The excerpt below is from the new, third edition of eBay
the Smart Way -- AMACOM's best-selling guide to the world's biggest
marketplace. The excerpt is geared toward first-time sellers and
occasional sellers looking to grow a part-time income as an eBay merchant.
eBay has changed a lot in the two years since the second
edition of this book. It has grown to over 70 million registered users
offering 16 million items, making it harder to stand out. eBay isn't just
bigger -- it's better. Today, advances in auction management software make
it much easier to maintain customer service standards while handling
anywhere from three to 300 simultaneous auctions. The excerpt explains how
this new software works and how it can help sellers improve feedback
rankings -- the key to getting top dollar at eBay auctions.
More information about the book, eBay the Smart Way, and
author Joseph T. Sinclair follows the excerpt. Good luck with your
auctions!
Top 9 Tips for Successfully Auctioning
Items on eBay
by Joseph T. Sinclair
This top 9 list will help you focus on what's important for
success in auctioning your items on eBay. Always keep in mind that
excellent customer service has come to be expected online, and eBay is no
exception.
Research the Market Value.
This is the first and most important step in listing something for sale.
If you set your minimum bid or reserve too high, no one will bid. If you
set it too low, you will shortchange yourself. Use eBay's Advanced
Search page to find prices on similar items from auctions that have
recently concluded ("Completed Items").
Pile It On.
Put as much information about the item as you can gather in your auction
ad -- information, not hype. The Web is an informational medium, and
there is no practical space limitation. Lack of adequate information is
almost certain to bring lower winning bids and in many cases no bids at
all.
Always Include a Photograph.
Pictures sell. Good pictures sell even better. There are a very small
percentage of items that don't need a photograph. The rest do. Provide
multiple photographs for expensive items (e.g. at least five or six
sharp photographs for a vehicle.)
*Sellers Beware* I know of a woman in Sonoma County,
California, who has an interesting eBay strategy. She buys items on
eBay from auction listings that include poor photographs. She then
takes good photographs of the items, relists them on eBay, and sells
them for a profit. Great moneymaker.
State Your Requirements.
Clearly state your requirements for sales to inform bidders of what to
expect. Be sure to include everything that will cost winning bidders
money.
*Tell Them Before* If you intend not to sell to
bidders with undesirable feedback, state that in your sales
requirements. Then check the feedback on the leading bidders. If one
is undesirable, email him or her before the auction ends to state that
you will not accept the bid and ask him or her to retract it.
Carefully Word Your Auction Title.
Craft your auction title to include keywords that buyers are likely to
use when searching for your item. But make the title readable, not just
a string of abbreviations.
Answer Inquiries Immediately.
Always answer bidder email inquiries immediately. If you wait, you may
lose a bidder. A robust auction ad will help reduce excessive bidder
inquiries.
Follow Through.
Most winning bidders will expect you to take the initiative to complete
the transaction after the auction ends. Contact winning bidders by email
within a half-day (a half-hour is better) after the auction ends and
restate the details of your sales requirements. Keep a record of all
documents, including the auction ad and all emails, for reference.
Provide the buyer with a receipt. After the transaction is complete,
don't forget to submit feedback on the winning bidder.
*eBay Retailers* If you sell regularly on eBay, you
will need to develop a system for handling auctions that will keep you
well organized and responsive to buyers. It doesn't take more than two
or three auctions at the same time to completely confuse you if you
aren't organized to handle the action.
Use an Auction Management Service.
If you sell routinely, use an online auction management service to
manage your eBay business. The benefits far outweigh the cost.
Provide Good Customer Service.
You are the seller, and the winning bidders is your customer. The
customer is always right. Put customer service first. Keep a cheerful
attitude. It's your responsibility to set a cheerful tone for the
follow- through process. On eBay, customer service is the name of the
game.
THE OCCASIONAL SELLER
Put yourself in a buyer's shoes. You want to make a bid for
$620 on a used telephone system (retails for $1,849) for your small
office. The seller represents the system is in excellent condition and
wants a money order for the final bid price (no escrow).
You are faced with sending a money order for $620 to
someone you don't know. You don't know whether you will receive anything
for your money. If you do receive something, you don't know what kind of
condition it will be in. Will you make the bid? Try the following four
scenarios:
The seller has no history (i.e., no sales or purchases).
The seller has a history of 5 transactions, all rated
neutral.
The seller has a history of 7 transactions, all rated
positive.
The seller has a history of 153 transactions, 2 rated
negative and the remainder positive.
How are you going to vote with your $620? Chances are
you'll pass on number one, too much of an unknown. Number two looks as
though he or she will be trouble of some sort; that's a pass. Number three
looks like a reasonable risk. Number four looks like a low risk.
The first three sellers, above, will lose a certain
percentage of the potential market. Number one might get some bidders, but
because of the high price, many potential bidders will pass because the
risk of dealing with a first- time seller is high. Few potential bidders
will think it's worth the time and trouble to deal with number two, who
obviously isn't making anyone happy. Although number three looks good, the
feedback is a little thin, and some potential bidders will pass. Virtually
all potential bidders will feel comfortable with number four; they've
probably got more favorable information on number four than they do on
many retailers in their own communities.
The point here is that your reputation is important as a
seller, and your reputation depends on your customer service. It doesn't
matter whether you sell occasionally or sell regularly. Make your
customers happy, and you'll build a good reputation. A good reputation
will bring more bids. More bids will bring a higher price.
Now, as the seller, what can you do to improve customer
service for the auction of the used telephone system? Here are four
options:
Accept a credit card (or PayPal).
Offer to put the transaction in escrow.
Provide a warranty.
Throw in a gift certificate for a book at Amazon on how
to install and operate a small office telephone system.
About 90 percent of buyers on eBay use credit cards where
sellers accept them. Perhaps the best, but most common, customer service
you can provide is accepting credit cards. There are dozens more ways to
get merchant accounts for Web ecommerce in 2004 than there were a few
years ago. Get yourself a merchant account, and start accepting credit
cards.
What can you do generally as an occasional seller to
increase customer service? Respond to communications (e.g., email)
promptly. Be prepared to promptly ship the item you sell. Think of
yourself as a seller, and exercise common sense. Follow some of the
suggestions in eBay the Smart Way in regard to providing
convenience for potential bidders.
THE PART-TIME EBAY BUSINESS
If you have a part-time business on eBay auctioning
merchandise at retail, pay close attention to customer service. Some of
the things you can do:
Follow the guidelines in eBay the Smart Way for
running your auctions and conducting your eBay business.
Promptly respond to communications from potential bidders
and customers.
Organize a responsive follow-up system to track your
customers through the transaction process. Read about auction management
services below.
Run your shipping operation in a professional manner.
Accept payment in as many ways as possible.
Provide guarantees where practical.
Listen to your customers.
If you summarize the above list, it boils down to one idea:
Get organized! Don't take selling on eBay lightly. Even selling just a few
items a week can get out of control before you know it, if you're not
prepared. If things do get out of control, you will have some unhappy high
bidders and other unhappy eBay members; that does not bode well for
success on eBay.
You can't conduct a part-time eBay business haphazardly and
expect it to be as successful as possible. If you take it seriously and
provide good customer service, your business may grow into something to
which you can eventually devote your full time and energy; then you can
quit your job!
If you have a full-time job and you are trying to
supplement your income by selling on eBay, you may find it difficult to
provide the customer service you need to maximize your success. Hiring
employees to do some of the work is out of the question. Just the
paperwork to employ a person is too demanding. One way to improve your
customer service, when you don't have the time, is to hire independent
contractors.
Shipping is a good example of something you can outsource
(have done for you by another business). Some small business specialize in
shipping merchandise for customers. Shipping is a chore. Have a shipping
company do it for you. That will leave you time to spend on other customer
service activities that you can do better, more efficiently, more quickly,
or more easily. Obviously, the shipping company is an independent
contractor.
If you have a part-time retail business on eBay, you can't
wait until the weekend to do your shipping. You have to ship as soon as
payment is secured, or you will have some irritated customers. If you
can't do shipping every day, find someone to do it for you.
One clever way to do your fulfillment is drop shipping.
Drop shipping means having your wholesaler ship the merchandise directly
to your customer. Many wholesalers are set up to do this. Today, to be
competitive many wholesalers give quick shipping service. Hence, drop
shipment can solve your fulfillment problem at the same time that it
eliminates your inventory warehousing problem.
AUCTION MANAGEMENT SERVICES
Auction management services help eBay sellers track
multiple auctions without getting lost in a blizzard of e- mail, bids, and
expiration notices. They include an auction template so you can just
fill-in the blanks and never type a product description twice. They track
correspondence and bids for each auction. Some of them automatically
contact winning bidders and even provide a "checkout" to process financial
transactions. They generate and store all documentation, including
invoices and accounting reports that can be used for banking and taxes.
Wow! Auction management services do it all for you. It
doesn't get any better than this. These services take care of your
business. eBay takes care of your marketing. You can find someone to do
your fulfillment. And all you have to do is find some inventory that you
can sell at a profit.
The last two editions of this book took the point of view
that most of the software available for eBay auction management was
inadequate. In fact, the first two editions offered a database scheme for
keeping track of auctions that served multiple purposes. The auction
management services were just starting to appear at the time the second
edition was written and had not yet reached their potential.
What a difference today! Auction management services --
software services delivered via the Web -- are now quite robust, and
sellers who don't use them will spend much more in lost time than they
will save money by not subscribing to them. Even eBay has beefed up its
auction management software imitating the excellent services offered by
third- parties.
I have no reservations today about recommending that you
find an auction management service you like and use it. If you are an
occasional seller, you can still keep track with a system on paper. But
for routine daily or weekly selling, an auction management service will be
your best friend.
HOW IT WORKS
An auction management service provider delivers its auction
management services to you via the Web. That is, you use the software in
your browser. It's simple. You go to the auction management service
website and log in. Then you can use whatever services you have subscribed
to. You use the services through your Web browser. Sure, you have to learn
to use each service, but this is simplified by the fact that you always
work via the familiar interface of your Web browser.
As long as you remember your login name and password, you
can use these services any time from any computer connected to the
Internet.
Because you don't necessarily load these services on your
computer in the form of resident programs, you don't buy the software. You
subscribe to it (i.e., rent it) usually for a reasonable monthly fee.
WHAT ARE THE ADVANTAGES?
We're all used to buying software and using it as much as
we like for as long as we like one our computer without further cost.
Thus, we need to try and understand the advantages of using software as a
service.
You never have to update the software. That is done by
the provider as soon as the improvement is ready to use. You get the
upgrades sooner rather than later.
With some services you may not even have to store your
data. You can store it on the provider's computer. Presumably the
provider does daily backups relieving you of that task and worry.
You have unlimited use of the service for a flat monthly
fee.
The fee per month is low considering the value of the
software. When you buy the software, sooner or later it becomes obsolete
and you have to buy an upgrade. When you subscribe to a software
service, it's like paying for software in small installments rather than
all at once.
You never have to worry about installing the software on
your computer or upgrading it.
What it amounts to is carefree use of software at a price
that doesn't take a big investment up front.
WHAT ARE THE DISADVANTAGES?
Software services are not without disadvantages such as:
You need broadband to make the most effective and
efficient use of a software service. Most services don't work as well
with a dial-up Internet connection.
The monthly fee is an irritant, particularly when it is
more than nominal. Unfortunately, an expensive software service would
also be expensive as a standalone program (i.e., one to be loaded on
your computer), and you would have to pay the entire cost up front.
AUCTION MANAGEMENT SERVICES
These are online services that work through your Web
browser. They include:
If you prefer a more traditional software approach, you
might consider buying and installing one of these auction management
software programs. Check out the following:
As you have probably discovered in your reading, I don't
favor traditional software programs for auction management. Auction
management services offer far more. Unfortunately, not everyone has a
broadband connection to the Internet. If you don't have a broadband
connection, you have a solid reason for using a traditional program rather
than an online service. Nonetheless, obtaining a broadband connection
should be your goal due to the wider scope of services it will bring.
People
looking to exponentially increase their visibility and potential
profit keep turning to eBay the Smart Way, the definitive guide
to smarter eBay tactics. Now in its third
edition, this priceless tool has changed with
the times to cover the latest trends.
