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eBay Selling and Fraud

By: Alan Biron

Have you heard of people making over $10,000 selling their products on Ebay? For some, online auctions like Ebay are their main, or only source of income. But making money on Ebay isn’t something that can be done overnight. You will need to analyze the potential market, and choose your products carefully in order to maximize your profit.

The first step in order to attract buyers to look professional. When listing your product, don’t describe your product as “Cool fone 4 sale.” Use proper spelling and grammar but keep you description short and sweet. Be descriptive but make sure it is short and to the point. Use high quality photos and make your add attractive, but not so glamoured up that it looks tacky. Choosing the proper category to list your product in is also important. Try to put your item in the most descriptive category as possible. If you are selling a smart phone, instead of listing in the cell phone category, list your item in the Cell phones>Smart Phones category. This will help to attract specific buyers who are interested only in your article.

By performing the proper market research before you list you item is important. Try to view some other similar items to get a feel of how much you should be charging for your product. Similarly it is important to know what the demand for your product is. If you are selling a popular item, such as a PlaySation 3 or Nintendo Wii, you are more likely to get buyers, than if you are selling an item such as a vase. The most important thing to remember when selling on Ebay is to post a picture of the item you are selling. People like to see things before they buy them, and a high quality photo will go a long way in enticing buyers.

Next, you should perform some research. By learning what the demand for your product is, and what the average price it is selling at, will help you determine the most affective strategy when selling your product on Ebay. When people look at you Ebay listing, after looking at the picture, they look at the writing. In order to have the most affective listing, you should spend time creating a well crafted listing that will entice potential buyers. However, it is important to remember that too much reading may turn people away from your ad. The more payment options the better. By allowing potential buyers to pay via credit card, PayPal, personal check, or money order, you are attracting more buyers. If you limit your payment options, you may be losing out on buyers who are unable to pay through your selected payment options

Hopefully, these tips will allow you to create hard hitting and attractive ads that will sell your items instantly. Remember that the more professional your listing looks, the more likely you are to sell your product.

What a dilemma! How do you price your products on EBay. Many sellers know that pricing their product too high will result in their item not selling, but pricing to low and you will end up losing money. So how do you find that perfect selling price that will maximize your profits?

The first step to ensuring the correct pricing for your item is to do some research. Search for your item, and similar items on EBay. By getting a better understanding of how other people have priced their items, you can also charge the same price, keeping your item competitive, Don’t think that you can charge a bit extra and make some more money because most likely buyers will go for other items and not yours. Don’t go onto EBay thinking that you will be able to ask for the full price of your item, or even half the price. If you are selling a used item, you will be lucky to get three quarters of the price you bought it for. Try setting your reserve price, or the lowest bid that you will sell for, at at least half of the price you bought the item for. Of course if you are offering a rare or collectible item, you will be able to charge higher price. Also remember that you need to take into account shipping costs. If your item is selling for $70 but shipping will cost the buyer an additional $30, they may be turned down by the fact that the item costs $100.

Have you ever considered opening up your own eBay store? You may have seen people with there own stores and have wondered what the benefits of having an eBay Store. Like any business, opening up a store on eBay needs to be though out and the pros and cons need to be thoroughly considered.

The main advantage of your own eBay store is the increased exposure. EBay reports that eBay store operators have an average increase of over 25% in sales after they open up there own store. You can appeal to thousands of potential customers when you open up your own eBay Store.

Stores also increase the number of repeat customers you have. When selling as an individual member, other members won’t remember you or the service you provide. By operating a store, people will remember your store name and will refer their friends and family to your store. EBay stores also offer some special features not available to regular users. One of these features is automatic relisting of your unsold items. And unlike a normal posting, you can choose to list your items for 30, 60, 90, or 120 days at a time, compared to the usual 10 days for normal users. You will also increase your credibility by running an eBay Store. People are more likely to purchase goods from a professional looking seller, than just some user posting their items. People will see that you are not going to scam them and that you are reliable and honest.

Ahh, now we get to the final part of any EBay transaction, shipping. Without shipping your transaction can’t be completed. The right shipping practices will help to ensure that your customer receives their item in perfect condition. This will make the difference between a happy and unhappy customer, as well as negative or positive feedback.

Remember to use proper packaging. If you are shipping multiple items or pieces, wrap each item individually to ensure proper protection. Pack your package with bubble warp or packing peanuts. Because packing peanuts may move while being shipped, it is a good idea to pack the peanuts in tightly so that you can hear no rattling. You can also use new rigid side boxes. These boxed have corrugated sides, offering maximum stability and strength, and will ensure that your box does not get crushed in transit. Remember not to exceed the maximum gross weight of the box you are using. It is important that you package and tape your shipment up right. Cellophane tape, masking tape, string, or paper tape will not be sufficient when packaging your item, and most postal services won’t accept a package that has been taped using these methods. Try using water activated paper tape, nylon reinforced tape, or pressure sensitive plastic tape to ensure your package stays safe in transit.

By following these safe packaging practices, you will help to ensure both you and your customer are satisfied. This will result in a positive feedback on EBay and will encourage buyers to buy from you.

If you are interested in selling your products on EBay, now is the best time for you to do it. In a recent press release, Ebay has announced that it will cut listing prices on its site by up to 50%. This includes listing fees as well as other fees and expenses you may face when selling something on the online ausction. Ebay’s decision was its latest effort to stay competitive against up and coming e-commerce sites, particularly free sites such as Craigslist. The cut in prices will come to EBay on February 20th. Sellers will be able take advantage of discounted auction fees. However, this decrease in fees, will lead to an increase in commission on goods that sell. For example a 5% commission on an item that sells for $100, will now increase to a 7% commission. However, this decreases the risk you have when you list your items for sale on EBay. If your item does not sell, you are not paying such high listing fees, then losing the money when no one bids on your item.

"A majority of sellers will see their fees go down," said company spokesman Usher Lieberman. "We are basing our success on their success and we want to encourage sellers to list more items with us."

If you live in the United States or Canada then you are one of the lucky ones as these changes will only affect sellers in North America, but EBay hopes to expand these prices changes to the UK and Germany in the next few months.

Because it almost impossible for you to have a face to face transaction through Ebay this has led to a slew of frauds and scammers who are only after your money. To help you avoid getting scammed there are certain things you should make sure you do before buying or selling your item.

Firstly, you should always check the persons feedback. In general, I only deal with buyers or sellers with a rating of 95% or greater. You can also see what other EBay members say about the member you are buying from or selling to, so you can be sure that you are informed before you go through with the transaction.

Watch out for new users. Though everyone starts as a new user, some new users are really old scammers who open up new Ebay accounts as there old ones gain too much negative feed back. Sellers or buyers from countries like Nigeria or Indonesia are most likely scammers, but don’t classify all your buyers or sellers as scammers if they are from these countries, there are still many honest people out there.

There are certain scams you can look out for. One is known as the advance fee scam. This is when a buyer contacts you and claims to be a third party broker dealing with the transaction for his “client.” You will most likely be offered double the price of your item, but the catch is that you must send the “broker” his “commission fees” before you receive the money. After you send the money, you will not hear from him again and you will know you have been scammed.

Though most EBay users are honest, and are truly offering to buy your item, there are a small fraction of users who will try to scam you. The most popular form of scamming on EBay, and on the Web in general, is known as phishing. Scammers try to get you to reveal your personal information, which they then use to make purchases.

Most phishing on EBay comes in the form of buyers offering to pay you through a bank to bank transfer or through money order deposited directly into your bank account. These methods of payment require you to reveal your personal information about your bank account numbers, and will allow the scammer to make purchases online using your identity. Remember to never, ever, EVER, give out any personal information on the Web, unless it to a secure and trusted website.

The second form of phishing comes in the form of fake emails claiming to be from Ebay or PayPal, asking for your personal information. These emails will come in the form of the standard PayPal or EBay emails, complete with pictures and warnings to never give out your personal information. The sender will always be Service@PayPal.com but the actual email account used to send the email will be a third party free service. The most common third party email account is …@account.com. Remember, EBay, PayPal, and any other large corporation send emails from their own domain name. If you put your mouse over the link they want you to click in their email then look in the status window on the bottom left of your browser you will also see that the link does not take you to paypal, but a site that looks exactly like it so they can steal your login information if you try to login there to check your account without knowing any better. If you happen to receive one of these emails help the fight against identity theft by forwarding the respected email to either spoof@paypal.com or spoof@ebay.com so they can track the origin of the email and hopefully stop another source of fraudulent emails.

Giving out your personal information on the Web is never a good idea, unless you are absolutely positive that you are dealing with a safe and secure service.

Article Source: http://www.articleresourceindex.com

For some great online classifieds shopping serving the Halifax For Sale, Nova Scotia For Sale, and Halifax Buy and Sell communities. Our website is monitored 24/7 to seek and remove such fraudulent ads as we talked about online. Shop safely and securely in the Halifax, NS, Canada area with us.

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