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For some reason I feel compelled today to make some notes on my eBay philosophy and process. This is very non-comprehensive since Jay & Ryanne’s FAQ really has most of the nuts and bolts stuff.
Buying:
– Getting good inventory for a low price is the key. Other tasks are *necessary* (e.g., can’t sell what you don’t list), and some, like taking good photos, may get you a premium for your items. But none have more upside potential at the margin than Getting. Better. Stuff. (10x better photos won’t get you 10x the price; 10x better inventory will.)
– Buyers are willing to pay more, “on average” (don’t ask me to formalize this yet), for professional items that help them make money, than for luxury items.
– Sellers are willing to part more cheaply with highly specialized things, because (unless they are sellers or end-users themselves), they can’t use them.
– Never buy something that needs repair unless you (a) can sell it as-is, (b) are REALLY looking forward to how much fun it’ll be to repair.
– “Consumables” are often overlooked and underpriced. E.g., you probably won’t get that fancy saw for cheap, but the box of saw blades will likely go for a song, and you may be surprised how much it fetches.
– When buying in quantity, especially when paying significant money, the principal thing to assure yourself of is not the sale price, but whether the item sells *at all*.
– Lot up cheap items you have in quantity, until you feel good about the price you’ll get per transaction/shipment.Where to source:
– Anywhere you can find stuff that is worth your time. If you’re not finding that stuff, relentlessly search for a better venue until you do.Researching:
– Learn to price items in the field accurately with your iPhone, so long as you can do this without offending the seller. You’ll avoid a lot of junk inventory that looked good at the time.Listing:
– Make your listings a little more honest than seems necessary. Be blunt in the condition notes, don’t soft-pedal anything.
– Take good photos, but you don’t need to bother going from good to great. Same for descriptions.Shipping:
– Buyers will pay lots of money to ship good items.
– With enough ½” bubble wrap and kraft paper, you can pack pretty well anything. Buy it in rolls; yes it’s a little bit expensive but so is your time. In general, buy some shipping supplies instead of constantly wasting time scrounging. Get a box resizer.Customer service:
– Remember that you have parted with an item you didn’t want anyway, whereas the buyer has parted with their hard-earned money.
– Be understanding. Try to resolve the situation with partial refunds for disappointed buyers. Don’t get bogged down with these incidents, but move on to the next sale. -
I really like this one: “Make your listings a little more honest than seems necessary. Be blunt in the condition notes, don’t soft-pedal anything.”
We also learned a long time ago to just bluntly state any problems. Buyers will still fall in love with items and know what to expect. The worst thing is to set expectations for a flawless item and then send something that has problems.
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Thanks for the list – the researching on the phone is one of the “newer” tools that all us scavengers have. I’m sure 10% of my purchases prior to smartphones were bad ideas I could have avoided with a little on the spot research!
Also agree with the condition description – nothing makes me more furious then buying something with an obvious flaw, and my least favorite sellers are those who have very easy items to test and list them as “untested”. All “untested” means to me is that it is not working and you are hoping to sucker someone to buy your item if all it takes is plugging it in or other less than 1 minute setup to make sure the item works.
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I do sometimes run into items that I really can’t test though. My current thinking for them is as follows:
(a) Apply balance of probability: does it look like it ought to work? Was it bought in a context where one would assume it would work? Does it at least power on?
(b) Is it extremely heavy to ship?If it’s worth much more used than for parts, and I think it probably works, and it’s not too heavy, then I list as used. But in condition notes, I write in “untested, full refund if it doesn’t work”. That way the buyer knows that it might not work, in case they had a time-sensitive purpose in mind for the item.
If it’s either too heavy or I think there’s a good chance it doesn’t work, it gets listed for parts.
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