Will online shopping be doomed? Just like there is a need for product variety in the market because of different consumer tastes and habits, we habit, we also believe the same applies to different types of markets. If the traditional market is getting saturated why not have another option?
Pros & Cons Of Dropshipping
Dropshipping can be regarded as a good start for managing a passive income, which is a low-risk and flexible business model, it requires less time to manage compared to owning a brick-and-mortar store which does save you a lot of money and stress. Another thing is, once the stores go well, you can make good money from the online business.
Pros
1. Start Easily
You don’t need to be a business guru or a successful merchant to get started. You don’t even need any business experience! If you are willing to take some time to learn the basics, you can get started quickly and get the rest as you go along. Less capital is required. All of this means that you can start your business anytime. You can start getting everything up and running within a matter of hours.
2. Flexible
That is one of the attractive benefits. You can get to be your own business and set your own rules. It’s by far one of the most flexible careers that anyone can pursue. You can run your dropshipping business anywhere with an internet connection. As long as you can communicate with suppliers and customers, you can run and manage your business.
3. Wide Selection
Since you don’t have to pre-purchase the items you sell, you can offer a variety of trending products or what dropshippers call "HOT products' ' to your potential customers. If suppliers stock an item, you can list it for sale on your online store at no additional cost.
4. Easy To Manage And Grow
Since it doesn’t require you to make any commitments, you can manage everything with little hassle. Once you’ve found suppliers for your dropshipping store, you’re mostly only responsible for your online storefront. As you grow up, your business model doesn’t have to change very much at all. On the contrary, you have to put more work into sales and marketing as you grow, and pay more attention to your customers and products.
Cons
There is an increment of micro-brands and the ease of setting up and maintaining e-commerce stores and today's market is filled with fierce competition and reduced customer loyalty. Customer behaviors show the demand and need for product variety in the market.
1. Low Profits Of Set Up
More importantly, you'll notice that profit is primarily dependent on traffic, so if you're building an eCommerce brand from scratch, it will take a long time to build your customer base.
Of course, since you don't have to manage or store inventory, the overhead costs are low, as is the return.
The money you invested has decreased, but you have decreased your investment. This means you have to do a lot of business to make ends meet, let alone turn a loss into a profit.
2. Competition Is High
There will always be overly optimistic entrepreneurs who only focus on the "low-overhead" part and ignore the clear evidence above.
Since the funds needed to start a direct selling business are very small, a lower barrier to entry means a lot of competition, and the most popular markets suffer more than other markets.
Basically, the bigger the company, the more it can reduce the markup to deliver the lowest price.
3. Search For Good Dropshipping Partners
In standard e-commerce, if customers complain about product quality, speed of execution, or return policy, they can solve the problem themselves.
In direct shipping, you are more or less at the mercy of the supplier, but you have not directly communicated with the customer.
The shipper is essentially trapped, hoping that the supplier will solve the problem while assuring the customer about things beyond their control.
In addition, as the delivery person goes back and forth between the customer and the supplier, there is also a delay in communication. If the response is slow, all communications will stop and troubleshooting will take longer.
4. Branding Isn’t An Easy Thing
Like a ghostwriter or a lyricist behind the scenes, the agency must understand that the credit for their work is given to others.
If a product you sell is great, your customers will primarily focus on that product's brand and completely forget the shopping experience. After all, this isn't the logo on the box. So you have to spend a lot of time promoting your brand and building a good brand reputation.