The Dropship Forum .co.uk

[Bhuna]

SORRY THIS MAY GET LONG…(said the vicar to the headmistress…)

Over the next few days I aim to bring you a little guide on getting started, or at least let you know how I set about it to give you some ideas going forward…

This is not a bible document on what to do, this is not advice from me on what to do, this is just my account of setting up a business using a dropshipper….or two. I will not tell you who I use I will not tell you who to use but hopefully some of the following will help you on your way to making those decisions for yourself. Please also note that my thanks go to other members of this forum and the staff of the dropshippers I use as without their advice, I would not be able to make up this document which will hopefully help you, another newbie entering the world of selling….

1. THE START

First of all if you are a new member on here and you have a mortgage, credit cards, monthly bills, etc and are looking to earn yourself lots of extra cash very quickly for very little work then I suggest you stop now. There is no immediate income and no immediate answer to all your problems if you are not prepared to put some time and thought into making it work.

I suggest, if you have not already done so, that you start off getting used to whether or not you can run a business / shop of some sort by initially joining an auction website and selling items on there. Start off with some ‘used’ cr@p lying around the house, like toys, games, books, old dvds that you no longer need/use. You will find a lot out about yourself here – how good at customer service are you, how good you can turn around orders into deliveries and it will benefit you by building up a good feedback rating on the auction site you choose (this will come in handy later as you will need to continue to use other outlets other than just your website you are aiming to set up).

2. OK ANDY, I KNOW THAT, WHAT NOW…

OK – so that works, what now, move on to brand new products – for example, I’ve popped down to my local Shop For Shoes at sale time – kids shoes brand new famous brand name down to £5 and to top it all its buy one pair, get one free – so £2.50 for a pair of kids shoes – that sells for £8/£9 upwards each. Do the same and guess what – you have just sourced your first supplier – SALES at shops in a town near you. Again why do this – people now start to see that you sell brand new goods and not just used items, you gain yet more valuable experience in whether or not you can cope with an increase in customer service queries raised about the goods you offer (I found that for some reason people queried brand new goods more than they did used goods) and you can start to see how much time is needed in running your business. Consider using things your auction site offers such as shop facilities, stats etc.

3. DROPSHIPPING

Now you will know how long you can spare time wise on your venture, you will have gained some funds and also experience on supply and demand hopefully by researching what is selling of yours and what is not selling. You will also have realised that nothing comes free and the auction site and possibly the payment method you use all take their cut somewhere along the lines.

Now you want to maybe cut out on buying, packaging, sending items off – so you have found mention of this, what you think is new, craze called “Dropshipping”. It’s not new, its been around a few years now and there are a lot of Dropshippers (suppliers that deliver for you) out there – some complete cr@p ones, some great ones, some ripoff ones, some real cheap ones so what ones do you choose….


WELL YOU WILL HAVE TO WAIT UNTIL TOMORROW TO READ THE NEXT EPISODE OF “FOR THE NEWBIE, FROM A NEWBIE…”

(PS. I will not post a new post just to increase my post count – I will just be amending this one sometime tomorrow as long as it doesn’t make it too long – mods please let me know if I am out of order post a really long post sorry.)



Andy.

[Bhuna]

EPISODE 2 (I know I said tomorrow but I had time today in the end…)

(Mod - apologies was going to edit my old post and add this but not allowed to as over 60 minutes.)

4. WHAT DROPSHIPPER TO CHOOSE

I know you all been waiting for this episode as you all thought the answer was coming but basically the answer to this question is – IT REALLY IS UP TO YOU, as you will not find the answer on this website/forum. You will, however, find plenty of advice, recommendations about various suppliers be it wholesale or dropshippers but you will soon realise that what is right for one may not be right for you and what is right for you may not be right for someone else. I can tell you however the things to seriously consider are:

i) your fund availability – in Episode 1 I mentioned about auction selling to start – building up a slight fund – hands up if you thought ooo I made £ 50 and went down the pub with it…..ok those that did that please leave… :LOL: just kidding. OK well that was silly as you need it now, the majority of dropshippers require a sign up fee – why you might ask – well how else are they going to make their money when they go out of their way to source cheap supplies, and offer them to you at a price that means you can make a profit and still sell at a reasonable price. (although you will read later that price is not everything). The fees are also there to cover admin, running costs, employing staff etc to provide you with a service that makes you look good to your customers…. However take a look there are some free dropshippers out there if you research it – a good starting point to add some more funds to your auction account and feedback don’t forget.

ii) consider selling what you know – if you work with computers, building laptops etc, consider searching out the computer suppliers. Similarly if you work in underwear, be careful it gets cold over winter… Why work in an area you know – KNOWLEDGE – you will know your product and when someone asks you about your product you are selling who better than someone that knows what a CPU is or someone that knows what a G-string is. Your answer will be immediate, you wont have to wait for your dropshipper/supplier to look it up and come back to you to go back to the customer and you are already on your way to looking professional, and really giving the customer the image that they are dealing with someone that knows what they are selling.

iii) using some links from here, or from what you have found, investigate your dropshipper (I told you you wont make money immediately in this without some work). Read into their shipping policy, their returns policy, their terms and conditions with you, their prices. Phone them up, talk to them, experience their customer service by asking some general questions about signing up with them. Why you might ask – because it is their customer service that is the backbone to your business. You don’t want someone with a shipping policy of 2 to 3 months. You don’t want someone that will not accept returns (unless there are specific items that arent returnable of course), you don’t want someone that its going to take 3 days for them to answer the phone to you when you are trying to find out an answer to a question your prospective customer has raised and you certainly do not want someone whose prices are so high to start with, there is absolutely no way you are going to be able to add on a margin, your expenses and costs and still sell the product at a reasonable price…

iv) Gather information – in particular fees, auctions sites and payment method providers, and the price you are going to pay for the goods you are selling and the cost of shipping you pay to get those goods to your customer. Now admittedly this is a little more difficult as during your research you will find that some suppliers/dropshippers do not show their prices until you have signed up. However, this is where you can test their customer service again – phone up/email and just ask for a small sample of prices of a few items – most dropshippers would probably be prepared to give you an idea. The other important things to get then are the auction fees and payment method and shipping costs as all these will need to be built into your factoring how much you can then sell that item for – so that you can then see if those set of products are worth selling and therefore you can decide if you want to sign up to that particular dropshipper / supplier….. but WAIT..

v) What else does the dropshipper/supplier offer you? You have to think ahead – are you happy enough just selling on auction sites or as I expect you mght want to do as that’s why most are on this forum, you are already considering your own webshop etc. Well check out what the supplier/dropshipper is offering within its package – hosting, website templates, building you a website, auto feeds to update your products for you, etc etc.


Well apologies but that’s all I got time for in this Episode (as the boss is trying to read over my shoulder now…). Episode 3 will either be late tonight or tomorrow sometime depending on my spare time later. This will move on to “SET YOUR LIMITS”, “PRICING ISNT EVERYTHING”, “YOUR WEBSITE”.

(Again mods – if this is too long, please feel free to PM me to shorten, or split it out).

[pcbob]

[Bhuna]

Obviously if anyone thinks what I have said is slightly or totally incorrect then please feel free to correct me - as stated I'm a newbie as well and just thought I would write a small guide to help the newbie).

Cheers,

Andy.

[bill7096]

My breath is baited, roll on episode 3

Excellent post. It gives a REAL insight into what is required.

Reading introductory posts, I am sure many people consider "dropshipping" is a get rich quick scheme, when in reality dropshipping is not a business in itself but merely another form of retailing. As such it has all of the pitfalls of any other business and quite a few new ones for the unwary. Hope this gives a few a reality check.


Bill

[Bhuna]

5. SET YOUR LIMITS

OK so before we sign up you need to know some very important things – a lot of the next few days/weeks (depending on how long you can spend on it) will be large outlay with little income (unless you have managed to find that miracle product that will attract people to the listings/website instantaneously of course …). This is where you need to look at things such as:

i) how much time have you spent on this so far and can you sustain or increase that amount of time without impacting on your day job, your family life, other important things in your life as although you are now planning on letting someone else package up and send out your goods you are still responsible for a lot of things – listing the item, marketing, customer service queries – you will get them even just from auctions site sales, and other things.

ii) Look at how much you can afford to lose – yes LOSE – because some of you will – even after reading this (if you ever did get this far, as I expect some of you in the first few lines of Episode 1 thought – I know what I’m doing I’ll carry on asking and asking on this forum – someone will give me that all singing all dancing supplier of 1p iPods that I can sell at £25 and take over the market, take over the world ….). sorry got carried away there… Yes you may lose some money, because surprisingly and I cannot prove it with statistics but I have a strong gut feeling that some sign up with dropshippers, paying their subscriptions, put one or two items on auction for sale, don’t sell anything, think oh well never mind and never list or try again and give up – this is why you have to set a limit on how much you are prepared to LOSE. Never ever exceed this limit unless you are prepared to lose the higher amount as well.

Ok – we set limits on expense and we reviewed our time available to spend on your business, what now. Well now you can sign up to a dropshipper – AT LAST I hear you shout – about bloody time – 3 episodes in and you finally say I can sign up…..

Hold on though – what was this about a limit – why do I need to set one – I aint spending money……. Believe it or not you will be – initial outlay to the dropshipper, every auction you hold has initial set up fees, monthly fee for your auction site shop if you have one, printer paper cost, printer ink, stamps/postage for sending out your receipts if you want to send paper receipts, keeping adequate records should the tax man catch up with you (although you should really look at making sure you register as a company/sole-trader), set up costs for your website, hosting costs, it all adds up and it all adds up to a lot if nothing sells to start with – hence SET YOUR LIMITS.

6. MY SHOP ON AUCTION SITE ISNT SELLING ANYTHING

One thing to remember is that unless you are paying a premium, your shop listings on an auction site are unlikely to appear on top of a search for a product by someone using the auction search facility. Why not? – Because it lists those auctions coming to an end first, goes through the normal listings, then possibly tags on to the end those listings on shops ending in 30 days .

You will need to remember to not just list shop items but put some items onto normal auctions to ensure that your items get found by those searching auction listings. I only use one particular auction site that runs like this – I can only assume that others are similar as they make more money from normal auction listings that don’t sell than they do shop inventory items that don’t sell. Ensure that your auction has links back to your auction site shop and then this will attract more visitors.
One thing to remember as well is to keep all information about a buyer that you possibly can – name, address, email. This will come in very handy later under the section “my website”.

7. PRICING ISNT EVERYTHING.

What is the first thing that is blamed when a product of yours isnt selling within the first week.

Who then gets the brunt of the blame when a product of yours isnt selling within the first week.

A couple of questions for you to ponder over whilst I complete this section and post it with EPISODE 4 (yes sorry you have to wait I got my day job to do now).

When you have thought about the answer to those questions – think again about Who should actually get the blame rather then who gets the blame…

Most newbies that have come on to make a fast buck will get the answer to the who should get the blame question wrong – I expect most others that have started up and started to succeed will get these right and in particular the mods / sponsors of this forum can probably get all these questions right. I have learnt what the answer is and I will let you know in EPISODE 4 later in the week / nearer the weekend sorry.

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EPISODE 4 will cover PRICING ISNT EVERYTHING and sorry I was going to try to include it in this episode, YOUR WEBSITE.

EPISODE 5 will be slightly longer in coming as I am still researching most of this at the moment and it will hopefully cover LEGISLATION YOU NEED TO BE AWARE OF, SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMISATION, EXPANDING YOUR BUSINESS.

Thanks for reading and I am open to questions (but I am only a newbie and I bet if you searched you would already find the answer on this forum somewhere.).

To finish – please note that I actually take little credit for most of this information in here – the credit goes to the majority of users of this forum and to the customer services of the two dropshippers I use as that is where I found out all my answers.


Andy.

[Bhuna]

The next instalment... (mods - can I ask you to remove "episode 1" from the main title of the thread as i have obviously moved on now ).



7. PRICING ISNT EVERYTHING.

What is the first thing that is blamed? – “the price is too high from my supplier so I cant sell it any cheaper compared to other prices on …. auction site/websites”.

Who gets the brunt of that blame? – “my dropshipper/supplier must really be cr@p as they charge too much that’s why I am not selling anything as its cheaper elsewhere….”

I have been reading this forum for approximately two months before I joined it and if you search on here, there will always be someone somewhere that has moaned about one of the above – some of those posters are no longer around. If you have got this far and suddenly finding that your supplier prices are too high to compete by the time you have added listing fees, payment fees, other costs etc, and your product is not selling then who SHOULD really be getting the blame – let me give you a clue – what were YOU asked to do in Episode 2 before signing up with a dropshipper/supplier…..still cant remember, still cant be a$$ed to go back and read it – ok ok I will tell you – GATHER INFORMATION – this is why it is not a make money quick campaign as you need to research yourself and not try to get others to do it for you or just think I will go with them as everyone else has. Now I hope you are sitting down as this may shock you – did you know that there is more than one supplier out there and therefore you might find that whilst the dropshipper you chose can offer a certain range of products at a really good price, another range of products that he offers you is actually cheaper elsewhere with another supplier.

I will give an example on here as if you read the forum it is commonly found – football products are cheaper with dropshipper A as that’s all they do, dropshipper B however offers them but not at as competitive prices as A, but dropshipper B also offers several different range of products – if you can only afford to go with one dropshipper (remember SET YOUR LIMITS) then you do limit yourself to begin with if you only went with A – unless you want to specialise for now. If you go for dropshipper B you can still offer those products for sale as well as the other ranges of products B offers – but you know you will not be competitively priced for the one range of products – or you would have known if you did your research to begin with. There is nothing to stop you signing up with the other dropshipper at a later date when you have made a little money.

However, the title of this section is not blame you blame me blame them, it is PRICING ISNT EVERYTHING and this is something that I have again found out by reading this forum and whilst I dismissed it to start with I can now honestly say PRICING ISNT EVERYTHING – yes you can still charge more than your competitors AND still get the sale. I had a product on Buy It Now at a price of £19.99, plus P&P of £6.99. Another auction had exactly the same product for £15.99 and P&P of £5.99. a fiver in total less than me – but I could not afford to go any lower than my price without making a loss (I do not use loss leaders at present – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loss_leader for those that don’t know what that is). So why did the person go for mine – I don’t know exactly why as I didn’t ask the customer but some ideas are:

i) my feedback thanks to my previous sales was 100% +ve, and five times as many as the other sellers.

ii) my description of the product was well set out, using a template from the auction site to spice it up a little, a picture. The other one was just black text, white background, little description, small picture.

iii) I had “uniformed” all my auctions/buy it nows. Not sure what word to use but basically each of my auctions looked the same for each category I was selling in – the background template used, the font used in the header on the description, the colour of text, the font used for description. I looked at some of the things the other seller was selling and yes there was uniformity there – they were all black text, white background, little descriptions.

iv) At the bottom of each and every auction listing/shop listing I had set out a table listing the payment method accepted, the shipping terms, postage I use, my returns policy and a comment about any problems can easily be resolved before leaving negative feedback please contact me. The other seller had just ticked a few default boxes and put the P&P price in.

So basically what I’m trying to say here by giving these examples is presentation and professionalism is the key – make your client think that you are professional by the way you set out your products for sale – don’t just apply the format to the auction sales but to your auction shop listings as well if you have one. Also spend the time in getting your auction shop categories etc correct.

I know that I might have been lucky and the buyer may not have found the other seller but I’m more inclined to think that it was down to my presentation and professional look than the lack of searching by someone looking to buy that item.

You will then find that PRICING ISNT EVERYTHING and hopefully find that people will buy from you even if you are a couple of quid more expensive than a rival seller on the auction site.

8. YOUR WEBSITE (part 1)

Whilst this is a guide For a Newbie, from a Newbie, I am assuming that you know how to register a domain name and you don’t need help in thinking about a name or registering it. If you don’t know what a domain name or a domain name registrar is then I suggest you go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domain_name to learn about it and also go to a search engine to find a suitable registration company to use.

When you have a domain name and hopefully you got a reasonably catchy one and not something stupid like www.idontthinkyoushouldbu...yandrun.yyy.zzz you should consider aligning all your identifications with that domain name. Eg. Your auction site ID should perhaps now be your website name (without the .co.uk / .com as auction sites wont allow that) so if you have a domain www.mywebsite.co.uk then call call yourself mywebsite on the auction sites. Name awareness then for anyone that comes across your listings.

Time to refer back to an earlier Episode here again – Episode 2 – can you remember you were asked to also consider researching something else….yes what does your dropshipper / supplier offer. If you haven’t found out yet then go away now whilst I write part 2 of YOUR WEBSITE. Some things to look for are what hosting is available, cost of hosting, what do they offer by way of set up, ongoing support, user manuals/faq sections, and do they offer automatic product feeds. All these things are very useful and should be considered carefully.

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Ok my lunchtime is over and I need to get back to a report I am writing so YOUR WEBSITE (part 2) will have to wait. Future episodes of FOR A NEWBIE, FROM A NEWBIE, will be looking to cover:

- Your website (Part 2)
- The dropshipforum – what should you expect from it.
- Legislation you should be aware of.
- Getting people to your website
- Expanding your business.

Thanks for reading…..well I hope you have been otherwise this has been a waste of time

Andy.

[Bhuna]

9. YOUR WEBSITE (part 2).

OK – you have had time now to investigate what your dropshipper offers and I can now tell you this. Your website, whoever you go with, WILL NEED WORK done to it before you are ready to go public. Yes it will be ready to sell items on, yes you could go out there with the basic look, but as mentioned before many a time in these Episodes, you will need to do some work again.

Therefore, please note that if you are looking to go into having your own website – it is recommended that you have a basic knowledge of html and what you are looking at. You do not need to be an expert but some basic knowledge will go a long way – otherwise you will be doing one of two things – getting fed up and give up, or asking so many questions that people will start to think you cannot do anything yourself so why should they help you.

Assuming you have been set up with a website by a dropshipper/supplier, what do you need to do:

i) you will need to write your policies: Terms and Conditions, Shipping, Returns/refunds, Privacy Policy, Payment Option pages. Where do you start you ask – the best place to start is with your dropshipper/supplier first – print off and read through all their policies relating to these matters – as basically you are likely to be mirroring these in what you do to some extent. In particular the shipping and returns/refunds policies. If your dropshipper states in their shipping policy that they take 5 to 7 days to process and send orders – you don’t want to be saying that orders are issued the following working day in yours – as you will only generate complaints, queries etc. If your dropshipper only accepts returns within 7 days, you don’t want to be stating you accept them within 28 days (please also bear in mind that you will have to comply with legislation – see a later episode).

Another good place to start and I’m sure most on here will not mind – is have a look at other peoples websites and what they have got in their policies / terms and conditions. Now don’t just copy and use them – be polite and ask first – I’m sure most on here will let you as most on here have probably just copied or got ideas from someone else on here

ii) you will need to set up your website via the admin console provided. Login and you will be confronted by a lot of menus – varying depending on what cart etc has been used I believe. You will need to make sure that your email addresses are entered – sales@, info@, whatever you have set up to deal with queries and complaints etc. You will need to enter your company name, address, telephone contact number. Most importantly you will need to set up your payment methods that you accept and make sure that they correctly point to your account details – be it a popular one pointing at the correct email address used etc.

I told you it was a lot of work in Episode 1

iii) I suggest you do some user testing – 2 reasons for this – you know what your customers are experiencing when they come online and use your website because if you experience problems or think something isn’t working you will persevere with it – but your customer will just click the red X and bugger off to an easier to use site or one that works properly. The other reason is that you make sure that items are displaying properly, your payment method works (this one is a difficult one to test if you use a particular payment method as you cannot send yourself payments so you will need a friend or a family member to make a dummy purchase from your site). Test the registering with your website as a customer and then go and look at the auto email you get – does it need changing to look more professional – are you happy with the auto emailing etc – these are all settings you can change via the admin section of your site. Then as the admin person – go and look at what you get informed of, if someone joins, if someone buys something, if someone raises a query via the contact us page on your site – you will need to know how all these things work to run your business/website otherwise how will you know if they are not working when you start up.

iv) a MAJOR thing to test and look at is – what are your prices set to – some auto feeds will add a percentage to the dropshippers supply price – are you happy with this – check that the feed has worked correctly and does not show a lower price than what you will have to pay (how do you do that – well I’m afraid this is where you have to wait for Part 3 now).

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COMING UP IN “FOR THE NEWBIE, FROM A NEWBIE”:

- Your website (Part 3)
- The dropshipforum – what should you expect from it.
- Legislation you should be aware of.
- Getting people to your website
- Expanding your business.



Thanks and I really hope some of you are finding this helpful.


Any questions – please ask and I will try to include the answers in the next episode.


Andy,

[dropbop]

Wow Bhuna,

I would swear you were at this for years. Great post indeed

[Bhuna]

the next enthralling installment from a newbie:

10. YOUR WEBSITE (part 3)

Ok – you are now in the process of checking/testing your website and you are at the stage of wanting to check the prices. You can go about his one of two ways depending on how computer literate you are.

“The I don’t know much about technology easy way” – but time consuming – is to firstly find some prices on the dropshipper/suppliers website that you know you are the prices that you will be purchasing at (I say this because there are some dropshippers out there that display the RRP if you don’t log in, and there are some out there that then offer levels of discount on that depending on whether you bought the bronze package, or the bright silver package with gold spots, or the gold package with silver spots on it.) Make sure you know what prices you will be buying the item at and remember to check postage and packaging cost for htat item as well.

Now go on to your site and find exactly the same product – go through to checkout and see what it is then asking you to pay – compare the two prices. Is yours higher? Good it is – but you cant stop there – remember to then take into account of the hidden fees – the ones that you wont see on your website but the ones you will need to cover – for example a certain payment method provider out there charges 3.4% plus 20p per incoming amount/sale – therefore you will need to make sure that the price you are charging covers this cost as well. You will then need to consider other costs your are incurring and how you will be covering these – ie the website hosting, the set up costs you have just incurred – so remember to make sure that you have an adequate profit margin on each item to take into account these as well. Most people I believe mark up products between 25% to 100% - you of course if you really wanted to can mark up more or less than that – if you do more then remember you might be outpricing yourself totally no matter what your site and professionalism looks like – if you do less then yes you become really competitive but make sure it covers your costs otherwise you will find that you are making a loss and you didn’t want to do that did you.

Well you have checked one product – its fine – is that it – no – in all honesty I would check at least 2 or 3 products in the same range to just make sure. Your website hosts / provider should be able to give you instructions on how to change prices of items within the admin area of the Shopping Cart – however if you need more information then I suggest you Google which Cart it is you are using – you will usually see some reference to it somewhere on your pages…the carts I have come across so far are ZenCart, oscommerce and I have heard of another one just starting out Magenta. Now there are others out there so a google and search for forums relating to which one you are using – forums are a very useful source of information if used properly – they have search facilities etc and people are more and likely to help you IF you have done a little bit of research first.

“The I have intermediate technological knowledge easy way” – time consuming to set up, but in the long run gets quicker. This way is my way – your website products will usually be set up in what is known as a MySql database which you can access via the Cpanel if you want but one way I access the information in this database is via ODBC links to an Access Database set up on my laptop. Sounds complicated but if you look for the ODBC MySql drivers for MSAccess then it is straight forward. You can then link to all your tables in MySql database. Using MSAccess you can then run queries to get off the products in certain areas etc and prices – you even change prices this way rather than individually through the admin tool. To compare the prices now with the prices you can pay I suggest you now look for a download from your dropshipper/supplier that lists their products – usually a .csv file (comma separated values) or a .xml coded file. Import this into your MSAccess database – you will need to work out about columns you using etc as each dropshipper varies (if you haven’t got a clue what I am saying here you can move on to the next section by the way – I did say this is the intermediate knowledge way). Find the columns you want – usually product code, product title, price, and extract that data from the table. Or you can now write queries in Access to compare the product codes with each other and display the website price and the dropshipper price – for those that then know what they are doing you can put in extra columns factoring in paypal fees, markup etc and compare your sale price with that of your cost price and obviously you want to be selling higher than what it costs you – although you can use loss leaders but that’s another area which I do not dabble in at the moment (see the link in episode 4 re loss leaders).

“the I have expert fantastic super dooper technological knowledge easy way” – quick to set up and quick to deal with – good for you – well done – you could probably teach me a thing or two please – I look forward to reading your ebook in return – perhaps you can share some of this knowledge with us so we can all speed up please . .

11. THE DROPSHIPFORUM – WHAT SHOULD YOU EXPECT FROM IT. (or any forum come to think of it).

You have obviously come along and joined the dropshipforum here and want to take lots away. What should you expect from the forum and its members – well this answer is simple:

“EXPECT EVERYTHING – GET NOTHING, EXPECT NOTHING – GET A LOT.”

You will get out of this forum and probably most forums you join, what you put into it. I’m not saying that everyone needs to sit back spending hours typing up a newbies guide like I have – and by the way if you wonder why I am doing the guide – its helping me just as much as I hope it helps you – I’m using this as a kind of checklist as I go along making sure I am covering all bases of setting up my business my way. This is basically my experience ‘LIVE’ as I work on my site and my business and I want to share that with you as my way of helping out. I might not be right all of the time hence as mentioned in episode 1 – this is not a bible, but I hope everyone that reads this then realises exactly what they are about to let themselves into before doing it.

Sorry – back on track now – Expect everything – get nothing: There are so many people that have registered on this site, since I have joined and I’m still new, whose first post is:

“Can someone give me a link to the best supplier out there with the biggest profit margin on the most fantastic product that there ever was”. Not even a please – come on if you are going to ask that in your first post you got to at least say please and be polite….then you will get your answer – it might not necessarily be the answer you want and I’m surprised that some of the answers are not just short swift replies really telling you where you can stick that post but as always the people on here, moderators etc are so polite and helpful (have I as$-kissed enough yet ).

“Expect nothing – get a lot.” : In all honesty – your first post in joining any forum you join because you are really looking for guidance and assistance in setting up something to make you money should really be aimed at the “Introduction” section – come in say hello – introduce yourself – what you are looking to do, sometimes why – I’m not saying write a life story but a short post of “hello, my name is Andy, I’m an alcoholic” (damn wrong forum) goes a heck of a way in starting what will be a very long and helpful relationship with other members of this forum.

Now you are new to this so you are not going to have gods gift to offer the forum and you will not have all the answers to all the questions you see some people raise on here – but take part – join in the community here. We are all after the same thing – to make a quick buck – although if you have been taking much notice you now know its not quick. . The biggest and best thing you can do is to make sure you do your own research on here – there are so many threads and so many links already with so many various comments about this dropshipper, that dropshipper, you will find out about some decent suppliers from the threads you can access. If you have your eyes solely on that list in the Dropshipper Links thread that you want access to immediately after 20 posts – you will not get there – but if you research on here a little more you will probably realise that most of what is probably in that thread (yes I don’t know yet either as I have not got access and am not fussed when/if I am given it to be honest at the moment) – there are plenty of references and links already in the open threads to help you / guide you on your way. Why will gaining access to a thread that contains 100s of links suddenly make it any better for you to set up your own business – make it work with the information and items you have at the moment first – as if it you cant get it to work now with the one or two suppliers you have sourced – it wont all of a sudden magically work just because you now get access to 100 or so more suppliers information.

Take part where you can – feel free after introducing yourself in the intro forum to answer someone elses question or provide a little bit of advice – no matter how small the advice is it might be something that someone had not thought of. Even if its not the all singing all dancing right answer for that person at least you are showing willing to help out a little rather than just come on here and take, take, take. By all means as well – ask your questions (remember to use the search facility a little at first as well as someone may have already asked – in particular if it involves a what are www.websitename.co.uk like as a supplier) – most people on here will go out of their way to help you if you have started to take part – if you have started to show you are not just here for a long list and the answer to what is the right product etc etc etc. (you may only have questions to ask and not have many answers to give yourself – this is just as acceptable on here as long as you word it right/politely, show that you have done a little bit of searching yourself and that you don’t expect everyone to research it for you when you have done nothing yourself first to find an answer).

There are people on this website willing to give you the advice, give you the assistance in correcting your website, give you the names of some suppliers, but you have to build up a little respect first and not expect everything without giving a little – even a little thanks goes a long way when someone has answered your questions (although don’t just post Cheers to build up your total post count – it wont work). There is a group on here to post a link to your website – if done correctly people will then look at your site for you – advise you on anything – comment on perhaps some improvements or advice on the policies you have written.

Anyway that’s all there is to say really on forums without repeating myself.

And that’s the end of Episode 6 as well…but don’t worry more to follow soon:

----------------------

STILL TO COME IN “FOR THE NEWBIE, FROM A NEWBIE”:

- Legislation you should be aware of.
- Getting people to your website
- Expanding your business.



Any questions – please feel free to ask and I will try to include the answers in the next episode.


Andy,

[paulc010]

Another good one Bhuna. Couple of niggles. It's Magento (a FOS ecommerce solution) not Magenta (a colour).

On the intermediate "techie" section. Some hosting providers don't allow access to their mysql databases directly from the outside world, but connect them via a private network which is accessible from your web server only. This protects against the many mysql vulnerability attacks that are floating around out there. Worth bearing in mind when selecting a hosting provider; especially if you're counting on having this access(sic). I prefer the database server to be more secure, so like those that keep them on private networks..... mine does

Paul

[Bhuna]

Thanks Paul,

Any help in correcting this or clarifying some points is of great assistance to everyone. thank you.

Also not quite sure why i typed magenta .lol. i knew it was magento - guess i trying to get these out too fast and not re-reading em too much.

oh well.

Andy.

[Robbo]

Hi Andy. I don't have time to go through it all now but just wanted to say thanks for your contributions and I'm sure they will raise some interesting points.

[Bhuna]

12. LEGISLATION YOU SHOULD BE AWARE OF.

I would just like to stick a disclaimer in here now – I am no legal expert, I know very little of the detail involved in the following legislation items that I mention and I don’t even know if I will cover absolutely everything you should be aware of as a business / website trader. I do know though that there is a lot that is out there to protect the consumer and you need to be aware of what rights your customer has should they order something from your website, should they buy something from your auction site shop or even from your shop in person. I cannot be held responsible if you solely rely on the information and assistance I am trying to provide here and it is ultimately your responsility to seek relevant legal advice regarding this matter if you are unclear on anything.

A main one that you will be affected by when selling over the internet, either by your auction website shop or your own website is the Distance Selling Regulations (2000) – these have been brought in to implement a European Council Directive. All member states of the EU must implement this directive within their national legislation so this actually means you have to be aware of this if you are shipping/selling to other EU countries. Please note however that I have no idea what legalities/requirements you need to be aware of if you ship to the US, or other non-EU countries. Basically, there are set regulations you have to comply with regarding the descriptions of goods, the information provided, details about yourself provided before entering a contract with someone. For information you could try out this link:

http://www.oft.gov.uk/sha...eral/oft698.pdf

This gives you details on what you need to give a customer before they decide to buy from you – you need to make sure you have relevant policies etc on your site and I suggest you do take in quite a bit of what this booklet covers. It mentions consumers cancellation rights and returns rights, and when you have to provide goods by – Eg. 30 days unless agreed with the customer. I am not going to list everything form the regulations but that gives you an idea that your customer is now protected in some way on the goods that they purchase.

Did you also know that whilst some auctions are exempt from these regulations – your auction site shop may not be – Buy It Now prices and instant checkouts may be covered by the regulations depending on what sort of account you have with your auction site – your customer may have rights under these regulations to return something they buy off you on the auction site. It is your responsibility to check this out further – in particular if you have a business and not a private account on the auction site. Most shop accounts on auctions sites now are deemed to be business accounts – but you need to check it out.

There are certain items exempt from the regulations but I am not going to detail all these – it is your responsibility to sort it out now – you are aware.

Another thing to note is that the Distance Selling Regulations do not replace a customer rights under the Sales of Goods Act, Goods and Services Act, etc etc and these are all things that as a tradesperson now you should be aware of.

There are a few posts on the threads/forum here about legislation etc and it is worth the research. Also, please note that it is you that is responsible for the DSR, not your dropshipper or supplier – contracts between business and business which is what it is when you buy something from them are not covered under the DSR – you may need to find out what your rights are under this and business regulations around – check the terms and conditions of your supplier / dropshipper and see what you are covered for by them by way of returns. Most legitimate suppliers and dropshippers out there will comply with the DSR because they know you have to – but be warned.

Also be warned about importing goods, or even exporting goods as extra taxes may be involved – I personally at the moment and I know it is going to limit my sales chances, but I will currently only be shipping to the UK – until I learn more about import/export and the taxes involved.

Ultimately though the buck stops with you now – you have entered the business world – you are responsibe for making sure you meet the minimum regulations that apply to you and your business. Hopefully you still remember you were warned in Episode 1 its not that ‘quick’ money making method you were looking for is it…. Good luck .


Ok its nearly the end of the working day sorry so another episode comes to the end…

----------------------

STILL TO COME IN “FOR THE NEWBIE, FROM A NEWBIE”:

- Getting people to your website
- Expanding your business.
- FAQs (if anyone has got any questions start asking now – PMs accepted – I will ignore the ones about but where can I get the mega profit making products from….)


Any questions – please feel free to ask and I will try to include the answers in the next episode.


Andy.

[Bhuna]

Hi everyone,

apologies to those awaiting the next instalment of my newbie guide but i've been given a big job at work to do which needs my full attention damn i got to do some work). As my spare time at home is currently spent with my kids and new dog, any little extra time i get is me getting my site up and running and my business going.

As such theres going to be a delay in getting the final chapter on here - in the meantime though i think you newbies have got a lot of reading still to do and hopefully this has helped some in making the decision before they commit as to whether they really do have the time for all this.

I will still be in the chat rooms and on the forums to answer questions if i can help anyone but the lengthy guide has to wait a short time sorry.

Andy.

[paulc010]

Andy,

Anyone who's actually using your guide to start out have a good few weeks at least before they need the information in the next installment

You and yours come first.

Paul

[Sam2]

Thanks for the useful info Andy. I am glad I used the search button.

[sgd]

This is really a great posting and will help a lot of people, including me!

I am at the very early stages o setting things up and it really is a minefield isnt it?

I have come across some Dropshippers that 'appear' to be perfect, have responded to all of my questions quickly and satisfactorily but then I read on here that they are a 'nightmare' to deal with!

Preparation and Planning, as with anything, are the key things I think, despite just 'wanted to get going'!

Thanks

[MrWall]

A huge thanks from me as well

just developing my ideas now with a view to be up and running by august - tutorials like this are invaluable

again, thanks

[adoredeals4u]

Hi Buanah

Have just read through your newbie to newbie, have had my site up and running for about 2 months, and still have loads to do to get it right. And still learning. I agree this is not a quick buck business, and i know the more you put in the more you will get out.

Just wanted to say that i wish this information was here when i started, it would have been so helpfull, I am going to take the advice you have given, and do some more research (again) lol.

The guys on the forum have been extremely helpfull, and would just like to thank each and every one for the support. And may I also suggest any newbies here take note of what you have said before they start.

Great posting
Thanks
sue (adoredeals4u)

[Robbie]

Very helpful Bhuna, thankyou very much.

[bigears]

great post, thanks

[joab]

I am impressed Andy, really impressed.
Your userguide for newbies is verry helpfull, you should write your own e-book and sell it on e-bay. You sure have the knowledge and writingskills.

take care,
Joost

[paulc010]

Oh the irony

[He did, but eBay have banned the sale of eBooks.....]


Paul

[Bhuna]

Still is available as an ebook - just as soon as i can be assed to upload it somewhere lol