Are you searching for profitable ideas to make money on Shopify? This is the guide you need.
Two decades ago, selling to a buyer in another country meant packing your products for a trip. With online shopping, selling and making money is simplified.
Shopify, alongside numerous other e-commerce platforms, continue to innovate new ways to reach wider audiences and earn more.
In this guide, we’ll show you how to make dropshipping with Shopify. Let’s dive in.
Why Choose Shopify?
Enter a well-set Shopify store and you’d begin to think it’s Walmart redesigned.
Shopify’s extensive custom features and user-friendly interface merge into an ideal platform for anyone to monetize products and services.
Business partners looking to expand? Check. Undergrad with some spare hours? Check. Sole entrepreneur? Check.
With an ever-growing portfolio of users, Shopify is perfect for anyone passionate about business, products, selling, or just making money. That’s you.
Business Strategies to Make Money on Shopify
Running a profitable Shopify business requires business acumen. You have to embrace the experience by wearing a businessman’s shoes.
Here’s how you can approach successful selling on Shopify:
Research and Choose a Profitable Niche
The foundation of a successful Shopify store is in identifying a profitable niche. Find out about trending products, explore popular marketplaces and analyze customer demands. Go for niches or products that align with your passion and interest while having a substantial target audience and potential growth.
Set up your Shopify Store
Opening a Shopify account is straightforward and requires no technical knowledge. Sign up with Shopify and select your preferred theme that can be customized to reflect your brand.
Optimize your store for SEO and keep it mobile-friendly. This will enhance your visitor’s experience and drive conversions.
Make use of tactics such as compelling product descriptions, customer testimonials and reviews, user-generated content and a seamless checkout process to improve conversion and sales.
Sell High-Quality Products
High-quality products set you apart from your competitors and helps you make more money. Offer and sell high-end products that are rich in quality and aesthetics.
Whether you are buying to resell or sourcing from suppliers, do not compromise on quality.
Build a Loyal and Engaged Customer Base
Customers are the base of your store. Your service and commitment earns their loyalty and trust. This will help you establish a strong brand presence.
They are your marketers, ambassadors and brand influencers. Take care of your customers and engage with them through social media and email marketing and respond to their issues swiftly.
Encourage them to subscribe to your newsletter, offer discounts, offer incentives for referrals etc. Personalize your communication and leverage customer feedback to continually improve your offerings.
Implement Effective Marketing Strategies
While Shopify is an excellent platform to sell, be open to explore and expand. Study other dropshipping marketplaces to reach a wider audience. Platforms like Amazon, eBay, Etsy etc are recommended dropshipping alternatives.
While at it, also ensure you have a solid presence on social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest etc.
Leverage some marketing strategies like social media marketing, content marketing, email marketing, influencing and search engine marketing to increase brand visibility.
Develop a detailed marketing plan and monitor its effectiveness through analytics tools to optimize your campaigns.
Monitor and Optimize Performance
Shopify provides and permits various third-party apps and integrations that enhance your store’s functionality and profitability.
Available in categories including upsell and cross-sell, abandoned cart recovery, and inventory management, these apps can be automated to streamline operations. This is handy for boosting sales.
You can monitor and analyze your store performance using Shopify’s built-in analytics or third-party tools via the Shopify app or website
. Track metrics such as:
- Conversion rate.
- Average order value.
- Customer acquisition cost and
- Customer lifetime value.
Assess your brand’s strengths and weaknesses based on gathered data, and identify areas for improvement.
8 Business Ideas to Try on Shopify
1. Dropshipping Store
With Dropshipping, you can distribute products without holding inventory. How does it work?
- Source for a reliable supplier or manufacturer
- Post product images on your Shopify store
- Ship product directly to your customer from the supplier.
One important thing to know is that there are no limitations to what you can sell. All you need is a trustworthy and reliable supplier to get quality products.
Some suppliers offer branding and shipment services where products are customized, packaged and shipped to the customers with your brand logo and tags.
In addition, Shopify integrates seamlessly with popular dropshipping platforms, making it convenient to launch and manage your dropshipping store.
2. Print-On-Demand (POD) Products
POD involves customizing items such as T-shirts, Mugs, Phone Cases, Caps etc.
The business model? It works just like dropshipping. However, printing commences only when an order is placed. The products are packaged and shipped to the customer on your behalf.
This is one lucrative business on Shopify. Shopify integrates with various POD apps and services, making it simple for you to set up and manage your store.
3. Niche Product Store
Selling niche products is another cool business idea to try on Shopify. Rather than sell general merchandise, you may want to narrow down your products to suit a smaller target audience with unique needs.
To select a niche, here are factors worth considering:
- Demographics – Gender, age bracket(), education and income level of your target audience
- Price – You can choose to sell luxury items, limited items or discounted items.
- Originality and Quality – Handmade products, premium products and economical.
You may also choose to sell to people in a particular region, city or country.
Moving forward, we will look at some of the niche product ideas to try.
- Pet Store – With over $250 million in sales in 2021, Pet business is a good niche-based business to dive into. Products include food, flea and tick repellants, and other items a pet owner may need.
- Health and Wellness – These business models work to improve the state, mind and overall well-being of customers. In this context, health and wellness may include nutrition, supplementary medicines or alternative medicines.
Also, you may sell ointment and scents to uplift the homes, offices or the human mind.
- Travellers – Travellers who want to travel light look for the best alternative for lighter loads and more eco-friendly products that are sustainable. Providing solutions to these issues will not only grow your business, it will also help in restoring the ecosystem.
4. Craft Making
Make money on Shopify selling handmade crafts. Be it crocheting, rug making, knitting, decorative items, paperwork etc.
To be an edge above your competitors, you can make your items eco-friendly and sustainable as people are more likely to purchase these products.
Juice up your offerings with complementary online courses for people who have an interest in craft making and designs. Earn more by selling the skill, and selling the knowledge.
5. Subscription-Based Business
Create a subscription-based model that offers customers a regular supply of digital products or services. This model provides recurring revenue and helps build a loyal customer base.
Also, you can work with brands to buy and resell their products in bundles or mini-packages.
The fun part of this business is the expectations of customers about what you have packaged in a box and their excitement upon revealing the box content.
6. Build Your Cloth Line
Leverage Shopify to show people your handwork. Use Shopify as a platform to showcase your business acumen.
Grab the attention of Fashion enthusiasts and young adults who are starting in fashion with your unique designs and materials.
Looking to stay two steps ahead of the pack? Plug into fashion styles and trends. Incorporate them within your designs, and watch your competitors play catch up.
To make money online on Shopify, make use of Shopify features, third-party apps and integrations such as upsells, cross-sells, product recommendation, abandoned cart recovery and other product recommendation apps to keep customers engaged in your store.
7. Online Fitness Brand
People who want to stay fit without going to the gym can subscribe to your channel for daily fitness exercises. This niche is an under-rated way to make money with Shopify.
With the increase in the need for people to stay healthy and fit, more people are subscribing to online classes to aid their fitness journey. Create a Shopify store with detailed, interactive online programmes for your loyalists.
In addition to classes, you can also sell diet and nutrition plans that complement their workout sessions and healthy lifestyle.
Want to deliver a personalized experience? Share your workout sessions across your socials.
Give your customers a peek into your routines as well. Share the struggles and the wins. This will gain their trust, increasing their confidence, and sealing their commitment.
8. Sell Books and Art
Lastly, selling your art piece, masterpieces and other artwork will fetch you the money you need on Shopify.
Post the images of your art piece, paintings and drawings as products on Shopify. Include their price tags and product descriptions for easy identification.
If you are good at photography, you can also sell your photographs on your Shopify Store. Capture nature, pets, wildlife, and fashion, and open your images to the public.
Leverage technology to convert your artworks into high-value, marketable NFTs and sell them at a worthy price.
Be sure you understand what NFTs are and what tools you need before you mint your first artwork.
Conclusion
Shopify provides a wealth of opportunities for entrepreneurs and businesses to thrive in e-commerce.
If you haven’t started a Shopify store, yesterday was the best time to start. Now is the second best time to implement.
Review the options shared above, sit down for in-depth research, and decide how you want to enter the market.
As you set up Shopify, be strategic about standing out. Optimize your visuals, content, and services to appeal to your target niche.
Track your periodic performance to spot gaps for improvement.
And if you need a third-party app to boost site traffic, reach out to CRO platforms like Adoric for expert counsel and advice.