Approximately 10% of our small business community have created an ecommerce platform for their business since the start of COVID, with dropshipping becoming an increasingly popular option.
A super efficient way to sell products to customers, without requiring you to have access to a huge warehouse or storage facility, dropshipping allows you to kickstart your dream business faster and cheaper.
To give you some idea of exactly how that process works, we spoke to Lisa and Anna. These two Australian small business owners used the dropshipping method to kickstart successful side-hustles that have already made them money.
Anna’s father had always run businesses importing and manufacturing from China, so when he passed away in 2019 she decided it was time to join forces with her husband and take up the family mantle. After doing some market research they founded, Boat & Bather, a beach towel business.
Anna and her husband both already ran two businesses between them, so they knew they couldn’t spend too much time running a third. They turned to Fiverr.com to provide freelancing assistance in the areas of the business they didn’t already have a natural skillset.
“For Boat & Bather we needed to be very specific with our artwork; our images needed to look sharp, clean and formatted precisely. We used Fiverr sellers for image editing, logo creation, website build, SEO and packaging design,” said Anna.
With the fiddly artwork outsourced to export, Anna and her husband were able to focus their time on building up the business.
“Our first shipment of the towels started selling quickly. It was a fun process to learn and try to master! We enjoyed the process of designing, manufacturing and then selling the final product directly to the USA market,” said Anna.
Anna has been delighted by the speed of the success of Boat & Bather and told Flying Solo outsourcing to Fiverr has contributed to their great result.
“Fiverr services provided a positive impact to our business. It is a one stop shop for all sorts of digital solutions.”
Her biggest tip? Create a really detailed job task brief with as many references as possible so your project can come to life as quickly as possible.
“Once you find a seller that works well with your processes then you can retain that amazing resource ongoing.”
Lisa started her business Steel Forged Knives “as a bit of a hobby” back in December 2019. Knowing she wanted to source her knives from China but wanting to save on costs, Lisa decided to pursue the dropshipping method.
Her next step was finding the right selling platform for her knives.
A long time eBay customer, Lisa told Flying Solo her positive customer service experience made the platform feel like a solid choice for dropshipping.
“I knew the platform well from a buyer’s perspective. Knowing that eBay provides a readily available potential customer base without needing to build a social media profile and online advertising made it a simple decision. Since joining eBay, it really has been a very smooth process to operate on.”
While Lisa experienced COVID-related delays in early February this year, things have turned around quickly for her business ever since.
“I have seen sales grow steadily since starting Steel Forged Knives. I had originally thought this would be a hobby for me, but as sales continue to increase, I can realistically see this becoming a full time business for me in the future.”
Have you got a dropshipping business idea just begging to come to life? Don’t wait! Now is a great time to team up with Fiverr as a seller, and bring your brilliant small business or side hustle to life. With verticals across Graphics & Design, Digital Marketing, Programming & Tech, Writing & Translation, Video & Animation, Music & Audio, Business & Lifestyle, Fiverr.com can help. Sign up (for free), set up your profile and gig, and offer your work to our global audience.
