How I Built A Successful Ebay Store

I have been dabbling in online marketing (MLM, Network Marketing, Direct Sales) for the last few years now and initially struggled with a successful business model. I almost got to the point of giving up on my other endeavors because I was spending more money than I was making when I came across Ebay. Honestly, things were bleak and I figured I needed to find a way to start selling off belongings to make some money and I decided to check it out a little more.

Prior to that, I had never considered myself a sales person and really never thought I'd be selling products of any kind in an e-commerce store. Fast forward a couple of years and my Ebay store was the only thing making me any money. It really didn't take much convincing that this was the way to go when I started seeing sales happen. Initially I started with odds and ends around the house and when I successfully sold Play dough and vintage fishing lures, I knew I was here to stay.

I learned early on that there are a few necessary tools needed to successfully start and run an Ebay Store. First thing is actually paying for a store through Ebay. There are many different options depending on the size of the store you want, but to begin with, all you need is the cheaper option the $15.95 subscription.

Additional Store Fronts: Now, if you are up to it, you might consider creating a separate store with the same items so that you double your e-commerce web presence. A great website for that is ProStores. ProStores is an EBay company and right now they offer you a free month to get your store up and running. You could also do what many do and create your own Amazon.com store.

Products to sell: Once you have your store, you either need to have a lot of stuff in your house to sell, go shopping for things to sell, or choose a drop shipper like I did. For me, having a supplier handle the warehousing the of the items I list was the best option.

I chose to use Doba and have been very satisfied with their services. When I got started I did not have a lot of capital to use to purchase things to sell in my store. Doba allowed me to list items from their catalog, sell the item, collect payment from my customer and then pay Doba for the product. Doba then drop ships the product to my customer for me using my business information.

Enhance your Listing: Now that you have your stuff, you need to maximize your listings. You can use Ebay's system to create your listing but I have found that there are additional services that provide more freedom and personalization of templates. I chose to work with Auctiva. Auctiva makes managing your listings very easy and you have a ton of creative templates to use. You can even launch a 2nd or 3rd storefront through Auctiva if you choose to even maximize your E-commerce profits even further.

Accepting Payment: When you have your store up and running, and you find items to sell, you are doing to need a payment system to use when you create your listings. There are a variety of sources you can use but I chose to use Paypal Business Account. Setting up your account is free and I just love the ease and convenience of the service. Paypal handles everything to do with payment, is easy to use in case of refund, and even makes tax time easy with the data it keeps of all your sales for your tax records.

Are you already on Facebook? Did you know that you can promote your Ebay store items by linking your Ebay store to Facebook? You Can! Each time I create a new listing for my Ebay store it shows up on my Facebook page and goes out for all to see. As I was learning the process of creating listings I turned this feature off and occasionally, when listing multiple items, I temporarily shut this feature off. I did not like looking at my FB wall and seeing the last 10 luggage items I listed. If you don't mind however, you can showcase everything you list on Ebay right to your Facebook store. You have now just advertised your store and your merchandise and it didn't cost you anything.

There are really no tricks to getting your store ranked in Ebay so that you actually show up in searches.

#1. Provide thorough, good quality listings with plenty of information and photos of what you are selling. Be clear about your policies and procedures and really work to answer any questions that might come up right in your listing content.

#2. Have competitive prices. No one is going to want to buy from you if they can get the same quality item cheaper elsewhere. The only time this may not apply is if you happen to be a Top Seller or a Power Seller. Otherwise, there is a lot of competition on Ebay and you need to provide good product, great prices and remain competitive.

#3. Provide Free shipping: If you can afford to provide free shipping without cutting into your profit margin, offer to ship for free. This actually helps you rank better in Ebay and what customer doesn't love to have something shipped for free. This is another area where your customer may be willing to pay a little extra on price to save on the shipping.

#4. Update your store often and keep your products new and circulating. I made the mistake of just forgetting about my store and suddenly found out a bunch of my stuff was out of stock or discontinued. Nothing worse than telling your customer you can't provide something they ordered from you.

#5. Provide Great Customer Service. This one thing alone could help make or break your business. Customer service is as easy as responding to questions from potential buyers in a timely manner. It is also as simple as keeping your buyer updated throughout the whole sales process. I like to let my customer know when their order has been place, let them know it shipped, and also provide a tracking # for their purchase. These little steps alone could make all the difference in your seller ratings.