Tips on Finding Dropshipping Products to Sell + 10 Best-Selling Merchandise Ideas
Your success in dropshipping depends on reliable suppliers providing quality wholesale products at reasonable costs. Once you begin selling, store expenses and eCommerce fees can stack up, so you need to think about finding dropshipping products that minimize these risks.
In this article, you’ll find dropshipping insight – how to find dropshipping products to sell at cost-effective prices and a large order volume, in a niche you’re comfortable with.
How to Find Dropshipping Products for Your Online Business
Before we delve into the dropshipping product research tools, it’s crucial to understand where your eCommerce business stands in the broader marketplace and how to focus on finding your market niche.
1. Define Your Niche Market
Running a successful dropshipping business relies on selling winning products. But what may be more crucial is to find specific dropshipping niches that work well in the eCommerce industry.
Dedicated categories of products create unique dropshipping niches that give your brand a more pronounced identity, customer loyalty, an edge over competitors, and a lower overall marketing spend.
Not all niches are profitable – you need a category of products with high demand and a consistent search volume that isn’t saturated by competitors. Products with high profit margins and low shipping costs are often the highest value.
When analyzing market trends, know which niches to choose and which to avoid. Some of the metrics that you should consider when finding a niche include:
- Demographics: age, gender, education, lifestyle, background, etc.
- Location: geographic location, language preferences, frequented sales channels, tax policies.
- Search interest: traffic volume, keyword density, seasonal spikes, trends.
- Customer spending: total market value, average order value, profit margin flexibility.
- Competition: keyword difficulty, marketplace saturation, brand-specific products, etc.
2. Research the Best Dropshipping Suppliers and Their Top Products
Dropshipping suppliers function as product and fulfillment centers that list products from partnered manufacturers for store owners to sell online.
Dedicated dropshipping platforms like Printify manage partner communications, eCommerce integrations, product routing, and order fulfillment, among other features that would otherwise cost you time and money.
You should look for product selection, pricing, and additional tools and resources that will help you develop a more centralized dropshipping model.
Wholesale dropshipping – offers a larger product selection and more profit margin flexibility but zero customization in the production process.
Print-on-Demand dropshipping – offers a more competitive edge and brand customization but requires more effort on the merchant’s part when designing products.
We’ve made a dedicated list of suppliers that have long hosted some of the top-performing dropshipping stores in the market. Check out The 15 Best Dropshipping Suppliers and choose which is best for your online store.
3. Perform Competitor Research
Competitors are your best friends and your biggest challenge. While they fight for the same audience, browsing similar niche stores will help you create a more rounded dropshipping model.
Note your competitors’ product selection, pricing, shipping, and marketing content to generate ideas for your own online store.
The type of content your competitors produce, the social media marketing used and the overall brand image they publish will impart knowledge of audience expectations, the level of customer engagement, and how you can improve your storefront design and interface.
Successful and popular eCommerce stores will appear higher on Google search results, mainly due to Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – how well an eCommerce store generates traffic and offers a good user experience.
For more information on Search Engine Optimization, check our more in-depth resources:
4. Look for Trending Products
Once you have an idea of how a marketplace is set up, conducting a Google search analysis and keyword research is the next important step to generate data-driven market metrics.
Multiple online keyword tools can give insights into a particular market niche and product category:
- Google Trends – examine geographic concentrations, rising trends, and seasonal spikes by entering specific keywords.
- Google Keyword Planner – analyze traffic volumes, search match types and long-tail keyword variations in a given market niche.
- Facebook Audience Insights – find demographic trends, customer locations, page visits, and general online audience activity.
Use Google Trends or other popular keyword tools like Ahrefs or Semrush to analyze specific user search queries and see what products your customers are more likely to buy based on traffic estimates.
Lastly, involve yourself in online communities that are likely interested in your niche and products. Dedicate the time to research forum boards, social media channels, popular influencers, and user-generated content to establish your product strategy.
5. Use a Dropshipping Product Research Tool
As dropshipping continues to grow, it can get overwhelming to differentiate between all the available products and suppliers.
eCommerce platforms have developed useful product research tools that scan and feature any particular product category and its profitability for online retailers. Make sure that the dropshipping tool is legitimate and works with suppliers with existing merchant reviews.
What to Consider When Picking Products to Dropship?
Your business model, dropshipping supplier, listed products, and sales channel all work in unison. A selling strategy must account for all aspects of a supply chain to ensure consistency and measurable profitability.
Selecting a Quality Dropshipping Supplier
Look for the following crucial features when selecting a supplier to sell products. Your final decision should be whether the listed products, pricing, and interface are right for your business model and budget.
- A definitive list of wholesale products
- Automated order routing and shipping
- Supported eCommerce platform integrations
- Clear and manageable user interface
- Active merchant support network and guides
- Up-to-date marketing and dropshipping resources
- Existing and positive merchant reviews and testimonials
Dropshipping Business Model
We mentioned selling products in two different ways – dropshipping and print-on-demand. If you choose a print-on-demand supplier, you will need to prepare designs and apply them to product templates before they can be sold.
Printify offers free tools like the Mockup Generator to seamlessly upload designs to customizable product blanks.
Once your design is ready, the process is much the same as regular dropshipping. Custom prints are fulfilled by a print provider, which you can then sell as on-demand dropshipping.
Next, you should decide whether to sell high-ticket or low-ticket dropshipping products.
- Low-ticket dropshipping – sell inexpensive products at a high-profit margin.
- High-ticket dropshipping – sell expensive products at a low-profit margin.
Each product pricing model comes with its strengths and weaknesses:
Selling cheap low-ticket products:
You sell more products for less money that are easier to ship to a bigger market, at rates that invite impulse buyers. Low-ticket dropshipping takes added effort to moderate and advertise, but competition is more scattered.
Selling expensive high-ticket products:
You sell fewer products for more money, at higher shipping costs, to a smaller niche market, at rates that invite buyers with higher quality expectations. High-ticket dropshipping is easier to moderate and market, but competitors are more impactful and harder to compete against.
Product Price Range
To price a product, look at comparable competitor prices and research your supplier’s shipping and production costs.
Dropshipping products need to be priced to cover business expenses while adding a profit at the end of the sale. These costs may include:
- Supplier production and shipping costs
- Costs of marketing and product promotion
- eCommerce listing, transaction, and hosting fees
- Paid dropshipping research tools, etc.
Good dropshipping profit margins are between 15-20% of the wholesale product cost. For example, if your supplier offers a wholesale price of $40, you should optimally aim for a profit of at least $8, with a minimum retail price of $48.
If you want to learn more about pricing a product for dropshipping, delve into How to Price a Product for Ultimate Success.
Shipping Costs and Regions
Shipping costs are the number one reason customers abandon carts at checkout. It’s important to select suppliers close to your customers that ship products at fair rates.
Make sure to research whether your suppliers have distributors near your region or offer ways to deliver in bulk at lower rates.
Since wholesale products can be sourced worldwide, they often don’t have a specific regional market. If you’re struggling with making sales due to shipping costs, consider lowering them on the store page and compensating with higher prices.
Dropshipping Store Platform
Dropshipping relies on eCommerce sales channels to operate. When creating an online store, you have two choices: online retail marketplaces or storefront hosting platforms.
eCommerce marketplaces are websites like Amazon, eBay, Etsy, and other public spaces where merchants offer their product listings without a dedicated store page.
Marketplaces are the quickest way to start dropshipping. Items are listed by category, and sales rely on maintaining competitive pricing, adding relevant tags and product pictures, and advertising.
eCommerce platforms are storefront hosts like Shopify, WooCommerce, Wix, and other independent domain service providers. eCommerce platforms are better for personalization and store branding. You can design your own store page with all the necessary features and template presets without having to do much back-end coding.
Not all sales channels fit all products, so making an informed decision is important when choosing your platform. Marketplaces like Etsy are better for crafts, jewelry, and personalized clothing, while eBay has a larger audience for consumer electronics.
If you choose to create your own storefront, you will have to invest more in marketing and good SEO practices, because users are very unlikely to stumble upon your page independently, as opposed to when browsing a marketplace.
10 Best-Selling Print-on-Demand Products for Your Dropshipping Store
Now it’s time for product ideas. Here’s a list of trending dropshipping products for consistent sales at a high profit.
9. AOP Tote Bag
10. Tough Cases
View the Printify Catalog for over 800 excellent niche products and filter the options that suit your online store and brand idea.
Sell Dropshipping Products With Printify Today
Printify is a quality print-on-demand dropshipping supplier with global fulfillment centers and flexible delivery rates. We’re partnered with top-performing eCommerce channels such as Shopify, Etsy, Walmart, and eBay. Sign up for free to start your dropshipping journey with the best products on offer.
Pick a Product
Select a product from the Printify Catalog. Open a specific product page to see all manufacturing details, including design features, sizing, print details, and valuable selling points. Then, scroll down to view available print provider information – the cost of production and shipping, estimated delivery times, fulfillment center locations, and merchant reviews.
Apply Your Design
Once you’re satisfied, click Start designing for the Mockup Generator tool. The software will guide you to quickly upload an appropriate image and drag it onto the template. Use the preview screen to see how your product will look once finished, and then save.
Order a Sample
Your saved product will appear in the My products section of your Printify account. We recommend that you use this page to order a sample before you begin to sell. This way, you can make sure that you’re selling something that matches your quality expectations and will come out as planned.
Connect a Store
With unique products at hand, you can integrate your store with a click of a button. Go to integrations next to your account icon on the upper dashboard, enter your store page URL, and wait for the process to initialize. You can also use the custom API option if you don’t have a store with one of Printify’s partnered integrations.
Publish and Start Selling
In the My products section, you can immediately publish your new designs to your store catalog as available listings. Check the product edit page to change the price or the product description beforehand.
Printify’s unique products give you an edge over the competition. Our platform makes the design, integration, and order process easy to get you selling right away. We manage a dedicated 24/7 merchant support network and have guides for any questions that might come up along the way.
Finding Dropshipping Products FAQ
How do I get products for dropshipping?
Partner with a dedicated dropshipping supplier like Printify.
How do I find a good dropshipping niche?
Look for inspiration online, find an audience interested in a specific product category, do competitor research to view existing product supplies, and analyze search trends to see if a niche is profitable.
What are the best products to dropship in 2023?
The top products for dropshipping in 2023 are clothing and accessories, products for children, pet supplies, art supplies, home decor, beauty products, and products made through environmentally conscious manufacturing.
Where can I find dropshipping product ideas?
Use dropshipping product research tools like AliExpress Dropshipping Center and Niche Scraper, or conduct your own search through customer analysis and researching your competitors.
Make It Happen Today!
Written by
Janis Lazda
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