Making big Money with Membership sites

Your Monetized Membership Site Set Up Today.
 
People love to be a part of something, to be included. Look at all of the chat boards, forums and discussion groups that are online. How many do you participate in? Do you realize that you can make some serious money by using the same principle and creating a club?

It doesn't matter that you are new to the Net, don't know how to create a web page or that you aren't even an expert at something. This is as easy as it gets.


What Are You Good At And Enjoy?
 
Personally, I love food. So, for demonstration purposes let's build a membership site around food. I don't have to be an expert on food to have a club or membership site about food. I just have to present a place for other people that love food to meet each other and exchange
information that is special enough that they want to stay month after month.

Lets Break the Topic of Food Down Into Smaller Parts.

Appliance cooking

• Bread machine

• Crockpot cooking

Baking

• Indoors

• Outdoors

• Campfire

• Solar oven

Canning

• Water bath canning

• Pressure canning

Fermenting

• Beer

• Brine

• Kefir

• Kombucha

• Pickling

•  Vinegar

Gardening

• Container

• Herb

• Hydroponic

• Organic

Grilling
Indoors
Outdoors
Naturopathy (healing with food)
Salads
Smoked Preserved Foods
Soups
Storing food

You get the idea, I could go on for a week.

Go to Yahoo Groups and find groups that address the 'parts' of your topic of interest. You are looking for the largest groups that have an obvious leader or mentor and whose membership is very active. You don't need to include all of the groups at once, but find three or four that are
complimentary to each other and join the groups. In this instance, I found:

1. A Doctor of Naturopathy who describes his free membership site as a herbal remedies list that has a complete set of files on most herbal remedies, their formula and preparation and is for those of you who are interested in total healing using herbal remedies, nutrition, and all natural methods including "LAUGHTER" ;-). The good doctor's group has a very loyal following of 6,532 members at the time of this writing.

          The doctor's personal web site shows that he also retails the remedies that he
          teaches about and has a couple of books to his name for sale.

1. The second group has a very loyal following of 6,137 (30 of which have joined this week). He has a very active list of proactive people that are obviously expanding the list by word of mouth.
   This list was initiated to discuss the art of preparing traditional Kefir with Kefir-Grains. They welcome members to discuss other cultured food-products, some of which in fact, are explained throughout the list owner's extensive web site. He encourages the discussion in relation to health-related attributes of cultured food-products also. He has a book on the topic and sells the starters for probiotic cultures.

1. Our third group is a well published author with 9,637 members whose group is described as follows. The original e-mail resource for recipes, encouragement, tips and discussion for once-a-month cooking (OAMC), make-ahead meals, feeding the freezer, bulk cooking, freezer-meals, mini-sessions, Mega-cooking, or just general cooking ahead.

1. The fourth group contains specialists in organic gardening and have a faithful following of 6,057 members. Friends talking about their homestead: gardens-orchard-vineyard-flowers-herbs-fruit cellarschickens- goats-honeybees-stocking up-compost-recipes and selfsufficiency. See how simple it is to grow your own organic produce, and learn how to feed your family healthier. 

Once you have found a few experts in your area of interest that compliment each other, but don't compete, study them. Read the messages that have been posted, go through the files and see:

• What is missing that you can contribute to the group

• The perspective of the list owners

• The attitude and perspective of the list members.

You can add more 'experts' as you grow. Adding an expert at least once a month should help to keep your club members and existing experts in the club.



Now the Fun Begins!

Start your own Yahoo group cross pollinating the groups that you've joined and call it a club. Do you think that our doctor would like to sell his remedies to the 21,831 members of the cultured food, organic gardening and recipe groups? Do you think that the other three group owners would like to sell their wares to the lists of the doctor and each other?

Sure they would!

Invite the owners of the other groups to join free, tell them that you would even like to showcase them on your club site, tell them that they will be the expert in their field here and are encouraged to sell their wares and promote their web sites. Go on to offer to upload all the files
from their file section to yours as a courtesy and give each expert their own file area. Then send them out to tell their lists about the new club in town that is showcasing them.

Keep your dues low, it's easier to get 200 people to pay $5 than 5 people to pay $200. The smaller the amount is the more likely the members are to stay in the club month after month. And our purpose is to build passive residual income. That is to say that we are going to build this once and get paid month after month.

The four folks in our example groups have combined lists of 28,363 people. If just 5% of them join our 'club' at $5 a head that's an extra $5,675 income this month... that's $189.16 per day. It took me less than 15 minutes to find these four, if I apply myself for another half hour there
is no telling how many 'experts' I can find... that come complete with lists, to join my club and promote it to their lists.

And no, the 'experts' I bring in do not have to have a Yahoo group. I have one chef in the cross-hairs that has his own active forum and over 48,000 members. Google your interest as well as doing a Yahoo search for the 'experts' in your field.

Back toYahoo...
Yahoo groups are very easy to set up. Just log into your free Yahoo account and click the link that says Start A Group. After that you will be walked through the process of setting up your group (club) one question at a time.

Now, here's a few things to think about.

In the Manage your group area of your Yahoo group:

• You can set your Yahoo group page to show or not show how manymembers you have. I would not show until the numbers were impressive.

• You can show or not show member profiles and contact information. I would choose to not show, because you want your club to be the only means of communication between members and faculty.

• You can set the site to accept anyone or you can qualify them. I would qualify them and give the payment link in an email to them to qualify... by paying. :o)

Setting Up Your Payment Method.

Go to PayPal and set up a free business account if you don't already have one. Once inside of your account find recurring payments. I would love to tell you where it is, but they like to move things. It should be somewhere in Merchant Accounts in accepting website payments. Make sure that you keep track of the payment information to send to your clients.

Draft an e-mail with the payment information and welcome to copy and paste into your Yahoo group post area. This will automatically be sent to the applicant when they ask to join your club. Once they have paid, you will receive notification from PayPal and can manually approve the person in the management area of your group. Again, they will be sent an email to welcome them automatically. You can customize this letter too in the management area of your group.

You want to be very active in your club. As the owner you will need to give something to the membership on a regular basis. For instance in this case I would probably give them a weekly menu of things that are very delicious and extremely good for you... as well as a grocery list for the week. In that weekly e-mail I would also suggest items to purchase that I receive a commission from if they do, such as a particular pressure cooker to help them prepare nutritious meals more quickly.

I like to do things once and get paid for a very long time so I would make 52 menus and put them in an autoresponder set to send a message once a week and be done with it. I use the autoresponder service at A1eBiz for all of my lists. Yes, this does cost $20 per month, but so far that's the only expense you have with your new business venture.

As for items to sell the club members in the autoresponder messages simply go to ClickBank, set up a free account, then go to the Marketplace and search your club's interests. I found 109 cookbooks alone there, not to mention other cooking items that are on the market.

Remember to Google your area of interest for items that offer affiliate programs that are not paid through ClickBank. You have to be a little careful here. Offer purchasers a bonus that requires them to send you the email receipt for the purchase. If you don't receive the commissions from the company as you should, then you can forward these email notifications from your purchasers and request your commissions. This is something that you have to keep on top of to really benefit from any more, but well worth it if you have the time.

Another way to make money from your club is to compile the information that is freely shared in each thread of the posting into e-books and sell them cheap to the membership. One lady does this and doesn't even cut the posts, she just copies and paste the whole thread into a pdf file and sells them for $5 each to her list members.


Start Spreading The Word...

Tell your other lists, post information in forums and other groups that you're a member of. Tell your friends and family, about your super-duper 'club' and your already elite membership. A lot of groups will allow what is called a signature file. That means that when you post to a group you
are permitted to list your web site or Yahoo group under your name. Not all groups allow this, so know which ones have rules against it. If you are allowed to use a signature file, take advantage of it.

Send out a press release each time you get a new expert. There is a press release generator and over 9,000 live links to local newspapers in the U.S. and Online press release sources. There are also live links for advertising venues in the same place.

As you can see this is a very easy process, that requires no previous Internet expertise. It's just people working together to the benefit of all. You can have your club set up and generating a steady monthly income by following the steps above in just a matter of a couple of hours. By
being active in your club and promoting it on a consistent basis you should have a very healthy income stream.


Now, rinse and repeat... what else are you good at and enjoy? Nobody
said that you could only have one club. ;o)

Continue reading →

How to Get Massive YouTube Traffic

Note:

The example quote in this Article is regarding adult files, but do not upload any adult file on ShareCash, it is against the ToS. You can use these tips and tricks on your normal video uploads, these can be implement on games video, fashion industry, cheats, keygens, musicvideo etc. infact you can use this guide for all kind of videos you gonna upload on youtube..

I will try to be as short as possible, without any bullshit techniques, i have seen paid youtube

reports trying to explain how to watermark a video, or 20 pages of explanations how to upload a video on youtube, that's lame.

I will not include here simple things like how to download videos from youtube, how to

watermark them, or how to upload videos to youtube. If you feel that you need help with these ones, please ask and I will do my best to help you out.

Gaining views to your video

Importance of Titles:

• Make money online - very bad title
• Make 100 000 $ online - it is better
• How i made 100 000$ online - it is even better
• How i made 101 437$ online in just 2 weeks - i would say this is the best

• Sexy girl - very bad title
• Sexy girl stripping - better
• Sexy girl stripping for you - even better
• Sexy girl stripping in front of a policemen - i would say this is the best

 

Keep in mind: do not use generic terms or generic numbers for a title, since that would not be credible. Use more exact details and people will pay more attention.

Other catchy phrases: Oh my god, THIS is insane, the WORST signer ever, usually demand attention from user. Be sure to include capitalization in your title, but not a full title written in caps letters. Just highlight the most important ones.

You can also use misleading titles: For instance you upload a trailer, but say:

“See the FULL movie here” People will enter to see the video like crazy.

Or, lets say you have a simply sexy strip video: You use phrases like the one mentioned above:

“Sexy girl stripping in front of a policemen” even if your video may be just a simple strip one.

The idea is to make the visitors watch the video. Later in the report you will see how you can benefit from it.

Importance of Tags

Write as many tags till they will tell you that you have reached the maximum number of

characters possible. Simple as that. You can search for an existing video according to your

niche/video over the youtube and here you can use the Tags used by others. So this will give

you a idea that how you can shuffle good tags to get your video go viral which will produce

more and more views for you.

Importance of Description

First thing your description should contain your url with http://www in front of him Then press

enter 4-5 times.

Shitload of text here, take one of those keyword research tools that generates results on an

input keyword and copy paste plenty of text here. So far, youtube search engine is based on

descriptions but it does not penalize word spam so to speak. This will drastically improve your rankings in the youtube search engine.

Importance of Video Thumbnail

At youtube the thumbnail is just the picture from exactly the middle of the video. Pay attention to this, a bad thumbnail can spoil your video. On the other hand, there are people who got thousands of views just from the fact that they used a misleading but appealing picture in the

middle of the video, which appeared as their thumbnail.

Be the first to upload

One of the secret of gaining youtube views is to be the first one to upload a potential viral

video. For instance, be the first one to upload a new trailer of a movie or of a game. Be the first one to upload the highlights from champion leagues. Be the first one to upload the latest celebrities’ spoofs. Try to take new videos from other websites and upload them fast to youtube.

Use the youtube search feature and choose to rank the videos by the most recent uploaded. There you can see potential gem videos. Take them and reupload them and use proper tags description and titles to make them viral and surpass the original video. You can use the same method but at another websites: see the most recent uploaded videos.

and reupload them at youtube with proper tags.

What i do. I search youtube for new sexy videos, when i see something good i download them and reupload them using extremely well defined tags, titles, and descriptions. After this, I go back and flag the original uploaded video from different accounts as being adult and breaking youtube TOS. Youtube removes that video and there is plenty of space for me to gain the views. Another trick from here: Have an established youtube account, old and with plenty of views. This way, if you upload a shady video, your account is not going to get banned, just the video will be removed.

If a new account uploads an adult video and is flagged, youtube tends to ban the account as

well not only the video. If an established account uploads an adult video and is flagged, the

video is removed, but the account is not deleted.

Another benefit of established youtube accounts is that you appear more often on related

videos, or more videos by this user and you get more exposure.

How to get honours on youtube?

I have seen recently this only technique being sold for 19$. It is very simple and can be made in 2 different ways:

The first one is to purchase a software on the market that auto comments and auto rates on your video. Tube automator, or tubeinator as I remember where doing this. You may want to check out in the forum for these scripts as well. You will get plenty of comments and 5 star rates on your video, so your video is going to be honoured as the most voted and the most discussed within its category.

The second one is too make multiple accounts and comment and rate your video manually. This might sound very hard, but the reality is that you need very less comments and stars to get featured as many people do not bother with this. It is useful sometimes as it can give your video straight thumbs up, but it is not an earth shaker.

Another thing that you can do is to appeal to the people sentiments in order to comment and

star your video. For instance, if you have made a video about your dog, say in the video, if you liked this dog please rate and comment. If you put a sexy video say, if you like her, please rate and comment. If you have put a movie trailer, say if you have seen the movie, please rate and comment. This will increase the conversions to your website.

Now, as a matter of fact what are the videos that are usually viewed and go viral:

• sexy
• funny, comedy
• drama = shock, bad accidents, stuff like that
• cute = babies, pets, etc..
• latest games, movies, shows etc.
• Why ONLY youtube? There are plenty of other videos websites.

How to convert viewers into visitors:

There are several facts that need to be keep in mind

First one: COMPLETELY watermark the video with your url. This means from beginning till the end, not just beginning, not just the end, not just in the middle.

Completely. Because there will be other people who will just take your video, edit it and

remove your credits, and then add their own credits in order to gain traffic. By completely

watermarking the url, you avoid this.

Second one: Make use of the TOS restrictions in order to drive traffic to your website. For

instance youtube videos forbids the adult videos. You can just take a soft sexy video, and at the end of the video, say: “Youtube TOS forbids us from showing more. Please visit our site to see more".

Or you can just take an adult video, cut the introduction part where there is no nudity, and

upload that one, with the same message. This is REALLY a killer, you will get plenty of traffic using it. Most of the users are looking for adult videos on youtube, but they can not find them. When you will display such a message, be sure they will become your visitors. You will learn more how to monetize the traffic and this kind of traffic later on in the report.

Or, another example: upload a trailer of a movie, this is legally, and at the end say:

“In order to see the full movie online, visit www.etc.com”. You will later learn how to monetize this kind of traffic.

Third one: Give them just a little of what they want, and at the end of the video redirect them to your website to see everything. For instance, let s say you just upload a video of a kid walking on a street, when a bus is coming towards him. STOP it before the end, and display the message: YOU wanna see what happens next? Visit www. Etc. com.

Another example: Upload a video of a people near a lion, crocodile, elephant, everything.

Suddenly, the animal is getting nervous,- you can get plenty of such video on youtube, - and

starts to attack the owner. You stop the video before the attack and say: You wanna see what is next? Visit www. Etc. com.

Another example: lets say you just downloaded the highlights from a famous soccer game, all the goals and misses everything. Lets say the score was 3-2 . Cut the video and make separate video for each goal. And then upload each goal with the message at the end: if you want to see the full highlights and the other goals, visit us.

The examples are countless. You can check in the forum and share ideas with other people about what work, and what does not.

Fourth one: Prolong the end of the video and watermark it with your url. What does that

means? It means that at the end of the video , there will be like 30 seconds of a background

and just your url displayed there. Why is this useful? Since at the end of the video, youtube and other websites display advertisements or related videos thumbnails. IF you just made a video trying to send your visitor to your website, and he sees those advertisments, he may be distracted. By putting a black blackground just with your url on it, you assure that nothing will distract your viewer, at least for the time he is looking there.

Thanks for reading this Article, I hope now you can give it a try according to this guide and can gain traffic. Make more and more youtube accounts, upload n re-upload the same video on all of your accounts with different title and tags. 

Good luck,

 

 

Continue reading →

Make money Selling on eBay

How To Start Your eBay Selling?

Just about everyone has sold items on eBay or knows someone who has. Most people sell items they have in their home or garage that are of no use to them any longer or they are moving and need to clean house. Earning a few extra dollars selling their usable junk is fun and doesn’t take much time out of a persons day. Right?

What if you decided you wanted to go a step further and make selling on eBay a small business venture. Could you earn enough to give up your part-time job or maybe pay for the Harley Davidson motorcycle you’ve had your eye on for the last year?

Yes, you can earn an income selling on eBay and compete with the big

companies.

Knowing where to start is the first major step to embracing the concept of running an eBay business. The tools you need to begin an eBay business are:

•  A computer and printer
•  A digital camera
•  An account with eBay and PayPal
•  Some type of merchandise

Before you take that first step with your new eBay business, contact your city and/or county sales tax division. Most counties and states require you to file with them and obtain a sales tax number. You may need to collect taxes from your eBay customers on their purchases and you may have to file for sales tax collection every month. You can set up your sales page on eBay showing the customer that sales tax needs to be charged and collected. After an item is purchased, sales tax for that particular state will be added to the total bill. There are people who don’t claim their income or collect taxes on their sales from eBay. This is very careless and dangerous. No one wants the IRS knocking at their door.

After obtaining information from the city and/or county regarding your business, you have one more decision to make. Do you want a separate bank account just for business expenses and income? This is a decision each individual must decide for him or herself. I would suggest you open a separate account so money affecting the business would not be mingled with your household expense money. You will eventually need a business

account as your eBay sales grow and your income increases. This is a concern you could discuss with a CPA or tax attorney.

Set Up the Ebay and PayPal Accounts

The first step is to register with eBay and PayPal by opening an account if you don’t already have one. I can’t stress enough that you should read all the rules and regulations set forth by eBay and Paypal. You need to follow the guidelines to have a successful business. Both eBay and PayPal have excellent tutorials on running an online business and you can find unlimited information on the web regarding selling on eBay. There are also classes you can take that instruct you on running an eBay business. Do your homework and get the facts before making that first business sale.

 

Find Merchandise To Sell

After setting up an account on eBay and PayPal, you need to decide what you are going to sell. Selling your unwanted household items, your stock will eventually be depleted and selling your ex-husbands possessions is not a good idea. You need to find your niche or market. Do you have an interesting hobby that could lead to sales on eBay?

What do you have a knowledge of that people want? Is there a need that should be filled? Selling items that you are interested in or knowledgeable about helps but don’t limit your sales to these items. With a little research, you can become quite knowledgeable on any topic.

Obtaining merchandise to sell can come from many different sources. Most beginning eBay business owners don’t have thousands of dollars to invest in merchandise. Obviously, you need merchandise to sell to make money but you need money to buy merchandise to sell. To start your business from the ground up with no capital takes imagination and ingenuity.

How about sticking $50.00 in your pocket and hitting the garage sales early Saturday morning? You would be amazed at the items put out for sale under $5.00. Look over the merchandise and keep in mind what will be valuable for resale.

You don’t want to purchase large or bulky items (too expensive to ship), or would you purchase any item that was illegal to ship.

Remember to look at the merchandise with this in mind: 'who would want to buy this item and what would they be willing to pay'? If it cost you $3.00 to buy and $4.00 for shipping & handling, what is the minimum profit you are willing to make?

Don’t forget you have eBay fees that will have to be paid for the posting of this item for auction and depending upon payment type, you may have PayPal fees. If making $3.00 profit is okay with you, then figure out what your eBay fees are and set the selling price. Remember you are trying to purchase items for quick resell to fund your business. You could reasonably visit 5 or more garage sales in one morning. The earlier you

arrive at the garage sales, the better the selection.

Flea markets are another great avenue to visit for eBay merchandise. Once again you need to have an idea of what is marketable and what price you can place on the item.

One good draw of the flea market is they will probably have a large quantity and may give you a discount if you buy in bulk. So if you find a great item for $4.00, you could ask for a discount if you purchase 10 or more.

Always check the quality of the item and ask yourself, “Is there a market for this”. Do not think you can buy high end, name brand merchandise for just pennies on the dollar. If someone at a flea market is selling Chanel No. 5 for $15.00 an ounce, walk away from the dealer and do not look back. He isn’t selling the real Chanel and you don’t want to do business with a fraud. You never want to promote any item on eBay as a brand name that isn’t genuine. Your reputation as an honest business owner is at stake and there may be legal issues involved as well. Buy from honest sources and remember the old adage, “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is”.

Stores that have “going out of business sales” are a good place to look for merchandise for eBay sales. Once again you need to know what is hot on the market and what price people will pay. If you find a store that specializes in Christmas items going out of business in August, hurry on in. Good quality Christmas cards, lights, decorations and figurines bought

cheaply can be resold for a nice profit. Just remember, offering people good holiday merchandise at a low price before the holiday season is smart business.

Depending on sales and promotions, you may be able to pick up some real bargains at Kmart, Wal-Mart, Costco or Sam’s Club. Each of these stores buys in volume and always has some price breaker offerings.

These price breaker items are often called loss leaders (they are sold below cost) and they are used to generate sales for higher ticket items. This is a common practice in most retail stores today, especially the big box stores. If you spot a great deal on a loss leader, buy as many as you can afford and resell for a few dollars less than the other eBay seller.

Once your eBay business has started making money, you can snatch up good buys and sit on them until the demand rises.

Example: You are able to purchase 1000 small American Flags for $50.00 during a February sale. You buy the flags and hold onto them until the 4th of July and sell them for 50 cents each. You’ve made a nice profit for yourself with very little work. The flags were easily stored and you only tied up a small amount of money for the 5 months you held the flags.

Always think ahead and plan for the next big sale.

Buying in bulk as stated earlier can be profitable. You need to have storage space for the merchandise where it will be kept clean, dust free and easily accessible. Also if you buy good quality merchandise, it may be stored for months or years until the demand is up for your item. If you purchase 100 Christmas placemats, don’t worry if they don’t all sell this

year. You can always store the placemats until next year and market them a little earlier than other eBayer’s market their Christmas wares.

Any item can be recycled for sell as long as there isn’t an expiration date.

There are many “Wholesale Warehouses” that sells merchandise in bulk.

You need to do a lot of investigation before signing up with these wholesale distributors. These wholesale companies may be located in the US or may be located overseas. Ask questions before signing on the dotted line. You certainly don’t want 1000 coffee makers arriving every other month on your door step. Know what type of merchandise you are

ordering and when and how it is shipped. With some of the wholesalers, they keep the stock in their warehouse and direct ship it to your customer (for a charge) when you make the sale. This is pretty convenient for you as the business owner. Buying from wholesalers is not for the start-up eBay business but you do need to keep this in mind as your sales

increase and you have some capital to invest in more merchandise.

When you are first starting out selling on eBay, the items you sell may be inexpensive (you can’t afford to stock the higher ticket items) which means you will have to sell more items to earn $100 a day. After a few weeks in business with more capital in your pocket, you may be in a position to sell more expensive items which equates to fewer sales to maintain your earnings goal of $100 per day.

There are other ways of earning money on eBay besides selling merchandise. Do you have a service that can be offered on eBay? How about ghost writing (no, I am not referring to Alfred Hitchcock) or offering a “How To” e-book on a subject in which you are proficient or have an interest in. If you could write an e-book on an interesting topic and sell it for $9.99, you would only need to sell 10 books to earn $99.90 for a day. 

There would be no trips to the Post Office and no worry about replenishing products as they sell. Material for an e-book could be obtained from doing web searches on a chosen topic and then compiling your information. Remember you are not re-inventing the wheel; just

presenting it with a new cover.

Another opportunity for earning money selling on eBay is selling other peoples wares. This can be profitable for the experienced eBay seller.

Note, I said “experienced” seller. I do not suggest a beginner using this method as there are many pitfalls which a newbie might encounter. If a beginner thinks he wants to venture in this direction, I suggest you read, “Don’t Get Burned on eBay” by Shauna Wright.

Okay, we’ve discussed obtaining the merchandise to sell. Now we need to proceed to the next important step. How do you market your wares?

How to Market on eBay

Before you list your first item on eBay, browse through the site and look at other seller’s products. Examine the pictures of the merchandise they are selling and read the descriptions of the items. What do you like or dislike about the seller’s listed auction? What caught your attention and made you look at that particular item instead of the other 1500 items that were listed in the same category? Critique other seller’s listings so you can apply your new knowledge to your own auction.

Four rules that should be followed are:

• Take clear, bright pictures of the item you are selling (using a tripod to ensure the pictures are in sharp focus).
• Write a concise description of the item that is for sale.
• Write a concise description of the item that is for sale.
• Disclose all defects that the item has; do not try to hide any imperfections.
• Never misinform or lie to a potential buyer.  

Rule number 1 is pretty obvious. Have you ever scrolled down an eBay page looking at some items for sale? If the seller hasn’t posted an image of the item in the gallery, I don’t bother to click on the item title to see what is there.

If a seller can’t afford the 35 cents to post an image in the gallery he is obviously not motivated to sell his wares. Likewise, have you ever been interested in someone’s listed item but the picture is so blurred or out of focus you can’t really see the product? Sometimes, the picture is so bad, you can’t tell what they’re selling! You want to show off your item to catch a prospective buyer’s attention so please take clear pictures.

A few months ago I was browsing through weight lifting equipment on eBay. I had a weight lifting set that I planned to sell and I wanted to get an idea of what people had to offer. I ran across an item that listed gym equipment for sell for $20,000 with no pictures and just a brief description. I noticed the seller was new (this was their first listing) and I felt a little sorry for them and emailed them with some advice. I advised them they needed to insert some photos of individual equipment and maybe a photo of the whole gym. I explained that with them being new to eBay and auctioning equipment for such a high price and no photos, no one would bid on their gym equipment. I offered this advice in a friendly manner and the person did email back and said there was too much equipment to photograph and they just couldn’t list everything that was for sale.

Needless to say no one bid on the gym equipment and the seller still had to pay the eBay fees for running the ad. You would think they learned their lesson but a week later the same ad ran again with the same results.

Some Important Rules to Help Your Sales

The first important rule and the best advice I can give a newbie eBay business seller is get organized.

After you have purchased your merchandise for auctions, take a couple hours or days and photograph each item. Then write a clear, informative description of the item. Doing this ahead of time will save time and you will be able to place all your merchandise up for auction whenever you desire without having to get the camera out or tax your mind with

writing. This will become important as your business grows and your time is limited.

Rule number 2 and 3 should be self explanatory. Let the potential buyer know exactly what they are bidding on. Give them all the pertinent details of the item up for auction and if you don’t know the make or model year, let them know. Also, disclose any defects or blemishes the item may have. Don’t try to hide a defect or scratch as this is dishonest and may lead to an unhappy buyer. Treat your buyers as customers.

Rule number 4 should be followed in all your everyday dealings. Don’t lie to anyone you’re doing business with. You want to grow your eBay business and the best way to do this is by selling a good product at a good price and treating people fairly.

Tools for EBay Sellers

There are many tools you can utilize to help market your wares. You can find some of these tools for free on the web and others you need to purchase. There are hundreds of E-books offered on the web to assist beginning eBay sellers and there are classes offered at an affordable price. It may benefit you to save the money you earn selling your own cast-offs and take an eBay class before beginning your business venture.

Gaining knowledge is an asset to any quest.

There are even computer programs available to aid your research on

eBay. They can help you to determine:

• Whether a product will sell and for how much
• Ways to increase a listing´s chances of selling
• Ways to boost your profits on each listing
• Market trends for your specific product
• The size of the market and your specific competition   

Get Items to the Buyer

After you have made the sale, you need to ship the item. One important lesson is to learn how to calculate the cost of shipping for items. It will not benefit your business if you charge the customer $3.00 for shipping and it cost you $5.00 to ship. It is also very bad business to gouge the buyer with high shipping costs.

You can purchase a small postal scale to weigh your items. You can calculate shipping costs based on the weight of the item by using UPS, FedEx or USPS web sites. For heavier items, use a bathroom scale and weigh yourself and then weigh yourself holding the boxed item. The difference will be the weight of the boxed item you plan to ship.

Having boxes, tape and packing supplies available is a plus. To save time and frustration, it is best to have a shipping box ready for the item you are auctioning. This way you can have the item packed and ready to attach a shipping label on the box. I once sold a target, compound bow that I was no longer using. The odd shape of the bow made it hard to pack so I looked around for a couple of weeks until I found the right size box for shipping. (I could have taken the compound bow to a UPS shipping center and let them pack it for me for an outrageous charge).

After finding the right size box and packing up the bow, I listed the item on eBay and it sold in 2 days. As you can see, it was smart to find the right size box before putting it up for auction.

Sold items need to be mailed off as quickly as possible to the customer. The more positive feedback you receive from customers the higher your rating will be. The higher you’re rated, the more trust customers have in you.

 

Dealing with Dissatisfied Customers

As with any business that deals with the public, you will have unhappy customers.

Whether it is the quality of the product they bought, the time in shipping transit or the price they paid, customers will complain. You need to resolve the complaint as fast and efficiently as possible. It is much better if you and the customer can resolve any issues by yourselves. PayPal does have a Buyer Protection Plan which is suppose to protect both buyers and sellers. Notice, I said “suppose” to protect sellers. It really protects buyers so I suggest if you sell anything over $25.00 (or whatever amount you decide you can’t afford to lose) to add shipping insurance in the shipping and handling that you charge the customer.

That way if a customer says the parcel was lost or damaged, you can recoup your money.

A claim of a lost item may mean you refund the customers purchase price (less shipping and handling) or give them a discount on a future buy. How well you resolve the complaint may pay off in sales in the future.

Once again, read “Don’t Get Burned on eBay” by Shauna Wright for great

insight on eBay selling.

Summary

In review, the steps needed for a successful eBay business are:

1. Read all tutorials for eBay and PayPal
2. Register with eBay and PayPal
3. Select suitable merchandise
4. Photograph and write up description of item to be auctioned
5. List the merchandise for auction   
6. Ship auctioned item to bid winner  

One of the biggest mistakes a newbie eBay seller makes is not reading the rules and regulations for eBay and PayPal. I mentioned this at the beginning of this article but want to stress its importance. To make money selling you must follow certain guidelines which will protect you and your earnings.

Setting your goal of $100 a day in eBay sales is viable. You need to research your products and plan for this business to succeed. Don’t be afraid of making mistakes or failing, just work hard to reach your goals. When you have those first sales under your belt you will know what it feels like to be a winner.

You can earn an income from selling merchandise or services on eBay. Earning $100 a day is not unreasonable and after a month or more your earnings could certainly increase.

Happy eBaying

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