Get practical insights on Shopify dropshipping with ZIK to efficiently build your store and achieve $10K/month. Learn strategies tailored for dropshippers, covering essential tools like Aliexpress and Shopify apps.
Does reading about success stories on Shopify dropshipping inspire or intimidate you?
You’ve read about those other dropshippers earning a five- to six-figure income monthly through dropshipping, and you’re probably thinking to yourself, “I will never get there!” The dropshipping business model is lucrative, and earning $10K monthly is possible.
Some dropshipping store owners can earn up to $50K a month! However, believing that this can happen overnight is the main reason why many beginners of the Shopify dropshipping business fail.
When I started my own dropshipping business and online selling, it did not hit my sales target immediately. There are many challenges involved with this business model, which includes a high level of competition.
As you may or may not know, starting a Shopify dropshipping store is gaining popularity, and more sellers want to get a slice of the pie.
This guide shows you how to start a dropshipping business from scratch and build a strategy to ensure ecommerce business success.
The journey to starting a Shopify store will be riddled with challenges and will require some luck. However, building the right foundation for your dropshipping store will make a difference in your business trajectory.
Article Overview
Detailed Guide to Starting a Shopify Dropshipping Store as a Complete Beginner
Key Takeaways
- Know the basics of setting up your Shopify account and how to build your online storefront.
- Product selection is critical to your success as a dropshipping business, so use tools like ZIK Analytics or Google Trends to identify opportunities and winning products.
- Maximize the Shopify store features to optimize sales performance and increase product visibility.
- Employ various marketing methods, such as paid ads and social media campaigns, to hit your sales targets.
- Scale up your dropshipping stores with influencer marketing, affiliate marketing, and developing your own brand.
Detailed Guide to Starting a Shopify Dropshipping Store as a Complete Beginner
In the succeeding sections, I will discuss the essentials of starting a dropshipping business in Shopify. Here are the steps to building a successful Shopify store:
- Setting up a Shopify store
- Product selection
- Using Shopify store features
- Marketing and sales
- Scaling your dropshipping business
Keep reading to get in-depth insights into each critical step to starting a successful Shopify store.
Setting Up a Shopify Store
If you’re a beginner to Shopify dropshipping, you must first set up your account on the Shopify website. You need an account to build your online store and start dropshipping products to make money online.
Setting Up an Account on Shopify
To set up your Shopify account and store, go to the Shopify website (www.shopify.com). Follow the steps to create an account and provide the details required upon signing up.
The store subscription plan is the first decision you will make when creating your Shopify account. The cost of setting up a Shopify store varies according to your chosen plan.
Each level will have different pricing and features available to your account. Therefore, choose according to your needs and budget.
You can always start with the lower-priced plan and upgrade later as your needs change.
You can start with the free 3-day trial to understand how Shopify works. You won’t need to provide your credit card information to create a free trial account.
After that, you can subscribe to Shopify for $1 a month. It makes setting up your Shopify account as a beginner risk-free as it involves low investment.
If you want to start the free trial, visit this link. You can also check out the various pricing plans to choose what’s right for you.
Here is an overview of the available plans and their pricing structures:
- Basic – The ideal choice for solo entrepreneurs. The plan is worth $19/month (paid annually).
- Shopify – The best plan for small business teams. The plan is worth $49/month (paid annually).
- Advanced – The best plan for scaling your business. The plan is worth $299/month (paid annually).
- Plus – The recommended plan for complex businesses. It is valued at $2,300/month (paid annually on a 3-year term).
Pricing can vary, so visit the Shopify website for the latest plans and pricing.
Upon signing up, you will be asked to provide your email address.
Pro Tip
Create an email address dedicated to your Shopify store.
That way, it will be easier to manage communications relevant to your Shopify dropshipping business, especially as you will likely receive several notifications from Shopify.
Follow the steps to sign up and provide a payment method for your account. The entire process will only take five minutes, and you can start setting up your dropshipping store in Shopify!
After signing up to Shopify, it’s time to work on your dropshipping store’s backend. The Shopify admin provides all-in-one access to essential tools and features for managing your Shopify store.
I recommend you familiarize yourself with these tools, as they are vital to your dropshipping business’s daily operations.
If you have a new Shopify account, expect the dashboard to look slightly different, with no sales under your account yet. However, once you start making sales, you will be able to see your sales history and other daily statistics from the dashboard.
Setting Up Domain for Shopify Store
The next crucial step when building the online store for your ecommerce business is to set up your domain. Do this before anything else to ensure your desired domain is still available.
You don’t want to spend the time and effort to create a business name and logo only to find out later that the domain is no longer available and in use.
Start by searching the available domains for your chosen niche. The best way to do this is to visit a domain hosting website like GoDaddy.com.
You can check your preferred domain to see if it’s already taken. Ideally, stick with the .com domains, as they look more trustworthy and are easy for your buyers to remember.
So, you’ve found the perfect domain for your Shopify dropshipping store? There are two ways to purchase that domain for your ecommerce store.
Option 1: Buy the domain from a third-party host.
You can go to GoDaddy.com or any domain provider and purchase your domain from their website. After you’ve purchased the domain, you can connect it to your Shopify dropshipping store.
For this method, you must know how to buy a domain and connect it to your ecommerce store.
Option 2: Buy the domain directly from Shopify.
The ideal option for setting up a domain for your ecommerce store is directly from your Shopify account. Go to your dashboard > Settings > Domains. Once on the domains page, you will see the option to “Buy domain.”
Click that and then input your chosen domain. You can pay for it directly via Shopify.
The best part about buying the domain for your Shopify dropshipping store from the website is that you won’t have to deal with the technical part of connecting your domain to your online store. Shopify will connect your domain, which makes it ideal for beginners.
Once you find a domain that you want that is available, it’s time to begin setting up your dropshipping store: business name and logo creation. Use your creativity here and choose a name and logo that makes your dropshipping business stand out.
Adding Payment Providers
Now, let’s talk about payments. This part is crucial because you want to provide enough payment options for your future buyers.
The real reason for setting up a dropshipping business is to make money, so it’s important to make it as easy as possible for your customers to pay!
Having a Shopify store differs from selling through online marketplaces like eBay or Amazon. Shopify dropshipping store owners will collect buyer payments, so you must provide your customers with options.
Ideally, provide at least two payment methods for your ecommerce business.
The first option is to receive payments on your online store using credit cards. The next payment method is PayPal, which is ideal for Shopify stores with US customers.
PayPal is a reliable payment method because of its high security level, so many US buyers prefer it when buying online. Choosing reliable payment providers for your ecommerce business helps attract more customers to purchase from your Shopify store.
Setting up payments to your Shopify dropshipping store is easy. Go to Settings > Payments. If you want to set up a PayPal, you must connect your account to your online store to start receiving payments through PayPal.
You will receive instant payments on your PayPal account once you have set it up in your store.
If you choose credit cards as a payment option for your online store, there are a few options available to do this. If you see Shopify Payments on this page, you’re lucky because it means it is supported in your region.
Shopify Payments is the platform’s payment system, simplifying how dropshipping store owners process payments. It ensures that payments run smoothly, and you can enjoy low transaction fees.
When you see Shopify Payments as an option, click on it, and it will launch the registration process. If not, don’t worry because you can add other reliable payment providers to your ecommerce store.
Setting Up Shopify Store Theme
Finally, you have to configure your dropshipping store on Shopify. Choosing a Shopify theme that fits your niche and your ecommerce business needs is crucial to your store’s success.
Make sure that the theme you choose aligns with your brand identity. It is also crucial to consider your target audience when picking a theme to ensure it appeals to them and you can attract more potential buyers to your store.
To choose a theme, go to the Shopify dashboard and click ‘Online Store’ > ‘Themes.’ You can visit the Shopify Theme Store for options that fit your needs. Some themes are free, and there are paid ones.
If you don’t have the budget for it, you can choose any free themes with user-friendly interfaces that make it easy to showcase your products.
Customize the Storefront
Once you’ve chosen the theme for your Shopify dropshipping store, you can customize your storefront. Customizing is crucial to improving the overall customer experience of your store.
Think about the end-user experience on your website and focus on making a great first impression on your customers.
When building your online storefront, ensure buyers know exactly what you’re selling!
Add a call to action on the home page and immediately showcase your products. Make it easy for your target buyers to browse your products or learn about your online store.
Product Selection
Product selection is critical to the success of your dropshipping business. Therefore, I suggest you spend much time choosing your niche and products before launching your online store.
Why does product selection matter when starting your Shopify dropshipping store?
First, this business model is already highly competitive, even saturated. The best way to stand out and attract potential customers to your dropshipping store is to offer products that customers want or that no other sellers have.
Another reason to spend time on product selection is that it will determine your profit margin. Any business owner knows that profit is the sole purpose of setting up your ecommerce store.
What’s the point of starting your own Shopify dropshipping business if you’re not making money?
Finding the right products – and eventually reliable suppliers – can make a difference in how much profit you can bring home!
But what are the criteria for product selection for your Shopify dropshipping business? The first thing to consider is your target audience.
It can be overwhelming having to pick a product on top of your mind, with millions of possible options. Start with your target audience first.
Create a persona for your target audience or your ideal buyer.
Once you have that persona, the next thing to do is to identify a common problem they have. Once you know what problem your ideal customer has, you can find products that will solve that problem.
Offering a solution through your products can make your Shopify dropshipping business stand out. These products not only offer something of value to your customers, but you also appeal to their emotional needs.
It is a great marketing strategy for your Shopify store, which you must consider when choosing products for your online store and increasing the likelihood of making a sale.
In addition to the above strategy, you should conduct market research and analysis. Market research is vital for any business model, not just dropshipping businesses.
It is the best way to validate the demand for a product and ensure that you have enough customers who want to purchase it.
Tools like ZIK Analytics enable you to access the latest data insights and relevant trends to decide on product selection when dropshipping on Shopify. Aside from ZIK Analytics, you can also use free tools like Google Trends.
These tools provide real-time data about top keyword searches and actual sales data before you start selling a product. Google Trends, in particular, enables you to analyze data and trends in a particular region or globally.
Hence, you can optimize your market research to fit a specific demographic or region.
You can also analyze social media trends to identify opportunities before selling certain products on your Shopify dropshipping website. You can also examine customer engagement and feedback to identify gaps and serve that market.
Competitor analysis is integral to product and market research for your dropshipping businesses. Looking at your competition and their top-selling products gives you valuable insight into what’s trending in your market and how you can offer something more valuable or unique to attract potential buyers to your Shopify store.
Focus on standing out based on competitor analysis, and don’t just copy what your competitors are doing.
Once you have a list of the dropshipping products you want to sell on your Shopify store, the next thing to do is add them to your store. You can employ tools to automate importing products from your dropshipping suppliers to your own online store.
Automating the import process for your dropshipping products can save you time and effort, especially when adding a large volume of products to your online store. Research these tools that automate this process and find the right fit for your ecommerce business needs.
But if you want to add the dropshipping products to your Shopify store manually, go to the dashboard, choose ‘Products’ > ‘Add Products’, and then start listing each product to your store. Follow the best practices when optimizing your product listings.
We have created a full guide on how to do that to maximize the visibility of your product listings and increase sales for your dropshipping store. But to give you an idea, here are some ways to optimise your Shopify dropshipping business listings.
- Add your target keyword on the listing title
- Add the target keywords to the product description
- Add several product images
- Set a competitive price is profitable
Once you have listed the products on your Shopify store, you must add the shipping costs. Determine your shipping scheme for your dropshipping store, as it can be a point of differentiation from the competition.
Do you want to offer free shipping or charge a flat fee?
Perhaps a good idea is to offer free shipping when a customer purchases your products up to a certain amount. For example, you can offer free shipping to customers when their order value reaches $50 or above.
Aside from the shipping costs, plan for which regions you want to offer shipping from your online store. Do you offer worldwide shipping or to select regions only?
Regardless of your decision, you can set up your account’s shipping costs and policies. Go to Settings > Shipping and Delivery. You can manage your shipping rates on this page.
Using Shopify Store Features
Familiarizing yourself with and utilizing the Shopify store features will propel your dropshipping business to the next level. These features are integrated to ensure you can optimize your sales and maintain profitability for your Shopify dropshipping website.
The first tool available is the ability to run promotions and discounts in your Shopify store. Buyers like promos and discounts because they incentivise them to buy from your store, which means savings.
Therefore, it’s a good marketing strategy to use Shopify store discounts and limited-time promotions to create a sense of urgency and get customers to buy from your Shopify dropshipping store.
You can add discounts and codes to your store by going to the dashboard and choosing ‘Discounts.’ Offering discounts and promo codes will attract more buyers to your store.
Aside from store promotions and discounts, the email marketing campaign is another excellent feature available to Shopify store owners. Build a database of email subscribers to your store and send weekly or monthly newsletters.
This feature is free for Shopify store owners, giving you more reasons to leverage it for success.
Craft compelling email marketing campaigns to keep your customers engaged and build relationships that would foster customer loyalty. A well-executed email marketing campaign can distinguish between successful dropshipping stores and those not.
You can tie this with the Shopify feature above, enabling you to use promotions and discounts. Whenever you have a sale or discounted promotion for your online business, you can promote it in the newsletter.
That way, your customers will know if you have ongoing promotions they want to take advantage of.
Aside from promotions and discount offerings, you can use your email newsletter to send updates about your online business. You can send newsletters to announce the arrival of new dropshipping products to your store or when you want to share valuable content with your audience.
Whatever it is, ensure the information you send via your newsletters is valuable to your customers.
Building an email database takes time, especially if you use the opt-in method wherein your customers willingly share their email addresses to be included in your email list. Thus, you can speed up this process by incentivising your customers to opt into your email list.
For example, you can give them a 5% discount on their first order if they subscribe to your email newsletter. The Shopify Email feature is an excellent tool to build high-conversion email campaigns for your online business.
Marketing and Sales
Building a solid marketing strategy can help your ecommerce business reach the next level if you want to hit six-figure monthly sales for your dropshipping stores.
The first marketing and sales strategy is using social media platforms like Instagram or TikTok. These sites are highly popular and a good platform for reaching your potential customers.
Add short-form videos and content to social media to build an audience and foster engagement within your community. Leverage social media posts to gain traction in terms of traffic to your Shopify dropshipping website.
Another marketing and sales strategy to employ is to use paid ads. Ads help drive sales to your ecommerce store with a clear call to action and targeted exposure to your ideal audience.
Use compelling visuals and customer testimonials to add credibility to your online store. That way, it will attract attention from your audience. The best places to use ads include social media and Google.
However, it varies according to your target audience and their platform. So, it pays to understand your understanding to know where to find them online.
Once you’ve posted the ads, keep tracking their performance to analyze their effectiveness. The data will inform your future ad campaigns, allowing you to optimize results and ensure you get the desired results for your marketing campaigns.
Scaling Your Dropshipping Business
Now that you have the information you need to build a strong foundation for your Shopify dropshipping store, it’s time to consider how you can scale your business. There are various ways you can scale up, and one of them is to collaborate with content creators or influencers.
If you’re unsure which content creator to collaborate with, you can contact marketing agencies to partner with the right influencer that fits your marketing goals. That way, you can align your audience with the content creator’s audience for maximum results.
It also ensures you can achieve optimal results with each content output.
Another way to scale your business is to employ affiliate marketing. It has the same dynamic as influencer marketing; you will partner with content creators to promote or showcase your products on their platforms.
The affiliates are incentivized to promote your products for every successful sale.
Finally, consider transitioning from a dropshipping business model to creating your own online store brand. This will give you better control regarding the quality of products and how you deliver customer service, as you will handle the order fulfillment.
This strategy is a great way to foster brand loyalty and have a more sustainable and profitable business model and strategy.
But for now, as a beginner, it’s crucial to understand the basics of running a dropshipping business before you can think about making a six-figure income or scaling.
Final Thoughts: How to Succeed with Shopify Dropshipping
There you have it: a complete guide on how to do Shopify dropshipping as a complete beginner!
Hopefully, this information will be helpful as you navigate the saturated market of dropshipping businesses. This knowledge will give you more confidence in knowing what to expect and how to overcome common obstacles in your dropshipping journey!
