Pricing Your Products On Ebay

Competing on price on EBay is a sure way to disaster. Sellers who employ this strategy will find themselves at best working for nothing and at worse losing money. The eBay market place is full of different types of sellers who are all employing different strategies to achieve their specific goals. There is, for example the big players. These are guys who own large businesses and will use eBay to dump stock on. They may not be bothered about making a profit they just want rid of their stock so they’ll sell it at a low price.
You also have the big players who use eBay to attract customers to their websites. They will sell products below the market value knowing that once they hook a buyer they will then up sell other products to make a profit.
You also have people selling personal items that they no longer want, or unwanted gifts so they will sell these for a low price and of course you will have people selling products illegally, copies etc. For a new seller to enter this market place and try to compete on price is business suicide.
I write from experience as well as thorough reviews and experiments. In my early days of trading, I did try to compete on price and I paid the price for that folly. I run an online arts store www.artscraftsandhobbies.co.uk and I have my own eBay store Arts, crafts & Hobbies. A part of my inventory consists of painting instruction DVDs. When I first started trading, I started on eBay and I priced the DVDs low at £10.00 each. Now art instruction DVDs are quiet expensive, they retail for between £18.00 up to £60.00. I had a supplier who provided me them at a good price.
As I said, I originally priced them at £10.00, which didn’t leave me much of a margin but I was naïve,and as you know we all have to pay to learn. After engaging in quiet a lot of studying and experimenting, I saw that price increases didn’t affect my sales at all. So, I took the decision to raise my prices substantially. For example, I increased the price of my DVDs from £10.00 to £14.99.
Now this is a substantial increase but in reality, it’s around what I should have charged originally. My reasoning was simple I would have to take a huge hit on sales to actually lose revenue, I worked out it would have to be something around a 35% drop. If sales did drop by that amount then I would be still earning the same income level from less work. Sounded like a good deal to me.
Now here’s the strange thing. My sales in the first month of the price increase went up. I sold more DVDs that month than any previous month since I had started trading. And they have remained steady. I also sell plenty of products in my store that other sellers sell cheaper.
I do not try to compete on price. When I add a new product to my store I don’t even look at what others may be selling it for, I’m not interested. I price the product using my own system, which takes into account eBay and PayPal fees and gives me my profit margin. I’m not doing this to make eBay rich or to give things away. I’m doing this to build up an income for me and my family. I want rewarding for the work I put into my business otherwise it’s pointless.
So if you’re thinking about entering the eBay marketplace don’t get fixated on the prices others are charging for their products. Take your cost price and add eBay and PayPal fees then add your profit margin and that’s your selling price. Be professional and focused. People don’t just buy on price and you probably don’t want to do business with those who do. Other factors come into play like how well you have listed your item, feedback and trust. Experiment a little and see what happens.
Keep Trading

Paul

Planning; don’t make it an excuse for inaction

We know the old clique about how failing to plan is planning to fail. And it’s true, we can’t move forward confidently without a plan. Every business book emphasises the need for a plan to enhance our chances of succeeding in our venture. What I don’t like is the insistence of some of these books that a plan has to be detailed and run into tens of pages. Containing detailed financial calculations.

This didn’t work for me. I just don’t see the point of spending days and possibly months writing a minutely detailed plan with forecasted financial data laid out on a spreadsheet. The figures can only be guesses. Some of the plans I’ve seen in books are like something you would do to impress a tutor on a PHD course. . Personally, I don’t see the need for such in-depth planning.

In fact, I believe it can be counterproductive and sap the energy out of you. After reading, as much as I could about business planning I decided to discard most of it and improvise with my own plan. The first question I asked myself is “what am I aiming to achieve?” I stated this clearly. My main goal.

Once I’d stated my goal, I needed to break it down into smaller goals that could be measured. I needed to know that I was on the right track to achieve my main long-term goal. By setting smaller goals, each with a target I can see my progress visually. This is important for moral. We grow in confidence when we are succeeding.

Having laid out my long-term goal and broken it down into smaller measurable, goals, I then broke the smaller goals down into targets. This is my plan. Once I had it written down on two sheets of A4, I launched. Once I launched my business, I was immediately getting feedback from the market I was in about my business strategy. My plan allows for flexibility. I have nothing set in stone apart from my long-term goal of creating wealth.

Certain strategies I deployed didn’t work, but I expected this and just changed them. I also saw opportunities that had never occurred to me during the planning process. The feedback I was getting from the market was real, not forecasted, so my decisions were based on concrete facts.

I recognise the importance of a plan but we can get caught up in planning to the point where we become paralysed, afraid to move until certain conditions are just right. It can become an excuse for inaction. If we wait for everything to be just right, until all the heavens have aligned for us, and our own position is perfect we will never launch.

I believe that taking strong positive action with a bad plan is better than sitting on the perfect plan. At least your bad plan will soon become apparent and you can make the necessary changes that will propel you towards your goal. The perfect plan will never happen because there’s too many variables coming into and out of play all the time. Don’t let planning become an excuse for inaction.

7 Reasons Why You Should open An Ebay Shop

No serious business can exist without a shop to display its goods. Ebay is the same. If you want to become a serious ebay seller with a recurring income then opening a basic store is a must. Here’s seven reasons why opening an ebay store is essential to grow your business..

1. Gives you instant credibility by having a regular web presence.

2. Allows you to list hundreds of products for customers to browse.

3. allows you to automate the repetitive tasks associated with online selling. This will save you lots of time to devote to more productive areas of your business.

4. Allows you to market more effectively

5. allows you to build relationships with your customers and guarntee repeat sales.

6. Get free reports about your sales. This is crucial to see what’s happening in your business. You need to get access to what’s happening so you can make informed decisions and formulate stratergies to grow your business.As your business grows and your inventory and activity increases, you need all the help you can get.

7.Gives you more exposure. Ebay reports that people who open a store receive a 25% increase in sales within 3 months. You are guarnteed more exposure by having your products permanently online for potential customers to view any time of the day.

A shop will prove you are serious about starting a business. It will be a committment to yourself that you are not just an occasional ebay seller but a professional trader. If you haven’t already done so, take the next step and open a shop.

Changing A Negative into A Positive

How To Turn Negative Feedback to Your Advantage

In my experience the vast majority of people are well balanced and fair minded. If you make a mistake in your eBay business by sending out the wrong product or some other error, the majority of people will inform you and be quiet happy with an apology and wait for the replacement.

You may however, in your eBay business come into contact with one of the antisocial group people who delight in being obnoxious and disagreeable. One seller complained that someone who bought one of his products sent him an email saying “if you send me 50% of my money back I won’t leave you negative feedback.” The seller refused; the buyer left negative feedback.

Most sellers go out of their way to please to avoid negative feedback. Since EBay, in another of their rule changes have now prevented sellers from leaving negative feedback we can’t even retaliate. So what can we do if someone leaves us a negative?

We can turn it to our advantage. The way we respond to negative feedback says a lot about us. If for example, we respond with a stream of expletives and abuse then buyers reading our feedback will soon move away from our shop. Would you go into a shop where the owner may start abusing you if you upset him? For this reason I would strongly recommend that you resist the temptation to respond immediately.

The way to turn a negative into a positive is to respond in a rational and friendly way. If the buyer complains about the slow delivery. Just respond with something like: “Sorry about that. I did post it the day after ordering.” Or if the buyer complains about the product. Again, apologise and mention you are happy to exchange it or offer a refund.

Under no circumstances get involved in a slanging match. It will only damage you. You may be fuming at the negative feedback especially if you believe it is unjustified. Don’t show this in your response. Respond calmly and friendly. This will show future buyers that you’re only human and may make mistakes. You do however seek to put them right.

Once you’ve responded in a reasonable and objective way. Leave your computer and go to the gym. Start pounding the treadmill imagining that the negative feedback reader is under your feet. You’ll feel much better.

Surviving On Ebay

I’m becoming less and less a fan of eBay as its current management continue on their determined quest to destroy a monopoly. It’s difficult but it can be done, with constant bad decisions, showing no respect for the people (sellers) who make the money and by arrogant indifference. The cost of selling on eBay when it is all calculated is almost 10% of your selling price. That’s an awful lot of money snatched from your profit margin. Many have already shut up shop and left to concentrate on their websites and other selling venues.

I’me seeing more and more people complaining about Feebay in the forums, many have given it up as a bad job and gone. I have to admit this is tempting but I would advise against it for people who are just starting a business. Your ideal model as an ecommerce business is to have your own website selling your products.

There is no selling or listing fees on your website and you get to keep all the profits. You will still have to pay PayPal fees if you choose to use PayPal, but apart from that, you get to keep all the money. Your goal has got to be to get a website established as soon as possible. Getting a website is easy. A simple matter of getting someone to create one for you. There’s no shortage of people willing to do this.

The problem is getting it established. This requires a lot of work and a lot of knowledge about search engine optimization (SEO) The sole objective of SEO is to get people to your site. A site without traffic is pointless, you need visitors who will come and buy. And here lies the problem with EBay at the moment, traffic is falling. The very thing we pay for is collapsing.

So is EBay still worth it? I have to say yes, just. With careful planning and disciplined business diligence ,there are measures you can take to get yourself established on eBay and run a profitable business. It’s not easy but you can do it. The first thing you need to get under control is the fees. Everywhere you turn on eBay there is a fee slapped on you.

Keep a close eye on your listings. If something is not selling after you’ve relisted it a number of times then you will have to think whether it’s worth listing it again. Every time you relist it, it costs you money. Relist a number of non-selling items constantly and all you are doing is paying eBay and getting nothing back yourself. Any profit you make on other items will be eaten up paying fees for non-selling items.

I say this all the time but I’ll say it again. Do not absorb the ridiculous eBay fees into your profit margin. Add them to the price of your item along with the PayPal fees. If this means the price of your item is too much for eBay buyers then move it somewhere else. Sell it on another site or your website. It’s not sellers fault that they are having to increase their prices it’s eBay’s fault for increasing their fees. We as sellers must cover our costs before we can make a profit. There’s a lot of work involved in running a shop and we need paying for it.

When it becomes unprofitable then it’s time to leave. Many have already taken this option and eBay is losing its once proud reputation of being a marketplace where bargains could be found. The cost of selling on eBay makes it impossible for sellers to sell cheap and make a profit.

Choose your product carefully. There’s no point selling DVDs. The market is saturated and the margins are too slim. I read of one guy on a forum who make fifty pence on each DVD he sells. What’s the point of that? All that work for fifty pence. Ideally, you need to look for a niche market.

Do some market research on eBay to see what sells and for how much. Also how fast items sell. You should factor the listing fees into the price. If you have to relist an item, add the relisting fee to the price. Maintain your margins. This is the whole point of running a business to build wealth for you.

EBay is no longer a market where you can sell your good cheap. The current management have destroyed that concept. At the moment, it’s still a good place to sell goods and you should use it if you are just starting out but lay long-term plans as well. Your long term objective is to get a website, and become independent of eBay, until then hone your skills on ebay.