Selling on Ebay-Get Started in 7 Easy Steps

Ebay auctions are definitely the easiest and fastest way to start earning money online. Ebay.com gets over 1.5 billion page views every month-that means ebay takes care of the single biggest problem all internet business owners face-traffic.

With over 9,000 new users registering on ebay every day there's not likely to be a slow down to your business-if you know how to get started. Follow these easy steps to put you on the road to online profits today.

#1: Get an Ebay.com Selling Account, it's free and easy.

#2: Decide what you're going to sell. For starters it's a good idea to look around your garage or attic, or that closet full of baby clothes that your little one has out grown.

Baby clothes sell very well on ebay.com-just do a search at ebay.com for "baby clothes" then look at the completed listings for an idea of what sells. Also note the starting bid and shipping costs.

To make a full time business from ebay.com auctions you'll want to expand, but this is a great way to "get the feel" for what sells and how to place a listing.

#3: Take pictures. The old saying "a picture is worth a thousand words" has never been more true or more important than it will be to your auction. Without a picture It's very unlikely your auction will get any bids.

Use a digital camera or scan pictures into your computer. You can upload a free picture for each listing. For any more pictures you'll have to pay Ebay.com a few cents to "host" your pictures, or you can have your pictures hosted at a picture hosting website for a small fee.

#4: Making your listing. This is one of the most important steps of your auction. Log into your account at Ebay.com and it is pretty simple to follow the directions. If you make a mistake in your listing it is possible to go back and edit the listing after you've submitted all the information.

Using html to enhance your listing shows the buyer that you take their bid serious. It can increase the number of bids on your auction. Be sure to research similar auctions and notice when they started and ended. Try to list your auction close to the same times for best results.

Take note of the starting bids in similar auctions as well. Usually people come to ebay.com to find a good deal, so start the bid at a comparable price.

#5: Answering bidder's questions. Sometimes the potential bidder will have a question to ask the seller. Ebay.com has made this very easy. The Bidder posts their question and ebay.com sends an email message to the seller without disclosing your email address to the bidder.

Answering these questions as soon as possible is important to the response of your bidding. Remember this is a potential buyer who has done a search for your item at ebay.com. Their intent is to buy the type of item you are selling. Treat them like a paying customer.

#6: Accepting Payment. There are several ways to receive payment from the bidder after the auction ends. One of the most popular ways is by accepting credit cards through PapPal.com. It is free to set up an account and there are no set up fees for accepting payment.

The seller could also send you a check or if you prefer not to wait until the check clears you could ask that they send a money order instead. State in your auction description how soon you accept to receive payment after the auction ends.

#7: Shipping. Ebay.com has made it easy when you make your listing to put a "shipping calculator" on your auction. All the bidder has to do is enter their zip code within the U.S. and the calculator will give them a shipping price for shipping through U.S.P.S. Or you can state a specific shipping price in your auction description.

Package your items carefully and be sure to put a return address on the box. Also include a note requesting feed back for the transaction.

There are several ways to increase the bid amount on individual auctions, as well as find things to sell as a long term income stream for further auctions.

Jennifer Parks is the author of Selling-on-Ebay-Now.blogspot.com with free information, software, resources, and secrets for selling on ebay.

In The News:
could not open XML input