What Should Dropshippers do during Coronavirus Second Wave?

By taking a drilled-down view into the kinds of purchases customers are making globally can help retailers plan for the challenging trading period ahead.

According to a survey released just before the announcement of England’s second lockdown, John Lewis & Partners revealed that 60% of people will be completing their Christmas shopping by the end of November.

This figure is set to climb even higher now that it’s looking more likely that many brick and mortar stores will close, opening up huge opportunities for those with a strong eCommerce set-up including drop shoppers.

Those who will reap the rewards during the second wave are savvy dropship pets who’ve used thd who used the first lockdown to re-evaluate and improve their online channels and offerings.

So what should a dropshipper do during Coronavirus second wave? Let’s find out.

What should a dropshipper do during Coronavirus second wave? Make sure you stock up on inventory for winning products. Buy those products in bulk to save ongoing costs. Adjust pricing timely with any required increases while ensuring ad strategies are ahead of the curve. Don’t use ePacket as long shipping times could cause customer complaints and disputes.

So that we can understand a little more about what dropshippers should do in order to stay ahead of the second wave coronavirus, let’s discover a little more about what that means.

What is Coronavirus’s second wave?

Here we can see that, if compared with the spring when the new coronavirus just started to spread all over the world, the number of new cases of COVID-19 now has grown rapidly.

With a surge of new cases of Coronavirus second wave in Europe and the US, across Europe and the US, Governments are taking measures to contain the situation.

So this is why many countries are closing public spaces, and lots of the larger corporates and many other businesses are announcing the second period of remote working.

According to experts, The number of new COVID-19 cases appears under control for the moment, which is good news.

However, this is time for all eCommerce store owners, dropshippers, and anyone in retail to begin preparing for the second wave.

So how are real-life stores comparing with online sales during the Coronavirus?

How has the coronavirus affected online sales?

As many have possibly predicted, it doesn’t take a genius to deduce that given periods of lockdowns, enforced mask-wearing, queueing in the rain, and other grim realities of bricks and mortar shopping that we are likely to see an upsurge in online shopping.

According to SaaS platform provider Quantum Metric, online sales from select brick-and-mortar stores have increased by 52% compared to a year ago, while conversion rates have gone up by 8.8%.

So how will this affect the kinds of products bought online and what are the new trends appearing?

What is coronavirus second wave shopping?

Second wave shopping isn’t about hoarding essential things, but about self-caring and life improvement for example.

We are also seeing a spike in many types of home products, especially those which include kitting out a home office space such as home office chairs, for example.

According to other experts, it seems that UK retail sales increased for the fifth consecutive month in September powered by a rise in spending on DIY and household goods.

Why are customers spending during the second wave of Coronavirus?

Spending on household goods and garden items fuelled the recovery in sales on the month, as consumers shifted spending away from holidays abroad.

The ONS said the volume of retail sales rose by 1.5% between August and September, continuing recovery in consumer spending from the biggest slump on record during the lockdown.

Are more customers cooking at home and ordering online?

Some experts have said that with more restrictions on hospitality venues imposed by the government in recent weeks, this could give retail sales a further boost in the months ahead as more people are cooking at home.

However, it could be that with rising levels of unemployment after the end of the furlough scheme, this might be likely to drag down consumer spending,  as people become more cautious about overspending during the second Covid wave.

However, consumers are more frequently allocating their brick-and-mortar shopping budget to online shopping during the pandemic according to other reports.

So it’s looking good for those who are setting up ECommerce ventures as coronavirus second wave shoppers will be flocking to online stores including dropshippers.

How has working from impacted Coronavirus dropshipping?

According to some important retail data, it seems that comfort and wellness remained overarching factors for successful products, and items that were successful early for Covid-19 shoppers continued to sell well.

An evergreen pandemic-favorite, sleepwear also seems to be a good choice for a winning product as while all-in-ones (onesies) saw an increase as ultra-quick 30-second dressing became a viral trend this year.

Popular dropshipping categories of the second wave COVID-19

Here are a few of our top tier products to ride the second wave of the coronavirus.

• Health care
• Beauty care devices
• Essential oils and home perfume
• DIY
• Gardening, along with other general home improvements
• Cooking tools and accessories
• Working from home essentials including desks, computer chairs, and comfortable clothing

So does all the uncertainty around the Coronavirus second wave mean that the costs for dropshippers and other store owners will rise? Let’s find out.

Does it mean more cost for dropshippers and online sellers?

• Products if sourcing from China, then the impact should be as normal cost-wise as production capacity has now relatively stabilized
• Advertisement: More retail businesses move online, and with more people starting to shop online you might need to increase your ad budgets to keep up with increasing demand and ensure second wave coronavirus shoppers aren’t visiting competitors’ stores.
• Shipping costs: After the first wave of the pandemic, shipping capacity is virtually back to normal, however fluctuation should be expected as there are still so many uncertain factors going forwards.
• Shipping efficiency: You should factor in a delay during last-mile delivery. Last mile is a term used in supply chain management and transportation planning to describe the movement of goods from a transportation hub to a final destination. With measures taken to contain coronavirus, delay is expected.
• Virtual assistant: There will be increased availability of SOHO freelancers, so this should force costs down for their services

How should dropshippers prepare for the second wave of Coronavirus?

So how can new dropshippers and those who are already running a successful eCommerce business make sure they are fully prepared for COVID-19 second wave shopping?

Let’s discover more.

• Avoid selling masks Try to resist the opportunity to sell masks or even medical-related mask products as this can be quite a risky venture. You may run into unforeseen difficulties if for instance if there is a radical change of prices or policies. Also, you may also get involved in customer complaints if they have different expectations of how your products might protect them. While consider selling mask-related products such as mask bracket.

• Buy in bulk Take your cue from our above list of dropshipping products and do your own research. Make sure you keep abreast of your stock inventory for any winning products by ordering in bulk to keep your costs down to the minimum. Stock inventory for winning products.

• Increase ad budget and selling prices Make sure you are on the ball with any price changes and remember to adjust them accordingly. You might also think about increasing the selling prices of products in order to optimize your ad budgets and get more from your spending to keep your profit margins as healthy as possible.

• Use alternatives to ePacket Although HyperSKU provides ePacket as one of its shipping options, we recommend you avoid that as an option. ePacket has very slow shipping times and its overall lack of shipping efficiency can often lead to customer complaints and worse, customer disputes. This is too risky and not to mention a huge time and money drain for dropshippers. Choose efficiency and quality over cost is wiser especially during holiday season.

And finally…

In some final thoughts, it’s worth keeping in mind COVID-19 is still unfolding worldwide, and there are many unknowns ahead.

The Coronavirus second wave is already impacting our personal lives, our businesses, how we connect with others and will have a lasting effect on how we approach our global commerce.

It also seems that Coronavirus second wave dropshipping trends will be moving towards higher frequency but lower revenue shopping carts, so it’s important for new or existing dropshippers to increase their focus on building loyalty.

Without a doubt, the digital retail experiences customers have been having these past few weeks, good or bad, will have a lasting impact on their ability to build much-needed loyalty for eCommerce store owners.

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