What is Drop shipping?

So you like the idea of selling on eBay or setting up your own web store, but haven't got the time or the space or the facility to buy, post and send. Well here is the perfect solution.


I have recently stumbled of a really good way to make money. It combines all the things people like, selling on eBay, setting up a web business, all of these things, into a painless and hassle less process, where you essential just flip money to make more money.


Drop shipping involves you selling a product which you don't have and then buying it when somebody buys it from you and then sending it straight on to the customer. Sounds pretty illegal right? Well that is where you are wrong. There are several wholesale drop shipping companies set up around the world to do just this very thing.


As a British citizen, I found ATS distribution to be the best source for this, and while their prices are quite expensive, they are very reliable. All you do is sign up, put some money in the pot, not as a registration fee or anything, but as a balance to buy stuff with, and then put an advert on eBay or your personal eCommerce website, and there you have it. It is a virtual stockroom, which somebody else manages for you, and I am sorry but nobody can say no to the convenience of it all. 


what I did was I put some items on eBay intitially, for the asking price of the Drop Shipping company, and then watched people bid and quite often the item sold for 20 or 30% more than the RRP, which is really good to see. You just need to choose your items carefully. Remember the bigger the audience, the better the sale, so electronic gadgets and headphones sell best, but there is most competition.


Another thing to be wary of it the postage and packaging, but this is a piece of information which is given to you by the  drop shipping company in most cases and therefore is less of an issue to worry about.


So it really is that simple to make money selling things now. I would say this is a great place to start because you have nothing to loose until you sell something, and then you gain if you see what I mean, so everyone is a winner. It gives you some experience of selling before you start buying real stock and gives you more headroom when you do.


I would advise this to anybody who asks me what the best way to start selling on eBay is. all your products are new so there is no worrying about that, and it is all done for you. Just sit back relax and watch the drop shippers do all the work!

Setting up a Business on eBay

So you will arrive at this article with some intentions of having stuff to sell on the eBay store. This might be due to a clear out of the attic or garage, or you have a valuable item you would like to get rid of, or you may have arrived here by reading our article on yard sales, and feel you are ready to get stuck into setting up a business on eBay. Whatever, this article will guide you through how to sell on eBay and how to set up a business on eBay, along with other sites that you can use to sell your stuff.

With your items gathered, you will be able to analyse what sells well and what to put on at what prices. Now anything techy sells really well. There are loads of people wanting to pick up a bargain on iPods or cell phones or old TV monitors and even assorted cable spaghetti. Other things which sell well are watches and jewellery, along with toys and games. While these sell best, pretty much anything that you would buy second hand will sell on eBay, because the target audience is so big that the chances of people viewing a certain item each day are high enough for everything to be covered and craved on the eBay store.

While that sounded very nerdy and mathematical, essentially you have a good chance with anything, just a better chance with some things than others. For example, I tried to sell a clarinet reed on eBay just to see what happened, and I didn’t sell. Not a big enough audience wanting clarinet reeds because half the population don’t even know what 1 is, let alone have a use for it!

So with your selection of items sorted, you now have the tedious task of putting everything up. First I would advise that you take a photo of everything you need to sell. A good photo means a good sale essentially, and no photo means no sale. Or there about. So get a clean piece of white or black paper (white is better because it is happier and more inviting) and slope it against a wall on a table or something so you have a nice homemade studio. Now you don’t need a fancy camera for fancy photos, it is all about the light and the background. With background sorted, make sure there is plenty of natural light and place your desired selling object in a reasonably artist manor if you can manage it, and snap away until you get a photo which looks nice. I really enjoy this process and take ages over it, but if it isn’t your thing don’t make it last too long, however this is paramount to your eBay lot’s success.

Next you need to create an eBay account if you haven’t already done so and go to the sell an item under the sell tab. I also advise at this point you set up a PayPal account if you haven’t done this either, as this will help to maximise your sale chances further. The Listing Creation form is very intuitive and just requires a little knowledge around the bidding price area. With the start bidding price, it is free to list if you start at 99 cents or less, however you may want more for your item, so you have to weight up the risks and the value of the item.

The one thing I would say is don’t go to high, but don’t go to low either. Think about how much you would want for it, then how much you would pay for the item if you were going for a bargain and take of about 10%. That is the golden rule really. Also if you have purchased the item previously with the intent of selling on eBay, then you need to make sure you know how much you paid for it in the first place to avoid loosing money.

Another handy tip is to look around and see what the same item is going for on other listings on eBay. Remember people buying on eBay go for a bargain, not to splash out lots or else they would buy the item brand new, so this is important to consider as well. Make sure you are well clued about cost and type of delivery too, or else you could end up losing money by posting it for more than you bargained for.

While this may seem a lot of information to take in at once, they are small things that you need to think about to get that perfect sale. If you are considering buying on eBay as well with the hope of reselling, look out for things which you could split or join together for more money, or collectable items which you know a lot about that are going for a bargain. It might then be worth taking these to a specialist website or dealer for the chance of a better return.

While this article largely covers eBay, there is also the option of selling on Amazon and Play.com which would be more useful for books and CDs and DVDs, as these websites, especially the latter, specialise in these items and therefore getting specialist traffic to them. You just refine your target audience by doing this. Another website to look at is online classified ad directory, Loot.com, but expect more content about these websites at a later stage.