It should not be a surprise to say that ebay has changed the way of shopping style. They are the one who instilled confidence in people to transact online. It is quite evident from statistics with millions of members and millions of listing at any given point of time.

When I did a small survey in my town, I was quite surprised to see that 1 out of every 2 was knowing about ebay service / 1 out of 6 was a member of ebay / I out of 8 has used the ebay service (buying or selling). But the most important aspect was that 1 out of 60 was seller in ebay and all were buyers. What it meant was 1 out of every 60 ebayer has ever sold any item in ebay and all were just buyer. Though my survey group was quite small so it might not be accurate in finding but it made me to think the opportunity which lies ahead for those who want to make a living from home. It is well known fact that there are thousands (if not millions) of people making a living on ebay and many of them are earning five-six figure income.

So how one can earn money in ebay? It’s quite simple to understand, Ebay gives you a platform to let the world know what you have to sell and you have multiple way to seize the opportunity. Lets discuss about it in brief:

What you can sell:

You will find penny priced item to very costly item listed in ebay catering to all kind of buyer. I have seen many people selling the junk item (what they have not used from couple of years) at a good price. At the same time there are seller who provide shop just like as usual with standard product. To start off with, you can sell your household item which is of no use to you (it might be of a great value ot others). There are many example wherein people have sold their item (antique) for a very high price what would have fetched them some small amount (or nil) if they would have given to their neighour shop). You have flexibility to put it on auction and let the user discover its real price or you can make it a fixed price (you will have defined profit in this case).

Once you get familier with selling procedure, you can start finding out the place where you can pick up the items. As said above, some item could be non-standard product which you may even pick up from your neibhour or garbage shop or you have a choice to pick standard product like Mobile / camera / MP3 player / Toys / Books etc. You have thousands of categories to pick. You can always find out the place where you can pick up at lesser price and sell at 10-20% markup at ebay. If you can offer less margin, you can play in volumes and you might get a good discount from your dealers. Its always good to pick items of high value so that your margin also remains big. I have seen quite a big number of people selling chinese mobile handset at a discounted price and sells 10 pieces everyday. They keep less margin (may be Rs. 1000 / $20) per handset and at the end of day they make (Rs. 10000 / $200) just from one item. Not at all bad.

Once started everything becomes automated and you dont need to put high effort. You just need to put nice picture, good heading and list the items. your dealer will deliver the item at your place, your courier buy will come and pick the item from your place and deliver. In some case, buyer also might come to pick the product from your place. So your effort mainly goes into choosing the product and sourcing it from cheap and reliable sources. There are many non-standard items which are very high commission product because of its nature like Jeweleery, Antiques, Stamps and coins, handicraft etc. In these type of product you get a chance to make very high margin (sometimes 3-4 times or even 10 times of your cost)

So give a try and explore this. If you come across any problems, there are many ebayer in the coomunity who will be ready to help you out. Even Ebay staff are very friendly and ou can seek their advise too.

Related posts:

1. How to get more buyer in ebay
2. Selling in Ebay – Know your customer
3. Ebay for stay at home moms