You’ve created an e-commerce store brimming with unique products, and have meticulously curated them using engaging product descriptions or even branding to capture the hearts and minds of your target audience. But you’re getting none to very little traffic.
Using an effective dropshipping strategy is how you transform random website visitors into loyal customers. However, there are different types of dropshipping strategies, and the most effective one depends on your budget, business size, and risk appetite.
Let’s Explore the Different Types of Dropshipping Strategies and When to Use Them⏬
What Are the 4 Major Types of Dropshipping Strategies
Let’s break down each dropshipping strategy to pick the best one for your dropshipping business:
1. Classical Approach
This is the oldest dropshipping strategy, it started around 2015 and was widely adopted up until 2019. What this approach entails is you create a generic dropshipping store with e-commerce platforms like Shopify, then promote your e-commerce products with paid ads, especially Facebook ads.
Also, instead of spending a lot of time researching specific products, you choose a niche and browse through products available in that niche on dropshipping supplier websites like Aliexpress and Alibaba. You then start running ads and testing out different products within that niche until you find a rainmaker product.
Pros
Simplicity- you don’t have to spend hours performing product research. You can simply pick any trending products in your niche on your supplier website.
Beginner-friendly- this is the simplest dropshipping strategy, you can learn this strategy within weeks and start applying it to grow your dropshipping business.
High Scalability- Once you start generating enough revenue, you easily scale up your dropshipping business by expanding to other niches and creating relevant ads for them.
Cons
Capital Intensive- ads are not cheap, you might end up spending a huge percentage of your profit on ads, especially if you are selling unique products.
Poor Branding- This approach isn’t great for you if you are looking to build a strong brand identity; you are testing random products till you find a winning product. When running a generic store people won’t know what to look for in your store, so you end up not being known for anything.
Prone to Product Quality Issues- Since you are experimenting with different products from different vendors, there are bound to be some products with low quality.
Customer Service Problems- Also, when your product quality is inconsistent, or vendors have a low order fulfillment rate, customers will be dissatisfied and rate you poorly.
Social Media Bans- another common side effect of the classical dropshipping strategy is how it makes your account look malicious. This is because you are running too many ads for different products.
Unless you are looking to lose money, this is not great dropshipping strategy. It’s captial intensive with little ROAS and could potentially damage your business reputation.
2. Free Organic Approach
This is the cheapest dropshipping strategy, rather than spending money on ads, you are focused on scaling your dropshipping business using organic content creation (videos, blogs, and even engagements) and SEO. For example, you can search through Quora or Reddit for questions related to dropshipping products, answer these questions, and direct them to your store.
You could also create viral TikTok reels with unique products most merchants aren’t selling yet. You even have to create the content from scratch, you can simply jump on trends by remixing reels of viral content.
Pros
Cost-effective- Using this method, you don’t have to spend money on ads, saving a lot of marketing costs, and increasing your profit margin.
Strong Brand Image- You are focusing on choosing unique products, so it helps position you as a great source to find products people can’t get from anywhere else.
Positive Impression- When creating content on platforms like Quora or Reddit, you are answering people’s questions and solving a problem. This information exchange creates a positive first impression for potential customers and motivates them to visit your dropshipping store.
Cons
Steep Learning Curve- this is not the easiest dropshipping strategy to learn. Creating viral content takes experience and remarkable creativity, you have to learn how to develop high-performing content for different platforms.
Slow Results- Organic content doesn’t bring sales overnight, it’s a long-term strategy. Your content may take up to 6 months to a year to start generating high traffic to your website. So, if you are looking for quick conversions, this is not the strategy for you.
Difficult to Scale and Lack of Predictability
Time-consuming- while you’re not paying for ads, you’re still investing a lot of time in SEO and social media content creation.
While this dropshipping strategy is relatively cheap, it is not a great option if you are looking to scale your dropshipping business quickly.
This method is great if you are just starting your dropshipping business and looking to save cost. It’s also great if you are trying to create a strong and positive brand image for your dropshipping business.
3. Trend Hijacking Approach
Rather than continuously running ads for low ROAS like the classical approach or spending long hours researching and developing viral content, the trend-hijacking strategy blends both dropshipping strategies.
The Trend Hijacking strategy looks for products other drop shippers are already selling and makes your dropshipping store the best option for your target market. This involves having a user-friendly website, a very branded design coupled with an irresistible offer, competitive pricing, and ranking your store as the 1st result for keyword searches related to those products.
According to Numero, On average, the number 1 result on SERP gets 31.7 % of traffic, while the second gets 24.71 %, and the traffic keeps going down with the search results. Using trend hijacking helps you get most of the traffic to your store and convert them to customers without spending so much money on ads competing with other merchants.
With an average conversation rate of 4.73%, the Trend Hijacking Strategy is unique in its approach because it targets mostly warm and hot audiences instead of using Interruptive marketing as most merchants do on Social Media Ad Platforms.
Pros
Minimizes Cost- with the trend hijacking strategy you are not running ads constantly, and you are also not competing with other merchants on social media. You are simply identifying high-traffic products and diverting the website traffic to your store.
Efficient- Unlike the free organic approach, you start seeing results with the trend-hijacking strategy almost immediately.
Beginner Friendly- The trend hijacking method is also pretty easy to learn, even if you have no experience with dropshipping. You are also not doing it alone, the trend-hijacking team will be with you, guiding you, every step of the way.
Cons
Limited to about $11k sales/day- The trend hijacking strategy has proven results of up to $11,000/day in sales. Although $11k/day is a lot, even for big e-commerce brands, if you are looking for a figure outside this bracket, you might want to combine it with a more aggressive dropshipping strategy.
It’s one of the most cost-effective dropshipping strategies.
It helps you achieve your sales targets, build your brand reputation, and grow your dropshipping company quickly. You don’t spend so much on ads or wait for a long period to see significant results.
4. Surf Scale Strategy
This involves finding a new product that other drop shippers haven’t started selling yet and selling it to as many people as possible. You are scaling up your dropshipping aggressively using discounts and ads across various channels to get as many people as possible to see your products and buy them.
Pro
Fast Results- this is a very aggressive sales approach, you are optimizing all sales channels and pushing out ads. As a result, people are most likely to buy from you because they see your product way more than other vendors.
Cons
Capital Intensive - constantly running ads across different platforms is not cheap, you will be spending a lot of money on ads.
Low-Profit Margin- with a huge ad budget, you will be spending a huge percentage of your profits on ads, slimming down your profits.
High Risk- a low-profit margin is an almost sure pathway to running into bankruptcy. When spending so much money on ads, you may not have enough to automate your dropshipping processes, which leads you to compromise on quality and end up earning poor reviews.
Content Fatigue- After a while, people get tired of constantly seeing ads about a product or products in the same niche and scroll past your ads.
The Bottom Line
You can take different strategies to scale up your dropshipping business, they all have their pros and cons. However, the most effective dropshipping strategy that allows you to generate significant sales while minimizing cost is the Trend Hijacking Strategy.
