Nearly half of YouTube and Instagram users in the US said they saw more adverts on those platforms, and 52% of Facebook users in the US said the same about the social network.
According to Insider Intelligence/eMarketer, less than 10% of users on the social platforms we surveyed thought ad load had lessened.
Following Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram, TikTok held the fourth spot for users feeling the number of ads had increased. Reddit and Linkedin were at the bottom of the list of those believing ads had increased.
Insider Intelligence/eMarketer
The most common people to report encountering unpleasant ads were Facebook users.
YouTube Shorts continues to compete with TikTok by incorporating many of the latter app’s most popular features.
On Tuesday, the Google-owned platform introduced a narration voiceover function for iOS, a tool that is already popular on TikTok, reported TechCrunch. Narration is used by creators to add commentary to previously recorded videos.
After filming a video, tap the checkmark button in the bottom right of the camera screen to use voiceovers on Shorts. Then, tap the voiceover option, choose where you want to begin your voiceover, hit record, and then adjust the volume if necessary.
YouTube Shorts recently added another TikTok-inspired iOS feature: the option to respond to comments with a video. TikTok launched this feature in 2020, while Instagram followed suit in December.
In related news, Shorts creators will be allowed to earn ad money from their content for the first time.
Meta’s latest test makes it more difficult to discover the Shop option on Instagram.
“As part of our continued work to simplify your Instagram experience, we are testing a few changes to the main navigation bar at the bottom of the app with a small number of people,” a Meta spokesperson told TechCrunch.
The Shop tab has been withdrawn from the app’s Home Screen and is now hidden beneath Settings in the latest test. The Shop tab was previously located on the bottom navigation bar.
The removal of the Shop tab from the main navigation bar may harm some online stores that rely on Instagram Shops for revenue, according to the report.
While it is not entirely eliminated from the app, it is much more difficult to find. However, other places to make purchases on Instagram include the feed, stories, and reels.
Spocket is a platform that provides shipping solutions and winning products for dropshippers.
There are thousands of products mostly from US and EU suppliers.
Spocket can be easily integrated into a number of ecommerce platforms such as Shopify and Woocommerce. This makes transferring products and managing your store possible in just a few clicks.
Spocket has currently over 60k entrepreneur users and has shown to be a “the complete package” of a dropshipping tool.
Just to name a few benefits that are included such as:
Faster shipping, auto-updated inventory, sample orders, branded invoices, and more.
About AliExpress
AliExpress is one of the world’s largest ecommerce platforms, with over 100 million products, most from Asian suppliers.
fulfilling orders for your dropshipping business is easy and straightforward, all you need to do is copy their products and add them to your store. Once you get an order request, you purchase the product from AliExpress and let them ship the product to your customer.
You can integrate AliExpress with over 35 ecommerce platforms such as Shopify, Woocommerce, Wix, Bigcommerce and more.
Cost
Spocket
To start using Spocket you have 5 plans available to choose from:
The free plan.
The starter plan at $24.99/month.
The pro plan at $49.99/month or $24/month if paid annually.
The empire plan at $99.99/month or $57/month if paid annually.
The unicorn plan at $299/month or $79/month if paid annually.
Each of these plans has a 14 day free trial and no credit card is required.
The pro plan is a good place to start, since it offers enough products for a dropshipping business to set off as well as premium products to help you stand out and make more sales.
Once the pro plan is not enough you can then upgrade to the empire plan and get an unlimited number of products (10,000 to be precise).
Each of these plan’s special benefits is described in the image below:
AliExpress
Now the best thing about dropshipping through AliExpress is that it is completely free, unlike other marketplaces. That is if you choose to dropship manually and it is a great option for sellers that want to start without investing extra money.
However, if you do want to make managing your store easier you can purchase the Alidropship WordPress plugin. This plugin can be used as an automation tool making controlling products, sales, and shipping more hassle free.
Buying the Alidropship plugin costs $89 and it is a one time purchase.
With this plugin you can automate product pricing, integrate to a WooCommerce store, import AliExpress products easily, import product reviews, and a lot more.
If you’re already dropshipping with AliExpress it is something worth checking out.
Delivery Time
Spocket
Online customers are always looking for the quickest way to get their product. The longer the delivery time is the less likely for them to purchase from your store.
One of the main advantages Spocket is known for is their Shipping time.
Since 60% of Spocket’s suppliers are from the US and EU, delivery time is a lot shorter and is usually between 2-5 days.
You can minimize shipping time by choosing suppliers that are close to the location of your customers. And the estimated arrival times are specified in every product page.
Make sure to take in account the supplier’s processing time as well, that is not included in the shipping time.
The processing time is also fairly short, about 1-3 business days.
AliExpress
The real downfall of AliExpress is that their shipping time can take forever, and complications happen too often.
The standard shipping time takes about 15 to 45 working days! And even with their premium shipping packages take from 7 to 15 working days.
Seriously, most people are not willing to wait that long, especially if they can find the same product somewhere else with a shorter delivery time.
That only can risk your dropshipping business, particularly nowadays where competition is very high.
Easy Of Use
Spocket
Even if it’s your first time dropshipping, you will find using Spocket is very easy and beginner friendly. Their website’s layout is clean and organized, all the products are arranged by category, and there are guides and blogs for any question you may have.
Here are a few of the perks of Spocket that will ease up the process of managing a dropshipping business.
Auto-updated inventory –
Stock levels are updated automatically at all times. Making sure you never sell products that are out of stock.
Order fulfillment-
It takes a click of a button to process orders, and let Spocket handle the rest. Once an order has been confirmed, the customer details are sent directly to the supplier. Then, once the order is ready it will be shipped straight to the customer.
Order tracking-
Your order is trackable at any given time, the “track order” button will provide you and your customers with the location of your products.
Importing products-
All it takes to import a product to your store is one-click. Product images and descriptions can be easily imported and edited as well.
Automated pricing-
Spocket has a pricing mark-up feature that allows you to decide your profit mark up for all of your products. So that you don’t need to price each product manually.
AliExpress
Getting started with AliExpress is as easy, and free. All you need is to create an account and you’re good to go.
Once you find the right products, contact the supplier – most of them will offer dropshipping services. Then you can start marketing your products and make sales.
As was mentioned before, you can also use Alidropship to get your own ready made store. Or integrate it with Woocommerce.
And if you’re interested in other platforms, AliExpress integrates with almost all e-commerce platforms. This makes importing products, management, and growing your business much easier.
If not using a plugin, importing products from AliExpress is done manually.
Suppliers
Spocket
One thing they are well known for is their strict product quality control.
And Having suppliers from the US and Europe also contributes to keeping the product quality high. Knowing that the suppliers and vendors meet such high standards, means you don’t have to worry about any product being a scam or defective.
Dropshipping high quality products will also make sure customers will gain trust in you and will keep buying more.
The downside of it all is that the number of suppliers are limited, and you cannot directly contact Spocket suppliers.
For instance, if you do wish to dropship products from suppliers outside the US and EU, you’ll need to settle for longer shipping times and higher costs.
And if you wish to communicate with your supplier, you simply cannot. But you can always contact Spocket’s central support team in case you have any questions.
AliExpress
Low quality products are not foreign on AliExpress. Unfortunately, AliExpress does not have a quality control policy and allows the sellers to manage their products’ quality as they please.
This does not mean there aren’t high quality products, it just means you need to find reliable suppliers. And with over 200,000 suppliers available, you’ll most likely find multiple suppliers for the same product you’re looking for.
There are a few ways around this problem:
Ordering samples
Checking reviews
Building supplier relationships
The last one is really important, not only for making sure you’re always getting high quality products. But also for getting better deals and priority services.
After building some close relationships with reliable suppliers you can even get to include branded invoices or placing your logo on products.
Pros and Cons
Take a quick look at the sum up of the pros and cons of AliExpress vs Spocket in the image below.
Conclusion
Both platforms have proved themselves to be worth solutions for dropshippers. Each dropshipper will prefer one or the other for different reasons.
Here are the take outs to consider from this article.
If you care about having the best product quality, fast shipping times, can afford a monthly subscription, and want to take dropshipping to the next level. Spocket seems like the best fit for you.
On the other hand, choosing to dropship with AliExpress has many disadvantages. It might be tempting to compromise for the product quality and shipping time just because it is the cheaper option. But as was mentioned throughout the article, doing so can risk your business success long term.
With that being said, if you’re not willing to give up on AliExpress’s wide range of products and still want to be using it for your dropshipping business.
The good news is you don’t have to.
Spocket can integrate with AliExpress using their ‘AliScraper’ app. That way you can import products from AliExpress using Spocket. It’s basically combining both of them, that way you’re truly getting the best of both worlds.
Best of luck!
Struggling to find good products to sell? Not sure who’s your target audience? Tired of losing money on products you were sure were “winners”?
Then Ecomhunt is what you need! Find hot winning products that are added daily, spy on their ads & stores and import them into your store in 1 click and Start Selling Today!
3 Mistakes You're Doing With Upsells That Hurt Your Online Store Sales
Upsells are a great way to increase your online store’s profit, but if done the wrong way it can have the opposite effect!
Instead of making you more profit, upsells can bring confusion and drive your customers away from your store…
So before you set up a new upsell on your store, here are the 3 mistakes you’re doing with upsells that hurt your dropshipping store sales.
Make sure to read the whole article because I don’t only explain what to do, but how to fix it and get your upsells to actually work!
Enjoy.
First of All, What Is An Upsell?
An Upsell, as the name implies, is an offer to purchase and additional item on top of what you’re already selling.
It can be anything you like, a physical item or a service, and it’s sole purpose is to make an additional profit for your business.
You can choose to offer an upsell in the product page(next to the product you’re promoting), or in the later stages like in the cart page right before the customer proceeds to checkout.
In some cases, the upsell comes right after the purchase has been already completed – This is called a post-purchase upsell.
A post-purchase upsell is probably one of the most efficient ways to get extra income because it happens right after the customer has finished his order.
The customer is already warmed up, happy with his purchase, and there’s no need to enter the payment and shipping details again to buy the offered upsell.
So with a single click of a button, the customer can purchase an extra item from your store and make you more money.
Sometimes having a working upsell on your store can be the difference between a marketing campaign that makes you profit or one that only loses you money.
So make sure to check out these 3 mistakes done by Dropshippers and learn how upsells should really be done!
This is probably the most common mistakes newbie Dropshippers do when offering upsells with the products they currently promote.
If you think about it in a simple way, why shouldn’t you offer more products to buy? If a customer doesn’t want any of the upsells then he can simply proceed to the checkout and buy the main product.
So no harm done, right? Well that doesn’t really work that way…
The problem with people is that we’re a SUPER curious species and we like to explore and look at shiny stuff. So if something cool is presented, then there’s a big chance we will go out of our ways to check it out.
And in this case, the exploration will be the random products you just offered. So instead of proceeding to the checkout page, you’ll have a bunch of customers who are going to click on that random shiny product and see what it is all about.
This is BAD for your business because you’re:
Delaying your customers from going forward with their purchase, thus making the purchase process much slower than it needs to be.
“Confusing” your customers with random products and making them lose focus from the main product you’re currently selling.
In both cases, you’re risking of losing your customers in the process and losing valuable sales. And this is something your really don’t want to happen, especially when getting customers isn’t getting easier by the day.
So if you’re already offering upsells, make sure they have a connection to the main product you’re promoting. You’ll increase your chances of making additional profit and you don’t have to worry about your customers wondering around to different places.
Sometimes an upsell, even if it has a clear connection to the main product you’re selling, can be a bit too complicated for your customers and possibly drive them away from your store.
Here’s an example:
Let’s say you’re selling the calming pet bed which is a winning product that made a lot of Dropshippers some really good profit over the years.
With the right marketing campaign, nothing stops this pet bed from doing crazy sales this Q4 again. So if you were to pick up this product and sell it on your store, then adding an upsell to increase your AOV is a logical thing to do.
Now a good upsell I could think of for this product would be this cat hair brush:
It’s a great complementary product to go with the calming pet bed. It is self explanatory and even if a customer decides to check it out, it will take him less than 10 seconds to fully understand what it is all about.
So with this product as my upsell, I can expect almost no issues at all and there’s a good chance a bug chunk of my customers will end up taking this brush together with the pet bed(if the deal is actually tempting).
But imagine a scenario where instead this simple pet hair brush, I would’ve offered this product:
This automatic cat feeder that looks complicated and even has an app to operate.
This can be a great product to sell as your main product, but offering it as an upsell requires A LOT of reading for your customers to fully understand if they really want it or not.
So now your customers are going to be clicking on this product and reading through it, which will eventually prolong the time till they reach the checkout.
And this is the best case scenario – The worst case scenario is your customers checking out this product and simply moving on from your store back to browsing Facebook or TikTok.
So think well before adding products which are too complicated as your upsells.
No matter how good the upsell can be, it eventually prolongs the buying process for each customer. Especially when the upsell is in the product/cart page, where the customer still didn’t complete his order.
So depending on the product you’re currently selling, sometimes it’s even better to leave it clean and just roll without any additional upsells.
The best example to that would be a one-product store where the everything revolves around a single product, and you don’t actually need an upsell to make it work.
On the contrary, an upsell in some cases(no matter how good it is) may ruin the “vibe” of your one-product store and get you less sales.
In these cases, it’s better to focus entirely on the product you’re actively promoting and making single/multiple sales of the same product.
After that, you can devise a plan and remarket new products to your already existing customers – Get those extra risk-free sales using email marketing ?
To Sum It Up
Upsells are a great way to increase your AOV and get more profit into your business, but you can’t just add some random product and expect sales to magically increase.
You have to be extra careful when adding products as upsells and make devise the right strategy for it to affect your dropshipping business the right way.
If you have questions, feel free to ask me in the comments.
Good Luck!
Struggling to find good products to sell? Not sure who’s your target audience? Tired of losing money on products you were sure were “winners”?
Then Ecomhunt is what you need! Find hot winning products that are added daily, spy on their ads & stores and import them into your store in 1 click and Start Selling Today!
Footwear is the most popular product category among US luxury purchasers, followed by handbags and leather goods, cosmetics and beauty products, and perfume.
According to an Insider Intelligence/eMarketer survey, less than one-third of customers purchased accessories such as eyewear, jewelry, and watches in the previous year.
Insider Intelligence/eMarketer
According to Insider Intelligence/eMarketer, personal luxury sales in the United States will exceed $109.25 billion this year. Ecommerce will account for more than one-fifth of those sales.
Inflation will have less of an impact on core luxury shoppers than on the ordinary US consumer. As a result, the luxury category will be resilient, rising at a rate of more than 13% in 2022, compared to a rate of around 6% for retail overall, according to the survey.
According to video game creators, streaming will have the most growth of any gaming platform by 2025, as indicated by 40% of those questioned, according to Perforce and reported by Insider Intelligence/eMarketer.
While fewer people mentioned the metaverse or consoles, another 24% said that mobile will grow the fastest.
Insider Intelligence/eMarketer
The future of gaming will be defined by versatility and connectivity, making streaming and mobile viable options, according to an analysis by Insider Intelligence/eMarketer. “Greater 5G infrastructure and adoption will bring high-definition graphics, fast downloads, and advanced interactive elements to these platforms—in some cases, without the need for pricey hardware like consoles or headsets,” it said.
Digital trust is the belief that a platform will safeguard user information and offer a secure environment to produce and interact with content.
In critical categories, including privacy, safety, and ad relevance, trust in social media platforms has significantly decreased this year, according to the sixth annual benchmark poll of US social media users by Insider Intelligence/eMarketer.
Data security and privacy were identified as the primary factor affecting trust in the online survey of 2,225 US adult social media users between 18 and 76. Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Reddit, Snapchat, TikTok, Twitter, and YouTube all lost ground in this category.
Insider Intelligence/eMarketer
Since last year, perceptions of ad relevancy have decreased across all platforms. Apple’s privacy-related changes, which restrict platforms’ capacity to target and evaluate the effects of advertising, were probably a contributing cause. Only 26% of platform users agreed or strongly agreed that they saw relevant advertisements, a decrease from 34% the previous year.
Walmart now uses AR technology which allows you to virtually try on clothes (Credit: Walmart)
Walmart customers can now virtually try on items from the comfort of their own homes, thanks to AR technology in the retailer’s app.
Customers must upload a full-body photo of themselves to generate a realistic simulation of what an item of apparel would look like on their own bodies in the new Be Your Own Model experience, Walmart announced.
The functionality, made possible by the company’s acquisition of the Zeekit virtual try-on platform last year, can recognize where the fabric should drape and shadows should fall.
Walmart stated, “a single shirt can come in six different colors, seven different sizes and two sleeve lengths. Our technology captures all the variations and shows how they look uniquely on each individual.”
The feature is currently being rolled out to iOS users and will be available on Android devices in the coming weeks.
This Could Be Your Christmas Winning Product - Check Out This Cat Niche Product Which Is Exploding On Facebook Right Now!
If you’re looking for a winning product to sell this Christmas, then this cat niche product is exactly what you’re looking for!
With the right ad and a conversion optimized store, cat owners everywhere will be flowing into your store and buying one or multiple pieces of this super cool product.
And that’s not it because the store selling this product and its video ad are perfectly done, so you don’t have to look anywhere else to take inspiration from.
Don’t miss out on this product and make sure to read the whole article – There’s plenty to learn from the original Dropshipper selling this product!
Enjoy.
1. The Product
This week’s winning product is this super cool toy for cats I have found on Facebook. It popped up on my feed while I was working, and I just couldn’t ignore it.
As a cat owner myself, I’m a sucker for cute cat toys and I tend to spoil my cats a bit more than the average cat person – So it wasn’t that hard to grab my attention.
And after seeing the ad and the amazing job the original seller did, I just had to recommend it for you to sell as well.
This product can be a crazy winner if you play your cards right, so don’t sit out on this product and start selling it right now!
2. The Ad
The original ad that popped up on my feed has pretty good engagement and it looks like people are genuinely interested in this product.
As for the ad itself, I see no issues there as they have it all – Text descriptions, nice music, a call-to-action text, and the first 3-4 seconds of the video are interesting enough to get people to stop and engage with the ad.
If you’re going to sell this product, then take inspiration from this ad to increase your selling chances.
But that’s not all…
The engagement on this ad isn’t “crazy” so I decided to see if there’s more to it that what eye sees.
And so, I decided to take a look at their ad library:
It looks like this product is doing well for them and each day they’re adding more new ads.
They have ads that run since July and new ads that were added in the same day of writing this article.
They do use the same thumbnail for each of their videos, but each video starts differently.
From videos where they show a bored cat to guilt trip cat owners
To videos where they start right away with a happy cat playing with this toy.
I absolutely LOVE what they have done here as it’s very important to refresh your creatives to get more people to notice your ad. The thumbnails could’ve been different as well, but this isn’t Youtube so it’s not that of a big issue.
Ad copy:
The ad copies are pretty well done with different variations used depending on the first 3-5 seconds of the video.
You have 2 lines explaining about the product, a bit of scarcity text, and a promotion on the current deal they run. As I already said, job well done and nothing to fix here as well.
3. The Store
Now this is where it gets a bit more interesting…
When I first saw this store, I was sure this is a one-product store which sells only this cat Cordion toy scratcher. But it looks like there’s another product they’re selling which is a cat brush.
So I guess at first this was a one-product store for a cat brush or this scratch toy, but eventually they just added one more product and decided to brand it all under the same name.
And I got to say, this is a pretty good idea!
Instead of focusing entirely on a single product, they are re-branding each product under the same name, doing it really well, and this turns the vibes of this store from a regular general store to look like it’s a real brand.
If you ever thought about opening a one-product store but didn’t want to invest that much on each product, then just do the same as these sellers right here and it should get you the same results.
Ok back to the product.
The first thing you see is the quantity discounts bundle on this product:
I have to admit that this is probably one of the better looking bundles I have seen in a long time. It’s pretty big so you can’t miss it and the design is quite inviting and I bet it is working pretty well for them.
The quantity discounts is a really good call because there are a lot of people out there owning more than one cat so they’ll probably need more than one toy.
That’s extra money in your pocket and you should do it too.
Product description:
The description for this product is PERFECT – You have GIFs, pictures, and even a FAQ section about the product. The original sellers know exactly what they’re doing here and sales must be flowing in!
And of course, you also have the shipping and refund policy which are really well written.
Product reviews:
And last but not least, the perfect review section which has it all – From high quality review photos on to an understandable English and not some gibberish auto-translated text.
This is how a review section should look like so do exactly the same on your stores when selling this product or any other.
4. The Checkout
We have here the standard Shopify 3-page checkout with the first one being the customer information page. As you can see in the picture above, they didn’t forget to upload their logo on the checkout page as well so it’s a pretty good start.
On top of that, the Phone number field is OPTIONAL which means people don’t have to add their phone number in order to proceed with the checkout process.
I absolutely love this because some people hate giving their phone numbers because of spam and other reasons. This definitely increases the conversion rate!
Shipping page:
Nothing unusual with their shipping page… Both options are trackable and the paid option costs on an extra $2 which is for insurance. It’s a pretty small sum so I think a good percentage of customers might actually take it.
That’s extra $2 in your pocket – Good for them!
Payment page:
My only problem with the payment page is the tipping section. I know it’s $0 by default, but I do think some customers might find it a bit annoying.
Tipping should be asked when it’s a handmade product(or at least a product that looks like it was handmade)… When it comes to products like this cat toy, I don’t think there’s need to be any mention about tipping.
But who knows… Maybe customers are so happy about this product they’re willing to leave a tip. Worth the test I guess.
To Sum It Up
If you’re looking for the perfect winning product to sell this Christmas, then this is definitely the one. And if you’re not sure how your ad & store should look like, then you have the perfect example right here.
This product can make some serious bank for you this Christmas so don’t sit out on this and start selling it right now!
If you have questions, feel free to ask me in the comments.
Good Luck!
Struggling to find good products to sell? Not sure who’s your target audience? Tired of losing money on products you were sure were “winners”?
Then Ecomhunt is what you need! Find hot winning products that are added daily, spy on their ads & stores and import them into your store in 1 click and Start Selling Today!
