Tricks of the eBay® Business Masters [Paperback]

Michael Miller (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0789736993 | ISBN-13: 978-0789736994 | Publication Date: September 2, 2007 | Edition: 1

What tricks or tips will you find in this book? Here’s a short list:

 

     •    Plan for a successful business

     •    Determine what kinds of products

           to sell

     •    Find suppliers for your inventory

     •    Manage your inventory levels

     •    Administer your day-to-day business

     •    Create more effective listings

     •    Set the right prices

     •    Handle customer payments

     •    Pack and ship your products

     •    Promote your business

     •    Sell items on consignment as a

          Trading Assistant

     •    Cut costs and increase profits

     •    Expand your business beyond eBay

 

Want to be your own boss? Want to make a decent living selling online? Want to start your own profitable eBay business? Then check out the 101 tips and tricks in Tricks of the eBay Business Masters–the best advice you can get for building a successful eBay business.

 

Everything you need to know about building an eBay business is in this book. From writing a business plan, to purchasing inventory, to choosing a shipping service, you’ll find pieces of advice that will better help you do what you need to do. These are the tips and tricks that the eBay business masters have used to grow their own eBay businesses.

 

Now you can learn from the most successful eBay business people. Learn how to increase your sales–and your profits–with the 101 tips in this book, Tricks of the eBay Business Masters.

 

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1

1 Tricks for Managing Your eBay Business . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5

2 Tricks for Deciding What to Sell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .51

3 Tricks for Purchasing and Managing Your Inventory . . . . . . . . . . . . .89

4 Tricks for Creating More Effective Listings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .121

5 Tricks for Setting Prices and Handling Payments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .163

6 Tricks for Packing and Shipping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .195

7 Tricks for Promoting Your eBay Business . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .221

8 Tricks for Running a Successful

Trading Assistant Business . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .251

9 Tricks for Cutting Costs–And Increasing Profits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .269

10 Tricks for Expanding Your eBay Business . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .291

11 The Ultimate Trick for eBay Business Success . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .323

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .325

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Michael Miller has written more than 75 nonfiction titles over the past two decades, including Absolute Beginner’s Guide to eBay, Easy eBay, Tricks of the eBay Masters, Making a Living from Your eBay Business, and eBay Auction Templates Starter Kit. He has established a reputation for clearly explaining technical topics to nontechnical readers and offering useful real-world advice about complicated topics.

 

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Introduction

Want to be your own boss? Want to make a decent living selling online? Want to build your own successful eBay business?

Others have done it. Others have turned simple eBay selling into a profitable business. Others have figured out how to run a profitable business on eBay.

What do these sellers know that you don't? You'd be surprised; there are a lot of tricks involved in building a successful eBay business.

One hundred and one of those tricks are presented in this book, Tricks of the eBay Business Masters. One hundred and one tricks that show you how to sell profitably and successfully on eBay. One hundred and one tricks that show you how to grow your business into one that provides a full- or part-time income for you and your family.

What kinds of tricks am I talking about? Well, you'll have to read the book to find out, but in general these are tricks that help you plan for growth, locate and purchase inventory to sell, create effective auction listings, pack and ship efficiently, and manage your business and business growth.

Want to know what products to sell? That trick is in the book. Want to find out the best service to use for shipping your products? That trick's here, also. Want to learn how to increase your profit on every item you sell? That's here, too.

Where do these tricks come from? I've garnered these tricks from years of personal selling on eBay, and from observing hundreds of successful eBay sellers over those years. The tricks come from those who've learned how to do it themselves—the eBay business masters who run their own successful eBay businesses.

You can use the tricks in this book as a step-by-step guide to planning and building your eBay business—or, if you're already selling, you can use these tricks to help you sell more and more profitably. Whether you're a big or a small seller, you'll find more than a few tricks in this book that will help you become more successful.

How This Book Is Organized

Tricks of the eBay Business Masters contains 101 tricks for building a more successful eBay business. These tricks are organized into 11 chapters, each focused on a particular aspect of eBay selling:

1. Tricks for Managing Your eBay Business

2. Tricks for Deciding What to Sell

3. Tricks for Purchasing and Managing Your Inventory

4. Tricks for Creating More Effective Listings

5. Tricks for Setting Prices and Handling Payments

6. Tricks for Packing and Shipping

7. Tricks for Promoting Your eBay Business

8. Tricks for Running a Successful Trading Assistant Business

9. Tricks for Cutting Costs—And Increasing Profits

10. Tricks for Expanding Your eBay Business

11. The Ultimate Trick for eBay Business Success

At the end of each chapter you'll find a profile of a particular eBay business. These eBay business masters share their advice and expertise about selling on eBay; they're examples of how it works in the real world. Read and learn from them.

Conventions Used in This Book

I hope that this book is easy enough to figure out on its own, without requiring its own instruction manual. As you read through the pages, however, it helps to know precisely how I've presented specific types of information.

As you read through this book you'll note several special elements, presented in what we in the publishing business call margin notes. There are different types of margin notes for different types of information, as you see here.

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Note - This is a note that presents some interesting but not necessarily essential information about a topic discussed in the surrounding text.

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Tip - This is a tip that might prove useful for whatever you're in the process of doing.

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Caution - This is a caution about something that could prove harmful to your business—so take care!

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There's More on the Web

Now that you know how to use this book, it's time to get to the heart of the matter. But when you're ready to take a break from setting up your new wireless network, you might also want to check out my personal website, located at http://www.molehillgroup.com. Here you'll find more information about all the other books I've written and am in the process of writing. I'll also post any updates or corrections to this book, in the inevitable event that an error or two creeps into this text. (Hey, nobody's perfect!)

In addition, know that I love to hear from readers of my books. If you want to contact me, feel free to email me at [e-mail]. I can't promise that I'll answer every message, but I do promise that I'll read each one!

But enough with the preliminaries. Turn the page and start planning your eBay business!

© Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.

Product Details

• Paperback: 349 pages
• Publisher: Que; 1 edition (September 2, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0789736993
• ISBN-13: 978-0789736994
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.2 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,445,900 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Michael Miller is the best-selling writer of more than 100 non-fiction books. He writes about a variety of topics, including computers, online selling, business, consumer electronics, and music. From his first book (Ventura Publisher Techniques and Applications, published in 1988) to his latest title, he has established a reputation for practical advice, technical accuracy, and an unerring empathy for the needs of his readers.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, November 15, 2007

By 

John Donivan - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Tricks of the eBay® Business Masters (Paperback)

First off, I have a brick and mortar business, and I'm contemplating going online with it. I browsed several books on the subject of Ebay selling, and chose this one - I'm glad I did. Several books are about Ebay generally - how to buy AND sell. Most have general advise about business - bookkeeping, inventory. When you take those factors into consideration, some of them only have a quarter of the book about selling, and then it's too general, anyway. This one has meat - he gets down to the details of how to set it all up effectively. Setting up the actual site, promotion, some run down on the Ebay tools and features. He also has several featured sellers, and profiles of them and how they made it happen, and quite a few URLs of contacts for research and tools. The word "Tricks" is actually just a device to lay out major thoughts - he doesn't pretend they are tricks, just good practice. Good book....

5.0 out of 5 stars Very detailed, September 11, 2009

By 

O. Haraldsson - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Tricks of the eBay® Business Masters (Paperback)

This book was a big surprise to me. I expected few tips I did not know about but I got much more than I expected. The book is very detailed and mentioned bunch of things, tips and tricks I was not aware about. I have many ebay books but I have to say, this one is outstanding.