Selling goods on eBay has become one of the most lucrative online business arrangements. Many people think that succeeding in an eBay business is effortless — this is a misconception. Yes, running an eBay business is relatively easy, but it still needs to be structured in a very systematic manner. There is some basic planning that should be incorporated at the time of launching your eBay business.

Getting Started on eBay
The most fundamental step in starting an eBay business is understanding your priorities and availability of resources. These can be easily evaluated by answering certain questions:

• Do you plan to use eBay as a part-time or full-time source of income?
• Are you passionate about the kind of products and services you are willing to offer?
• Is the amount of time that is needed on a daily basis compatible with your lifestyle?
• Do you want to be an online retailer, affiliate or just a dropshipper?
• Do you have access to procuring the goods, you plan to advertise, on a regular basis?
• Which selling format is easier for you to handle — eBay auctions or selling goods for a fixed price?

Registration
Once you have answered these questions, you will feel confident about starting your eBay venture and a basic outline for your business plan will begin to emerge. Now, it is time to be registered as an eBay Seller.

• Just visit eBay’s Home Page> Click on the ‘Sell’ tab
• The page provides you systematic (step-by-step) guidelines for registering yourself
• Make sure to provide the latest and fully-functional contact and financial information, including banks and credit cards

Taking Precautions As An eBay Seller
Once the registration is completed, it is time to organize your business options.

• As a general practice, many eBay sellers tend to file for incorporation — Limited Liability Company (LLC).
• Inventory — create a proper format for calculating expenses and profits in a detailed manner. Ensure that you maintain separate accounting books of your eBay venture, which will further help you, file your taxes.
• Insurance — some eBay entrepreneurs take extra precaution in the form of seeking insurance coverage for their business.
• Legalities — there might be some localities where conducting business from home might lead to some extra form of taxation or it could be deemed as violating regulations. Check-out such issues and complete all the formal paperwork.

Make Informed Decisions
Success as an eBay seller doesn’t come easy as you have numerous competitors to compete against. One aspect that most eBay sellers tend to ignore is using the site’s resources in educating themselves about the best business practices that should be followed. Some of these recommendations are listed on www.ebay.com/university.

Renting Options
When you begin any business venture, the idea is to seek maximum security (the least risks) and an eBay business is no different. Instead, of outrightly renting a huge warehouse facility, begin with using yours or some nearby garage, spare sheds or even the basement to store goods.

Payment Options
This could be one tricky aspect. Many customers might have an aversion to a payment method that appears convenient to you. The solution lies in seeking a universally acceptable mode of receiving payments. For this purpose, PayPal is highly recommended since it carries out transactions rather quickly and the services are quite cheap. It provides the facility of linking your banking accounts and credit cards for sending/receiving money, all around the world. Further, its registration process is very simple and asks for a limited proof.

Optimization
There are literally thousands of serious and prospective buyers who are always streaming through eBay product categories in search of that ‘special’ offer. While some of them are looking for the latest items, some are bothered only for discounted items and many are there just hoping that some extraordinary offer might come their way. Your eBay store should be able to attract all sorts of visitors.

It has to be a blend of exclusive, contemporary, outrightly cheap/discounted and seasonal goods. Again, you have to ensure that when visitors conduct an eBay search, the chances of your goods being shown in the search results is the maximum. This is something parallel to search engine optimization. For this purpose, carefully choose the words you use to describe your merchandise. Each item should be listed with a name that contains important keywords and a hint of your exclusive offer.

The most convenient way of establishing your online business is by becoming a registered seller on eBay. Registering on eBay as a seller isn’t difficult and neither is listing your products on it. In fact, at any given point, eBay boasts of having thousands of registered sellers working from home, advertising their goods. However, a usual problem that many online sellers on eBay face is that of being unable to attract a decent amount of web traffic towards their merchandise. Thus, the biggest challenge in making your home-based eBay enterprise profitable is creating enough queries and eventually sales for the products you are offering. This can be achieved through a combination of the following:

1. Offering Goods That Complement Contemporary Demand Trends

This problem can be easily solved if you are able to offer goods/services that are in-sync with the current demand trend among the online shoppers. This can be easily done by using eBay in two ways:

A. What’s Hot
The site has a dedicated section titled, ‘What’s Hot’. It is listed in the ‘selling resources’ section in the form of a link. This section has a list of goods:

• towards which a high volume of enquiries have been generated
• that are being sold in great numbers by many online retailers, including those on eBay
• that have generated a lot of curiosity due to their unique features

Advantages
At the time of starting your online eBay business, you would have access to restricted merchandise. This section lists the most in-demand goods for every category. This further simplifies the process of zooming-in on goods that suite your current availability, preference and price. Other benefits include:

• eBay itself ensures that the kind of merchandise shown here is updated regularly
• Once, you know what goods are in demand, it becomes easier to operate your business from home, as you know exactly what goods need to be acquired
• You have the comfort of scrolling through this list, at your home, and for no charges, i.e. this service is free

B. eBay Pulse
Another initiative taken by eBay to help its sellers is the ‘eBay Pulse’ page. This is a slightly tweaked and a more precise format of the ‘What’s Hot’ section, i.e. the listed goods are not in accordance with demand trends or preferences tracked over a few weeks/months but on a daily basis.

2. Selling Merchandise At Prices Lower Than Your Competitors
This is perhaps the most challenging part of being a home-based seller on eBay. Prices are generally the biggest factor when it comes to a customer’s buying preference, particularly in the online mode. So how do you offer merchandise at competitive rates? This can be done by:

• Buying in bulk from wholesale traders
• Procuring goods from Start-up businesses that are desperate to launch their products
• Buying seasonal goods in the off-season and then selling them at higher prices when their demand begins to rise
• Seeking usually-neglected items such as spares from the home, office and nearby businesses who might be happy to sell-off their ‘junk’
• Teaming up with repairers/rehabilitators who are good at creating fresh-looking items from second-hand goods. This is particularly applicable to apparels and electronic items.

Affiliate: An Alternate Approach To eBay Business
Whenever the term ‘eBay business’ is used, it generates an image of products being sold by online sellers. Yes, this is the most common form of home-based business opportunity offered by eBay. However, this isn’t the only way in which eBay can be used to generate decent earnings. There is another option which doesn’t involve any sort of ‘direct’ buying. You can create an eBay business by becoming an Affiliate. That way, you don’t have to be concerned about procuring the goods.

Who Is An eBay Affiliate?
This is a simple way of creating a steady source of income from eBay. As a part of the Affiliate Program, you are supposed to only list the goods for sale and not purchase/procure them.

How To Operate An eBay Affiliate Program?
eBay gives you the liberty to launch affiliate websites. It has an entire page dedicated towards this purpose. For starting your eBay affiliate business, you need to create a personalized, content-rich site that lists items belonging to a particular genre of your choice. If an online shopper wants to purchase an item listed on your site, he/she will be directed to eBay and if an actual sale is registered, you would be awarded a commission.

Establishing your own drop-ship eBay business is a recommended way of earning online. It is more convenient than being an eBay seller, as the risk and the problems associated with being a merchandiser are no longer yours. A drop-shipper can be understood as a retailer who has no stocks, inventory and does not even have the need to purchase any kind of merchandise! This means that all the issues such as overhead expenses and storage of items are negated.

Finding Goods To Drop Ship
This can be simply done through a search conducted on eBay:

• Visit eBay’s Home Page > Click on ‘Advanced Search’
• A ‘Find Items’ page is shown where keywords can be entered
• Enter the kind of product you want to include in your list
• Choose the product category from ‘In this category’ drop-down
• Click (tick-mark) on all the options listed below the Category box
• Opt for results to be sorted> Choose ‘Price Highest First’ from the ‘Sort by’ drop-down
• Click on ‘Search’

This will create an instant list of the most-selling merchandise in the chosen category. Just make a list of these items. You now have to find a source for these items — a drop shipper.

Finding a Drop-shipper
There are overwhelming choices when it comes to companies that would want to have their goods drop shipped. However, differentiating a worthwhile company with a legitimate business is the challenge. The reason is simple –

1. There are many drop-shipping scams that are prevalent on the web
2. The longer the drop shipping chain, (i.e. the number of sources that handle the merchandise before it reaches the customer), the smaller would be your percentage.

Solution: The idea is to personally investigate a prospective drop-shipper, as most of the ones advertising are simply intermediaries in a long list of people who stock the goods. Each of them is basically a broker who procures goods from small distributors. Such drop-shippers cannot be relied upon for paying your percentage or delivering the goods to your customers. The idea is to get your merchandise directly from a manufacturer or an authenticated wholesaler who is ready to drop ship. Verify the market reputation of every drop-shipper that you might consider and particularly, their stocking capabilities.

Establishing A Drop-shipper
Once you have found a retailer/wholesaler/manufacturer who can be trusted as a drop shipper, mail him a proposal. It should contain your intention of listing his merchandise on eBay. Enquire about his ability to drop ship on a regular basis. If you receive a confirmation for your proposal, request him to mail over the details of his drop-shipping volumes in the last few months.

This would generally be presented in the form of an inventory-like document that would detail the kind of goods and the geographical area where the retailer has been drop shipping. This will give you a precise picture about the kind of merchandise and volumes that he is capable of delivering. When these issues are resolved, ask for what sort of percentage he is ready to offer.

Creating eBay Drop Ship Item List
The procedure is similar to listing your own products, as a ‘seller’ but you don’t have to take photographs and create the list yourself. Nearly every drop-shipper has a website or at least an online catalogue of his goods. You need to just paste the product images and create the keyword-heavy description.

How Does eBay Drop-shipping Work?
Your responsibilities include listing the products on eBay, so that online visitors can search and choose them. Every time, an interested customer wants to purchase the listed items, you have to relay the information over to the dropshipper, who will in turn, pay you a handsome commission for every recorded sale. The items and every issue associated with them is that of the manufacturer/company that has agreed to be your drop-shipper.

Perhaps, the only problem is the customer grievance that would be diverted to you and not the drop-shipper. The reason – an online customer isn’t aware of the relationship that exists between you and a drop-shipper. Hence, every time an ordered good does not reach on schedule or it is delivered in a compromised form, the customers will hold you responsible.

It is an excellent decision to buy a DSLR on eBay. However, when you decide to buy a DSLR, please check its price, purpose, resolution, size, future upgrades available, dust protection, shutter speed and other similar features. A camera is an expensive item and must be bought with extreme care and caution. Having mentioned that, to buy anything on eBay, you need to be register first.

Sign Up
Get an account with eBay if you want to buy a DSLR from their site. Signing up is a fast and an easy process that requires you to fill up a form. The entire procedure is free of cost and all you need to do is read their terms and conditions and agree with them.

Hunt For The Right DSLR
Hunting for the right DSLR can be done in two ways:

Searching for it
You can start searching for the DSLR model that you want by describing it in a couple of words. You have an option of narrowing your search to get the exact item you want.

Browsing for it
Browsing is helpful as you can make a choice from a range of options. You can browse for the item from among various categories and a list of items. This is a good option if you are not sure how to describe your choice.

Choosing The Type
Your choice of the camera will depend upon the kind of photography you want to do. DSLRs for professionals are much more complex and as a result are more expensive. Your choice of camera will determine its price and also its quality and model.

DSLR Features
When examining the characteristics of the DSLR, consider elements such as lenses, batteries, memory cards, sensor size and filters etc.

Purchasing The Accessories
There are certain accessories that you will require to buy along with the DSLR, like camera bag, filters and extended warrantees.

Know The Details Of Your Transaction
Ensure that you know all the details related to your transaction. For the information and other particulars, click on ‘ask seller a question’ link under the seller’s profile.

Purchasing Options
There are two options by which you can purchase your DSLR. ‘Buy It Now’ enables you to buy the item at a fixed price and might also save you the trouble of waiting for the auction to complete. Bidding requires you to wait till the auction completes. This procedure can be a bit time consuming. However, the advantage of bidding is that you may get the best deals through auctions.

Reviewing The Feedback
The most important step is to review the feedback of the product and the seller. You can either interact with other members on eBay or you can participate in the discussion boards and chats on eBay. Looking at the seller’s Feedback Score (which should ideally be above 90%) will give you a fair idea of the seller’s credibility. Please make sure that the seller is reliable, especially when buying a valuable thing like a DSLR.

Making Contact With The Seller
Click on ‘Contact Seller’ and confront him with straightforward questions about the camera like information about the model, various features etc. That way it gets difficult for the seller to trick you if he is trying to do so.

Modes Of Payment
After winning or buying the item, you must send the payment to the seller within three days of the transaction. If you are paying electronically, in agreement with the seller, you can click the ‘Pay Now’ button and make online payment. Otherwise, make the payment through any of the ways specified by the seller. One of the best places to buy DSLRs is through eBay. The first thing you need to consider when buying a DSLR is its price. The additional prices will include the cost of the lenses, filters, batteries, free bag etc. The value of the DSLR will also depend on the model you buy.

EBay will give you tremendous opportunities to explore all the features mentioned above. Just remember to shop smart to be a successful buyer on eBay!

Impress your friends with your photography! Go ahead click here to find a cheap DSLR on eBay.

photo by pen.machine

One item that I find constantly sold on eBay that you would never think of is clothing.

While some people may feel strange about purchasing used clothes on the internet, the reality is that it’s not much different then purchasing them at a garage sale or bargain store. And used clothes present an opportunity to find a steal on a single clothing item or bulk of clothes that would normally cost you a fortune from a new clothing store.

If you are considering selling clothes on eBay, the first and only place you can start is by searching your home or apartment for clothes that you no longer wear, no longer fit, or are outdated. Collect these clothes in a bin or on hangers and set all in one place.

Next you need to wash each item carefully and intently. Make sure the clothing item no longer smells dirty or has stains on the material. If the clothing is in bad shape with a lot of holes or rips your best bet may be just to donate it to a clothing shelter.

Make sure you also wash each item according to the tag’s instructions in order to make sure you do not damage or ruin the material.

After you have washed and decided on all the clothing items you will sell, make a list for each item including the brand, color, size, and condition.

Lay each clothing item out on a flat and well-lit area such as a dining room table. Grab your digital camera and begin taking snapshots of each item. Make sure you get a few shots of each item. For example, with t-shirts you would want to include a photo of both the front and back of the t-shirt. A close up on the shirt’s logo may add further value to the item.

Secondly, you need to take measurements of each clothing items. The measurements must be active, because even a slight error could save a buyer who cannot fit into the clothing item a lot of time and hassle. Make sure you include the bust/chest, waist, hips, inseam, and length on the item’s description.

Last but not least, post the clothing item on eBay with a starting bid, photos, and the item’s description. Make sure you start out with a very low starting bid in order to ensure interest and competition. Remember these are clothes were talking about, as people aren’t going to spend $9 for a used Reebok t-shirt when they can buy one new for $12.

Remember that honesty is the number one business ethic, and it’s especially important on eBay. The customer cannot touch or smell the item, so they can only rely on the information you provide them. The better and more accurate your description, along with quality photos and a reasonable asking price all contribute to honesty.

Make sure you also are very specific about pricing, methods of payment you will receive, and shipping information. Once the auction ends, keep in close communication with the buyer, addressing any questions, payment problems, or shipping concerns. Always notify the buyer once payment is received and product is shipped. Try to ship the product as soon as possible after receiving the payment.

photo by striattic

Start selling clothing on eBay here.