It can be difficult to work out how to grow your business when you are also trying to manage good customer service, savvy marketing, and sound finances. However, expanding your product range could help.

Adding different products can draw in more customers. And the more eyes on your store, the better it is for profits. Expanding your product range sounds like a lot of time and effort and usually it is. But not with dropshipping.

If you’ve been curious about different approaches to boost your online store, dropshipping is a genuinely low risk option that could help.

While many people run successful online stores that consist solely of dropshipped products, there’s no reason why you can’t combine selling dropshipped items along with your own products. In fact, there are several reasons this is an opportune tactic for online business owners wanting to grow their brand.

What is Dropshipping?

If you are already selling your own items in an online store, you will remember how long it took to develop your products and figure out how to produce it before you could start selling it. And then you had to work out packaging and shipping!

Dropshipping frees you from all these problems.

Dropshipping is a business model that involves three parties: you, the supplier, and the customer. First, you find a supplier’s product and place it in your online store. Then, once you make a sale, the supplier will ship it directly to the customer – all without you ever touching the product. 

How to Grow Your Business Using Dropshipping?

It might sound strange to hear someone else’s product could help build your brand. But it’s true. Up to 33 percent of internet retailers use dropshipping as their main method of order fulfillment, including huge companies like Zalora, Amazon, and Vettons.

Combining dropshipping with your own items can help you expand your store, work out what products to invest in, and even give you a competitive edge.

1. Test Out Potential Products with Little Investment

Rather than investing in your own product, you figure out how to grow your business by dropshipping a product of interest or similar and gauging its potential. After adding the item to your website, you can work on advertising it across different platforms as you would for anything else in your inventory. Then, use tracking and analytics to decide if it its suitable for your target market.

If the product is wildly popular, that is great! You are making money with the mark-up on the item you are dropshipping and you know that it is worth developing a similar product of your own. You could even bulk order or create an OEM arrangement from your current supplier with your branding. Then again, if you are happy with the product you are dropshipping, continue selling what you know already works.

On the other hand, if the product flops, you will know the idea was not viable. Then, you can simply delete the item from your store and your total loss from the whole experiment will be whatever you did not recover from your spending on ads. Much easier than creating your own or dealing with piles of leftover stock.
 

2. Sell Products That Complement Your Own

Do you have the perfect idea for a product that matches the one you already sell, but don’t have the time or expertise to create it? Dropshipping these complementary products could help increase brand awareness and drive future sales of your own items.

For example, say you sell handmade necklaces and earrings. You would love to be able to sell rings, but you can only make so much jewelry. Necklaces and earrings are taking up all your time. Besides, you are not really an expert at making rings anyway. By supplementing your jewelry business with dropshipping, you can find a complementary product and sell that in your store alongside your handmade items.

By doing this you are giving customers more options. Not to mention, offering bundle deals or upselling with the new item could be a good way to increase order value.

Plus, if the ring helps to draw new potential customers to your store, your brand is being exposed to an audience that otherwise would not have found it.

Dropshipping versatility is allows you to trial different complementary items as often as you like. Perhaps the ring was not the best match for your store but selling face mask chains is a better fit. Options such as is this help you grow your business in a cost effective and convenient manner. 

3. Test New Markets

Once you had some success with your products and store, but if you want to continue, working out how to grow your business through entering new markets becomes increasingly important.

This is especially key if you are in a niche market or find you have more and more competition coming your way. However, as lucrative as entering a new market could be, it is something many businesses shy away from due to the associated costs. This is not an issue with dropshipping because you never have to worry about shipping – your supplier takes care of it. And, your supplier could even be based closer to new markets you are targeting, like Indonesia or the Philippines.

Dropshipping is a great way to learn how to grow your business in new markets without having to spend a lot of money in the process. Being able to offer products via a dropshipping supplier gives you the freedom to experiment and see if you get any positive results.

You can test out multiple markets and see which best respond to your product. And, because dropshipping is so simple to get started with, you can invest more time into researching which approaches work best for each market and figuring out social media marketing for users in different locations.

If you find that a new market is responding to the dropshipped item, start thinking about the sales channels you could use to sell your own products in that market. Or, start dropshipping without worries if you are satisfied with the product and supplier you are currently working with.

4. Respond to Competitors Quickly

Keeping track of what your competitors are doing is a good move for any type of business. It helps inform you about new trends, stay up to date on different advertising methods, and keeps you motivated to always make your business better.

And naturally, it is important to be aware of your competitors so if they make a move you can quickly respond.

If you want to know how to grow your business, keeping an eye on your closest competition is one of the best ways to learn. Say a competitor suddenly began selling a new product and customers loved it – it would be in your best interest to try and grab a slice of the action, right? Of course! However, this requires quick movement to start selling the product before the hype dies down.

The most important steps are finding high potential products and reliable suppliers who can keep up with demand. But when you are already busy running a business this can be challenging. 

To create a stable online business, sometimes you have got to think outside the box. 

If you have been wondering how to grow your business but only know about time-consuming or expensive ways, dropshipping offers an alternative.

Whether you are curious to move into new markets, thinking about different products, need to find ways to respond to competitors, or just want to expand your catalogue, dropshipping can help. Start combining your online business with dropshipping today.