Tuesday, December 26, 2006

How To Make Money On Ebay - By Niall Mehaffey

Making money on ebay is not as hard as you may think it is, a lot of people have this idea in their head that you have to invest a lot of money or have a big company in order to really be successfull on ebay but this is just not true, you can make money on ebay working from your own home, by yourself and it can be a lot of money, too, if done correctly.

How To Make Money On Ebay Tips

Here are a few things you should remember if you want to start an ebay business:

Always do your research before you try to sell something - The worst possible thing you can do is invest your own time and money into an idea you have and setting a business up, only to find out that nobody wants to buy your product. it is horrible. Research what people are buying, interested in, prices, competition, everything you can to make it easier on yourself.

Study your competitors - An excellent way to find out how to make money on ebay is to simply study those who are already doing it successfully, you can watch how they list their auctions, price their products, deal with customers, run a store, pretty much everything about thier business, study it and learn from it.

Find a great product to sell - The easiest way to make money on ebay is to get yourself a hot product to sell, this pretty much means the buyers will come to you but it's not that easy. Here's a little tip for you, one of the biggest sellers on ebay right now is digital products, in other words ebooks and you couldn't find an easier business to run than selling ebooks.

Always look for improvement - If you really want to get ahead of the game and become a big player on ebay then you have to constantly look for new ideas and strategies you can use to improve your business, basically stay up to date with the trends. You can do this simply by being active in ebay, watch things that happen, listen for gossip on the forums, talk with other sellers and any other ways you can think of to stay up to date.

Automate as much as possible - This is the real key to success, the more you can automate your business, the faster and bigger you will grow. Think about it, if 95% of your business runs on autopilot then you can focus most of your time on building and expanding your business instead of just running it, so always automate something if you can.

Discover the secrets to making huge amounts of money on ebay on complete autopilot at:

==> http://the-internet-marketer.com/MakeMoneyOnEbay you'll find out exactly how to make money on ebay easily and quickly!


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Monday, December 25, 2006

Sell a Car on eBay with these Three Tips - By Odalis Bitterroot

If you have a car for sale, you’ll probably consider running a classified ad in your local newspaper. You might consider talking to dealers. You may even be adventurous enough to think about listing the car at a reputable “cars-only” website in hopes of finding a buyer.

All of those might be workable options, but there is another way to move your extra vehicle: eBay. The eBay Motors section of the immensely popular auction site is a spectacular way to sell cars. It doesn’t take long to list a car with eBay and with millions of potential prospects looking at the car from all over the world (and in your neighborhood), you’ll usually find a buyer whose willing to pay at least what the vehicle is worth.

Selling a car on eBay isn’t rocket science, but there are a few things you can do to improve the sales price and to make the experience more enjoyable. Let’s consider three tips to help sell a car on eBay.

Photographs

A picture is worth a thousand words, and ten pictures is easily worth ten thousand more. Buyers want to see the car, and they want to see it from every possible angle. Take a series of clear, accurate photos and supply them with your auction listing.

Don’t just focus on the great parts, either. Buyers want to understand the vehicle’s condition and to feel as though they know everything about the car that may require a “touch up.” Don’t be ashamed by that rust spot above the rear fender. Illustrate it with clarity and the resulting increase in credibility will help your sale.

History

Buyers want to know about the car. That means they want an idea of its past use and ownership. You don’t have to detail every family trip the old sedan made, but you do want to provide prospective buyers with a little history. It helps them to better understand the vehicle.

Be honest. If the car you want to sell on eBay wasn’t really driven to worship and back (only on Sundays) by a careful, little old lady, don’t claim that it was. Let people know if it’s ever had significant repair work done, be forthright about past accidents, and tell prospective buyers about how you used the vehicle and cared for it.

Salesmanship

You don’t have to have the skills of the guy on the floor of your local Mercedes dealer, but some good sales techniques will help you to sell a car on eBay. Accentuate the positive, write a compelling and interesting listing, and explain why the car is worth a bid.

Auctions featuring well-written comments that have “personality” will invariably outperform those that contain little more than dry specification information. Take the time and make the effort to breathe life into your eBay Motors listing.

If you want to sell a car on eBay, these three tips will help you increase the likely final price. Of course, there is more to successful use of eBay motors than these basics. In fact, there are complete ebooks stuffed with information about the ins and outs of selling a vehicle via the popular auction site. If you plan to regularly sell vehicles using eBay or are considering listing a relatively valuable car, you should consider doing more research on how to improve your eBay experience.

Odalis Auctions! Odalis Bitterroot provides top-notch information about online auctions and how to use the phenomena to your advantage. You can read more about
selling cars on eBay and other topics at his blog, Odalis Auctions!

Whether you just want to make better online auction buying decisions or want to learn about the hottest ways to make money on eBay, Odalis Auctions can help.


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Thursday, December 21, 2006

eBay's Square Trade - Do We Need It? - By Steve Dempster

As an eBay trader, I've built a small but enjoyable business on eBay. I pay my listing fees, I pay my final fees, I pay my PayPal fees. Not a problem. Now it seems eBay wants more. Let's take it into context: if (as eBay claims) 3 million sites are paying for the privilege of displaying this 'Square Trade' logo - what is eBay creaming from this? The sums are easy - 3 million x $9.50 per month = $342,000,000 a year. That's right. Read it again. $342,000,000! It's a staggering amount of money, probably more than the GDP of some countries! And for what?

You get to display a little green logo on your site. Wow. eBay says this will lead to -

A 43% decrease in future negative feedback. What's that? eBay are presumably here presupposing that you will deal with buyers who are bursting at the seams to give you negative feedback. Piffle. In any business you will encounter buyers who are, for whatever reason, determined to trash your service. It's just life. It is up to you, as a trader, to ensure that your customers are satisfied with their purchase. It's no good expecting eBay - or anyone else - to bale you out if you're selling cheap rubbish. Deal with your customers on a professional basis, respect their needs and rights, and they will respond with positive feedback. Ignore them, rip them off, treat them only as a revenue stream and you will fail in your enterprise, eBay Square Trade logo or no.

eBay also seem to suggest that their Square Trade logo will entice buyers who are looking for a seller they can trust. It's a fair point, but surely eBay should do some domestic cleaning and rid themselves of the crooked sellers they still seem to harbor? The UK's BBC hung eBay out to dry with a documentary recently, pointing to the fact that some sellers - who I am sure are in the minority - cheerily flood eBay with counterfeit and fake designer goods. Now, eBay are not the culprit here, and I would not suggest for one moment that they condone this behaviour. Yet it would be interesting to know just how much of eBay's untold millions is spent combating this unwanted incursion - and what they intend to do to stop it.

Look at the Square Trade sign-up page. Aside from the 'free first month' tempter there is a very salient phrase - and here I think it is fair to quote - 'join eBay's largest community of trusted sellers'. Does that mean that those of us who do not wish to further line eBay's pockets by joining the Square Trade programme are untrustworthy? The implication is, I think, present. eBay has discovered yet another lucrative revenue stream - the 'trusted seller'. It is unfortunate that, given that eBay was started as a 'matey' community venture, it now sees fit to promote such products as the Square Trade deal. If eBay are so committed to fair and honest dealing, combined with the wish to promote ethical and honest dealers, then why do they seemingly offer this Square Deal to anyone who is willing to pay their fees?

I have just been through the sign-up process ( I haven't signed up). A very annoying point is that eBay ask you what kind of member you wish to be - US or non-US. It's on the same mindset level that, in days thankfully now gone, one used to be asked (in a job application) if you were 'Catholic' or 'non-Catholic'. Does eBay not realise that by doing this, by setting the US on a pedestal as the 'prime' registration, that they are alienating members in the UK, Europe, India, Australia, South America - in fact, the 'Rest Of The World' (which, in case eBay has forgotten, is a lot bigger than the USA!). If all those members chose to abandon eBay in favour of a more 'friendly' auction site, one can't help wondering how long it would take before eBay realised that they aren't alone in the online world and revised their charges accordingly.

In summary, I would say that eBay are getting above themselves. Yes, they are a huge company. Huge companies come and go (where are IBM now?). Yes, they are (were) innovative. So are many others. Yes, they have made a lot of money. I have no problem with that. It's when companies squeeze their cash-cow lemon so hard the pips squeak that they should think about a few things - like the fact that there are a myriad of other auction sites biting at their heels. Don't take the mickey, guys.

Steve Dempster has been an internet junkie for more years than he cares to remember. His eBay shop can be seen at his site href="http://www.theinvisibleedge.co.uk">The Invisible Edge


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Wednesday, December 20, 2006

Ingenious Product Ideas to Sell on eBay for Unlimited Profits - By James Penn

If you ask many sellers what the major drawbacks to selling on eBay are then many would say the packaging and shipping of items. Who really wants to get up early in the morning before work to drop off a package at the post office? Many sellers are now resorting to selling eBooks but that market is becoming over crowded and it’s very difficult to make any real money selling eBooks on eBay. In this article I reveal innovative products or services you can sell on eBay without packaging or shipping and it’s NOT eBooks.

Firstly, you could consider selling domain names. Domain names can be bought for under $10 and if you manage to choose one that is in demand then you could go and sell it on eBay for $20 or more. You can easily locate these domains just by testing. It requires very little effort and sometimes you stumble upon hidden gems that you could go and sell on eBay for four figures!

Secondly, you could sell your writing services. The demand for eBooks and articles has never been greater. Many people want these written for them and if you have expert knowledge in a particular niche you could write eBooks on that subject for the highest bidder.

On the same lines as selling your writing services, you could sell your graphic design ability or web design skills. You could design eCovers, banners or websites to the highest bidder. You could learn these skills in just a few days and all you really need is a copy of Photoshop and maybe some action scripts.

Perhaps the method that requires the least effort is selling linking space or advertising space. If you have a website with high amounts of traffic or a high Google page rank, then you could sell links or space on your website for adverts. A one way link is very important in terms of search engine ranking and your link could greatly benefit your buyer. You could charge perhaps $10 for a link for one month. After the sale you could then ask the buyer if they would like to buy the link on a monthly basis and they can pay you $10 every month. This is great for residual income.

Similarly, you could sell advertising space in your newsletter or ezine. If you have a large subscription base then you could charge a lot of money for this. For even more money, you could charge buyers for a solo ad to your subscribers. You could promote their product in one of your newsletters and you could easily charge 10c for every subscriber you have.

There are a few ideas for products you could sell for higher prices than eBooks and without the packaging or shipping. Admittedly, some do require a little work but it’s something different. Make sure you don’t sell too low though. Many people are oblivious to these products that you could sell there is little demand for these products and services at this time therefore there may be fewer bids on your auctions. Start your auctions high to make sure you don’t lose out.

James Penn is an eBay expert and has assisted many eBay sellers since launching his website which details exactly how to make money on eBay. You can visit his website at http://www.auction-enterprise.com and sign up to his newsletter for free eBay eBooks at http://www.auction-enterprise.com/free-ebay-ebooks.html as well as all the latest eBay selling tips. Finally, you can grab some of the hottest selling eBay eBooks at http://www.auction-enterprise.com/ebooks.html


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Tuesday, December 19, 2006

Dealing With Phishing Emails - By Mark Kenny

While organisations such as eBay and Paypal are attempting to stop fraudsters sending out phishing emails, the reality is they are losing the battle. Phishers are a growing problem, with no signs of slowing down. There are a few things you can do, to ensure your not a victim of a phishering attack.

1) Always check who the email is addressed to.

Most phishing emails are not addressed to you personally so this should be the first thing to look for. Remember that eBay and Paypal emails always include your real name in emails. Fraudsters who send the emails do not include this, because the majority of the time they don't know who they are sending the emails to.

2) Use a devoted email address

By using a devoted email address for eBay and Paypal you'll know immediately that any emails sent to other email accounts are phishing emails. If possible do not include the email address in any of your ebay listings, as the more visibility your email address gets, the more likely it is for the phishers will find it out and you'll receive on of their messages. Phishers regular view the eBay sites to collect the email addresses of users.

3) Mailscanner

Mailscanner is a script installed by hosts that protects against viruses from the server. One major advantage of mailscanner is it includes anti-phishing measures. Any url contained with an email which is disguised, hidden or different from the anchor text is highlighted by the mailscanner script as a possible phishing attack. Therefore you always are aware of what your clicking on before you visit any sites contained within the emails. If you are receiving emails though your own hosting account, as oppose to though a web based account (yahoo or gmail for instance) ask your host if they support mailscanner.

4) PhishFighing.com

PhishFighting is an ingenious site that turns things around on the fraudster. The site was setup to flood phishering sites with fake information, both usernames and passwords. When you receive your next spoof email simply visit the site and enter the web address of the phishering site into PhishFighting.com. Every twenty seconds, a fake entry is submitted to the site making any genuine details of victims hidden between the hundreds of fake entries.

5) Forward Emails

Forward any suspicious emails to spoof@ebay.com or spoof@paypal.com and the relevant department will attempt to get the phishing site shut down. This is normally done, by eBay contacting the datacenter where the phishing site is hosted & asking them to remove it.

Overall, stay alert and do not respond to emails in a hurry as this is when your most likely to be caught off guard. Stop and examine them to ensure they are genuine first. Additionally, any emails which are genuinely from eBay will always appear in your messages folder within My eBay.

Mark Kenny, runs the http://www.AuctionCUT.com forum where users regularly discuss various aspects of eBay, Spoofing and Online Auctions. Register at our Dropship And Auction Forum today and receive a free exclusive report after making ten posts.


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Monday, December 18, 2006

eBay – A Slightly Cynical View - By James Hunaban

It goes without saying; we all love a great deal! The question is, are you going to find one, on an auction site such as eBay? Well, in my experience, yes and no. As with any auction, online or offline, people bidding against each other can often run the price up to more than the item is worth. In which case, why bother with an auction at all, just go down the shops or wherever.

Ok, before I put you off the idea of auction sites altogether, I have to say, they can still be quite useful. My personal feedback score on eBay is 120+ which indicates that I have profited from using the service. I have found it very handy for getting rid of household items that are no longer needed. On the flip side, some people use it to collect stuff that they probably want but don’t really need.

Of course you also have the part time trader types who scour garage sales, boot sales, flea markets etc looking for bargains, and then selling on eBay for a profit. Hey, I’m not knocking it, good luck to them, I’m sure there are quite a few people who do rather well out of it. It’s not for me, though, too much hassle, and then there are the dreaded fees.

Talking of fees, with eBay, when selling, you have to pay a listing fee, and also a percentage of the final sale price. Fair enough, I suppose, they have a business to run. Although I can’t help thinking, the people doing the best out of eBay are eBay. Ok, I’m an old cynic, but I think it pays to be cynical these days. Having said all that, they did not become the market leader in auction sites by chance, and a lot of work and some good business decisions must have gone into it.

You have to make sure you safeguard yourself against the numerous scam artists trying to operate in the online auction world. You can make a start by studying the information and guidelines in the eBay site. Also, whoever it is you’re dealing with, do make sure you have a look at their feedback, and try to get a feel of the sort of person they are.

At the end of the day, wheeling and dealing on eBay can be good fun, and you can make a bit of cash as well. It does help if you’re an old cynic like me, or maybe that’s a hindrance. You decide.

James Hunaban is the owner of ebay-marketing.jims-info.com a site full of eBay information.


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Thursday, December 14, 2006

Thousands of People are Making Money Online by Starting an Ebay Online Home Business - By Joshua Spaulding

Selling items of Ebay involves being able to provide a quality description of your item as well as a photo. You can list items without a photo, but most people are not interested in buying what they can’t see. If you plan to sell items on Ebay for an ongoing income, it is wise to invest in a digital camera.

Listing fees on Ebay are very minimal, making the endeavor a low investment. If you sell items on Ebay for a living, make sure you keep detailed records of your expenses. This can include the purchase of a digital camera, listing fees, and the cost of items that you resell. You can deduct the cost of packaging, labels, and packing materials that you use.

You will need to keep very good records of the items you sell and the price you sell them for. Since this type of selling on Ebay is considered a home business, you might be able to deduct a portion of your home office or Internet connection costs on your income tax return.

Since you will want the items you list on Ebay to sell, make sure you are listing items that are in demand. You can check by searching for the item in the listings already on the site. If there are several bids on each of the items listed, it is likely yours will sell. If there are several items listed, but no bids, you are encouraged not to list your item, as it will not likely sell. You will lose money because of the listing fees. Looking at other people’s listings is a great way to set your opening bid price as well.

Some sellers decide to set a flat fee for shipping costs. Be careful as this can end up costing you money if the actual shipping cost is more. Ebay has made it easy with built in features that help calculate shipping to a specific zip code. You might have to enter the weight of the item, so a small scale might be a great investment for your home business.

The most popular items for sale on Ebay include clothing, jewelry, toys, computers, cameras, collectibles, vehicles, video games, and CD’s. You will often get a better price for your items if they are new, or nearly new. To obtain items that you can resell on Ebay, hit the stores. Look for sales. The day after Thanksgiving and the day after Christmas are excellent times to find great items you can pick up, and then resell for a profit.

The best Ebay sellers are prepared to meet the demand of online shoppers. For example, find sells in your area on winter jackets. Put them away until the next fall. The demand for new winter jackets will be high, and you can sell them at a profit. The day after Christmas and Easter are a great time to find dress up clothing for children at a very low price. Purchase Halloween costumes the day after for a substantial savings, then list the costumes the following season in plenty of time for the costumes to be shipped before Halloween.

No matter how good your price is or what you are offering, you won’t sell much of anything on Ebay if you don’t have a good feedback rating. When you buy or sell an item on Ebay, you are given a rating about the transaction. As a seller, you need to make sure your customers are satisfied. Be very clear about what you are selling and the quality. State any return policies you might have. If a buyer is not happy, offer solutions to make you both happy. It is strongly recommended that you clearly state that the buyer must purchase insurance on the item or you will not give a refund if they don’t receive their item. This will help cover you from potential fraud and income loss. Stay organized with shipping and make sure the items go out within a day or two of the closing date.

Should you encounter issues with buyers that you can’t resolve, Ebay offers many solutions. You can file a complaint against a buyer for non-payment, non-communication, and being difficult to work with. There is arbitration available for such issues. Make sure you clearly state in your listings that you do not accept cash. This will prevent a buyer from making fraudulent claims that they paid for the item. Paypal is a great online way of getting paid that allows buyers to instantly pay you for an item. You can also accept personal checks and money orders.

Making money on Ebay is very easy if you are organized, you keep an eye on what is selling, buy items at a cheap price to resell, and offer quality customer service. This home business can earn you hundreds to thousands of dollars per month. It depends on the price of the items you sell, how many you sell, and how much time and effort you want to put into managing your online business.

Joshua Spaulding is an Author and Webmaster providing Proven ways to Make Money Online. Joshua also runs a Quality Article Directory.


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Wednesday, December 13, 2006

Making Real Money on EBay - By Paul Katsande

Trading on eBay is one of the best businesses you can start on a shoestring. In fact, millions all over the world earn more than a full-time wage on the eBay sites. If you want to make money on eBay, there is a right way to do it. This article shows why you must trade on eBay, and points you to resources that will tell you how to trade on eBay for maximum profits.

eBay is the largest internet auction site in the world, with over 180 million registered users world-wide. In 2005, these registered users bought and sold goods worth somewhere in the regions of $40billion. That is a lot for a company which launched just over a decade ago, in 1995 to be precise.

Why You Must Trade On eBay

Targeted customers at your doorstep. With the eBay internet auction sites, millions of potential customers are there, waiting for you. You don’t need to spend time and money advertising your goods or services. Customers who look at your products are interested in them, and have voluntarily searched for such products.

Open for business 24/7.Your items are on sale 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Customers can have a look at your items at a time of their convenience. Being an internet trader, you are not bound by the opening hours regulations of your local government.

A world-wide market. On eBay you can choose to sell to the whole world (currently excludes most of Africa though). Your market is not limited to your geographic location. As they say, the world is your oyster.

No employees. All you need to trade is a computer. Unlike other businesses you don’t need to have employees. Of course, your computer is on your beck and call 24/7.

Part/Full time. Its up to you if you want to start off part-time or full-time. You can stay part-time for as long as you want. Most people choose to keep their old jobs, until their auction businesses can pay the bills.

No start-up costs. eBay is free to join, both as a buyer and a seller. The signing up process is easy, and not unnecessarily complicated. Within minutes of signing up, you will be ready to start trading on eBay. Where else have you heard of a business with no start-up costs?

No financial risk. All you stand to lose if your item does not sell is your listing fee, less than a fiver in most cases. Money to buy stock? You don’t need to buy items for sell. Why not start off by selling those old unwanted items stuck in your attic.

Market research. With this business, it is possible to do your market research in advance. It’s easy to get detailed knowledge on what sells, and for how much before you buy any stock. In business better informed decisions go hand-in-hand with profitability.

Auctions are simple to learn. As with any system, you need to learn how the auction site works and how you can maximize your benefits. Fortunately, it’s all very easy to learn. Net auctions are not like brain surgery or rocket science. All it takes to become a major player is observation, attention, and time.

"I am not a sales person." That’s fine. All that’s required of you is to describe your item honestly. Some people are scared to approach people to sell something because of the huge fear of rejection. That never happens on an internet auction. With net auctions, the transactions are impersonal. For most transactions, the only ‘physical’ contact is when you post the item!.

eBay shops. Besides the auction, eBay offer a shop front where you can list your items. You can customise your shop as you like. Your buyers can keep coming back to check what you have to offer, just like a regular online shop. It’s a snap to set-up an eBay shop.

Register on eBay

To register on eBay you must:

1. be at least 18 years of age.

2. have a valid email address

Just visit the eBay site for your country and fill out the registration form. Some general tips when registering:

1. be creative with your username, but don’t go overboard.

2. avoid using words that might give your products a negative connotation.

3. avoid using all-caps names. That might be considered to be SHOUTING.

4. agree to have a personal page on eBay, the "About Me" page.

Start Making Money

After registration, you can now start trading. But before you rush off to sell that first item, you should start by buying something from eBay. Why? You need to experience the whole process from the buyer's perspective. Get a feel for the thoughts in a buyer's mind when deciding whether to bid or not.

What do you trade? Just about anything, including goods and services. Read this Making It Big on eBay to see what others are doing.

If you are keen to get ahead and avoid the usual mistakes sellers make, then download the free ebook, Make Your Net Auctions Sell!, at Making Real Money on Ebay. Its a big read, but well worthy the effort.


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Tuesday, December 12, 2006

How to Successfully Run Mystery Auctions on eBay - By Avril Harper

The term ‘mystery auctions’ is self-explanatory because no one ever knows precisely what they are buying at mystery auction. A strange state of affairs, sounding impossible to most people, but big business all the same, and featuring some of the highest finishing prices on eBay, including, recently:

* Holiday Stocking Mystery Auction, Coach Handbags + fetched $2676 (See Footnote)

* Win Big Baby Mystery Auction Cash Box fetched $3,100 (See Footnote)

That’s very small fry compared to the early days of mystery auctions when prices of several thousand dollars were common for really weird items such as expensive gifts bought and confiscated from a cheating partner, spare change removed by the seller from a drunken husband’s pocket.

Most mystery auctions involve bidding on a box or envelope, possibly empty, usually with contents, but never with enclosures fully described. So you’ll find envelopes offered containing an undisclosed sum of money, boxes containing specified items like toys or collectors’ stamps without further detail, the contents of a cheating husband’s pay packet (was it a bonus week, back-paid overtime, a nice fat redundancy cash payout?). More exciting still are envelopes that might contain a fortune or may even be empty or, at the other extreme, boxes packed with genuinely useful and valuable items sellers simply need to dispose of to generate cash flow or room for more stock.

The main rule for a product to qualify as a ‘mystery’ auction is that a substantial part of the listing must remain secret. Clues may be given to the contents at the beginning and various stages of the auction as long as content remains substantially a mystery.

Footnote

Strangely, neither of those sellers are still registered on eBay, which probably has much to do with dishonest bidders and non-paying buyer scenarios typically confronting mystery auction sellers. Don’t be deterred, there are easy ways to avoid problems like this, and mystery auctions really are a very good way to make money, honestly, and generate lots of happy, repeat customers for your business.

A New Trend in Mystery Auctions

Sellers sometimes give a rough idea as to contents to help visitors make an informed decision to bid or pass on a particular auction. This is a growing trend, often involving very high perceived value products such as collectibles, land and property, investment opportunities. Many professional eBay Mystery Auctioneers focus on specific product types for their auctions, such as scrapbooking and jewelery making supplies, collectors’ stamps and postcards, even land and Japanese militaria. To illustrate:

- eBayer - mlig-auctions - sells land and currently has multiple mystery auction listings for large and small plots of land with bids extending to many thousands of dollars and never an auction closing unsold.

Currently he or she is offering:

MYSTERY LAND AUCTION=21+ACRE+ROAD &CREEK FRONTAGE=RARE!
ALL 1st BID LEVELS WIN CA$H+ALL BUYERS WIN FREE PARCEL!
(Bidding currently stands at US $12,501.00)

- Similarly offering land and other investment properties are eBayers:

auction-land-sales

certified-investments

* Most collectors are magpies, liking nothing more than a good rummage through packages of unknown items relating to their special collecting interest, be it: stamps, postcards, Johnny Cash memorabilia, stock and share certificates, or virtually any other portable collectable (‘portable’ because multiple large item lots can be heavy and expensive to post, so small is usually best).
- eBayer – affiliatedcoins - (feedback 11933) currently promotes a number of mystery packages containing one theme collectibles, in this case Japanese Memorabilia. His auction reads:

MYSTERY AUCTION: 1942 WWII JAPANESE MILITARIA

Avril Harper is an eBay PowerSeller and provides hundreds of business opportunity articles href="http://www.avrilharper.com">http://www.avrilharper.com. She has produced a free guide - 103 POWERSELLER TIPS - which you can download with other freely distributable reports and eBooks at href="http://www.toppco.com">http://www.toppco.com


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Monday, December 11, 2006

10 Ways eBay Sellers Can Avoid Negative Feedback - By John Thornhill

Your eBay feedback is your biggest eBay selling tool bar none. If you have bad eBay feedback you will struggle to make sales and your eBay business will suffer. Therefore you must protect your eBay feedback as much as possible. Here are 10 tips that will help you maintain an excellent feedback rating.

1. Always be polite in all correspondence. This goes without saying, always treat your customers with respect and give them a pleasant buying experience. By doing so you may gain a customer for life.

2. Avoid excessive shipping charges. If you charge $10 shipping for an item and the cost is only $3 you are leaving yourself open to negative feedback.

3. Mail your items as soon as possible. Don't wait till the end of the week. Taking too long to deliver your goods means you are risking your feedback. You should always aim to have items packaged and sent within 48 hours of payment.

4. Make sure your item description is accurate. Don't say your item is as good as new if it's not. This is probably the most common reason for negative feedback.

5. Answer emails promptly. Don't wait days and days to answer any queries. This only makes your customer frustrated and this can result in a negative comment.

6. List any flaws your item has. If the item you are selling has a scratch or mark say so or you could be left a negative comment for a poor item description.

7. Don't retaliate to awkward customers. Sometimes you may get an awkward or offensive customer, that's life. Don't retaliate, just deal with their query in a polite and professional manner. This usually ends in the customer apologising and excellent feedback follows.

8. Accept returns. If a customer is not happy with your product for whatever reason allow them to return the item and refund their purchase minus shipping fees. You can then cancel the transaction through eBay and you will get your fees returned and therefore wont be out of pocket. This leaves you free to relist the item with your feedback intact.

9. Package your items carefully. If you are selling delicate items make sure they are packaged carefully with plenty of protection, the last thing you want is your customer to receive damaged goods.

10. Don't leave feedback first. If you do you are leaving yourself open to negative comments. A happy customer will always leave feedback first, if you leave feedback first you will learn the hard way, trust me.

Remember! Your customer is a real living person. I think sometimes people forget this, try to make the whole buying experience as easy and pleasant as possible. Your customers are the lifeblood of your eBay business and your number one goal should be to make them happy. This can only result in excellent feedback and in turn success for your eBay business.

John Thornhill trades on eBay under the username planetsms and earns over $1000 per week on eBay on autopilot. To see how he does it visit his eBay store at http://stores.ebay.com/PlanetSMS


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Thursday, December 07, 2006

What To Expect From An Online Auto Auction - By Robert Darby

How many types of online auto auctions are there? What is the scam risk with online auto auctions? Are there vehicle reports where to check the history of a car for sale at an online auto auction? These are but a few of the questions that are most frequently asked when you want to buy a car online.

There are free online auto auctions, where you can bid and have the car checked once the auction is over. Web sites specialized in car auctions are just intermediaries, if your bid wins, it is between the two parties involved to close the deal and write the contract. Usually, you can examine the car in daylight before purchase.

Then there are the salvaged cars online auto auctions, where you can buy reconditioned cars that have been recuperated from a flood, a car crash or a fire. Very often, behind such cars lie big scams, that you'd better do some research before going to a car auction.

First you should be suspicious when the price of the car is too low, and when you can track no precise history record. So, when you go to an online auto auction make sure you buy the car below the fair market value, otherwise you'd better go and buy it from the seller directly.

Try not to get caught into a bidding war, because in case you win it, you will have to pay the winner's premium, as most online auto auction sites require. That is, you will pay a specific percent of the total bid to the auction site, which can be quite a sum, in case it's 10% or your bid for instance.

Car rental agencies also try to sell at online auto auctions; however these cars are a lot better maintained than the salvaged cars. Usually car rental agencies use them for a year or two, and then try to take them out of service. Some of these cars still have warranties in affect, so it's better for you to check who you are buying a car from.

Researching for some history records of the car you want to purchase would save you a lot of trouble. Before getting at an online auto auction, check on details on the car you want to bid on. It doesn't matter where you are from, state or country, you can easily be the victim of a scam.

If you are looking for a car auction you should stop by the best online car auction site


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Wednesday, December 06, 2006

Make Money On Ebay - A Personal Experience - By Ashwin Foogooa

Anyone – yes, anyone – who is serious about making money online should know about eBay, the darling stock of the dot.com boom earlier this decade.

eBay is one of the very, very few online businesses that weathered the dot.com crash. You can guess why – as its CEO Meg Whitman puts it – eBay is “transforming the way in which e-commerce is being conducted”. And eBay has gone from strength to strength since it acquired Paypal, the world’s largest online payment services company.

Can you make money by selling on eBay? The short answer is YES, without a doubt! I have used eBay to make at least $1,500 profit every month over the last 9 months. And I know for a fact that many people earn more than that. For selling online, eBay stands out from the crowd for 3 reasons:

Its aim is to make selling easy for you – ordinary people like you and I can sell to as big an audience as the Marks & Spencer, Walmart and John Lewis of today;

Other than the main search engines (i.e. Google and Yahoo), eBay attracts more traffic every day than any other website. Yes, Ebay reaches out to more people than any newspaper and/or television company in the world;

95% of the users of Google/Yahoo still use them for one simple purpose – surfing the internet. However, with eBay, it’s quite the opposite. 95% of people who use eBay are doing so with the intention of spending money online. You can make money from eBay precisely because of that quality traffic it generates;

How can you make money from eBay?

There are many ways of making money on eBay. Don’t forget that eBay is like a shopping mall, a marketplace. So all the fundamental rules of demand and supply, pricing, economics, business and plain simple logic apply! Essentially, it boils down to buying low and selling high, like traders do in all walks of life.

If I am not convincing you, then please follow the link below to “This is Money” website where it states that 70,000 people in the UK alone now earn a 2nd income on Ebay.

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money-savers/article.html?in_article_id=406867&in_page_id=5

Here are various ways of making money on eBay. They are NOT exhaustive and I am sure that many people use other techniques. Also, you need to choose the technique that suits YOUR skills and lifestyle the best:

Searching for misspelt items deliberately, buying them cheap and selling them at a higher price after spelling them correctly;

Buying an item, then improving its listing and photo displayed, and reselling at a higher price;

Sourcing an item that can be bought cheap in your area (e.g. in your local newspapers, at an antique fair, or in a developing country) and then selling on eBay;

Buying in bulk from wholesalers and retailing on eBay;

Buying and selling ebooks;

Personally, I make money on eBay selling ebooks. The beauty of an ebook is that it is not like a normal item. If you want to sell, say, mobile phones, you can only sell as many as what you have in stock. Whereas with an ebook, you can sell as many as the number of buyers prepared to pay for it. All you need to do is email the buyer the ebook once you have received payment.

For instance, I could have easily written all my blogs in an ebook, put a copyright on it, and listed the ebook on eBay for $10. With a catching title, subtitle and picture, I would sell about 4 copies every day. And if I sell 15 varieties of ebooks, I would easily make $1,500 profit every month.

However, you also need to be aware of the following pitfalls:

eBay is only as good as how well you use it. If you do not master the listing techniques and, remember, apply the fundamental rules of economics, you WILL FAIL;

eBay is expensive. It charges you a listing fee and a final value fee of 5.25% of the price you sold your item at. On top of that, Paypal, the online payment services company owned and used by eBay, charges 3.4% of the price you sold your item at. This means that at least 10% of the price you achieve will be paid to Ebay or Paypal. So if you are selling a low-margin item, this will get very risky;

Both eBay and Paypal are trusted brands. Therefore, they invest heavily in ensuring trust and safety on their sites. They can – and will – punish any users who fail to comply with their listing rules and Acceptable Usage Policies. These policies can be onerous so I strongly urge you to familiarise yourself with them. Punishments from eBay/Paypal will range from removal of listings, temporary selling restrictions to outright suspension and lifelong bar for serious and/or persistent violations;

Irritatingly, eBay and Paypal can sanction you even if you have not done anything wrong! You may feel that you have done nothing wrong, or more commonly, have been operating in a “grey area”, but for them, everything has to be black or white. If they do not see it your way, they will sanction you unilaterally and you will not be able to do anything about it.

Summary assessment:

Typical monthly earnings $300-$10,000, depending on how well you use it. Ebay is very open-ended in this aspect.
Get rich quick? Maybe, if you are generating $10,000 a month. But I think you should use it as a hobby to generate a 2nd income to start with.

Decent 2nd income? Yes, easily.

All from home online? Yes. But you may have to use the post for accepting checks, collecting recorded items and go to the bank to cash your checks.

Legal and ethical? Yes, and it should remain so. If you fiddle the rules, you WILL be caught by eBay / Paypal. Remember that they invest millions in enforcing their rules!

Ongoing effort required? I spend about 1.5 hours a day – 7 days a week

Initial cash investment required? Variable – although I would recommend that you have about $300 of working capital to start with to cover your eBay fees. You may not use this at all if items sell fast and your buyers pay on time;

Initial time required to set up? Max. 3 hours – but you will learn new things as you carry on selling and will always have to spend some time on setup every week.

My Recommendation

I recommend that you try eBay if you are serious about making money online. Set yourself a budget, and start slowly. Do not act big at the outset. In order to maximise your chances of doing well on eBay, I recommend that you get yourself one book on eBay. If anything, you should try eBay just for the eBay experience. How would you feel if/when you hear that people like yourself are earning extra cash every week on eBay and you aren’t?

Visit my blog at the link below to see the books that I recommend.

www.ecashmint.blogspot.com


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Tuesday, December 05, 2006

Top Five Easy Ways to Run Your eBay Business More Efficiently - By Doug Luthringer

Do you have lots of stuff to sell on eBay, but you just don’t have enough time to do it? Are you trying to operate your eBay selling as a business, but you just can’t generate enough volume to make yourself independent? Here are five easy ways to make your eBay selling process more efficient and more profitable.

1. Sell the same or similar items. The easiest way to push a lot of volume without creating more work for yourself is to sell the same item or similar items over and over again. The latest stat that you may not have heard is that if the eBay community were a country, it would be the fifth most populous country in the world. That means that there is no lack of customers willing to buy your products. Once you take a high quality picture, write a detailed description and weigh your item, you can duplicate that listing every time you sell a product. If you are selling the same items over and over again, there is no reason to have to sit down and write completely new descriptions every time you want to relist an item to sell.

2. Use Turbo Lister or other automated listing services. Since I started using eBay’s Turbo Lister, I have shaved many valuable minutes from each listing that I write. That translates into saving hours, weeks and even months from my listing process. These automated listing tools work great for what I covered in the first step. All the information is saved and ready to upload with a click of a button. I preach using Turbo Lister during my classes even to novice users because of how easy it is to use and the ability to duplicate listings.

3. Be prepared for the season. You should have in stock seasonal or cyclical items that are proven sellers every year. Don’t just think about Christmas as the only buying season. Every major sport from high school, to college, to professional has a definite up-trend in sales. You would be surprised how many people have transplanted from one region to another and would love to have a hat or sweatshirt from their high school or college team. Keep in mind these items will usually have licensing fees if you are creating them on your own. The easiest ways to buy these products are from wholesalers, or at the end of the season at a discount from catalogs or even Wal-Mart to sell at the start of the next season.

4. Step 1 through Step 5. Not Step 1, Step 4, Step 2, Step 5 then Step 3 and back to Step 5. You need to figure out what the eBay selling process is before you start selling and lose track and what step should come next. First and foremost always research the products you intend to sell before you buy them, and then realize that no one wants to buy them from you. You can research completed listings on eBay, or buy access to any number of historical databases that store eBay’s completed listings. Once you determine that your products will sell on eBay, you should then take and edit photos, weigh the item with its packaging, then write a detailed example of the item. If you start writing a description before you take pictures, you may have forgot to closely examine the item to mention any defects or missed important details. When you get to the shipping and handling portion of your listing, you don’t want to have to go back to your warehouse, storage location or basement to determine what the actual weight of the item is. This also forces you to have the packaging materials on-hand. You do not want to have your shipments delayed because you are waiting on your supplier’s delivery to arrive. You should also have designated areas that separate the different stages of the process so you do not get confused as to what steps you need to do next for certain items. This will avoid re-work or missing a step of the process for items along the way.

5. Automate processes with personalization. eBay’s Selling Manager allows you to automate notification emails, posting feedback, relisting items, status updates and lots more. USE THEM! You can send a personalized “Shipping Notification” email in three clicks. eBay provides templates that you can customize with your own message, then the system automatically inputs your customers’ information so it looks personalized. You can do the same for many other customer service tasks. You want to be able to efficiently and effectively communicate with your buyers so they know where their items are in the process. You can also use PayPal to purchase shipping labels, which will then send your buyer an email with the tracking or delivery confirmation number included.

In closing, you always need to remain flexible to be able to adapt to changing market conditions from your customers, suppliers, competitors and buyers. Be willing to change, or your competition will change around you and leave you standing in a warehouse full of unwanted products. Let eBay do the little things automatically so you can worry about making your business a true success by selling relevant products at the most opportune time.

Doug Luthringer is a certified eBay education specialist who has taught more than 200 students "The Basics of eBay Selling" course and "The Advanced eBay Selling Techniques" course. He has been selling on eBay for nearly seven years and has completed over 3500 eBay transactions and has over 2000 unique positive comments with no negative feedback. Doug has also been invited to be a guest speaker to talk about how to sell on eBay and the use of Google AdWords to small and medium size business, as well as university students. You can get more information about Doug and his eBay selling book at http://www.Thefastmall.com


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Monday, December 04, 2006

How To Make Your Ebay Listing Get Found By Buyers? - By Ricky Lim

With thousands and thousands of listings for each category on ebay, it is easy for your ebay listing to be buried and ignored by buyers because buyers can’t find them. Sure, you could pay more money using featured items, bold items, second category and all those stuff. But what if there is a better way for your listing to get found without paying the additional fees that eats into your profits?

Up to 85% of ebay users use the search function on ebay to find what they want. Since most ebay users do not use the check the “title and description” box during searching, that’s means the title is the single most important factor for your ebay listing to be found.

Ebay allows up to 55 characters in the title and you should full use of it. I’ve seen listings where the title is only 15-20 characters long and give very vague description on what they are selling.

Try to be as descriptive as possible in your title. For example, if you are selling a dvd player on ebay. Put in the model no, brand of the dvd player. An example would be “Sony DG-1098 DVD player v2” or something along the lines. The main advantage is you get less competition for more specific terms and also buyers who find your listing this way already knows about this product and are more inclined to bid on it.

Keywords in ebay are also important. Some keywords are hot and get a lot of searches while others get close to none. One way of finding hot keywords is to use ebay pulse and get the top 10 keywords for your category.

Then to try to weave in at least 1 such keyword into your title so that your listing shows up on search results.

It is also important to add a picture to your title listing. There are 2 reasons for this. Firstly, a pictures tells a thousand words, putting a picture of your product helps buyers to know what they are buying. Secondly, listings without picture appear almost as a single line on ebay search results while those with pictures take up almost 4 times the space. So it’s easy to spot your listing with pictures.

Ricky Lim is an ebay powerseller who runs an ebay selling tips site. Visit his site for more selling tips on ebay dropshipping and ebay bid snipers


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Sunday, December 03, 2006

Ebay: Buy Sell And Profit Online - By Roy Scott

Say the words home-based business and many people will automatically think of ebay. And why wouldn't they. Ebay is, by far, the world's largest online auction with over 40 million dollars moving through its coffers each day. If you're thinking of joining the ebay profit bonanza, read on.

After registering as a seller with ebay you'll immediately be faced with the seemingly daunting task of deciding what to sell. The more beneficial question to ask yourself is, what should I buy? As strange as it seems your first transactions with ebay should be purchases. You want to build up some positive feedback before you start selling. The quality of your feedback will be the foundation of your ebay business. Always remember this.

Now, back to the matter of what to sell. Ebay wants you to do well and they offer many resources to help you be a successful seller. Some of their paid and free resources are: the marketplace research buyer behaviour report, sales reports, merchandising calender, ebay pulse, hot items by category, and the ebay solutions directory. All of these very useful tools are accessible through your ebay sellers account. There are also courses by Powersellers and others knowledgeable about making money on ebay. Just make sure that the courses are no older than 18 months. Ebay is constantly changing.

Some of the more popular places to find things to sell on ebay are, flea markets, yard sales, secondhand stores, and liquidation sales. Then there are the formal avenues of working through drop shippers or buying bulk wholesale.

The appeal of drop shippers is that they carry the inventory, and do the packing and shipping of the purchases. Your only job is the placing of the ads and the handling of the financial transactions. Sounds easy doesn't it. But there is a downside. Late shipments, out of stock items, and damaged shipments, are three very real concerns that could devastate your feedback rating. And the process of finding a reputable drop shipper is not a cakewalk if you don't know what you're doing. There are a lot of shysters out there ready to sell you worthless list of drop shippers.

Buying bulk wholesale, on the other hand, comes with the twin problems of storing huge amounts of merchandise and coming up with the money to make large bulk purchases. And then there's the not so little problem of will you be able to move the merchandise and turn a profit.

The best advice for those new to ebay is to start modestly. Learn the ins and outs of ebay; things like merchandise presentation, writing ad copy, pricing, and auction length. Build your positive feedback, find your niche, and take advantage of all of the resources that ebay offers you. By the way, there are alternatives to ebay, like Overstock.com, Auction Fire, and uBid. Check them out and see if they're more your speed. They all have their merit, but there's no doubt ebay is the king.

To learn more about starting and growing an ebay business, visit http://www.ebaygreen.com.


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