| |
| |
|
Net Auctions and Auction Information |
|
|
|
Losing Sales By Overcharging For Shipping And Handling
As a serious seller on eBay you're familiar with their fee circumventing rules. If not, visit: http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/listing-circumventing.html. In a nutshell their rule is that you are not allowed to put an item up for bid for a penny and charge $100 for shipping and handling (S&H) in an attempt to avoid the transaction fee. Since we are not trying to avoid fees we all follow the rules - right? To a certain extent yes, but many sellers are still stretching the bubble by over charging for S&H in an attempt to maximize their profits and losing bidders in the process - the end result is the opposite of what they hoped for. Ultimately they reduce their sales and although these efforts fit within eBay's policies, when extreme, they are considered an unfair practice by many buyers. I'll give you an example. I play in a Texas-No-Hold-Em poker game once a month - just a bunch of friends who get together, play a little poker, talk about their lives and have some fun. I thought it would be nice if we had some 'professional-style' poker chips so went to eBay to buy some. I like to think of myself as an intelligent eBay shopper so I watched the auctions for a few days and noticed that the final price averaged $60 for the chips I wanted (retail is about twice that at a local store). The market was determining the price, or was it? As I watched these auctions I noticed an interesting problem, the shipping charges varied greatly. For the sake of this example let's say one seller was offering S&H at $20, another at $30 and one $50. We'll call them Seller A, Seller B and Seller C. As a buyer, if I was willing to accept the price determined by the market - in this case $60, then the final cost of the item from each of these sellers would be: Seller A: $60 + $20 = $80 I did some additional homework and discovered the package would weigh 17 pounds, the size would not increase shipping costs and the sellers were all in my state. I went to the UPS and Fed-X web sites and plugged in the needed information for shipping cost estimates. The results were $11 and $17. All things being equal the total cost of the chips should be around $71-$78. So which seller's auction did I bid on? Only one - Seller A - and I got the chips for $52, plus S&H ($72). If I hadn't won that auction I may have bid on Seller B's but probably would have lowered my total bid amount by $10. Seller C's auction closed without a singe bid. Seller A got my business, Seller B may have, and as far as I was concerned, and apparently other bidders, Seller C can go pound sand. The outcome of this example should be pretty clear and it should be obvious by now that you don't want to be Seller C. Although you may get an occasional windfall with less savvy bidders, in the long term your sales will be much less than that of other sellers of similar items. That's not to say you shouldn't recoup your shipping and handling costs in the process. We're not in business to lose money, but make sure you are not trying to pad your 'profit' at the expense of loosing bidders and ultimately sales. Take the time to do similar research on your own items and market niche and find out where you stand with your shipping and handling charges. If you're fair to your customers they will think better of you for it and in the long run your sales will be better. © Copyright 2005 Steven Woodward - All Rights Reserved About the Author: No permission is needed to reproduce an unedited copy of this article as long the About the Author tag is left intact and included. We do request that we be informed where it is posted and reciprocal links will be considered.
MORE RESOURCES: This RSS feed URL is deprecated, please update. New URLs can be found in the footers at https://news.google.com/news
Google News |
|
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
Snipe Your Way to Auction Success Bidding for a bargain is all part of the exciting eBay experience. But what can really disappoint is when you're all set to win that fantastic, gold plated gizmo and someone else just beats your bid in the very last minute. Make Money Online: Learn To Sell On Ebay The online auction site eBay is an excellent tool for makingmoney online. Think of eBay as an online yard sale andshopping mall. Easy Money on Ebay? Ebay was only two years old when I discovered it.A friend I worked with was also starting to sell on Ebay at about the same time, and we exchanged ideas and experiences constantly. Tips on How to Profit from eBay Buy It Now Auction Listings eBay is an online auction site so it stands to reason that most users will tend to auction off their items aiming to get a high price.The problem with auctioning items is that eBay can be a very fickle place, one week an item may sell for hundreds of pounds but the next week the same item may sell for pennies. Importing Products to Sell on eBay The interesting thing about online buyers is they are extremely price sensitive. A survey done by Forrester Research shows that 73 percent of surveyed online buyers expect prices on the Internet to be cheaper than in stores. Drop Shipping Increases Profits You would like to increase your income by selling other peoples` products but you just don`t have the money to stock inventory.On the other hand, perhaps you have lots of your ownproduct and would like to increase your sales, but youdon`t have a lot of money for advertising. The Benefits of Buying and Selling Locally Shop at a flea market in Oaxaca, Mexico. Trade with a vendor in London, England. eBay is the Greatest Opportunity YOU Have to Create a Career Online eBay's being spoken about everywhere these days. At work, school, down the pub. The Top Ten Antique Categories On eBay! Knowledge is Power! And this statement could not be more true when it comes to selling on eBay. As explained in my book "eBay Marketing Wholesale SourcePak", being successful on eBay all depends on being in the right place, at the right time, with the right product. The Powerful eBay Bidding Strategy That Claims A 99% Success Rate Don't you just love it?You've found that special item on eBay that you've just got to have!No If's Ands or Buts, you've got to win that item.You've checked and double checked the "End Of Auction" time and date and you're at your computer, signed in and raring to go at least 30 minutes before the auction ends. Rent A Coder & Other Service Auctions You may be in the market for a new website. Perhaps you may be looking for a new logo or a database constructed for yourself or a small business. Auction Image Hosting for Ebay Auctions: Free Single Most Recommended Tip It is a well known fact that the more pictures taken of an item, the better it will sell. Not only will you get more bids, but you will make a superior final profit. Taking Paypal on eBay Accepting Paypal as a payment method might increase your selling prices and your profits. This depends on what you are selling. When is Wholesale Really Wholesale You've finally found the wholesale source for the high demand widget that is selling like hotcakes on the Internet. Thoughts of watching the money pouring in and celebrating the new found success selling widgets has you so excited that you can't wait to buy 5 widgets at wholesale and double the investment. 10 Tips to Starting a Financially Successful Ebay Business Startting Right Now Ebay is Perhaps the easiest and fastest way to start a home based online business. Here are 10 Tips to starting a Successful Ebay Business1 - Become an Ebay ShopperBuy a Few things on Ebay. What Ebay Can Teach Us About Success I flew back to New York from Atlanta a few weeks ago and picked up 'Business 2.0' magazine for the flight. Selling on eBay? Heres a Success Tip for Your Online Auctions Are you planning to sell on eBay? Or have you tried in the past but not had much success with your online auctions? If so, here's a strategy that has worked very well for me.In my experience, the auction lots where I created a useful collection of related items got more bids and closed at higher prices than auction lots that were all one thing. How To Stop Ebay Buyers From Sniping Your Auction For Less Than Its True Value There are many savvy eBay buyers who use automated bidding programs, which are referred to as sniping software. Sniping allows the eBay buyer to place an unseen bid in the last seconds of an eBay auction allowing them to win the ebay auction at a very low price if there was no reserve. Low Cost, High Profit Dream Products To Sell on eBay and Amazon Finding quality products to sell is the key to continuing success. Keeping a pipeline of low cost, fast moving items to sell is also a must. eBay Auction Sellers Guide to Finding Hot Money Making Products You might be one of the thousands of individuals who open a trading account with eBay and dream about making auction selling a full-time home-based business.However, before that dream can become a reality, you need to do many important things while running an auction business.
|
| home | site map |
| © 2006 |