Many want to run a profitable business that serves customers not only within a specific region but also all over the world. If you are one of the people who got that dream, this article is for you.
Dropshipping is a business that delivers equivalent prospects to everybody. It does not matter if you are an islander or a dweller of a busy city. If you are looking to secure a superior future for yourself and your loved ones, you can simply set up an online business that will generate money for you from all around the globe.
If you are still wondering if it is a good idea to start an online business in Sri Lanka, you should know that in 2019 eCommerce sales amounted to almost 3.5 trillion dollars worldwide. With the positive global indication of the growth of eCommerce around the world, it is always a better idea to start it on your own.
You don’t need to manufacture goods or to purchase them from somebody in advance. All you need is steady Internet access and an eCommerce website. Your business journey begins from here.
The main purpose of this article is to educate you on how to start your own dropshipping Sri Lanka business model. We will explicate what a dropshipping business is, how to locate the correct dropshipping business ideas and everything else you should know to start dropshipping.
What is dropshipping?
When it comes to dropshipping, it is not the traditional eCommerce business. With dropshipping Sri Lanka you shall run an eCommerce website without owning any inventory. In other words, no big investment is required to get started with your online business in Sri Lanka.
You will have an eCommerce website and when you get an order, your supplier will get notified and they will send the goods to your clients directly. So, your involvement is less. You do not have to worry about stock level, delivery arrangement packaging. Etc. Everything will be taken care of by the supplier.
Why dropshipping Sri Lanka?
Sri Lanka is an up-and-coming nation and a promising place to live and run an online trade-in.
As it\’s national, you can take advantage of numerous growth aspects influencing the eCommerce ecosystem in Sri Lanka. Thanks to a speedily rising computer literacy rate, long-established internet networks, and remarkable GDP gains, the island has a lot to offer you! The connectivity it allows makes it feasible for you to connect with your traders and clienteles on a steady and regular basis and covers the way to pleasing business performance.
In addition, there are the best payment gateways in Sri Lanka that support starting an online business in Sri Lanka.
A diverse environment lets you study more about the life and disputes of various ethnic groups, and tailor your deals to numerous buyer segments.
So, there is nobody that would stop you from introducing a money-making trade that breaks geographical limits and lets you run your business on a global scale. How would you like the idea of promoting China-made goods to clients widely spread across the world – and residing in the luxury of your own home?
How dropshipping works in Sri Lanka?
Step 1: Selecting the perfect Dropshipping Business Idea
It is all about what you sell. The goods you choose to sell matters a lot. You will have to spend some time identifying the great business plan for dropshipping Sri Lanka. Many suggest choosing a niche product that you are passionate about. However, that is not a great idea always. It’s a mixer of hard work and passion that works together to generate a good profit. Finalising a proper business idea is key. Successful business ideas are usually more profitable. You will automatically become passionate about the business idea when you start making cash from it.
There are various tools available for you to work on the business plan. Here are some of the tools which will help you to generate the business plan for your dropshipping Sri Lanka business.
- Google Trends – It is a good tool to find if the selected niche for upward trend or downward trend. However, finalising a decision based only on this data is not a great idea. Also, this tool will not explain if it is feasible to execute it easily. It is mainly because some niche business idea will show an upward trend in this tool, however, it may not have enough searches in Google.
- Ubersuggest’s Keyword Tool – Solution from Neil Paten who is one of the best digital marketing company owners, these tools help you to find the number of people searching on the internet for the mentioned keyword. This tool also supports us to find the competition and their position which will help us to identify the feasibility of the chosen business plan or suggestion for any other in the future.
- Browse and find the other famous websites within the niche you have chosen. For example, if you choose fashion as your niche, find all the competitors who are out there in this niche. Check their website and find what products they are mainly highlighting. Check their fast-moving goods group to identify which goods are easy to sell.
Mostly the most money-making dropshipping business has trends within the main niche itself. For example, sports clothes have their demand and trend in the fashion niche. You shall focus on denim to gain a competitive advantage in that specific niche. Another example is Marble phone cases which have their trend and demand within the phone case niche. You will want to have the trends as goods but not as the whole eCommerce store, especially if you are constructing a long-term business. Don’t forget to keep this while you are working on your dropshipping business plan.
Step 2: Know your competitors
Once you have decided on what goods you are going to sell online, you should know who your competitors are, what do they sell and how are they selling the products to their customers. There are many ways to perform a comprehensive competitor analysis.
- In Google Search, enter the product that you are planning to sell along with your target geographic to see who is showing up on the top list. Those who come within the page in Google or any other search engine tools will give an idea of who is your main competitors within the specific location. If you are located in a different area and if your target market is a different country, use other SEO tools such as SEM Rush or Ahref to get info about the rivalry for certain keywords. Or else you shall use VPN to change your IP and check the competition too.
- You shall use tools such as Alexa or SimilarWeb to identify the competitors within the niche who might not show up in Google at the top. These websites will give a summary of your competitor websites and also will showcase their social media profiles any ads they are running and the audience and the traffic they are gaining to their website.
- Use social media and hunt around. I was able to craft a good drop shipping business idea by doing an in-depth rival analysis. I usually browse the social media pages and ads within a specific niche and find how many followers they got? How are they marketing their brand and the product? What is the engagement level for their posts? Also, what can I do differently to get a competitive advantage and what can I copy from them which they are already doing well.
- Using tools such as BuzzSump, you shall know your competitor’s content and what content performs better for them so you can replicate it too. Using this tool, you will be able to find which content is performing well on social media, and how many shares and engagement these blogs get. Singing up to a competitor’s newsletter will also support us to find the type of content they are using to attract their customers.
Step 3: Look for suppliers
There are plenty of different dropshipping companies and suppliers available in the market. A comprehensive review of all of those companies and suppliers are beyond the scope of this article. Instead, we have listed some of the well-known dropshipping supplier directories in this article which you shall make use of. Please note we are not certifying any of the directories mentioned here. We are providing here with some options to choose from.
- Oberlo
- CJdropshipping
- Supplymedirect
- CROV
- Modalyst
- DropnShop
Step 4: Build your dropshipping eCommerce website
There are a few tools that you should use to build your dropshipping eCommerce business in Sri Lanka. Here are some of those.
Domain Name – For any website or business, the domain name they are key. This is the main factor that needs to be considering in building a long-term business brand. You shall make use of a free business name idea generator to help you to identify the suitable name and to find the domain availability. You shall choose the domain extension based on your target markets. If your target market is only Sri Lanka, then it is recommended to choose .lk domains. If you are targeting globally, then it is already recommended to choose .com domains.
eCommerce Website Development – Getting your eCommerce website with payment gateway integration is important to start marketing your business. You shall use tools such as WIX or Shopify to get the web design done. However, if you are looking forward to getting a professional to work on the eCommerce website, Tectera is considered one of the best web design in Sri Lanka.
Step 5: Marketing Marketing Marketing!!!
So now you have a domain name and a good eCommerce website. What’s next? It’s time to start marketing your business like there is no tomorrow. You have to be aggressive in marketing. This is a significant step in your dropshipping Sri Lanka business. So, don’t waste your time on keep on changing the store designs and pretend that you are trying to make the website look better to get started with the marketing. Don’t do that. Your focus should turn to get your first sale from the website and that gives the best feeling for all your hard work.
If you are a start-up with a limited budget, don’t worry. Here are some of the best marketing ideas that can be used to get started with dropshipping with a minimum marketing budget. Here are a few to get you started:
- Facebook Ads: I understand it can be persuasive to spend $500 on Facebook Ads. Many entrepreneurs think they shall make a good return from the first ads themselves. That is not correct. For example, I spent $20 on my first and did not have any conversion. I was worried about this loss. However, the trust is I did not risk much amount at the beginning. Therefore, I got up back quickly and created my second ad and it managed to get conversions at five cents a click. It is suggested to keep the ads budget minimal at the start so you shall afford experimentation. At the start, you will not know what is going to be your best-selling products. Therefore, create several and unique ads to identify your best-selling product and best-performing campaign. If you are focusing on the globe, I would recommend you target the entire world except for Canada, the USA, UK and Australia. This will help you to get a good return with minimal ad cost. When your business start growing, you shall increase the budget and start focusing on the developed countries such as Canada, the USA, UK and Australia.
- Retargeting Ads: If you have the minimum budget, I recommend you make use of the retargeting ads because the cost is low compare to the usual ads. This ad works well only when you have plenty of organic visitors to your website. For example, you wrote a great blog about your products and you are gaining a lot of traffic to your website. Now it’s time to convert that traffic into your customers with the use of retargeting ads. This is much better than the usual Facebook Ads and it is cost-effective too.
- Influencer Marketing: Starting a dropshipping Sri Lanka will require you to a bit bitty at the beginning. If you cannot afford to pay for influencers, you shall offer them to work with you on an affiliate commission instead. Or else you shall offer free goods to them and request them to feature it. Offering affiliate commission is a good idea because not all the influences will convert into a sale. It’s like giving a try in the dark. If you pay an affiliate commission rather than an advertising fee, then you lower the risk of your dropshipping business.
- Get free media coverage: Using free tools such as HARO, you shall get 3 emails per day where the reporters will ask you to provide stories for their articles. Certain reporters may be looking for influencers in a specific niche and whereas others may be looking for product recommendations. Anyway, this free traffic will help you to get sales with the support of your retargeting ad. Rather than adding a link to your main page, send the traffic to a specific category page or a product page to create a more targeted focus. You shall still use your brand name for the hyperlink.
Step 6: Optimize your campaigns and website
Once you are done with the launch of your eCommerce website, building the brand and marketing, now it’s time to analyse the results of your hard work. You will find some ads perform well and others did not. You shall check which had performed well and the reason behind it and then start changing the ads to be more competitive and optimised.
You shall make use of free tools such as Google Analytics or Google Search Console to evaluate the performance. In addition, you shall use these tools to identify your reach and to make sure your staff is increasing, not decreasing. If you are using separate tools to perform your social media marketing and email marketing, automate a weekly or monthly report to get an idea of the performance.
Overall, it is very important to test and optimise your online eCommerce store to gain proper success and to increase your revenue that you generate online. Analysing will make sure your website does not fall behind the best practices and keeps you ahead of your rivals too.
Tectera is the best web design Sri Lanka. We at Tectera offers a wider range of website design and development, eCommerce website development and digital marketing at a very reasonable cost. We are also a leading SEO agency in Sri Lanka, and we do offer higher quality digital marketing services all around the world.
