Expert: Marvinator - 12/27/2005

Question
I am currently serving in the US Air Force (National Guard) and when i am at home i want to spend as much time as I can with my family. I am 19 years old and have been wanting to start my own business all of my life. Do you think ebay is for me? I do not have much money and have no clue what to sell, so any information on starting a business would be a great help. I cant afford one of those expensive kits to help start a business and was hoping you would help me.

Answer
I want to be able to help you, but to be honest, you have three strikes against you. Let me see if I can explain.  

STRIKE ONE:   You are currently employed full time in the National Guard. This means that you can be pulled away from your ebay business at any time.  It also means that you already are spending a lot of time away from your family.  Add to that the hours involved in running an ebay business and you find yourself away from your family on more than a full time basis.  

It's been said before that Ebay is not for wimps.  Most people feel that to run an Ebay business only takes a few hours a week.  Post the auctions, wait for the money to roll in.  Sorry...Ain't gonna happen.   Let's walk through just ONE auction:  First, and foremost, you have to spend the time to get the item. This means shopping with the wholesalers, knowing your product and even doing the right research to see if it will sell on ebay.  Next you have to purchase it, get it in and make sure it is saleable. You may also need to deal with the seller/wholesaler on items received damaged.  (Let's not even get into any effort needed to get the item saleable, as in repair or cleaning of used items purchased such as collectibles and antiques.)  Once you have the item, you need to take a photo, get the photo from the camera to the computer and edit it.  (Adjust brightness, color and crop for marketability.)  Then you still have to write up the auction, include the picture and get it ready to start.

Once the auction is started, there is still more work to do.  If there are people bidding on your item, you may want to check out these people to see if there are any problems, not to mention regular questions which must be answered in timely fashion and professionally.  (How professional can you be when someone asks "What color is this blue shirt?" or even such odd questions as "Is this the other one or have you understood that this is not what needs to be?"  Yeah, these are real questions I've received from real sellers!)   

Once the item sells, you will take the time to send an invoice and track payments.  (Not all bidders pay immediately upon receipt of the invoice, so you will need to check on your email regularly waiting on payments, check the snailmail for payments and even send polite reminders to those who have forgotten.)  Once the payment is received, the item is then carefully packed and shipped.  Are you done yet?  No, sorry.  You still must be sure that the item arrives at the customer's place AND wait for them to announce their satisfaction and leave feedback.  (Not all bidders will leave feedback even if politely reminded.)   I've not even mentioned what may happen when someone decided that they want to return the item, or have a problem with an item or just want to be a pain in the....
well you get the general idea: Ebay takes time and plenty of it.   And this is for just ONE item.  

Ok, let's move on.
STRIKE TWO:  You have no idea how to start or run an ebay business and no money to invest in learning how.  I'm not trying to be the bad guy here, but you really have nothing to bring to the table.  Just learning the eBay system is a chore and keeping up on the daily and weekly changes to the Ebay system can be time consuming.  (But I will give you credit for one thing, and that is, you recognize this before you got started.  I can't tell you how many times I've heard people say "I've just sold an item on Ebay, what do I do next?")

So, at least with this strike, you have one thing going for you, and that's the knowlege of your own abilities and the willingness to learn.  The Ebay site map has links to everthing you need to know.  TAke the time to start with the Selling Primer and learn it all. THen go to the Site Map, and click every link just to know what it's for.  Keep notes.  

Then when you've got the system in your system, it's time to play "what if."  Get that family you menitoned to help.  Have them ask you POINTED questions like this: "What if I buy an item from you and want to return it?", or "What if the buyer never pays?", or "What if you sell an item and discover that the dog chewed it up?"  Ask them to get both as serious and as rediculous as possible and no holds barred.  Yeah, you will get some funny questions (family is like that) but you will also find some interesting thoughts in there.  "What way are you going to ship this?"  "Where will you get the boxes and tape?"  "How much will it cost to ship?" these questions will not only cause you to think, but also cause you to get excited because it's another opportunity to prepare youself, do research and get answers.

As a side note, any question which cannot be answered, you can come here to ask or turn to a great group of sellers who like to hang around and help others.  In the Ebay discussion groups and Chat rooms you will find TONS of help and answers already waiting for you to find them!  When you can answer each and every question thrown at you,  this means you're prepared and ready to take on the next step.  

STRIKE THREE:  You have no idea what to sell.  This alone puts your entire Ebay strategy at risk, because with out the product you stand a chance of never getting started.  Ebay is not a place where you just plop something on auction and wait for the money.   

You would expect this to be an easy question to answer.  You'd think that all you'd need to  get is a list of items that sell for lots of money, or sell in large quantity and that would be that.  This is not, however, that easy of a question to answer due to the many variables that come into play on Ebay.  Two people can sell the same item and one will get many bids and the other will not.  What makes the difference are the variables.

First and foremost, you need to know that not everyone can sell the same thing on Ebay.  As above, one person may get bids and the other will not.  I've even seen two people use almost identical auction layouts and one will still not get any bids while the other does.  There really is no cut and dried answer.  

Many of the volume sellers on Ebay were selling these same items before Ebay came along.  These are the wholesale lot buyers and manufacturers that were just looking for a new venue to sell their goods. They knew their product and knew how to sell it.  Ebay was just another step in their sales process.  If you don't already have a product, the field can seem not only wide open, but daunting to say the least.  WHAT to sell is the question new sellers will always ask.

The one thing I tell new sellers is that you HAVE to sell what you know.  If you know a bit about depression glass, then I'd say that's your area to start.  If, however, you don't know the difference between Mayfair and Cabbage Rose, then you're going to have trouble with those items. Everyone knows a bit about something.  You need to assess your own abilities and your own knowledge areas to find those items with which you will do best.

By way of explanation, let me tell you a couple of stories.  A lady I know does her merchandise buying on Ebay.  That's right, on ebay. She peruses the categories where she knows the items in question and looks for those auctions where someone has listed an item and has no clue what they have.  She's found collector plates that she has resold for 5 times what she paid. She's found clothing that she retakes a picture, lays out a better auction and makes more money.  She never leaves her chair, and yet finds things to sell. Is she successful? Most of the time. Could anyone do it? Probably not.  I point out that she only buys those items with which she is familiar, and which she knows will do better if properly advertised.

The second story concerns a girl of about 13 who loved Barbie Dolls.  She had a ton of them at home and decided to sell a few to m ake room for others.  She quickly found that some sold well where others did not.  Being a Barbie fanatic, she knew where to get information on what sold and why.  Armed with this, she goes each saturday to the local Thrift shops and picks up collectible dolls.  Her thriving business makes money on a regualar basis - again, because of what she knows.   

This is the one thing that many new sellers (and buyers) fail to grasp when starting on Ebay.  Ebay is a venue.  YOU are responsible for making your auction sell and sell well.   It is much like the local classified ads.  Which ad would you consider first:  "Plate, dog and woman $10.00" or "Collectible Gianni Designed 10 Inch Plate.  1940's era with Woman in Art Deco clothing walking her full sized Poodle.  Plate is in excellent shape and ....."  well, you get the idea.   HOW you sell is as important as WHAT you sell.

As for finding items, the best place to look is your own area.  Check out the wholesalers, lot end buyers, and outlet stores for good buys.  Keep in mind that Ebay is a buyer's market.  Once you find an item, take the time to research it's viability on Ebay.  You can search Ebay for the past 30 days worth of auctions to see if the item has already been up for auction, as well as if it sold, how much it sold for, how much it started at, how many bidders it got and how many other identical items were also up for auction at the same time which didn't sell.  Research can be your best friend in finding your niche.

I know many people who spend their time during the spring and summer going to yard sales and garage sales.  Many Ebay sellers beleive in them wholeheartedly.  Again, the problem here is that you need to know what you're looking at, and what will sell on ebay.  There are millions items on ebay at any given moment.  The probability that any item you are selling is already offered on ebay is quite high. The challenge is to make your item MORE appealing than the others, offer it cheaper, describe it better, etc.  This is how a good seller makes their mark.  

I can't stress enough that the new seller should do their homework.  Researching how much an item will go for will prevent you from ending up with a living room full of  cookie jars for which you paid $9.95 but won't sell for more than 8.95.  Taking the time to find the right supplier will keep you from ending up with an item that is only one of several hundred already being offered on Ebay - and for less than yours!.  Take the time to seek out good sellers and ask them for tips and hints in the selling process.  I can't begin to tell you the horror stories I've heard from people who deal with new sellers who have no idea how to pack a breakable item for shipping, don't have good customer service, take 30-45 days to ship an item, and a hundred other areas of selling that people forget to think about.  

I hope I have opened your eyes  a bit and also didn't scare you too much.  I feel it's my job to be honest in answering questions and yet complete which is why I have people return to me again and again for answers.  I don't sugar coat anything and I'll be as honest as I can with you.  

Thanks for writing.