How To Start Your Skincare Dropshipping Business In 7 Steps
Starting a dropshipping business, like any type of venture, isn't always easy peasy lemon squeezy. Still, it's a great first step into the world of entrepreneurship. And we're here to guide you through it!
Thanks to dropshipping you don't hold any inventory or pay for products upfront. If you're serious about your new venture, then it can become a sustainable source of income in the long run.
If you're passionate about skincare and ready to become an entrepreneur, here's a guide on how to get things started in just a few simple steps.
Step 1: Do Your Research
As soon as you have decided to start a skincare dropshipping business, conduct thorough competitive research. Check out other skincare brands in the market – what are they selling; what's their visual identity like; how are they marketing their products; what are their prices, customer reviews, etc. Research like this will help you understand the competitive landscape and how you could stand out with your brand.
In many resources, you will also hear the word “niche”, which in the ecommerce world is key to success. This is because the chances to be successful if you're catering to a specific niche are much better. It gives you your own audience and, thus, less competition to worry about.
Here's an example of a niche: Skincare products for chemistry students, where your designs consist of molecular patterns. You can put a chemistry formula cheat sheet or pun on the product packaging.
Some ways to go about your competitor research are:
run a Google search — try using Google tools, like, Google Trends;
use competitor spy tools like Similarweb, Niche Scrapper, Sell The Trend or others;
browse social media.
Step 2: Choose A Dropshipping Supplier
Selecting the right dropshipping supplier is a critical decision that can make or break your new venture. Look for suppliers that offer a wide range of high-quality skincare products, reliable shipping options, competitive pricing, and excellent customer service. Other factors to consider are product availability, order processing times and available online store integrations.
Selfnamed offers more than 70 sustainable, high-quality products that you can customise with your brand. We have put years into product research and ingredient sourcing to make sure the end product is not only effective, but also friendly to your skin and the environment.
The very essence of Selfnamed products lies in the active ingredients sourced from flowers and herbs from the Baltic meadows and forests. The unique natural environment of the Baltic region contributes to the potency of these ingredients.
Our products are Natural and Organic Certified according to the international COSMOS standard by ECOCERT Greenlife. All products comply with the necessary regulations, so you can legally sell them in the EU, UK, and the USA.
If you plan on starting your skincare dropshipping business with Selfnamed, know – you're in the hands of industry professionals, who want to see your business reach new heights.
Selfnamed Performance Skincare Product Sample Set
Step 3: Build Your Ecommerce Store
Next thing on your skincare dropshipping business to-do list is building your ecommerce store. This will be the home where you send traffic, sell products, and process payments. Selfnamed currently offers direct integrations with two of the biggest ecommerce store platforms in the world: Shopify and WooCommerce (Woo).
Both platforms make it easy to build and launch your ecommerce website, from finding a domain name to adding marketing and sales plug-ins. Between the two, there are an estimated 5 million-plus users who've earned billions of dollars, globally. They are complete commerce platforms that allow you to sell in multiple places (including online), sell in multiple currencies, and easily manage products and accept payments.
You don't have to have design skills or be a developer to use either of these platforms. Once you sign up, you get access to a variety of themes and store templates (free and paid).
If you need help deciding, which platform to choose for your business, see a brief comparison below:
Step 4: Decide On a Business Structure
If you're serious about your venture, you may want to set up a legitimate business entity. Unfortunately, we haven't gone to law school, so we can't offer legal advice. Please note, that business structures may differ from country to country. For example, in the USA, most small entrepreneurs (ecommerce sellers) tend to go with either a sole proprietorship or an LLC.
Furthermore, it's important to check the tax requirements in your country – or in the case of the USA, in your specific state. For example, if Selfnamed products are sent to a business in another EU country, we don't charge VAT if you have a valid EU VAT number, and you have been approved as a verified status in your Selfnamed profile. You can learn more about our billing and taxes policy here.
We strongly recommend consulting with a lawyer before deciding on a business structure.
Step 5: Get Your Finances In Order
A common mistake entrepreneurs make when starting a business is mixing their personal finances with business finances. This often causes confusion, makes accounting more difficult, can lead to personal assumption of business liabilities, and is a big red flag for tax audits.
To avoid unnecessary headache, we recommend keeping your business and personal finances separate as much as possible. The best way to do that is by opening up a new account in your business's name. Another way is to keep all your business-related finances in your PayPal account and operate with that as much as possible. However, once your skincare business really takes off, a separate bank account would be a smart move.
How much money you earn with your skincare dropshipping business, is totally up to you, as you are in charge of the profit margins. We recommend reading this article to understand how to earn money with Selfnamed, before launching your store.
Step 6: Market Your Dropshipping Store
Now, that you have all the steps on how to start a skincare dropshipping business, it's time to talk about marketing your new store. To stand out in your market, you may want to put extra effort into your marketing and advertising efforts when building your business plan.
Here are different ways to market your store:
Paid ads (Meta and Google). Facebook ads are scalable, products can perform well on them, and they tap into people's desire to impulse buy. You can run Google Shopping Ads and target long-tail keywords where shoppers are more likely to buy.
Influencer marketing. Influencer marketing is an affordable way to reach your target audience because people tend to trust influencers more than traditional advertising. The best social media platforms for influencers are TikTok and Instagram.
Content Marketing. Perfect for building a long-term stream of traffic for your store. You can start a blog around your dropshipping niche and create content that entertains and educates your audience. If written format blogs aren't your thing, explore YouTube or podcasts as options to spread the word about your brand.
Communities. Get involved with groups of people who are passionate about your niche. Start conversations with potential customers on Reddit, Facebook Groups or other online forums. Aim to help and build relationships with potential customers so they trust your brand and want to buy from it.
Email marketing. A powerful too for dropshipping businesses, as it helps build long-lasting relationships with customers and drives repeat purchases. By sending targeted, personalised content, you can increase customer engagement and boost sales.
Step 7: Analyse And Improve Your Offering
This is already a step for when your skincare dropshipping business has been launched, and you've been marketing for some time. Start looking at the results of your hard work and check your store analytics. Ask yourself this:
What are my best performing products?
Where should I put more ad funds?
Who are my best customers?
Are people buying more on desktop or mobile? And what's the conversion rate for each device?
What products and variants are the most profitable?
What are my sales and gross profits looking like month over month?
Am I staying profitable after covering all the store fees at the end of the month?
What other products, features my customers have asked for?
Also, don't forget to check in on your competitors, especially those in the same niche as you. Are they raising or lowering their prices? How often are they adding new products? What can you do more, to drive even more traffic to your store?
Answers to all of these questions above will help you decide on how your business should develop further on. Don't be scared to experiment by switching things up for products that don't sell so well. Perhaps they need a more compelling description or title. Perhaps it's possible to change the design of the packaging, or perhaps your customers don't have enough information about the product, so you might need to push more on influencer marketing.
Whatever your first results are, don't give up – keep going! In most cases, it takes a bit of time for things to pick up and for customers to notice your store. But, by staying consistent, things are bound to improve. So, enough waiting around – start your skincare dropshipping business and work towards financial freedom!
How To Start Your Own Skincare Line Using Selfnamed
Selfnamed is here to help create your own skincare line by making the process as simple and seamless as possible. As soon as you decide on your ideal customer and product range, there are only a few simple steps to take:
Select product sample sets. You can choose from more than 30 high-quality, organic or natural certified skincare products made in Northern Europe.
Add your style. Selfnamed offers an easy-to-use design studio to create labels and packaging. You can work with pre-made print-ready templates or create your design from scratch. You can also choose our design service.
Start selling your products. There are no minimum orders, meaning you can easily adjust the volume to your needs.
Before making a custom order, we recommend looking at our sample set selection. These sets contain curated product lines for different skin types, letting you choose the best products for your brand. This way you can test the products — their consistencies, textures, fragrances, as well as packaging quality.
There are the basic steps on how to start a skincare line from the comfort of your home. Best of luck with your new endeavour!
