Shopify vs AliDropship 2024: Which Solution Do You Need?

Shopify vs AliDropship: Which solution do you need? Ultimately, the answer depends on what you’re trying to accomplish.

When to Use Shopify and When to Use AliDropship

When to Use Shopify

Pick Shopify if you want to:

• Sell a wide range of products, from dropshipped products to items you create yourself, subscriptions, digital products and more.
• Access a comprehensive toolkit for website design, marketing, inventory management, shipping, and order fulfillment.
• Leverage omnichannel sales methods to increase your conversions and unlock multiple avenues of revenue.

When to Use AliDropship

Pick AliDropship if you want to:

• Connect your existing website with one of the world’s largest dropshipping marketplaces (AliExpress) and access thousands of products.
• Have a store built for you from scratch, complete with a catalog of recommended products.
• Outsource order fulfillment to a third-party, and focus simply on growing your store.

Shopify vs AliDropship: The Pros and Cons

Shopify Pros and Cons

AliDropship Pros and Cons

Shopify vs AliDropship: Overview and Pricing

What is Shopify, and How Much Does it Cost?

Shopify is an omnichannel commerce platform, and a solution I recommend to many business owners. It can support any business model, with options to sell products and services, subscriptions, and even dropshipped or print on demand goods.

It also allows you to sell through marketplaces, social media, and in-person, with a built-in point of sale solution.

Basically, Shopify gives you all tools you need to build a great online store (with customizable themes), manage your business (inventory, order, and customer management) and streamline operations (with shipping, fulfillment, and analytical tools).

While Shopify’s “Starter” plan for $5 per month allows you to sell through social media and messaging apps, you’ll need one of the company’s core plans to access all of the platform’s features.

Shopify pricing options include:

• Shopify Basic: $39 per month (monthly) or $29 per month (annually)
• Shopify: $105 per month (monthly) or $79 per month (annually)
• Shopify Advanced: $399 per month (monthly) or $299 per month (annually)
• Shopify Plus: Custom pricing starting at $2,300 per month.

You’ll also need to pay transaction fees on Shopify if you’re using a third-party payment processor instead of the integrated Shopify Payments option.

What is AliDropship, and How Much Does it Cost?

AliDropship is a solution that supports dropshipping businesses, allowing them to create stores, and sell products from AliExpress.

There are two ways to access the solution. You can either ask AliDropship to build an online store for you, or you can use a plugin to connect AliDropship’s features to your existing website.

The first option gives you access to a turnkey dropshipping storefront, already pre-populated with products from AliExpress, and support from a personal account manager.

The second option basically allows you to transform your existing website into a store, with products from AliExpress.

If you ask AliDropship to create your store, you’ll get a 14-day trial, and then you’ll need to pay a monthly subscription fee of $39 per month. If you use the plugin, all you need to pay is a one-time fee of $89 (plus the cost of any add-ons or extra services you might want).

Shopify vs AliDropship: The Core Features

While both Shopify and AliDropship support ecommerce companies, they’re very different platforms overall. There are some overlapping features to mention. For instance, both options can give you access to a storefront, inventory management tools, analytics, and store customization options.

Both AliDropship and Shopify can also help companies with fulfillment. AliDropship manages all of your fulfillment processes for you (thanks to the dropshipping model) automatically. Shopify allows you to access fulfillment services via the “Shopify Fulfillment” solution.

The Main Features of Shopify:

• Website builder and theme editor: Shopify gives business owners a comprehensive website builder, content management system (with a blog), and the freedom to customize their store’s design with themes and code.
• Omnichannel sales: With Shopify, you can sell products and services through your custom website, marketplaces (like Amazon and Ebay), social media channels, and in-store, via Shopify POS (the Lite version is included on most plans).
• Marketing tools: Shopify integrates with social media channels, Google analytics, and features an SEO-ready design, ideal for content marketing. It also integrates with various marketing tools, and has its own chat and email marketing options.
• Integrations: Shopify’s comprehensive app market allows you to connect your store to other dropshipping platforms, print on demand companies, marketing tools, and software for analytics, inventory management, fulfillment, accounting, and more.
• Business management: With Shopify, you’ll have all the tools you need to run a successful business, from Shipping solutions, to inventory and order management tools, staff accounts, customer profiles, analytical and reporting tools, and more.

The Core Features of AliDropship:

• Multiple store options: With AliDropship, you can get a new ecommerce storefront built for you, and filled with products specific to your niche, or you can integrate the company’s plugin with an existing CMS (like WordPress).
• Comprehensive product catalog: AliDropship links your store to AliExpress, allowing you to choose from hundreds of products from different categories. You can add those products to your store in an instant, and set your own prices. Plus, AliDropship handles all of the packaging, picking, and shipping processes of order fulfillment for you.
• Marketing tools: AliDropship gives companies basic tools for marketing and conversion rate optimization. For instance, you can showcase customer reviews on your website, launch flash sales, and offer customers discounts.
• Add-ons: Depending on the CMS you use, you’ll be able to leverage a range of plug-ins and integrations (like WooCommerce for WordPress), as well as extra tools to help with marketing, accounting, and other business operations.
• Business management: With both the plugin and the turnkey store, you’ll be able to manage orders and inventory, track sales and profits, monitor order progress, and place orders automatically. You can even automate price changes, based on a custom markup formula.

Shopify vs AliDropship: Final Thoughts

Both AliDropship and Shopify are great tools, but they serve very different needs.

Shopify is great if you’re looking for a flexible, omnichannel commerce solution that adapts to any business model, and allows you to sell any kind of product.

AliDropship, on the other hand, is a good choice if you’re looking for a simple way to get started in the dropshipping industry, and access thousands of products for your catalog.