DROPSHIPPING: How I got scammed by fitness influencers on Instagram
Are you scrolling your Instagram feed every 15 mins when you are stuck at home? Are you aware that you’re the perfect candidate for e-commerce brands partnering with Instagram Influencer?
With more than 21 million users in France, Instagram is considered by influencers to be the social media generating the most engagement and is the preferred platform for advertisers and agencies for posts and Stories.
That being said, let me tell you my story. I recently got into fitness and healthy lifestyle since lockdown started one year ago. What better moment to get in shape when you have no social life ? I started to follow a lot of french fitness influencers, men and women and a few content creators specialized in nutrition and healthy recipes on Instagram. I was really addicted to them, looking at every posts and stories every day to get motivation for my workout and learn more about this lifestyle. I started to identify myself to the fitness content creators and I felt they were sharing the same values as me and obviously they seemed to have my best interest at heart.
That’s the first issue with Instagram Sponsored Posts: when we are looking for recommendations, we are influenced by someone we know or follow online. They seem honest and authentic, share our values and we like them even more when they propose us some discounts.
We can easily identify sponsored posts as they are flagged with a “paid partnership with (brand name) tag that appears immediately under the user name. When influences talk about the brand in story, most of the time they add a hashtag #sponsored for more transparency with they’re followers.
So at first sight, we’re completely aware that our favorite influencer is going to make a lot of money if we buy the product he recommends.
We might not feel confident purchasing a product directly through Instagram, but if an influencer has tested it before us, why not trust it ? Blame it on our senses, but the more interaction we have with a product, the more familiar, comfortable and confident we feel purchasing it.
That’s how I bought the connected scale FitTrack and Les Gargouilles plastic ball with bio-ceramic balls for economical laundry, recommended by french fitness influencers. I only noticed a few weeks later they were dropshipping products.
What is dropshipping ?
Dropshipping is a retail fulfillment method where a store doesn’t keep the products it sells in stock. The drop shipper will virtually generate profit by increasing the prices of low-cost products that are already on direct sale on well-known Chinese websites such as Aliexpress or Wish. The buyer receives a product ordered directly from China while having paid a large commission to an anonymous broker. The only thing drop shippers have to do is create a nice e-commerce website and drive traffic through paid ads or partnerships.
How are influencers driving sales for dropshipping products ?
To scam as many people as possible and make them come to a ghost site instead of letting them buy on Aliexpress, dropshippers get in touch with web stars followed by thousands of people promising them a large amount of money generated in a short time. Then the influencer makes his subscribers believe he has benefited from an incredible offer, he shares a discount code and asks followers to swipe up to get direct access to the product’s website without actually knowing it is a drop shipping site.
That’s how I foolishly landed on the Gargouille website after seeing a story from a french fitness influencer (2.7M) and how I bought a Gargouille after seeing some pictures of whales swimming in the ocean, terms like “organic ceramics” or “committed”.
I thought I was doing a good deed.
A few weeks later, I made the same mistake when another french fitness influencer (678K) shared a discount code for the connected scale Fittrack. She was saying that she is actually using the balance to keep track of her progress and that she was really satisfied with the technology. Guess what ? After a few weeks, I realized that the weight displayed on the scale was not right. Even though I read some positive reviews before buying it, I still felt for it. With further investigation, I found out that these two products were on Aliexpress sold at much lower prices.
Now that I am completely aware of this dishonest but legal practice, here are my tips to detect dropshipping:
Reverse image search: do a reverse image search on Google; if you see more of the same images, that’s a great indicator that that store is dropshipping.
Scam Doc: Copy and paste the product reference or the company name on ScamDoc
Aliexpress: check directly if you can find a similar product with same image/description for a much lower price.
Don’t trust product reviews: don’t always rely on positive reviews, some dropshippers just import reviews from the AliExpress page that they are sourcing the product from.
Check shipping times: find out more about their shipping information in their product description, FAQ page, or Shipping page. If it takes more than 2 weeks to get delivered, the store might be dropshipping.
No phone number available: most dropshipping store don’t have a phone number for customer support, they mostly only show an email address on their contact page.
Beware of greenwashing: More and more dropshippers are using ecology as an incentive to buy. For example, they promise to clean up the beaches, plant a tree or make a donation to an association.
