8

 
 

SELLING ON eBay


MERCHANDISING IS VERY IMPORTANT
Whatever you're selling on eBay, presentation matters.
If your stuff doesn't look good, make sure your model has killer lips.

 

Dear Readers:

This is a mostly-spoof and not-quite-finished article on selling on eBay. I'm a buyer more than a seller. I did try selling on two traumatic and painful occasions. The following presents what I learned. It should serve as a warning and inspiration to other sellers, and also to buyers. Buyers will never again think nasty thoughts about sellers (unless they're justified). Because once you've done it–– mastered listing something on eBay, much less successfully selling it––you're in a whole new reality. It's hard: Talk about a personal growth opportunity.

An excerpt of the coming (I ain't saying when) complete article on selling follows. Just a taste. I'm actually considering many options for this series, since I've been told it's "The funniest stuff I've ever read". (I consider my recipes page, RECIPES, the funniest stuff I've ever read.) Maybe an ebook, maybe a book book. Maybe just this. We'll see. ( Or maybe a movie....)

Enjoy.

On to selling on eBay!

 

PRINCIPLES OF APPLIED ECONOMICS: SELL YOUR OWN STUFF FIRST
If you like these articles, you'll love my books. Click and be transported.
Stepping Off the Edge has two chapters on getting into and out of eBay addiction.
Numenon is a thriller about the richest man in the world meeting a great Native American shaman.
"It's Dances with Wolves meets Wallstreet, with a little Stephen King thown in."

AUTHOR SANDY NATHAN IS THE WINNER OF 8 NATIONAL AWARDS!

SANDY NATHAN
Click to go to sandynathan.com


BECOMING A SELLER

Sooner or later -- and I suspect sooner in most cases-- every eBay buyer realizes, "Hey! I can sell my stuff there!" In my case, the realization came much sooner. I had to raise some cash before the Visa bill came and my husband found out about the Kingman turquoise squash blossom necklace. I also didn't want him to know about the plain silver squash that I lucked onto. Or the deal I cut with the folks with the Fantastic Multi-Gem SS Bracelet (signed by artist) to post the charge next month. Was I motivated!!

But we're all in the same fix, right? We buy a little of this and that, then remember the closets and drawers, garages and barns full of stuff that we can transform into moolah! Our beloved and still functional detritus can turn into cash money via the Net-- with which we can buy more, new stuff. (Cargo, they call it in primitive New Guinea. We all need cargo. Crave cargo.) Sellers are born every minute. Many types of eBay sellers exist, ranging from a new breed of retailer who sells exclusively via eBay, to on-line retailers who sell some things via auction, to regular retailers with store fronts who can get a better price for out of season goods on eBay than their usual dumping grounds. (I am being facetious. Much merchandise sold on eBay is brand, spanking new, in the factory box.) eBay is the place where buyers can get deals and sellers can get a higher price than anywhere else.

It's the new, international garage sale.


YOU CAN SELL PRETTY NEAR ANYTHING ON eBay, AS LONG AS IT'S TANGIBLE AND NOT ALIVE. (OR ILLEGAL)
You can sell the anklets (I did), but not the feet.

This isn't a complete run-down on how to sell on eBay. Many books have been written on that. For the full skinny, I refer you to the following resources. You can order the books right here. Click on the title and our Bookstore will take you to them on the Amazon.com site. Use your Back button to return. (All websites that have links with Amazon get a rebate on sales made through them. We donate 100% of our rebates to a very worthy charity. When you buy through our Bookstore, you get low Amazon prices and benefit your fellow human beings. You might want to bookmark our Bookstore and use it as your normal access to Amazon-- many people are.)

MY RECOMMENDATIONS:

  • eBay THE SMART WAY: Selling, Buying, and Paroling on the Web's #1 Auction Site, Joseph T. Sinclair. "The completely unauthorized guide to eBay auctions". I inhaled this guide when I got it. I like it because of its management orientation (published by the American Management Association), its clear guide to beating sniping, it's great common sense. Shows you how to do everything yourself, AND includes HTML templates to put good looking auctions up by yourself! Some info is dated: eBay currently forbids advertising objects not related to your auction on your ad page, for instance. EVERYTHING ON THE WEB CHANGES FAST. ALWAYS CHECK WITH eBay OR ANY AUCTION SITE FOR LATEST REGULATIONS BEFORE POSTING AN AD!
  • eBay FOR DUMMIES, Roland Woerner, Stephanie Becker, Marsha Colier. Published with the authorization and assistance of eBay. I like this guide very much. It covers almost everything-- doesn't talk about sniping, for instance-- but it gives you everything you need to buy or sell successfully. Covers pre and post sale stuff-- how to pack your sold items. A run-down on the auction assistant services and programs. Everything. Clearly and simply. Not for dummies. For neophytes.
  • THE eBay WEBSITE: eBay provides a great, complete, absolutely up to the minute guide to itself on its own pages. Log on and start reading. The Help Pages, Buying and Selling. All the Guides. Even the Bid Sections of each auction provide wonderful information. And the site evolves every day-- see below. Some Amazon reviewers of the books above said, "Why do you need these books? The site does it all." It does, and it doesn't. When I have a question, I like a hard copy I can hold in my hand without waiting for it to load. I want something I can take away from my computer and read. eBay's Help and Service people are hard to beat.


Link to amazon home page for additional shopping.

***

OKAY. The above books and eBay itself will give you all the "how-to" info you need to sell successfully. IÕm not going to repeat what they do so well. I'm going to talk about how it feels to enter the auction world as a seller. This is my personal experience in the seller role, this time. eBay is my favorite auction venue. It's also the biggest and provides the most active market. I looked around at a few others and figured I had enough on my hands with eBay. And I'd gotten used to its format, its auction pages, Help section, the whole nine yards. eBay felt like home.


BUY THIS NECKLACE AND SCARE YOUR MOTHER!
Selling on eBay requires innovative sales techniques. When this handmade (by me) Gothic necklace didn't sell with ordinary methods,
I used an unusual headline aimed at a deeper level of my (assumed) teenage buyer's psyche.
That's what they really want to do, right? Scare mom. Get back at her for whatever she might possibly have done.
It still didn't sell.
But I'll sell it to you. $35 for the set. This is a killer look and it took forever to make. Email me!

 

SELLING ON eBay

I was motivated to sell by more than a need to raise money fast. Sometime during those dim, flickering hours when I waited for every piece of silver jewelry on eBay to load, lights flashed in my head, "I can sell my jewelry here." Not just my own pieces that I didn't wear any more, but the cases in the closet. The drawers full of beads and stones. Because I once had a jewelry business! Way back in the '70's, I made my mom a pair of earrings. The experience was seminal: I could make pretty jewelry! I liked combining beads and stone and wire and stuff. Not only that, I could get wholesale credentials and do it cheaper. A new business was born-- Valdine. (That's my middle name.)

Valdine quickly failed, shot down by the realities of competing with Laurel Burch-- who had just been discovered selling her stuff on the street in front of I. Magnin's in San Francisco. No. Not true. About Laurel Burch, yes, but my business, no. Valdine was done in by marketing problems. You don't just haul a couple cases of great designs into a jewelry store with a bright smile and expect the owner to buy it. Jewelers buy at Market, twice a year. Also, you have to have a rep. A space in the Jewelry Mart or the equivalent. A marketing network. A name.

Other aspects of selling jewelry were hard. Store owners did not care that I was really smart and sensitive and over educated for what I was doing. They made comments about my stuff right in front of me like I was a piece of wood. One prominent jeweler made racist comments about my earrings, which were made of Chinese pieces. The process was painful. I found I could maybe sell a piece or two (at a wholesale price) at a jewelry store or fancy shop, or I could "leave it on consignment." That means, "The seller takes 40% if they sell it. If not, you come and get it, assuming you wrote down what went to what store and they remember to call."

Which left craft fairs as a marketing device. We'll talk about those later. Valdine failed. I had lots to sell on eBay.


ART PHOTOGRAPHY FOR YOUR ADS ISN'T REQUIRED
However, these did sell.
I want them back.

I CAN SELL MY STUFF ON eBay! WHAT A GREAT IDEA!

At last, a marketing venue that was safe (I held the goods until they were paid for), broad (worldwide), and very, very active (millions of sales every day!). Valdine could rise again, and maybe succeed! I began to dream, once more, of competing with Laurel Burch. (Who by now is a design institution, in addition to a retail magnate.) I figured I could do a good job selling. I know something about marketing. I had all those years of studying economics, the time at the Stanford Biz School, working for the professor teaching the Negotiation Course, and, of course, the time spent with the management consultant setting up our furniture store right. I knew a good ad from a bad one, and lots about graphic design.

To sell, you have to persuade buyers to buy your stuff rather than other sellers'. You have to meet their needs. Provide service. I knew that. I also knew that eBay has millions and millions of items for sale all the time. If I was going to be successful, I'd have to compete with millions of other sellers for my buyers' dollars. I needed a sales plan. A marketing strategy.

More than that, I'd have to figure out how to use the listing page at eBay. Arggh!! Have you looked at that sucker? It requires use of HTML. Knowledge of "URL's".

But I was motivated. The Visa bill was coming.

 

OKAY, THAT'S IT. TOLD YOU IT WAS A TEASER. IF YOU LIKED THAT, YOU MAY LIKE THIS:

 

 

AUTHOR SANDY NATHAN IS THE WINNER OF 8 NATIONAL AWARDS!

SANDY NATHAN
Click to go to sandynathan.com

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