Why Dropshipping Is Not a Get Rich Quick Scheme

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The internet is packed full of influencers, YouTube personalities and blogs singing the praises of dropshipping as a means to free yourself from the world of traditional work and build a long-lasting business that boosts your income.

They are right, but for every leading light in this exciting world, there are also plenty of people who present dropshipping as a way to get rich quickly.

Dropshipping is not a way to get rich overnight and our blog today explains why.

But first, what even is dropshipping?

As a dropshipper, you have an online store – a website or mobile app or both – where you sell a range of products.

However, you won’t have any ‘inventory.’ You won’t have a single piece of merchandise boxed up and ready to go in your office, garage, spare room or loft.

When a customer orders from a dropshipper, the dropshipper orders from a supplier. The customer pays you, and you pay the supplier – ideally, less than the customer pays you! Better still, the supplier does not send the product to you but directly to the customer, in your name.

The best part is that almost all of that is entirely automatic, and you don’t have to attend to the details. You just have to bring in the customers and show them the products that they want.

Wait, I thought that dropshipping was supposed to be ‘over?’

On the contrary, dropshipping is very popular. Most online shoppers never realise they interact with a dropshipper rather than a ‘traditional’ online retailer.

By 2025, the dropshipping industry is expected to be worth nearly £415 billion. More than a quarter of all online retailers are actually dropshippers, and dropshippers make (on average) nearly 50% more profit on each sale compared to retailers who keep their own inventory.

Dropshipping is popular with different people for different reasons.

There are perhaps as many good reasons to become a dropshipper as there are dropshippers, but most people come to the industry for one of three reasons.

First and foremost, they want a very profitable business to operate without a significant initial investment.

Next, dropshippers want to be self-employed. Especially when you’re working on a second income or ‘side hustle,’ you want to be your own boss and set your own schedule.

Lastly, they want a business that can be managed from anywhere with an internet connection. When 98% of your input can be delivered over a smartphone, you can literally work anywhere.

However, dropshipping is not a ‘get rich quick scheme.’ It takes time to develop correctly and with experienced support. 

Dropshipping is a business, and it takes time and effort to develop any real business. It is incredibly flexible when you do it right, and it is ideally suited to being a ‘side business’ at first. But the more successful you become as a dropshipper, the more time and effort you’ll have to put in to keep the business growing.

Successfully, it will make enough money to be considered your ‘main business.’ It all depends on how much time and effort you’re willing to spend developing it.

How do I create a truly successful dropshipping business?

The short answer is that you’ll need a winning website, excellent product picking skills, an understanding of list management, order management and order fulfilment (or team who help you with all of this), and a commitment to excellent customer support.

The key is attracting customers, offering them the products they want, getting the right products to them promptly, and making the entire experience both pleasant and exciting. The least successful dropshippers provide poor customer experience and rarely sell to the same customer twice.

A checklist for beginning your dropshipping business

1) Choose a good name and a logo for your dropshipping business

After all, what would a website or an online store be without a name? Certainly not very successful. Brand recognition is key to success in this industry, and you need to spend some time coming up with a catchy, appropriate name that tells potential customers to expect good things from your business.

In the same way, your logo will be the key visual symbol of your business – its face. It should be neat, refined and trustworthy, but also attractive and interesting. That’s not an easy needle to thread! Make sure you spend some time and effort on it.

2) Buy a domain name

Now that you have a name, you’ll need to purchase a version of that name for your primary website. Your business name really should match your domain name quite closely. This is key to building consumer confidence.

If it turns out that all reasonable iterations of your business name are unavailable as domain names, you might just have to start over.

3) Write up your basic website copy or hire a copywriter

You’ll almost certainly need (at least):

  • Homepage content
  • About Us content
  • Contact Us content
  • Terms of Service content
  • Privacy, Returns and Shipping policies
  • A (good) FAQ document

We suggest writing all of this up in Word or Google Docs. Not only will this help you catch any embarrassing typos (remember, customer confidence is key), you’ll be able to copy and paste it right into your content management system or directly into the web page editor.

4) Determine your products and their prices

You’ll need to know how much the products you intend to feature will cost you, how much of a mark-up you can charge and remain competitive, etc.

You don’t have to get this 100% exactly right before you start, and you can always change your pricing as you go.

However, you should have a realistic idea of your pricing options to deal with step 5:

5) Determine how much it will really cost to run this business, and set a realistic budget

A few of the most important questions you can ask yourself right now are ‘How much can I spend to get this business up and running?’, ‘How much can I spend each month to keep things ticking over?’ and ‘How much income am I likely to get in return?’.

6) Decide how you will handle advertising

Your dropshipping business is not going to become popular through word of mouth (at first). Off-page and organic SEO, pay-per-click campaigns and even good old-fashioned reciprocal linking can do wonders for market penetration and brand recognition. But, generally speaking, you get what you pay for.

Again, you can change your advertising strategy as you go – in fact, you should! But you should begin with a complete advertising and promotion plan, as well as a reasonable budget for these efforts.

7) Choose payment gateways and other solutions

There are more ways than ever to get paid for your services online. Each service has its own advantages and disadvantages, and each handles processing fees differently. Making the correct choice from the beginning can be a huge boost to your profitability.

8) Decide on analytics and business intelligence solutions

As was the case with payment solutions, business analytics services and solutions are available from dozens of reputable providers (and plenty of less reputable ones as well). Having a good solution in place straight away can help you spot hidden problems and opportunities early and drag your business up to profitability faster.

You might not get rich quickly, but there’s an easier way to get started.

The key to getting profitable more quickly – and making a respectable second- or third-income stream out of dropshipping – is choosing the right partners. Armaan Resales provides exactly the tools and expertise you need to build a dropshipping business that will grow sustainably and provide income over the long term.

We can help you connect with suppliers who are eager to build bigger sales networks and tap new markets. We can also show you how to establish the kind of automated operations which keep your end customers happy while providing you with the next best thing to a passive income. We remove all the burden, so you only have to spend a few hours a day on your business.

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