Drop Ship News

Dropship Tips: Minimizing Ecommerce Fraud in Your Home Business

Most of the time, when someone thinks of fraud in conjunction wit ecommerce, it’s from the consumer’s view point; but fraud is a problem for ecommerce merchants as well and you might appreciate a few tips to minimize the problem in your home dropship business.

If you talk to a few successful ecommerce merchants, they are liable to tell you that they have thrown in the towel on preventing fraud and are intent on simply minimizing it and containi9ng the damage as best they can.

This is a sad state of affairs, but the grim truth is that every time some new method of stopping hackers and internet fraud comes along, there’s a crook with a way of beating it.

The best thing you can do, as a dropship ecommerce business person, is to get proactive about minimizing fraud. Here are a few tips that should help keep the criminals at bay as much as possible:

• Be choosy about your payment processor. Don’t just go with the cheapest rates and monthly costs. Instead, choose a payment processor who works actively to provide you with risk management support and keep you up to date on specific ecommerce fraud risks and liabilities, so that you can try to stay one step ahead of the crooks.

• Make sure you have a good fraud screening process in place that will automatically recognize suspicious characteristics. These include multiple shipping addresses used by single customer, international orders, extremely large orders, payments with credit cards that have similar numbers, multiple orders on a single credit or debit card within quick succession and more. Your fraud detection process should be programmed to flag for review any suspicious characteristics.

• These two Credit Card Associations---Verified by Visa and MasterCard Secure Code---use a personal security code that, if the purchaser cannot verify accurately, halts the transaction in its tracks. In most cases, if you use these two security features, you will not be liable for charge backs that are fraud related.

• Create and maintain a “fraud file” in which fraudulent transactions are recorded and all new transactions compared to these. If there is a match---the transaction is declined.

• One of the most critical things you can do to prevent ecommerce fraud in your home dropship business is to achieve and maintain PCI compliance. The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards are security management, policies, procedures, network architecture, software design and other protective measures that are intended to help organizations proactively protect customer account data. This compliance is mandatory in your own best interests to make sure your dropship business meets the industry data security requirements

Use these tips and research to find other ways to minimize ecommerce fraud. Remember that fraud eats up your profits!

Your dropship home business will be much safer and secure if you are aware of the fraud problem and make a conscious effort to stay up to date on ways to contain the damage, to keep your business as safe as it can possibly be.

Dropship Tips: How to Gain Repeat Customers

While there is no doubt that you always want to have fresh, new customers for your dropship business, you might be able to put a few tips on how to gain repeat customers to good use, too.

New customers are great. But repeat customers, the ones who come back time after time, are pure gold.

Why?

There are actually several reasons for this. First of all, repeat customer sales only cost a small fraction of acquiring new customers. Another reason is that they are much easier to sell since you have already gained their trust. Yet another---and very good---reason why repeat customers are money in the bank to your dropship business is that they make fantastic brand advocates, spreading the good word about you to people they know and greatly expanding your sphere of influence.

So, a few tips to help you gain repeat customers might come in handy to build your dropship business.

Dropship Tips to Gain Repeat Customers

Here are some tips to help you build a rock solid repeat customer base for your home dropship business:

• Over Deliver---No matter what you promised the customer, go above and beyond it. Unfortunately, many people expect under delivery, so when you over deliver you really wow them. You don’t have to lose money to do this, just a little extra service or coupon for free shipping with the next purchase, anything that is probably beyond what the customer expected will make a good impression.

• Have a Forum---Internet retail research has shown that ecommerce businesses that offer customers a forum to meet and cyber speak gain more repeat customers than those that don’t. Like the Cheers theme song said, sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name. By providing customers a place to interact, you’re making them feel at home and welcome on your site and much more likely to come back. For example, if you dropship camping equipment, you could have a forum for camping enthusiasts.

• Allow Reviews---Allow customers to submit reviews or comments on your site about the products they bought from you. People in general like to get their two cents worth in. Give them an opportunity to do that and you are doing more to gain a loyal, repeat customer. Don’t worry about getting negative reviews, but if you get too many about the same thing; it would behoove you to sit up and listen because there is almost certainly a problem with the product.

• Have Polls and Surveys---Use polls and surveys to let your customers tell you what they would like to see from your dropship business. It might be specific items, more coupons, promotions or contests…whatever it is, they will like being asked for an opinion and you can gain not only repeat customers but also some valuable insight into what your shoppers want from you.

• Use Social Media---Social sites like Facebook and Twitter are a good way to acquire repeat customers. But, here is where many ecommerce entrepreneurs drop the ball and fail to use social media marketing to its best advantage: you must respond to comments! Nobody likes talking into a vacuum and if you don’t respond to customer comments, you will lose good will in a hurry, along with customers.

Use these tips to grow your dropship business with a strong repeat customer base!

Dropshippers: 5 Proven Ways to Boost eBay Sales!

If you are one of the many dropshippers on eBay, you might be interested in picking up a few tips for boosting traffic and sales to your listings.

After all, more traffic and sales converts to more money and who doesn’t want that, right? Have you ever heard anybody in ecommerce say, “No, really, I don’t want to make more money?”

Of course not. Making money is a good thing and eBay dropshippers are generally in favor of getting their share of it.

Here are 5 tried and true, proven ways to boost traffic and sales for eBay dropshippers:

I. Use Cross Promotion with Other Sellers

Some eBay sellers are hesitant to do this because they fear they will lose sales. But, when you cross promote your items with other sellers, you increase your visibility and widen your sphere of influence on the site because those other sellers are showing your items, too. It’s a case of one hand washing the other and it does work, so don’t be afraid to give it a try.

II. Start an eBay Newsletter

You have free email marketing with newsletters, so take advantage of it and actively solicit subscriptions from customers as well as looky loos. Offer an incentive of some kind. You don’t have to give away the store, but make it worth someone’s while to opt-in to your email list. Please note that this is available to eBay store owners only, but hopefully you already have a store. Which brings us to our next tip.

III. Have an eBay Store

The Basic eBay Stores subscription is a mere $15.95 a month. Since the Spring Seller Update, if you agree to keep your store for a year, instead of on a month to month basis, you get the benefit of 150 free listings every month. This is nothing to sneeze at! Do the math and figure what you would pay for listing auctions for items with a starting price of, say, $34.99. You’re looking at $0.75 per listing fee. If the item doesn’t sell, you can relist and get a credit if it doesn’t sell the second go round. But, if it doesn’t, you’re out double listing fees. Ouch!

IV. Use Best Practices SEO

Many sellers don’t understand the importance of SEO for eBay drop shippers and others. In fact, keywords are vitally important! If you fail to use your prime keywords in your titles and descriptions, your rankings in eBay Best Match search will not be as high as they could be. As with any other search engine, the higher you are in search results, the better off you because more shoppers see your listings. If they don’t see your items, they’re unlikely to buy them, right?

V. Ask For the Sale

This is yet another area where a common misconception abounds for eBay dropshippers and other sellers. Any seasoned sales person understands the importance and effectiveness of simply asking someone to buy. If you haven’t tried it, start including a call to action at the end of every one of your descriptions and watch your sell through rate go up. For instance, if your dropshipping flash drives, end your description with something like this: “Why risk losing all of your important data? Back it up with a flash drive!” It’s easy. Just ask for the sale.

Dropshippers and other eBay sellers can use these 5 tips to help boost traffic and sales!

Starting a Dropship Home Business: Are You Ready?

While very few who have experienced the perks and privileges of working from home in a dropship business could argue that it isn’t fabulous, the fact is that being your own boss really isn’t for everybody and before you jump in with both feet---it might be a good idea to do some serious soul searching and ask yourself a few questions to make sure you’re ready.

Although starting a home dropship business doesn’t require a fraction of the start up costs associated with a traditional brick and mortar business, there are certain things that are common to all business owners, online or off.

Some do very well working from home, and others don’t.

What separates the successful from the unsuccessful? Here are some questions to ask yourself before embarking on a home business in dropshipping.

 

A Dropship Home Business

Let’s take a candid look at what you might reasonably expect if you start and run a home business of any sort, including a dropship business. Your answers to these questions should be revealing, giving you a pretty good idea if you can make the grade or not.

Fact: To be successful working from home, you need to be able to keep your eye on the ball and not be distracted too often from the job at hand. There is a ton of temptation when you’re doing business from home. Things such as personal phone calls, family, pets, television, Facebook and lots more can derail you and get you off track for getting your work done. You must be able to hold steady, even in the face of tempting distractions, and work.

Question: Can you do this? Can you steer a straight course toward accomplishing your daily work plan and goals, so that your home business will be a success? Or are you likely to cave at the first opportunity to abandon your work for something more fun? If so, you are unlikely to be a success with a dropship home business.

Fact: Those who are their own bosses must be able to get up and hit it at the time they have designate to start their work day. They have to be able to maintain motivation to do whatever it takes to meet their goals and keep themselves fired with a desire to succeed. If they falter, they have coping mechanisms to help them get their groove back.

Question: Are you a self starter? Are you self motivated, able to meet each new workday head on, with enthusiasm and drive? If you feel your motivation waning, do you have ways to get your want-to fixed? Have you lined up a support group or a peer who understands the days when your motivations gets up and walks out, and can give  you the pep talk you need to drag it back again? If not, you may not be a good candidate to work at home.

Fact: Nothing in life worth having comes easy. To succeed, you must have the determination to keep on keeping on even when you hit bumps in the road. Successful business people know that there will be perils, pitfalls and even plain old bad luck from time to time. But they also understand that with commitment and perseverance, these things will be overcome.

Question: Do you have the ability to stick to it and---if you get knocked down---get up, dust yourself off and start again? Do you see the slightest setback as permanent defeat and failure? If you do, don’t quit your day job. You probably wouldn’t make it in a home dropship business.

Before you start a home dropship business, be sure to get a healthy dose of reality and be ruthlessly honest with yourself about what your strengths and weaknesses are so that you will go into it with clear expectations.

3 Timely Tips for Starting an Ecommerce Dropship Home Business

Are you dreaming of escaping your dreary 9-5 job and working from home as your own boss with an ecommerce dropship business?

If so, you might find a few timely tips to come in handy!

Starting an ecommerce business is a piece of cake compared to starting a traditional brick and mortar store. It is immensely easier, much less expensive and very fast to get up and running; bringing you in an income almost right away.

Advantages of an Ecommerce Dropship Business

Forget having to pay rent or lease on a store building. Never mind taking out all kinds of costly insurance such as theft, fire, legal liability and more. No worries about having to sink a small fortune into inventory….storage space to house said inventory….fears of ending up with excess inventory you can’t move….furnishings, displays, cash registers, bookkeepers and accountants or any other of the 1001 things it takes to start a regular business.

With ecommerce, your business is online. You don’t even have to incur the expense of a web site because you might prefer using one of the big marketplaces like eBay or Amazon as your sales venue. EBay is now giving Basic plan store owners 150 free listings a month, so you don’t even have to pay fees unless and until your item sells. Sweet!

 

Tips for Ecoomerce Dropship Business Start-Up

So, if you’re all fired up with enthusiasm and itching to get started with your own ecommerce dropship business, here are 3 tips to speed you on your way and expedite the process:

1. Research a variety of products and niches before deciding on one. Your niche needs to be one in high consumer demand and preferably not oversaturated with competitors. Do your homework and choose wisely. The time you spend researching what will make a profitable niche for your dropship business will pay big dividends in lots of sales later on, after you start selling.

2. Make a business plan. Some people have the mistaken idea that business plans are only for brick and mortar businesses. Not true! You need a solid business plan that outlines clearly things such as business goals, marketing, and much more. You should have both short and long term goals and plans, with a well laid out route of how to get to where you want to go. This gives you a track to run on and makes things much easier.

3. Choose your wholesale product source wisely, be as choosy as you were deciding on a niche. This is a critical step in your dropship business start up. If you end up dealing with a product supplier who ships low quality, defective products to your customers, your business is doomed from the outset and your lifespan as a seller online is going to be short and not sweet. Be sure to find a supplier with genuine wholesale prices, too, or you won’t be able to have enough room for profits.

These three tips can help you start and maintain a successful, profitable ecommerce dropship home business, so get started now and wave goodbye to that dead end job!

Brand Names Have Clout: Dropship Emerson Products!

If you are considering starting a home business in ecommerce, here is a great tip for you that will help you make more sales and money: brand names have clout, so dropship Emerson products or another big box brand and you will have a better chance of having a successful business working from home.

You may be wondering why brand names for dropship products, or any ecommerce products for that matter, are better than no name generic products.

The reason is because online shoppers very naturally have trust issues and find it difficult at times to go through with an internet purchase due to fear of being scammed by an online rip off artist. Unfortunately, it does happen. When you look at it from the consumer’s point of view, you might understand why trust is such a huge issue.

Look at it this way---when you go into a traditional brick and mortar store to buy something, you are able to look around the store, check out the people working there or the owner, plus you can touch and see the product up close and personal in real time as opposed to the virtual world of the internet.

Buying online, shoppers have to take you at face value and take a gigantic leap of faith to buy from you when they only have your word and images that could have been copied from somewhere else as far as the quality of their products.

So, when you dropship an internationally famous brand name such as Emerson, you automatically advance several steps in the sales conversion process. When people see that you are offering a well known brand name, it builds trust because they are familiar with it and know it to be of high quality. You might say that this is sort of a case of being judged by the company you keep, because this trust of the brand seems to rub off on the seller by virtue of selling it.

Where to Dropship Emerson Products

So, where can you dropship Emerson products? Basically, any of the major online marketplaces are fine venues for dropshipping Emerson products. You might also start up your own website.

There are advantages to both of these plans. But do keep in mind that it will be impossible for you to duplicate the incredible amount of global traffic that flows through sites such as Amazon and eBay. So, if you are just getting started in an ecommerce home business and need to get some sales under your belt and money coming in right away---you might be well advised to go with a large site, at least in the beginning.

 

Sourcing Dropship Emerson Products

Be very careful when you source dropship Emerson products! Make sure you choose a reputable, established business that will give you real wholesale prices.

If you pay retail prices for products you buy for resale, you cannot make a profit, not enough of a profit to make your dropship business viable, anyway.

There are lots of Emerson products to dropship. Here are a few suggestions:

• Televisions
• DVD Players
• Blu-Ray Players
• Stereos
• Microwaves
• Toaster Ovens
• And Many More

These are all hot products with a high consumer demand, which is half the battle won right up front!

Brand names do have clout with consumers, so dropship Emerson products and have a thriving ecommerce home business with a name shoppers know and trust.

Dropship Flash Drives & Make Money Working From Home

If you would love to quit your job and start an ecommerce business, here is an idea for you: dropship flash drives and make money working from home.

More and more people are opting to drop out of the Rat Race. As the comedienne Lily Tomlin once said: “The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you’re still a rat.”

And that’s about the size of it, folks.

Life is too short to spend it chained to a job that brings you no joy and too little pay. When you work from home with an ecommerce business such as dropshipping, you discover the difference between making a living and making a life.

Having a profitable niche is naturally a big step up the ladder of success in a dropship business, since a hungry niche---which means one in high consumer demand---will ensure that you make plenty of sales and profits.

 

Dropship Flash Drives and Make Sales

When you choose to dropship flash drives, perhaps along with other computer products, you are definitely supplying a consumer demand because millions of people around the world use these handy little gizmos.

So, what are flash drives?

In case you aren’t entirely clear exactly what flash drives are, here is an explanation from good ol’ Wikipedia:

“A USB flash drive is a data storage device that includes flash memory with an integrated Universal Serial Bus (USB) interface. USB flash drives are typically removable and rewritable, and physically much smaller than a floppy disk. Most weigh less than 30 grams (1.1 oz). As of September 2011, drives of up to 256 gigbytes (GB) are available. A one-terabyte(TB) drive was unveiled at the 2013 Consumer Electronics Show and will be available during 2013. Storage capacities as large as 2 TB are planned, with steady improvements in size and price per capacity expected. Some allow up to 100,000 write/erase cycles, depending on the exact type of memory chip used, and a 10-year shelf storage time.”

There you have it. That’s what flash drives are and now you can probably see why they are in so much use and demand.

Where to Dropship Flash Drives

You will be able to choose almost any online marketplace to dropship flash drives. Here are a few suggestions:

• Amazon
• Overstock
• eBay
• Bonanza
• eBid
• uBid
• And More

When you start looking around for a good wholesale product supplier for dropship flash drives, be sure to find a reputable business with high quality products, preferably well known brand names. Brand names definitely generate more trust in shoppers, which translates to a higher conversion rate and more money in your pocket.

You also want to make sure that your dropship product source gives you real wholesale prices; low enough that you will have an ample margin of profit when you mark up for retail resale. Without that, you will not be able to make a success of your online home business.

Anyone who wants to start living the good life with their own home business could dropship flash drives for great sales and profits!

Need a Great Ecommerce Home Business Niche? Dropship Airguns!

If you are living for the day when you can walk away from your 9-5 job and start an ecommerce home business, here is a great idea for a profitable niche: dropship airguns!

Airguns are hot and if you decide to ride the wave of their popularity, you can make some tidy profits working from the privacy, security and comfort of your own home.

There are many people buying and using airguns, so you would have a niche with enough of a consumer demand to ensure plenty of traffic and sales.

Although the popularity of airguns has increased during the past few years, they have been around for a long time.

 

Dropship Airguns: Information

You may have heard of airguns, but not have a clear understanding of exactly what they are, how they are used and what makes them a hot commodity for dropshipping.

So, to shed a little light in the subject of airguns, here is an excerpt from Wikipedia that will hopefully explain things:

“An air gun is a rifle (air rifle), pistol (air pistol), or shotgun that fires projectiles by means of compressed air or other gas, in contrast to a firearm which fires projectiles by means of a burning propellant. Most air guns use metallic projectiles as ammunition. A few use arrows. Air guns that only use plastic projectiles are classified as air soft guns.”

That explains what they are, but what are they used for?

Airguns are commonly used for hunting, pest control, plinking, (recreational shooting) and competitive sports.

They have been around for centuries and are an example of the oldest known form of pneumatic technology. The Livrustkammaren Museum in Stockholm houses what is believed to be the oldest airgun, a bellows type airgun dating back to about 1580. During the 17th century, airguns were used to hunt big game such as wild boar and deer. It was about that time that they began to be used in warfare, as well.

They were also used extensively for poaching back in the late 19th century because they were significantly quieter when fired than a conventional firearm.

 

Where to Dropship Airguns

You may have heard that firearms can’t be sold on eBay or Amazon and are wondering if this includes airguns.

In a nutshell---no, it doesn’t.

However, there are strict provisos that must be met on both marketplaces. Here is a list of eBay’s rules about the sale of airguns:

“Airsoft guns, replica guns, or other imitation firearms may be listed when:

• They have blaze orange barrel markings or a blaze orange barrel plug permanently attached to the weapon.

• They can't be converted to shoot lethal projectiles.

• State laws must be followed. In most states, you have to be at least 18 years old to buy an airsoft gun.”

As for Amazon, they have many listings for air guns of all types.

You could also create your own web site, although many entrepreneurs who are just starting out prefer to stick with a large and established site initially, due to the huge flow of traffic.

If you want to bid a less than fond adieu to your daily grind and work from home, dropship airguns for a high performance niche!

Heads Up Dropshippers: Health and Wellness Sales are Booming!

Here is a heads up for dropshippers: health and wellness sales are booming now more than ever before, so if you want a different niche or are just about to start a home business in ecommerce, this is something to take into consideration.

If you want to be as successful as possible in ecommerce, you must dropship products that are in high demand, or at least sufficient demand to keep you supplied with enough traffic and sales to make nice living.

If you dropship health and wellness products, you will have a potential goldmine and ample opportunities for lots of sales and profits.

Dropshippers of Health and Wellness Products

What makes health and wellness products such a desirable niche for dropshippers?

Because there is an enormous global consumer demand for these products. People all over the world are becoming more and  more health conscious and at the same time, more proactive about staying healthy. This is good for them and good for you, too, if you supply that demand.

This is a niche that is very much en vogue at the moment, although health and wellness products have always been in demand to some extent.

Back during the 1800s, traveling salesmen went around the country hawking all kinds of potions and elixirs that claimed to cure whatever ailed anybody. These sellers earned the nickname “snake oil” salesmen but despite any ridicule and skepticism, their products were much sought after and many people bought them.

Today, people are generally better educated about the things that are likely to help them achieve health and wellness and receptive to products they believe will help them attain this state.

According to research by Euromonitor International, The latest health and wellness findings revealed that fortified/functional products are set to see a strong constant annual growth of 5% over 2012-2013, equivalent to US $11.5 billion globally.

This research showed that the top five functional trends for 2013 include:

1. Desire for energy
2. Long-term weight control   
3. Probiotics: The year of US, China and Brazil
4. Preventative aging
5. Heart-healthy emerging markets

This graph will give you an idea of how the market for the health and wellness niche is projected to perform:



Obviously, this is a very broad niche for dropshippers and you may feel more comfortable focusing on just one aspect of it. Or you might not. It will be a little more work in terms of marketing and SEO, but you could successful offer a variety of health and wellness products from all the popular categories shown above.

Where Dropshippers Sell Health and Wellness Items

Basically, you can dropship health and wellness products on any online venue. If you are just beginning to build your ecommerce home dropshipping business, you might be well advised to start off on one of the large, established marketplaces such as Amazon or eBay simply because millions and millions of global visitors flow through these sites daily.

Anyone looking for a great niche for an online home business should think about this idea---join the drop shippers of health and wellness products for fantastic profits!

Dropship News: Looking Around for an eBay Alternative?

If you have a home dropship business, the latest batch of changes on eBay might have you looking around for a viable alternative.

The Spring Seller Update might be somewhat beneficial to smaller sellers or those who sell fairly low priced items, but for the sellers who deal in large volume and higher priced products---it’s another fee hike. A big one!

One thing this update has accomplished, it seems, it to put paid to the prevailing rumor of the past few years that eBay is making a concerted effort to get rid of small sellers, since this update actually gives them a bit of a break.

But, if you are in the group of dropship sellers who prefer to sell pricey goods, you will soon see your fees shooting up….again.

Many beleaguered eBay sellers are swearing that this latest change is the proverbial last straw and are actively seeking another online marketplace to move their dropship sales business.

So, are there any eBay alternatives?

Yes.

There are alternatives, although some simply do not have the traffic that flows through eBay. Let’s take a look at your options available for eBay alternatives:

• Amazon---This humongous marketplace is bigger and some say better than eBay. Amazon has continued to see massive sales growth during the past few years when eBay either remained stagnant or went backward. There are strict rules and policies for sellers on Amazon and the fees are about the same as eBay. But, you would have the advantage of more traffic, which would translate to more sales. So, the fees would probably be worth it.

• Bonanza---This is a friendly site that has experienced much growth. However, it is still not getting the kind of traffic that the two giants--eBay and Amazon---get. Still, the fees are very low and if you have a hot enough niche and have been wise enough to build up a large opt-in newsletter subscription list of your customers on eBay, you might be able to take a lot of business with you. eBay wouldn’t like this but so far haven’t been able to prevent sellers from getting the email addresses of buyers from Paypal. This may be yet to come as eBay appears to be increasingly paranoid about buyers and sellers having any contact whatsoever. For now, though, you are free to harvest those email addys and run to the eBay alternative of your choice, announcing the move with a bulk email newsletter.

• Ebid---This one is sort of like eBay’s little brother and has quite a bit to offer, even if it can’t match Big Brother’s traffic. The traffic is lower, but so are the fees. Some ex-eBay sellers are reporting good luck on this site.

• eCrater---This eBay alternative is gaining in popularity and has a very user friendly interface for sellers. One big plus is that all items are added to the Google Product Search, something that isn’t possible with eBay anymore since their apparent falling out with Google. Buyers can also use Google Wallet at checkout if you want to get away from Paypal, and the fees are a little lower than Paypal.

• OnlineAuction---This site offers an $8 monthly membership and no listing or final value fees, plus you can add a link to your own website, something eBay has prohibited for quite some time.

If you’re fed up to the gills with the constant policy changes and fee hikes, there are eBay alternatives for your dropship business!