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A Millennial Entrepreneur’s Story: “They Laughed When I Started Dropshipping, Then I Banked $51K in 8 Months!”

By Yaroslav Nevsky

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Hold onto your hats, readers, because we’re about to dive into a story that’s nothing short of extraordinary! Ryan, a spirited millennial entrepreneur from the Baltics, didn’t just venture into the world of dropshipping; he took it by storm, raking in a staggering $51,004.83 in just 8 months! Now, he’s pulling back the curtain, sharing his unique journey and the secrets behind his jaw-dropping success. He’s even crafted his own Instagram Shoutouts guide. Ready to get inspired? Let’s dive in and hear what Ryan has to spill!

Disclaimer: all the success stories published in AliDropship blog are the results of interviews conducted in the written form. Even though the editors may make some minor changes to the grammar, spelling, and/or punctuation, the respondents’ writing styles, views, opinions, stores screenshots and personal photos are left unchanged.

Hi, please introduce yourself!

Hi, my name is Ryan. I am 29 years old.

This is a story about how I made $51,004.83 in 8 months with dropshipping using Instagram Shoutouts while working a full-time job.

My parents taught me to get a good education and a prestige job. I did that but felt that that’s not something I want to do all my life. So I started to brainstorm ideas on how I could earn online.

I started with poker but failed, continued with stocks trading – failed again. Then I built an affiliate website and got a couple of hundreds and I still have this website but I don’t do much with it.

Then in 2015 or 2016 (don’t remember exactly but that was the time Alidropship wasn’t live yet), I read my first article about dropshipping. I instantly liked that business model and I started to search for more information about it. And I found Yaros’ threads on Digital Point forums. I read both of them from start to finish and as soon as AliDropship went live, I opened my first dropshipping store.

I must admit that the idea of one-time payment delighted me: as a millennial entrepreneur, I didn’t get much savings to spend on dropshipping.

How did you begin your millennial entrepreneur journey with dropshipping?

I opened my first store with Alidropship DaVinci theme in August 2016. Got my first sale on October 3. I celebrated that, I was so lucky.

Interestingly, I didn’t spend a dollar on marketing! All I did was posting on Facebook groups, on Instagram, Pinterest, and Twitter. I did that manually. In the next few months, I earned close to $1k in sales.

And then I opened 2 more stores.

Don’t want to say that that was my mistake, I better like the word ‘learning’. But those 2 new stores didn’t go well, both generated around $100 in sales in 2 months.

In total, with those 3 stores, I made $3573 in sales in 2017. All with zero spendings on ads, only free methods.

And another store…

At the end of 2017, my wife introduced me with a new store idea about a niche I even didn’t know existed and I opened a store for her. The store went pretty well, my wife gained 20k Instagram followers in a few months and that store earned $2409 in 2018 with zero ads spent.

Until July 2018, I have made around $10k in sales with all my 4 stores combined. As I was working a full-time job I haven’t spent a dollar from my dropshipping earnings and I thought that I have to move this to another level or I will work my job all my life.

So I researched, read, watched Youtube videos. And I came to thought about the new store and how to promote it. I opened it in July 2018.

Since then I have made more than $50k in revenue and around 40% in profit from that store.Uv7Od8Q.jpg

I even have registered my business officially: it’s registered as an LLC company in the USA.

How do you promote your stores as a millennial entrepreneur with a limited marketing budget?

I only use Instagram shoutouts. To make them most efficient, I tested various ad types, various influencers, started slowly until I saw sales coming in. I have made an A-Z guide on How I Made $51,004.83 in 8 Months. It covers anything I know about Instagram Shoutouts. It’s not that hard, it’s much cheaper than Facebook ads and also easier to master.

How long does it take you to manage your stores daily?

Around 2-3 hours. I answer on private messages on Instagram, I arrange new shoutouts, answering e-mails. Few times a week I check for new products on Aliexpress.

How do you deal with difficult customers (if you have any)?

I have them from time to time, but not too often. I try to deal with them in a professional way. As I don’t want bad reviews, sometimes I refund even if I think there is no my fault. I was stressed because of problems with customers when I started, but now I take that just as a part of the dropshipping business.

How are you planning to continue your millennial entrepreneur journey?

I think I have to sell a few of my stores as I don’t have time to manage them as I would want to.

Then, I will continue to work with my best store and try to get to $100k in sales this year.

I am learning about Facebook and Google ads and I am going to start to test them soon. I have always been the “measure seven times, cut once” type of person, so I will probably start slowly.

And in the future, I would like to open my own brand. But that’s more like a dream at the moment.

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We are very grateful to Ryan for sharing this amazing and honest business journey filled with ups and downs! We hope it will encourage other millennial entrepreneurs to try themselves in dropshipping, too — and tell about their experiences as well!

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By Yaroslav Nevsky
Yaroslav is a founder of AliDropship Community helping people worldwide to start and run a successful dropshipping business.
26 Comments
Omry 5 years ago

I am happy every time to see more successful people!

You may ask if you are using an alidropship plugin
Or alidropship Woo plugin?

Thank you ♥

Ryan 5 years ago

Hi, Omry.
I am using Alidropship plugin with Rembrandt theme.
Ryan.

Omry 5 years ago

Thank you!
I wish you good luck ♥

Erick Owange 5 years ago

Am erick owange . am really willing to get into this business but I lack someone who can guide and assist me in this business cauz am still new don’t know anything plz can I get your support in term of guidance and assist in starting business as you orientate me.I will highly appreciate and thanks

Olga L. 5 years ago

Hi, thank you for your interest!
Please, read this detailed article to understand how AliExpress dropshipping works: https://alidropship.com/aliexpress-dropshipping-business-monumental-guide/
Also, these guides will be helpful: https://alidropship.com/guides/

JOE BARE 5 years ago

Ryan interested to buy few of your site send me your price list thanks

JOE BARE 5 years ago

Ryan interested to buy few of your site how to contact you

Akash shah 5 years ago

Hi if you want to buy website please contact me akashshah743129@gmail.com Thank you

Joyson John 5 years ago

Hi Ryan, what is your eCommerce website name? If you reveal it, your story will be more trustworthy.
Thanks.

Olga L. 5 years ago

Thank you for your interest!

The store owners sharing their success stories in our blog never disclose their store addresses for safety reasons.

They fear the possibility of losing customers who might switch to AliExpress, and they don’t want other entrepreneurs to copy their designs, promotional strategies, and product offerings.

Ryan 5 years ago

Hello, Joyson. If the video with earning proof doesn’t look trustworthy then I don’t know what else will help. Won’t reveal my website, sorry.

Ankit kumar 5 years ago

Wow that’s really motivated story. I am also new in dropshipping and I started with Instagram Influncer and it giving me pretty good result. Not that much but yeah it’s good. ankitbishnoi.in

Michael 5 years ago

Hi. How do you deal with the long waiting times until the package arrives to the customer? Isn’t that an issue?

Ryan 5 years ago

Hello, Michael!

That’s an issue only in 1-3 times out of 50 maybe. Usually, customers are waiting and don’t complaint about shipping times. Even if they are, I send them tracking info, I try to be as professional as possible and they usually understand the situation are waiting. So this shouldn’t be the reason to stop you dive into Dropshipping.

Malik Imran 5 years ago

WHy he is selling his ebook for $69? Has he really made money??

Olga L. 5 years ago

Thank you for your interest!

That’s right! Through this eBook, he sells his knowledge and the experience he gained while running a moneymaking business. He is sharing the industry secrets that made him competitive on the market, so why would he want to distribute it for free?

Dahil Zhalaki 5 years ago

Hi Olga,

Your supporting him even makes this more suspicious. Why don’t you let him defend his posts? It may seem that you’re making up stories on your blog to encourage people to buy your products on here. I’m not saying that you’re dishonest, I’m just saying that the vibe I get, it’s like you make up these stories. How do you respond? And this is important for your corporate image and brand.

Thanks
DZ

Olga L. 5 years ago

Dear Dahil,

The comments section is open for publication, so, whenever Ryan has a moment to check the comments and answer them, he does it. And, while he is unavailable, I answer the questions in order to not let them stay unanswered for a long time 🙂

I really appreciate your interest to our publications, and it hurts me to think you’re not finding them authentic. This article, for example, has the link to Ryan’s thread on our dropshipping forum (https://forum.alidropship.com/threads/dropshipping-with-instagram-shoutouts-a-z-guide-on-how-i-made-51-004-83-in-8-months.13602/) where you can check out his profile, photos, period of activity, messages he leaves, etc.

All the authors who agree to publish their stories in our blog have varying privacy requirements and online activity levels. For example, Zbigniew (https://alidropship.com/successful-ecommerce-business-road/) gave a link to his Facebook page, while Mousslim (https://alidropship.com/ecommerce-drop-shipping-success-story/) even shared his Instagram account, but for some authors, it feels troubling to even provide their high quality photos.
We respect our clients’ privacy, and never push them to disclose the information they don’t want to share, or take any other actions they’d rather not take. I hope you understand that we’re doing our best to balance between our interviewees’ security concerns, and our readers’ desire to learn as much as possible from an open and free source of information.

Monica 5 years ago

Really ? Why do you NEVER say the name of the websites? Because it’s not true, right ?

Olga L. 5 years ago

Thank you for your interest!

The store owners sharing their success stories in our blog never disclose their store addresses for safety reasons.

They fear the possibility of losing customers who might switch to AliExpress, and they don’t want other entrepreneurs to copy their designs, promotional strategies, and product offerings.

Kabiru 5 years ago

Please Ryan can you give us the name of you stores so we can buy from you

Ryan 5 years ago

Hello, Kabiru!

I am not selling websites, my friend.

JOE BARE 5 years ago

so why you said : “I think I have to sell a few of my stores as I don’t have time to manage them as I would want to.” ?

Ryan 5 years ago

I am still thinking if I need to sell them or not. Currently only selling one, PM me on forum if you are interested.

Remy 5 years ago

I want promo code ryan@ecomhint.com ebook

Ryan 5 years ago

Hi, Remy. Send me a PM on the forum or send e-mail to ryan@ecomhint.com

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