I need to raise some money, and as such, I’ve decided to sell a few items on eBay. I have an antique doll, some Lladro figurines, a vintage suit, and a turquoise necklace. I’ve already registered as a seller, but I’d like to get some advice before I post a sale.
—What are my responsibilities in getting the item to the customer?
—Do I get to choose the amount of the opening bid? If so, what amount should I set for these items?
—I don’t have a scanner. How can I work around that?
—How soon after the auction closes would I get my money?
– Usually, I just ship via trackable airmail. Relatively inexpensive and kinda quick. Just make sure you pack it well.
– Yes. Check on other similar items is what I’d recomend. Either that, or just open low. Bidding will bring it higher relatively quick if its worth it anyhow. Whatever you do, don’t star too high. You may very easily scare away bidders.
– Get a cheapo digital camera would be my choice.
– I give the buyer 10 days personally.
Other advice - Don’t just limit it to US residents. Some of the best bidders for items are out of country people. Just make sure they pay in internationally cashable M.O. or paypal.
– Oh yeah, check into signing up with Pay-Pal. Some people only like going through them and no other way!
If you don’t have any feedback, you might want to bid on and buy a couple cheap things first to get some feedback built up. Many people are uneasy buying from someone with 0 feedback.
I like taking PayPal the best (immediate payment in most cases), but to attract more bidders I will take MO’s and personal checks. I am probably going to stop taking checks soon - they really are a hassle because they need to clear the banks before I ship the item out. Never ship before the check clears both your and the buyer’s banks. I usually state payment must be received within ten days of auction close.
If I get paid by MO or PayPal, I ship the next day (except on Sundays). I feel responsible to get the item out as quickly as possible, some people are slow shippers and their feedback reflects that. Aim for good feedback, if that means having to do your darndest to ship quickly - do it.
Pictures are a big plus - almost a must. You will get more bids with good pictures.
Describe all flaws, chips, cracks, breaks, scuffs, pimples, rips, tears…etc - completely. Especially with your collectibles. I’m serious, some people go batshit over microscopic flaws.
I start my bidding at the least I will take for an item. If you must get $50 for someting, start it out at $50 or set a $50 reserve - once your item is at auction, you must follow through with the sale, even if you didn’t get as much as you wanted for it.
Pack well, and with breakable items I insist on using insurance. I add it onto my shipping charges. For shipping charges, I try to figure them out and state them in the auction - I don’t like bidding on auctions where the shipping charges aren’t stated up front in the auction.
You don’t need to scan digital pictures, eBay will host them for you if you don’t have webspace. I think the first one is free, and each additional is like 5 cents. You can upload directly from your hard drive.
Rilchiam, you do have a digital camera, right? In one of the posts above, you answered affirmative. A scanner is not involved in any way. That is what I’m basing my suggestions on.
A digital camera doesn’t use film, it stores the pictures digitally. If you do in fact have a digital camera, how do you view the pictures if you are not transferring them to your computer?
::::I’ve never actually viewed one of the pictures. See, it’s actually Mr. Rilch’s camera :::shuffles feet:::, but he’s willing to let me use it in this endeavor. He uploads the videos to our DVD burner; I’ve never seen any of the still photos he’s taken.
Aww, that’s OK. Maybe you could find out the make and model of the camera, and someone here can give you step by step instructions on how to get the pictures to your hard drive and resize them for eBay postings? If it’s a Sony, I can help, but other brands I have no clue about. It really isn’t that hard. It will really help your auctions if you include good clear pictures.
If you have a 35mm film camera, you can take it to a place that has Kodak processing (such as Target or Walgreens) and get a Photo CD along with your developed pictures. You can then put that CD in your CD-ROM drive. You’ll want to use some sort of photo-editing software to reduce the size of the pictures–otherwise they’ll be huge and take forever to load on eBay.
Sometimes, you can pick up an inexpensive scanner, too. I got mine from the clearance area of Office Max for (IIRC) $35 last year.
Good luck! My aunt has quite a profitable little business going just selling all the stuff she’s collected over the years on eBay.
Sure thing! Using a regular camera and scanning the pics is an idea too, but if the pictures don’t turn out good, you’ll have to reshoot and wait for them to get developed and put on disk again. And on the off chance bidders want more/better/closer-up pictures, you’ll be glad you know how to shoot and email with the digital.
I used toi do this, because it seemed like a good way of making sure I didn’t forget to send anything (or list it again by mistake, thinking it hadn’t sold), but then I had a rash of non-paying bidders and I had wasted the packing materials.
I pack up when I receive payment now and I keep track of who hasn’t paid because they are the ones for which I haven’t yet left feedback (there’s an option in the feedback forum thing to find everyone for whom you still need to leave feedback).
Read the buyer’s “profiles” (or whatever they call them, I haven’t been on for awhile), they’ll tell you how many times that person has purchased things, and also there are comments on whether the person paid promptly, if they were reasonably polite, etc etc.
I’ve done that everytime I’ve purchased something (haven’t sold anything yet) and haven’t had any problems. I only buy from people with “good reps”.
::I’ve never actually viewed one of the pictures. See, it’s actually Mr. Rilch’s camera :::shuffles feet:::, but he’s willing to let me use it in this endeavor. He uploads the videos to our DVD burner; I’ve never seen any of the still photos he’s taken.