Welcome to the fourth issue of UK Auction LIne News.
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Last week Ebay released their figures for the second quarter of the year, April to June. During this period over 225 million items were listed on Ebay and sold over $5.6 billion dollars worth of items. Over 16% of all items were purchased using the Buy It Now feature and 11% were offered only with the fixed price option. There are also of 34 million currently active Ebay user accounts and that is a big market in anyone’s language.

I have heard from several different sources that Ebay intend to launch a magazine in the near future. Back in 1999 a private company produced an Ebay magazine under licence but Ebay withdrew the licence and it ceased publication. At the time of writing I have not been able to discover when the first issue is due out and whether it will be available in the UK but I will keep an eye on it.

Expect August to be fairly quiet in terms of Ebay, but now is the time to start getting ready for the busy period between September to December. If you have not made a start yet now is the time to get ready, start looking out items to sell and get those listings ready.

If you have not visited the web site lately www.ukauctionline.co.uk then you will not have seen the revamp that we have given it. There are lots of new features, a free 6 part course and much more. In the coming months we want to increase the amount of information on the site and if you have any contribution you would like to make we would like to hear from you.

Dave Bromley

Contents:

1. What can you sell now?

2. After the event- A Checklist

What can you sell now?
by Dave Bromley

There is going to come a time when you have cleared out the attic, there is actually room to park the car in the garage and the children have fitted padlocks to their toy boxes. So what on earth can you sell now?

This is the time that you are going to have to decide exactly what kind of Ebayer you want to be. Is it going to be a hobby or a business? These two things are not mutually exclusive and there is no reason why your business cannot be your hobby as well. But what I am really talking about is are going to be a serious player who permanently has 10 or more items listed or someone who just pops in or out.

If you are a hobbyist you can buy items as you see them at car boot sales, auctions or wherever. My main Ebay business is selling information CDs but I cannot resist buying items if I think I can sell them for a profit on Ebay. For instance the other day I saw a motor cycle manual for a 1960’s motor bike. This is a subject I know absolutely nothing about but I felt certain that somewhere there was some one who would really want it. As it was only 50p I bought it and sold it a week later on Ebay for £5.50 plus postage. Not a fortune but it was 1000% profit.

When you are paying a pound or less for any item you can afford to take the risk and the odd item that does not sell will be more than compensated for by those that do. However, if you are going into selling these type of items on a regular basis it will pay you to specialise.

I believe that with a bit of effort it is possible to become expert enough to profitably operate in most niche markets within a couple of months. Whether it is American comics, salt & pepper sets or fishing tackle or any other specialisation you can learn the essentials pretty quickly.

Read books and magazines that covers your area of interest. Send for catalogues and price lists; browse Ebay and the other online auctions to see what is actually selling and the prices achieved. It really is a lot easier than you might think to become an “expert” and it can be very profitable.

One of the big advantages of operating in a niche market is that once you have sold something to a customer there is a good chance they may be in the market for similar products. There are two ways that you can do this and eliminate further auction fees. The method I use is to send out a compliments slip with each item. The slip says, “Congratulations and thank you for your successful bid. I occasionally have similar items to the one you have purchased for sale. I would like to e-mail you with details of these when they are available. If you would prefer not to receive these please e-mail me at newsletter@ukauctionline.co.uk. And I will ensure that you are not bothered. Thanking you” and then I sign it. As I write this I have not had anyone request not to receive e-mails.

The second way is to create a web site and when you dispatch an item enclose details of the web site and address. Using a combination of Ebay, web site and e-mails you can build up a really profitable niche business.

In the next issue of UK AuctionLine I will look at buying items wholesale to sell on Ebay.

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In the last issue the gremilins got in the works and a large part of this article was not published correctly. Therefore we are republishing it in this issue.

2. After the event- A checklist

When you get that e-mail from Ebay, Congratulations you have sold item ???? that does not mean that your work is done. Quite the reverse in fact. How you handle the transaction from here can have a direct bearing on how profitable your Ebay operations will be in the long term.

Here is a suggested list of what you should do when notified of a successful bid.

1. Send the successful bidder an e-mail.
   Congratulate them on being the successful bidder
   
2. Remind them exactly what it is they have bought.
   
3. Remind them of the Item Number and Price.(Including the postal charges.)
   
4. Tell them the methods of payment that you accept. (If you accept cheques tell them who to make it payable to and the address you want it sent to. Also I ask people to write the item number and their address on the back of the cheque. (It is amazing the number of people who just put a cheque in an envelope with nothing else and presumably expect you to guess what it is for.) You should also tell them if you intend to wait for the cheque to clear before dispatching the item.
   
5. Tell them that once you have received the payment you will submit feedback and hope that they will be able to do the same.
   
6. Once you are notified by Paypal that the payment has been received or the cheque has cleared be sure to dispatch the item as soon as possible.
   
7. Make sure the item is well packed and that you have applied the correct postage. (I also get a receipt of postage certificate stamped by the Post Office when I send the item off. (This is a free service!)

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