[Method] Amazon to eBay Drop-shipping Done Right! Spoon Fed! *Long/Detailed*

[danluna97]

Hey thanks so much for the post I have two questions if you could answer them?
1. Do you go for the items sold by amazon only or also the items that are Fulfilled by amazon also?
2. And when setting up the price do you add the taxes amazon puts on you? so you would have to manually go in and check the taxes for each item on amazon?
Thanks so much!

 

[atticanibal]

Damn, nice and detailed tutorial Will save it for later use.

 

[lewy2k]

Hey thanks so much for the post I have two questions if you could answer them?
1. Do you go for the items sold by amazon only or also the items that are Fulfilled by amazon also?
2. And when setting up the price do you add the taxes amazon puts on you? so you would have to manually go in and check the taxes for each item on amazon?
Thanks so much!

1. Fulfilled by Amazon items are great for selling on eBay, I strongly encourage doing those too.
2. When I setup the prices, I don't take tax into account. Although, if you choose items fulfilled by Amazon, instead of Amazon directly, many of them do not charge tax. This is why those are my favorite types of items to list.

 

[SirLoki]

I feel a bit ignored.. Maybe you didn't see my question ?

I get a decent amount of views on many of my items without getting sales.. I want to think that my titles are ok and since you are crushing it on eBay I'd appreciate if you could give me some advice on what to do ?

 

[lewy2k]

I feel a bit ignored.. Maybe you didn't see my question ?

I get a decent amount of views on many of my items without getting sales.. I want to think that my titles are ok and since you are crushing it on eBay I'd appreciate if you could give me some advice on what to do ?

How many items are you talking about? I have listed hundreds of items that never get sales. The key is to list large groups at a time, while re-listing the ones that do sell and letting the ones that don't go. If you believe your listing is as high quality as possible and there is no way you can lower your price, then I suggest moving on to new items.

 

[dondada7]

Do the items have to be sold by amazon only?

 

[lewy2k]

Do the items have to be sold by amazon only?

No, you can do it with anything sold on the entire Amazon website. I don't have any experience trying this with a different website though, if that's what you're asking.

 

[dondada7]

No, you can do it with anything sold on the entire Amazon website. I don't have any experience trying this with a different website though, if that's what you're asking.

No thats what I meant. Last time I did this I was undet the impression that I could only sell amazon listed items for some reason. Definitley giving this another go anyway. Thanks.

 

[LeftBlindEye]

Thanks lewy2k Im going to test this out. I will report my results.

 

[lewy2k]

Thanks lewy2k Im going to test this out. I will report my results.

Good luck man

 

[SirLoki]

I have 180 active listings, but I only get 1 sale a week if I'm lucky (can go 2-3 weeks with no sales)
I do not have any item that sells everytime I relist them, it's just by luck that I get the sales I think

The thing that frustrates me is that you say you only have 150 listings active, but you manage to get 20K in sales ! I don't know how the hell you do that lol

 

[klassnaya]

I have 180 active listings, but I only get 1 sale a week if I'm lucky (can go 2-3 weeks with no sales)
I do not have any item that sells everytime I relist them, it's just by luck that I get the sales I think

The thing that frustrates me is that you say you only have 150 listings active, but you manage to get 20K in sales ! I don't know how the hell you do that lol

Try these items with Amazon off coupons. It's from my profile in D$D. Hope it helps.

 

[lewy2k]

I have 180 active listings, but I only get 1 sale a week if I'm lucky (can go 2-3 weeks with no sales)
I do not have any item that sells everytime I relist them, it's just by luck that I get the sales I think

The thing that frustrates me is that you say you only have 150 listings active, but you manage to get 20K in sales ! I don't know how the hell you do that lol

Its not that crazy if you think about how I got to this point. I probably listed a total of 3000 items in the past two years, testing which ones sold and which didn't. Eventually you get an idea on what sells and what doesn't. Over time I found around 150 items that sell a few times a week. I just encourage you to try all types of items. At first, I was ignoring items I didn't like personally, which is a bad way to go. List any and everything from all different departments. You never know!

 

[SirLoki]

That makes a lot of difference there lol
I thaught you only listed 150 from the point you started and money just started coming in

You didn't mention that you've tried and listed 3000 items to get these 150 winners
I nearly started hating you lol

Good for you mate ! And thank you for your answers

Would you say adding item specifics (Brand, color, Type, Material, etc) helps rank the listing or is it just a waste of time if I mention everything in the description ?

 

[Aatrox]

I know about the method and one of my friends is doing it outside the US and he makes it work. Straight to the point method and it works. Great share by letting us a few details. Thanks.

 

[bomajed]

First of all, thank you so much for this
your post is the most appealing method I found so far in BHW, I was really getting depressed by the amount of unuseful methods here!
However, the problem here is that I never sold anything on eBay before, so my account is limited. I mean 10 items/month! That's ridiculous for someone who needs to list and test hundreds of items! Is there any way around this eBay limits?!

 

[Avid Learner]

Once sold on eBay, but nothing like this...method sounds cool, indeed.

Regarding Scaling: What tools do you use to automate?

Seems that the selection of items to sell would be tedious without some way to scan/filter. It is the bulk comparison Amazon to eBay that would be key (presumably for thin competition, higher eBay price range vs Amazon), so really need tools for both, then to match items. Amazon has an api, but I am not aware of tools (but also have not thought of this, so have not looked for them previously).

Also, listing in volume on eBay can be a pain...do you use something like Turbo Lister?

Since tax is charged based on ship to address from Amazon, Amazon will collect tax for 23 states. Been a while since I've sold on eBay...does it now have a way to configure to selectively collect tax by state?

Not all items can be from third party prime shippers - who may not collect tax for any state but their own, but you still have to know what state thiers is for collection purposes from your buyers. In low volumes, that may not be hard to manually deal with, but scaling makes it a challenge. Perhaps you have some tools to help manage this? Maybe part of the tools for above items?

Google Shopping might also be a good place for comparison / sales - have you considered or experience with that?

 

[johnnyr860]

The only downside I will mention to this drop shipping method is that with some people yes you do get some angry or not so happy customers as was the case with me. I sold some items from Amazon to Ebay and when the customers noticed that not only did I ship them the item from Amazon but that the item I shipped them was listed cheaper on Amazon I get a few angry or upset buyers requesting refunds and that is never good. That being said not everyone is going to get on your bad side.

I only had a few buyers here or there get angry or upset with me and claim I was deceiving them which in return led to them giving me negative feedback on my ebay account but I was able to resolve the issue by shipping the items to my house first and then to the buyer so I could swap out the box and add an ebay shipping invoice. After I got a few of the items some of the ones I got didn't even have a shipping invoice with them (but some do like my college textbooks).

I also don't make as much money as you claim to be making with this method. I already responded to someone elses post in this threat on things that have helped me increase my sales but even in then I am making nowhere near the numbers you claim to be making so I am guessing you must have done other things too to get more sales? I mean I wonder how you were able to get the numbers you mentioned.

 

[johnnyr860]

I have 180 active listings, but I only get 1 sale a week if I'm lucky (can go 2-3 weeks with no sales)
I do not have any item that sells everytime I relist them, it's just by luck that I get the sales I think

The thing that frustrates me is that you say you only have 150 listings active, but you manage to get 20K in sales ! I don't know how the hell you do that lol

The key here is to always offer free shipping. I can't tell you this enough times. People are suckers for items with free shipping. You offer them free shipping on all your items and they will purr to you like a cat lol no but really free shipping is always good I noticed that once I stopped charging for shipping I was able to get more and more sales slowly but surely. Another thing is you need to do research to see what your competitor sellers are selling for on ebay.

Take the item you are trying to sell and do an exact search for it on ebay to see what the item typically goes for and what sellers are selling it for. Also note down how many of that item the sellers are able to sell as it tells you on their listings how many of that one particular item the person has sold. If you see that a particular item you have is not being sold much in sales by other competitors or that other competitors keep relisting the same item than maybe that particular item you are trying to sell is not popular and therefore a no go and you should probably find another product to sell. I recommend you search an item on ebay before buying on amazon so you can make sure the item is making people sales to begin with. Wouldn't want to buy an item only to find no one is interested in that item.

You can also do an advanced search on ebay that allows you to see listings that have ended both buy it now and auction so you can see what an auction price for an item finished at as well as what a buy it now price was sold at. Lastly, always try to outsell your competition. If that means you need to list your items at a cheaper price than everyone else just to get the sale through than so be it do it. People tend to go for the listing with the lowest buy it now price and free shipping. That is why if you do the math and whatever the items you are selling if you find you are not making enough of a profit than you may need to look for items that cost more and sell those to make better profits.

 

[lewy2k]

First of all, thank you so much for this
your post is the most appealing method I found so far in BHW, I was really getting depressed by the amount of unuseful methods here!
However, the problem here is that I never sold anything on eBay before, so my account is limited. I mean 10 items/month! That's ridiculous for someone who needs to list and test hundreds of items! Is there any way around this eBay limits?!

If you start selling a few items, you can request eBay increase your selling limits. Like I said though, mine were raised before I even got the chance to ask! So just try listing up to ten items and making your first sales, the limits will be raised soon after!

Once sold on eBay, but nothing like this...method sounds cool, indeed.

Regarding Scaling: What tools do you use to automate?

Seems that the selection of items to sell would be tedious without some way to scan/filter. It is the bulk comparison Amazon to eBay that would be key (presumably for thin competition, higher eBay price range vs Amazon), so really need tools for both, then to match items. Amazon has an api, but I am not aware of tools (but also have not thought of this, so have not looked for them previously).

Also, listing in volume on eBay can be a pain...do you use something like Turbo Lister?

Since tax is charged based on ship to address from Amazon, Amazon will collect tax for 23 states. Been a while since I've sold on eBay...does it now have a way to configure to selectively collect tax by state?

Not all items can be from third party prime shippers - who may not collect tax for any state but their own, but you still have to know what state thiers is for collection purposes from your buyers. In low volumes, that may not be hard to manually deal with, but scaling makes it a challenge. Perhaps you have some tools to help manage this? Maybe part of the tools for above items?

Google Shopping might also be a good place for comparison / sales - have you considered or experience with that?

Seems you didn't read a large portion of the original post. I clearly state I don't automate anything. I also state why I am against using automation with this method. At first is was tedious to try to find items that would sell, but after some time, I learned what items tend to sell and which don't. I have also become very good at analyzing sold items in different categories on eBay and it gives me a feel on if I can sell well in those categories.

I am against automation because any tool I have come across does not do nearly as good of a job as I can do at this point. Sure, you can automate something to find profit margins, but automation doesn't have a feel for the market and doesn't know which items tend to sell and which items don't. That is not something you can automate off of data alone. I am able to make as much as people do with automation, with a fraction of the active listings. Therefore, my job is much less time consuming because I am spending less time dealing with customers, fulfilling orders and figuring out if items are still at the same price or in stock.

My point is that automation would only hurt how I use this method. I have found a way to make my listings high quality. Listing on eBay is not "a pain" when you are familiar with it and you know if done by hand, your listings will be much higher quality than the rest. Automation KILLS this method. It leaves you will too much residual work in the aftermath of all your sales. This leads to disgruntled customers and poor feedback. Feedback is the name of the game on eBay. Hence the reason I only have 5 negative feedbacks in over 2 years with this method.

Also, I remember hearing something about having to pay a state tax if you choose to collect tax from customers. I eat the tax on part of my items to keep myself from having to pay. A lot of times I will keep tax in mind when pricing my items. It's just a bonus when I don't have to pay it. I'd rather do that than to have to deal with any state tax situation.

The only downside I will mention to this drop shipping method is that with some people yes you do get some angry or not so happy customers as was the case with me. I sold some items from Amazon to Ebay and when the customers noticed that not only did I ship them the item from Amazon but that the item I shipped them was listed cheaper on Amazon I get a few angry or upset buyers requesting refunds and that is never good. That being said not everyone is going to get on your bad side.

I only had a few buyers here or there get angry or upset with me and claim I was deceiving them which in return led to them giving me negative feedback on my ebay account but I was able to resolve the issue by shipping the items to my house first and then to the buyer so I could swap out the box and add an ebay shipping invoice. After I got a few of the items some of the ones I got didn't even have a shipping invoice with them (but some do like my college textbooks).

I also don't make as much money as you claim to be making with this method. I already responded to someone elses post in this threat on things that have helped me increase my sales but even in then I am making nowhere near the numbers you claim to be making so I am guessing you must have done other things too to get more sales? I mean I wonder how you were able to get the numbers you mentioned.

You must run your eBay business differently. I have had one or two people ever contact me being upset over items sent from Amazon. They never once left negative feedback.