Thread: Wholesale and Ebay

Hello Netbuilders,

I've recently set up an account at Sunrise Wholesale and listed several items on Ebay as Buy-It-Now listings. Sunrise Wholesale offers dropshipping and has plenty of stock for most of their items at any given time, so that's not an issue. The problem is that even though the items I listed were good items and were listed for far below market value, not one of them sold. I think the biggest problem is that no one is seeing my items. Does anyone have any tips on how to get better attention to my Ebay listings?

Thanks,
Brandon

Did you do any market testing for your products before listing on eBay?

No, I'm new to marketing. I have extensive experience in content creation and I've wanted to get into wholesale for awhile now but I'm just now getting around to it. What kind of market testing should I perform?

Originally Posted by Brandon Dennis

I've recently set up an account at Sunrise Wholesale and listed several items on Ebay as Buy-It-Now listings. Sunrise Wholesale offers dropshipping and has plenty of stock for most of their items at any given time, so that's not an issue. The problem is that even though the items I listed were good items and were listed for far below market value, not one of them sold. I think the biggest problem is that no one is seeing my items. Does anyone have any tips on how to get better attention to my Ebay listings

Hi Brandon.

How mature is your eBay account? What's your feedback score? I assume it's higher than 5 since you can do BINs. Are you offering free shipping? How long are your auctions? How much competition is there? What type of products are you offering from Sunrise?

All of these things affect how eBay's new listings work. Listings *used* to be displayed in order of close date, but they're giving power sellers & free shipping bumps in the "SERPs".

In short, it can now be *very* difficult to get your listings seen. It may be that you have to work is really slow at first, as you are building up your feedback.

Did you research eBay's completed listings to see whether similar items sold recently and if so at what price? Don't be afraid to make money on your products. You shouldn't have to offer it "far below market value". As a matter of fact, if it's TOO cheap, it may scare people away.

Don't get sucked into the idea that it's worth selling something for $5 over cost if you can move a bunch. As it turns out, you can make a quick buck, but that income source goes away because you destroy the market for it. I can go into more detail on this if you want, but you only have to be $.01 cheaper than the next guy to close the bargain hunters. Being $20 cheaper only means you've lost $19.99.

HTH.

Hey Brad,

My Ebay account is at least two years old, although not used much. I believe I have a feedback score of 8. I offered free shipping on every one of my listings and I've set the listings for varying times. The first listing was set at 1 week but that wasn't selling so I set the others at 5 and 3 day periods to lure in the "OMG, It's running out soon. Let's buy it now" crowd. Sadly, that didn't work either. I've listed a small variety of items:

1. 8 piece knife set
2. wood jewelry box
3. Konaki 4 GB MP3 player
4. Telescope with tripod
5. Cordless Yahoo Messenger Internet Telephone Kit

I didn't do any research on the items beforehand because I'm not sure where to look. Is the only way to find relevant items just to search through completed listings and hope I run into something similar? I listed the first couple of items right at market value plus free shipping, while I listed the later few items far below market value to attract sales although it was still high enough that I would make a minimum of $40-$50 profit from each sale.

Originally Posted by Brandon Dennis

Hey Brad,

My Ebay account is at least two years old, although not used much. I believe I have a feedback score of 8. I offered free shipping on every one of my listings and I've set the listings for varying times. The first listing was set at 1 week but that wasn't selling so I set the others at 5 and 3 day periods to lure in the "OMG, It's running out soon. Let's buy it now" crowd. Sadly, that didn't work either. I've listed a small variety of items:

1. 8 piece knife set
2. wood jewelry box
3. Konaki 4 GB MP3 player
4. Telescope with tripod
5. Cordless Yahoo Messenger Internet Telephone Kit

I didn't do any research on the items beforehand because I'm not sure where to look. Is the only way to find relevant items just to search through completed listings and hope I run into something similar? I listed the first couple of items right at market value plus free shipping, while I listed the later few items far below market value to attract sales although it was still high enough that I would make a minimum of $40-$50 profit from each sale.

Okay, you're on the right track. A higher feedback will help your rankings, but it's not the sole factor.

Your items aren't exactly exciting, but you should get some hits. I wouldn't expect any of them to sell in 3 days though - the less likely someone is going to be looking for an item, the longer you have to have it listed. Why don't you PM me your listings and I'll take a look and see if there's anything that jumps out there.

As far as research, yes, using the completed listing search is the easiest way. There are services out there that correlate all the eBay data and are useful for finding trends and pricing. TeraPeak.com is one I've used in the past.

1. I'd recommend setting your products a few dollars below market value. You've mentioned that you have set your products at market value and far below market value - neither should work effectively. Your eBay account is less trustworthy than your competitors, so why would they buy your product if you were charging the same price? Being by far the cheapest will look rather suspicious.

2. Find a wider range of relevant products. Target a specific type of product. This will give you a look of more professionalism.

3. What does your copy look like? You should be listing more than just blunt facts about the product. Talk to your customer.

4. How many views are you getting? If you're not getting very many, this could mean two things. a) your product is not wanted b) your product is pretty competitive. Assuming the second option, you might consider purchasing featured listings.

5. Try offering a bonus with your product. If that doesn't work, try selling the bonus with your product (as the bonus).

There may not be much demand for the products you chose. Are other people selling the same products? If so, monitor their auctions to see at what price people are buying.

If other people are not selling the same products, try using an auction (not a fixed price listing) and start the auction price below cost. This can be used to determine the price eBayers are willing to pay. You will see a lot of $0.99 auctions doing the same thing. Sometimes this starts a bidding frenzy and the price gets bid very high.

I've been selling items on eBay since 1999. Today, it is very difficult to make any real money on eBay unless you have unique products that are in demand. Watch the fees you are paying. After you total up the listing fee, selling fee and PayPal fee, you will find that your cost for selling a product on eBay is between 14% and 18%. IMO, that is too high.

Also, eBay auction add-ons, such as multiple category listings and gallery images can raise your selling costs considerably. Do not use these unless you have plenty of profit margin.

A lot of people have been burned by crooked sellers on eBay. Cheap items sell well, but buyers are generally very cautious about buying anything that costs more than $50.