Dropshipping business is not easy, and in this post, you will read about the dropshipping niches I tried and failed terribly at as a newbie who was testing things and had no idea how to find a hot-selling dropshipping product or niche.
As a beginner, every niche or product is a hot-selling; you want to try any shining product without digging into the nitty-gritty of how you will market, your market audience, your marketing strategy, and the required amount needed to have a conversion.
I was naive and excited to make quick bucks with this new e-commerce model. Almost everyone in the dropshipping group I was in posted screenshots of earnings, and boy, did I wish to be left out. No.
After some research, I dug deep into my pockets and used the few coins I had saved for the Christmas holiday to sign up for my first Shopify store. I was motivated by the screenshots, the Lamborghinis, and the rented Airbnb apartments.
I saw myself in their shoes, giving Lambos virtual rides and living in those big mansions. I didn’t care how they got there, but one thing I was sure of was that the dropshipping business played a major part in their success.
Since we all know you can do more with Shopify’s free trial, I created the Shopify store and installed the Oberlo Chrome extension to help import hot products from Aliexpress to the store.
I gave myself ten days, and my target was to do everything within the first ten days before the Shopify free trials ended.
Within ten days, I had to envision a high-converting store, a premium theme, web content creation, and essential pages.
The funny thing is, when you are making mistakes, the so-called dropshipping gurus don’t offer a helping hand if you can’t afford the $1999 dropshipping mentorship course they offer.
You are left to make mistakes, learn from your errors, and keep your head above water despite the expenses a newbie incurs as they start with no signs of making it work.
Enough of my storytelling. Here is a list of dropshipping niches I tried and failed terribly.
Table of Contents
Weed Niche (420)
I joined the dropshipping business when the call to legalize 420 was on the rise, and I also read encouraging stories of successful 420 affiliate blogs and offline shops that were booming.
I gathered courage even though I had never used 420 nor had ideas about the audience’s behavior, such as what they love, their shopping habits, etc.
Since almost everyone in that niche was selling a physical or drop-shipped product, I decided to go the print-on-demand route.
In the back of my mind, I knew that a print-on-demand Business is a Low-Risk Model for Selling Custom T-shirts, so I took that route.
Instead of selling 420 products, I designed high-quality designs for shirts.
My idea was to sell custom-printed, on-demand T-shirts related to weed. I wanted to avoid a crowded sub-niche and be a lone ranger.
Print on demand was a new business model launched after the dropshipping business emerged. I had hopes that 420 T-shirt designs would sell like hotcakes.
The design I created was to play around with the word Weed.
I wasn’t aware of the mistake or something for a niche like that; running paid ads is restricted since Facebook ads wouldn’t approve 420 adverts, taming it as drug-related and against their policy.
I tried targeting people 21 and older, but my ads were never approved. I have spent time and money building the store, hiring T-shirt designers to work on the designs, buying a domain name, and am about to start paying the Shopify monthly fee.
But here I am, an entirely done store with high-quality designs ( I guess) but no advertising channel. I had a low budget as I was about to launch.
I decided to go with Instagram influencer marketing, and I took two days to research and find a relevant influencer who would match my brand and have a targeted audience.
In a nutshell, I spent $300 among ten influencers in general, with only two sales amounting to $69. I closed the store after running losses of paying Shopify $29.
If you want to try the weed niche, at least don’t be like me. Research and have your marketing options open. There are successful Weed-related Shopify stores and Amazon affiliate blogs, which means it’s a good niche but requires thorough research.
Wooden Bowtie
I followed a trend; anything wooden was a hot selling product I perceived. I saw promoted Facebook posts selling wooden toothbrushes, sunglasses, and everything wooden.
The selling point was based on the food it does to our environment, the positive impact, and the percentage they claimed they donate to every sale they make.
I said, “Oh if they are already selling wooden sunglasses and toothbrushes, what else is left to be sold?”
I spent time researching Aliepxress, and boom. I came across a wooden bow tie, and people love bow ties. But what about a classy wooden bow tie? I convinced myself they would love it more.
A domain was bought (woodenbowtied.com) just like the weed store was created; I did my due diligence and did justice to this new store. I knew this was it. Unlike the missed weed niche, I was 100% convinced this was a hit.
The wooden bowtie conversion was shallow; based on the hype I saw online, I would compete with the big dawgs who spent above $1000 per day on one ad compared to my $5 per day for four days of testing PPE ads.
I wasn’t feeling the niche, so it took time to break even, and I made about ten sales. With the current global changes happening and the need to keep our environment sane, wooden products are great for niches.
You can try to ensure that if you’ve promised to donate a percentage of the sales to an organization, you don’t bluff about it; you do it.
Fashion
Women shop online more than men; hence, selling a woman’s product has a higher conversion rate than the other niches. Most online drop-shipper stores tend to focus on women-related niches.
I saw Fashion Nova and thought, “These niches must be the hottest; if not, how can one explain how Fashion Nova kept opening new sub-niches, e.g., Fashionova-curve, etc.?”
With the above notion, I went full-on into dropshipping women’s ‘s-related fashion products. I had a general store (fashion).
Fashion wasn’t bad, but the disputes and chargeback killed my passion.
With fashion, Asian sizes are not accurate for customers in other countries like the US or UK; sometimes, the material used doesn’t match the one in the product description; hence, an increase in disputes in returns triggers PayPal limitations and bans.
Before I found my current niche, the above were the dropshipping niches I tried, and I was not happy with the experience they gave me.
Conclusion on dropshipping niches I tried
Even though the above outlines dropshipping niches I tried and didn’t do well in, I encourage you to try despite my experience. Maybe it was rookie mistakes that caused me to fail.
It doesn’t mean the same can be your story if it doesn’t work for me.
You can learn my techniques for finding hot dropshipping niches and avoid wasting your time and money on harmful products.
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