Buying at auctions is a great way to save money. Selling at auctions is a great way to make money. It boggles my mind when I hear someone tell me that they've never participated in either activity. I've walked away with some of the biggest steals of my life using online auctions. On the other side, I have made a substantial amount of income selling on online auction platforms. It grew from a simple pastime, to a hobby, to a genuine way to make some serious cash. Over the years, I made sure to jot down notes and tips I picked up for my personal gain. Now, I've decided to share these secrets with the public. If you put in the time and effort using what I've written in this book, you'll be shocked at how easy it all is. As a note, if you see '(eBay)' written next to one of the tips, it's mostly geared toward that website. These little secrets and tidbits were only for me at one time, but now that I've made my own little empire, I'm happy to finally share them with as many people as I can... You're welcome!
#1 Products that Sell First off, let's dive into the kinds of items that will definitely produce more sales online. Collectibles Memorabilia (entertainment, sports, historical, etc.), stamps, toys, wines, and any and all antiques carry large profit margins. These meaningful items are a go-to when it comes to auctions online. Consumable There is a huge possibility for back-end sales. Think about items that someone would buy and be forced to buy again once they’re all gone. For example, toilet paper, office supplies, paper goods, etc. Information This kind of product is either downloaded or mailed in printed form or via CD or DVD. It's considered to be an informational product. Out of the three, this one takes the most research and patience. However, it's generally worth the effort.
#2 Cover Your Bases Sales Letter – Arguably, the most important thing. Your sales letter is the first thing that a potential buyer sees. This has to represent the product and you. A quality sales letter should reflect the quality product for sale. Credibility – Buyers should view you as trustworthy and respectful. Help build this image of yourself by garnering positive feedback, exuding a real passion about your products and sending prompt and articulate response emails. Choose Your Niche – When you pick the right niche for you, then you'll have a better understanding of your customer. Know your customer and you will learn how to sell to them. Inner Expert – If you're not already an expert, become on. Buyers start to buy certain types of items from the same sellers after a while. It's because they begin to see them as the go-to authorities on whatever they need. Earn your position of authority in the minds of buyers for your particular niche.
#3 Potential Buyers Want Quick & Easy Payment Options Greatly reduce any hiccups in the payment process, by covering as many different payment types as you can. Imagine if you and a competitor have a similar item for sale. Who do you think the buyer will choose? The one who offers the kind of payment option he wants or the one who doesn't? It's a simple way to be even more accessible to more customers. Common payments methods are Paypal, Venmo, personal check, cash, money order, electronic checks or credit cards by phone, fax or a secure server.
#4 Paypal This one is really simple. The majority of buyers online use Paypal as their go-to payment system. If you haven't made an account yet, it'd be in your interest to set one up sooner rather than later.
#5 Use Your Time Wisely with The Post Office You can actually have all of the mailing supplies you need sent to you by the USPS or UPS. Other things that may help: purchase an inexpensive scale, print postage at home and peruse shipping rates online.
#5 A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words The better your photos are of the product, the more professional you will appear. Take several photos and really try to make them as special as possible.
#6 Don't Overcharge On Shipping This is a good way to garner negative feedback. Buyers are highly aware of high shipping costs. Charge what is normal.
#7 Love Your Customer View your customers as royalty. The goal is to turn every new customer into a repeat client. Technically, your customers are more important than what you sell. Be sure to look after them and they will take care of you in return.
#8 Delivery Confirmation is Your Friend Adding a delivery confirmation in your shipping charge only costs an extra 35 cents. If you
email the tracking number to the customer, they will have the ability to track the package themselves.
#9 Spell-Check This may seem like an elementary step, and it is, but you wouldn't believe how many times I spot a misspelled item at auction. It makes the item look bad. It makes you look bad. And it has the stench of unprofessional standards, which immediately drives potential buyers away.
#10 After the Auction is Over... This is how to ensure a satisfied customer after your service. – – –
Quickly respond if any problems arise. Make speedy contact after the auction. Give necessary info in simple, easy to understand terms. They will want their product shipped promptly and intact.
#11 How to Be Excellent at Customer Service •
Follow up the day after the sale to catch any problems.
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Be sure that the auction process is as painless as possible.
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Hold back on strong promises, but be sure to deliver and then more in every other aspect.
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Make it your mission to respond to emails ASAP.
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The customer's always right (even when they're dead wrong).
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Once again, your customers are everything.
#12 International Buyers Banks might trouble you over foreign funds. Insist that they pay by international money orders or by credit cards. Be sure to grab some customs forms from the post office beforehand to save time.
#13 Don't Stop Your Auctions Early... … unless you get a truly outstanding bid. Don't let anyone persuade you into cutting the auction short. Let it run through until the last possible moment.
#14 Short-Term Goals (eBay) •
Find some items around your house and use them as test runs when selling on eBay. This is a great way to start out and get used to the entire process.
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Get 10 positive feedbacks to earn a gold star. This will build your trust among the community. Make a real effort to keep all of your feedback clean.
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Find a solid niche for yourself. Take some time to really think this one over. Your future success depends on your customer base.
#15 Bold Titles It's a fact. Bold titles garner more attention, therefore they receive more clicks from potential buyers.
#16 Pricing Strategy Make the minimum bid just a smidgen under what you believe it might be worth. But, don't start the bidding too low. Either way, you'll be selling the item whether or not you like the last bid.
#17 Do Your Own Advertising Tell other people on the internet about the auctions. Go to relevant message boards and newsgroups. Modify your signature on your email to advertise the products. There's plenty of ways to get creative online when it comes to advertising.
#18 Quick Tips for Copywriting For Your Auction •
Positive language
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Be sure to ask for a bid at the end of your main description
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Use attention grabbing words – promises, deals, questions, relevant news
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Play around with underlining, bold facing and italicizing important phrases
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Write short paragraphs. Make them 3 lines or 4 at the most
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Short sentences are always best
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Make the opener the shortest paragraph
#19 Sales Mistakes Here's a list of common mistakes sellers make. If you're auction didn't receive any bids, one of these common errors could be the culprit. •
You don't improve your ad copy
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You don't write any information about yourself and/or your business
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People don't feel safe when they bid
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Spelling Errors
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You don't include various payment/ordering options
#20 Try Not Compete With Similar Items When you put up an item for auction, be sure to see if similar items are already selling. Learn how much they're going for and be sure to put your item up as soon as they come down.
#21 Packing Material Many people don't know that newspaper actually makes great packing material. Bubble wrap is considered to be more professional, but keep in mind it is more expensive. Another nifty trick is saving packing material you get from shipments you receive.
#22 The Lifetime Value of Your Customers Why not try and develop a relationship with your bidders for the long run? Offer them products that are similar. It's always good to look past the initial sale. Tell winning bidders that you can send them an email of future items that might pique their interest.
#23 Effectively Re-List Your Item Your auction ends with no bids... now what? If you decide to re-list your item, there are a few questions you have to ask yourself. Questions – – – – – –
Was it overpriced? Is the headline effective? Is the description written professionally? At the end of the day, is your item something that no one really wants? Wrong category?
Possible Problems – – – – –
Starting bid price Bad reputation and feedback Competing with other items Poorly taken photos
#24 Dutch Auctions (eBay) If there is an auction that's selling multiple items it's referred to as a Dutch auction. You will begin to understand how powerful online auctions are once you become comfortable running multiple dutch auctions simultaneously. Dutch auctions are great because they allow you to maximize your time and energy. You can attain both profits and customers at a lightning fast rate. Here's an example: Imagine that you have a 500 fancy, cutlery knives and you're selling them for $5 dollars each. You can sell them off one at a time, or you could take out two large ads and sell them all in a week. If you're selling them at $8 dollars each, then that means you'll have made $1300, minus the costs of the ad. So, now you've made $1,300 and acquired 500 new customers. You can contact those same customers and sell them similar items outside of the online auction space. As you can see, Dutch auctions will help you save time and seriously boost your profits.
#25 When to List Your Items for Best Results In my experience, Saturday and Sunday mornings, roughly 6-9 a.m. have garnered the best results for me. Traffic on eBay is the highest during weekend mornings.
#26 Make Your eBay Page (eBay) I'm always surprised when I see a user waste their “My eBay” page. It's a lot like the opening page of a website. It should say something that immediately grabs the reader's attention. Your auction page can only be promoted for so long because it's temporary. Your My eBay page never goes away. Use it as a solid promotional tool, not only for your products, but for you and your business as well.
#27 Don't Make the Starting Bid too High It's not a good way to get a lot of bids. Bidders go to online auctions (and auctions in general) because they want a deal. This is really not the area in which you want to be greedy.
#28 Handling Difficult People Strive to be as courteous as possible to your bidders. With that said, there will undoubtedly be times when you are confronted by buyers with no manners. The best way to handle this is to wait awhile before you respond. When tensions are high and you're ready to explode... just remember that one customer shouldn't drive you insane. Take a minute to calm yourself before you respond.
#29 The Pros and Cons of Reserve Bids Experienced potential buyers are normally reluctant to bid when all of the information isn't available from the onset. But, let's review some of the benefits of reserve price auctions. • • •
Low starting bids could attract bidders. You don't have to sell if the item doesn't reach its reserve. Some sellers have to use them because of items that fall into certain categories.
#30 Consignment A way to acquire products to sell is by consignment. You could potentially approach businesses and find out if they want you to auction their services, products, or anything at all they want to sell. This is an excellent way to broaden your inventory, but many people are hesitant to go through the process. However, it's not really too difficult. Place an ad in the newspaper or use sites like Craigslist.
#31 Some Negative Auction Buyer Personality Types Unfortunately, you will definitely run into some of these negative personalities. –
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The Loser – This buyer will email you, confirming that the check is in the mail... and then it never comes. Less than 5% of your auctions will end like this, meaning it will most likely happen at some point. Debbie Downer – This buyer will be unhappy with your product no matter what you do or if it's in good condition. The Haggler – This buyer thinks that for some reason the bargaining starts once the auction is over. Politely tell them no and be firm. Mr. Antsy – This buyer will be very impatient when expecting their order. Do your best to articulate clearly why any delays in the shipping have occurred, or why it's taking longer than they expected.
#32 Clipart You could add some special touches to your page with images and graphics to enhance your auctions. If you do it right and sparingly, your page will be more visually appealing. Check out clipart.com for some free images.
#33 Asteriks ***** MICHAEL JORDAN ROOKIE CARD! ***** There's going to be a lot of items going up online. Asteriks help to distinguish your items from other listings. It's something very simple, but definitely effective.
#34 Bold ***** MICHAEL JORDAN ROOKIE CARD ***** You will be charged an extra $2.00 on eBay for a bold title. It's best to do this for items higher than $10.00. Once again, it's good to have your items stand out and this is a great method to increase exposure.
#35 Underscores *****MICHAEL__JORDAN ROOKIE__CARD ***** Using underscores between words in your title, will make your item title longer. It's another
free way to make your listings stand out among your competitors. However, you don't want all of your listings to appear the same. Play around, mix and match and view your results.
#36 Use Great Key Words In Titles Try to be specific in a smart way when it comes to creating your titles. For instance, instead of just writing “car,� indicate the make and model as well. Type keywords into your title, so the greatest number of searches by people who are looking for a product like yours can find it.
#37 Filing System Find a filing system that works for you. Be sure to scan important documents into the computer such as business expense receipts and account statements that you receive through the mail. I would choose a digital filing system over paper. It's easier to to keep track of and you save some trees in the process.
#38 Consumable Products There are several places to buy wholesale goods. Here's a good list of places that I have found to be successful. www.metabolife.com www.peaknutrition.com www.fatabsorb.com Although it's ideal to develop your own consumable product, it's difficult to say the least. In the meantime, these sites provide great prices at wholesale.
#39 Proofread Your Ads and Email Be sure to proofread your listing! Misspelled words and improper grammar is a major turnoff. For a lot of text, it's a great idea to get an extra pair of eyes on your writing. You don't want to catch a mistake once the auction has already begun.
#40 Find Your Niche Picking a niche and sticking with it is a surefire way to become successful. When you first
begin, it's fine to sell a little bit of everything, but when you get serious, it's time to really define your corner of the market.
#41 Offer A Free Newsletter or Mailing List A newsletter is great for three things. You can build trust, plug your auctions and give out free information. It's a great way of staying in touch with potential buyers and customers. If people don't want to receive your emails they can simply unsubscribe or request to be taken off your mailing list.
#42 Short-Term Product Sources Short-term product sales are a good way to get started in your business. I wouldn't recommend it for the long haul. Short-term product sales means that you find the item, buy it, sell it and make a quick $10 or so. Try out sites like www.pricewatch.com or www.mysimon.com. You could make some quick cash, but not enough to warrant you doing it for a long, sustained amount of time.
#43 Keeping Track of Auctions Once you start getting your business in gear and have more than 5 auctions going simultaneously, you're going to need a smart system for keeping track of it all. A customer might ask you if you've received payment and you'll need to find their item number quickly. You can use a spreadsheet on the computer or the old pen and paper method. Write down the URL, listing price, category and item number. I would suggest doing this sooner rather than later. You would be surprised how quickly the sales, numbers and products start to stack up on each other. Stay organized!
#44 Taxes You might not know this, but auction income is taxable. Keep records and collect the reward when tax time comes. Don't get penalized! Consult with a CPA or the SBA for advice on tax liabilities and credits. Terms and conditions change from location to location. The tax filing records should allow you to see your sources of income and business expenses. A sole proprietor or business owner would probably use a cash-based bookkeeping system. From a tax standpoint, it could be beneficial for a new business to use the cash method for accounting purposes. This way, actually recording income can be delayed until the next tax year and expenses are counted immediately.
#45 Use Website for Promotion A tried and true method to boost your profits is to use a personal website with your auction listings. Be subtle when promoting your website through your auctions. You want to create a fun, community-like atmosphere where your long-term customers can continue to check out your auctions and website. Create a world for them to explore and discover more products they want to buy.
#46 Other Places to Promote You auction isn't going to promote itself. You would be surprised at how many people put up auctions on a regular basis, do little to promote them and then wonder why no one bids on their items. Be tenacious (but logical) when promoting your products. Use message boards, newsgroups and free classifieds. Use highly-targeted emails to avoid being reported as spam.
#47 Boost Those Profits! Another unique method to boost your sales is by offering products called 'back-ends.' A back-end sale is when you offer products to customers who have bought from you in the past. It could be a product that compliments or enhances an already purchased item. You have the chance to make a lot of money if you prepare correctly. Building the trust of your customer will make them more likely to buy from you again. Use this to your advantage by offering them items that they will be interested in. Let's use a professional stamp seller as an example: He's got a customer base of 10,000 serious eBay stamp collectors. If this guy does his homework, he'll understand what kinds of stamps his customers love. When he finds the right source for these stamps, he will undoubtedly make money. One day, he sends his customers an email explaining to those 10,000 potential buyers that he has 5,000 WW2 stamps. In a couple of days, he sells them all and gets a profit of $50 per stamp. That's $25,000... Think of your auctions the same way. Seriously think of a way to corner the market. Continue to fit yourself in a better position to resell to your customers. Once again, if you don't have a niche, you can't pull this off!
#48 Dealing with the Post-Office Nobody likes the DMV... or the post-office. Be sure to prepare for the post-office in advance. I always make sure to have all of the shipping supplies I need sent to me by the UPS or USPS.
You can even take care of all of your postage needs from home. If you need to, look up shipping costs using I-Ship (http://www.iship.com). Buy a low-budget scale and print postage (www.stamps.com) right off your computer. Time-management is crucial in all areas of life, but especially managing your own business. You don't want to spend too much time at the post-office.
#49 Study! Continue to read guides like this one to master market strategies and the best ways to boost profit margins. Once you find your particular niche, be sure to stay up on topics in that particular industry. To become an expert, you must truly become an authority and trusted goto source of whatever niche you're trying to corner.
#50 Back-Up Losing all of your data is a terrible thing. It's so important that begin to back up your data – today! Buy a hard drive or USB drive. You might want to consider purchasing a surge protector just in case you have to avoid a disaster. If you have the money to spend, you could also buy an uninterrupted power supply, or UPS. It will prevent your computer from being damaged during any kind of electrical problem.
#51 Good Feedback is Everything This should be your top priority when you first start out. Here are some quick tips: • •
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Sell a quality product After you sell the item, ask the customer if he plans on leaving positive or negative feedback and if there's a way you can remedy the situation if he plans on giving you a poor rating. Treat your winning bidders like kings and queens.
Sometimes bidders won't leave feedback at all. Emphasize the fact that you NEED it. You can even email them a link to the feedback page and politely follow-up. It should be your goal to never receive negative feedback. Good feedback is everything.