9 Steps to Start Dropshipping with WordPress

You might have read the six-word story, “The author picked awards. Ghostwriters smiled.” Here, you can compare the author to a dropshipper and the ghostwriters to wholesalers or suppliers.

Along with providing the benefit of selling without owning the products, dropshipping relieves the dropshipper from storing or shipping products. It has been a decent choice for entrepreneurs because of its low-cost operation and functional simplicity. Analyzify predicts the global dropshipping market will reach $476.1 billion by 2026.

This blog post will explain nine consecutive steps to start dropshipping with WordPress.

What is dropshipping

Dropshipping is a type of order fulfillment business that sells products without requiring manufacturing, storing, or shipping done by the owner.

In this eCommerce business model, instead of buying products earlier, the sellers simply maintain a connection with a third party, typically a supplier, to whom they hand over the orders when received. The suppliers then ship the products directly to the buyers, and the sellers pay the suppliers when the order is placed.

So, this order fulfillment process engages the vendor in marketing, advertising, customer relationships, etc., and relieves from product manufacturing or procurement, inventory management, and storekeeping.

For new entrepreneurs, dropshipping holds a lot of possibilities. Its scalability, cost-effectiveness, and lower risk make it an attractive option. While it may offer a lower profit margin than businesses directly connected to manufacturing or supply, your business can start growing quickly with the right strategies and a focus on conversion optimization.

Is WordPress worth it for dropshipping?

Though WordPress is not dedicated to any particular business model, it works successfully for dropshipping as much as for other business models. There are some reasons why you should start dropshipping with WordPress.

• High-end integration options
• Enormous types of themes
• Top-notch plugins, both free and pro
• Cost-effective solution
• Customization and adaptability
• User-friendly interface
• Seamless SEO support

The one primary reason for dropshipping is its scalability, which is wholly connected with the same features of WordPress. WordPress is also popular because of its beginner-friendly dashboard. You can quickly build and optimize pages suitable for you and your users.

How to start a dropshipping business with WordPress

Starting a business in a broad and competitive field like dropshipping requires thorough preparation. You need to know where to start and the sequence of tasks. 

1. Choose a dropshipping niche that fits you

Picking the right niche for dropshipping is more about eliminating unnecessary headaches in the future. All extended niches have too much competition, and less competitive niches are less profitable.

So, it’s never like choosing only your favorite or the one where you have expertise; instead, you must focus on a few matters.

– Look for trending products and their sustainability

– Check competition throughout the market

– Calculate profit margin and risk factors

– Consider the eco-friendliness

– Seasonality of the niche

You can use tools like Google Trends to research your niche.

2. Select a reliable supplier for long-term collaboration

Once you have chosen your niche, choose the right supplier for your dropshipping business. 

Potential supplier issues, such as low-quality products, delayed shipping, and poor communication, may be found all over the market.

Consider a few facts while choosing the proper supplier for your dropshipping business.

• Quality of the supplier’s products through reviews and ratings
• Shipping procedure and duration the supplier typically processes
• Communication methods and viability to the supplier
• Key points of agreement such as delivery time expectation, packaging, etc
• Refund and return policy and duration regarding these

Globally renowned sites like Ali Express and Salehoo are more often used for dropshipping supplies. However, you can also find your supplier on other sites who meet your requirements.

3. In-depth competitor research

To outperform your competitors in this dynamic field, analyze their business strategy.

You may follow a few steps while researching your competitors.

• Identify your competitors
• Identify their products and customer base
• Analyze their pricing strategies
• Follow their advertising campaigns
• Detect their success points
• Track them on social media
• Scrutinize their content creation strategy
• Look over their strong and weak zone
• Scan their offers and promotion strategy
• Enlist competitors by ranking and find out the gap to enter
• Monitor the changes your competitors make and detect the reasons

4. Select products and set prices

In-depth competitor analysis makes it easier to select products and set prices. Since you need not purchase before selling, you can change your product list randomly. However, you should balance new and old products in your shop to maintain an attractive product portfolio. 

Why should people purchase from your dropshipping store? One reason is that you make it a brand that the manufacturer may not be capable of or interested in. Products with more reviews and ratings will enhance your brand’s credibility. So, choose your products wisely. 

• Research the trending products on top e-commerce sites, including Amazon and eBay
• Look for products that have low competition, adequate demand, and considerable profit margin
• Check if the products can be linked to holiday seasons and sale campaigns
• Ransack the product reviews: pick the low-risking ones with quality
• Try to enlist the lightweight ones for simplified and cost-effective shipping
• Pick the products that are easily linkable to a combo pack with other ones

Pricing is a vital reason for buyers to purchase. There are plenty of online stores, and one single click can cause a user to leave your site. Perfect pricing strategies can make your buyers add your products to the cart without hesitation. 

• Consider competitiveness and your business’ age
• Calculate your total cost and expectation of profit margin
• Look into the market conditions and competitors’ actions
• Consider manufacturer-suggested retail price where applicable
• Keep your price limit where discounts can be given
• Add another pricing for bundle shopping

5. Build an eCommerce website with WordPress

WordPress is a CMS that easily suits any online business, mainly because of its extensive themes, plugins, and integrations. You must first create a WordPress e-commerce website to start dropshipping with WordPress. You can follow some steps to start a dropshipping store easily.

• Get domain and hosting that are the best for your site
• Install an insightful theme for a satisfactory user experience
• Use required plugins that best match your demands
• Build pages with must-have forms, payment methods, chat widgets, etc
• Add your products to the site with optimized descriptions
• Add an SSL certificate to your site

There are many eCommerce plugins, but WooCommerce is the leading WordPress plugin used for eCommerce. Here’s how WooCommerce can help with your dropshipping store –

• Cost-effectiveness at its best
• Extended opportunity to customize
• Secure for payments and data
• Optimized inventory management
• Hundreds of free and paid extensions
• Advanced multilingual content platform

6. Market your dropshipping business meticulously

A dropshipping entrepreneur is more a marketer and less a seller. If your marketing strategy goes right, consider your business is on the right track to grow.

• Customize product descriptions with practical SEO practices
• Add customer reviews and testimonials
• Have a solid social media marketing strategy
• Create a sales campaign that converts
• Leverage lead generation for email marketing
• Focus on  customer retention and retargeting from the start
• Have a well-thought-content SILO plan to generate leads from blogs
• Invest in video marketing for overall branding
• Connect with influencers to promote your top products
• Run paid promotions for products that give you a high-profit margin
• Implement holiday marketing ideas for eCommerce

7. Consider your business structure and register

There are typically four types of business structures suitable for a dropshipping business. Before registering your business, you must determine which business structure you want to adapt.

Sole Proprietorship: In this structure, there remains no separation between the business and the owner. The owner is liable for all the business debts and is subjected to bear all the taxes and legal issues. The owner is the only person who gets the fruit of profit or the hit of loss.

Partnership: In a partnership business, profit, loss, debts, assets, and taxes are divided among the partners either proportionally or according to their agreement.

Limited Liabilities Company (LLC): An LLC is a legal fence between a business and its owners, bearing the same tax-paying entity. LLC owners’ assets remain protected if an LLC is sued for failing to pay its debts. In terms of tax purposes, an LLC is treated as a sole proprietorship or partnership business possessing all business tax obligations that flow through to the owners’ tax returns.

Corporation: In a corporation structure, the business is a separate legal and tax-paying entity from its owners. Corporations provide the business owners with the most liability protection. Corporations file their income tax returns while paying tax on the business’s profits at the corporate income tax rate. A C corporation maintains double taxation on its income: one is at the corporate level, and the other is at the shareholder level.

8. Organize your finances

Dropshipping is a cost-effective business scope, but there are a few financial procedures to follow.

• Open a bank account for all kinds of transactions
• Set up payment processing on your website
• Thoroughly research the tax considerations
• Consult with a business consultant or a lawyer
• Organize your investment from the start

9. Ensure smooth order-fulfillment

Although WordPress has adequate plugin support for fulfilling orders, you must choose and integrate plugins so your customers don’t face any issues when they shop from your dropshipping store. Using high-end features and extensive integrations, you can quickly fulfill dropshipping store orders using Fluent Forms templates.

What’s next

Before launching your dropshipping business like a pro, you must research, plan, strategize, and decide your moves. Then, the organized execution process will matter the most for your start-up. Dropshipping business will test your patience, decision-making skills, and problem-solving capability. And the rewards are long-lasting once you are on the right track.

You can learn a lot from your competitors by following their tactics.  Learn how to retain your visitors and turn them into repeat buyers.  Utilize WordPress’s user-oriented features to establish your dropshipping store using plugins like WooCommerce and Fluent Forms.