10 Dropshipping Challenges In Africa

Starting a successful dropshipping business is no easy task, and for those in Africa who want to target international customers through Shopify, the challenge becomes even greater. 

Starting a dropshipping business in Africa to target international customers is complex, especially if you are a dropshipper living in Africa.

There are many dropshipping challenges in Africa, even for me, who has been doing this for almost 10 years, but new challenges arise with new features every day.

Some may tell you how easy it is to start a dropshipping business, but they leave out the geo-restrictions that come with the whole business setup.

In this blog post, I will share some of the challenges dropshippers face in Africa, challenges I have gone through and still face even after 10 years in the dropshipping business.

1. Restricted Shopify Features

Most eCommerce platforms prioritize US residents when testing their new features or accessing premium services.

Shopify does the same regarding new apps, marketplaces, and marketing channels.

As a dropshipper in Africa, you cannot use marketing channels like TikTok marketing or activate a TikTok shop in your store.

TikTok marketing and other features can only be installed in a shop whose location is set to the US or other countries. 

If you operate in Africa, Instagram shop features are automatically unavailable for your dropshipping store. 

What other drop shippers enjoy, like having customers view and complete orders on their Instagram account, is something we can’t have as African drop shippers.

Suppose you wanted to start TikTok marketing. It would be impossible unless your store location changes from, let’s say, Kenya to the United States.

It’s practical to change the store location with a valid address and documentation. 

The TikTok platform is accessible worldwide, but if you want to run paid ads for your Shopify store, you’ll need to upgrade to TikTok Business.

To overcome this geolocation restriction, dropshippers in Africa are advised to register a valid LLC, obtain a virtual address and mobile phone number, and use a VPN.

You will need a US bank account to connect to your payment gateway provider; I recommend using Wise.

I discussed registering your UK business company on this channel and securing a valid UK residential and office address.

Why the UK?

I prefer UK company registration over LLC in the US. UK business registration is less tedious and time-consuming than US LLC registration.

Also, UK company registration takes about 72 hours for everything to be restored by Companies House, and all documents are scanned and emailed to your country.

At a discounted price of £62.99 plus VAT, exclusively for Dropshippingit, the Prestige Package offers fabulous value and huge savings on our products and services if you purchase them individually.

This has helped many drop shippers who have difficulty accessing TikTok marketing and other Shopify features.

You can check out the UK company registration in the video description below.

2. Shipping sample delays

Unlike our counterparts, they can ship product samples to their doorstep within 3-7 working days. 

This is next to impossible, and we must wait at least 45-60 days using Aliexpress shipping methods like Epacket Delivery and other courier services operating in Africa.

Dropshippers in other parts of the world also have the Amazon option; suppose they wanted to create their own UGC content and film how-to videos for the product(s) they are promoting. The Amazon Premium offers shipping to the US in less than 3 days.

Now you ask yourself, why can’t African dropshippers ship samples via Amazon? Well, it will be 3 to 4 times the price of the product you tend to ship.

Let me give you a live scene.

A product X costs $2 on Aliexpress, but because aliexpress shipping to Africa may take forever, I go to Amazon to look for the same product.

I am faced with the following issues:

• The product is available on Amazon, but the seller is not shipping it to Africa.
• The product is available on Amazon, and the seller is shipping to Africa. Still, the available shipping methods are all premium, like DHL, which now charges 5 times the product’s value.

Even with a premium shipping method, the probability of getting the product in Africa still needs to be guaranteed. 

So what do we do?

We opt for option B, gather existing videos of the same product from different sources, cut and paste, and try to make a good video out of the plagiarized content.

The goal is to convince the customer that the video is yours. To make this believable, we brand the video with our store logo and play with color toning and other transitions to add video effects that blend with our actual brand.

3. Ad Manager Restriction And Algorithm Discrimination

There are several dropshipping challenges in Africa, and some might dash your hopes.

So here you’ve fought your way through signing up for a Shopify free trial, which costs only $1 per month for the next 3 months.

Start a free 3 Day trial and enjoy 3 months of Shopify for $1/month Instead of $39/month on selected plans. Sign up now

You would only part with $3, an outstanding offer, more so for us in Africa, whose currency is a bit weak; getting a 3-month break on Shopify to learn the ropes is quite a treat.

You’ve then managed to set up and get an ad account approved via the UK company registration, which is just under $100, and you get 10% off if you use my unique subscribers-and-readers link designed just for you.

Now, the hurdle to bypass is the giant in the room, as always, running your ads and getting conversions.

This is what happens in ad managers. As a dropshipper in Africa, I run an e-commerce agency through my website, dropshippingit.com.

I have over 50+ dropshipping customers for whom I manage their ad accounts and marketing.

If I post the same ad and use the same creative with the same budget without my NORDVPN set to the US, trust me, that ad engagement will be the lowest, despite the US ad account location.

And if I do the opposite, set my NordVPN location to the US, and run the same as maintaining everything as the previous ad, the conversions will shock you.

I am trying to say that ad management limits your reach, even if you pump $1000 per day; it’s just their way of telling you to move to the US and have the freedom to run a successful business.

Ad account limits many, and one can wake up to a permanent ban or suspension without prior reason given.

The same exposure a TikTok account gets when it posts UGC content on its performance is almost 1/3 of what a drop shipper in Africa would be treated to.

The algorithm needs to address how far our User-generated content can go compared to that of our counterparts in other developed countries.

4. Payment Gateway Limitation

Nothing is more demoralizing than struggling to withdraw sales from your Shopify account to your local bank while dropshipping in Africa.

Dropshipping challenges in Africa can only be addressed by highlighting the struggles eCommerce store owners face in converting a customer into a sale, and then again in getting the same amount wired to their local banks.

5. Paypal Restriction and high-risk judgment

Payment gateways like Stripe and other convenient processors are turned off by default for dropshippers in Africa whose store location is set to their respective African countries.

Paypal, for instance, is a minor god that wants to be worshiped. Every time one receives sales in their stores. They will hit you with a ban or limitation, and when you provide all the needed documents, they will still hit you with an “orry, we can’t work with you now email.

It becomes worse if you use PayPal in Africa; they’ve profiled Africa as a small village and clustered all businesses as high-risk, even the legit ones. As we all know, PayPal hates dropshipping.

Right from the company documents, they provided the information they needed. Still, they will hold your sales for 21 days or longer.

6. Stripe Judgments and Denials

Stripe is only available in 46 countries; no African country is among them.

Stripe recently introduced a solution for store owners and small businesses in countries where Stripe is not accepted. Stripe Atlas is here with us; the only problem is that you must apply to use or integrate it, and it costs $600.

To get a Stripe Atlas account, you must have a company formation in Delaware and comply with the state filing fees, and you are again required to sign legal documents to establish the company bylaws and to assign IP to the company.

Part of the $500 fee covers business tools, an EIN, and access to the Stripe Atlas community, and they will provide you with a business template to help run the business if the Stripe Atlas account is approved.

The problem comes with the fee payment. As a s start-up drop shipper in Africa, we work on a budget. Most of the time, there is no budget to work with because we try to do things without spending much, given low income and unemployment rates, so to slap us with this fee is a setback for most entrepreneurs who start dropshipping businesses in Africa.

7. Shopify payments to the rescue

Shopify introduced its built-in solution for store owners, and we were relieved to have found payment gateway solutions for dropshippers in Africa and for e-commerce in general, but that was short-lived.

Like its counterpart Stripe, Shopify has specific countries it allows access to or allows activation in. 

Shopify payments don’t allow any African country to access or use their services; as of now, they only operate in 23 countries, all in Europe and North and South America.

So, to use Shopify payments, we are still going back to the method of bypassing all these restrictions; as an African who desires to start a dropshipping business, get yourself an LLC or UK company registration, a virtual mobile phone number, a VAA, and then change your store location to your newly acquired business location.

8. Unreliable dropshipping suppliers to Africa

As sweet as dropshipping to international markets would be, there are still passionate dropshippers in Africa who want to dropship within Africa and target customers in their respective countries or across the entire African continent.

If one chooses this path, it is the easier option for setting up a local payment gateway from third-party providers like Mpesa integration, FlutterWave, and Intasend payment gateway, which offers mothan Stripes in terms ofoff qualiof servicecee and features.

Now, they must find a reliable dropshipping supplier to ship products to African customers. These products are of high quality and delivered without delay, just as for dropshippers in other parts of the world.

On most dropshipping platforms, such as AliExpress, it’s important to note that not all suppliers offer shipping to African countries. If they do, the shipping method available might be out of budget or too slow for normal business operations.

Finding a dropshipping supplier for African dropshippers is challenging, and it’s also something people should consider venturing into and tapping into that green niche.

International dropshipping suppliers like Cjdrosphipping, USAdrop, and Zendrop do not offer shipping to African countries. This makes the dropshipping business target fellow Africans as customers rather than the US market.

Conclusion About Dropshipping Challenges In Africa

As an ecommerce platform, Shopify should help dropshippers and store owners worldwide with equal opportunity and remove geolocation restrictions on some of its apps and services, including those from third-party providers.

There is equal opportunity for everyone, regardless of location, to sign up on Shopify and make a decent living off a dropshipping business; even though it may sound efficient, it’s essential to have in mind that it takes a good store design, a unique product (niche), and detailed marketing to make sales with a dropshipping business.

If your dreams of dropshipping in Africa have nearly been crushed, it is time to renew your strength, remove doubt in your ambition, and pursue it; this time, do it the right way, get your legal documents, secure a good address, and get yourself a virtual US mobile phone to help with signing up on Tiktok business manager and remove algorithm scars.

Never hide your IP address; I recommend NORDVPN, which has helped me with my clients in most cases without our data being leaked.

A dropshipping business is a journey; it’s not a get-rich-quick scheme. Therefore, give it the necessary attention and treat it as any other business you would start online.

Suppose you fail on your first attempt; stand up and do it countless times till you find your winner.

Share your thoughts in the comment section below.

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