After avoiding it for years, I’m finally on eBay. I plan to be selling only. My goal is to pull in about $150 a month. I’m a toy and collectibles dealer and have done shows in meatspace. But, I’ve never bought or sold anything on eBay before. I need to know how to minimize fees, get good feedback, and all the tricks everybody knows. Thanks for your help.
Spend a lot of time on the member to member help forum reading everything you can.
No-one will buy from you if you have no feedback. Go forth and reap feedback; buy ten or so cheap items, pay quickly, leave your sellers good feedback.
Offer Paypal.
Offer reasonable postage.
Offer to combine postage in your item descriptions.
As of next month, you’re totally rooted when it comes to getting good feedback:
My suggestion is not even worry about your feedback. If ebay doesn’t give a toss any more, why should you? Describe your items accurately, photograph and describe any flaws, answer queries quickly and post within a reasonable time-frame.
Print out the fees and charges page and refer to it each time you list. You might find for example that if you list an item at $19.99 it will incur a lesser insertion fee than an item starting at $20.
Don’t start your auction at 99 cents unless you want to sell the item for 99 cents.
Having a store is good if you have items which tend to sit a bit while auctions are better for “hot” items.
I list a lot of items “Buy it Now” if I know what price I want and I know they will sell on ebay for that price. So that’s your uncommon items priced reasonably. You won’t get top dollar on ebay for anything but rare items.
Put several strings in your item title ie. don’t describe your Dinky toy as a “Dinky toy”. Use caps and describe it as “DINKY TOY CAR MECCANO SERIES 30 DAIMLER” so searches for “Dinky”, “toy car”, “meccano”, “daimler” and “series 30” will all pick up your item.
I’ve just given up selling on eBay, so some might say that disqualifies me from commenting - but here are my suggestions anyway:
-Take time to get really good photos of the item you’re selling - take several pictures from different angles and include something else such as a common coin, or a small ruler alongside the item to give an idea of scale. Try to take the kind of photos you’d be happy to see in a magazine - you might not achieve this, but aim for it.
-Describe your item as lucidly, completely, and accurately as possible - and do this as early on as possible in the listing description - some people put their company logos, or waffle about their reputation up there - you want to make sure that people viewing the item are immediately able to understand what they’re looking at.
Don’t try to ‘talk up’ your items - it just comes across as cheesy. Don’t try to conceal any flaws or damage - mention these clearly (although not right at the top of the description).
-Upload some of your images to your own photo hosting (resize them first to between 400 and 600 pixels wide, so they load fast and don’t stretch the page) - Insert these at various points in your item description using the HTML <img> tag - IMO, this looks nicer than a big cluster of images at the bottom of the listing, and it doesn’t cost as much as getting eBay to host all the pics.
-Don’t be tempted to add a long screed of terms and conditions to your listings (including whiny threats about what you’ll do if something goes wrong, as many sellers do after they get burned one time). Sellers and buyers are bound by the rules already in place at eBay - so you don’t need to restate these and any you try to add on top probably won’t be binding or effective anyway.
-Send your items promptly and securely - pack them on the assumption that someone will drop the package, drag it along rough concrete and then step on it (i.e. pack to resist shock, abrasion and crushing). Use a signed-for delivery method if at all possible, and especially for more valuable items.
-Communicate with your buyers at every stage - If they pay straight away, just thank them for their payment at the same time as advising them the item is on its way. If they don’t pay promptly, send a payment reminder after a few days, with something friendly like “many thanks for your winning bid” in the comments field - and when they pay, send them a separate message thanking them and again, advising of despatch.
-Feedback is a contentious issue. Some eBayers believe the buyer should be given feedback immediately upon payment, others believe this should wait until the transaction is complete - and the buyer has confirmed receipt and satisfaction in some way - Make your own mind up, but do remember one thing - you’re there to trade items and money - not feedback.
I was going to say this was bad advice, but that’s just because I’d forgotten Dinky toys were indeed made by Meccano. Ignorance fought…
Make sure you include as many relevant terms in your item title and description as possible, and completely avoid any that are not relevant - keyword spamming will get your listing pulled (there’s a lot of it about - people selling “Mustek digital camera like Nikon Canon Fuji Sony Olympus”). ‘As new’ is also considered keyword spamming, but that may not apply here anyway.
Why all caps?
This is contrary to what a lot of ebay experts say. Many people advocate starting at a very low opening bid, even $.01, because a low price will attract more bidders. And once people bid, they are more likely to keep bidding and try to win.
In my personal experience, anytime I have listed anything, I have started it low like that and it always closes at around what I expected to get out of it. Like if I sell a set of comic books that I estimate will bring in 25, even if I start it at .01, the market still drives it up to the expected amount. The lower the price, the more people will bid on it and put it on their watchlist and such.
Other than that, I will second a few things that others have already said: make sure you take good pics, be upfront with your shipping charges, and make sure that if you can combine shipping on multiple items, that you mention how you will go about that in the auction. Like, if it will be an extra $x.xx for every item won after the first, or if you will go by weight or whatever.
I have bought and sold things on ebay for years, and have always been happy with the process. I have enver had a store, just sold things from time to time. I’m not sure how the fees differ if you do have a store, but don’t spend too much extra on the auction if you don’t have to. Just use one picture if you can display everything you need to about the item in one. Extra pics aren’t too expensive, just .15 each I think. You really don't need to spring for Bold or Borders or anything else for your auction, unless it is a rare item. People who are interested will see it regardless of the bells and whistles that can be added. I do however, like the "Gallery" feature, which displays a small thumbnail of your picture in the search results. I think that is .35, and I usually do use that when I list something. You don’t have to though.
And like Mangetout said, don’t include some long shpiel of details in your listings. When I look at an auction that is so messy I can’t find the info I want, I just back right out of it. Just include pertenant info, like shipping, item condition, stuff like that.
If you have any more questions, don’t hesitate to ask.
ETA: One more thing: the best days to list items are Saturday and Sunday (assuming you list them for 7 days. You can also do 1, 3, and 5 day auctions). More people will bid on auctions closing on weekends, since more people will be home. The worst time to have listings close is weekday afternoons, since more people will be at work.
When choosing closing times, think about your audience.
If it’s kids, aim for after school during the week (4-7pm).
If it’s older people, Sunday nights (6-10pm) are the best times.
I think the gallery is going free as part of the forthcoming fee structure change.
That’s good advice. I made some nice profits recently snapping up old (but working) laptops people had listed to end at weekday evening rush hour times (nobody around to snipe manually - they’re all driving home from work), often also cheap because of shoddy descriptions and pictures, then relisted them with decent pictures and a full description, ending at a sensible time (daytime is actually quite good, as lots of people surf and bid from work), selling at five or more times the price I bought them.
If you list something on a Thursday evening on a 10-day listing (do you guys still pay extra for that?), it will end on a Sunday evening, having been visible for two weekends - this often works well for harder-to-find items, where you want to collect the largest number of potential bidders before the listing ends.
For common items, there’s no point listing for a long time - all the views and activity will happen when the item bubbles up nearer the top of the search results sorted by time left - so if there are lots of other similar items to yours, you probably won’t lose out by listing on a 5-day auction or even a 3 day one, as long as you work out a sensible end time.
Mangetout, tell us why you gave up on Ebay. And what will you use as an alternative?
I just made my first purchase this week after having been a member for over 3 years.
I have no feedback but I was considering starting to sell some of the kids outgrown clothes and toys. Comments?
I gave it up for two reasons:
-Because of the forthcoming changes - the fee revision, although announced as a reduction, is in fact a significant hike - they’re to reduce the listing fee and increase all the others; this means a 30 to 40% increase in the fees I would be paying. I could probably still turn some kind of profit under those circumstances, but I’m not sure it’s worth the effort.
-Because of the announced change to the feedback system - they’re making it so that sellers can’t leave anything but positive feedback for their buyers - I understand their motive for doing this, but I feel that it’s inherently dishonest and dictatorial, I also fear it will be exploited in a rash of new scams.
So my heart just isn’t in it any more.
I’m not sure what I’ll do as an alternative - I might be able to sell some of my items through my website eventually, but for now, I’m looking at other web-related earning schemes, such as producing video for sites that pay rewards for lots of views.
There seems to be a fairly lively market for stuff like that, you should do OK. Selling second hand clothing has its own unique set of dos and don’ts, with which I’m not really familiar (I know that declaring whether you smoke in the home where the item has been stored is considered quite important, for example). Best of luck!
Can you explain the motive for me, because I don’t understand it at all. So basically, if a buyer just doesn’t pay you, or takes a LONG time to do it, or finagles out of their winning bid, all you can do is…nothing? Well, ok, if it’s serious enough you can notify eBay and they’ll do whatever, but I have to imagine that they deal with that so much that not every person gets their account banned or whatever. Negative feedback for buyers lets sellers know they hey, this person might be a scammer.
I know that the feedback system is broken, because a seller would leave negative feedback for a buyer because maybe the payment took one day longer than they wanted, then the buyer wold negative feedback to retaliate. Likewise, let’s say the buyer pays as soon as the auction ends, it’s all good, but the item arrives broken, or not as advertised, so he leaves negative feedback to the seller, the seller will, again, just leave negative feedback to retaliate.
But there’s a simple solution…don’t allow them to see the kind of feedback they gave each other until both parties have given feedback or the time limit for doing so has expired. I don’t see the problem with this method.
I don’t either, and it’s been brought up on the boards before (your idea).
I can’t believe that Ebay won’t institute something as simple as what you suggest.
I agree with the good advice that many others have already posted. I’ve sold a number of things and have had the best success with collectible toys and the few pieces of militaria I had around the house. Good photos make sales, as do honest, thorough descriptions. Honesty and communication are key. I also recommend shipping world-wide. I’ve sold some stuff to folks in the UK, Japan and Tasmania. As long as they pay the shipping and customs, I have no problem sending stuff anywhere. I offer a 100% return guarantee – if my item is not as described, send it back and I’ll refund the customer’s money., I’ve never had anything returned. I have 100% positive feedback. I’ve had almost universally good experiences and encourage you to get into selling. My general rule is that it isn’t worth my time to list anything that I won’t get at least $20 out of. I usually check the present auctions and see what stuff is bringing before I post a similar item. I should note that I’ve never bought anything. Happy selling!
Radegast, with the return policy you have, what if someone were to return your item saying it was DOA or not as described. Only it ends up you suspect they returned a different item that was identical.
We suspect someone did this at a rummage sale we had. They bought a CD player from us and then came back an hour later saying that it didn’t work. We figured they went home, swapped the one that we sold them with the same one they had at home that stopped working. Now they got their money back from us and obtained a working cd player. 
We know ours worked because we were using it to play music during the rummage sale and it mysteriously stopped working the moment they bought it. The one they returned had some marks on it that led us to believe that it wasn’t the same one we sold.
I suppose it’s possible to make note of unique features/scratches/serial numbers if you can but what about items that don’t have unique features?
In theory, yes. In practice, in times gone by, yes. Today, the competition on ebay is so great that the market won’t drive it up unless you have a rare or unique item…and even then, you’re taking a risk. You’ve been lucky.
Trust me on this, a lot of the ebay experts strongly advise against this practice.
Question for you and for anyone else who has shipped items overseas: What shiping service do you prefer to use for this? Post Office? UPS?
Also, how do you determine what overseas shipping will be before you list the auction? Just use ebay’s shipping calculator, or is there a better way?
I guess it must depend on the item(s) being sold. About a month ago, I did a purge of my comic book collection, and started all the auctions at $1.00, and they all closed around what I expected to get out of them. The auctions I thought would go for $25-30 did so, the ones I thought would bring in $10-15 did, and so on. Only one auction that I can think of closed significantly lower than expected, it was some issues of Wolverine that I thought wouuld get around $8-10, and ended up closing at $1.25. (annoyed grunt)! Overall though, I made about $300 for 21 auctions, which was my target, so I was happy.
I can imagine for each individual product, the market is different. On some things, I’m sure you would get ripped off if you start them that low.
I never buy from someone who doesn’t allow me to pay via paypal.
I never buy from someone who has a small cost and a large shipping fee.
I never buy from someone who can’t tell me what shipping will cost - why would I commit to pay an unknown cost?
Putting “rare” or some similar word in the title of something that isn’t rare will probably get me to buy from someone else.
Lot’s of good suggestions here.
Here’s a few of mine:
- Look at other seller’s pages, and model your pages on what you like. In my case, that means I don’t have screen after screen of huge 100-point multi-color type in ALL CAPS on a purple background with bugs following the cursor and music playing…
- Consider using a third-party listing program. I use Garagesale, and it takes a lot of the tedium out of the listing.
- Use ebay to research your item before you list it.
- Attend some real auctions to observe auction mentality.
- Keep very close track of your auctions. If you have several going at a time, it can be tricky to remember who has paid, who you’ve shipped to, who’s received their item, etc.
- Like anything else, using ebay well takes experience. Start slow and enjoy.
No, please not all caps. It’s harder to read and personally I just skip over them.
Check other similar listings and price similarly (I just laugh at the people who claim something is rare and price it ten times higher than every other one - not that I think you’d do that). Don’t waste title space with ‘rare’ ‘vintage’ ‘nostalgia’ or any of the other useless words.
Lots of good quality pictures. Personally, I prefer them to be under the description, so I can read it while the pics are loading.
Don’t write your description in all caps and do use good grammar (should be easy).
Don’t waste your time prettifying your auction - you don’t need a background or any of the rest of that junk.
When I was helping my sister with hers, I had a template and we just plugged in the description, pictures, and title. Apparently you can make a template on eBay now.