Friday, August 1, 2008

Dropshipping ~ Good Or Bad?

Dropship is a fabulous way to increase sales ... someone else is doing your selling for you! BUT -- It is NOT for everyone. And my first words of advice which I hope you will follow are ... "DO NOT OFFER EXCLUSIVE MARKETING RIGHTS!". Yes, I'm yelling that. It ties up your inventory with NO guarantee that they will sell all your items.

Think carefully and don't get yourself locked into a timeframe deal like 6 months or some such thing. You are in charge. You determine the parameters of the dropship agreement. NEVER sign one of those boiler-plate agreement forms you can pick up at the local copy store. They're laden with lots of language which may not be relevant to your city/state/country and could create problems.

Just be sure your contract / agreement is clearly spelled out for the shipping fees for US, Canada and overseas and that it includes delivery confirmation or insurance if you usually require those.

Your dropship agent is responsible for getting the right mailing address to you. Be sure THAT is in there somewhere! Only once have I been bitten by that and I had to send another items out -- thankfully it was a medium sized basket and I had another in stock. Now I make sure THEY are responsible to either refund the customer or re-pay me if they screw up.

Most dropship agents don't want you to put any info in or on the package so their customers can bypass them and order directly from you. If that's the case, then they need to supply you with business cards to tape to the return address place on the package and put inside as well. Some will email you an invoice to put inside the package. I make my tags for dropshipping very plain so all it has is fiber content, etc., and my copyright symbol for instance: (c) 1990 MKD. I use the initials since I've also got that registered with the state of NV as mine in my DBA.

Like I said earlier, it's not for everyone. You are the only one who can make that final decision. It can be lucrative IF the marketer knows their stuff and advertises/promotes vigorously. Think carefully, get opinions from your friends, relatives, online friends you can TRUST. Then sleep on it for a day or two before making that final decision.

~ Marge ~

2 comments:

Debbie's Fun Bagz said...

You are RIGHT ! I have total control over my dropshipping. If someone wants me to dropship for them, they have to email all the necessary information. They are totally responsible for loss or damage of the shipment. They have to accept all risks. But I have been fortunate, I have not had any problems. I just started wholesale on my website, and some of that is dropshipped. I don't consider the purchaser as competition. It's an order I would otherwise not had if they hadn't ordered. So they are just helping me reach more customers, indirecly. It means more business for me. You have great advice.

~Marge~ said...

Thanks, Debbie!