Starting a successful dropshipping business isn’t about your goals, your website design or your work-hard attitude. Instead, it is about finding the right dropshipping products to sell online, which is without a doubt one of the most daunting tasks for dropshippers today.

You can find a lot of forum threads on this topic where people are looking for expert help on finding dropshipping products that sell. However, the real answer you need is not out there on forums. Instead, it is in your own head and the ability to brainstorm, research and analyze the market.

So, are you ready to get creative?

Step 1 – Start With A Set Of Guidelines

The first thing you need when determining what to sell on your dropshipping website is a set of requirements for your future products. In fact, you must have a filter or a set of guidelines in order to see what kind of products you can sell and make profits from. Otherwise, you would be shooting in the dark.

Some of the must-have dropshipping product guidelines include the following:

• Your product must not be fragile and must be easy to ship – Choosing fragile or overly delicate products will fill you with headaches and money returns because of broken goods.
• Your product should not take up much space – Choosing small products to sell is what’s best – so make sure to pick products that fit in a shoebox.
• The product’s value must be ambiguous – Placing a price tag on electronics is hard because people know their price. This is why you should pick products like keepsakes and informational goods which are easy to price and earn money on.
• The product should be timeless – Again, products like electronics lose value the longer they stay on the shelves.
• Seasonal goods are another ‘no’ – You want to sell every season and not just one season, right?
• Sell goods that sell from £15 to £200 – This is the sweet spot for dropshipping products that sell like hotcakes.

Now that you have the list of guidelines, it’s time to move to the next step, where you should think outside of the box.

Step 2 – Think Outside Of The Box

As a dropshipper, you should not only see products with a nice price tag that you can earn money on – but also think about expanding your business and selling more as you continue to add products. Here, it is important that your products are relevant to each other. Basically, you should think about points such as:

• Choosing a niche with related products that you can expand into – If you sell handkerchiefs, you should start selling linens in an easy way. The goal is to expand to markets easily, so have this in mind.
• Choosing products that are bought as more than one – If you are selling handkerchiefs, you will rarely get an order with one handkerchief. The goal is to scale and get more orders, right?
• Personalized products sell more – The margins for something personalized are always higher than regular products, so make sure to offer customized goods and charge more.
• Consumable products are also great – Consumable products give you repeat customers which translates to stable sales.
• Fan bases are great – Choosing products that have dedicated fan bases or blogs also gives you a certain audience you can easily market to.
• Accessories, product sets and additions – Products that come with accessories and additions are great because they incentivize the buyer to order again. So, it is in your best interest to start selling product sets and accessories so that you can cross-sell.

Now that you really know what dropshipping products to aim at, it’s time to look at the analytics.

Step 3 – Brainstorm Products To Sell Using Amazon’s Sales Data

As you probably know, Amazon is becoming the largest marketplace for online shopping in the world. From the United States to Germany, there are a lot of local Amazon sites which promote great affiliate programs where dropshippers can earn well.

One thing you should know is that every Amazon product is assigned as a BSR or a ‘Best Seller Rank’. The number is used by Amazon to determine how well a product is selling compared to others in the category. Here is an example.

So, you can learn a lot from every particular product with the BSR and make an educated guess on how many units are sold per day. Roughly, a BSR of 7228 corresponds to about 10 sales per day.

The image below can help you regarding BSR rankings and different categories (source: JungleScout.com).

Step 4 – Trending Products Are Great For Dropshiping Businesses

Many dropshippers are using the search engines to calculate how good some products are selling – and which products to pick for their strategy.

Since Google is the largest search engine in the world, it is also usually a place that most shoppers visit to find good products online. So, you can use the Google Trends tool to search for the hottest products in some category or products that are currently trending.

Besides Google Trends, you can also use the following websites to find trending products which are suitable (or similar) to your store’s inventory:

• Kickstarter.com
• Wish.com
• Wanelo.com

By taking a look at these resources, you can find trending products which are suitable to your store’s inventory.

A Final Word

In the end, luck is also a part of finding dropshipping products that sell like hotcakes. In order to succeed in the world of dropshipping, you have to be lucky as much as you have to be resourceful. However, this guide can give you a good start and let you eliminate a couple of roadblocks right from the start.

Good luck!