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