Ask Me Anything about selling on eBay

This topic is seriously very informative.
Loved the idea, Thanks y'all for sharing your experiences.
I'll keep reading..
 
It's safe to say things have changed a lot since this thread's creation. Is it still as profitable as it was back then? How did you adapt? Especially with the rising popularity of sites that ship within two days.
 
Hey,

1. how can I keep up with ebayers they already sell the same product and sell it for an unbelievable good price? Because they have a lot of money to buy the products in mass.

2. If I buy a product for $10 what have I to add on this price?

eBay fee
PayPal fee
Cargo

Tax depending to the country?

Regards
 
It's safe to say things have changed a lot since this thread's creation.

Things haven't changed much in the last 2 months, at least in regards to what I'm doing

Is it still as profitable as it was back then? How did you adapt? Especially with the rising popularity of sites that ship within two days.

The beauty of mass importing and direct manufacturing of my own branded item is that I don't have to adapt. Just keep shipping on time, and make sure quality of the product is good,and everything else will pretty much take care of itself. There will always be a market for white label or store brand items if the price is right and quality is good. One of the big themes I have been banging on since the beginning of the thread is eCommerce is heading toward more profits for professionalized sellers and amateur sellers are being squeezed on every end. That trend has not changed.
 
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1. how can I keep up with ebayers they already sell the same product and sell it for an unbelievable good price? Because they have a lot of money to buy the products in mass.

You don't try to compete with those people. You don't want to be selling the most popular items; you want to be selling most profitable items.

2. If I buy a product for $10 what have I to add on this price?

eBay fee
PayPal fee
Cargo

For what I do, I assume 15% of the revenue is selling cost and another 5% for fraud, packaging, and misc. costs.
 
Hey, heres a few questions :) (Bronze Powerseller)
1 > Why do multiple listings in the same catagory de-rank at the same time?
Background Story: I have just gotten back into eBay and have about 40 listings all in the same category. I boosted 7 listings with variations via fiverr watchers/views which helped most of them jump to first page within 3 weeks. Its been around two months now and 5/8 listings have de-ranked to P2/P3 even P5 even though they were all getting sales nearly every day. Should I continue to boost them?

2 >One of the sellers I'm up against has around 20 listings with less sales and about the same feedback but his/her listings are always on top of mine. Its not the title as I've checked and even tried to replicate, its not the rating as they have 1 negative in the last 6 months and I have 0 for 12 months. I make more sales but they are still always dominating the first 5-10 results. Cant make sense of it.

2.5 >There are 2 attributes that I'm thinking may have effected listings ranks;
- I added UPC numbers (purchased 1000 from eBay for $3) on all my items just before they de-ranked. Any connection?
- I have had 1 customer ask for an exchange around about the same time. Any connection?

Thanks in advance if you reply.
 
You don't try to compete with those people. You don't want to be selling the most popular items; you want to be selling most profitable items.

How can I find out which is the most profitable product?
 
1 > Why do multiple listings in the same catagory de-rank at the same time?
Background Story: I have just gotten back into eBay and have about 40 listings all in the same category. I boosted 7 listings with variations via fiverr watchers/views which helped most of them jump to first page within 3 weeks. Its been around two months now and 5/8 listings have de-ranked to P2/P3 even P5 even though they were all getting sales nearly every day. Should I continue to boost them?

I don't recommend using fiverr watchers because one of the most important eBay metrics is sell through rate. If you have watchers who don't buy, that kills your sellthrough rate in the long run.

2 >One of the sellers I'm up against has around 20 listings with less sales and about the same feedback but his/her listings are always on top of mine. Its not the title as I've checked and even tried to replicate, its not the rating as they have 1 negative in the last 6 months and I have 0 for 12 months. I make more sales but they are still always dominating the first 5-10 results. Cant make sense of it.

It may be because of overall account strength or better sellthrough rate. Also, this is my opinion, but eBay penalizes accounts that carry non selling items, as they are considered clutter.

2.5 >There are 2 attributes that I'm thinking may have effected listings ranks;
- I added UPC numbers (purchased 1000 from eBay for $3) on all my items just before they de-ranked. Any connection?
- I have had 1 customer ask for an exchange around about the same time. Any connection?

These shouldn't matter. Also, I don't really trust those 1000 for $3 UPC numbers as being legitimate. It's much safer to just get a brand exemption from Amazon if you are not selling branded items.
 
How can I find out which is the most profitable product?

By becoming really knowlegible about what you sell. Generally, if you are just trying to just do pure drop shipping off wholesellers who advertize, you don't have an edge and you won't be able to find things to sell for a reasonable profit. For example, I know someone who makes his living by selling a $8 wholesale product for $12 on eBay, which seems like not profitable enough to do, but he found out that he could source the product for less than $2 if he brought cash to the factory floor and dealt with the manufacturer direct.
 
By becoming really knowlegible about what you sell. Generally, if you are just trying to just do pure drop shipping off wholesellers who advertize, you don't have an edge and you won't be able to find things to sell for a reasonable profit. For example, I know someone who makes his living by selling a $8 wholesale product for $12 on eBay, which seems like not profitable enough to do, but he found out that he could source the product for less than $2 if he brought cash to the factory floor and dealt with the manufacturer direct.

Another question is it allowed to promote my own products due eBay network partner to generates more money?
 
I don't recommend using fiverr watchers because one of the most important eBay metrics is sell through rate. If you have watchers who don't buy, that kills your sellthrough rate in the long run.
It seems to have worked for me to rank from page 20+ to page 2-3. The problem is, without views and watchers you are never seen in the end pages for a keyword that has over 3k-4k results.

It may be because of overall account strength or better sellthrough rate. Also, this is my opinion, but eBay penalizes accounts that carry non selling items, as they are considered clutter.
So would you recommend re-list the non selling listings or just get rid of them?

These shouldn't matter. Also, I don't really trust those 1000 for $3 UPC numbers as being legitimate. It's much safer to just get a brand exemption from Amazon if you are not selling branded items.
I added them because I read somewhere that eBay favors listings with UPC numbers. I will monitor the UPC's to see if another result ever shows up for them either on google or eBay.
 
It seems to have worked for me to rank from page 20+ to page 2-3. The problem is, without views and watchers you are never seen in the end pages for a keyword that has over 3k-4k results.

It may work in the short run, but everything I do is biased toward long term. I have listings up from 2009 that haven't been changed much and still generating revenus.


So would you recommend re-list the non selling listings or just get rid of them?

Many people relist items that have no sales in 30 days as new listings because eBay favors new listings over automatically rolling over listings.
 
Why would you need to verify another eBay seller? For what purpose?
That's my account and I can't sell anything on it bcus its not verified. So my question is what is takes to verify a seller account
 
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