Finding the right dropshipping supplier is one of THE most important factors in the success of your dropshipping business. As mentioned in this article, the supplier will be the one responsible for fulfilling orders and making sure orders are processed efficiently and in a timely manner. 

It is therefore an important step in this process to identify legitimate suppliers who can offer you significantly lower prices and better order fulfillment. Some suppliers may pose as wholesalers but in reality, are retailers who have higher prices and do not buy directly from manufacturers. 

So how do we identify them? 

As one of the most used dropshipping suppliers in E-Commerce, Aliexpress is number one on the list because suppliers there can offer you the lowest prices of almost anything you can think of selling. There are other dropshipping platforms though such as Dropship Direct, Wholesale Central, SaleHoo, MegaGoods, and more. Some of these platforms are free to use but most of them are paid. Since I’ve only used Aliexpress, I will be focusing on that in this article, and also because it is widely used by many dropshippers. 

In addition, what’s the point of dropshipping if you’re going to pay the monthly fees for these suppliers? 

Difference between Aliexpress and Alibaba

Before we proceed with identifying the right supplier to work with, let’s differentiate first Aliexpress from Alibaba. For the benefit of those who are not familiar with the two platforms, Alibaba caters primarily to businesses that buy in bulk and sells their products to consumers while Aliexpress caters directly to consumers. 

Alibaba also offers the customization of logos and packaging with minimum required order. Take a look at the image below:

As you can see from this image, you can buy this watch at $1.35/piece for orders less than 500 pieces, 100-499 min. order for $1.44 or $1.53 for 10-99 pieces have the logo customized on the watch for a minimum order of 300 pieces and customized packaging at minimum order of 1000 pieces. You can still buy this watch for one piece though and have it sent to your customers, but it will cost a total of $19.21 to have it sent to your customers in the US. 

On the other hand, Aliexpress offers you a significantly lower amount per piece and does not require minimum order amount to buy. Although suppliers there do not have the capability to customize logos or packaging.

Here’s an example:

You can buy a watch for $3.58 with free shipping and no minimum required quantity to order. 

Take note though that some dropshippers who have the budget to start their business, use FBA (Fulfillment by Amazon) service or other fulfillment services to order products from Alibaba and have their products branded with their own. I have to let you know though that this is costly and requires you to register a company in the US to be able to do so. 

Finding the right supplier on Aliexpress

The success of your brand relies on how well your supplier fulfills your orders. It goes without saying that finding the right supplier is the key to becoming successful in this business. When your supplier messes up the order, it’s your brand that’s responsible for that, not the supplier.

Many of the customers do not even know you are dropshipping their orders from a supplier. Here are a few things to keep in mind when choosing a supplier to work with:

• Find an experienced supplier with years of experience in dropshipping – create an account on Aliexpress to use in placing your customers’ orders. Inquire about their product and services such as policy on returns or damaged products, if they accept dropshipping, methods of payment, and any information you feel is vital to your operations. 

In our example below, we can see that the seller has been in the business for 12 years now. It also has information such as seller ratings and overall store positive feedback. I highly suggest working with suppliers with no less than 95% overall positive feedback. This point was actually not taught in other dropshipping courses I know.

This will let you know that the seller has good positive reviews from customers who ordered products from them in the past and how well they resolve issues relating to refunds, damaged products, and whatnot. 

• Think long-term. When we put up a business, we always think it’s going to last for as long as it can. So it’s important to find a supplier that can help us and support us with our growth when we scale up the business. When your orders have increased significantly high, how can they help you with it? Instead of placing the orders manually on Aliexpress, is there a workaround they can do to help you with the burden of manually placing 100 orders online? Some dropshippers I know have found suppliers that allowed them to just email and pay in bulk daily or whatever is applicable for the number of orders they bring in.

• Find suppliers with good quality products. As you may already know, one way that we can figure this out aside from buying the products ourselves is to read the customer feedback. Go to the product you plan to dropship and read the comments and ratings. Good quality products have a high level of customer satisfaction rating and low returns and dissatisfied customers. 

• Find suppliers that fulfill orders on time. Due to the competitiveness of the market finding a supplier who ships orders in a shorter amount of time can mean happy customers. Longer shipping times may lead to dissatisfied customers. 

Also read How I Earned 10k USD in Dropshipping Business: Without spending a single cent on ads

Tips for Fulfilling Customer’s Order

1. When you place your customer’s order on Aliexpress you may think of saving yourself some dollars to add to your income by using the free shipping service. I tell you it’s still worth it to spend a couple of dollars on shipping by using ePacket. It only costs about $2 and some cents to have their orders delivered within 2-4 weeks. The free service can be as long as two months! 
2. It’s very important to be honest with your customers about shipping time. Dropshipping can mean that their orders may be delivered within 2-4 weeks or longer depending on the product and other factors such as holidays etc. There are suppliers that can fulfill orders in two weeks’ time including delivery but some require a longer time period due to product preparation and packaging. So it’s safe to tell your customers upon order confirmation the time their orders take to be delivered. 

You can use the lines such as  “Your order may take 3-4 weeks to be delivered as we ship from global suppliers…”

This way your customers would know what to expect and when to expect their orders. You can also avoid customers from getting angry because they were expecting their orders to arrive in 5-7 days, which is the usual delivery time frame in the US.

It’s not always possible to find suppliers that will be great right off the bat. So you may still go through the elimination process as you go along and make sure to find another supplier who offers the same product but can give your better service.

Here are some of the questions you can ask prospective suppliers:

Are the prices still negotiable if I place more orders?

What’s your return policy?

Do you have representatives that can answer questions about the product specifics? 

What’s your refund policy?

You may ask other questions that may be useful for your business. The important thing is knowing the supplier can take care of your customers and are easy to reach out to.