by Dave Bromley

The very best place to source products is trade shows. Now as the name implies these are not usually open to the general public but this is not a problem because you are not the general public.

Because you sell or want to sell products on eBay you are in business. In other words you are “trade”. All you need to do is provide elementary proof and normally you can gain free access to most trade shows.

The purpose of these shows is for manufacturers, distributors, importers and wholesalers to let retailers see what products are available for resale. For most retailers there are 3 ways that they can buy products for resale, by having a sales rep visit them at their retail premises, go to warehouses to view or buy stock and/or go to trade shows.

Trade shows have a big advantage because you get many companies under one roof and it is a lot easier to go to one trade show rather than visit twenty or thirty different warehouses.

There are Trade shows throughout Britain although the biggest and in my mind the best is held each February at the National Exhibition Centre (NEC). It is called the International Spring Fair and to register for a no cost ticket and get more details visit www.springfair.co.uk. The event runs from 5th to 9th February 2006.

So lets start with the question of how you demonstrate that you are “bona fida” trade. There are really only 2 things that you need and they are a letterhead and a business card. Of course before you get either of these you are going to have to decide upon a business name. You may at sometime in the future decide to have a proper business name but for this exercise it is not necessary. You can just use your name and a description of what you do. For instance:

John Brown Marketing

Sally Smith Associates.

or something similar. You can easily create some letterheads using the word processing or desktop publishing package on your computer.

You may be surprised to learn that business cards are very important and serve several uses. As we have said they help to establish you are bona-fida and you will find that you will normally be asked for your card when making enquiries of exhibitors. There are two reasons why exhibitors are keen to get a business card from visitors. One is so that they can take the details from your card to add it to their mailing list. The other is because exhibitors know that there are only 2 types of visitors to a trade show, those that have the power and authority to place orders and those that do not. Having spent often many thousands of pounds for an exhibition stand they do not want to waste their sales staff time with “tyre kickers”. As the owner of your business you very obviously have the authority to place orders.

Another reason for taking a good stock of business cards with you to a trade show is that many displaying companies have a free draw competition. All you have to do is drop your business card into the box and you could win some nice prizes. Of course you will also be added to the mailing list of that company for a while but that can be a small price to pay if you win a good prize.

There are plenty of programmes around that allow you to print out business cards on your computer but my advice is not to use these. Because most inkjet and laser printers cannot cope with thick card used by professional printers the home made versions tend to be flimsy unimpressive cards that are easily recognisable for what they are.

To get 250 coloured business cards printed by your local printer will cost between £25 and £30 but I have a better solution. Vistaprint are offering to print you 250 professionally produced business cards for FREE. All you have to do is pay the postage of around £5. As obviously each order is printed especially you need to get your order in as early as possible as they can take up to 3 weeks to arrive.

To select your design and wording CLICK HERE

Armed with a supply of your business cards you are almost ready to go to your first trade fair. However, there is one other very important item you should have and that is a notebook. You will see an awful lot of product in the few hours that you are at the fair and although you will undoubtedly come away armed with brochures and catalogues it is a good idea to jot down any noteworthy points. For instance you may want to note down details of minimum orders or shipping costs.

This Article is taken from How to Buy Products at Trade Shows
to Sell On eBay. The complete e-book has been placed on www.ukauctionline.co.uk/tradeshow and can be read and printed off from there

By Tim Gilberg

eBay Search tips and secrets

This is an example of how I used the Ebay search tab to triple my sales and profit in 1 month!

I had found a great supplier of computer liquidation products using my Ebay Power seller Cloning techniques. I was excited to be selling over $1000 a day in these products (laptop parts and accessories). I noticed I had a lot of repeat buyers, which is a great thing. I would test the products and I shipped them fast, and emailed tracking promptly. These are the keys to building great feedback.

I was searching ebay for new products and ideas one night when a light went off in my head! I decided to check the sales history of the eBay buyers of my products, I assumed they were using them in their computer repair shop. “Important lesson on Ebay I have learned over and over!” Do not assume anything such as if a product will sell, what price it will sell for, what the ebay buyer may do with the product. Keep an open mind and you will not limit you profit opportunities.

I went to the Ebay search tab and I typed in one of the ebay user’s ID that purchased products from me. The user id is available in any ebay listing. Then I clicked on the ebay search option and chose by bidder and entered their ebay user id, when I searched last 2 weeks of eBay purchases, I noticed the bidder was sourcing a lot of laptop components from many different ebay sellers. I thought to myself they are buying a lot more parts than a standard computer repair facility would use, so I then decided to check and see what this Ebay user was selling. I found a very profitable business option at this point.

The ebay buyer of my laptop parts was selling complete laptop systems. It took me 2 seconds to figure out what they were doing, they were sourcing the individual parts from Ebay sellers such as myself, then combining the components together and selling a complete laptop on Ebay. So then I checked the ebay seller’s completed auctions and noticed he was selling the completed laptop systems like hotcakes for $650-900 depending on the specs, I used the search technique to add up his parts cost it was around $300, Wow! He was making over $350 per laptop Guess what, I shifted gears that night and started putting the laptops together myself I tripled my profit and sales volume in 1 month. As you see search search search! Use this same principle to research history or sales activity on any product or service

Ebay gives you access to the sales secrets of any successful seller

Key point

Create an Ebay account just for selling products

Create an Ebay account just for buying products

You can have multiple sales ID’s or accounts on Ebay I highly recommend this, you can see from my search examples you don’t want to give potential competitors a view into your buying sources on Ebay, I have used this technique to find successful Ebay sellers sources on Ebay and on the internet. The sales history is there use it.

Sales history of any product on ebay is available to you with a few simple clicks from your mouse. Go to the Ebay search tab then choose competed auctions, you can also use this technique to search sellers completed auctions.

The beauty of Ebay is the completed sales information on any product. When the item sold, how much did it sell for, how many were sold, this information is priceless and in normal business situations this would be a guarded secret In the past if you were entering a market you would buy market research from a business consultant for thousands of dollars to find only a tiny sliver of what is available at you fingertips through ebay searches.

Tim Gilberg is able to provide information and insight from a unique perspective - that of someone who is actually doing what others just talk about. Ebay Power Seller Platinum Status was Attained by Tim Gilberg, which is one of the highest sales levels attained selling on eBay. Tim is active on Ebay and liquidation.com as well as consulting and working with other Top ebay Power Seller's to give you real life in use insight, not theories.Visit Tim Gilberg at his website Make Money on eBay

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com

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By Carolyn Schweitzer

The Problem...

It's happened to the best of us.

You've been watching the auction all week, and finally you're about to claim your prize--a rare bronze statue from the Qing Dynasty.
Or something just as tantalizing.

You log on a few minutes before the auction closes, and confirm that you're still the top bidder -- no one has challenged you in several days. You're already picturing "your" statue prominently displayed on the living room mantelpiece, your friends green with envy as you tell them about the great deal you got on eBay. You refresh the page a few times, to make sure you're still number 1. You even up your bid a little just to make sure no body tries to outbid you at the last minute.

50 seconds to go...30...10...the auction has ended and the statue is yours!! You refresh the page for the last time so you can see your eBay ID announced as the winning bidder. And that's when your heart drops to your toes. It's not your eBay ID at all, but some joker who calls themselves "SpeedyFingers123".

How could this have happened?

You were the winning bidder with only 10 seconds to go!! Speedy or not, it just doesn't seem humanly possible.

Well, you're right. No one is that fast. SpeedyFingers123 (I made that one up, so if it's your actual eBay ID, please don't sue me!) won the auction in the final 4 seconds. It isn't humanly possible because "speedy" didn't actually place the bid. The bid was place on his or her behalf, from a remote server, using something called Bidding Software.

You've Been Sniped!

The act of placing a bid during the final seconds of an online auction is called "Sniping" and it's perfectly legal on eBay. Bidding wars and sniping are an eBay sellers dream and a buyer's nightmare. Why, you're asking yourself, don't these people just use eBay's trusty proxy bidding process? Why not just discreetly enter the maximum they're willing to pay at the beginning of the auction, then let the cards fall where they may? Well, for a couple of reasons. First, it's not human nature. If all you have to do is outbid the next guy by fifty cents or even five dollars to win, wouldn't you?

Second, it doesn't make economic or strategic sense to place a bid anytime before the last five minutes of an auction.

Think about it. eBay encourages bidders to use the proxy system and place bids early. What this means is that an inexperienced bidder who wants an item will want to be the highest bidder right away, and will keep upping their bid to hold that winning position. They'll only stop when the bidding exceeds their budget. Then the next guy comes along and continues the process. If this starts at the beginning of a seven or ten day auction, and ends with a bidding war in the last 10 minutes, the final price for the item can spiral out of control. Many items sell for far more than fair market value because people get caught up in "bidding fever" -- all they want is to WIN, they're not even thinking about whether the price is realistic.

What to Do?

A better strategy would be for everyone to "watch" the auction until the very end. Again, there's two good reasons. One, the price doesn't spiral up as just illustrated. Two, the auction has zero bids, so it attracts fewer bidders-- less competition. It's a fact that once an auction has at least 1 bid, it becomes a magnet for additional bidders. Shoppers scanning an auction page tend to jump to the ones with bids, figuring there must be something that attracted other bidders. The more bids, the more interesting the item looks.

Wouldn't it be great if a seller started a two carat diamond ring at $0.99 and no one bid until the last five minutes, and they all bid in fifty cent increments? Someone might win the ring for just a few bucks!! Of course, that never happens, but it would be the ideal situation for a buyer-- and it would put eBay out of business in a hurry. eBay encourages early bidding and smiles upon the snipers of the world. eBay makes their profits on listing fees and "final value" fees. The more the item sells for the higher the "final value". This makes eBay very happy. That's why you'll never find any tutorials anywhere on eBay telling you to wait until the end of an auction to bid.

The Solution...

OK, so now that we understand the benefits of sniping, lets get back to our friend "SpeedyFingers123". Speedy probably started out in life just like I did. She learned everything she knew about eBay from eBay and never realized there was such a thing as bidding software. Never knew a computer could do your sniping automatically, bid on your behalf in the last 2 to 8 seconds of an auction, and do it while you're asleep. With sniping software, you tell the software program which auctions you're interested in and how much you're willing to pay. eBay never knows you've seen the auction until your friendly sniping service swoops in and places your bid with only seconds to spare. Neither does your competition. They never see you coming. The only way you can lose is if someone else uses the same program sets their maximum bid higher than yours.

(Yes, my friend, you can still lose. There's no guarantee of winning an auction no matter what system you use, if someone else is willing to pay more. If you set your maximum bid at a million dollars for a hunk of Elvis' belly button lint and some nut is willing to pay a million ten, you're still going to lose!)

"Bidding Fever" Cured

Let's face it, there IS a positive side to losing an auction. It's the satisfaction of knowing that you didn't lose your head and spend more than you could afford!! Trust me, I've been there, done that, and come to regret it. With sniping programs, you can "set it and forget it" and walk away knowing that if you don't win, you couldn't have afforded it anyway.

What's that I hear you saying? "But I could have had it if I'd just upped my bid by another fifty cents!" Hey, did you listen to anything I just said? Do you want to drive yourself nuts? It's only stuff, after all. You can't take it with you, and there will always be more. The beauty of eBay is that there will probably be another just like it, or at least something just as fabulous.

You're in Control

There's another big advantage to using bidding software. Two things, actually.
First, sniping programs allow you to do something called "contingency bidding". Suppose you're interested in several very similar items and you want to win at least one of them but not all. Provided they're not all ending at the same time, you can create a contingency plan telling the bidding software to cancel your bids on the other items as soon as you win one of them.

Second, you can change your mind about an item you're bidding on at any time (except in approximately the last 15 minutes).
On eBay, it's a huge "no-no" to retract a bid. You can only do this under the most dire of circumstances. Do it too many times you'll be politely asked to leave. Permanently. But, because eBay doesn't register your bid until the Sniping program enters it for you, (at the very end of the auction) you can cancel your "snipe" with no penalty. You're canceling what you've programmed into the sniping software, not an actual bid on eBay.
Isn't that nice? No more "watching" an auction you're unsure about, and then forgetting to bid on it. No more babysitting your computer so you can be there for the final moments of the auction. No more finding out you've read the description wrong and you're bidding on an item you don't want. Or finding something you like better after you've already committed yourself to another item, and having to pass on it. (Or worse, spending way too much on both!) And, finally, you have the satisfaction of knowing that winning doesn't depend on the speed of your fingers or your internet connection.

Believe me, the first time you snatch an item away from SpeedyFingers123-- or anyone else for that matter-- you'll be hooked.

© 2005 NetBrainer LLC. An eBay Power Seller and rabid eBay shopper, Carolyn Schweitzer is the owner and editor of "NetBrainer", a site dedicated to improving the performance of buyers and sellers on eBay. (You can learn more about sniping programs at NetBrainer.com ). Carolyn also provides weekly recorded tips on eBay for "Third Mind USA Small-Biz radio".

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/

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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)


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I have never thought of selling on eBay being a sex thing but I do know about niche marketing. However Cheryl (user i.d wizardorea) has launched a new site aimed strictly at female users of eBay.co.uk.

You can visit the site at www.wizzardoreas-world.co.uk/womensbay/ I think the concept is interesting but I really do not find myself qualified to review the site as I am obviously not a member of the niches target market.

However it is a chatty site with some interesting members stories. I can see it being popular with stay at home mums who buy and sell on eBay on a strictly part time basis. This month issue includes one or two unexpected features such as a section on how to make play dough and a recipe for Ricatoni with Ricotta and Bacon.

With a subscription of just £3 for 6 issues this is a low cost membership site and I wish it well.

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eBay's Press Release about the Skype Purchase

Rush for QXL lifts shares 850p to four-year record

Newspaper group to challenge eBay

This months special offer

It is only a couple of days since England won the Ashes at the Oval. Personally I have found it amazing how cricket has suddenly "become the new football". Children can be seen knocking a ball with a bat instead of kicking footballs around and interest in cricket has never been so high.

If you have any cricket related items, books, videos and the like now could be the time to list them on eBay. I am sure any autographs from members of the victories team will be going at a real premium.

I recently saw a listing on eBay for a screen saver and judging by the sellers feedback this was quite a poular product. Coincidently I recently saw a link to a video about creating your own screen savers. It is surprisingly simple and once you have =crteated a screen saver you can sell it over and over again.

If you would like to see the same video that I did then:

Click for Highspeed/Broadband Connections

Click for Lowspeed/Dialup Connections

Finally I want to tell you about a site I jhave found that is giving away a massive amount of information products for fr<<ee. From what I can see when you click the button to take up the offer you are taken to a thank you page that does have some paid offers. But you can ignore them and scroll down to the bottom of the page and click the download button and get all the give aways. Believe me it is worth it because I notice some really good products in this no cost package. But do not delay I believe that the spobnsor of this offer only intends to keep it onlinefor a couple of day.

For the downloads go to http://tinyurl.com/7o322

Thats about it for this month.