How To Start An Online Dropshipping Business In The Philippines

Dropshipping is one of the most practical and most profitable strategies when it comes to building a small or even a medium-sized business online. Here in the Philippines, hundreds of independent online entrepreneurs are raking in healthy amounts of monthly income using the method. The great thing about starting an online dropshipping business in the Philippines is that most people can do it.

You don’t need to be a computer programmer or a software developer or a marketing expert to get started. All you need is a basic understanding of how the internet works (search engines, email, advertising, online shopping, etc.)

How Dropshipping Works
In the simplest of terms, dropshipping involves creating an ecommerce store where you display and promote products. But you don’t own these products. In short, your online store only serves as a display window for your prospective customers. When a customer decides to buy from your store and sends in an order, that’s when you get to work. You go to your supplier, make the order in the name of the customer, and your supplier ships the product to your customer. So basically, you are some kind of a retailer but you don’t keep any inventory.

It’s like setting up a physical store wherein you only display items on your shelves. When a customer walks in and says he wants to buy something, you take his order, run out the door, go to another store, buy a similar item, then run back to your own store, and give the item to your customer. Of course, you need to sell the item at a higher price if you want to make some profit. This is exactly how dropshipping works, only this time, it’s done on the internet.

To summarize, you need to partner with a supplier which will provide you with the products that you're going to sell in your ecommerce store. You market and promote the products, the customers make orders through your store, you purchase the ordered items from your supplier, and the supplier ships the products to your customers. Everybody wins.

If that's not clear enough, here's a simplified illustration of the dropshipping setup courtesy of Shopify:
Step 1: Customer places order with your shop.
Step 2: Shop places order with third-party supplier.
Step 3: Supplier ships order to customer (invisibly).
Step 4: Shop alerts customer that the item has been successfully shipped.

Now, let's get to the nitty-gritty of things. How exactly do you start selling online through dropshipping in the Philippines? To make things a lot easier to understand, I am going to focus on two online companies for this guide. And these companies would be Shopify Philippines and AliExpress. Of course, there are other companies that you can use like Amazon and Shopee but so far the easiest to use are Shopify Philippines and AliExpress.

Shopify Philippines: This is the ecommerce platform where you are going to create your online shop. This is the platform that will host your store. It's where you display and create listings for the products that you are going to promote and sell. You have to pay a monthly fee for the platform's services. You can choose from any of the following three types of accounts:
1) Basic Shopify - $13 a month
2) Shopify - $54 a month
3) Advanced Shopify - $107 a month

You can learn more about the various features of each account type here. Shopify offers a 30-day free trial for dropshippers in the Philippines. You should take advantage of this opportunity while you can. You can use the platform without any strings attached for 30 days. Once the 30-day period expires, it's up to you whether you want to continue with the service or not. This is a good way to try the platform and see if it's the right fit for your planned online store.

AliExpress: This is the ecommerce platform where you can find suppliers for your Shopify store. It's highly recommended that you study the platform from top to bottom before you start dealing with suppliers. There are tons of resources online that can show you everything you need to know about AliExpress and how it works. Once you've digested all the information you need, go to the AliExpress website and create an account there.

Creating An Online Store On Shopify
1. Go to to official website of Shopify Philippines.
2. Click on the "Get Started" button.
3. Fill all the requested information like your email address, your store name, and contact details.
4. Add products to your store. This is where your AliExpress account comes into play. You will be adding products from AliExpress suppliers. You should go to Shopify's Help section to find guides on how you can add products to your store.
5. Customize the overall look of your store. This allows you to tinker with logos, text, colors, and themes. Don't worry, there are hundreds of Shopify themes that you can choose from.
6. Set up your domain name. Go to your "Dashboard" and find the "Add Domain" option. Follow the steps as required.
7. Set up and activate your payment processor. Shopify supports over 100 payment gateways. The payment gateways supported in the Philippines include 2Checkout, Coinbase, Mastercard Payment Gateway Services, PayDollar, and PayPal Express Checkout.
8. Set up your shipping rates and details.
9. Make your store live.

Where to Promote Your Dropshipping Ecommerce Store in the Philippines
1. Google AdWords:
2. Facebook Ads:
3. Instagram:
4. Pinterest:

How To Sign Up And Register With The Lazada Affiliate Program In The Philippines

If you ever tried online shopping in the Philippines, there's a big chance that you have come across Lazada. After all, the shopping site is the largest of its kind in Southeast Asia. Aside from the Philippines, Lazada also operates shopping sites in Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore, and Vietnam. Lazada enables you to either purchase or sell products through its platform. But these aren't the only ways on how you can use the site. You can also earn money from it by registering as an affiliate through the Lazada Affiliate Program.

If you are not familiar with the concept of affiliate marketing, you can read a comprehensive overview of it here. But in the simplest of terms, affiliate marketing involves promoting the products/services of another person or company. Every time you make a sale, you earn a commission. In the context of Lazada, here's how it works:

1. You sign up and register with the Lazada Affiliate Program.
2. You start promoting products in the Lazada marketplace to people through your blog or website.
3. You get paid a commission every time someone buys a product through your affiliate link.
4. It's that simple!

There are obvious benefits to these amazing opportunity. One, you can make money even if you don't have your own products. Remember that you will be selling and promoting products that are developed and created by other people/companies. Two, you don't have to keep inventory because everything will be handled by Lazada. And last but not the least, starting your affiliate marketing business is very easy and very cheap. All you need is a decent blog or website which will serve as your main vehicle in promoting the affiliate products from Lazada.

So are you ready to join the thousands of Filipinos who are earning decent amounts of income from Lazada's affiliate marketing program? Yes? Then follow the following steps:

1. Go to the homepage of the Lazada Philippines website. Make sure that you are on the right website. It should be lazada.com.ph. Keep in mind that the company operates separate websites for their markets in Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam.
2. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and look for the "Affiliate Program" tab.
3. In the new window, you should take the time to read the information provided and all the linked resources (Overview, How It Works, Commission, Advertising Media, Support and Learning, Terms and Conditions).
4. After reading the resources, look for the "Sign Up" button and hit it.
5. Create your login details (email address and password).
6. Complete your profile information (name, company name, mobile number, address, birthday).
7. Add the information about the website or app that you are going to use to drive traffic to Lazada (website URL, type of website, source of traffic, traffic level).
8. Submit the completed information. Keep in mind that at this point, you are applying to be accepted as an affiliate. Lazada will review your application if you are a good fit for the company.
9. Lazada will send you a confirmation email within 24 hours. In the confirmation email, you will be informed if you've been accepted or not.

A few important things about the Lazada Affiliate Program in the Philippines:
1. Registration is free. You don't have to pay anything to apply. So if you come across people telling you that you can get a Lazada account from them for a fee, don't believe them.
2. Commission rates for the products can reach up to 10%.
3. You are eligible to earn commissions from your referred customer within 30 days. For example, if a customer clicks on your affiliate link, you will be recorded as the referrer. You earn commissions from the products that the customer buys from Lazada in a period of 30 days.
4. You will be paid in Philippine pesos.
5. You will be paid through PayPal or directly on your bank account. Your earnings will be transferred within 30 days from the day your invoice was generated.

101 Ways On How To Earn Money Online In The Philippines

Let's cut through the chase. Without further ado, here are the dozens of ways on how you can earn and make money online in the Philippines. You can do most of these in your free time. That is you don't have to quit your regular job. Although it's possible to do this full-time, it's advisable that you pursue these full-time only when you have reached a comfortable income threshold. Don't quit your day-job just yet. Explore these avenues first and see how it goes before you make that decision.

1) Start A Blog Then Monetize It
Before you take the first step, you have to understand that this isn't going to be an easy work. Understand that you are in this for the long run. Don't expect your blog to start earning moolah the moment you launch it to the world. There are so many factors that will determine if you are going to be successful or otherwise.

Here's what you need to do: Find a niche market. If you don't know what a niche market is, please Google it. Find a niche that is aligned or at least relevant to things that you are genuinely interested in. Creating content about a topic you are passionate about will be easier. It will be harder for the well of ideas to run dry. Once you've decided on the subject of your blog, get a domain name, register it, and start churning out content.

It's advisable that you build a sizable number of content/articles before you explore your monetization options. There are many ways on how you can monetize your website. You can display advertisements. You can promote affiliate products. You can write sponsored posts. You can even create your own product and sell it on your blog. Again, Google is your friend here. Just go to Google and search for ways on blog monetization. A lot of these blog monetization methods will be discussed further down below.

2) Sign Up With Amazon And Promote Products From The Company's Website
Amazon is the largest online retail site in the world. Almost any product that you can think of is available in their site. Promoting products from Amazon is called affiliate marketing. Basically, here's how it goes: You sign up, you promote Amazon products using your unique affiliate links, you get paid a commission if someone purchases a product through your affiliate link. This can be very lucrative. Sales commissions range from a few cents to hundreds of dollars depending on the price tags of the products sold. For instance, if you sold a laptop worth $200 and the affiliate commission rate is 6%, you will get a commission of $12. Not bad, right? And yes, Amazon accepts affiliates from the Philippines.

You are going to need a website or blog where you are going to promote the Amazon products. You can display the products in your website's side-bar. You can write in-depth reviews about the products. You can subtly promote the products within the articles that you write. The more people you send to the Amazon website, the more money you will earn.

3) Sign Up With Google Adsense And Display Their Ads In Your Blog Or Website
Again, you are going to need a blog or a website for this to work. It's worth mentioning here that you can only apply for an Adsense account if you have a site. Adsense employees will review your website and decide if it's a right fit for their advertising program. You will be notified if you are accepted into the program. To increase your chances of being accepted by Adsense, make sure that your website is well-designed and that it contains a lot of valuable content. Be warned that there are certain topics and themes that are prohibited in the Adsense program. You should look these up and make sure that your website is not violating any of them before you apply for an account.

4) Sign Up With iWriter And Write For Money
If you think you can write, this is something you might want to check out. iWriter is a freelance writing website where you write articles and be paid for your efforts. How much you are paid depends on your overall rating in the site. There are four levels of writers in iWriter: Standard, Premium, Elite, and Elite Plus. Standard writers get paid $2.5 for a 500-word article. Premium writers are paid $4.9 for the same article. For Elite and Elite Plus writers, the rates vary but the rates can go as high as $100 for a 500-word article. You can only reach the Elite and Elite Plus levels if you consistently write high-quality articles that get high ratings from article requesters. iWriter pays via Paypal. You can choose to be paid every week or twice a month. Payout minimum is $20. Sign up with iWriter right now!

5) Become A Microworker For Spare5
Are you familiar with Amazon Mturk? Because Spare5 works the same way. You will be doing small tasks and be paid for your efforts. These tasks can be anything from creating tags for images to looking for the contact information of certain individuals or businesses. Depending on the number of tasks available when you log in, it's possible to earn a couple of dollars within an hour. The work can be boring and redundant but it's easy work that you can do in your spare time. There's an app for the site so that you can work on tasks while you're on the bus on your way home. Spare5 pays every Friday through Paypal provided that you've reached the $1 minimum payout. Read our Spare5 review for more information about the site.

6) Become A Microworker For Clickworker
Clickworker follows the same business model as Amazon Mturk and Spare5. You do menial tasks and you will be paid for your efforts. It's a little bit difficult to gain access to jobs in this site because there are always tests and assessments that you need to take. Be sure to read the guidelines before you take the assessments to improve your chances of passing them. Clickworker pays via Paypal. Read our Clickworker review for more information about the opportunity.

7) Be Paid Posting On Online Forums Through Postloop
What is Postloop? Basically, this is a site which owners of forums pay to direct their members and post on the forums. After signing up with Postloop, you will be provided with a list of forums and blogs where you can participate and post comments. You will be paid for every forum post and blog comment that you make. If you are a fast poster, you can make $1 to $2 in an hour. That's about 90 pesos in an hour. That's above minimum wage in the Philippines. Read this Postloop review for additional details.

8) Sell Stuff On Facebook
Filipinos are among the most active users on Facebook. Chances are most of the people you know are active users of the networking site. You may also have come across people who are selling items like clothes, computers, and gadgets on the site. You can follow their example by offering your stuff for sale. You can choose to sell people near you or you can also offer shipping options. Just make sure that you have an efficient ordering and payment system in place. It's highly recommended that you create a Facebook Page (this is different from a Facebook Profile) for your store. Safety tip: only sell and ship to people whose identities you are able to verify. There are a lot of scammers on Facebook who would disappear or deactivate their profiles once you've shipped them your products.

9) Write For Essays.Ph
Essays.Ph is a freelancing website run by Filipinos for Filipino freelance writers. The rates for the articles are really low but if you are a fast writer, it can still be a decent source of additional income. Here's a tip: Go for topics that you are familiar with so that you don't have to do extensive research. If you can write a 1000-word article in under an hour and be paid for a few hundred pesos, that's still good money. Essays.Ph also follows a writer-ranking system. Experienced writers who consistently turn up high-quality work are promoted to higher levels where the jobs pay more. Essays.Ph pays via direct bank transfer, cash remittance, Gcash, and Western Union. The site also has a forum where you can connect and interact with fellow writers from all over the Philippines. The site claims to have over 70,000 freelance writers.

10) Write And Edit Articles For Zerys
This a freelance writing site where you can write and edit articles for clients. Unlike other writing sites, the amount you get paid for an article you write or edit will depend on what the client is willing to pay. Zerys is merely the middle man that takes care of the transfer of payment between the client and you. Payment is via Paypal. You will be paid whenever the client approves your work. The problem with Zerys is that there's very little work available for Filipinos. Weeks can go by without any jobs available for writers. And if there's a job available, the competition is very tough. The jobs get claimed just minutes after they're posted. With that said, don't expect too much from Zerys. You'd be lucky if you can get a job or two in a month.

11) Review Calls On Humanatic
In the simplest terms, Humanatic is a website where you are asked to listen to recorded phone calls. You will then be asked a simple question like "Did the caller connect to a qualified agent?" You are usually provided with multiple-choice-type questions so all you need to do is click on your mouse. It's not that hard to make a few dollars in Humanatic in under an hour. Some of the site's most prolific reviewers make more than $50 a day from the site.

12) Find Gigs on Craigslist
Dozens of jobs and gigs are posted on Craigslist Philippines every day. Just head over the "Jobs" section and browse through the listings. The gigs are organized into categories so that you can search in the categories that are relevant to your expertise and skills. If you are a graphics designer, you can go to the Art/Media/Design category. If you are a freelance writer, you can head over to the Writing/Editing section. Here's a tip: Be careful about the gigs and jobs that you do because there are a lot of scammers in the site.

13) Write An Article For Listverse ($100 Per 1500-Word Article)
Want to make a quick hundred bucks? Then you should try submitting a list article to Listverse. But before you do, make sure that you visit the website and read several of the list articles published there to get an idea about the type of content that they're looking for. Basically, the article you submit should contain at least 10 list items and should not exceed 1,500 words. The main categories of articles in the site are Bizarre, Entertainment, General Knowledge, Lifestyle, Science, and Society. Pick from one of these categories and find an interesting topic that the site hasn't already covered. Listverse only pays their writers through Paypal so get a Paypal account first if you don't have one.

14) Write For Kicker Daily News
Kicker Daily News is a popular website based in the Philippines. We don't know how much they pay their writers but according to their website, writers are paid on a per article basis plus a cut of the site's revenue. They require applicants to have excellent American English writing skills. They also prefer those with degrees in Mass Comm, Journalism, English, Literature, and Marketing. However, you can still apply even if you don't have a degree as long as you can provide proof that you have a published article in a news site. They are also looking for full-time writers only. Apply for Kicker Daily News.

15) Find Gigs And Small Jobs On Reddit
Reddit is a great place to find gigs or learn about opportunities that can earn you extra cash. The trick is to find subreddits that are focused on these topics. For example, there are subreddits about writing sites where freelance writers share tips about the sites they write for. Three subreddits that we highly recommend for Filipinos are Beermoney, WorkOnline, and SlaveLabour. There are tons of other subreddits in the site that focus on other niches like design, graphics, programming, etc.

16) Write Articles For HotCopy
HotCopy is a content writing site where you get paid writing articles for clients. Your pay rate depends on your level. There are three levels of writers in the site: Standard, Advanced, and Pro. Standard writers are usually paid around $7 for a 500-word article. Pro writers can get up to $25 for an article with the same word count. For additional details, read our HotCopy review and see if the site is suitable for you.

17) Write And Submit Articles For ContentGather
This is a writing platform where you can submit articles you wrote to the "marketplace" pool. People looking for content can purchase your articles at a fixed price. One advantage of this site is that you decide how much your articles are worth. It's you who places the prices on the articles. For more information, read our Content Gather review and decide for yourself..

18) Get Involved With Dropshipping
Dropshipping in the Philippines is fairly new but there are those who are already raking in the cash using the method. What's great with the strategy is that just like affiliate marketing, you don't need to keep any inventory. The products that people buy from your online store will be shipped to customers by your supplier.

The other ways on how to make money online are coming soon. So stay tuned. If you know of a way on how to earn money online in the Philippines that wasn't discussed above, feel free to tell us about it in the comments section below. Thanks a million.

An Honest Review Of Humanatic: Is It Worth It Or Is It A Scam?

[Overview of Humanatic: Humanatic has other companies as its clients. It offers a service in the form of a software that enables companies to better analyze the phone calls directed towards their businesses. The Humanatic software combines the services of thousands of reviewers from around the globe and the power of computers to transcribe and analyze the phone calls. Reviewers listen to the recorded phone calls and provide answers to questions that will help the clients improve their customer service or increase their sales.]

I've come across Humanatic being mentioned quite a lot of times in some of the forums that I frequently visit. Although most of the chatter around the site and its services are positive, I held off signing up with the company because it struck me as very similar to Amazon's Mturk services. Anyway, since I haven't been too busy the last couple of days, I decided to check out the site and find out what I can get out of it. In this article, I am going to chronicle my experience with the company.

First things first. You can only become a part of the Humanatic team if you have a valid and verified PayPal account. If you click on the Register or Join tab, you will be directed to a page that will ask you to login using your verified PayPal account. Obviously, if you don't have a valid and verified PayPal email address, then you can't proceed. Fortunately, getting a PayPal account and having it verified is super-easy. If you don't have one already, then go get one. Now.

Once you logged in using your PayPal address, you will be sent to the sign-up page. In it, you will be asked to input your name (your real name, no aliases) as well as select the country and city where you live. You will also be asked if you speak Spanish. I'm assuming that a lot of the jobs inside Humanatic need Spanish speakers that's why this question was asked. I don't speak Spanish so I clicked on the "No" option. You will also be asked to write something about your current and recent employment history. A short overview paragraph will do.

I completed all these and clicked "Submit". My application has been sent and all I have to do is wait for a follow-up email from the company. That's all for today. I will write more about the company and the jobs it offers after I get in and experience the jobs myself. Updates are below. I have them numbered so that it will be a lot easier to follow my progress.

1) I received a confirmation within 24 hours that I am now a member of the Humanatic team. I immediately went to my dashboard to see if there's any work available. I was met by a notification that I need to watch a welcome video and get paid $1 for it. I watched the video and after confirming that I've seen it in its entirety, my account received the $1. Pretty sweet. Easiest buck I ever made.
2) Most of the time, there are no phone calls to work on. After several refreshes, I finally was able to do two outbound calls. Each job took me just a few seconds. After finishing the two jobs, I checked my account and saw that it increased by .07 cents. Doing the math, that's .035 cents per job. I'm disappointed obviously. However, the two jobs I did are among the lowest-paying jobs in the site. There are several higher-paying jobs that I am yet to unlock because I'm still new on the site. I don't how long I'll have to do the lower-paying jobs before I get the chance to crack the higher-paying ones.
3) Humanatic has a leaderboard wherein the day's biggest earners are shown as well as their earnings. For instance, as of today, at the top of the leaderboard is a user named Eugenio Candelaria who so far earned $8.76 for the day. That shows that you truly can make a little bit of extra money from the site if you are persistent.

The Importance Of Advertising And Marketing Courses For Aspiring Entrepreneurs

If you are an aspiring entrepreneur, there are a lot of steps that you need to go through before you are ready to build a business from scratch. One of these steps would involve educating yourself about all the aspects of the industry that you want to enter. The next obvious question is what are the things that you need to prioritize in learning? Well, there are a lot of things that you must learn but you must pay special attention to the advertising and marketing aspects of running a business. You see, having a good product or service is great but if you can't effectively promote it to the right audience, it amounts to nothing. In a nutshell, if you want people running towards you to buy your products, you need to educate yourself about the best practices in advertising and marketing them.

There are tons of advertising and marketing courses today. Basically, you have two options on how to get them. You can enroll in a business school or a university. Or you can teach yourself by making use of the thousands of resources that are available online. Whatever path you choose, the results will be the same if you are truly committed in educating yourself. These courses often differ from each other but their goals are always the same. That is to show you the strategies in promoting products and services to people. The courses are usually divided in modules wherein you get to learn how to do things. The next stages in the courses would involve application of what you learned in the real world.

Advertising and marketing courses also vary when it comes to the amount of time that you need to finish them. Some courses would take a few hours, some days, and some even months. It's recommended that in deciding which courses you should take, you must choose the ones that compliment your desired pace. If you want to learn only during your free time, then pick the ones that offer flexible schedules and modules.

Immersing yourself in advertising and marketing courses has a lot of benefits. First of all, you are going to learn a lot of information that you can utilize for as long as you are an entrepreneur. The things you learn are indispensable. Whatever niche or industry you are, the lessons remain relevant and applicable. The courses also have valuable indirect benefits. They teach you how to be flexible, how to adapt to changes in the business environment, how to deal with the competition, and how to turn your weaknesses into strengths. In short, you get better in everything that you do as far as your business is concerned.

As the popular adage goes, education is one of the most important ingredients in achieving success. If you have in your hands the knowledge and the skills to build a profitable business, then there's very little that can stop you to do just that. And one of the best ways to accumulate knowledge and skills is through advertising and marketing courses.