How to Dropship on Amazon Without Money: Full Beginner’s Guide

Starting an online business doesn’t have to break your bank account. That’s right! Learning how to dropship on Amazon without money might seem too good to be true. However, there are ways to earn a profit with little capital.

If you’re an eager entrepreneur looking to minimize costs for your Amazon dropshipping business venture, this article is for you. We’ll cover the basics and discuss how to dropship on Amazon without money. We’ll also review Amazon’s advantages and disadvantages and find helpful tips for success with dropshipping.

Let’s dive in!

How To Dropship On Amazon Without Money

To start dropshipping on Amazon, we must take a few key steps. Without further ado, here’s what we should do to launch an Amazon dropshipping business at no cost.

1. Amazon Product Research: Choose Your Niche 

A crucial step before opening our Amazon dropshipping store is choosing a niche through product research. A niche is a product or category we want our store to be known for. As a result, a niche helps target a specific audience and build a solid customer base.

There are several product research methods we can use to choose our niche:

• Analyze Best Sellers On Your Supplier’s Website
• AutoDS Winning Products Hub
• Product-Finding Blog & Best Sellers Playlist
• AliExpress Dropshipping Center
• Google Lens
• Keep Track Of Social Media Trends

These methods are all excellent product research tools. Some no-cost product research methods include looking at supplier best-seller pages or AutoDS’ product-finding blogs and best-seller playlists. Moreover, we can use AliExpress Dropshipping Center and Google Lens to find sellable products.

However, if we want automated, data-driven results, AutoDS’ Winning Products Hub automates the product research process so we find trending products with ease. It provides detailed analytics we can use to optimize our listing, such as sales price, profit potential, target audience, and competitor analysis.

Many dropshippers use this tool to optimize their dropshipping store. Here’s how the Winning Products Hub can work for us.

On the AutoDS platform, we can find the Winning Products feature under Marketplace on the left. From there, we can immediately browse through a catalog of Winning Products for our store. Once we find a product that catches our eye, it automatically redirects us to a dedicated product page.

We can find relevant information about the product, including title, description, price, variations, and shipping information. Moreover, we can find further information, including valuable insights:

• Selling price, potential profit, and number of orders.
• Engagement score – level of audience interaction with the product.
• Saturation score – the market saturation based on the number of competitors.
• Target audience insights (gender, age, interests, etc.).
• Social ads (Facebook, TikTok).
• Competitors (stores selling the product).
• Return policy (return window and who pays for it).
• Reviews.

Then, we use the ‘Import Draft’ button to import details and proceed to importing. Remember, creating an optimized product listing helps to attract customers.

2. Select A Free Amazon Dropshipping Supplier

The great thing about dropshipping is that we don’t need to pay our suppliers until after we get paid by our customers. Nevertheless, we must select a reliable supplier that offers quality products at competitive prices and dependable shipping.

Here’s a checklist of qualities we need to look for in our supplier to ensure they’re reliable:

• Practical shipping, return, & payment policies
• Worldwide warehouses
• Wide product range
• High-quality products
• Positive customer reviews

We can use plenty of reliable suppliers for our Amazon dropshipping store. However, it’s best to work with multiple suppliers so we can offer various products while giving the best prices. Plus, we have something to fall back on if one supplier runs out of stock.

The AutoDS Warehouse is AutoDS’ repository of products featuring private suppliers’ items. We gain access to exclusive products giving us a competitive advantage. Plus, there are multiple deals we can use to increase profit or extend to customers to increase sales.

Moreover, AutoDS Warehouse allows us to incorporate personalized logos. This capability helps make us more recognizable to customers, strengthening our branding and marketing.

3. Select The Right Amazon Selling Plan

Once ready to set up our Amazon store, we must choose the right selling plan. The professional plan ($39.99/mo.) is automatically selected for us once we register for a seller account. To dropship on Amazon without money, we need to downgrade to the individual plan ($0 per month).  However, there is a fee of $0.99 per item sold, so it’s best to move to the professional plan once we reach 40 monthly sales.

4. Create Amazon Listings & Import Products

Once we’ve found the products we want to sell and where to source them, it’s time to create our Amazon listing and import. Before anything else, we need to identify whether or not we can sell a product on Amazon. 

To determine product or brand approval, click the ‘Sell on Amazon’ button on the right side of a product post. If the current item requires approval, moving on to another product is better to save time. Notably, tools like AutoDS can warn us when a brand requires approval. 

Once ready to sell, we can list and import products in two ways. First, we can manually list by adding all the details individually for each product. However, this is time-consuming and ultimately inefficient for running our business.

Second, we can use AutoDS’ Product Importer to automate our product-importing process. With this feature, we just copy+paste a product’s ASIN and add the product URL from our supplier. We can import products in a matter of seconds.

Additionally, we can optimize our product listing before importing to our Amazon store. Go to AutoDS Drafts or Products section, add product tags, choose shipping methods and edit product variants. However, we can only change titles, descriptions, images, and item specifications through the product detail page of our Amazon store.

5. Promote Your Amazon Dropshipping Store

Since Amazon is a marketplace, we compete with several other sellers who are likely offering the same products as us. This intense competition is why it’s essential to market and promote our Amazon dropshipping store properly. Effective marketing attracts the attention of new customers, increasing our sales and thus our profit.

Here are the marketing methods we can employ:

• Sponsored Product Ads
• Win The Buy Box
• Facebook Ads
• TikTok Marketing

Sponsored product ads on Amazon increase our visibility on the platform. Similarly, Facebook ads help us market directly to our target audience, increasing chances of conversion. However, we do have to invest financially to market with these methods. 

Another method is Winning the Buy Box. Products on Amazon often have several seller options available. However, when buyers purchase a product directly, the seller on the buy box gets the sale. Achieving this requires excellent seller metrics and positive customer ratings, which could be difficult when we’re just starting.

The marketing methods we’ve mentioned do require some capital. However, through strategies such as TikTok Marketing, we can create and post content to promote our products for free. Once we’ve earned enough profit, we can invest in other marketing methods to further boost our sales.

Beginner’s Tip: Always add a link to your Amazon store in every post so interested buyers can conveniently find and buy products on your store.

6. Fulfill Customer Orders

Having an efficient order fulfillment process is critical to customer satisfaction. There are two ways to go about this step. First, we can manually fulfill orders by going to the supplier’s website and purchasing the product with our customer’s delivery address. Once tracking information is available, add the tracking number and click ‘Confirm Shipment’ on the ‘Manage Orders’ page to complete the process.

A significant downside to manual order fulfillment is the increased risk of errors and potential delays once orders start pouring in. Fortunately, automation can easily solve this.

The AutoDS Automatic Orders automatically inputs the details provided by the customer. This streamlined process saves time and reduces the chances of mistakes and delays in order fulfillment.

On the AutoDS platform, our orders will appear on the orders page of our AutoDS dashboard. Then, the system automatically processes these orders directly from our supplier to our buyer. However, there’s an important difference between order automation on Amazon and other selling channels.

When fulfilling orders for Amazon, we must manually enter customer address details in AutoDS’s order settings page. Fortunately, we can use the AutoDS Address Copier Chrome extension to transfer this data automatically. All that’s left to do is add the buyer’s country data before proceeding. 

The system automatically updates the customer’s order status and the supplier’s order number. Moreover, AutoDS simultaneously updates tracking information once it’s available. With AutoDS’ Automatic Orders and Address Copier extension, order fulfillment becomes hassle-free for dropshippers like us.

7. Provide Exceptional Customer Service

Customer service is integral to the success of our business and shouldn’t be left behind. When we deliver excellent customer service, we make our store the better choice for customers. Plus, this differentiates us from our competitors. 

We could offer the same product for the same price, but customers will choose us if we provide better service. To that point, satisfied customers are also more likely to return and become repeat customers.

To clarify, Amazon handles all customer contacts regarding customer services issues for which Amazon is responsible. Similarly, sellers on Amazon manage all customer contacts regarding customer service issues for which the seller is trustworthy. Therefore, Amazon will handle all transactional communications while the seller handles service or content updates.

Offering excellent customer service doesn’t have to cost us, but it will benefit us. Higher seller ratings from customers make us more reliable to potential buyers, resulting in more conversions and sales.

Advantages & Disadvantages Of Dropshipping On Amazon

Undeniably, there are both advantages and disadvantages to dropshipping on Amazon. Let’s briefly discuss the pros and cons of using the platform when we want to dropship on Amazon without money.

Advantages Of Dropshipping On Amazon

• Free organic traffic
• No warehouse cost
• Larger active user base
• Multiple product categories
• Easy scalability (test products/replace products)
• Efficient order fulfillment

Dropshipping on a popular marketplace like Amazon gives us access to millions of active users. This free organic traffic lessens our need for marketing. And, with a dropshipping model, we don’t hold inventory of products, cutting down our warehouse costs to zero.

Plus, it’s easier to scale when dropshipping on Amazon. First, it allows us to test products and replace the ones that don’t profit much. Second, it already has an efficient order fulfillment system we can take advantage of to manage multiple orders. 

Disadvantages Of Dropshipping On Amazon

• Limited Branding
• Competition

Regarding disadvantages, it’s evident that competition is high on a platform like Amazon. On top of that, there are also limited branding opportunities for us. These limitations make it harder for us to establish a recognizable brand and stand out from our competitors.

To combat these, we need to optimize our product listing to improve our searchability and become more visible to customers. Additionally, excellent customer service improves our store ratings, making us a better choice for interested buyers.

4 Tips To Succeed With Dropshipping On Amazon

We know the pros and cons of dropshipping on Amazon. In this section, we go over four key tips to successfully dropship on Amazon without money. Let’s go!

Test Various Products For Optimal Success

The beauty of dropshipping is that we can test various products in our stores without the risk of a financial loss if something doesn’t sell well. It doesn’t just end at product research. We must observe each product’s sales to determine which ones to keep and replace.

Nevertheless, we need to conduct product research to achieve the best results for our store. When choosing replacement products, we can refer to our sales data during our product research to find the best products.

Promote Products To Drive Traffic

As discussed, marketing our store and products is vital on competitive platforms like Amazon. Marketing our store requires investment but will benefit us in the long run. Still, there are ways we can promote our products organically. 

Creating content on social media platforms, such as TikTok or Instagram, is a no-cost method of promoting products. We can create videos, infographics, posters, etc., and simply post them on social media for others to see. Moreover, optimizing product listings with SEO makes us more searchable and visible to potential customers looking for our products.

Communicate With Your Customers

One effective way to increase customer satisfaction is through regular engagement. We can do this by directly responding to their inquiries through the comments section of our product page or posts. Likewise, being proactive in providing important updates is extremely helpful for customers.

When communicating well with our customers, we’re more likely to be perceived as trustworthy and reliable. Consequently, this helps increase our ratings and positive reviews. Plus, a pleasant experience will also keep customers coming back.

Automate Your Amazon Dropshipping Store

Automating our Amazon dropshipping store enables us to focus on scaling our business. Notably, having a streamlined process takes a load off our shoulders so we can operate without worry. 

We’ve already seen some beneficial tools from AutoDS that we can use to automate our business. Still, there are more features we can utilize and benefit from to scale our Amazon dropshipping store.

AutoDS is an all-in-one dropshipping automation solution that enables us to optimize our business for maximum efficiency and profitability. It helps us manage everything from pricing, stock monitoring, order fulfillment, tracking updates, inventory management, and more. 

The platform offers a plethora of features we can take advantage of:

• Product Research Marketplace
• Price/Stock Monitoring
• Quick product imports
• Automatic price optimization
• Complete order fulfillment
• Easy inventory management
• Automatic tracking updates
• Advanced image editor

With price/stock monitoring, AutoDS automatically adjust prices and stock numbers when our supplier does, so we don’t suffer a net loss. Additionally, price optimization raises the costs for best-selling products and reduces them for products that don’t sell to maximize profit.

The automatic order fulfillment and tracking updates help us manage multiple orders so we don’t lose out on sales. Likewise, quick product imports and inventory management help us easily manage our store or even multiple stores simultaneously.

Plus, AutoDS provides us with other great resources:

• Business policy templates
• eBooks & dropshipping guides
• and much more!

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I Dropship On Amazon Without Money?

To dropship on Amazon without money, you can set up an independent seller account for free. With this free plan, we can start selling, but we have to pay a fee of $0.99 per product sold. If we plan to sell more than 40 products, upgrading to a professional plan of $39.99 with no per-item fee is best.

Is Dropshipping On Amazon Profitable? 

Dropshipping on Amazon is very much profitable. However, it’s important to address challenges like intense competition and strict policies and guidelines to succeed. For dropshippers, conducting product research, providing excellent customer service, and having an efficient order fulfillment process is essential for the success of an Amazon dropshipping business.

Are There Any Restrictions Or Guidelines When Dropshipping On Amazon? 

Yes. Amazon does have specific guidelines for dropshippers to follow, which include having a reliable supplier that fulfills orders on time, accurate product listings, and providing customer support for returns or other issues. 

Conclusion 

Yay! We now have the basics of how to dropship on Amazon without money down. Even with little to no capital, we can confidently start our online Amazon dropshipping business.

Remember, while we can start dropshipping on Amazon with little capital, we increase our chances of success by making meaningful investments. We can scale up and take our business to the next level with effective marketing and efficient automation tools.

The journey doesn’t end there. We recommend the following articles to equip you on your Amazon dropshipping journey further:

• Dropshipping On Amazon Made Easy: A Comprehensive Guide
• How To Sell On Amazon Without Inventory And Increase Profits By 200%
• How To Start A Dropshipping Business: A Complete Guide