Branding with White label or Private label dropshipping

One of the pros of dropshipping is the low entry barrier because you can start it with zero inventory. At the same time, the low entry barrier means a lot of competition. Almost 90% of drop shippers fail during their first month after getting thwarted that their online stores are not making enough money. The solution: white label dropshipping services. Put simply, private label dropshipping suppliers set themselves apart by staying on the straight and narrow and creating a level of trust with the customers.

To stand out from the competition, you invest expense increasingly in advertising campaigns or spend time finding niche market products. Moreover, every time you build a single-product store to launch a product. Ultimately, none of them is no longer a viable solution. The pain is that without customer loyalty, you will never get the adequate and regular traffic needed to keep an online business, especially a dropshipping business running, simply because shoppers like to go to their favorite online stores/brands first. After all, it is not your logo on the product.

The best way to earn customer loyalty is by building a brand that can create a product with a personality and a voice. White labeling and private labeling dropshipping are one way of branding your product to differentiate from other dropshipping products. But, as many of you know, building a brand for a dropshipping product is not a simple task. Most sellers from AliExpress or similar marketplaces cannot personalize or modify your products with your logo or customized packaging because they target the B2C market. And minimum order quantity (MOQ) is another major obstacle to build a brand. It is one of most manufacturers’ requirements when you ask them to customize your products for white labeling or private labeling dropshipping. In most cases, MOQ is such a large quantity that you would not move forward. So how to start your own white label or private label dropshipping?

6 tips for launching a white label or private label dropshipping successfully

1. Find a product niche

Product selection is key to the success of the dropshipping business. Most high-volume Dropshippers start with a product that can drive the force of their dropshipping business. When you start a white label or private label, you should exercise extra caution in your product selection. After all, there are some cons to use white label or private label:

• Minimum order quantity: MOQ for white label or private label is such a large quantity, and you would need to invest a great deal of money in order.
• Dead inventory: a wrong choice of white label or private label product can put yourself in an awkward position to have inventory difficult to sell.

Make sure the products you select have a great amount of search traffic. Bestsellers, high-ranking, and high-margin products have a good chance of winning white label or private label dropshipping. Also, small size and lightweight products are good for reducing warehousing and shipping costs.

2. Choose White label or Private label

Both white label and private label products are manufactured by a contract or third-party manufacturer and sold under your own name and branding. The difference between them is that:

With a white label, manufacturers sell their generic products to multiple retailers and repackage the products under their own brand name; In comparison, Private label manufacturers can create or redesign a product exclusively for a specific retailer with his custom requests, for example, designing a product, customizing the product’s color, or designing packaging for the product. The retailer can alter or enhance a product any way he wants with a private label.

When you decide between the two options, it all comes down to your business goals, market positioning, cash flow, and brand awareness. You need to analyze your business and identify what the most important thing is. Building a brand with a white label is cheaper for you to start than a private label because only repackaging the product with your own brand is faster and more economical. And white label dropshipping can generate higher profit margins than generic product dropshipping, also called “blind” dropshipping. However, you will have limited branding options, less choice of products, and still, face tough competition. In contrast, branding with private labels will provide you more customization options and create a unique brand image and value to your customers, further gaining your brand higher customer loyalty. But manufacturing a private label product means a specific manufacturing process has to be built or particular raw material needs to be sourced to create a product uniquely and exclusively for you. All these extra resources will increase costs and lead time that are passed on to you. Ultimately, you have to find yourself a good tradeoff between them.

One way to do private label easily and economically is a light version of a private label. By simply adding your own logo on the product, customized packaging, custom mailer bag, and thank-you card, you will still differentiate yourself from other stores of the same product. And if you are playing the card right, you can maximize your physical interaction with your customers with a memorable and positive unboxing experience. Your customers will appreciate your effort and reward you by returning to buy from your store. Moreover, customized packaging and custom mailer bags can be used for many different items in your store; make sure that your packaging and mailer bag can fit in them all perfectly.

3. Find a reliable Chinese manufacturer or supplier

Finding a good supplier for white label or private label dropshipping is more challenging than finding a good supplier for blind dropshipping because:

• Most of the dropshipping suppliers don’t offer white label or private label solutions. You would need to spend time searching for a Chinese manufacturer or supplier who agrees to add your logo on their products and provide custom packaging.
• You would need to explain to the manufacturer or supplier the detail of the customization, such as the logo size, the position where you want it to be printed on the product, and the color. All of this needs you to communicate with the Chinese manufacturer or supplier who often has minimal English communication capability.
• Once you found a manufacturer or supplier, it is still difficult for you to verify that it is a reliable manufacturer or supplier and ensure that it has a quality assured product.

So, the question is, “How to find a reliable Chinese manufacturer or supplier for white label or private label”? You might try the following methods:

• You can search for it on Google. You can find product sourcing services companies that can help you vet manufacturers and suppliers and negotiate with them on your behalf. For example, E-commerce Express is a world-class, one-stop product sourcing and E-commerce fulfillment services company for global E-commerce sellers. It vets manufacturers and suppliers, saving your money and countless hours and frustrations in their attempts to research, negotiate, and communicate with suppliers and shipping companies from a great distance.
• You can also search it on Alibaba, not AliExpress. On Alibaba, you can find some manufacturers or suppliers with third-party verifications of the product and certifications. However, two drawbacks of this method are:
• You might be frustrated by their language barrier.
• Besides, it has many manufacturers or suppliers for one product, and you will need to spend some time to verify them and select a promising one.

4. Always get a sample

In most cases, it is hard to get a white label or private label sample mainly due to the minimum order quantity requested by the manufacturer. The manufacturer won’t waste his time and resource to customize you only one piece of sample. It is understandable since the manufacturer is driven by profit. It would be a typical requirement that your order quantity for a sample must be larger than 50 units, or you have to invest in a plate-making fee or mold cost for your customization.

Two tips to reduce sampling cost for white label or private label product is: “

• You can buy a sample of his generic product to verify its quality.
• You can also buy a sample of his white label or private label product from one of his customers to verify its customization quality, and capability.

By ordering samples, you can check and test it with your own hands. Asides from making sure that the product quality reaches your expectation, you can also see how fast the supplier reacts; and how quickly he delivers your product in good condition; and how well he packages it; and even how he handles product defects and damaged goods

5. Enhance your brand awareness with influencer

Enhancing your brand awareness is crucial to creating a successful brand with a white label or private label product, especially a new product. Influencer marketing could boost your white label or private label brand.

Influencer marketing has been a buzzword in recent years. And It involves a brand collaborating with an online influencer to market its product. An influencer has the power to affect others’ purchasing decisions because of his or her authority, knowledge, position, or relationship with his or her audience. With the right influencer marketing strategy, your white label or private label brand awareness can be effectively promoted and amplified in a short time.

6. Accelerate order processing time and delivery time

When it comes to white label or private label, you have to care about order processing time and delivery time to ensure a great customer experience. Faster processing time can shorten the time to deliver the product to the customer and ultimately increase customer satisfaction. Order fulfillment with AliExpress utilizing apps such as Oberlo or Dropified can take 3-5 minutes per order because it still requires each order to be loaded and pay function selected. 100 orders can easily take 5-8 hours of additional order fulfillment time. You can collaborate with the order fulfillment company to process your orders with his ERP system and ensure all your orders will be processed accurately and fully automated in a few minutes.

No customer wants to wait a few weeks for his online order. With blind dropshipping on AliExpress, the typical shipping time is 15-45 days at a minimum. Having a fast delivery time when dropshipping white labels or private label products is definitely a great way to increase your customer satisfaction and brand loyalty. According to Edison Alix Partners’ data source, the maximum delivery time online shoppers will accept to receive free shipping is, on average, 4.5 days in 2017. With the rapid growth of E-commerce business, online shoppers will expect even shorter free shipping time.

So, how to get a faster delivery time when dropshipping a white label or private label product?

You need a 3PL logistics company. A good 3PL logistics company has multiple shipping lines that can provide fast shipping times and offer different shipping options based on product attributes such as size, shape, paste, liquid, internal battery, etc. E-commerce Express is a world-class industry-leading 3PL logistics company that offers services including strategic inventory warehouse distribution, express shipping line with 4-10 days average shipping time, international warehouses, and careful inspection of products and packaging.

Conclusion

With the rapid growth of E-commerce business, dropshipping is one of the most popular online business models that has been prosperous since Oberlo started to allow dropshippers to easily import products from AliExpress directly into their Shopify store and ship directly to their customers in 2015. The new trend has given everyone a low entry barrier into dropshipipng business and brought a severe competition. Dropshipping business model, especially the blind dropshipping model, becomes less profitable and highly competitive. To stand out from the competition, you have to earn your customer loyalty by building a brand.

White labeling and private labeling are one way of branding your product to differentiate from other dropshipping products. But because they both have a large minimum order quantity requirement and run a risk of dead inventory, you must pay extra attention when you come to a white label and a private label. There are 6 tips to be aware of if you want to launch a white label or private label dropshipping successfully.

• Make sure that you find a product niche that have a great amount of search traffic. It would be best if you always focused on adding your white label or private label only to your bestsellers, high-ranking, and high-margin products.
• Your business goals, market positioning, cash flow, and brand awareness are the factors you need to consider when deciding between white label and private label. You need to analyze your business and identify what the most important thing is. You have to find a good tradeoff between these two dropshipping business models.
• You have to find a reliable Chinese manufacturer or supplier for white label and private label. Because these two business models are more complicated than the blind dropshipping model for customization, a legitimate Chinese manufacturer or supplier with no communication barrier is the key to successful product sourcing. It is recommended to google and find product sourcing services companies that can help you vet manufacturers and suppliers and negotiate with them on your behalf.
• Even though it is hard to get a white label or private label sample due to the minimum order quantity requested by the manufacturer, you still can buy a sample of his generic product to verify its quality; or you can also buy a sample of his white label or private label product from one of its customers to verify its customization quality and capability. The most important thing is always to get a sample.
• Influencer marketing is a strong marketing tool to enhance your brand awareness when you use white labels or private labels. Through an influencer, your brand awareness can be effectively promoted and amplified in a short time.
• To ensure a great customer experience with a white label or private label dropshipping, you have to make sure you have faster order processing and delivery time. A good 3PL logistics company has multiple shipping lines that can provide fast shipping times and offer different shipping options based on your product attributes.