The Home-Based Bookstore: Start Your Own Business Selling Used Books on Amazon, eBay or Your Own Web Site [Paperback]

Steve Weber (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 23, 2011

Want to know the most profitable, lowest-risk idea for your home business? It's selling used books online, which is growing 33 percent annually, according to a November 2005 study by U.S. publishers.

Here is the complete text of the most popular book about online bookselling of all time: The Home-Based Bookstore: Start Your Own Business Selling Used Books on Amazon, eBay or Your Own Web Site

Learn how to start your business part-time, then work as little or as much as you want. This step-by-step guide, written by one of the most successful and highly rated sellers on Amazon.com and eBay, includes everything you need to know:

-- Where to find books

Find books in your own neighborhood to resell profitably to a worldwide pool of ready buyers. Get the best sources for valuable used books at low prices.

-- Where to sell Learn

How to list your books to sell at the best price on Amazon.com and eBay, and even your own Web store. -- Which books to buy What to look for in fiction, nonfiction, and collectibles to resell at the highest profits.

-- Grading and pricing your books

How to describe and price your books. Learn what buyers are looking for.

-- Handling customers

Tips on handling online book buyers. See the author's time-tested scripts for responding to customer issues. Learn how you can get and maintain high feedback ratings.

-- Fulfilling orders

Easy-to-use ideas for storing, organizing, and shipping your books and handling returns.

-- Automation tools

Maximize your efficiency with these tips on automating your business. Automatically notify customers about shipments, and print postage to ship your books without leaving home.

-- Taxes and legal requirements

How to register your business to obtain the proper permits and be exempted from paying sales tax on your inventory.

-- Exclusive list of wholesale book distributors

Exclusive profiles and contact info for 32 wholesaledistributors of used and new books. Order inventory at up to 90 percent off retail, shipped right to your door.

About the author:

Steve Weber started his home-based bookstore as a hobby in March 2000. Two months later, he quit his day job to sell used books full-time on Amazon.com and eBay, using his one-bedroom apartment in Virginia as warehouse and shipping depot. In the meantime, he has sold more than $1 million of used books to buyers in all 50 states and 31 foreign countries. In this step-by-step guide, Weber tells you how he took $80 in savings to buy his first batch of books, then invested the profits to build a successful business, and how you can too.

--This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

CONTENTS:


~ Why Online Bookselling?

~ Where to Find Books Library sales
Estate sales
Thrift shops
Used bookstores
Remainder distributors
Postal Service auctions
Treasury Department auctions
Book fairs
Bargain tables
Classified ads
Local auctions
Lower priority sources


~ What Books to Buy
Learn to find unusual books
The trouble with fiction.
Textbooks.
Textbooks to avoid.
Nonfiction to avoid.
Other books to avoid
Romance novels
Books by comedians.
Paperbacks
Know what buyers want
How much to pay


~ Where to Sell Books
Amazon Pro-Merchant Subscription
Amazon zShops.
Half.com
Biblio
eBay
Fees.
Abebooks.com
Alibris
Barnes & Noble
A1Books
TomFolio.com
BookAvenue.com
UsedBookCentral
Yahoo Stores
ValoreBooks.com
Your own Web site
White Oak Books
Chrislands


~ Grading and Pricing Books
Condition
Assigning condition.
New:
Like New:
Very Good:
Good:
Acceptable:
As new:
Fine:
Very good:
Good:
Fair:
Poor:
Ex-library:
Book club:
Binding copy
Pricing books
Amazon Sales Rank.
Title Z
NovelRank
Adjusting prices
Clearing deadwood.
Keep working


~ Focus on Service
Feedback
Prompt shipping
Working with the USPS
International shipping
Provide a tracking number
Describe items accurately
Enclose your contact information.
Solicit feedback after delivery
Request negative feedback removal
Problem customers
Feedback on other venues
Delivery mistakes
Your return policy
Your Fulfillment System
Designing your SKU system
Shipping
Tracking customers


~ Collectible Books
Pricing
Condition
Modern first editions
What to look for
How to recognize a first edition
Collector's editions
Children's books
Science


~ Advanced Automation
Pricing and inventory software
Seller Engine
Bookrouter
Mail Extractor
AMan for Marketplace Sellers
BookHound
HomeBase
PricePartner
FillZ
The Art of Books
Readerware
SellerMagic
ChannelAdvisor
BookRepricer
BookSku
Monsoon


~ Wireless pricing lookup
ScoutPal
MediaScouter
FBAScout

~ Online Postage
Endicia
Stamps.com
Click-N-Ship
USPS Shipping Assistant
Shipwire
Other resources


~ Taxes, Legal Requirements, and Records
Monitoring your business's progress
Preparing financial statements.
Identifying receipt sources.
Your business's legal structure
Sole proprietorship
Partnership
Corporation
Limited liability company
Local ordinances
Sales taxes
Income taxes
Supporting documents
Business use of your home
Insurance
Bookkeeping
Hiring employees


~ The Future of Bookselling
A proliferation of sales venues
Google
Opening a brick-and-mortar shop
Appendix 1 Remainder Book Wholesalers
Describing remainders
Remainder stores


~ Appendix 2 New Book Wholesalers


~ Appendix 3 Shipping Supply Vendors

~ Appendix 4 Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA)
Use FBA 'Basic Fulfillment'
Competing with FBA
Drawbacks of Fulfillment by Amazon
Lost or damaged FBA items
Fulfillment by Amazon facts
Long-term storage fees for FBA
Best practices
Smart FBA shipping
Amazon EasySell
Use Amazon as a drop-shipper
Imports and exports
Export items

~ Appendix 5 More Resources

~ Glossary

~ Index

About the Author

Steve Weber started his home-based bookstore as a hobby in 2001. Two months later he quit his "day job" to sell books online full-time. In the meantime, he has sold more than $1 million of used books to buyers in all 50 states and 31 foreign countries, becoming one of the most highly rated sellers on Amazon and eBay.

Product Details

• Paperback: 168 pages
• Publisher: Weber Books; 1st edition (July 23, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0977240606
• ISBN-13: 978-0977240609
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.4 x 8.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (172 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #38,259 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #7 in Books > Business & Investing > Economics > Commerce
  • #11 in Books > Computers & Technology > Internet & Web Culture > eBay
  • #16 in Books > Literature & Fiction > History & Criticism > Books & Reading > Booksellers & Bookselling

More About the Author

Hey, thanks for visiting my page.

I'm Steve Weber, publisher of Kindle Buffet, which is a free website, newsletter, and app that displays Kindle books offered free during temporary promotions. I also have a book called "Kindle Buffet" (Guess what? It's free!). It's one of my several nonfiction tomes about bookselling and collecting, publishing, authorship, book marketing, and social media. You can check out all of my books right here on this page.

I'm from Charleston, West Virginia, and currently live in the Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C.

In college I studied Journalism -- BS, 1987, West Virginia University (Let's Goooo, Mountaineers!) I was pretty green back then, and I figured a career in newspapers was just the ticket for a guy such as myself who enjoyed writing but had no ideas of his own.

After working several years as a reporter and editor, I started a home-based business selling used and collectible books online (mainly on Amazon). Five years later, I wrote my first book based on that experience: "The Home-Based Bookstore." It's a short book but it took me a long time to write it. I'd never written anything longer than 25 paragraphs or so, and had never used an outline since grade school. I still don't know how to use one. Maybe that's why it takes me so long to write, and all my books read like an upside-down pyramid ;-)

Recently I've been fascinated with publishing my books on the Kindle, and all the other great books available. I'm especially keen on checking out each day's free Kindle books, of course. They're irresistable, like candy or free beer. Or, as one Kindle Buffet reader put it, "They're like potato chips. Nobody can download just one."

I started Kindle Buffet in the summer of 2012, and it draws on my experiences in book-picking, interviewing, writing and publishing. I feel like I have a knack for recognizing what other people might want to read, and talking them into doing it. I figured it would take just 20 minutes a day to update the site and, for a while, it did. Just as with everything else I do, it ended up taking about 25 times longer than I'd figured. So these days I've got about 20 minutes left in my day after I've finished with Kindle Buffet.

A lot of people ask me how I manage to do it all. "Steve," they say, "how can you possibly read 60, 70, 80 books a day, seven days a week?"

My reply is always the same: "Doesn't everybody? I mean, c'mon, they're FREE! There's no excuse not to!"

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

238 of 249 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Advice and No Rosy Glasses. Highly recommended December 8, 2005

By B. Marold HALL OF FAMETOP 100 REVIEWER

Format:Paperback

`The Home-Based Bookstore' is written by Steve Weber, who solicited this review from me and supplied me with a copy of his book. I expect this will not influence my review, but it is good for you to know this up front.

Before I opened this book, I posed some questions I thought the book should answer. These questions, with the author's response follow:

1. What are the criteria for choosing Amazon.com, eBay, or one's own site for selling a particular title?

The author clearly prefers Amazon over most other options, although he gives some good reasons for setting up your own web page.

2. How do you pick titles to sell? Some obvious examples, such as Stephen King hardcovers are really poor second hand sellers.

The author gives some very general suggestions on which titles to pick and which titles to avoid. I agree with him almost entirely, although I can think of some exceptions to most of his titles to avoid; however, that is based on special knowledge of certain fields such as cookbooks.

3. How do you acquire interesting titles cheaply? Whenever I browse a second hand bookstore, 99 out of 100 titles are pure junk. I have yet to find, for example, an important out of print cookbook at any used bookstore.

The author provides many good sources, including every one I could think of, plus one or two I did not think of.

4. How do you track your stock so you can quickly determine whether or not you have a title OR where you may be able to acquire a title for a book hunter.

The author gives many useful answers to this question, including some new technology options that really surprised me, based on accessing the Internet through your cell phone.

5. What is the best shipping option considering cost versus speed?

The author gives some very good analyses on the advantages and disadvantages of fast versus slow delivery options.

6. Is there any value to branching out to recordings?

The author never once discusses how to apply his suggestions to other merchandise, even though he does go so far as to consider expanding an Internet sales operation to a brick and mortar store.

One of the reasons the author does not deal with other goods is that marketing books through the Internet is so much richer a subject than I imagined, in spite of the fact that I am a major customer of these services. The amount of software written to support this enterprise is staggering.

In a nutshell, Mr. Weber has given us an excellent manual on how to do this very specialized, albeit very popular form of Internet marketing.

The first sure sign that Steve was not pulling the wool over our eyes was when he stated that while this activity can be really rewarding, it is still hard work. The plus side is that you get to keep all the rewards of this hard work.

Since running a bookstore was always one of my secret ambitions, I really appreciated almost everything Weber had to say about this adaptation of the corner bookstore. If I were to point out any one thing where the author was light on his recommendations, it would be with the fact that I think a person who really knows and loves books in the first place will do much better than the average entrepreneur. I suspect that one could get into real estate investing without a good knowledge of law, carpentry, or finance, but unlike houses, books are something which not everyone knows well. One test for an aspiring book merchandising operation would be to name the leading textbook authors in statistics, economics, symbolic logic, and organic chemistry. I cite these because Mr. Weber makes the excellent point that non-fiction books hold their value much better than fiction, especially current popular fiction. The author does not point this out, but a major exception to this rule should be manuals on computer software. No one has any use anymore for a text on Multiplan, dBase III, or Wordpro.

I especially liked Mr. Weber's recommendation that the reader consider specializing in a particular field, such as cookbooks. This is an especially good suggestion as everyone must eat and so everyone needs someone to cook for him or her. It is also a good field as there is a rich bibliography of out of print cookbooks which most foodies would love to have access to, such as English writer Jane Grigson's catalogue.

While Mr. Weber does not deal with any other type of goods, I suggest his suggestions would work almost as well for records, toys, or collectibles in general, as long as you know your subject.

I am very happy Mr. Weber provided his book to me for review as it is very unlikely I would have found it on my own, and it is an especially fertile plot of ideas, suggestions, and guidance regarding this enterprise. I am happy for him that he got his work into print when he did.

138 of 147 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A real nuts-and-bolts guide to making money December 3, 2005

By Michael J. Edelman TOP 100 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback

There are untold thousands of books on the market that promise the buyer a way to make money. Most just provide an outline, or some ideas that the author claims will produce guarenteed millions, buying distressed properties, government surplus, whatever. Some are by successful business owners, but don't really get into the details of running a business. And some are out-and-out frauds.

This book, though, is almost unique among how-to business books. It's written by a successful busienssman, and it's a real, practical nuts-and-bolts guide to setting up an internet-based used book store. In fact, it's so detailed you have to wonder why the author is going to such pains to help set up his own competition.

There are chapters on where to buy books, what books to sell and which to avoid, how to grade books, the best selling venues, how to describe books, how to set up an inventory system, how to deal with problems- if you can't run a business using this book alone, you shouldn't be running a business, period.

Now reading this book won't guarentee you can make a successful go of an on-line used bookstore; you still need the kind of drive and perseverence that characterize all successful business owners. This isn't something you can make a go of in a few hours a week; it requires dedication. And you need to be flexible; I suspect that this business model won't be profitible forever, as the publishing market changes. But it's a good model for more than just books. I could see applying the same model to other used goods.

If you are, in fact, the kind of person who has the drive and the devotion to make a business work, and you're looking for a good business model to start with, you could do a lot worse than to get a copy of "The Home-Based Bokstore". I strongly suspect that this book will spawn a lot of new Internet entrepenuers.

125 of 135 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Enough information to get you started. November 28, 2007

By Rufus Quail

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

The Home-Based Bookstore doesn't claim to be complete and comprehensive, so it's probably not fair to give it only four stars because it skimps on some useful information.

For example, Mr. Weber recommends giving the customer a tracking number but doesn't make it clear how to get one. I'm sure this is idiotically simple to anyone familiar with postal transactions. That's probably why Mr. Weber didn't give a hand-holding description of the process.

I was clueless. I took my first shipment to the post office and asked for a tracking number. The clerk started pulling out forms for costly and complicated types of service and began to spout arcane postal jargon. I couldn't cope with the information overload so I shipped my books without the all-important tracking number.

My next trip I learned that you have to get DELIVERY CONFIRMATION. Look for the small lime-green form. It has a bar code label (with tracking number) that you attach to your parcel.

I could have used some help with book terminology, i.e., the verbiage to put into the "comments" field of your Amazon listing. If you browse the listings, you see myriad descriptive terms. Is there a right or wrong way to list your book? The book does not address the topic.

The book is rife with listings for pricing and inventory software, online postage services, and the hand-held scanners you can use for automated scouting at book sales. It's puzzling that the author would present these listings without commentary regarding which ones he found useful, or if he used them at all.

The author could have summarized how he was able to quit his job in three months and sell books full time. As others have noted, he generously shares precious inside knowledge, so this might not be a valid gripe. Without this book or one like it, the fledgling bookman would have a harder time getting started.

This manual outlines enough of the basics to get you started. I was able to sell a few books before I even finished reading The Home-Based Bookstore, the book that introduced me to selling books online. It popped up on my Amazon recommendations and I thought "Why not give it a shot?"

Within days of buying the book, the local Friends of the Library (FOL) had a "parking lot" sale. I headed for the sale with high anticipation of launching my bookselling empire.

The "sale" turned out to be a disturbing mob scene. The books are piled into several plastic shopping carts. Scanner-wielding book vendors paw through them frantically, pushing and shoving to gain the advantage. They are like vultures attacking a carcass. A few books spill out of the carts and are left on the ground. Within minutes, the vendors skulk off to their corners to guard their booty.

The Friends of the Library are selling books on Amazon. They have rightly already culled any books of real value. The books causing the frenzy apparently are the dregs the Friends don't want to bother with. They are offered at the parking lot sale for 10 cents to 25 cents, however. If you're not shy about mixing it up with other booksellers, you can make money at a sale like this. That's what one of the vendors told me. All of the vendors were women at this sale, so the risk of a brawl breaking out might actually be low.

I can't imagine myself joining a mob scene, so I all but gave up on getting inventory this way. I had plenty of extra books from my own collection, so I decided to use Amazon to clear some space on my bookshelf. Opening an account and setting up your listings is easy as pie. Within a few minutes you are in business.

I listed books from $3.29 up to $65.00 depending on the lowest price showing. The next day my prices were undercut by other vendors. I retaliated with price cuts of my own. They responded with further cuts, and so on. I eventually stopped cutting my price. The other vendors have (Cyberdyne) robotic software that cuts their prices automatically. The book I listed for $3.29 was later listed for a penny, the result of a regressive bidding war between the robots.

I figured $3.29 was my bookshelf-clearing price. If I can't unload a book for $3.29, I'll donate it to the library. Let someone buy it for a dime at the parking lot sale.

I typed the ISBN into the Amazon search screen to gauge the market for each book. When you come up with 1,356 copies starting at a penny, it's safe to say the market is saturated. I ended up with three crates of these marginal books, destined to land on the pavement at the parking lot sale.

Why not sell my leftovers to a used bookstore? The first one I called said no thanks, "we are overwhelmed with inventory right now." The second place I called didn't really want to hear from me but said they might consider taking some books off my hands if they met their stringent requirements, etc. Who needs it? I took my crates to the library and got a nice thank you.

I sold seven books! Amazon's shipping guidelines actually have pictures showing just how you should address your parcels. You can't go wrong. By my second trip to the post office, I was a savvy shipper, even mastering the DELIVERY CONFIRMATION process.

I gave same day or next day service. My books were in good condition and reasonably priced. I wrapped my parcels meticulously. For my labors, I was rewarded with two 5.0 feedbacks from my customers. Bless their hearts!

I'm going to go on Amazon and find an outfit for a hockey goalie, complete with face mask and helmet. I'll use it as battle gear for the next FOL sale. My bookselling competitors won't know what hit 'em.