3BrNBBRz4UYdo+!~~60_7.JPG "chameleon54"){kind=avatar}
@kitschkovenwrote:
You seem to have the Midas touch!
I used to sell a lot of second hand books when I first joined in about '04... it seemed to be a lot better back then.
I realise that many sellers are struggling to make sales on ebay at the moment and the platform appears to be a bit stagnent. There is a lot of things that go into achieving good sales on the site. Some of the things that have worked for me are
* selling things that are slightly different to most other sellers.
* Most of the things I sell are used, but they are not generic things that are commonly found in op shops or garage sales. While I do still check these stock sources out ( mainly for a bit of fun ) and do regularly find items that can be resold for 5 times what I pay, these suppliers generally get picked over very quickly and the items available are still usually fairly generic, meaning you are competing as a seller with hundreds of other people selling similar things.
I have a couple of other people that search these sorts of stock sources and then onsell their purchasers to me. I pay them reasonably well and it keeps them coming back.
* A lot of my items are collectable and I try to go to the source. Either buying peoples complete collections in bulk for lots of money ( often thousands of dollars ) or buying from businesses through auction or private sale. I buy pallet loads of old stock that was once popular, but has sat in dusty cupboards in the back shed for several decades. In the last couple of weeks I have purchased 3 tandem trailer loads of goods from specialist auctions ( and I said I wasnt buying any more stock.....
), most of which will be sold through our new store which is going extremly well.
* I do sell some new items. These are products I have developed myself to fill a needed niche in the market that is not being supplied. I have the products made up for me by a local business which has the specialist equipment needed. These have proven to be good sellers with several selling over 100 units and often appear in the first few images in a general google images search. No doubt this high ranking by google helps my ebay sales along.
* Research.....A lot of the things I sell are highly specialised. While I know the ball park value of most things I sell, the items require A LOT of research to acertain exactly what they are and what they are worth. Without this knowledge all I have is a lump of scrap metal.
I often buy items basically for scrap metal price from others who dont know what the item is, do the research to place the item and turn it into hundreds of dollars. Example - A NOS mechanical piston set still in original box for a vintage car. Without knowing what it fits, its worth a couple of dollars. Find the make & model of the car it fits and it is worth $300 to some-one who is rebuilding their vintage car engine.
* Adapting and changing to meet changing markets. - My main stores sell an item that is being replaced by technology. The Chinese are making counterfiet repros of original items I sell and technology changes are slowly making it obsolete. This has been a gradual process over several years resulting in a slow decline in sales. The easy thing would be to say its all ebays fault. The buyers are not there any more etc. etc. We see similar posts all of the time. The reality is the stock line is just not as popular as it once was.
I have recognised the problems with the current items I sell and after a lot of investigation into product lines, recently opened a new store selling a different type of stock. This has gone extremly well with a lot of action and vibrancy. I get a number of questions every day and sales are increasing rapidly as I build stock levels and develop repeat buyers and followers. I could easily go back to full time ebay selling in this field and make good wages per hour. It has been a bit of a revelation after all of the gloom and doom, as sales through this store are some of the best & most active I have experienced on ebay.
* Selling things that are different to most other sellers
* Hard work...... I know it sounds like a cliche and everyone thinks they work hard, but I treat ebay like a job. I start work at 8.30 am. have lunch and knock off around 5.00 catching the post office just before it closes. Mondays I am often literally running all day trying to get everything packed and sent. ( public holiday in SA today, but not looking forward to tommorows packing ). When I list stuff, I sort into piles of similar items and work consistently for a full or half day of constant listing. I set minimum $$$ targets that I need to list and continue until the target is reached. For regular bread & butter items my target is a minimum of $1000 worth of listings per day. Better quality stock and this rises to $1500.
* KISS.... one of the most important rules.....KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID..... I try to keep eveything as simple and efficient as possible and have a number of systems in place to achieve this. Things like a designated packing area with standardised packing materials at hand. Also a large cutting board, sharp stanley knife ( with spare blades at the ready ) and 50 metre rolls of bubble wrap.
A seperate credit card and bank account, just for use with my postage. It keeps record keeping simple.
Good storage systems. With around 1800-2000 listings I need to be able to find sold items quickly.
Purchasing stock in bulk..... You can waste A LOT of time in op shops & garage sales finding a few mediocre items. Much better to buy by the pallet or trailer load. Plus bulk purchases are usually much cheaper per item.
I use standardised listing templates. I sort items into piles of similar items and list them using a standard template, only changing the photos & a few words.
Simple, quick record keeping. It can take A LOT of time to run cash books etc. for every item. I simply record my few bulk stock purchases each year in a note book and take sales figures directly from ebay monthly totals. Despite what others say, I find them to be accurate. As mentioned a dedicated card and bank account takes care of postage record keeping.
* And did I mention selling things that are different to most other sellers......
All of this may not be for everyone, but it seems to be helping me.
I'm buying off ebay like crazy if you've got what I want 
@kitschkovenwrote:
Great tips, thank you for generously sharing them. I can definitely see a big difference between your strategy and mine! That was an eye opener. Those of you who take it seriously deserve all of the success! 🙂
Was there a bit of luck involved initially? Did you kind of stumble across your market, and developed it from there?
I have been going to auctions, antique fairs and car parts swap meets for 30 years. Buying & selling stuff, and just looking around, so I have gained a fair amount of knowlwedge from that. I was even buying for an antique shop and a retro clothes shop ( acrylic mini skirts, fur coats etc. ) on a casual basis for awhile, just putting together trailer loads of stock & they would buy the lot from us at fair prices.
Another interesting direction my trading and hobbies took was writing on a regular, paid basis for a specialist motoring magazine. This gave me an inside running on a lot of interesting events including free, priority entry to things like the past Adelaide Grand Prix races etc.
My ebay business just grew out of my personal hobbies and things I was interested in. It makes the job quite enjoyable when you are trading in things you already enjoy and I have had some absolute treasures pass through the stores over the years. If I had kept the best 1 % of stock I would have a magnificent collection, but the top 1% could be worth 10 - 15 % of my turnover and keeps my stores interesting..
The really rare stuff I just think of a silly number and double it. I,m happy to have it sit in the store awhile, a bit like a B & M store window dressing. The suprising thing is quite often it still gets snapped up as collectors know they wont get the chance ever again to buy some of these items. A lot of the really rare stuff goes Overseas, some even finding its way to museums and on at least one occasion to an international music legend. ( through his manager ).
It is these types of finds and customers that keep the job interesting. I even sold a machinery part to some-one at the North Pole once.
One of the main ways I find value is through constant research. The last auction I bid on a group of 3 items and was the runner up at $25.00 . I thought I would search up their value today through " advanced search / sold items ". Each one of the three items was probably worth around $275.00.......
...... Whoops, but at least I will know for next time. It is through this constant research and mistakes, that over time I have learnt the value of quite a range of stuff. .
That is so great. I know one has to spend money to make money... sadly I don't have the financial means at this point in my life, but if I did, I would surely be looking to you as a mentor.
(BTW decided to cancel my Store subscription 😞 )
