The Dropship Unlocked Podcast

How To Lose Money Dropshipping on Shopify (Episode 89)

• Lewis Smith & James Eardley • Season 1 • Episode 89

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📞 Ready to Take the Next Step? https://dropshipunlocked.com/training-watch-apply?el=podcast-89-how-to-lose-money-dropshipping

🗣Hosts Lewis Smith and James Eardley discuss the common pitfalls that cause many to fail in the dropshipping business, and how to avoid these costly mistakes. 

Understanding these errors can be a game-changer for those looking to succeed in ecommerce.

👉 Prefer to watch this on Youtube? Check it out here  ➡️ https://youtu.be/SkG7g24c4C8

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Topics Discussed:

★ Traditional Dropshipping Model Pitfalls: Long shipping times leading to frustrated customers and high refund rates. Quality control issues resulting in negative reviews and returns.

★ Common Mistakes: Focusing on cheap products without considering long-term customer experience.

Poor customer communication and long wait times eroding trust. Lack of product differentiation makes it hard to stand out in the market.

★ Red Flags to Rethink Your Approach, for example low profit margins despite significant sales.

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Links and Resources Mentioned:

Pick up a copy of Lewis’ book: https://htabook.com 

Get Shopify for £1 a month for 3 months: https://www.dropshipunlocked.com/shopify 

Get a free trial with a professional phone line: https://www.dropshipunlocked.com/circle 

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Key Takeaways:

★ Quality Over Quantity: Focus on high-quality, high-ticket items for better margins and customer satisfaction.

★ Strong Supplier Relationships: Reliable suppliers ensure consistent product quality and delivery.

★ Exceptional Customer Service: Outstanding service and communication build trust and encourage repeat business.

★ Continuous Improvement: Regularly update your product offerings and website based on customer feedback to stay relevant and attract more customers.

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FOLLOW:

Thank you for listening to the Dropship Unlocked Podcast! Don't forget to subscribe and leave a review on your favourite podcast platform.

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★★★Dropship Unlocked - Lewis Smith★★★

🌏Watch Our Free Training ➽ https://www.dropshipunlocked.com/training?el=podcast-89-how-to-lose-money-dropshipping


That's a sure fire way to kind of run your business into the ground. Another law of the universe is if you don't look after your customers, they're not going to be happy with you and won't buy again. But sometimes people forget and think they can pull the wool over their eyes. It's like this kind of get rich quick money making flash in the pan model that they can push and show to people that maybe aren't familiar with, like the reality of that business once it's up and running and all the floors. So for somebody that is keen, Lewis to get started with a different business model, and they actually want to make money drop shipping rather than lose money drop shipping, where would you suggest that they start? If you see these red flags, probably you need to pause and just re evaluate the model or the path. Welcome to the dropship unlocked Podcast. I'm Louis Smith, the founder of dropship unlocked, and with me is our Client Success Coach James earthley. Now, when we're not recording the podcast episodes, we're running our own e commerce businesses and helping aspiring entrepreneurs launch their own high ticket drop shipping businesses keen to build your own six or even seven figure business, my book, the home turf advantage is your blueprint for launching a profitable online store. Grab your copy at HTA books.com today, and let's get you started now. Sit back, relax, and let's unlock your potential with the drop ship unlocked podcast today, we're going to be taking a bit of a different line of discussion for today's episode. It's time that we talked about how to lose money drop shipping on Shopify. Yes, you heard me right. We want to talk about how to actually lose money drop shipping on Shopify, because if you know how to lose money, then you can also learn how to make money on Shopify as well. We want to talk about some of the common pitfalls, why so many people get it wrong and lose money drop shipping and how we can avoid these mistakes from the start. So Lewis, are you ready to dive into this topic? Yeah, let's do it. James, this is going to be an eye opener for many, and I think understanding these pitfalls will save our listeners, hopefully a lot of time, money and frustration as well. Exactly now, I have experienced both losing money drop shipping, not afraid to admit it, and also making money drop shipping. So I can tell you both, and I know you have a similar experiences, Louis, we can tell you the differences, crucially, between how to lose money and how to make money. I think because if you know how to lose it, then you also know how to make money drop shipping as well. So I think let's talk about the model that is key to whether you're going to be losing or making money, and the traditional drop shipping that people first think of is often a reason why I think people, some people, can make it more difficult for themselves than others. So Lewis, what? Why do you think that the approach towards the traditional drop shipping often leads to people losing money? Yeah, if you're looking for a guaranteed way to lose money drop shipping, then I'd say go straight to a platform like AliExpress and source your products from there. Make sure that you're giving your customers really long delivery times. Make sure they're getting super frustrated, and you're getting a very high refund rate because the products that arrive at poor quality, and that's a sure fire way to kind of run your business into the ground and lose money. So if that's what you're looking to do, hopefully this podcast episode has helped you. And yeah, we can probably leave it there, I think. But no, in all seriousness, we'll talk. We'll dive into kind of some more details around, like how a lot of people fall into those initial traps and pitfalls that come with the traditional model. And we call it the traditional model. It's not like it's been around for hundreds of years, but it's, it's the more prevalent model, I guess we could call it, that the one that everybody talks about, and that's because there's a really low barrier to entry, and it's just you, you throw a few products together from Aliexpress or Teemu or oberlo or wherever, without really doing any due diligence on the quality of the products, whether the suppliers are legitimate, And you kind of put them on a site, run some ads to them, and then just hope for the best. And the long delivery times are, you know, imagine you order a pizza and it takes three days to be delivered. It's going to be cold, it's not going to be taste great, like you're going to be frustrated. And so it's kind of the same customers nowadays with Amazon, expect products to be delivered like the same day often or the next day. And so if we can, if we're making them wait three weeks for delivery for products from abroad, they can be very frustrating. The other thing is, when the products actually do arrive, there's such an inconsistency in the quality of the products from suppliers oversea, because overseas, because you're not really looking at, you're not getting any contact with the supplier, you know, you're not really, I mean, yeah, you can order a sample product, but who's to say that the sample they send you is going to be the same as the ones that they then send your customers when you're ordering, you know, at a much higher volume once your ads are up and running. So what that means is, if the you. Quality of the product is poor, you'll start getting negative reviews, and you'll start getting customers requests to return products. Now it's incredibly difficult to return a product to China, especially if it's like a low ticket, 1015, 20 pound, $20 product, and so because of the low barriers to entry that everyone talks about this amazing model of drop shipping and how it's so easy to do, it means that you get really high competition. So you get people driving the prices and the margins down, because there's always someone else who's willing to sell the widget cheaper than you are and make pennies of profit on every sale. And you know, it's like if everybody's selling the same stuff and they're running the same kind of ads to the same type of store and giving the same poor quality products, eventually the whole market suffers the effect of that. So yeah, if you're just using that strategy, then you might see some initial results in sales. And that's why it's kind of more dangerous, because it gives people a taste of success, and it shows, I mean, you can make sales with this and revenue, but then it starts to come crashing down once you realize that it's not a real business, and you open up your laptop every morning and see the inbox full of complaints from customers, that's not the kind of business I would want to run. So if you haven't yet gone down that path, he'd our warning in this episode. Exactly. This is a warning, and it's telling you how you can lose money if you do that. I just remember you brought back those memories for me. Then Lewis, when you talked about dreading opening the laptop for the customers emails in the inbox because I went down this route of drop shipping, which is the one that's kind of presented to you first, when you first start to look for drop shipping online, and you think, okay, it seems simple enough. Just partner with their supplier through AliExpress and start selling products. But what you don't get told is that if the products are poor quality and if there's long delivery time and there's no real returns process in place, then you're going to be the one dealing with the headaches from the customers that have had poor experiences. So I had to learn that firsthand, and what that boils down to as a business owner is, you know, a few weeks of running ads, a few sales coming in, and then down the line, it's a it's an email inbox full of issues to deal with, essentially, and not much profit to show for it in the end anyway. And once you've done the returns and you've worked out the ad cost that you've spent, you end up losing money. And this is certainly what what I did, but it is still the traditional drop shipping model, and I think it's still the one that comes to people's minds when they first consider the business model. When I met somebody who came over to the UK from LA this week, and he asked me what I do, and I said, I run e commerce businesses, and I use the drop shipping fulfillment model. And his first question, Lewis, and it's probably the same when you tell people as well is, Oh, right. So you use AliExpress, and you do drop shipping like that. And I think people in the US, they're more familiar with it, and they understand that's that's what drop shipping is to them. But I had to explain, no, it's a completely different model. But still, it just shows that that's like the traditional model that people are expecting you to do when you go into drop shipping. Why do you think that that so many people, Louis, assume that is the traditional way and go into drop shipping that way from the start, because it takes some some real work to build a real business. And a lot of people that just want clicks and views on YouTube or tick tock or Instagram, and they're just making content to try and push people into a model that has a nice, low barrier to entry, but is fundamentally flawed. Of course, if that's the only thing they've done, then that's the only thing that they can talk about. So that's why their content is so prevalent. It's like this kind of get rich quick money making flash in the pan model that they can push and show to people that maybe aren't familiar with, like the reality of that business once it's up and running and all the floors, you know, if you're a drop shipper focused on just selling the cheapest products that you can, and often they'll get those from China. So sites like AliExpress, if you haven't already seen it, would be a place where people would go to for that. Hence why your friend from LA probably thought that initially, because that's the popular model that everyone talks about. But you forget by doing that you're not even considering the long term customer experience. So you're like building your house on sand instead of on a solid foundation. Because yes, you can build the thing, but it's definitely going to come slipping down the hill once customers realize that the products are awful quality will take ages to arrive, and the thing with low ticket in E commerce is that you're often not making your profit on sale. Number one, your business is contingent on repeat sales. Your lifetime value is the thing that will make you money in low ticket. Typically, you're not. You know otherwise, you need significant volume at a good margin to make it work. So if your model relies on repeat business, and you're making the first customer experience an awful one. You can see why there's a disconnect here, when people realize, Oh, why aren't customers coming back or ordering more, or why? Why are they not? Oh, because they didn't. They weren't impressed with the first experience. So it's pretty obvious when you break it down. The other thing is poor communication. But. So a lot of these sites you'll see, and I've fallen into this strap as well. You order something that looks great on an Instagram ad or a Facebook ad, but they're very careful to not tell you how long it's going to take to be delivered. They just don't really put it on the website. So when you do order it, and I've thought, Where is that thing that I ordered like and you email them and they say, sorry, it can take four to six weeks to be delivered or something ridiculous, and you realize, ah, it was being drop shipped from China. And then that erodes your trust in the brand, and it makes you not want to use that brand again. And so it's frustrating. You're also, if you're selling those cheap products we talked about before, the competition, you're competing with all of the other drop shippers out there who also want a no or very low barrier to entry model, to just pick cheap products with no supplier relationship other than a Aliexpress site that they found, and then to just load them onto the same store. So you end up with all these kind of carbon copy burner stores on Shopify. And they call them burner stores because they're like, throw away stores, aren't they? Once you've made your sales, you disappear and shut the thing down and and it's just, I don't know, it's just a bit kind of slimy as a model. It's like, you know, you're not giving the customers a great experience, and therefore, you know that you're probably going to have to shut the thing down. And I just, it's just stressful. It's, you know, it doesn't feel sustainable. It's not really good for anyone. You're not going to make much money doing it. The customers are going to be dissatisfied. You're going to have to shut the thing down. There are much better ways to do this, and so I think if you're going to rethink those approaches, that's perhaps what we can talk about in today's episode. Absolutely. If that sounds familiar, if that's a business model that you've been drawn into, you know, I'm not surprised, actually, because that's exactly what I first came across when I wanted to start drop shipping, I agree Lewis that I think it's probably just because it's the model that's push much wider, because there's a much lower barrier to entry than the type of drop shipping that we do, that we see actually works and but I think sometimes when people go into drop shipping, they think that it exists outside the laws of the the other other things in the world, the laws of the universe. I think there's a bit of a law that that states that the higher the barrier to entry, the higher the chances of success. And when there's a very low barrier to entry, like with the traditional drop shipping model, I think that also equates to a lower chance of success, because there'll be more people naturally doing it. But some people think, or they forget, that that's like a bit of a law that I've noticed, and they think that it's different when it applies to drop shipping. Another law of the universe is if you don't look after your customers, they're not going to be happy with you and won't buy again. But sometimes people forget and think they can pull the wool over their eyes with a drop shipping store. But again, not the case like the reason that my stores have been successful is because I prioritize and looked after customers with great quality products. The reason why dropship unlocked Lewis, and why we've got so many members succeeding is because we care about the members success. We can't move away from that law and decide to sell something that wasn't going to work, because ultimately you get found out. So I think people need to reconnect with that. And if you want to lose money, as we're suggesting with this, listen to this podcast, go and do something that has a low barrier to entry. Don't look after your customers, and it's a sure fire way, I believe, to lose money, drop shipping. Okay, so somebody has noticed these signs, and perhaps they are already losing money drop shipping. What do you think they should do to stop and rethink and move in a different direction? Yeah, well, there are probably just some red flags to look out for that will tell you that the direction you're moving in might be problematic down the line. So if you see these red flags, probably need to pause and just re evaluate the model or the path that you're going down, because it's not too late to change. So the first would be consistently high refund requests. If you're getting lots and lots of refund requests, it's usually indicative of a customer dissatisfaction somewhere along the journey, whether that's in the long delivery times, if it's in the product quality, when the products actually do arrive, it's like if you were running a restaurant and like one in every three people that ordered a meal was just sending it back to the kitchen and saying, No, I'm not, I'm not having that. It's going back. The solution to making that restaurant better is not just to make more meals and to just churn through more customers and say, Okay, well, if we make three times the meals will will be okay. Obviously you have to fix the problem. Was as to, why is the food being said back. So that's the first thing poor product quality, which is a symptom of an earlier problem, which is using low quality suppliers and things like that. The second would be negative reviews and low ratings. So again, that's due to poor product quality or service not meeting expectations. A review could be based on the fact that it's taken three weeks for the item to get there and missed the important date that they ordered it for, or whatever the product you're selling is imagine a hotel that has bad reviews. You go on TripAdvisor and you look at the reviews and you see that it's like one out of five stars. You're not going to book that hotel. So customers are the same with your E commerce, or if they see. The reviews are awful. They won't choose to buy from you in the first place. And then the other thing is, if your profits are really slim despite significant sales, so if you're making sales but you're just not making enough profit, it's likely that the reason for that is because the acquisition cost to acquire the sales through advertising channels is eating up all of your profit margin, especially when you add in things like import taxes on these products, and you start factoring in like current currency exchange rates, because you're having to pay for the items in dollars, and then you're charging your customers in pounds. But then you've got to, you know, deduct the VAT, and then you've got to look at the import taxes and all of these extra costs. And occasionally you'll get returns the customer's request that obviously can't go back to China, and therefore you have to just accept those returns and refund customers. Well, every time you do that, you're losing not only the retail cost of the product, but also the trade price you paid for it as well. So it's kind of a double hit. And so at times, running a business like that can feel like you're on a treadmill, but you're just not getting anywhere. You're running and you're running and you're running and you're like, Okay, maybe the solutions to run faster, but you don't get anywhere. So it's really frustrating. And so those are some of the red flags to look for with the current business model. If you're going down that path, maybe it's time to just re evaluate. Yeah, you've got to listen to your customers. I remember when I was trying this traditional drop shipping model, I was getting those signs, so I was getting poor reviews from customers, and I was also seeing the feedback from Facebook ads that I was running, people could see straight through the poor quality products that I was trying to sell. So, for example, elasticated shoelaces that I was trying to sell, people saw straight through it. I was getting like, hate on my Facebook ads, because they could see that they were cheap and poor quality and that I was just trying to do a markup from from AliExpress, was the model that I was employing. But I should have ignored that. I should have listened to that and realized that what I was trying to sell, ultimately, there either wasn't a market there for it, or people could see straight through the type of model that I was trying to run, also the returns. I could see I was having returns. I had to return, or receive a return, of a customer's product that was sent over to Canada from China, and then that product was then returned from Canada to me in the UK, which this, yeah, I'm not very good for the global emissions, so don't come down on me on that. But I mean, aside from that, the actual packaging as well was horrendous. Absolutely sank, and it was just an awful experience. I realized that what I was trying to do, really, there was all these signs coming together to make me realize that there's no money in this, and I needed to rethink that model. So there are obviously alternative models, and you need to heed these warnings. What do you think is an alternative and you know, and why is it more effective than what we've talked about already? Well, the model that I use and now teach inside dropship unlocked is the home turf advantage model. And so the reasons why this model solves a lot of the issues that we've talked about is because it was designed exactly for that reason. It was like a an antidote to the problems that we were seeing emerge with the traditional, more prevalent, more problematic model of drop shipping. So firstly, partnering with domestic suppliers. So for us, if we're running businesses in the UK, that's UK, suppliers who are in the UK, distributors of the products who are here have the product already within the borders of the UK. That ensures much faster delivery. It ensures better quality control, because the supplier will have some element of quality control where they've already checked the products are okay before they're sent out. That's important to consider as well, because it doesn't mean that the products were manufactured in the UK. They could have been manufactured abroad, but if someone else has dealt with the importing of the product, paid all the relevant duties, checked the product quality and has them ready with a good courier partner to just send out the very next day within the UK, which is always possible. You can pretty much do next day delivery anywhere in the UK, from the UK, then it's just a much easier model and a much lower friction model for customers, because they're not second guessing their purchase. They're not waiting for weeks for delivery and then thinking, Maybe I shouldn't have bought it, and you get that buyer's remorse. The other thing is, we talked about the low value product and how it's quite difficult to make profit on sale number one, and so you're relying on future business. Well, with this model, the home turf advantage model, we focus on higher value product that have much, much higher profit amounts. So the margin percentage usually is about 30% we're looking for. So if you sell a premium 2000 pound sofa, like a really nice, luxury three piece corner sofa unit, that might be 2000 pounds, that might net you 600 pounds in profit once you've paid the supplier the 1400 pounds for it that they charge at trade price, because you have a trade account with that supplier. And by the way, consumers, other customers, can't go to that supplier and buy the product for trade price because they're not a retailer. So you're not going to have that issue that you talked about, where people. Bit of saying, hey, won't you just buy it from Aliexpress or buy it from the supply? If they tried to do that, the supply would say, Sorry, we don't sell to the public. We only sell through retailers, ie, through stores like ours. So if you can make 600 pounds profit on your first sale, firstly, it takes the burden and the pressure off you having to make ads work so well, because you could spend 50, 100 200 pounds on ads if you wanted to to acquire that sale and still be really profitable. But it also means you don't need to wait until sale number two or sale number three to make your profit. So it may it simplifies the whole e commerce model dramatically, because you can just make your your profit on sale number one, now they might come back later and buy a chair or a blanket or something else from you that they also need down there in their home down the line, once you're able to bring market to them through email or through ads, but you've already paid the money to acquire that customer and made a profit on the front end, which is really important. The other thing is, if you want to build a strong brand, building a retail store like this really sets you apart, because the customer reviews are good, because you can offer that really premium, like concierge level service to customers. Because how many 2000 pound sofas are you going to be selling in the day? Maybe one, maybe two. But that's okay. You make 600 or 1200 pounds in profit. You only need two sales in the day. So you can really look after those two customers. And I say you your virtual assistant, eventually can look after those customers once you're in a position to hire one of those and so it's once you're known as the best in the business, and you niche right down to a specific subset of customers, no demographic that you serve. You build a brand reputation, you build that brand loyalty, and you start to actually build asset value in a business that you could one day sell and remove yourself from and either just outsource completely, or decide to exit the business and sell it. So yeah, those are some reasons why the home turf advantage model was designed to work and specifically solve the problems that we talked about in the earlier part of this conversation. That's it, and that's the reason why we spoke about how to lose money. Because if you know how to lose money, you can flip all those points on the head and work out how to make money. So if you know, for example, that working with overseas suppliers with long delivery times is a sure fire way to lose money. Then think about working with local suppliers with fast delivery times, and they care about their product quality. Also think about, if you want to lose money, you go into real low ticket with low profit per order, where you need to sell over and over again in order to make profit. Or think about the alternative to that. As you say, Lewis is high ticket, and it's making upwards of 300 pounds profit on the first sale. And that way you're not so dependent. You haven't got to be such a wizard with retargeting and lifetime value. You can actually have a much wider margin for error when you run ads, and you can make money quickly, which is important when we first get a business off the ground, unless you've got tons of capital behind you, so you can be unprofitable to start with. So that's the opposition we want to be in. So yeah, you just need to flip these things on their head and realize that that's what is going to make you successful in the long run. And for example, with my own businesses, the way that I understand now that I'm in a model that really looks after customers is that one of my suppliers offers a white glove delivery service. And this supplier, for example, they'll make sure that the customer is shown their product by a, you know, a proper white glove delivery service man that that arrives with the product and really helps them to understand, you know, how to get the best out of that product. And that's an incredible service for that customers to receive, which reflects really well on us, but from our point of view over my store, and you know, the virtual assistants were fulfilling that order. We didn't have to ever see the product. We only paid for the product to the supplier once we'd received the order. And that's how e commerce can be incredibly profitable and leave a lasting impression on customers, you know, using the right model, which is what we talked about today. I mean, from your own examples. Lewis, can you think of some some tips that you've seen from successful drop shipping stores that use this model? Yeah, absolutely. So some of the things that you talked about, really and that white glove delivery is an example of exceptional customer service, like above and beyond. You're not going to be doing that for the customers that you're selling $10 widgets to from China. I You're not going to be sending someone around to their house to help them with the item and teach them about it. However, if you only have two customers per day, and you want to offer that level of kind of premium and concierge support, it's like having a personal concierge for every customer that just goes around now, what are the chances that that customer will be so happy with that service that they might just consider telling a friend about it, or a family member, or maybe in the future, when they want another item coming back for repeat business to your store, you've definitely set that up for success by doing it that. The other thing is, it gives you more margin, more. Buffer, so more profit on every order means you can run targeted ads. You can invest in search engine optimization and to really drive traffic to your store as well. So think of it like setting up your shop on the busiest High Street, rather than down some back street, because you can pay the premium prices to be there. You know, at the top of Google, you're paying for that premium digital real estate by running ads to it, and you can do that because you have the margin in those nice, high profit sales. The other tip, I think, is just to constantly improve and make sure that you're regularly updating your product offerings and updating your website based on customer feedback. So wait to see what the customers say. What questions did they have? What can you add to your store? What product offers or bundles or other things? Can you add accessory items that they might want? It's like refreshing your shop window to try and attract and bring in more customers, because you you know the things that will catch customers attention as they walk past your shop on the high street, so put those things in the shop window, bring in the traffic and try and convert them that so, yeah, much, much better experience. And those are some some tips that people can apply straight away. Yeah, that's it. And it can all be automated, especially when you've got virtual assistants on board. It can all be made into a process, so you're not having to continually optimize these things yourself. Personally, you put processes in place. So for example, we have a quiz on one of our store websites to find out customer feedback as to what they're looking for and what really matters to them, and then virtual assistants will take on board that feedback and implement it into the website. And it's a self fulfilling cycle that is all done outside of you as the business owner, but it continually improves the conversion rate. Similarly, when we get five star reviews, we'll make sure that they're posted prominently on the website. And that can all be a process that's outsourced from yourself as the business owner, but it's continually making sure that we're improving the E commerce business that we're running. And I mean, for those of you who are interested in starting drop shipping and want to know what it will be like in the early stages when you try out this new business model, I'd recommend episode 59 believe it is of the dropship unlock podcast, which is called navigating the first 90 days drop shipping. And in that episode, we'll really go into detail about the first and early stages of a business. So for somebody that is keen, Lewis to get started with a different business model, and they actually want to make money drop shipping rather than lose money. Drop Shipping. Where would you suggest that they start? Yeah, if you're looking to make money, drop shipping, which is, I know, a revolutionary concept, but something that we do day in, day out, so definitely can be done. I would make sure to start, to make sure you're starting with a solid foundation, focus on really good quality, high ticket items, so higher priced items that offer you that better profit margin on the first sale and mean that you can offer customers a way higher level of customer satisfaction because the product quality is better, but also because the service can be much better as well, because you have less customers to deal with and more profit to serve them with as well. The other thing is make sure you have really strong supplier relationships. Reliable suppliers are what will fuel your business as a drop shipper. So ensuring that you've got consistent product quality and that every delivery goes out and is nice and easy, and in your case, like you said, white glove delivery like that, if your suppliers can offer a service that's above and beyond just the usual, that can really help improve customer experience as well, and talking to the customer's experience that's going to be the thing that builds loyalty and trust. So really try and figure out, how can you give exceptional service and communication to your customers? You know? What can what touch points can you include in their journey to ensure that when they experience that service, they think, I'm going to tell a friend about that, or I had such a good experience, I'm going to tell my friend or partner or whatever about that, and then suddenly you've got word of mouth referrals happening, and they'll think about you in the future when they want the next item related to that niche that you're in. So if you're ready to do this, and you're ready to stop losing money in drop shipping, and you want to start making money with drop shipping, then a good place to start would be my book, the home turf advantage, that's available at h t a book.com the idea of the home turf advantage is it's all about creating a solid foundation and then executing on it effectively to build a profitable drop shipping business and then using it to replace your income and create time and location freedom. Enjoying the podcast. We'd love to hear from you leave a comment or a review, and we might just feature it on an upcoming episode, also for detailed show notes and resources. Head to dropship unlock.com forward slash podcast. If you found value from any episode of this podcast, please take just 10 seconds to leave us a quick five star review on your podcast app of choice. It helps us more than you could imagine. And who knows, you might just hear your comments on the show. Thanks for being part of our community. Your support helps us keep delivering a new episode. Every week. Now let's answer a question that we've had in from a listener. So thank you very much for getting your questions in. And remember, if you have a question that you want answered, potentially on the podcast, all you need to do is leave a comment beneath the YouTube video version of this episode. So this week, the question has come in from Emily Jones, 871 and Emily has asked, I'm struggling with analysis paralysis when it comes to choosing a niche for my store. How can I overcome this and make a decision? Yeah, thank you for your question, Emily. So the way that we've laid it out in our niche validation criteria, which is outlined in my book, which you can get@htabook.com enables you to ensure that you're picking a niche based on proven potential, right? So what that means is, because you've probably got this feeling at the moment where you're looking at everything and you're thinking, does my gut, my gut tells me this might be good, and my gut tells me that might be good, and that's bringing emotion into the decision making process, which there's there's a place for emotion in this process, but only after you've already validated it with data. I'm all for applying common sense to the process, but only when it's already built on a solid foundational layer of data. So follow the criteria inside my home turf advantage book, use data to guide you to a niche that you know is proven to work and is based on existing search demand, a product that's stable all year round, where you have other drop shipping retailers already operating in the market, where you have suppliers that will work with you already, like all these things, we can validate in advance of doing anything else. We don't want to go and build a website or build a store or anything, until we know it's going to work. And then once you have that data driven information, those insights, it's so much it fills you with so much more confidence, because you're making the decision based on that data, rather than personal feelings, to make those informed decisions. And you will feel that that analysis paralysis, as you described it, Emily will start to dissipate, because you'll be like, Ah, okay, I understand why this will work. Now I've know why it will work. I've seen it work. The uncertainty that you have before is often just because you're you're searching for the the perfect answer based on emotions, so trying to avoid perfectionism. Remember, there's no perfect niche out there, but there are businesses operating profitably in 1000s of imperfect niches. So the the key to this is not to fight like if the key to becoming one of those is clearly not to find a perfect niche, it's to find a niche that you're happy with the compromises of and that you're happy meets the most of the data criteria that we lay out inside my book, and then just take action. Taking action is more important than finding the perfect niche. If the people that try and search for the perfect niche, but never do anything, never make any money, so you've got to get past that. Keep moving ahead. And yeah, we'd love to hold you accountable. And inside the home turf advantage book, there are many methods that we can help you do that, and inside our communities as well, more than happy to help Exactly. Yeah, great question. Emily, very common for people to feel like they can't get over the line when it's based on cold, hard data and you can't argue with it, and that'll give you the confidence to go into a niche that you know will be successful. Okay, so thank you for your question. It's now time to highlight a recent review that we've had in for the podcast as well. So a big thank you to savan Hazen for sharing your thoughts in an apple podcast review. So Savannah has said Truly a great podcast with loads of insight worth a listen. Thank you so much for your review. Svan Hazen, we really appreciate it. Really glad to hear that you've been enjoying the podcast now, before you head off today, if you found today's episode useful. How about sharing it with your network? Maybe post it on Instagram or Facebook or LinkedIn and tag us. Tag the dropship unlocked team in it. We'd love to see it. It only takes a moment, and you could be helping someone take their first step towards e commerce success. We really appreciate your support in getting the word out there. Thanks for joining us on this episode of the dropship unlocked podcast. We hope you walk you away with insights and inspiration to kick start your E commerce journey. Grab a copy of my book, the home turf advantage at HTA book.com it's a distilled guide based on real experience to help you build your E commerce venture, don't forget to hit the subscribe button for more strategies and success stories. And if you like what you heard, a five star review would mean the world to us, and you might just get a shout out on an upcoming episode. And finally, thank you for deciding to spend your time with us today. We can't wait to bring you more insights on the next episode of the dropship unlocked podcast. You