The (still?) unanswered eBay question

I've read so many books on starting an eBay business, and yet I still don't have an answer to this: how on earth does anyone successfully sell physical products on eBay?

1.) I spent weeks researching every dropshipper and wholesaler I could (real ones; had to get a business tax ID, source the products through the manufacturers), and yet...

I couldn't find a SINGLE product that had a lower price than the completed auction listings on eBay. Not once. I don't get how this is ever possible. Which brought me to...

2.) Going the clearance/garage sale route. It seems to be a catch-22. Either you find a great deal in an antique store or garage sale, buy it, get it home and find out it doesn't sell, or only sells for about what you paid for it, or...

Find a hot-selling set of items on eBay, and HOPE you can find a good clearance or garage sale source for it.

Any links to some good articles on this problem? Any tips?

 

I think you actually answered your own question. The market is so saturated with people doing this that margins are squeezed to a point of not being worth it.

The only way you can really do it would be to try to buy excess returns from a place like this: http://www.liquidation.com/ or too actually make/manufacture something. If you can take piece of a product and assemble it into something more unique you make be able to scratch out a living by being different, like beaded jewlery or something.

 

yep. eBay is a lot harder than it sounds. Very saturated, very competitive, very complicated. Lots of fees.

Maybe I just didn't try hard enough but I pretty much gave up on eBay

 

i never even started. i took one look at the competition and threw up an ad in the local supermarket. no fees, though admittedly smaller audience. it still sold


(btw, 'it' was a snooker table)

 

Finding those products is the key. A few years ago I found a niche that wasn't saturated, and while there were other competitors, I dominated the niche on ebay. I had daily UPS pickup at my house, constantly receiving shippments from my supplier and shipping every day. The margins were slim, so volume was the key. I'd end up masking $10-15 per item after all the expenses, and frankly, that wasn't enough to warrant the labor to manage the orders and ship. I had great sales, lots of volume, so from the outside it probably looked like I was one of the eBay success stories. I soon tired of the labor and have gone on to more profitable ventures that don't require the cash outlay or labor.

 

Yes, it is very hard to compete with some of the sellers on ebay.

the product types have endless competition, and if you find a niche with no competition there is probably very little interest and you won't get good sales.

You might want to take a look at the ebay "want it now" listings to see what people are trying to get a hold of.

 

I can provide dropship sources from any category, send me a pm for more info

 

Thats why so many people have stores, such as ecrater and a few others... Ebay is just high fee's and competive.. Sorta like the real world lol

 

Yeah . . . the only way I ever made money on ebay was by selling infoproducts.

 

Actually sourcing the products ist hard
Whats the pain in the butt is ...

1 paypal the seller protection scheme is CRAP
2 the buyers, ie.. sell a watch at $1.00 they expect a Cartier and complain.
3 non paying buyers
4 the uk postal service their motto should be "you send it...we loose it"!!

I was a power seller for a while but the whole thing pissed me off so much i stopped.
There are easier ways of making money.

 

How true! I also was a powerseller, but gave it up after losing my patience too many times.

 

Interesting post. I started selling on eBay in 1998. A pair or Ralph Lauren Dress shoes. Sold em in 7 days for about 20 bucks less than I paid for them a year eariler. Not a bad deal I thought.

Since then we (wife and I) have become powersellers and have seen eBay change a lot. Last year we did 50k+ in revenue. Sounds good right, but after paying eBay's multiple ever increasing fees, Paypal, Postal service, paper, ink there was not enough left for me to consider this worth the time and effort.

Most of the post here sum it up. eBay requires several hours of work everyday. Your time is spent, creating listings, snapping photos, constant product reasearch, answering questions about product listings, packaging and shipping etc.

• Dropshipping is risky because you are not in complete control of the process and its your reputation , not thiers.
• Reselling items from liquidation.com can work but requires lots of ongoing research and cash on hand.
• Government auctions, Garage sales, bankruptcy sales, been to all of them and alot of the time the pricing is often based on eBays sell prices for the same or similar items.
• Read all the materials that you can before starting but experience is the best teacher

In my opinion eBay serves three primary purposes:

1. It is a great introduction to ecommerce and its challanges. You will be much better prepared to run your own ecommerce business after a year or 2 on eBay as a seller and buyer.
2. Great marketplace for someone selling products that they created (i.e. informational, crafts, cat5 cables)
3. Great for business owners with products they need to liquidate

 

Agreed! Can any of you give examples of these info products that people sell?

In my opinion eBay serves three primary purposes:

1. It is a great introduction to ecommerce and its challanges. You will be much better prepared to run your own ecommerce business after a year or 2 on eBay as a seller and buyer.
2. Great marketplace for someone selling products that they created (i.e. informational, crafts, cat5 cables)
3. Great for business owners with products they need to liquidate

[/QUOTE]

 

I would agree with Ebay being a saturated market and it is very hard to make a profit.

I have been a power seller on Ebay for several years now. I have tried selling lots of products in lots of different ways and over time it become apparent that it is not worth it for most items.

1. Margins are too small and the time it takes to list different items (unless you are super efficient and use turbo lister or something like that) your better off working doing something else.

2. The item you have to sell must be obtained for an extremely low cost or you will not make money on it.

I have a particular product I have that no-one else can get. I have it made especially for my store and have the rights to make it. It is a very popular item and people even get into bidding wars over the item. I make a good return on the cost it works out to be 100% mark-up if you average it out. Which is fantastic I think for ebay. About a year ago someone else started selling the same sort of product just a little different in design (damn I hade competition) it totally cut my profit margin as there was twice the amount to choose from and profit dropped in half or less, from $450 to $170.

I waited a good 8 months for him to run out of stock presuming he could not get more and it was a runout item. He did eventually run out and now I'm back to making goo profits again.

So even if you have a successful business on ebay it is possible that someone undercuts you and you loose it overnight. I had the luxury of owning several Internet businesses and it didn't affect overall income.

 

Here's a couple of options:

Goto eBay and search "information" across on categories.

I have an article related to this on my blog. PM me if interested.

 

Yes, same here. That why the research is an ongoing part of an eBay business because once you produce something that works, you will have competition in very little time, I'm surprised it took as long as it did for you. Ive seen it take as little as a few days.