Selling on E-Bay

[Racoon]

I just put my first two items up for bid on E-Bay..

Its all so new to me..
I jumped through a lot of ID,Password,Pay-Pal,Bank acount hoops..

I still am not exactly sure what's gonna' happen, or if my $0.00 paypal account balance is going to increase..

Some comics I have.. Theres alot on sale, never sure if someone is going to be interested.

My feedback is 0. No purchases and no sales at this point..

Anyone here have experience and/or tips of the E-trade??
Success or horror stories?
Hopefully I can make enough money to finance my new indoor gardening and indoor aquarium wants..

[freeztar]

The best advice I can give, as an ebay seller, is to always use shipping services that provide tracking. I've been burned by that before by a customer that claimed they never got the thumb drive I sent. They appealed with paypal and even after scanning in the reciept and sending it to paypal, they revoked the customer's payment and I was left without the money or the item.
That problem can never arise if you have tracking.

[DougF]

Thats good advice freeztar,
I haven't sold anything but I have done some purchasing, and all been OK no horror stories,
when buying i look at the Feedback: (99.9% Positive) and how long they been a Member: (since Jun-07-99 in United States)

[Racoon]

Originally Posted by freeztar

The best advice I can give, as an ebay seller, is to always use shipping services that provide tracking. I've been burned by that before by a customer that claimed they never got the thumb drive I sent. They appealed with paypal and even after scanning in the reciept and sending it to paypal, they revoked the customer's payment and I was left without the money or the item.
That problem can never arise if you have tracking.

Thats damn solid, Freezy.
Theres probably those unscrupulous out there who realize that and try to get something for nothing, as what seemed to be the case in your thumb drive incident.

Since I'm brand new, I have a 0 feedback.

Since I'll be selling mostly books and comics and shipping w/ the post office using media mail, I wonder if they have tracking codes for that?

You know, I worked at UPS in Portland for a few years, and as a boxline sorter for the Skyline area of Portland. I had wrist scanner that I would point and shoot at the bar code that was to track the packages, and keep count, and all that.
I never really thought about the importance of it despite the hundreds of thousands of packages I helped direct to their final destination, until now! .
Of course now the "tracking" and "re-routing" is a big selling point for Big Brown.

BTW, putting "Fragile, Handle w/ Care" on it didn't make any difference on how the packages got handled, or mishandled.
Those were some good times.

[InfiniteNow]

Originally Posted by Racoon

Since I'll be selling mostly books and comics and shipping w/ the post office using media mail, I wonder if they have tracking codes for that?

If it bothers you enough, r-san, charge your buyer a few extra bucks for shipping and send it certified mail.

[freeztar]

I repeat: paypal did not honor my "first-class" receipt from the USPS PO, YMMV.

Other good tips:

-Photos, photos, photos!!! I was selling single kyanite crystals for a little while and at first, they were selling for $1-$3, for nice "gemmy" crystals!!
I started taking my photos with natural sunlit-back-light, and the crystals started selling for $15!! Photos are KEY!!

-State your terms in a clear manner and always state your refund policy. If you don't have a refund policy, then state that!

[Tormod]

Rac, always be corteous and always reply to people's questions and you should be fine. You will have to calculate with some losses but the gains will more than make up for it!

I rarely sell but I buy some stuff on eBay and I always read the feedback for sellers. It doesn't matter if there are a few negatives if I can tell that the person who left it was not being fair.

[Racoon]

More good advice Tormod.
I've had a few questions from peole in Germany and Australia wanting to know shipping rates to their respective countries, and a few other things. I was on my good behavior.

I had one concerned addressed.
How do you get positive feedback, when people are reluctant to buy if you don't have any feedback?
(much like how do you get job experience if they don't hire you becuz' you don't have any job experience)

A friend who I work with on Sundays put in the initial bid for me.He has a very good feedback. Maybe that will get the people "watching" to get moving and start bidding. I told him he still had to pay for shipping if he won.

Thanks for the good advice so far.

[freeztar]

Originally Posted by Racoon

How do you get positive feedback, when people are reluctant to buy if you don't have any feedback?
(much like how do you get job experience if they don't hire you becuz' you don't have any job experience)

Just like with the job example, you have to start small. I'll take the risk to buy from a seller with zero feedback if the item is, say, $10. I would never buy a high-dollar-item from a new seller, but then again I would use Paypal so I'd be protected up to a certain amount regardless of the seller's status (theoretically anyways...).

A friend who I work with on Sundays put in the initial bid for me.He has a very good feedback. Maybe that will get the people "watching" to get moving and start bidding.

Don't get too anxious, most bids come in a flurry right at the end. It's called "sniping" and if you refresh your page over and over in the last two minutes, you should see the bid price go up and up.

I told him he still had to pay for shipping if he won.

Just make sure he doesn't get delivery confirmation.

[Racoon]

Thank you for the good advice so far.
I'm inclined to tell you about my recent experiences..

I easily sold my first 3 items.
1 to a cross-town friend.. My first positive feedback.

The next to Mimi in Germany .. she said I was the best E-bayer she ever had! friendly and fast (over 100 feedbacks on her ) I mailed her a little bonus after we decided on how she would like to be shipped..

The third one paid, but hasn't commented yet. Perhaps the media mail hasn't arrived yet. regardless, he got an added bonus and shouldn't complain

Always Better to exceed expectaions!
I was a waiter for some years, and understand salesmanship.. however, through Internet, the game is quite different. You don't know who you're dealing with and from more far off places...

So far so good.