Selling on eBay

Virtual Retail may indeed be new to eBay, however we have many years experience in advertising and completing multi million pound deals. We have therefore created this guide to assist new buyers and sellers with their eBay experience. There is no real set criteria to determine whether a buyer or seller is genuine, the only real way is to do your homeworkand check them out yourselves. If you went into a high street store looking to buy a large item, would you buy the first one or look around at compariable products? Consider the same approach when using eBay and you should be fine and enjoy your eBay experience.

General Information

You will notice guides on here stating 'check feedback', 'if less than 100 then avoid' and various other claims that to be honest, are way off the mark. A good example is a company that sells widgets, assume they sell over 500 a day on eBay and one gets lost out of each batch posted, surely when you consider that over the space of a month the seller will have on average 15,000 positive feedback versus the 30 negative feedback for the same period. Does this make that seller a risk or bad 'eBayer'? Not in the slightest - its actually reasonably good and very justifiable. Royal Mail admit that for 15,000 items sent a small proportion such as 30, going missing is acceptable and they will take that risk. Therefore as buyers or sellers on eBay we have to consider taking a similar approach and be more open and understanding when it comes to buying or selling online.

Granted, most people say 'why should I, i'll just go elsewhere', but this shouldn't always be the case. For example, we are new to eBay but have been trading worldwide for many years and have a wealth of buying power so we can sell expensive items at less than 50% of the RRP. Does that mean we are not genuine? Of course not. We probably have more experience in large business deals than 75% of the stores you see on eBay but this does not mean we are better than them and likewise does not mean they are better than us because they have a higher feedback score.

Top Tips

Many people first try selling on eBay because they want to clear out their unused items or clear the garage/loft space andbecause they just fancy giving it a go. Very few start out to sell on eBay professionally from day one but it does happen and you should therefore take this into account when you consider buying from a new member.

Before we explainthe selling process, firstly ask yourself whatdo you intend to sell, why you think eBay is the best venue and what do you want to get for your item? Experience and statistical analysis suggests that you should look into naming your item properly, have a realistic view that eBay may not be the best venue and also that you may not get the price you actually want.

Top 10 Considerations prior to selling on eBay

Before you start selling there are a number of things to consider.The main ones are shown below;

1) Do your own research: Do you want to be stuffing jiffy bags with CDs/DVDs or sell larger electrical/homeware items?Each have their own practical aspects and their own pro's and con's. For example how towrap, how to ship and any after salesservice you may offer. You will need to consider the space that you have, for example a spare bedroom or garage.You willbe surprised just how quickly you can fill that space. Do you want to start small and grow your business, or are you going to start big and go for it?

2)Your eBay user ID:Will your user name reflect what you sell? Or would you rather a catchy sounding name? If you are a company try using that, although websites such as test.com will not be allowed.It is entirely your choice just so long as the name is available.

3)Growyour Feedback Score:There are lots of guides stating a minimum number of feedback as being trustworthy. This is not the case whatsoever.A minimum of 25 positive feedback sounds good but what if that person is new, genuine and just wants a quick sale? If they are willing to give a phone number, have a website/store or are well known then forget their feedback score as their own reputation speaks higher than any score eBay can provide. Remember you get people trying to deliberately mess a feedback score by bidding, not paying and leaving negative feedback just to discredit the seller - its sad but it does happen!

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