Online Selling Tip of the Week

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If you have small children, bad weather, an illness, no transportation or any other reason why you are unable to get out of the house, you can still source inventory for your online business without ever leaving your home.

There are TONS of sites that you can order items from to resell.

Here’s a few ideas for you:

*Avon (either the catalog or online)
*dollartree.com
*ebay.com
*amazon.com
*bonanza.com
*addoway.com
*lakeside.com
*craigslist.com
*shopgoodwill.com
*Your local Facebook yardsale group

Please leave a comment to share your inventory sourcing from home ideas.

Sometimes, You Just Need a Little Nudge

The type of work we do can feel like you’re riding an emotional roller coaster.

One day, you wake up to a $69.99 sale and have stellar sales all day long, the next day you wonder if anyone can even find your listings.  You find something awesome at the thrift store or in your attic this week, next week you have a hard time finding anything of value.

Unfortunately, this is the nature of the business we’re in.  I don’t think that any seller is exempt from “panicking” at times and wondering if they’re going to make enough money this month to cover their bills, or sometimes we wonder if we’re going to make enough money to cover our fees.

I’ve been selling online long enough to know that there are cycles and when sales are low, I can take advantage of the extra time to list, revise and take some time off.  Not all sellers have this experience, and sometimes you just need a little nudge to get you going again.  Have you been there?  Who came along side you and encouraged you?  We’re all in this together.

When I got started, Lizzie and other friends helped me navigate my way.  Lizzie and I try to help and encourage you as much as possible.  Who have you helped?  Who have you encouraged?  I know that many of you do help your friends, neighbors, and people in your community with their online sales.  If you haven’t helped or encouraged someone selling online, please do.  It doesn’t take a lot, but sometimes, people need just a little bit of encouragement.

I can’t tell you how many times people have asked me to take a look at their items and give them suggestions, or times when I’ve gone to a friend’s (or sister’s ) house to help them with some listings during slow times or times when they were overwhelmed and just helping them list  a few items encouraged them and got them back on track.

We all need a little nudge sometimes, and there’s nothing wrong with that at all.  Helping our friends with what we love doing is a fantastic way to spend time together and get to know each other better.  I’d love to hear how someone has helped or encouraged you and how you’ve been able to help or encourage other sellers.

This Week on eBay

It’s been a GREAT week on eBay for me  I’ve been busy finding all kinds of great items to restock my store.  Some of them are selling pretty quickly too, which is a huge encouragement to me.

This has been the first week since the move that I’ve had sales anywhere near where they used to be.  It took about three weeks of consistent listing after a six week listing break before my sales picked up.  I still have a way to go, but I’m thrilled to be headed in the right direction again.

I took a day and did a lot of revising in my store.  I added several categories to help customers find my items easier.  I also gave my store front a face lift.  The next few days after my revisions, I noticed that my sales were quite a bit higher than they were the previous week.

By Friday, I had listed everything that I had purchased during the week so I spent some time getting items listed on Amazon again. I’m excited to get this venue up and running again.

Twice this week I made sales on Bonanza.com  I haven’t made a sale on there in a couple of months, but I also haven’t been trying to get things going there right now, my main focus has been on eBay.

I’m working on auctioning off the inventory that my friend is storing and shipping for me so that I didn’t have to move it all with me.  That’s coming along quite nicely.  She’s been a huge help to me.

I’m focusing in right now on listing items that will be a quick sale so I can get my income back up to where I need it to be and then I plan on working toward stocking up my store again.  I’m nearly back up to 600, hopefully I can get it there this coming week.

Seller Challenge: Promote Your Listings

No matter what site(s) you sell on, promoting your listings can pay off BIG time.

When you’re done working on a listing, It only takes a few seconds to promote what you just listed.

Here ares ome ideas for you:

1. Tweet your listings

If you don’t have a twitter account, consider setting one up. Work on building up your followers.  The more followers you have, the more people your tweets will go out to.  You can set up your eBay listings to automatically tweet for you.  If you’re selling on another site, you’ll need to manually tweet your listings, but that can be done fairly quickly either when you’re done listing, tweet as you list, or tweet a few times a week.

2. Link to your site in your email signature

Make sure you link to your site in your email signature.  You probably email people constantly about a variety of topics or business related issues.  If people are interested, they’ll click on your link and view your store.

3. Pin your listings

Pinning your listings is kind of like tweeting your listings, but in my opinion it’s faster. An added bonus is that  your followers on Pinterest get to see the pictures of your item, not just read your tweet.

It’s easy to set up a board on Pinterest for your items that you have for sale.  You can decide if you want to pin listings as you go, a few times a week or whatever works for your schedule.

There are several other ways you can promote your sites and listings.  Whenever I consistently work on promoting my items I see an increase in sales.

Don’t feel like you have to spend a entire day promoting or that you have to do every type of promoting possible.

** Start small.  Pick one and try it.**

If you don’t see results, work on a different way to promote, or continue promoting the first way and start promoting the second way simultaneously and see where it takes you.

I’d love to hear what ways that you’ve promoted your items that’s been successful for you.

Customizing Your Online Business

One of the best things about being self employed is enjoying the freedom to organize the schedule to fit what works best for you and your family.

The second best thing (in my opinion) is being able to customize your business to make it what you want it to be.

When you’re running an online business, you have a lot of options, and it’s up to you to decide what works best for your business.  You are the  CEO, right?

Here are some things to consider:

What sites will I have my items available for sale on?
*eBay

*Amazon

*Etsy

*Bonanza

*Addoway

*Yardsellr

(These are just a few sites that are out there.)

What will I sell?

*New items

*Jewelry

*Children’s clothes

*Shoes

*Toys

*Plush

*Jeans

*Women’s clothes

*Men’s clothes

*Sporting Goods

*Books

*Antiques

*Vintage

*Movies/Music

(These are just a few ideas, there’s a ton of other great stuff that can be sold.)

How much time will I spend on my business?

The answer to this question depends on how much time you have available, and how much time you’re willing to spend on your business.  Some people sell online for a hobby, so they just list and sell things when they  have spare time.

Other people sell online like a part time or even a full time job. It’s completely up to you. Just keep in mind that what you put into your business determines what you get out of it.  If you want to make full time profit  selling online, but you only work at it an hour or two a week, you’re not going to make full time wages.

In my experience, the more I put into my business–

*improving the type of items I have for sale by learning about new and popular brands

*keeping up with listing items as I purchase them

*selling on multiple online venues–

the more I get out of my business.

To choose how to customize your business define what your business goals are, then customize your business model to help you reach your goals.

I’d love to hear how much time you spend on your business each week, what kinds of items you sell and what your business goals are.

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