Dropshipping ecommerce is catching on as an avenue for people to gain the financial freedom and the time to create the lives they love. Of course, this form of entrepreneurship isn’t simply an easy pass to the good life, but for those willing to treat it like a business, it is possible to reap major returns. The Oberlo app has helped thousands to increase their sales and expand their businesses, and we’ve had the chance to sit down and pick the brains of some of our most successful users.

Jorge Robinson, for instance, is living proof that hard work and persistence can pay off when you’re willing to invest a bit in your dream of creating a profitable shop. After spending three years trying to make money online, Robinson finally reached his breakthrough with the discovery of dropshipping, and with the help of Oberlo he has watched his profits skyrocket over the past year. Now, his problems have shifted from struggling for success in the world of ecommerce to figuring out how to fill all his free time. Our conversation was full of useful insights for making it as a online entrepreneur.

TELL US HOW YOU GOT STARTED IN DROPSHIPPING ECOMMERCE? WHAT WERE YOU DOING BEFORE LAUNCHING YOUR SUCCESSFUL DROPSHIPPING BUSINESS?

I got started after I just sort of randomly bumped into the name Justin Cener. He was talking about dropshipping ecommerce and how you can make so much money through this pursuit. That definitely piqued my interest, and I joined his Facebook group where he had a couple videos including one about how to set up a Shopify store in under 60 minutes. Before I knew it, I was up and running with my own store on Shopify.

Before dropshipping I was working different jobs for about a year and a half while trying to make money online at the same time. I had actually been trying to make money online for about 3 years, so it was definitely a big learning curve. It was 2016 when I got introduced to ecommerce, and that’s when I started making real money.

WHAT WERE YOUR MAIN STRUGGLES IN THE BEGINNING? HOW DID YOU OVERCOME THEM?

The biggest struggle for me in the beginning was definitely finding an audience for the products I wanted to sell. I found my winning product the first time, thank god. I know people who spend so much money testing new products, sometimes 10-25 a week. Me, I was lucky to find my product the first time. After that, you have to find your target audience, and that’s definitely the trouble I faced until Facebook introduced something called flex targeting. This tool allows you to narrow down your audience and really find passionate buyers. Once they had that, everything clicked and started running from there.

DO YOU REMEMBER YOUR FIRST SALE AND WHERE IT CAME FROM?

I was at my buddy’s party. I’m drinking and having a good time when suddenly I hear my phone ring. I pick it up and notice that I got a sale for $26.91. It wasn’t a million dollars or thousand dollars. It wasn’t even 100 dollars, but I was the happiest guy at that moment! After that, it was only a matter of time before my store started picking up momentum.

DO YOU USE FACEBOOK ADVERTISING? HOW DID YOU LEARN TO USE THEM?

There’s so much to learn about Facebook advertising, things like manual bidding, click through rates and all this other stuff, which I had to pick up from scratch. I learned everything from watching YouTube videos and taking paid courses. You gotta remember, you have to treat this thing like a business. It is a business, so you have to invest, whether it be your time, your money, or both. With that in mind, I definitely had to invest my money into it. By watching videos, watching other people launch their own ecommerce shops, and making my own mistakes at the same time, is definitely how I learned.

WHAT KEEPS YOU MOTIVATED AS AN ECOMMERCE ENTREPRENEUR?

Wanting to be different. I have nothing against people that want to work 9-5, but I personally wanted something different. I wanted to set my own hours, I wanted to take vacation on my own time, and to be my own boss. I wanted the freedom to do the things I want when I wanted. That’s something that keeps me motivated, that and the fear of failure. You know, I’ve already had the success and I just can’t go back from there; I’ve worked too hard for this. Having this mindset is what keeps me going when I wake up every morning.

WHAT IS YOUR SALE-PER-DAY RECORD AS A SUCCESSFUL DROPSHIPPING BUSINESS?

My biggest month was definitely December. I think that’s everybody’s biggest month, even if you’re just getting started because it’s the holiday season. When Christmas rolls around, people are buying gifts for themselves or their loved ones. My highest sale in a single day was $2k, and I was hitting around $1,200 per day on average.   That month I racked in about $38k in total.

AS AN ECOMMERCE ENTREPRENEUR, WHAT’S YOUR TOP RECOMMENDATION TO NEW STORE-OWNERS?

I have 3 recommendations. First of all, upsell. If you’re not upselling you’re losing out on money. For example, if you’re selling a hoodie or a t-shirt, you wanna upsell something small like a phone case or a keychain. It brings in extra money, and who doesn’t like extra money?

Second, build your email list . If Facebook becomes obsolete, you can always rely on your email list, especially if you have a list of something like 200,000 subscribers. You can make a lot more profit without spending money on advertising.  

Number 3 is use Oberlo. This one speaks for itself. You save so much time. I would rather work for one hour than 3 or 4 hours a day on fulfilling orders, especially if you’re getting a lot of them. Oberlo is definitely the way to go if you want to save time.

HOW LONG HAVE YOU USED OBERLO?

I started dropshipping in June 2016. I first heard about Oberlo last October, but at that time I wasn’t getting a lot of sales, so I didn’t have problem fulfilling all of them myself. It wasn’t until December when I really started using it.

WHY DID YOU DECIDE TO USE OBERLO?

To save time. When you’re getting 30-50 orders a day, you definitely want to cut down on time spent fulfilling them. The reason why I decided to join this business is for financial freedom, but also for freedom over my time. So the biggest reason I use Oberlo is just to save time.

WHAT DO YOU LIKE ABOUT USING OBERLO?

Besides the automation that saves me time, which is probably the biggest reason, I like how it tells you how much profit you’ve made for the day because I can take that amount and subtract it from what I spent on Facebook, Ads, and it’ll tell me how much I earned.

WOULD YOU RECOMMEND OBERLO TO A FRIEND OR COLLEAGUE? WHY?

I would recommend it to an enemy if I had to. If you’re looking to save time and money, that’s definitely the way to use it. If you’re in it for the long run, then there’s gonna be a point where eventually you’re getting 50 or 100 orders a day, and Oberlo will become something you’ll really need –not even want– to utilize.