How to Dropship Jewelry in 3 Easy Steps!

Is selling jewelry online profitable?

Yes, very much so. Jewelry is part of human life—it is one of those things that improves a person’s sense of self-worth. And in dropshipping, you do not even have to buy your own inventory 🙂

Now, just because you can sell other people’s products doesn’t mean there are no steps to follow. Here, I want to talk about the right steps to take in dropshipping jewelry….the right way! I am assuming that you already have a good idea what dropshipping is about, then we can dive straight into the details about getting the most out of dropshipping jewelry specifically.

We hope that this short guide can be a jumping off point for anyone interested in getting into this market. A lot of people think starting dropshipping stores is easy, but if you don’t think about it first carefully you could loose a lot of money!

STEP 1: Find Suppliers

The first step in building a jewelry store is to find a supplier. Not all suppliers ship real authentic jewelry, so you have to ensure that you are getting supplies from a reliable source. If you want, you can also sell “faux” jewelry—imitations of the real thing but still look valuable, but you have to tell your customer this in advance. Otherwise, they might feel duped!

You could use the following websites/ services to hunt out a good supplier:

• SaleHoo – this is a dropship supplier tool that has over 8,000 verified suppliers in its list. SaleHoo offers a wide range of product options for online sellers. Be aware that Salehoo is a paid service, but the cost is relatively little at $67 a year or $127 lifetime. To get access to so many verified suppliers will save you a lot of legwork and could be worth the cost to a lot of people. It features an education portal that is free for you to use—the portal helps you learn how to manage your business. So that’s a nice bonus to have. With SaleHoo, you will also have access to a tool called Market Labs. This is a system that gathers data from all its suppliers and sellers, and it allows you to see what items are hot, what items are selling, and how much profit you can make for each. A nice addition to the basic functionality.

• AliExpress – While AliExpress has had a bad rap for cheap knockoffs, there are some gems in there if you know where to look! And if you are time rich but money poor Aliexpress could be a great to find good suppliers on the cheap! The great thing about AliExpress is that you can order one item at a time. Some other suppliers might force you into buying batches of wholesale lots. This makes it easy to do the testing we will mention later. The difference here is that, unlike the other two services recommended, Aliexpress is not only showing only high quality suppliers. To weed out the low quality suppliers, as a start try to find suppliers with multiple positive reviews.

• Spocket – this is a dropshipping tool that you integrate with your Shopify store. It is a directory of suppliers that are also vouched for by the operators of Spocket. It has a free membership and paid membership. Although be aware the free plan is limited and basic. When you find any kind of success, you will probably have to upgrade. With Spocket, you can choose jewelry products according to the location of the item, and according to where the supplier ships. The great thing about Spocket is that it does not only get suppliers from Aliexpress, but from all over the world. What this means is that you can source jewelry from different parts of the globe. It’s great to have such flexibility, and might help you cut down on long shipping times.

Test Potential Suppliers

After finding some suppliers that you like the look of from the above places, you then need to test their service and product quality to make sure they are both quality. Otherwise, you may have to deal with a lot of returns.

Just order one from each supplier. If you order “faux” or imitation jewelry, then you are not going to spend a lot of money. Even for authentic jewelry, do not be afraid to order. AliExpress has a buyer protection program. Read this program carefully, and only buy from sellers who offer a long time-frame for refund. It is important you check out the quality. After all, you are using them to back up your own business reputation!

If the product you get is not as described, you can return it to the seller and get a refund. If it is great, you can keep it and sell it later on from your online store.

STEP 2: Choose a platform

The second step on how to dropship jewelry is to build your store. But before this, you have to work out what platform to use. The platform is the software or system where you will build your store.

The two most common options are Shopify and WordPress with WooCommerce, but there are many more. If you already have an experience building a site, then you will find it easy to build your store via WordPress. If not, you are better off on Shopify.  

Shopify – here, you can build an online store that is fully functional. Unlike other web-builders, there is little to no need to use apps and plug-ins to build a store on Shopify. The system is ready for selling. All you have to do is to choose a theme and then upload your product images and descriptions. However, you will have to pay if you want some fancy extras to your store, such as upsells or countdown timers.

You do not have to learn about API integration with Shopify. You can choose from hundreds of payment systems and processors and activate them by simply clicking some buttons.

Shopify costs at least $29 per month. This fee does not include transaction fees. You have to pay Shopify a percentage of your sales, even if your sale was charged via another payment processor.

WooCommerce – this is a plug-in that you install in WordPress. WooCommerce will turn a simple blog website into something ready for selling. Just be aware that along with this comes more technical tinkering than with Shopify. If you already know about tinkering with websites, this could be a good option for you.

The thing with WooCommerce is that while it is free, it lacks a lot of functionalities that you would need on your store. It takes a lot of skill to make this work, but it is much more affordable than Shopify.

WooCommerce is great to build a jewelry dropshipping store on because of its flexibility. However, its flexibility comes at a cost. As with Shopify, you would probably need to spend a decent amount on addons to get your site exactly how you want it. And if you want your customers to take you seriously, you need a professional looking store 🙂

What I suggest is that you use alternative apps. For example, you can buy Elementor just once for $49 per year. Elementor is an app that allows you to build your WooCommerce store according to your taste, without having to buy the other WooCommerce plug-ins, themes etc.

STEP 3: Market your store

The last step on how to dropship jewelry is to market your store. There are basically two ways that I would recommend:

• Paid ads – the fastest way to get your business out there is to use paid ads. You can launch your ads in Google, Facebook, Instagram, and many other platforms. Ads can become costly, so make sure you do your research before you launch one.  
• Free traffic – the other method is the free method, which you can do through taking advantage of social media. You need to create your business pages and then post photos of your jewelry. You can also blog, and then wait until your posts rank high on Google.

Blogging is one of the most effective ways to build an online asset. Once your blog is published, it is there to stay, and it will deliver free traffic to your store for life. Just be aware that blogging can be slow at the start and social media requries a lot of effort to start getting decent traction.

So, Should I Dropship Jewelry?

Is jewelry good for dropshipping? Yes, it is, provided that you do your due diligence. Don’t just jump in there with the first few products you see. Research your products and make sure you find the best way to set up a pro looking store! Taking time at the start will give you the best chance of success.

Remember, dropshipping jewelry is not that easy. If it was, everyone would be doing it. Make sure you do it right and rise above the rest! It takes patience to select the products wisely and to build the store well. Once both are done, you will have to focus on using the right marketing platforms to find your customers and present your offer.

If you are new to dropshipping, you need to understand that this is not a get-rich-quick scheme. It can take weeks or even months before you can make a sale. The key to success is to have a budget that is going to last you at least a year. Think of it like a real business. People don’t start a real life business with only enough money for one month’s rent! This wouldn’t be enough time to build up the required business to make a profit. It’s exactly the same for an online digital business. Invest in it, give it time for you to learn your trade and find your customers.

Be patient. Understand that failure is part of the process. Identify where you went wrong, correct them, and then move forward.