Drop Shipping Sales – Can You Make Money? My Experience

Introduction

You see it all the time online…Adverts everywhere for this company’s programs or software that promise you the world. Of course many come complete with a background picture of a beach, a dude or dudette relaxing on a lounge chair, and holding a cocktail in their hand, looking VERY relaxed!

Admittedly, it all looks so nice, inviting, and conjures up images of freedom – freedom from worries, stress, lack of money, bills, etc. Is it for real though, these many promises of financial freedom? Most if the time, unfortunately, no…

Today let’s investigate one company I looked at in detail, became a part of, and currently am a member of…It is called “DS Domination.”

I joined this site about 4 months ago. The pitch was very good, the videos very clear, and it just made sense to me. I had been looking through many similar sites, and most were just folks trying to get my money, and when I looked deeper, there was nothing of substance behind them…This one seemed different…

So Just What is DS Domination and Can You Make Money? 

Great question and the exact reason I am making this post! Read on, please…

An Overview 

I will cover three areas of their program today:

(1) The training provided
(2) Use of their site, software and tools
(3) Their affiliate program

Background

This is basically a site that teaches you from the ground up how to get into the drop shipping business. It starts you out with very basic courses to show how you can start by using the online stores eBay and Amazon.

Easy to follow and implement what they teach, their training actually walks you through the process using webinars and associated training materials to make this easy.

The advanced classes they offer take you into more sophisticated methods of doing this business, and of course help you realize the potential of much higher profits.

The most basic level of membership, however, covers only the most basic methods of dropshipping, and to gain access to the more sophisticated training, you must buy their upgrades (as described below).

The Process

Drop Shipping is like any other trading business. You act as a trader in a market (in this case the onine sales market), you find/set up buys and sells using the tools they provide, and when the sales are made, you make a profit.

With their tools this process is automated to a large degree, and it has never been easier (I started with them when before they upgraded their system, so there was more work involved).

Now you can quickly identify suitable products on Amazon that you can then offer for sale, at a higher price, on eBay. This is their suggested focus at the initial stage for you, and what I have used.

Here’s how it works: When the eBay buyer makes a purchase of your product you are advertising (you have taken the image, information, etc. from the Amazon site) and pays (via Paypal), you then immediately go to the same item on Amazon (that costs less), purchase the product, and have it sent it to your eBay buyer.

The key here is that you do not buy products first, instead you will only buy the product from the supplier once you have a sale and received the money. You are trying to minimize your out of pocket expenses, nice especially at the start of your drop shipping business.

It may sound a bit complex, but it is not. Here is an example of how I did it in basically two steps:

Step 1 – Getting The Product From Amazon and Offering on eBay

I first looked on Amazon for products that were:

(1) Selling well,

(2) Had sufficient quantity available to sell, and

(3) Were reasonably priced (so I could mark up the price on eBay and make a profit AFTER the associated expenses were paid).

My first product selected was a simple set of kitchen glass storage containers. The pictures looked nice, the package was not too expensive, and the guy selling on Amazon had lots to sell, so I was set.

Next I went to eBay to see who else was selling these, at what price, and then looked at how they had set up their sell page/item description. I did the math to see if there was sufficient profit and as there was, decided to proceed.

I copied the sales picture and description from the Amazon site, did some changes to the picture, changed the description, and used this to build my eBay offer.

Part of this process included looking at the competition’s descriptions being used on eBay, and using the tools available inside DS Domination, make mine more attractive, i.e. using better keywords or a better item description to better sell the product.

Step 2  – Selling on eBay and Buying/Shipping Using Amazon Seller

When a customer sees my offer and product on eBay that looks better, has a better description, and is priced just a bit lower than the competiton, he hopefully will buy from me, and so it was.

When he did buy, his shipping details were provided to me, and his payment went into my PayPal account. Note: You will get a notification that a sale has been made from eBay…

In the old days (only 4 months ago!) you would then go to Amazon, buy the product and have it shipped as a gift to your eBay customer using their provided address.

They have recently upgraded their tools on DS Domination to make this all transpire automatically, and now it manages virtually everything for you, once you have entered all the information about what you are selling.

Now with their tools you only see the end result, your profit…There is a small cost to DS Domination for this convenience, but you can have the selling program on automatic almost using their system, a nice thing. The cost is well worth it.

It is a quite simple process, I think you would agree? Many people are using their site and program, and making lots of money doing so. The buys/sells I describe above will provide income but not the hundreds per sale using their more sophisticated methods provide.

You can make a good bit of extra money on a regular basis if you do nothing more than this though through their site/program. Of course if you want to expand and scale up, you can increase your profits a lot, and they do have training and additional tools for you.

These are all explained and training provided through upper level courses and programs they offer as follows…

The DS Domination Courses

I described here and have used the initial training and what it is intended to do for you as a starter. It is effective and shows your clearly and simply how to use the site, the tools, the keyword search and etc. you have access to as a basic starter member…

The initial and upgraded premium levels of training you can purchase and use, allowing you to scale up your buys, sells, and profits are as follows:

(1) DS Domination Pro – $19.95/mth (my current membership level)
(2) DS Domination Elite – $99.00/mth
(3) DS Domination Unleashed – $249.99 one time
(4) DS Domination Monopoly – $499.00 one time

Note: As mentioned they have recently upgraded their site and are now offering an All-In-One package, and depending on when you get in, you may be able to save money over buying all of the above individually.

The DS Domination Affiliate Program

Some on the internet have called this an MLM program, and it does have some similarities, but it really is more similar to an affiliate program in my mind. I have been involved with both. If you want more detailed information on the complete compensation plan, please click here ====>COMPLETE COMPENSATION PLAN

Basically, the monthly cost to be eligible to realize commissions is $9.95, and that is what you make for one person joining as a DS Domination member at the basic level as I am now…

Where the potential lies with their affiliate program, is when members you sign up decide to upgrade to the premium packages, at the cost mentioned above.

Depending on the program they select you can make quite good money. Note you have to have the same level of upgrade as the purchaser or you will not get the full commissions for their upgrade. See the detailed plan here for details ====> COMPLETE COMPENSATION PLAN

For me, this is not a very attractive program, and you can likely make more money pursuing other programs that offer a better commissions where you do not have to pay the full quite expensive price for their entire program to get full commissions. You are chasing money you have spent – I like to NOT spend much money and have my full commissions sent to me!

The Controversy

I have also seen here and there on the internet people reviewing this site who feel the methods being taught at DS Domination are in complete violation of the terms of service that Amazon and eBay have, and they will say that the user of this site and tools risks being banned from selling on one or both sites if they run into a problem.

Personally I am on the fence with this. There are a number of programs that seek to exploit the power of online sales and most are continuing to operate and sell their wares with no consequences. DS Domination has been around for qite some time now, and they have refined how they do business, but essentially the premise has remained the same, with no consequences.

I believe there is no malice intended with what they are doing, it is a trading business service they are offering their members. Many trading operations use a similar “just in time” system, wherein they do not keep large quantities of inventory on hand…That costs money and time, and is wasteful…

So it is the interpretation of the rules that this site and others use that create for them a “gray area” to operate within, and an opportunity such companies do take advantage of. Note they are providing a tremendous amount of successes for thousands of members currently and have done so in the past.

Also, eBay and Amazon are in the business of making sales, and as long as there is not a flagrant abuse, they likely will not and indeed have not pushed on this…What this site is doing does not fall into that category, or they would have been shut down.

This is the current lay of the land anyway. Things can change…Again it is how you interpret their rules…

My Personal Thoughts

I have not heard any negative comments from members (I am a member of their FaceBook page as well, in addition to the site itself which has a lot of information) in the 4 months I have been with them.

There were some murmurings of discontent during the roll out process of the new automated tools and site layout, which seems to be the case with every upgrade as what they went through, but they were very proactive in answering the complaints and addressing all the issues quickly…

My Take On This Program

I cannot say I am focusing on this sales avenue enough to warrant upgrading to their premium packages at this time, and likely will never do too much on the smaller trading they start you out with.

It just is a matter of time versus money…

My time is worth a certain value, and if I spend time on this I am not spending it on development of my own branded products and services, both which have the potential to provide many many thouands more in profits than selling kitchen storage containers!

If this is something that interests you, they have a program that has proven to work, is growing by leaps and bounds, and provided over a billion USD in sales for their members since opening the door for business.

Not too shabby!

You can click here  ===> DS DOMINATION

Please feel free to leave your comments below and if there is a subject you would like covered, just add it in the box directly below, the note will come to my personal email!

Thanks and have a great day!!