Stop Thinking - Just Get Started!
Stop just thinking about how good it would be to make money selling on eBay and get started! Start out slowly; say with only an auction or two. Learn the ropes as you go. Join an online eBay group to share ideas and to learn more from people who’ve been selling on eBay for years.
Selling on eBay is relatively risk-free, just remember to take your time when setting up your listing and check through the many tips in this blog, to help you.You can also check out my web site eBay Auction Secrets for lots of free resources.
Use a Customized Business Card - for FREE
A great way to raise awareness about your eBay business is to have some business cards made and leave them everywhere! Include your store URL or register a domain that is easy to remember, and have it forward users to your eBay "items for sale" page. If you are a Power Seller, eBay allows you to use the Power Seller logo on all your marketing materials.You can get FREE, professional quality business cards for free with this special promotional offer from VistaPrint, the world’s leading online printer.
Here's what you get:
* 100 Business Cards
* Heavy, 100 lb. (265 gsm) card stock* 30 different designs to choose from
* Four-colour (CMYK) printing process
* Fast and easy online ordering
* Satisfaction guarantee!
Go to VistaPrint to get yours.
Top 10 Secrets
Don’t forget to grab your free copy of the Top 10 Secrets to Selling Successfully on Ebay. Costs nothing, and will help you on your way to make money selling on eBay.
eBay Tools - Free
There are lots of tools around to help you make money selling on eBay.
The Free Auction Success kit will show you how to earn up to $100, $300, even $1,000 every week working from home on eBay. Plus they also give you the Best-Selling eBay Tips for Dummies for free.
(Sorry, US only)Or try this one - Perfect eBay Auction Kit
Automate! Automate!
A good auction management service is a vital tool if you are, or plan to be a serious online auction seller. Go ahead and try selling even just 5 items at the same time, and you'll see why you need to automate as much of the process as possible. A good auction management service will automate many of the mundane, time consuming tasks associated with online auctions such as : Listing multiple items quickly, managing sales and checkouts, leaving feedback automatically, and emailing all your customers at once. The Auction Resource Network is the service I highly recommend. For a very reasonable outlay, the time and effort you will save is priceless!
Using Second Chance Offer
Did you know the second chance offer was designed for a seller to offer their item to the next highest bidder in case the high bidder didn’t pay or want the item ? However, if you have another item the same, you can also use it to offer the item to the next highest bidder, at their bid price. You have up to 60 days after a listing ends to use the second chance offer, but I would do it immediately.
Know your eBay terms and acronyms
Do you know what "OEM" and "MIMB" mean?To make money selling on eBay, you must know and understand its basic terms and terminology. Whether you are an experienced eBay seller, or just starting out I highly suggest you know and learn all of these eBay acronyms and take a look at the eBay Glossary. The more you learn about online auctions the more effective a seller you will be.
Stand Out From the Crowd
The next time you list an auction, instead of using a picture of your product as a gallery image, make one that completely stands out. Make it bright yellow with red letters saying, "LOOK HERE", or "YES!", or something like that.Just make sure to provide images of your product in your auction description...images are good!You'll be amazed how much your new gallery image will *POP-OUT* in the Sea of auction listings. And, you will even gain traffic from curious auction surfers not even looking for your product!Then you have the opportunity to turn that surfer into a potential client...but that's a whole different subject.
The Auction Resource Network has these images, and hundreds more valuable tips, articles and tools available to its members.
Auction Search Program - Free
The Auction Search is a very handy, time saving software program that automates eBay searches for both buyers and sellers. With it you can find auctions that are ending soon, or Buy-It-Now listings that have just been added to eBay so that you know about bargains at just the right time to beat your competition. After installing on your computer, set up your searches. It will minimize to your system tray and work for you behind the scenes, notifying you whenever an item you are searching for comes up. Free download, and you can also give The Auction Search away to your eBay buyers as a bonus.
eBay Keywords
eBay Keywords is a program that allows you to deliver targeted text ads on eBay search results pages. When a user enters one of your keywords into their search, your ad appears at the top of the screen - before all the listings! You choose which keywords are right for you, and you don't pay for your ad until someone clicks on it. You can pay as little as 10¢ to get listed.
By the way, this is just one of the hundreds of tips, resources, tools and articles available to you at the Auction Resource Network – highly recommended.
Make Money Online
You don’t need your own website and server to make money online.
Use other people’s!
Use eBay’s site to sell your products
Set up an eBay blog – it’s free
Set up a blog at www.blogger.com – it’s free too!Post ads for your goods on free ad sites. In Australia, www.cracker.com.au, or http://www.gumtree.com.au/ are both excellent.
What do Buyers Want?
eBay Australia has a very handy new feature, called ‘Want It Now”. Buyers list what they are looking for, and sellers can respond with offers. Very interesting from a research perspective, and a lucrative source of buyers if you have particular products to sell and someone already wants them.
Not all of the buyers are in Australia, some are from USA and other countries. Ads are listed in the usual eBay format, in categories, and also with a search facility. Just click on the Want It Now link in Specialty Sites on the left-hand menu.
If you are new to eBay..
I was talking to a friend who is new to eBay. And I remembered how much there was to learn as a beginner. It’s easy to make mistakes, rush through explanations on the eBay site and make detrimental choices when listing or buying. I want to emphasize again – if you are new to eBay, sell some items to start that don’t matter too much. Keep the prices under $20 if possible, check your spelling, category – read the rest of this blog for lots of tips. Each time you list an item, something different will come up that you’ll need to learn about. Increase your confidence and knowledge through practice. Become familiar with how it all works.The only really important rule to remember in the beginning is to do give your buyer what you’ve said you would – in service and product. It will be detrimental to your future success on eBay to receive negative feedbacks, especially in the beginning.
Using Categories
Make sure you are listing your products in the right category, or even in more than one, if appropriate. Again, do your homework. Research your product, or a similar product, and find out which categories they are listed in. Even though a lot of people only use the Search feature of eBay, there are still many who will click on a category and browse to see what’s in it. They may be looking for something to buy that piques their interest, not necessarily something specific. Yes, it costs more to list in more than one category, however, it is worth it, if it will gain you sales and help you to make money selling on eBay.
