How To Start a Dropshipping Business With No Money in 2025

What is the dropshipping business model?

Dropshipping means you sell someone else’s products, but you do not need to buy inventory. In traditional retail, you buy the products from a supplier, and then you stock them in your physical store or warehouse. 

You do not need to do this in dropshipping. In a nutshell, this is how dropshipping works:

• You post someone else’s products in your store or social media account
• A customer pays you for this product
• You use that money to buy the product from the supplier
• The supplier ships the product to your customer
• The customer receives the product 

The customer will never know that it’s not you who shipped the item. In his eyes, you are the seller. He does not know that you are working with a third-party supplier. 

The biggest benefit of the dropshipping business model is that you do not have to spend a huge amount of money to get started or to buy inventory. You can even get started for free. 

Just imagine how many thousands of dollars you need to buy inventory in traditional retail. If nobody buys these items, they will sit in your stock room for a long time or forever. This will not happen to you if you dropship.

Ideally, you must build your own website or online store. However, if you are really short on capital right now, you can build FREE dropshipping stores on:

• eBay
• Amazon
• Facebook
• TikTok
• Etsy

It is free to set up your stores on these platforms, but they are not 100% free. You will pay a fee, like listing fees and selling fees. However, the fees you pay are negligible. For example, Etsy charges $0.20 per listing every quarter.  

But how do you make a profit? If the product and shipping cost from the supplier is $20, then you can sell your item in your store for $30 or $40, giving you $10 or $20 in profit. Of course, you must also take into account the fees you must pay, and then bake these fees into your final prices.

Can you start dropshipping with no money? – replace whole section

Yes, you can start dropshipping with no money. The only things you need are the following:

• A product and a supplier
• A store
• A way to receive payments from customers
• A credit card you can use to order from your supplier

If you use Facebook and TikTok, you can ask your customers to send you money through the usual means, like Western Union. This, however, is a little bit suspicious in a buyer’s eyes. Because of this, it is always better to build a free dropshipping store on Amazon, eBay, or Etsy.

Your supplier will not send the goods to the customer unless you paid for the item already. That is why you need a credit card.

As far as marketing goes, you can market your products for free. You do not need to spend money on advertising on Facebook, TikTok, or Google Ads. What you can do is create content that resonates with your target audience. 

Of course, it would help if you bought the product yourself so you can make videos of them on your own. For example, if you are dropshipping kitchen products, it would be a good idea to buy one of them, and then make videos that demonstrate how they are used.

You do not need to buy so many products all at once. You can start dropshipping with only one product, and this is what we call the one-product dropshipping store. As you earn more money, then you will have more to spend on your next products. 

Can you dropship private label products with no money? – replace whole section

No, you cannot dropship private-label products without money. But you can dropship white-label products with no money. Before we discuss further, let us talk about the differences between the two. 

• Private Label – this refers to products manufactured by a third party. This product is either your design or your formula and no one else can sell it. 
• White Label – these are mass-manufactured products where the supplier merely changes the brand name into yours. 

Although both private and white-label manufacturers require a minimum order requirement, some will let you buy only one piece. The best example of this is print-on-demand with Printify, or what we call POD.

In this dropshipping business model, all the products are white or blank. You will upload a design in the mock-up tool, and then you will see a digital sample, or mock-up, of the final product. 

You can now use that digital mock-up of the product as your marketing image. Post them on social media, Etsy, or in your Shopify store. Once a customer makes a purchase, you can proceed and order the product from the POD supplier. 

They will print the product and then ship it to your customer. This POD system is an example of white-label dropshipping. All the products in the system are mass-manufactured, and here is an example catalog. 

On the other hand, a good example of private-label dropshipping is coffee. In coffee dropshipping, you will ask a brewer to make a specific flavor for you. They will brand your packaging based on how you want it, but you have to order a minimum number of units. 

You will pay for these and then stock them in your house. It is very similar to traditional retail. There are, however, manufacturers and suppliers who will store the units or products in their warehouse for a fee. If there is an order, they will ship the order to your customer. 

Tips to succeed with dropshipping even if you have no money – replace whole section

You cannot market your products the usual way if you have no money. However, there are some things you can do to succeed in dropshipping without spending a fortune. 

1. Test products

This is not negotiable. You must order the products yourself as this is the only way you can validate their quality. In addition, the order process tells you how trustworthy a supplier is. It is only through this that you can determine shipping speed and accuracy. 

Many products online look great in pictures. In reality, they are junk. Just watch videos on TikTok about expectations and reality. You can do the same on Instagram. Many videos show how products online are not what they seem to be. 

Here is a good example: 

As you can see, the product is supposed to be a blanket, but the person who bought it got gigantic strings, not a blanket The same thing happens over and over for toys, canvas posters, inflatable swimming pools, etc. 

From my experience shopping online, most inflatable swimming pool products have photoshopped images. The artist, whoever it is, made it look like six or ten people can fit in the pool. In reality, the pool is only good for two to four kids. 

Just imagine the frustration of the customer who bought this product from you, and you will understand why you need to buy the product. 

2. Offer limited-time promotions

Even if you sell on Amazon or Etsy, you can offer discounted prices for a time. The reason you want to limit this offer to a certain time only is what we call FOMO or fear of missing out. 

FOMO is a marketing tactic where you “force” the customer to decide to buy now. If he doesn’t, he will never see this opportunity again. 

3. Provide clear return policies

One thing that many people look for is the refund policy. Although Amazon and Etsy have their policies. It will help you succeed if you create your own. 

Your refund policy does not have to be too long. You can simply say:

• Refunds and returns accepted within 30 days after delivery
• Returns are only accepted for broker and damaged items
• No returns are accepted for personal goods like underwear 

A refund policy is important because it addresses a customer’s fear. Since they do not know you, they will be much more willing to take the risk of buying if they know they can return the item.

4. Engage with customers post-purchase

Make sure you have a way to reach out to your customers after they buy. For example, send them a notification that their order is now being processed. 

After they receive the item, it also makes sense to ask them how they find the product. Ask them to go back to your online store and leave a review. 

5. Make enticing marketing materials

You cannot rely on what your supplier offers as product images. They are not good enough. After all, most of these suppliers are wholesalers and marketing is not their strong suit.

In addition, many consumers today are no longer attracted to product images. Instead, they look for videos that demonstrate the product. If you want to make a sale, buy the product you dropship, and then create videos for them, 

Share the videos on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, and on your product pages. This will increase your conversion rate and make your products more credible. 

Why consider starting a free dropshipping business? – replace whole section

The truth is that a professional dropshipping store is better than a free one. Free stores work, but an independent website is much more trustworthy than a free Facebook page or marketplace.  

Free dropshipping stores, however, have benefits that paid stores do not have. These benefits are mostly financial, of course.  

1. Free to Start

You do not need to spend a lot of money to start a dropshipping business. You can build a free Amazon and eBay store. Etsy, however, charges an activation fee between $15 and $29.

A typical dropshipping store will cost you at least $19 a month in webhost fees. Below you will see the current pricing of a Shopify subscription. 

You will pay this fee even if you make no sales. With Amazon, you only pay $0.99 per item sold. The other option is to pay $39.99 monthly, and this waives the selling fee. 

2. Little to No Need to Market

Building a free dropshipping store in marketplaces like Amazon or Facebook requires little to no advertising and marketing efforts. As long as you do your SEO correctly, people will find your products. 

The problem, however, is that you are competing with thousands of stores on Amazon. The trick, therefore, is to make your product titles and descriptions shine. Your product images must also be perfect.

We have a blog that shows how to write product descriptions that sell. I suggest you give it a read to make your products more enticing to the consumer. 

The product photos must also be attractive. In most cases, your suppliers cannot give you images that are competitive enough. You need to do the photography yourself. 

The good news is that you do not even have to buy the product, and neither do you have to take the photos yourself. You can use AI to create astounding images for your products. 

Here is an example of a product image from Printify:

Now, here is how it looks after generating it from an AI tool:

To learn more about how to use AI to your advantage, read our blog about 14 Best AI Tools for Dropshipping In 2024 - Free & Paid.

3. Easily Scalable

Finally, a dropshipping business is easily scalable. For example, if you began selling shoes, you can easily expand this store by selling more products, particularly those that fall into the fashion niche. 

Since dropshipping does not require inventory, you do not need to shell out any money to add new products. All you need to do is research about which products have a demand.  

Once you have this data, the next step is to look for a supplier. Then, I suggest that you order a sample product from that supplier. This is merely a test so you can see the product’s quality. 

You can do this scaling or expansion on any platform. However, just be mindful of the fees. For example, Etsy charges $0.02 per listing. If you have a thousand products listed, that’s $200 in listing fees every quarter. Then, Etsy would charge you more money if the product sold.