Online sales are growing rapidly as more and more people hop on the internet every day, in search of better prices and wider product range.
Dropshipping is trending among various digital marketers, who connect with thousands of suppliers online around the world, to buy products at a lower price, and make profit through their own ecommerce stores.
What Is Dropshipping?
Dropshipping is a form of e-commerce business model where a store neither owns a product nor maintains an inventory.
Instead, it purchases the goods from a third party, generally a manufacturer and gets it shipped directly to the customer only when it receives an order.
Hence, the business man does not really see or handle the product.
If you are wondering what are the advantages of dropshipping business model as compared to a traditional business structure or an e-commerce site catering to their own product, here are a few:
- Less capital required – This is the biggest advantage of dropshipping as you can launch an ecommerce store without investing in inventory. Merchant only needs to find customers and know the manufacturers.
- That too, you purchase a product only after the sale is made. Overhead expenses are relatively low as compared to traditional style of business.
- Quick start – You can get the business can be up and running in no time.
- Focussed Sale -Merchant can focus on more vital activities that directly affect growing the business like brand building, marketing and building relationships with customers.
- Logistics management not required – Using someone else’s product, frees you from the need to manage supply management. Low risk involved.
- No constraint of location.
Interesting Read: Best Wholesale Dropshipping Companies
Who Is It best Suited For?
Dropshipping is designed for those individuals who wish to start an online business, but do not have a lot of cash or big warehouse or stable location to run a business.
With the e-commerce giants Amazon, eBay, Shopify, AliExpress and other online retail platforms around, today anyone can start an online shop.
Oberlo and Alidropship are two most popular business models designed for dropshipping. Read along to know the features, benefits and the differences of these two products.
Key Features and Benefits of Oberlo and Alidropship
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Oberlo
Oberlo is an application which can be integrated to Shopify. The benefit of this application is that products can be added to your website automatically.
Oberlo takes the product description, details, images and variations from the product you select and adds them to your ecommerce website.
Products are imported and sold from AliExpress or Oberlo Supply Marketplace. The logo next to the product indicates the name of supplier.
The Oberlo team has hand-picked suppliers for the Oberlo supply marketplace to ensure that the best manufacturers and products are available. You can select and even switch between the suppliers that suits you more.
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AliDropship
AliDropship is a Wordress plugin that converts the WordPress website into a dropship store using AliExpress. You can browse through the products listed on AliExpress and import products directly into your store.
AliDropship connects you with suppliers that are on AliExpress. There are literally tons of suppliers on AliExpress and you can also see the ratings of the suppliers.
The process include auto updation of product information, auto updation of fulfilled orders, and also automated tracking of goods.
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Key Differences
Just like the two sides of coin, Oberlo and Alidropship have their own set of pros and cons. While both of these tools accomplish the same task, they have some differences as listed below:
1. Oberlo is more convenient to set up with Shopify. AliDropship set up takes a little longer as it is more customizable.
2. Shopify costs a minimum of $29 per month while if you use WordPress, it is free to use. You only pay once to buy AliDropship plugin. Regular monthly expense is $5 per month for hosting and domain.
3. You can just have a store with Shopify but there are lot more options with WordPress to retain and gain more customers.
4. In terms of process, Shopify is better than WordPress as you can get started with Dropshipping Business in just a Few Clicks.
5. Shopify offers better support system and therefore the time and efforts taken in handling multiple orders is lesser.
6. Shopify offers more design options whereas Alidropship is constantly adding new add-ons for free or for a one time fee.
7. AliDropship plugin allows you to have complete ownership of store. This becomes crucial if you wish to move your store to a different web host or even if you wish to sell it.
Interesting Comparison: Ezusy Vs Alidropship
Cons
With dropshipping, there is less control over products in terms of quality and delivery, as there is more dependency on suppliers.
Sometimes you can’t gauge the product right, just by looking at its picture. So connecting to a reliable source is a must.
Our Pick
We would highly recommend Oberlo dropshipping as the implementation takes just a few minutes, is easy to find quality suppliers at reasonable product price and you get a better support system.
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Conclusion – Oberlo Vs Alidropship
Dropshipping is an easy, quick and low-cost method for having your own online business. With the availability of software and tools, more people are going this way.
If you do not have any issues sourcing products from AliExpress, both Oberlo or Alidropship will work for you.
If you are on a budget, you may prefer the savings of AliDropship (no monthly fees) over Oberlo with a regular monthly payment. You may use the money saved for your marketing and promotion.
If you are new to this business, and want to start on a smaller scale, Oberlo is a safer choice. But if you know the process and wish to grow bigger in no time, you may want to go for Alidropship.
Regardless of which option you choose, you will be in safe hands. Both of them offer high quality products with excellent customer reviews.
So first thing, list down your requirements and then an informed decision accordingly.