Welcome back to our 'How Did This Become a Winning Dropshipping Product' series. In this series, we break down some of the most trending products for dropshipping. Our goal is to educate our users on some key factors that contribute to a successful product. If you want a more in-depth guide on how to find winning products, check out our article titled How to Find the Best Dropshipping Products in 2024.
In this entry, we’ll be analyzing the breakout success of a Wireless Car Vacuum. When a product finds success, you can never really attribute it to just one or two factors. In our article titled How to Find The Best Dropshipping Products In 2024, we list a short checklist of factors you should consider when doing product research.
We'll be exploring some of those aforementioned factors as well as other circumstances that have allowed this product to excel. Specifically, we'll take a look at the following:
As always, Zendrop sources this vacuum from its own network of vetted suppliers if you’d like to go ahead and check it out.
Without further ado, let’s dive right in to figure out exactly why this vacuum for cars is doing so well.
First things first, we need to clearly outline the criteria we’ll be looking at. A winning dropshipping product doesn’t automatically mean success. In actuality, a winning dropshipping product is a product that has a great potential to sell well. So that’s the question we need to answer today: how can we measure this product’s potential?
Many folks seem to follow this rule of “if I think it’s cool, everyone else will think it’s cool.” Don’t do this. Your personal opinion and biases are powerful tools, but they need to be trained via experience and exposure. More seasoned dropshippers will have already developed a sixth sense for products with great potential.
The five criteria we’ll be reviewing today are the following:
It’s important to note that none of these criteria are codified law. They’re more like guidelines, but that doesn’t mean they’re not helpful. You’ll find that most, if not all, winning products follow this criteria in one way or another. Another thing you’ll have noticed is that some of these skew subjective more so than objective. If this were an exact science, people would already have the ‘perfect formula’ they could use to corner the dropshipping industry. Luckily for us, this isn’t the case.
As mentioned in the Dropshipping Product Research and selecting Profitable Dropshipping Niches articles, if a product can fulfill at least three of these requirements then it clears the most basic requirement for viability. So let’s go back to the vacuum. How many of these requirements does it clear?
Does it have a “Wow” factor? In my opinion, sort of. It’s a vacuum cleaner for cars, and to me that’s not very exciting. However, I can see this product having a limited ‘wow’ factor for certain demographics. The specific model that Zendrop provides has a much slimmer design than what you’d normally expect. In fact, it kind of looks like a Dyson, doesn’t it? This similarity likely isn’t a coincidence. Chances are, this vacuum’s likeness is borrowing Dyson’s credibility to a limited extent.
Does it solve a problem of some kind? Definitely. But maybe more importantly, it’s insanely useful. Compared to other models on the market, this particular car vacuum is much more compact. It’s more easily able to reach nooks and crannies, making it more ideal for detailing car interiors. This small distinction is key. When we consider marketing, the product with a more specific purpose will oftentimes out perform a product with a broader purpose (as well as make more money). This is why developing a specific niche is so important. For many folks, seeing a specialized purpose (like car detailing) would make them think “wow, this might be the best car vacuum cleaner.”
Does it fit into a passionate tribe? Honestly, kind of? Something like this vacuum cleaner can be marketed as a specialized tool to regular folks who want an affordable, ‘specialized’ tool. So although this isn’t a very passionate tribe, there’s certainly a market with high demand. If a customer had to choose between a $25 Generic Wireless Vac, a $40 Car Vac, or a $120 Industrial Size Interior Detailing Vac… which one do you think they’d pick?
Does it have acceptable profit margins? Let’s take a look at Zendrop’s listing for the vacuum real quick.
The baseline cost comes out to $24.78 (you want to add product cost and shipping together to get your baseline). How do you determine the profit margin? Generally speaking, the price you sell your product at is around 2-3x baseline. 2x is $49.56 and 3x is $74.34. Now to some of you, $74.34 might seem a little high, right? Who would buy a cordless vac for $74.34? To check, we can go to Amazon and do some research on prices.
Prices range anywhere from roughly $30 to $90 – which is roughly the same range we found for our vacuum! Similarly designed products sell for around $50, so we can start with $49.99 (The .99 or .97 is a psychological trick that makes people think they’re getting a great bargain). We can decrease or increase this price as we test it to maximize purchases.
Remember, a lower price isn’t always better than a higher price. Sometimes, customers associate lower prices with lower quality products. That’s why higher baseline costs aren’t always a bad thing. In fact, they can help differentiate your product from your competitors, resulting in higher sales. Of course, this also depends on your marketing strategy as well. But all in all, the profit margin looks healthy.
Is it susceptible to customer complaints? As I’ve mentioned before, electronics have a lot of sensitive parts that can break or malfunction due to a million different reasons. Since you can’t really conduct quality control checks yourself, you’re at the mercy of your supplier.
Vendors on Aliexpress are NOT vetted by anyone. The fact is, many vendors on Aliexpress are middlemen who’ve contracted other middlemen who’ve contracted other middlemen to source the product from some random factory somewhere. Your supplier that you just sent $10,000 to fulfill 200 orders might just disappear overnight. This is not a joke. This has happened and continues to happen on Aliexpress to this day.
An unreliable supplier means that you won’t be able to reliably handle returns and customer complaints. It’s a big reason why Zendrop exists. We regularly tour factories in China to build a list of vetted suppliers who are reliable and held to a higher standard.
So with all that being said, we can see that this product checks at least 3 of the boxes for sure, with 2 of the boxes being a solid ‘it depends’. This doesn’t show us the whole story, by the way. All it does is tell us that this product had a great foundation for the successes that were soon to follow.
So how did the world at large react to this product? To start, we’ll take a look at what Google Trends has to say. I’ve gone ahead and input five similar keywords and set the timeline to one year.
When looking at this graph, we can see that it’s largely consistent for the past 12 months. This is a great signal for us that tells us that there’s a consistent demand for this vacuum. It even remained roughly consistent during Q4 of 2023.
But the most important takeaway is that this product’s popularity has been consistent for a very long time.
Tik Tok, and by extension YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels, has the capability to skyrocket any product’s exposure via viral content. But Tik Tok specifically is positioning itself as the modern day home shopping channel. As such, it’s important to do some research on market trends on Tik Tok.
Searching up “Car Vacuum” brings up a bunch of different viral videos mostly from 2023. There are several different car vacuum models, but let’s focus on ours for the time being. After all, even though we’re competing with these other models, we can differentiate with a more specialized use case.
On this front page, there are roughly 10 or so high-engagement videos depicting vacuums similar to what we want to sell. What does that tell us?
Well for starters, the views distribution is fairly even across the board. This means that the keyword we’re using isn’t monopolized by one channel. It’s fair game for everyone, for better or for worse. Users are constantly wanting to watch videos about vacuums, and they don’t have a preconceived notion of what specific brands are better than others. This creates an environment where anyone can break into the market with a few well-crafted videos.
The downside is that this product is prone to get saturated quickly. Given enough time and effort, however, this shouldn’t be too big of a problem.
The main takeaway is that people like gadgets like this. In fact, I might go ahead and say that the ‘wow’ factor for this car vac is much higher than I initially thought. As was mentioned earlier, these criteria are guidelines. Don’t be afraid to make changes as you see fit.
Fortunately, none of these videos are particularly complex, which means we could reproduce similar content without much trouble. Everything could be recorded in an informal setting with your phone. It looks like all you really need to do is flash the gadget, and record yourself cleaning your car.
As we conclude this entry, let’s summarize our findings:
In essence, the Wireless Car Vacuum's success is a testament to the power of combining a well-chosen product with strategic marketing, quality assurance, and alignment with consumer trends.
As we continue to uncover the secrets behind successful dropshipping products, remember that with the right approach, understanding of market needs, and effective promotion, achieving success in the ecommerce world is within reach.
Interested in knowing more? Check out How to Find the Best Dropshipping Products in 2024.
