• Welcome from Brian McGregor
• 1. Thought for the Day
• 2. If You're Selling on eBay, Here's Why You Should open an eBay Store/Shop
• 3. How to Keep Bidders Glued to Your Auction Listing
• 4. News & Views:
  Instant Display of Your eBay Auctions on Your Website or Blog
  Talking About Fun - Could You Fly a Helicopter?
  Cutting Out the High Shipping Cost Game
  Money for Nothing? And I've Proved It
  Finally - So That's How It's Done!
• 5. Someone's Auctioning What???
• Back to Newsletter Archive

If you're already selling on eBay, and you have a steady supply of items to sell, you're missing out if you don't have an eBay Store/Shop. (I'll use the term eBay Store from now, but this applies to UK eBayers where it's called an eBay Shop).

Here's why...

1. More opportunities to sell

Just because you're thinking about opening an eBay Store, you don't to stop putting your items up for auction! An eBay Store simply allows you to get your products in front of people in another way.

I would suggest you list 80% of your items in your Store with 20% as auctions, from which you can drive drive more visitors to your Store.

2. Better automation means more free time for you

It's much easier to automate daily eBay chores with a Store. There is far less effort involved in relisting unsold items, asking for feedback, and keeping track of your stock. The result of more effective automation is that you have more time to grow your eBay business.

3. Additional communications channel with buyers

When you have a Store, you can create your own store newsletter which eBay will send out on your behalf. This makes it very easy for you to stay in touch with your bidders and customers, and make additional offers to them or inform them of your new items etc.

All you do is add a link at the top right corner of your Store page that says, "Sign up for Store newsletter" -- and then eBay will automatically send people notices about your latest specials and products for sale.

4. More exposure = more traffic

Unlike your regular auction listings, your eBay Store effectively has a constant presence on the internet. Your Store home page and your Store category pages stay on there.

The benefit to you is that these pages can get indexed by the search engines! And this can bring you additional traffic, from outside of eBay.

5. Low Store fees equals more profits for you

Once you've invested in the modest monthly charge to own a Store, $15.95 (£6), all other eBay fees are far lower than auction style listings.

For example, if you run a regular auction listing for an item that is priced at $24.99 (£12.50), the normal listing fee is 60 cents (35p).

That same item in your Store will cost only 5 cents (7p) to list. Also, the Final Value Fee (FVF) is lower. Instead of the 10% FVF rate eBay charge for a traditional auction sale, the equivalent is only 5.25% when you sell the same item from your Store.

Is it worth investing in an eBay Store. Well, you'll have to do sums yourself. What I can tell you is that if you sell 20 or more products per month, it's definitely worth doing the calculation.

I was in the check-in queue for my flight to Mexico, when I felt a hand clamp down on my shoulder. That moment was to change my life forever.

Did that get your attention?

There's nothing better than a story to pull the reader in, and keep them reading right up to the end.

A recent phenomena on eBay is the increasing use of story style listings. These are proving to be highly successful for sellers.

How much would you guess an opened pack of Pokemon cards costing $4 would fetch on an eBay auction? Two, maybe three dollars?

Well, thanks to using the storytelling methodology, this seller made $142.51 from the sale of that Pokemon pack of cards.

This eBay auction became so well known, that it was seen by 179,257 visitors. Thanks to the entertaining story created by the seller, the auction became a story in itself.

Now, I know we can't all be brilliant story tellers. And I know too that many sellers use automated re-listing devices once they have an auction that runs successfully. But it seems to me that we can all learn something from this.

For selected items, if we spend a little time to create a personal story around what we're selling, it could be that we can make much more by the end of the auction.

Who knows, you could be the next Pokemon card author!

By the way, here's THAT Pokemon auction:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130144061675

Could you do better?

http://togo.ebay.com/


Talking About Fun - Could You Fly a Helicopter?

Here's a game you can play. Watch out, it can become addictive!

See if you can beat me. My top score is 2539.

http://www.hurtwood.demon.co.uk/Fun/copter.swf


Cutting Out the High Shipping Cost Game

One practice which really annoys me is where sellers offer items at low prices but massively inflate the shipping costs which are often hidden in their auction somewhere.

Pretty soon they won't be able to get away with this as eBay rolls out its new "Price & Shipping Sort" search option in September.

This new option sorts search results according to the total cost of the item, including all shipping and handling charges.

Also, according to eBay, items listed without shipping costs stated in the Shipping Cost field will show up at the bottom of search results pages.

Keep your eyes open for this sometime in September.


Money for Nothing? And I've Proved It

Here's something I've never seen before in all my years on the internet.

If you have a blog or website, here's a way in which you make money from EVERY visitor to your page. They don't have to buy anything, or click anywhere.

You get paid every single time you get a visitor to your website or blog. It's extremely easy to use.

And here's a neat twist. I've installed this on some of my eBay auctions which get high numbers of viewers. This means I get paid for every visitor to my auction page, whether or not they buy or bid!

Like I said, Money for Nothing.

http://www.workwinners.com/moneyfornothing/


Finally - So That's How It's Done!

Have you ever wondered how the pointer on your screen repositions itself when you move your mouse?

Here's how.

It takes a little time to load...be patient. It's worth it.

http://www.1-click.jp/

Nothing surprises me when it comes to internet auctions. Amuse yourself with some of these beauties in our monthly trawl through eBay's auctions.

Get your order in early...

But will it go through the letterbox?

Could be useful for the canine Olympics

But what's your wife for? (just kidding ladies!)

A levels? Just look at the auction title!

Disclaimer - I have no association with any of the sellers of the above items.