How to Start Dropshipping in Malaysia: A Stepwise Guide for Beginners 2022

Because of Malaysia’s dynamic economy and developed infrastructure for digital technologies, it is an attractive market for e-commerce in Southeast Asia. In addition, the use of e-commerce is rapidly growing in Malaysia. The number of online shoppers reaches up to 16.53 million, and it's equivalent to approximately 50% of the country's population.

Looking at the figures above, it isn’t surprising that e-commerce is popular in  Malaysia. Thus, dropshipping, the new e-commerce business model has become a lucrative business for aspiring Malaysian entrepreneurs. Compared to other online business models, dropshipping Malaysia requires low investment, has lower risks, and is easy to execute. But how can you start a dropshipping business in Malaysia? Let’s check in the post:

Are you ready to start your Malaysian dropshipping business journey now? No hurry, read the post carefully to check out the steps to start dropshipping in Malaysia for your online business. However, before that, let’s find the reasons why start a dropshipping business in Malaysia and why you should start.

Why Start a Dropshipping Business in Malaysia

About 25.84 million Malaysians are active internet users. The number accounts for 80 percent of its population. In addition, more Malaysians will penetrate to mobile phones. According to the research in January 2019, 40.24 million of 32.25 million Malaysians are mobile subscriptions, 25 million are social media users, and 24 million use social media on their mobile devices.

Moreover, according to Statista, the Malaysian e-commerce market will amount to US$4,337 million in 2020. And by the end of 2024, the revenue is expected to grow a whopping 8.4 percent to US$5,5995 million. All the data shows that e-commerce will be popular continuously in Malaysia and dropshipping in Malaysia is a good business move for both new and existing e-commerce stores. Compared to neighboring countries such as Cambodia, Vietnam, and Thailand, Malaysia has a much higher user penetration rate. Therefore, introducing Malaysia to your site might be a good idea if you already have business in these countries.

After looking at the above data, it’s not surprising that dropshipping will benefit you a lot when you decide to start one in Malaysia. Apart from the promising Malaysia market, next, let’s explore the benefits you can get by dropshipping in Malaysia in specific aspects.

Why Should You Dropship in Malaysia

Why should you dropship in Malaysia? First of all, dropshipping has many common advantages such as lower risks, time-saving, and ease of operation with the help of dropshipping tools like DSers.

Then, Malaysia dropshipping requires a low entry cost. With the dropshipping model, there is no need to buy a large quantity of stock beforehand and keep it in the warehouse. You only need to reach reliable suppliers. Then, these suppliers will handle the delivery of your orders from their warehouses.

Moreover, powerful platforms enable you to sell like Shopify or WooCommerce, you can upload dropshipping products you want to sell on them without any hassle. In addition, an established e-commerce platform like Lazada, Shopee, or eBay is also a great option for you. Most importantly, dropshipping suppliers in Malaysia will provide different pricing levels for these products. Then you can provide competitive prices to convert more sales.

How to Start Dropshipping in Malaysia

Now, you have a better understanding of Malaysia dropshipping. You know it’s profitable and promising. However, how can you start? Here is the short answer: have an online store, get a product, find suppliers for the product, reach out to a dropshipping tool to have an automated dropshipping, then market the products. Let’s check them one by one.

1. Creating Your Online Store

No matter where you dropship, Canada, Italy, Brazil, or the UK, the beginning of a dropshipping business is to create your online store. It is the same in Malaysia, you need to build an online store first. You can compare and pick a suitable e-commerce platform to design a new one.

When it comes to creating your e-commerce store, as I mentioned above, Shopify and WooCommerce are both wise choices. Here I would like to recommend Shopify. It’s a hosted platform, allowing you to create your own branded store using its platform tools. With it, you are able to design and customize your store and sell your product without any hassle.

Although the selling platform is not free, it will just cost you USD29 per month to get a basic plan. The basic plan offers you limited e-commerce features, it can guarantee that you can receive support if there is something wrong with your site. In addition, Shopify provides you with plenty of third-party experts that can expedite the creation of your store.

Creating a well-designed Shopify store also means you will receive less competition from other sellers. Your potential customers will only see your high-quality products. Thus, gaining more sales is possible. Sourcing your products from any dropshipping supplier in Malaysia and selling anything you like are allowed on Shopify. Unlike other e-commerce platforms like Amazon and Lazada, you might be not bound by rules and regulations on them.

2. Choosing Your Product Niche

Once you have an online store, it’s time to get your favorite products to sell. I recommend you choose a product niche according to your interests and market research. You’d better focus on a special category or a specific niche since it can help you narrow down your potential Malaysian dropshipping suppliers and your target market.

Just like the Philippines, electronics is the biggest e-commerce products niche in Malaysia, dropshipping baby products, clothing, and toys are also huge revenue earners. Besides, if you are planning to start Malaysian dropshipping, here are also some dropshipping ideas of product niches you can try out in Malaysia:

• Beauty Products
• Hair Products
• Home and Kitchen Products
• Pet Supplies
• Home Decor

You have to have passion for the product niche, and you have already done some market researches about it before making the final decision.

3. Finding Dropship Suppliers in Malaysia

You have got your online store and your products niche. The next thing is to find trustworthy suppliers for your products. Here I have to say AliExpress is an amazing marketplace. It can be viewed as an alternative of Taobao to English-speaking dropshippers.

AliExpress is well-known for its low cost to source your products here. You should note here that most products can take up to 60 days to arrive at your customers. Thus, it's better to take the condition into account when choosing AliExpress shipping method. AliExpress has extensions like DSers for your dropshipping store. With its Supplier Optimizer, finding reliable Malaysian dropshipping suppliers from AliExpress can be a simple task for dropshippers.

What’s more, there are plenty of reliable suppliers on AliExpress. Hence, selling products from AliExpress can reduce your cart abandonment. Moreover, selling products from AliExpress can reduce the return and refund rates for your dropshipping store.

4. Using a Dropshipping Tool

As I mentioned above, powerful dropshipping apps can bring you a simpler online dropshipping business. DSers, the AliExpress dropshipping official partner can source products and ensure supply chain management. Let’s explore how DSers benefit your e-commerce business:

• DSers lets you add orders from AliExpress to your online store directly. Then, you can choose products and include them with custom pricing in your store.
• You can get an optimum AliExpress seller for every order or product to get maximizing profits with DSers.
• DSers will add orders you placed automatically, making order tracking and managing time-saving.
• It provides a special pricing rule. You can use it to update the pricing of new products when added to the store.

5. Marketing

A good marketing campaign is crucial for business success. When you are doing dropshipping, you need to attach more importance to it. Why? More than one seller is selling the same products. A good advertisement idea will drive more sales for your dropshipping store.

Advertisements like Facebook ads, Instagram marketing, Pinterest marketing as well as influencer marketing, are great options for you to market products and store. Marketing strategies are also significant for your store. Holiday advertisement is one of the powerful tactics you can use to boost sales.

In addition, the Christmas day is arriving, why not seize the opportunity to start a Christmas marketing campaign in the holiday season to promote your products and store?

Pro Tip for Dropshipping in Malaysia

With the dropshipping business model, you can enter a new market while keeping costs and risks low for you. It is a risk-averse and affordable alternative to wholesale because only when your customers place an order, you pay and order products from suppliers. However, there is one more thing you need to pay close attention to the checkout flow of your store.

I have to say using one-page checkout is such a great thing. For buyers, one-page checkout can make them finish the whole buying process without any restrictions and will not waste any time switching to different pages. For sellers, it’s one of the impressive ways to improve customer retention and gain customer loyalty.

When starting a dropshipping business in Malaysia, you are a newcomer to the market, the useful way can make your brand be recognized by most people and attract more sales for your store in a short period. Therefore, applying one-page checkout in your store is necessary.

Bottom Line

Dropshipping in Malaysia is a great opportunity to test new products that you think your potential customers might have interest in. It is also a good chance to understand your audience and listen to what they need.

Now after reading the post, you may have your answer to the question: Are you ready to start your Malaysian dropshipping business journey now? If yes, just pick a product niche and test your dropshipping business idea in Malaysia with DSers.