TikTok Dropshipping: How to Start and Grow Sales
Quick answer: TikTok dropshipping means promoting products on TikTok and fulfilling orders through a supplier who ships directly to the customer. To start, connect your Shopify store to a TikTok business account, pick low-price, impulse-buy products that suit a young audience, find a reliable supplier, then grow sales with organic videos, influencer marketing and TikTok ads. Its strengths are huge reach and low entry cost; the trade-offs are time spent on content and ad budget.
Do you know TikTok dropshipping? TikTok’s huge user traffic makes it a lucrative marketing channel. TikTok ads have become a recognized marketing strategy for many brands. And there are a lot of dropshipping merchants advertising on TikTok to get more sales. Are you also wondering if TikTok marketing can work for your brand?
If you don’t know how to start your dropshipping business on TikTok, we have written this page to help you.
Benefits of TikTok Dropshipping
1
Huge traffic to attract a huge audience
In 2017, the TikTok application was launched in the international market and immediately became famous for dance trends, challenges, and lip-synch videos. TikTok users grew rapidly, and it became one of the most downloaded applications in the world. That growth means creative and quick-thinking brands can attract a large audience.
Publishers like The Washington Post have amassed 400,000+ followers in less than a year. Positioning themselves as a creative force with the potential to shift influence in the process to a new, more global, and younger demographic.
These show that TikTok Dropshipping can not only bring you huge traffic but also great brand awareness and influence potential.
2
More equity in marketing and attraction
TikTok Dropshipping also has a fairly fair competition environment, and the KOL price is low. Unlike Instagram or YouTube, even accounts with zero followers can get millions of views on new videos. Business accounts can also add a link in their bio to send traffic from TikTok to their store.
3
Strong ability to drive consumption
We found that the content that exploded in TikTok covers a variety of products, and there are bloggers who recommend Amazon’s good stuff series. Most of them are videos with millions of views. And some “recommended goodies” videos, the products cover small appliances, jeans, cosmetics, kitchen supplies, down jackets, and so on. As a cross-border seller, you can imagine how many prospective customers are asking how to buy these products under these videos. This strong ability to drive consumption is an impossible attraction for you to refuse.
Disadvantages of TikTok Dropshipping
1
Requires significant money
Although the amount of money spent on advertising on TikTok is much less than that on Facebook, it still requires a huge investment when you promote a product dropshipping on TikTok.
2
Take a longer time
Because videos on TikTok pay more attention to the quality of content, it means that you have to spend more time improving your content to attract your users. And your TikTok account and content may become popular overnight or for months.
3
Audience limitation
Most of the audiences on TikTok are young people: according to figures widely reported when this article was first written, 60% of TikTok’s monthly active users are between 16 and 24 years old, and 63% of TikTok’s users in the United States are between 10 and 29 years old. Therefore, your product dropshipping on TikTok should be closer to these people, so that you can make profits.
How to Dropship on TikTok with Shopify
In October 2020, Shopify partnered with TikTok. Shopify allows merchants to sell products in the form of shopping video advertisements. TikTok users can purchase products by clicking advertisements. All transactions will be conducted through Shopify’s website.
This opens up opportunities for all businesses looking to do TikTok dropshipping. Your followers can browse all your products from the TikTok app. If they’re interested in a product, TikTok will link them directly to your Shopify store for the checkout process!
So let’s see how to use Shopify for TikTok dropshipping.
1. Connect Shopify and TikTok
Create Shopify TikTok Store
Login to Shopify, enter your email address, and apply for your Shopify account.
Then directly connect a TikTok account of your own to the background. It is also possible to create a TikTok business account.
After successfully connecting to your store, you can see a TikTok business dashboard.
2. Product Selection
How do you find the most profitable products for TikTok dropshipping?
One key point is to refer to the TikTok ranking list. You can also refer to the list of platforms such as Amazon and AliExpress.
Secondly, search for hot spots on the TikTok homepage, for example, you can combine recent sports events and hot news selections.
The third caters to the consumption preferences of TikTok users. Most of the users on TikTok are young people, who can take advantage of their impulsive consumption characteristics to find unique products.
Fourth, you can also search for topics and tags related to the products you dropshipping on TikTok Popular, and do vertical and deep digging on the TikTok tag. Find the best-selling products related to the products you sell, and push them to the top.
In short, these products must meet the following characteristics:
The price can’t be too high
The audience is younger
Products are suitable for impulse consumption.
3. Find a supplier
Suppliers are your business partners who can drive your business success.
So what are the advantages of working with a supplier?
-
Can save your shipping time
-
Reduce manufacturing costs and make products have a cost advantage.
So how to find the right dropshipping supplier?
-
You can find suppliers who can cooperate with you on major shopping platforms such as Amazon and AliExpress.
-
You can also use Google to search for domestic and foreign wholesale suppliers. For example, you can try adding words like “distributor” and “bulk” to the search bar to make your search as specific as possible. But it will take you a lot of time.
Or you can go directly to an e-commerce fulfillment company that can help you grow your e-commerce business quickly and efficiently. Not only can they help you source products, but they can also help you ship them directly. For example, Honest FulPhilment, which has professional purchasing personnel, can help you purchase the cheapest products you need from all over China.
Third-Party Logistics (3PL)
In addition, you may also need 3PL logistics services to help your business. Third-Party Logistics (3PL) refers to the process of outsourcing logistics services, including storing and transporting items around the world.
The 3PL process mainly includes receiving inventory, 3PL warehousing, picking, packing, and shipping. Honest FulPhilment has its own tracking software that integrates with your e-commerce platform to keep you and your customers informed about orders and their fulfillment.
4. How to Use TikTok Organic Traffic Promotion
Organic Content
Before promoting your product and brand, you need to create your own TikTok account. And optimize your account and content every day.
First of all, I suggest you cultivate your account. Your video content needs entertainment users to be noticed. In this process, you will build an audience base and get more followers. So that you can become an influencer on TikTok. Then you can integrate your product or brand into your video content. I suggest you start from the cultural circle. For example, if you sell JK skirts, your content should be more in line with JK culture to attract your target consumers.
Positives
Building your own account is free. This means you can get higher profits. And with the increasing influence of your account, you will have a reputation advantage, and subsequent marketing will be more easily accepted by users.
Negatives
You need to spend a lot of time creating content and growing your following. And there is a risk of failure in the process, which can greatly damage your product and brand image.
Influencer Marketing with TikTok Dropshipping
You can work with some bloggers with a lot of fans and ask them to help you insert your products in high-traffic videos, or directly make promotional videos for your products to bring traffic to your products. Of course, the most worthy of your cooperation is the anchor who brings the goods. You must know that these anchors have far more influence than those stars with huge fan bases, and the price of using them will be cheaper than that of stars. A live stream could double your sales.
So, how to find the right influencer for your product?
You can find TikTok celebrities in relevant fields by searching keywords of your own brand or product.
You can find celebrities in the accounts of competitive brands or big brands.
Cooperate with some social media marketing companies to help you match the most suitable celebrity and promote cooperation. Such as Social Media 55, Social Hire, and NoxInfluencer, these companies are very good. But it will be expensive.
Positives
Low cost and high yield.
Cheaper than that of a celebrity.
The traffic of Internet celebrities is very large
Negatives
You can’t fully control who the audience is
How to Advertise on TikTok
- Open screen Ad
A full-screen ad that all users can see when they open TikTok. This is more direct and easy for users to see, but it is also easy to be skipped.
- In-stream advertisements
Interspersed and pushed during the process of users swiping videos. Refers to placing an advertising video on the “For You” page, and clickable pop-up terms such as “Buy Now” and “Learn More” appear below the video. Your content must be engaging enough that potential customers will click through to learn about it. For example, the words discounts or discounts can appear in the video or the same paragraph.
- Brands take over advertising
These types of ads are popular and often use a combination of images, GIFs, and video clips, linking to landing pages or hashtag challenges. This will greatly encourage users to interact directly with your brand.
Positives
Advertising on TikTok is cheaper than on Facebook. And the people who have bought something in your store will form a group. TikTok will think these are your audiences and will push your content to them, causing you to generate new traffic.
Negatives
You need to pay attention to two points, one is that some users will automatically ignore ads. Second, the advertisement will be rejected by TikTok review.
Suggestion: In order to minimize the chances of your ad being ignored and disapproved, it is recommended that you do a good job of building your brand and building your credibility. It is recommended that you upload videos of people using your product, or show how your product can benefit users in the video. And it is recommended that your video content conforms to TikTok’s value orientation.
5 Strategies for TikTok Dropshipping
Tags and sounds (the music you use in TikTok videos) are two of the best ways to improve content discoverability. If you add a hot tag to the title, you will be more likely to be voted for and promoted to the popular page. For example, the currently known “# for your page” tag is believed to increase your chances of appearing in “popular recommendations”. Also, remember that this is not Instagram. Don’t try to use 21 tags on TikTok, which will greatly reduce your video effect.
You need to keep an eye on trends and change your content. If you are not sure which are the latest trends on TikTok, you can check TikTok’s discovery page for inspiration. And you can co-shoot with others or make popular videos to join the trend. In addition, we also found that the most effective product promotion on TikTok is the product copied by the public. It is also a derivative of the existing trend.
TikTok supports users to interact frequently. The more you interact, the higher the popularity will be pushed. Comments are the way to achieve this. You need to reply to every comment under your video content, and also comment more on some popular bloggers. It would be better if your comment could become the first hot comment.
When you find someone following you, you can’t help but click on his homepage. This is your opportunity to attract traffic. Maybe your potential customers will be attracted to your homepage and even contact you by private message.
You need to use some effects on TikTok to publish videos, and the more videos you publish, the more fans you will grow. Remember that you should release videos at the same time every day, at least one video every day, preferably at 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. This will make it easier for people to see your account and content.
Conclusion
Now you know that as a social marketing channel, TikTok has great advantages and influence in today’s young market. You have also received some great advice on TikTok dropshipping through this article. Now you can promote your products in TikTok yourself. If you have further questions, you can contact Honest FulPhilment and we can help your business.
Hello
eCommerce Fulfilment Solutions
FAQ
What is TikTok dropshipping?
TikTok dropshipping means using TikTok videos, influencers and ads to drive buyers to products you sell without holding stock. When a customer orders, your supplier or fulfillment partner ships the item directly to them.
How do I start dropshipping on TikTok?
Set up an online store such as Shopify, connect it to a TikTok business account with the TikTok app, choose trending low-price products, find a reliable supplier, and promote the products with organic videos, influencer collaborations or TikTok ads.
What products sell best for TikTok dropshipping?
Products that look good on video, cost little and suit impulse buying do best, especially items aimed at a young audience. Check TikTok trending lists, hashtags and best-seller lists on marketplaces for ideas.
Is TikTok dropshipping profitable?
It can be, because a single video can reach a huge audience even from a new account. But it takes time to create content, ads and influencers cost money, and margins depend on product cost, shipping and returns.
Do I need a supplier for TikTok dropshipping?
Yes. You need a supplier or dropshipping agent that keeps products in stock, ships quickly and syncs tracking numbers to your store, because viral videos can create sudden spikes in orders.