How to do branded dropshipping: The Ultimate FAQ Guide
Today, more and more online stores have decided to do branded dropshipping instead of selling generic products. Brand promotion is one of the best ways to stand out from competitors and gain customers’ attention!
What is Branded Dropshipping?
branded dropshipping marketing refers to the process of creating a brand from your online store and selling products with your brand. Usually, you have to find a supplier that sells general products, ask them to add your brand to it, and sell it as your brand. When a branded dropshipping focuses on a niche market, it usually works better, rather than offering many inappropriate products.
How Does Branded Dropshipping work?
With regular dropshipping, you usually set up a Shopify store and start testing different general products to see which one works best.
Branded dropshipping is very similar to your regular dropshipping model. In a sense, you usually don’t have any upfront costs, warehousing, risks, etc.
The only difference is that you must choose a niche market and start selling products with your logo in that niche market. For example, branded online stores will not sell cups, soaps, and T-shirts without labels in one store. Instead, branded stores in the culinary niche will sell cooking gloves, aprons, and kitchen towels with their interesting branding and packaging.
Is branded dropshipping better than standard dropshipping?
Nowadays, with so many dropship stores selling the same types of products and using the same suppliers, it is important to have a brand identity.
Owning a mature brand can cultivate customer loyalty, trust, and a sense of belonging. Therefore, if we are talking about expanding the business scale in the long run, then branded drop shipping is the way to go!
Who is the best branded dropshipping supplier?
You can get in touch with two types of dropshipping suppliers: private label suppliers and white label suppliers.
Private label dropshipping can bring you a better profit margin, but it also brings some investment. This is because every manufacturer who agrees to produce goods specifically for you will set a minimum order quantity (MOQ). Therefore, you do not have to ship the goods directly from the supplier to each customer but are obliged to make bulk orders.
On the other hand, white-label manufacturers produce the same products for every buyer. However, they will agree to use your labels and packaging to mark their products and ship them to your customers at a certain price. There are many ways to find suppliers of white label and branded products, from a simple Google search to websites such as Alibaba, 1688.com, and Taobao.
What are the advantages and disadvantages of branded dropshipping?
Although branded dropshipping may be more profitable if done well, it does have its advantages and disadvantages:
Advantages of branded dropshipping
• In the long run, building a brand is better;
• The brand enjoys more trust and loyalty;
• When it is a brand, you can better expand your business;
• Increase the profit margin of your products;
• More suitable for experienced shippers who are interested in faster growth;
Disadvantages of brand direct sales
• A higher MOQ is set in order place;
• May require some upfront investment;
• There are fewer opportunities to switch between products and test different products;
• More work to build the brand;
• Need for daily content/marketing work;
What is the best niche/product for branded dropshipping?
The success of the product in the niche market you choose depends on price profit margin, packaging difficulty, size, demand, competition, brand, etc.
Taking all these factors into consideration, some of the best niche markets for branded direct selling products are as follows:
• Health and Beauty
• Jewelry
• Mobile phone accessories
•clothing
•shoe
• Pet care
• Gym and exercise
How to purchase branded dropshipping products?
You can purchase branded dropshipping products in several different ways:
• Make your DIY products and add your brand
To produce products on your own, you need to consider many factors, such as production time, location, cost, MOQ, etc.
• Buy general products and build your brand
Another option is to buy the general products(usually in bulk) from suppliers, add your brand to them, and then resell them as branded products. This is only possible if you are in the same country as the supplier. Otherwise, it will be huge trouble.
• Use private label suppliers
Private labeling is a process in which you, as the shipper, sign an exclusive contract with a manufacturer that produces private label products for you. However, please expect that the private label supplier has set a minimum order quantity.
• Use a full-service dropshipping agent to carry out branding and packaging for you
Many dropshipping services, such as SupplyiaDropshipping, will provide free dropshipping product sourcing services. This is essentially buying someone else’s product and putting your brand on it. This means that they will not only purchase, but also mark the products you sell with your logo, brand, and packaging. Then, they will ship your branded products to each customer separately.
How to build a branded dropshipping?
Establishing a branded dropshipping on Shopify will require you to perform the following steps:
Decide which niche/product to sell
When branding your Shopify store, the first thing you need to do is choose the right and profitable niche market. Countless general Shopify stores sell some products, so you need to choose a specific niche.
You must check the competition in your niche market, market demand, price profit margins, and product availability and suppliers.
Think of a suitable brand name
Therefore, now that you have chosen the niche market or the type of product you want to sell, it is time to consider a brand name that suits your business.
For example, if you are selling girly cosmetics, beauty, and cosmetics, your brand name should appeal to your audience. For example, having a brand name like “Lux Cosmetics” would be more appropriate than “Mark’s Creams”.
Design logo
Now that you have a brand name, it is time to consider a suitable logo. When people find your business, your logo will be the first thing they see, so make sure it is meaningful and memorable.
If you can create your logo, it will be perfect! If not, many freelance designers on Upwork or Fiverr can do this for you at a fair and affordable price.
Make sure your brand identity is clear
After deciding on the niche market, brand name, and logo, it’s time to put the entire brand identity together. The brand identity is the entire emotional response of potential customers, the entire customer experience. What does your business represent? Think in this direction.
No matter which social media channel or platform you use to promote your online store, your brand identity should be clear and unified across all channels.
Choose your typography and colors
The fonts and colors you use on the online store and all other social accounts should also be preset and consistent.
It is best to choose one or two fonts that can portray your brand and stick to it. Also, don’t just guess the colors you like. Instead, write down the exact code of the primary color and any supported colors. This will allow you to use the same colors in all designs or social media visuals in the future.
Sign up for a Shopify account
Finally, when you have to sign up for Shopify and open your store, we have come to this point. Here, please make sure you are using your brand name, logo, and keep the same brand identity as all other channels.
Although selling on Shopify is the best option for most shippers, you can also test other e-commerce solutions, such as Amazon FBA or WooCommerce.
Decide how to purchase products
When it comes to branded dropshipping, you need to find a way to source your products and packaging. You can do this by manufacturing your products, finding suppliers (manufacturers or wholesalers) who agree to produce general products and labeling them with your name, or by using a dropshipping agent who will do this for you.
Start marketing and promotion
Finally, the last but most important step is marketing. At this point, you will begin to realize why having an established brand voice is so important. Social media marketing (organic and paid), influencer outreach, content marketing, etc. are all good ways to start promoting.
Paid marketing
If you have some extra budget, paid marketing is one of the fastest ways to reach target customers and start selling.
For example, if you have a Facebook or Instagram page, you can target audiences that you think are most interested in your product.
You can select all content, age, gender, interests, geographic location, etc.
Organic marketing
Although it takes longer, organic promotion usually creates more loyalty and trust in the brand. You can do this on all social media platforms by regularly posting content that your audience likes.
To attract users naturally, you can try to use hashtags, invite your friends to like your page/store, ask people to share your posts, comment on forums and different websites as visitors, create Facebook groups, etc.
Having a well-designed SEO product description can also organically bring a lot of traffic to your store. If your storefront and product description follow useful SEO guidelines, you can rank higher on search engines such as Google and enjoy free traffic!
Influencer outreach
Another very successful way to reach your target audience is to conduct an Instagram search and list all the influencers that might be suitable for your product. Then, contact these influential people and politely ask them to cooperate. Of course, this means you have to give something back (usually money or provide them with free product samples).
In return, they will use your product to post visual effects (photos or videos) to gain trust, exposure, and followers.
Email marketing
Email marketing is not dead! Especially once you have an email list of existing customers and even website visitors.
You have attracted the attention of these people once, so they are more likely to open your email to see what else you offer.
Up-selling and cross-selling
Remember the customer email list we talked about? Well, the perfect way to use it is to provide your existing customers with upgraded versions of the products they purchased, or surprisingly supplement the items they originally purchased!
Now it’s feedback time! What do you think of branded dropshipping? What would you change? Let me know in the comments below.
