eBay Buying should be fun!

Greg Holden is the author of several books about eBay, including ‘How to Do Everything with Your eBay Business’, and ‘The Collector’s Guide to eBay’.
He also recently met several eBay millionaires, hoping to find common threads in their stories which would be of help to us mortal eBay sellers.
The eBay millionaires Greg interviewed were all aged 30 or less. And each of them grossed a million dollars or more on eBay in 2005.
Two women who run Express Drop, the drop-off store, just sqeezed in with gross sales of $1.02 million. Since their eBay revenue is shared with their consignment clients, and they have premises overheads, it’s fair to say that their profits were a little less than $1 million.
However, David Wirtenberg of Outrageous Diamonds grossed $4 million eBay sales in 2004, and he projects 2006 sales as being $8 to $10 million. And Chris Rush of HiFi Sound Connection grossed $5 million eBay sales in 2005. The chances are pretty good that each of these gentlemen made more than $1 million in profits.
Although PowerSellers who are at the Gold or Titanium level have achieved a high level of success, that doesn’t mean they are out of the ordinary. Greg found them to be just regular folks who are not really so different from you or me. Most of them started out with little or nothing and made the best of the same opportunities we all have on eBay.
So, what is that sets these young millionaires apart from the rest of us eBayers? Here are some of the things Greg I learned:
Choose your relatives wisely
Yes, Greg knows you can’t really do this, but he suggests you look to see if money really is growing on your family tree. Many of the eBay millionaires he met had relatives who were themselves entrepreneurs or had some experience in business. They called on those relatives for a helping hand when they were starting out. David Wirtenberg got some pointers from his father-in-law, who was in sales and marketing. Chris Rush started with a $10,000 loan from his grandfather to purchase his initial inventory.
Mentoring isn’t just for college internships
Even if your family can’t help in your eBay business, perhaps someone else can. Dan Glasure of Dan’s Train Depot started out in the cleaning business. His father helped get him started selling trains and other collectibles on eBay. After his father passed away, Dan called on two of his best customers for help - one a billionaire, the other a business professor - who helped him draw up some formal business plans.
Don’t imitate the Lone Ranger
Greg found that one of the biggest differences between the eBay millionaires and the rest of us, is volume. They deal in hundreds of sales a week, thousands per month. Marat Denenberg of Narro Corp. sells as many as 80 pieces of computer equipment each day. Some hire employees; and they rent or purchase warehouses. Many of them also do something that’s within the reach of most of us: they sign up with one of the auction service providers that helps them sell. Mordy Eisenberg of GSM Cellular works with ChannelAdvisor. Eran Dekel deals in such high volume that he was able to set up a discounted shipping arrangement with UPS. Other sellers Greg interviewed work with providers like Zoovy, Infopia, and Marketworks to help them build volume.
Be open to selling on consignment
Greg found that several of the eBay millionaires specialize in selling items on eBay for others. Adam Hersh, 27, is one of eBay’s most successful Trading Assistants. Tiffany Tanaka, Ellen Navarro, and Amy Mayer run eBay drop-off stores. If you’re just starting out and don’t have a lot of your own inventory to sell or can’t find a wholesale distributor, selling for other people can help you build up positive feedback and become a PowerSeller quickly.
Many of the millionaire sellers Greg met agreed that eBay is a great place to start your first business, no matter what your age and level of experience. So, although those selected for Greg’s interviews were relatively young, don’t think you’ve somehow “missed the boat” if you’re on the upside of 30 - I’m double that, and still like to think that I have a kick! So my advice is to think positive, learn from the success of these young entrepreneurs and you can become a more effective seller.

You have probably read plenty about niche marketing on the internet - but what does it really mean? This article takes a look at niche marketing in its context as an eBay shop based business.

eBay: who would have thought ten years ago that this little project of Pierre Omidyar’s, started in his living room, would now be the global phenomenon it has grown into? Many things have changed in the last ten years and opportunities for business online have mushroomed to the extent that there’s now almost ‘too much information’. One thing that seems to baffle people who want to get on the eBay bandwagon - and it’s nothing to do with the mechanics of having an eBay account which, let’s face it, are pretty simple. No - the real stumper for many people is this: what do I sell? What do I trade in? And what’s the best way to get exposure for my goods?

These questions are not asked by the casual eBay member; the one who wants to sell off some unwanted household goods or hold the online version of a garage sale. That type of trading, although still massively widespread amongst the eBay community, is not what niche marketing is about. In fact, it’s not what an eBay business in 2007 is about at all.

I personally don’t know any eBay millionaires but they doubtless exist and let’s get one thing straight: eBay did NOT make these people rich - they made THEMSELVES rich. They had the savvy to see that eBay is what it is - a superb turnkey operation simply begging to be taken advantage of. They learned how to take advantage of the plethora of tools and reports that eBay waved in front of them, tools that elsewhere could well have cost a fortune. And do you know what? You can do exactly the same! It’s just a question of learning how to use the eBay system.

One of the must-knows for anyone setting up or operating any trading business is this: know your market. What do your customers want? Where are they? What do they want to pay for your goods? These are questions that all business owners must know but, before that, before anything, you must know what you are going to sell. What is your stock-in-trade? Where will you buy it from? What investment do you need and (and this is a really important one) - how are you going to get those products in front of these potential customers that your research tells you are champing at the bit to buy from you?

In a redbrick business there are several avenues to market - direct mail, yellow pages, mailshots, catalogues - all tried and tested and all ranging from quite expensive to ruinously so. Just try pricing a minute of prime TV airtime - but have the smelling salts ready! On eBay things are a little different - simply get an eBay shop.

For those who don’t know what an eBay shop is, in some ways it’s a return to the old virtual shopping mall idea of the late ‘nineties, with all the pros and none of the cons. The virtual malls were a good idea let down by clunky servers and snail-speed connections. By contrast, an eBay shop is quick, easy to maintain and, importantly, easy for your prospective customers to use. It’s also inexpensive and will put your goods in front of more prospective customers than you could ever realistically hope to contact by other means.

Where an eBay shop can really come into its own is when you have your own website. Why? Simple. Your eBay shop can easily be embedded into a page on your site - where of course you can offer other goods or services and have targeted ads such as Google AdSense on the page, giving you more opportunities to earn income. An eBay shop can be as simple or as complex as you like and can grow as your business and experience does. Many people start off by selling products that they are interested in - a niche interest! But there are many, many niches within the eBay marketplace and ways of discovering them do exist - unfortunately these are beyond the scope of this article.

eBay shops are ideal for those niche businesses I mentioned above. If you want to sell pottery figures from Wade - great! Bakelite inkwells - no problem! I’m not saying you’ll ever make your fortune doing this but the important thing is that you will ‘cut your teeth’ in a real business environment - and there are enough niches for all. Maybe you’ll spread to a broader product base and make your million after all - maybe you’ll just have a very nice niche business that you understand and are good at. It’s all up to you!