Hello <$firstname$>

The last quarter of the year, that is October to December is traditionally a very busy time on eBay. This is due to the fact that as the nights start pulling in we all go back and start spending more time browsing the Internet and eBay in particular. Also as Christmas approaches our spending seems to go on to steroids. For the last four years Internet sales have grown year on year whilst the High Street has struggled.

If you want to benefit from this massive growth in spending at Christmas you need to start your planning now. Seasonal and gift products are always popular and you should begin sourcing these . Many people are looking for unique and unusual gifts. As Christmas approaches the Saturday and Sunday newspapers always have a wide range of regional food and craft gifts. So the market is there and many of these “niche” items could be ideal for selling on eBay.

The last thing you want to do is risk being left with a great deal of stock after Christmas. One way of avoiding this is to use Drop Ship to increase your product range as the festive season approaches. Alternatively you can look for companies that sell these types of product but do not have a web presence and offer to sell their goods on eBay for them on commission.

But the point is that if you want to cash in on the eBay Christmas spending boom you need to start planning now. For those people who like to take a little gamble, you can always try and spot the potential “big” toy for Christmas and buy now to auction just before Christmas.

I had an interesting e-mail the other day from a subscriber. He told me that when he visited his local Poundstretcher store he noticed they had a selection of software programmes on CDs, the titles included “10,000 photographs”, “5000 business Clip Art” as well as several others. The amazing fact was that they were all priced at £1 each. This was very good considering that they originally sold for over £12 each. Having bought there entire stock, about 20 CDs he has started selling them on eBay and he tells me the initial response has been good.

The lesson to be learnt is that it is always worth looking around your local area for bargains that you can resell on eBay. I was recently in my local market and one stall had a big selection of DVDs for sale at £1 each. These included some “old” B movies, I am sure that I could have bought those and sold them at a profit on eBay but to be honest at the time I just did not think about. That was my mistake. If you have got any examples of bargains you have purchased locally and then sold on eBay I would like to hear about them.

eBay are looking at ways to develop their services so they better meet customer needs. For this reason Continental Research, an independent research company, has been commissioned by eBay to recruit members to participate in an online survey from 19th to 14th August 2005.

Over the next few days, you may receive emails asking for your participation in these tests. Should you receive an email from Continental Research rest assured that it is not a spoof or scam email.

The first ever eBay University in Ireland will take place in Dublin on Saturday 10 September. There are still places available if you would like to go to the event.

The course will be an overview of selling on eBay.ie covering the essential concepts. Whether you are a first-time seller or more experienced but looking to sharpen your skills, I believe you will learn valuable tips to help make you more successful.

Experienced eBay staff will be on hand to answer your questions and you will get a chance to meet other eBay sellers.

To find out more about the content of the course and to book a place visithttp://www.ebay.confpeopleevents.co.uk/dublin/

By Dave Bromley

I have received some enquiries from subscribers about importing items into the UK to resell on eBay. Importing is never a totally complication and risk free option. Having said that it is also true that a great number of full time Power Sellers do import the items they sell and make a great deal of money doing this.

If importing interests you one of the best site to visit is www.alibaba.com. This site lists thousands of products offered by manufactures predominately from the Far East.

Recently Yahoo acquired 40% of Alibaba for US$ 1 billion. Another site you might like to visit is www.globalresources.com The problem with using any site such as Alibaba, Global or for that matter eBay itself is how to sort the genuine from the fraudsters.

Alibaba and Global both offer a qualified listing called Gold Supplier and Gold Web Site. Although companies that do not have a “Gold”” rating may be perfectly honest and genuine you should be that little more cautious in your dealings with them.

Purchases from these sites tend to be for quite large amounts so you should follow the following guidelines. Never send Bankers drafts to suppliers you do not know and have traded with regularly. I would avoid any company that asks for payment up front, companies that are honest and are used to exporting will be aware of the procedures that are designed to protect both buyers and sellers.

One option is to use an Escrow service ideally eBays. You should also know that there have been cases of fraudsters setting up false Escrow companies and insisting that you use these to make your payment. Needless to say you will never see the goods or your money again. Another option is to see if your bank provides a bank to bank transfer system in which the money is not released until both parties are happy.

Alternatively you could pay via your credit card. If anything then goes wrong with the transaction you can always seek a charge back. In summary there is a need to be cautious when you first enter the import export market but having said this it can offer you a greta opportunity to buy bulk stock at competitive prices.

top

1. End your auctions when everyone is home: The time you list your auctions can have a big effect on the number of bids your auction receives and the closing price of your auctions.

The time when your auction usually gets the most bids is near the end. If you have listed an auction for 7 days, the whole seven days have been building up to the end of the auction. The end is when the last minute bidding begins, bidders desperately try to out bid one another to win the auction. The end of your auction is also when it gets the most traffic because the less time your auction has left the higher it places in the search results of someone that is looking for items similar to yours.

So what is the best time to list? A better question would be: when is the best time for an auction to close? The best time for an auction to close is in the evenings and on weekends. Why? Because that is when most people are home! You want to make sure that when your auction is closing, everyone that is bidding on it or is interested in bidding on it is free to do so.

What would happen if your auction closes at 9 am on a Monday morning? Everyone would be either sleeping or going to work and no one would have the time or energy to place any bids.

You need to make your auction end at the bidder’s convenience, in other words when the bidder is home and surfing the internet, in the evening or weekend.

How important is it to end your auctions when everyone is home and on their computer? Studies have shown that a listing that ends at peak hours can attract up to 25% more bids that one that has a poorly timed ending.

This is something you should definitely look into because simply listing your auctions at certain times is probably the easiest and most effortless ways to attract more bids and make hire profits.

So if you want to increase your profits; you should have your auctions end at anywhere from 8 pm – 11 pm in the evening, or end on weekends (in the afternoons). In other words, your auctions should end when everyone is home and has a chance to place a bid.

2. 100% money back guarantee: you need to make your potential costumers feel comfortable, completely safe and take away any fears or doubts they may have about buying from you. A very effective way to accomplish that is to give a 100% money back guarantee. This is no “secret”. Nearly every retail store, internet store, manufacturer and power seller does this. And yet a lot of eBay sellers try to avoid it.

Some sellers are scared of buyers taking advantage of their money back guarantees, so they either create a huge list of rules and regulations that simply scare people away or have a “no refunds” policy. A guarantee’s purpose is to take away any fear or doubt people may have about buying from you, some seller’s guarantees do the exact opposite; there are just too many scary rules and stipulations. That’s why you need a %100 money back guarantee with no strings attached!

The only “string” you need in your 100% money back guarantee is a time limit. The best time limit to give is a 90 days. Don’t worry, most items are returned within the first couple of weeks, so if they haven’t returned it in the first 30 day their most likely keeping it. So why give 90 days instead of 30? Because it sounds better, Would you rather have 30 day guarantee or a 90 day one? 90 days it is.

A 90 day 100% money back guarantee can do wonders for your business, it will take away doubts, fears and uncomfortable feelings of skeptical visitors and make them choose you over other sellers that have less promising guarantees.

If you are scared to offer a guarantee, don’t be. You will gain more money that you loose. Sure there might be some people who take advantage of your kindness, use the product for 90 days and return it. But that is inevitable, the only way to completely avoid those nasty people is to never do anything. Stop being so scared, you will gain much more than you loose.

3. Professionally designed listing graphics: professionally designed listing graphics have been proven to increase the number of bids an auctions receives by up to 25%. And that is why getting hiring a graphics designer to design your auction graphics is worth every penny.

How can graphics increase the number of bids your auctions get by up to 25%? Well, let’s see:

First of all a unique design will give you an identity and make you stand out from a crowed.

Graphics can give your auction listings a professional appearance, and most people want to deal with professionals not amateurs.

A unique design will keep people thinking of you. Every time a costumer comes across one of your listings they will recognize you. Big companies pay hundreds of millions of dollars to gain recognition, why? Because most people tent to trust companies they recognize over companies they have never heard of before.

Those are some of the main reason why professionally designed listing graphics can dramatically increase the number of bids your auctions receive. There are many more reasons why you should get your own auction listing design, but the most important thing you should know is 25% more bids translates into a lot of extra money.

4. Detailed item description and high quality photos: remember that when a person buys something from eBay, they don’t actually get to see, inspect and try out the item they are buying. This is why good photographs are a huge part of attracting bidders. The better your photos are the more likely it is that people will bid on your items.

That is why you should have multiple photos of the item you have up for auction. You need to show every part of the product in your photos. So the visitor can see what the product he/she is about bid on looks like. Remember, if the visitor was in a store they would get to see the product from all angles.

Remember the saying; a picture is forth a thousand words. On eBay its worth two thousand! You need good, clear photos in order to maximize the efficiency of your listings. And to take good, clear photos you will need a good camera. If you want to sell small products like watches, jewelry, MP3 players, palm pilots and other compact products you will need to take very close up pictures, for that you need a camera that is cable of small detailed photos.

The pictures in your listings need to compliment the product you’re selling and make it look beautiful. For that you need to take the photos in good lighting and at an angle that shows off your product’s good looks. If your camera is of cheap quality, the pictures might turn out blurry. Combine blurry pictures taken at bad angles with bad lighting and your product can turn out looking worth half of your asking price.

Having clear, detailed pictures that compliment the product you are selling will create more value. Pictures that make the product look great will also grow the desire your visitor has to buy the product. Desire is big, and pictures that show the product in all its glory will definitely create more desire.

What you also need to do when you are putting something up for auction on eBay or trying to sell something on Amazon (or anywhere on the internet for that matter). Describe the product you are selling in as much detail as possible. I mean mention everything about the product. Mention the color, weight, size, texture, features, accessories, condition, warranty, box size etc.

You need to not only mention everything, but explain what it all means as well; don’t just say “this camera comes with X2r-c finder scope” say “this camera comes with X2r-c finder scope which allows you to take pictures at night and improves the quality of photos you are taking by 50%”. You need to make your description simple to understand because if you don’t; you might confuse your potential costumer, and most people hate being confused.

Confusion can lead to frustration, and if your potential costumers get frustrated; all they have to do is click the back button on their web browser, and boom; you’ve just lost a bid.

So remember; your costumer doesn’t have the chance to actually see, feel and inspect the product they are buying from you, and that can fill their head with doubt (BAD!). So make sure you have a clear, detailed and easy to understand description.

5. Offer shipping discounts: The number one reason why most people refuse to buy products over the internet is because they believe the shipping charges add too much to the overall cost of the product. If this is the number one reason why people won’t buy from you; offer shipping discounts.

Most power sellers offer combined shipping discount. This means that if you buy more than one item from the seller; they will ship the items together instead of separately, and that can save the costumer a lot of money.

To almost everyone that buys products off of the internet; shipping charges are a pain in the butt. That is exactly why you should offer to ease their pain in the form of shipping discounts and NEVER over charge on shipping and handling. Some people get the clever idea to over charge on shipping to make a profit. This is an extremely bad idea, and it can severely decrease the number of bids your auctions receive and the price they close at.

Remember; shipping charges are a pain in the butt, offer to take the pain away and you will be rewarded with extra bids, and bids translate into dollars.

High quality photos, professional graphics, 100% money back guaranties and shipping discounts will work not only on eBay, but on yahoo, Amazon, your own website etc. Just because I chose to use eBay as a basis for explanation doesn’t mean that the advice in this list can’t be applied to anything else.

I think you will agree that most of the methods to improve your sales featured in this list require very little effort. Be that as it may; professional graphics and strategically timed auction listings alone can increase the number of bids your auctions receive by up to 25% each (combined total of 50%).

top

It has been rported that 724,000 Americans have said that eBay is their primary or
secondary source of income. The research carried out by ACNielsen International
Research was based on a survey of 2,000 people on behalf of eBay.
In addition to these professional eBay sellers, another 1.5 million
individuals say they supplement their income by selling on eBay,
according to the July 2005 survey.

Compared to a similar survey carried out in 2003 this shows a 68% increase on the figure of 430,000 who were then claiming to make some or all of their income through eBay.

Pugster Inc., which operates on eBay using the ID Pugster888, is preparing to receive its 1 millionth feedback sometime next month. Pugster has been selling fashion jewelry on eBay and other marketplaces since 2002. Cecelia Song, General
Manager of Pugster, says she expects Pugster to reach 1 million positive feedback points next month.

(We picked up this story for the www.auctionbytes.com web site. If you want to subscribe to their excellent newsletter visit www.auctionbytes.com)


top

Phishers Hack eBay

 

 

 

Possibly one of the best ways to make money on eBay is to sell downloadable information products. Of course the problem for many people is that they do not know how to actually do this. One company has come up with a solution. They offer a servcie in which they upload everything and carry out all the work for you. What is even more amazing you can try this service at no cost to yourself. Here is the link if you wish to learn more Payloadz now.