HOW TO SELL ON EBAY | FREE TIPS

SELLING ON EBAY

This section will discuss some of the common choices you'll be faced with when selling on Ebay. This is not a “How to” sell on Ebay section. If your looking for detailed instructions on how to sell on Ebay, just go to the Ebay resources section. They have mountains of free information and tutorials. No need to pay for that. http://pages.ebay.com/sell/resources.html

Quick Cash VS. Long Term Business:

When I first started selling on Ebay, my goal was to convert my items into cash in the quickest possible fashion. I did this for a few years. After purchasing a membership to terapeak.com I started to analyze my sales and my competitions sales. I noticed a few things. I was making $5000/month in sales, my competitor was making $25,000/month in sales. My sell through rate was 99%, my competitors sales through rate was 25%. I was selling an item for $20, my competitor was successfully selling the same item for $45. I had an inventory of 35 items listed, my competitor had an inventory of 400 items listed.

WOW! I just realized something amazing. I found out a key secret in the Ebay business. The more products you carry in your Ebay store, they more money you can charge for your items. Here is why. Lets say your goal is to make $10,000/month on Ebay. If you have 10 items for sale, you have to sell a high quantity of those 10 items in order to reach your sales goal for the month. However, if you have 100 items, you can sell less of the initial 10 items and some of the other 90 to make up your $10,000/month. On Ebay, the lower your price, the more you will sell. Therefore, if you have more items, you can charge more money for your items and still reach your target sales quota for the month. You individual items will sell slower, but in the long run you will make more money on those items.

This theory works if you have a limited supply of an item, which is usually the case. However, if you have an unlimited supply, then you don’t have to apply this theory.

In laymans terms: Hold out for the bigger money! There is no rush. Stay strong and the right buyer will come along and pay your price.

Item Title:

To find an optimal title for my listing, I usually do an advanced search for item listings that have sold in my category. If I'm selling widgets, I'll do a search to see what kind of titles people who sold their widgets gave their auctions. This is quite simple, yet very effective. If you don't have the right keywords then people may not find your listing.

Pictures:

Your photos are worth 1 million words. If you don't have a digital camera, get one! Be careful when taking photos. Make sure you take the right angle and don’t show too much. You can sometimes make your item look worse than it is if you have low light. Do a Google search on photography tutorial. This can be an important factor in your selling success. You may also consider purchasing a “portable photo light box” on EBay. They are only $50 and will give you professional results.

Description:

I strongly suggest investing in a logo for your EBay business. www.99dollars24hours.com creates logo for only $99. For $99 you can give yourself an image. On the Internet, you can appear as big or as small as you want to appear. Why not appear big?

You can also use a template for your auction listing pages. You can purchase pre made Ebay templates or you can simply have a designer make one for you.

You may also consider purchasing a 1800 number to further validate your image. I use a company called Ringcentral.com and I am very happy with their service. You can start for as little as $9.99/month.

Online Auction vs. Fixed Price:

I almost exclusively use the fixed price option. The fixed price option allows you to demand a certain amount of money for an item. You can also put an option for the buyer to make an offer. If you wanted to sell a widget for $10-$12, you would list the item at $12 with a “make an offer” option. If an offer came in at around $10 I have the option to accept or reject the offer. You also have the option of placing a quantity of items in one auction. This is a HUGE factor. If you have 100 widgets, you just input a quantity of 100 and that way you do not have to keep re listing the item.

Another option to choose is the length of the auction. When I do fixed price I always select “Til Sold” which means forever or till the item sells.

Online auctions can be good for an item that is in very high demand and rare. This way you can allow the buyer to bid the item up.

You should set up a paypal account to accept payment. I strongly suggest getting one if you don’t already have one. You pretty much can’t do business on EBay without one.

Shipping: If you are not sure what an item will cost to ship, you can always visit the USPS website for the exact price www.usps.com . You will need a tape measure and digital scale. I bought my scale on eBay for around $20-$30. I couldn't do business without it. For international shipments, I usually use flat rate boxes as the price seems to always be substantially cheaper.

Multiple items for the same listings:

When buyers are searching on Ebay they are usually flooded with options. One trick I do is list the same item 3-4 times. This basically gives you more real estate on the results page and increases the chances of getting a sale. With the low cost of .35/cents in listing an item on Ebay, its a great way to get extra attention.


Featured Listings:

Ebay has the option of paying $40 (for now, goes up all the time) to feature your auction. Featuring your auction will put your listing on the top part of the search results page. This can be a very valuable tool for the right auction listing. I like to use featured Listing when I have a large quantity to sell of the same item. For example, if I had 100 LCD monitors to sell at $50/monitor; I could potentially sell $5000 worth of monitors in that one particular auction. Therefore, $40 is a rather small investment. I recently sold 60 LCD monitors in two weeks using the Feature Listing. It was well worth the money :).

Have Patience!

I believe you can sell ANYTHING on EBay. As niche and obscure as it may seem, you can probably buy and sell it on Ebay. I never worry about my item not selling on eBay. I feel that if my item is in working condition and I am selling it for significantly less than the manufacturer, it will eventually sell.

It once took my friend 6 months to sell 4 Aqua Massage beds on Ebay. However after six months, he received an email from a person in Australia that wanted the beds. Two weeks later $40,000 was wired to his account. PATIENCE! PATIENCE! PATIENCE! Learn the potential resale value of your product and stick to it.

What is an Ebay store?

An Ebay store is a great option for those selling on Ebay. There is a wealth of benefits to opening an Ebay store. To list a few view this page http://pages.ebay.com/storefronts/checklist.html

I personally opened my store for the simply reason on credibility. I felt that having an Ebay store instantly told my buyers that I sold on Ebay for a living and I'm dedicated to customer support and providing a good experience to my customers.

Now that I have opened my Ebay store there are a world of benefits. Just to name a few:

Your listings may appear on Google search results.
You can categorize your listings and view detailed sales reports.
Feedback left for buyers is automated. Saves me hours!
Buyers are emailed and reminded to leave me feedback. My feedback started to skyrocket after activating this feature.

These are just a few of the many benefits to opening an Ebay store.