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The key to a successful business is preparation, and understanding your expenses will help you succeed with what you do! So, how much does it really cost to start a drop servicing business? Let’s figure this out together!
The cost varies depending on the platform you end up using. For Shopify, you should be prepared for at least $29/month, while it costs an average of $80/year on WordPress. However, sales funnels may seem to be the costliest option ($97/month), but they can save you a lot in the long run.
In today’s article, I will be discussing exactly what determines your drop servicing startup costs and expenses and the various online tools that you can leverage to achieve success and dominate your market.
If you find this article inspiring and helpful, don’t keep it to yourself and share it with your beloved ones 🙂
What Does Determine Your Drop Servicing Business Expenses?
“You can only improve what you measure”
And it’s true… because numbers just don’t lie!
Knowing your initial costs, expenses, and numbers will give you a competitive advantage over your competitors, as you would be able to better know what’s your dream customer worth to you and your business.
Knowing so will give you insights about the customer lifetime value (which is the total expected amount of revenue from the relationship with the customer) and about the average order value for each buyer!
It’s important to figure out how much you’re actually willing to pay in advertising to acquire a new customer, but before that, you would need to have a clear vision of your finances and other expenses, for more on-point business decisions…
Businesses are not created and treated equally…
Although an online business requires less overhead and capital than a brick-and-mortar type of business, you still have to spend some time and money to raise a healthy and profitable online business, that really has the potential to replace your job.
So, what does determine your drop servicing side-hustle costs and expenses?
For Starting A Drop Servicing Business, You Would Need:
- A Unique domain name!
- Appropriate brand identity building!
- An email marketing toolkit and autoresponder!
- A functional and responsive online storefront!
- Marketing and promotion!
Domain name – A domain name is an actual URL that will represent your online business. It would look something like this: mywebsitename.com!
This is nothing to worry about as it’s a one-year (or more) tiny investment! The fact is, web hosting companies like Bluehost offer a free domain name with the yearly packages.
So, if you end up using Bluehost as your web hosting service provider, you will get a free domain name and SSL certificate!
Estimated cost: The total investment if purchased separately from third-party domain registrars like Namecheap is less than $10/year! (Check out Namecheap from here!)
Building brand identity – Brand identity is the visible elements of a brand, such as color, design, and logo, that identify and distinguish the brand in consumers’ minds.
They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but a logo is worth an entire novel. Fine – that may be a slight exaggeration, but the principle holds true.
The logo is a serious investment for your business, it’s a brand asset that has high potential value for your company, so it’s smart to hire a professional logo designer from the start.
If you want to get in direct touch with trustworthy and professional designers, Fiverr could just be your perfect way to go!
Fiverr is a freelance marketplace that has every service you may need to outsource to build and run a viable online business!
Alternatively, you can go ahead and create your own designs and images by simply utilizing the free resources out there!
Canva and Freepik are just two great tools that you can use to create astonishing images and designs.
- Try Canva for free (Open in a new tab)
- Try Freepik for free (Open in a new tab)
Estimated cost: The total investment of a professional logo design from Fiverr is something between $5-$30! (Claim your special discount on the first order on Fiverr)
Email marketing toolkit & autoresponder – Did you know that the average ROI (return on investment) is $42 for each $1 you spend on email?
Yup, that was according to a recent study by Litmus!
Holy moly!
What really differentiates veteran marketers from those newbies is that they use email marketing toolkits that allow them to create email sequences to follow up and engage with their audience.
According to Econsultancy, email marketing accounts for approximately 23% of online sales… Making it one of the most effective marketing channels at your disposal!
The ultimate beginner-friendly autoresponder that I’ve been using and recommending for my students and readers is GetResponse.
GetResponse is a complete email marketing toolkit that allows you to create forms, surveys, landing pages, funnels, and several automations to effectively build your mailing list and engage with those leads.
Estimated cost: The total investment when using GetResponse is $15/month. As a beginner, you honestly need no more than the basic plan, and you can upgrade as your business grows! (Get your 14-day free trial on GetResponse!)
Online storefront – An online storefront is the cornerstone foundation in your online business, and it’s obvious that every online business needs a website and domain in order to get noticed.
The 5 must-have elements of successful drop servicing website:
- Responsive and visually appealing design.
- Payment gateway integration.
- Email marketing integration.
- Social media accounts integrations.
- Facebook Pixel and Google Analytics integrations.
Through a virtual storefront, you would be able to list and offer your services, talk about yourself, get orders, and take payments from your customers!
Estimated cost: The total investment of creating an online storefront really varies from platform to one another. For Shopify, you should be prepared for at least $29/month, while it costs an average of $80/year on WordPress. However, sales funnels may seem to be the costliest option ($97/month), but they can save you a lot in the long run.
👉 Get Shopify 14-day free trial
👉 Get Clickfunnels 14-day free trial
👉 Get 60% OFF on all Bluehost plans
Promoting your business and finding your dream customers – If you don’t have a consistent stream of traffic or new people coming into your business… Do you even call it a business?
It doesn’t matter how optimized and well-looking your website is… If it’s not noticed by real humans, you won’t get profitable at all!
So, at this phase, you have claimed your unique desired brand name, created a great online storefront that you’re proud to own and promote and have build up your email flow using GetResponse.
Generating targeted traffic and customers is what you should be concerned about next…
Well, marketing could be overwhelming and complicated if you don’t know exactly what you’re doing.
Therefore, I highly recommend you invest in yourself and learn as much as you can, and always feel free to outsource what you’re not good at!
Estimated cost: The advertising budget varies from one channel to another. A great FREE book by Russell Brunson called “Traffic Secrets” teaches you how to exactly fill your webpages and funnels with a ton of traffic and effectively promote your online business! (Claim your copy while it’s free!)
The 2 Approaches Of Creating An Online Drop Servicing Website
When it comes to establishing your online presence and building your drop servicing digital storefront, you’ve really got to choose one of those two main approaches:
- The professional sales funnels approach
- The static website approach
Now, understanding this does not only determine your overhead but helps you do business more efficiently and effectively!
So, what’s the difference between a funnel and a website?
While a static website acts as a wall, a sales funnel can interact with your potential customers in a way to warm them up, get them familiar with you and your product, so they can finally take the buying decision.
A sales funnel is a series of steps, put together to help you achieve a particular goal, and lead people to a specific destination.
In short, a website could serve a totally different purpose. It could not be more than a portfolio or a digital business card… but it’s not an instrument for selling, at least effectively!
You know what a website looks similar to in real life?
It’s typically like going to a store in your local town and get no one to greet you or fulfill your questions…
A funnel on the other side is designed in a way to educate people more about your product/service and walk them through the next step or destination that you’ve set for them to go to.
It’s a process that starts with awareness, followed by interest, then the decision, and finally action, which is the second they decide to pay you money to get your product or service.
There’s no effective selling without high converting funnels, and this is what Clickfunnels can help you with.
Still, there’s no need to pull out your wallet quite yet! To prove that ClickFunnels is the best sales funnel builder on the planet, they’re offering you a 14-day free trial — just click here to try It out for 14 days with no obligation.
Do you think that ClickFunnels is the best sales funnel builder?
Why not give it a try and see for yourself. 😉
However, if you want to start a drop servicing business with the second approach, which is using a website, you can either have a self-hosted website using an affordable shared hosting like Bluehost, or leverage an eCommerce platform that has everything you need to start selling online, like Shopify!
For Shopify, you should be prepared for a minimum of $29/month. It has 3 different paid plans, basic, Shopify and advanced. The basic plan is more than enough and you can always upgrade as your business grows!
(Get your Shopify free 14-day trial here)
Having a self-hosted website on the other hand is a cheaper option for starting a drop servicing business, but it does require some technical and coding background.
The reason I recommend Bluehost is that I’ve been a customer since 2009 and it’s still the number 1 officially recommended shared-hosting by WordPress ever since!
From as low as $3.95/month, you can expect very reliable and fast web hosting, with a great customer support team and an easy to use interface.
(Claim your 60% OFF on Bluehost here)
I’ve already written great illustration guides on how to get started on those two platforms. I recommend you check them out:
Do I Need A Comprehensive Drop Servicing Course?
Drop servicing is a relatively brand new business model, and you can barely find someone that talks about it.
It’s becoming popular day after day, but still not as saturated as dropshipping or other business models.
To succeed with drop servicing, (or any other business that involves online transactions) you first need to understand how does the supply chain exactly work, and how do all parties work together flawlessly.
The fact of matter, a drop servicing course could simply be your road-map to business success.
eComDimes ultimate drop servicing blueprint has everything you need to get started with this trendy business model, and it breaks down the process into actionable steps easy to implement and achieve!
You can keep watching YouTube videos and going after free articles on the web, but unfortunately, that won’t incentivize your brain to take any action!
We are humans, and this is just the way that our brain works…
Remember, dreams are just dreams and will never remain dreams if you don’t take action… Start investing in yourself, the future is all yours!
Enroll Today And Take Your Business To The Next level!
This course will equip you with all the necessary starter tools that you need to get yourself positioned to start and grow your own drop servicing business!
Conclusion
Dipping your toe in a new industry and business opportunity may be overwhelming sometimes in terms of finances and overhead.
Knowing your costs and number will definitely help you stay in the game for a longer period of time.
So, are you considering starting a new drop servicing venture but do not know how much does it exactly cost to get started with such a business model?
By the time you finish reading this article, you should become familiar with the various approaches of starting a drop servicing business, along with the cost involved in each one.
I hope that you’ve found value in this post, and now it’s your time to share your thoughts in the comments!
Are you considering starting a drop servicing business? What’s your favorite approach for creating your storefront?
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Cheers,
Odeh Ahwal
