warehouse in the middle of nowhere america

Yerrrp. Sucks, don't go with GoDaddy.

With that being said, I'm going to cancel all my hosting, as I only need the domain registration now. That should save a fair bit of money.

yeah i was going to ask you about that , i thought i saw shopify has their own hosting included , which is nice

Oh yeah, worldwide warehouses - shit mang.

I guess I'll just wing it.

For everyone reading; if I have any issues with import taxes, I'll post the exact issues here, then post my/customer responses, and describe my solution/workaround and result.

Thanks to those who brought this issue up, and discussed it with me. I'll research solutions in the mean time.

damn now im wondering about the customs shit

OP here, just found out that SecurePay works with Shopify. Will protect all cards against fraudulent transactions:
securepay.com.au/pricing/payment-gateway-pricing/

Expensive, though. Probably worth investing in if you're losing over $300 a year in fraud, and making over $1,000 profit a year.

So Shopify answered our questions here: ecommerce.shopify.com/c/accounting-and-taxes/t/charging-vat-duties-and-fees-to-international-customers-323883

In summary:
>Customers who must pay tax, are responsible for paying tax, and it is typical/standard/expected of them to do so for any kind of import product
>There is no way for them to pay that tax ahead of time, through Shopify
>All companies in the world who import into that country rely on their customers to pay the tax upon receiving the item
>There is an app to help customers estimate taxes, here: (apps.shopify.com/pitney-bowes-clearpath-global-ecommerce-solutions)

Also, this thread will reassure you guys: ecommerce.shopify.com/c/payments-shipping-fulfilment/t/import-duty-calculation-316576
>Not all products get taxed
>Most small packages make it through fine

TO ANYONE WORRIED ABOUT CUSTOMS:
"Your customer will be responsible for any additional fees that are charged by customs. They usually will have to pay any additional fees at the time of delivery. It’s always a good idea to make sure to include this information in your policy page so customers aren’t hit with unexpected fees."

shopify.com.au/blog/14069585-the-beginners-guide-to-ecommerce-shipping-and-fulfillment

hmm, so basically just write a message somewhere near your checkout or cart page about possible import fees depending on location

Yep. With Shopify, you can't really customize the checkout page that much to include this information.

However, you should include it in your terms and services, and include it on the description of your products.

Was wondering this as well.

Isn't the main selling point of Shopify the fact that they handle domain registration, hosting and SSL certificates?

Hey guys OP here, forgot something important about marketing.

I use the app 'Privy' (apps.shopify.com/privy) which is a free email/sign-up/lead magnet generator, and it's excellent. The attached pic took me all of 3 minutes to create. I recommend you use it on your Shopify sites!

Yeah, all their domains are now SSL integrated which is cool.

I was so skeptical about shopify because of the price. But honestly, it's worth it. It's like a whole marketplace in itself now - kinda like Wordpress with all the plugins and themes etc.

What is "Lean startup" eric-ries equivalent book for ecommerce/marketing?

FOR ALL THOSE CONCERNED WITH FRAUD, SEE THIS POST

Attached image shows how Shopify automatically detects and warns you about potentially fraudulent transactions. This is available on any plan, including the basic plan.

e-commerce and marketing are two entirely different buckets 'o dildos, my friend

Ontop of OP's post here, see this thread to determine rules for when to approve and when to flag a purchase for manual approval
fraudlabspro.com/tutorials/how-to-hold-a-fraud-order-on-shopify

I have to say, this is one of the most entertaining Veeky Forums posts in a long while.

Had no idea how extensive and intricate the drop shipping business is.

GG OP, I'd buy you a beer if I could.

yfw dropshipping is chinkifying the west and shifting the economy to china and theres nothing we can do about it

Instead of a beer, I can give you a tip.

I googled your website and nothing came up.

May be a good idea to invest in SEO to add legitimacy.

this is shit i would like to know how to do

Yep, I have not invested a single dime or second into SEO yet.

This is my next goal (wanted the site to be up and running). For SEO advice, here's some tips ( this is relevant to you)

>Firstly, sign up for Google Webmaster (/www.google.com/webmasters/)
You will need to verify your site. This instantly tells google's algorithms that your site is more legitimate, higher quality and trustworthy than before
>The quickest way to boost easily create a boost to your SEO is to optimize your image alt tags. Alt tags are what your image is 'read' as by search engines, and the text that will be displayed if customers cannot load your image. You'll want to saturate your alt tags with as many relevant keywords as possible.
For example, if you're selling Instant Film Cameras, you'll want the alt tags of a fujifilm instax mini 8 to read something like "FujiFilm Instax Mini 8 Alt Tags". With Wordpress, this can be done through the "Media Library" section of the dashboard. For Shopify, use this app: apps.shopify.com/seo-image-optimizer

>Ensure that your headlines have as much relevant keywords as possible
For example, my headline should probably say "Lake Lace Lingerie" instead of "Lake Lace". My product pages could say "Underwear Lingerie" instead of "Underwear", or "Lingerie Bras" instead of "bras". Your header tags (, , etc.) are weighted heavier on keyword relevance by google's algorithms.

>integrate keywords into paragraphs naturally. Google knows when you're trying to spam keywords. Also, sites where pages have over 300+ words of text rank higher and score higher on quality/trustworthyness than sites with less than 300 words on each page. Keep this in mind.

>Backlinks are important, but only if they're good quality. DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES hire some pajeet/gupti/ahmed to spam backlinks to your site; google with spank you mercilessly with the paddle of punishment. To get some high quality links, (pt. 1/2)

many thanks user, ill try to work on a shop this weekend and post my results back here

(pt. 2/2) consider approaching bloggers within your field and offering to write (article/review) content for them, or offer them a product and if they like it, ask them to write a review on it and link to your site.

Also, comment on other blogger's sites and leave your website address where it's natural to do so (i.e., "Hey Greg, great article! Good to see the Lomo' Instant Wide at the top of the rating chart, where it belongs. I'm actually selling accessories for all the models you've mentioned here, if you're interested in them, check out our site: 'x'".

>Upload .xml sitemaps.
This tells google how to read your site, and also informs its algorithms that your site is legitimate and trustworthy.

>once complete, ask google to re-crawl your site.
This tells google to both index your site, and crawl all the pages to map them out. You can do this here: google.com/webmasters/tools/submit-url

>Include a 'contact us', 'terms of service' and 'privacy policy' page on the footer of every page. This is important, and google will relentlessly rape your SEO score if you don't have these.

More tips to come. Thanks to all who have contributed.

Thanks for reading the thread. You can use "CAMEFROMBIZ" on my site for a discount, should your gf/wife want some nice shit for valentines day.

good luck mate, any questions or feedback/advice, I'm happy to help and glad to receive.

shoot me an email at [email protected] or msg me on @lake.lace at instagram if you want to get in touch. good luck and I look forward to hearing how your business goes!

See:

Nah on statements it says "SHOP - LAKE LACE". Shopify lets you choose exactly what is displayed on the credit card statement, and all funds (as far as I know - please take this with a grain of salt and do your own research too) are charged to Shopify, who then internally deposits them (minus transactions fees) into my bank account.

reverse osmosis devices and water filters seem like a very nice niche in my language (it's saturated in english, but almost inexistent in my mother tongue).

how would you guys capitalize on this ?
Im thinking of a classic review website

In australia, there's heaps of people who are into alternative shopping and alot of those alternative stores have osmosis water filters and the like at severely overpriced rates. All you'd have to do is offer a similar product at a cheaper rate and market in the same ways mentioned above by OP and bobs your uncle you're in an unsaturated online market with shitloads of people who are keen to buy. Start approaching healthfood stores and drop flyers out, speak to the owners of said stores and see if they'll sell your product for kickbacks, etc, bam you've taken the niche in your corner of the world and it will market itself being on the shelves.

OP here, I've done amazon affiliate sites and here's some tips you should know:

>Amazon is a ruthless bitch on terms and conditions.
My site got cancelled with four figures worth of orders, all because I had a green button saying "Check Pricing & Availability" when any button or text linking to Amazon MUST be using their button.

>Using other bloggers in your niche is key.
Use some of the methods described in this post: to get in touch and get backlinks and traffic. Keep in mind that for affiliate sites; ranking is important but traffic is more important.

>For a great example of a successful amazon affiliate site, check out: pickmyshaver.com
It sold on Flippy for $60,000 USD the other month. It's simple and looks like shit, but it works.

>Products should be high priced.
When you start off, you'll be making only around 4% per product sold. Reverse osmosis filters are good as they retail for around $80 - $100 USD +. I hope you take my niche idea and make it work to your full advantage, bro.

>Include a Pro's AND Con's section for each review.
It's proven that people buy more when they receive some negative feedback. For example, when a restaurant advertised as "Small, but cozy atmosphere" they tripled bookings in comparison to advertising as "Spacious, great atmosphere".

>Be sure to include a 'Terms & Conditions', 'Privacy Policy' and 'Contact Us' page or amazon will shutdown your account.
Also, be sure to include the typical Amazon Affiliate disclosure, here is pickmyshaver.com's disclosure; literally copy paste and replace the URL with your own: pickmyshaver.com/amazon-affiliate-disclosure/

Keep us updated with how you go!

thanks user, I will look into this.

thanks user, i have the opportunity of exploring untapped niches because I fluently speak 3 languages.

However, I seem to get stuck in this never ending circle of reading and reading and reading, but never actually starting.

Your posts and your thread have inspired me to finally start.

Or, if you want to go with the drop-shipping concept (i.e., ), this approach is great.

The other day when I was in Perth, I was on the train and passed a shop called 'Water Filters Australia'. It would be easy to call such a shop up, pretend to be a customer and ask for their pricing. Work out how much profit you'd be making on an average sale, and estimate whether they can get it cheaper.

Then offer to supply direct to them at a lower margin. Directly walking in their and asking to take away their customers though, won't work.

One way to encourage healthy relationships is to ask similar businesses whether they have a website, and offer something like:
>A logo placement for a logo placement.
(This also improves backlinks and, thus; ranking)
>An offer as a secondary or recommended supplier when their products are out of stock (where you supply the same product), and vice-versa
>Content sharing on blogs, if they happen to have one (probably unlikely)
Where you could encourage writing an article on their site where it links to yours, and in turn they can write an article on your site where it links to theirs

You'd be surprised how many business owners are willing and keen to expand their visibility through this form of co-operation, where it's truly a neutral, noncompetitive arrangement. It's interesting how competitors can work together for their own benefit.

Not OP and currently in the same trap of reading a shitload but never going anywhere with it. This time is slightly different though. I'll be going to try it because for the most part the methodology of dropshipping requires little if any overheads. Hardest/most time consuming part would be marketing and growing organic followers.

OP is a good bloke for sharing all this information, I want to thank him and give him mad props.

Great! Congratulations on committing yourself to getting started.

From now on, see the previous things you've learned as the platform to launch you into action.

It's definitely good and advisable to read enough to understand what you're doing. If you ever have any questions in regards to dropshipping, amazon affiliate sites, marketing, e-commerce or branding, feel free to shoot me an email ([email protected]) and I'm only too happy to help. Two heads are better than one, and perhaps one day you'll know something I need to know.

Best of luck and keep us posted!

as far as selling goes as well, it is a small step once you gain traction to then employ yourself a salesperson on commission with a minimal retainer (minimum wage, part time, 15-25k a year) to sell your shit for you. Make sure you pick the right person.

Thanks bro, I hope it's helped people get the final pieces of information they need to make themselves some money.

If you ever need any advice or help, or have any questions or feedback, you can always shoot me an email ([email protected]) and I'm more than happy to help.

Keep us updated with how your projects/businesses/ventures go, I'm keen to see what you can make of it! Good luck

I've saved a copy of this thread to a doc on my HDD and when I get underway I'll shoot an email to you. I write a fair bit as well, so on that note I am keen to write reviews/articles/posts for your blog on chosen sites in exchange for linkbacks or some form of compensation. I'm fairly articulate and given that I post here too, you know that I either have plenty of time on my hands to write/research quality posts. If you need a copywriter to freelance for you, let me know, I'll flick you an email straight away and I'm happy to do a 3-500 word post for free and post wherever you want to demonstrate my ability.

Thanks again OP, good luck and I'll contact you either way once I get my shit underway.