Rob & Melissa Stephenson from Flea Market Flipper share five tips to make your eBay reselling business successful.
How To Resell Shoes - Interview W/Dealing With Dalton
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Reseller Hangout Podcast - How Do I Make My eBay Business Successful? 5 Tips
Rob: What's up, pro flippers? On today's episode, we are talking about how do you make your eBay business successful?
All right, guys, on today's episode, we are really diving into how you can make even more specifically five ways, five things you can do to make your eBay business more successful.
Melissa: So we want to dive into a couple different tips, a different couple different aspects of your business. Absolutely. That you can do and tweak, to help increase your eBay business, increase your sales.
Yeah, we'll go ahead and dive in. Let's dive in.
Rob: Number one.
Melissa: Number one that we wanna talk about is knowing what your time is worth. So, this is kind of a broader topic, I guess. Yeah. But you have to know what your time is worth so that you know that you're not spending all of this time for little to no profit, little to no money that you're making. So it's very important.
Rob: Absolutely. So definitely take a reflection or just notice what you're selling right now and figure out what are you actually making an hour? Are you selling a $45 items that you're paying $15, $20 for? And then after you're picturing the items, getting them listed, fulfillment, selling the items, getting 'em to the post office, how much money are you really making an hour? Is it one of those things that you're actually not making that much money an hour? Know exactly what you're worth, know what it's worth it for you to find those items and sell and know what you have to get on your profit so your hourly rate goes up. So that's the biggest thing, is really getting efficient with your business.
Yeah. To make money.
Melissa: I wanna add too on the efficiency, efficiency part of it is, we did an interview, with Dalton Lanning, a couple, I don't know what episode it was, we'll have to check it. We'll put it in the show notes. And, and we had him at the Reseller Summit last year. And it was really interesting that he went from doing all of these different kinds of items and scaled all the way down to a niche of just shoes because he could like he could do it, streamline all the pictures, streamline all the listings, and do everything so much faster. So he spent a lot less time, it was a lot less time consuming. Yeah. And you can make a lot more money because he streamlined that. So if you can have, create a system in your business or you're spending less time or you just streamline everything.
So I know exactly how I'm taking my pictures. I know exactly how I'm doing my listings.
Rob: The boxes he only had four boxes to choose from, for all of his shoes.
Melissa: So it just helped him a lot to increase his profits because he is decreasing his time. So like, or time spent. So he is, his hourly rate went up a lot when he could increase his productivity, so.
Yep. It's just an interesting, a different, aspect of that. So definitely know your time though, cuz we get people a lot of times, you know, say, well I, I found this at a yard sale for $5, I can sell it for $10. Is it worth it? And it's like, Is that really worth your time to? I mean.
Rob: No, by the time it's all said and done, eBay fees, time spent shipping, time spent listing and all that, no.
You have to really know what you're worth and that is not enough profit on one single item, right? For you, you're really going into debt. I would say with your time on those items, you can definitely do. But the problem is you're, you're not getting paid what you're worth, so know what you're worth and definitely find those items that really give you some profit.
Melissa: Now, there is a time in your business when you, that those can be very helpful and that is when you're starting out. Like if you're trying to grow your feedback. Absolutely. If you're trying to get your business off the ground and you just need more items, more sales, get that feedback up and, you know, learn from making mistakes or whatever, get those, get those things listed, those are fine to start with. But once you have a baseline, you've, you know, grown your feedback to at least like 50 and you're getting going, you, you kind of have to start to evaluate absolutely our, are these items really worth it? Is it worth my time to make $5? So, absolutely. Cool. So that's number one.
Rob: Let's jump into number two.
Melissa: Number two is to make sure that your items, you're use, you're competitive in your pricing and in your shipping.
Rob: Yep. This is huge guys. You can't put an item on there for $50 more than everybody else who is listing the same exact item. You have to be competitive to be able to sell that item. So you wanna be competitive, you wanna do the research, you wanna see what's available right now, actively on the market, and you wanna see what has sold so you have a good idea of where to price your item.
So you definitely want to be competitive with that price and shipping as well. You either offer free shipping or you're competitive with the shipping rate. The biggest thing is making sure your price is competitive, whether you do free shipping or you're charging a flat rate for shipping, you wanna be competitive so your item is more appealing, than anybody else out there. You wanna try to make that item stick out in some way or another.
Melissa: I will add that if you do are an established seller, sometimes you can, like, if you ever, there's a range of comps you can ask a little bit higher on that range if you have a lot of feedback and you have a hundred percent positive feedback versus point somebody who has, is starting out and has no feedback, you're gonna have to start at the lower end of those comps.
Cause you don't wanna just look at comps and automatically assume, okay, I have to be competitive, so I have to be the lowest. That's not necessarily true if you have to look at the condition of your item and your feedback and your, like what you have in your store. So you can start to price a little bit on the higher end.
Now if you're just here to turn it and go, go, go, like, which is fine too, you can do on the lower end. But some items also take a specific buyer. So it's not, the pricing isn't like being on the lower high doesn't really matter that much. That doesn't help. So, but being competitive and looking at that, and if you do have an item that's sitting there for a long time maybe the comps have changed since you listed it months ago. So double checking that every once in a while is a good idea.
Rob: Absolutely. So, absolutely. Great. Number three.
Melissa: Number three, answering questions quickly and good customer service.
Rob: So this is very important. eBay likes it when you're on platform. They like you to be listing, listing every day if you can. They like all that stuff when you're on platform and they see you on platform. One of the biggest things is when you start to get questions coming in on your items that you have because when you have items listed, everybody you know starts asking you questions, answer those questions as quick as you possibly can.
eBay wants to see that you're very active and that you're getting back in a timely manner, as quick as possible so people can make that decision. When people are emailing you a question, they're ready to make a decision if they're gonna buy it or not. So it depends on, I used to wait a day or two. I wouldn't respond right back to somebody. I would wait until I had time or something like that. Now when I see a question come in, I'm really responding back within five minutes trying to, cuz it's on my phone. I get the notification trying to drum up as much business as I can that way. So, be very prompt with your with your responses to people who are interested in your items and it will help you sell more items.
Melissa: Yeah, which actually goes into number four is good customer service. So that goes into being prompt and, and good with your messaging, but also good customer service on the back end of stuff. If you know something happens and people have questions or something's damaged in shipping and they need to maybe do a a shipping claim, just having that good communication for one. And then.
Rob: That's the biggest thing. Good communication.
Melissa: And good customer service. Yeah. And just being prompt to talk to people on handling anything that happens cuz it's a business, things will happen. But most of the time it's straightforward. Yeah. Somebody buys the item, you ship it out, they get the item.
It's good. Yeah. Every once in a while, it's not so, just having that good customer service can really set you apart. You don't wanna be, what would be the word that I'm looking for? You, you wanna make sure that you're handling any problems that come and.
Rob: And not just problems. Yeah. But even throughout the transaction.
Yeah. Once you get the item shipped. For us, we do freight shipping. Our freight shipping is not it, it's trackable through eBay, but it's not a great system. So it just reaching out once it's shipped and say, hey, the item went out today. It's expected delivery cuz my freight carrier tells me when it's expected to be delivered.
Melissa: And you have to upload the tracking separately.
Rob: Exactly. And my freight carrier is estimating it being delivered on this date. Here's how you track it. Here's the pro number, the tracking number, all that stuff. You give them that and you give them explanations throughout the process. Don't just they buy the item and don't no communication whatsoever, have good communication back and forth with them so it's a pleasant, a pleasant transaction where they're enjoying the transaction, you're keeping them up to date. If anything does happen throughout that transaction, you're on top of it and you're, you know what I mean? You have great communication and it's a great customer service for throughout the whole sale.
So, definitely eBay loves that as well. They're seeing the messaging going back and forth and seeing your interaction. So I guarantee the algorithms will favor that.
Melissa: Yeah, I was thinking about something before you jumped into number five. What's something I wanted to say about the competitive pricing and shipping?
Rob: Oh, cool.
Melissa: Competitive shipping. Like we didn't really talk about that. Like you can play around with going back and forth with free shipping as long as it's built into your price. Or added shipping. We go back and forth because you do a lot of free shipping. Yep. And we build it into our price, but then sometimes some people want to see the lower price plus shipping. So.
Rob: They expect to pay shipping.
Melissa: They expect to pay shipping. So it's like we, we still go back and forth and we test it and there's, you know, you can always test and see what works for your items. But you know, being, checking that out and seeing what works for the kinds of items you're selling your audience, but free going back and forth. Free shipping.
Rob: Yeah. Or, yeah. So I'll break that down a little further. Like Melissa was saying, switching this up. Say we have an item that's on eBay for $5,000 and I offer free shipping on that item. So $5,000 having shipping included in this. This is gonna go a pallet. I know it's roughly gonna cost me between $200 and $250 for it.
Now, I might want to lower that price, say $500 and I might add the $500 into shipping. So when people are searching, they'll see that. I know for me, $500, I'll easily be able to ship anything pallet anywhere in the country that I need to covering my shipping, my shipping quote, and my shipping supplies.
So I can do that. I can take it and put it for $4,500 and then I can do a $499. And add it. So it looks like the overall price is less, but the buyer is actually paying extra for shipping. So, just kind of breaking it down what Melissa was saying. So you lower the price, the overall price, to where it looks more appealing to the buyer.
They're looking like they're paying less for it, and then the shipping's on the back end, which it adds it on once they buy it, so it's one of those things and we go back and forth with this. Sometimes I'll do it and I'll put the shipping in as a flat rate for $499, $299, $399, whatever. I wanna do, and sometimes I'll add it into it and I'll, I'll raise the price of it and do free shipping because everybody's different how their mind works. What looks more appealing to somebody might not look appealing to somebody else. So you wanna switch it up and you wanna really experiment with that to find out the best way to go with it. So, yep.
Melissa: All right, number five.
Rob: Now jump back to number three, but now we'll jump back over to number five, the fifth way that you can actually build that successful eBay business.
Melissa: This is the most important really, I feel like, and it's take action and take massive action, but take action. Get moving, do things in your business. I know like that kind of sounds okay, of course, like, let me, just go take action in my business. But it's true.
Rob: Do things that make you uncomfortable. Yeah, that's the thing. Do things that make you uncomfortable, that are gonna push you to the next level if you want to grow anything. If you want to be successful at anything, you really have to get out of your comfort zone to see the results, and you're gonna make mistakes. Guys, check, check it out. Melissa and I have made plenty of mistakes through our 20 some years in this business, but we learn from the mistakes and we get better and better and better.
That's our, that's our goal with this business.
Melissa: I would say you actually learn more from when something happens to you versus just hearing it from somebody. Like if you actually have I don't know anything that happens in your business and you made a mistake, like you sent the wrong label to the wrong person or the wrong item to the wrong person.
You check your labels a lot closer the next time and it's a lot less likely to happen. Absolutely. Versus, you know, so those mistakes, they just make you better in business. They make you, yeah, learn from them, but also. A lot of people that we hear from, they're afraid to list that first item on eBay.
Like they're, it's just the, the whole analysis paralysis. So I gotta know all the things. I gotta know what could happen, what would happen in this, this, this scenario. And it's, it's just better just to go and do it. Like, you know, it's better to learn by doing so. Absolutely. Take action.
Rob: Take massive action guys.
That is our number five. That's it. Our number five and our one that we wanna leave you with is definitely get out there, do it. You're not gonna get any results if you don't do anything. You have to step outta your comfort zone and get there. So, so what if you wanna learn more about this eBay business, we definitely have something that we can send you to.
Melissa: Yeah, check out freeflippingworkshop.com. So you could check out that we have a workshop to see, if this business in our business model is something that could work for you, you can check it out and we would love to see you there.
Rob: You guys rock. Have an amazing day and we will catch you on the next episode.