5 Ways to Increase Your Online Sales in September

#1 Give your store front a makeover
Take a look at your store front and try to see it from your customer’s eyes.

*Do the colors and the graphic look inviting?

*Is the wording in your heading positive and upbeat?

*Are the categories easy to use?

*Is there a different template you like better than your current one?

Take a little bit of time and play around with your store front and see if you come up with a new look that you like better than the current one you have.

#2 Keep looking for and listing Christmas items

Christmas is just right around the corner.  If I had the option right now of listing some shoes or books and the option of listing toys and Christmas specific items, I would choose to get the toys and Christmas specific items listed right away.

People are already shopping for Christmas items, and you don’t want to miss out on sales because your items aren’t listed yet.  Even over the summer, I sold several items that are specific to Christmas.

#3 Clean out your shoes

Now that you have your Christmas items listed you can clean out your closets and sort out the shoes you don’t plan on wearing this winter.

Anything that’s still in good condition is a candidate for your eBay inventory.  If you’ve never listed shoes before, or if listing shoes doesn’t sound like fun to you…….just give it a try.  If you don’t like it, you don’t have to keep listing shoes, but I’m pretty sure that you’re going to enjoy it as much as I do.

Shoes are super easy to list, a good profit maker and  super easy to ship.

#4 Get your new inventory listed within the week it’s purchased

Even if you feel like you’re “behind” on listing your inventory, try to start listing all of your new inventory within the week it’s purchased.

You’ll be amazed at the items you list right away that either sell the same week or the week after.  What I try to do is list all of my new inventory the same week it’s purchased (and usually within 48 hours of purchasing)  each time I list my new inventory, I also try to pull 4-5 items out of my “to be listed” bin. I list those with my new inventory so that I can catch up on listing without it feeling like it’s a big chore.

#5 Use Mark Down Manager

I know I’ve mentioned Mark Down Manager before, but I’ll mention it again.  Even a sale of 10-15% off helps generate some good sales.  If you have items that have been in your inventory for awhile and you’d like to see them moving, try a 30% or 40% off sale.

5 Ways to Increase Your Online Sales in June

#1 Promote your items with social networking

The more, the merrier is what I always say . In this case, it’s the more exposure your items or your store have, the merrier!  Use social networking to increase traffic to your store.  Twitter, Facebook fan pages, post the link to your store on your Facebook account, post links to items listed in your store to your facebook newsfeed, blog about your items, put the link to your store in your email signature……anything to get more people attracted to your items.

#2 Maximize your description

One thing I notice right away when I look at descriptions is that a lot of sellers put very basic information in their descriptions. Many times I see descriptions that read “great condition, thanks for looking.”

Sorry, but that’s not a description.  Descriptions are FREE, it’s not like you pay per word or per letter, so use your descriptions liberally.  State details about the item, even if you feel like it’s obvious, state it anyway.  State measurements, color, describe the design, help the person fall in love with your item and make them feel like they just have to buy it!

#3 Increase your feedback score

The system of selling on eBay is kind of like a cycle. One part of the cycle affects the next part.  For some reason, the more sales you get, the more feedback you get. The more feedback you get, the more sales you make.  The higher your feedback score is, the higher prices your items will sell for, and the more customers will be willing to buy from you.

#4 State the shipping cost in your listing

I am just going to come out and say it: I am not a fan of calculated shipping. Most of the time when I look at a listing that has calculated shipping, it’s SKY HIGH.  To ship a women’s knit top, it will come up with something crazy like $10.85, when I know it can ship for less than $2.99 to anywhere in the USA.

I determine my shipping cost and sometimes I lose money on it, but most of the time I don’t.  The other great thing about flat rate shipping is that I can state the cost that item’s shipping right in the description.  I know the eBay populates the shipping price in the listing under the selling price, but for some reason since I added this line to my lisings:

Shipping is only 2.99!

My sales have gone way up.  It’s right in front of their face and encourages them to make the purchase.

#5 Upgrade to a premium store

I cannot say enough about what a huge time saver my premium store is.  Yes, it does cost more per month than the basic store, but the price per listing is much less (.05 per listing VS .20 per listing.)

The benefits of a premium store are fantastic and I’m learning more about them every day.  One of the things I like the most is the ability to automate feedback.  Once positive feedback is left for a transaction, I have it set to automatically leave one of five positive feedback phrases that I typed in for it to choose from. I love it that I haven’t had to leave feedback in months. I don’t even think about it any more

The more time I can save in doing little tasks like leaving feedback, the more time I have to list new items and stay on top of my shipping.  Time is money, and I’d rather use my time doing things that make me money!

How Much Inventory Makes A Good eBay Store?

That’s a question I hear pretty often.  Sometimes people ask me to look at their store to see why they’re not getting very many sales. Often the first thing I notice is that their inventory is fewer than 300 items.

Let me ask you a question.

If you went to a store, let’s say Macy’s, and they had 113 items in the store, what are the odds that you’d find something there you needed, wanted, or just had to have?

For me, the odds would be pretty slim.  I bet they would be for you too.

Stores that sell a lot of inventory, have a lot of inventory in stock.  You can’t sell it if you don’t have it in stock.

The same principles that apply to retail apply to selling online.

I try to keep my store at 900-1000 items.  That way, if I’m out of town for a few days, sick, or just not able to list, I still have plenty of inventory listed.

This summer, I plan to increase my inventory numbers.

Everywhere you go, you need to be thinking “eBay”  not just at yard sales and thrift stores.  Think “eBay” when you’re at Wal-mart, Target, Macy’s, discount stores, sidewalk sales.  Pretty soon, you’ll find that it’s not difficult to find inventory if you open your eyes and look around you.

If you don’t have a lot of money to invest in your eBay business, then literally, look around you.  Look in your closets, your garage, attic, storage sheds, anywhere you have belongings.  Look on Craigslist and Freecycle too…..you never know what you’re going to find.

I highly doubt that a person can make a full time income by selling on eBay and having 100 items listed in their store.  Not unless they are $1,000.00 items.

My advice to you: If you have fewer than 100 items in your store, set a goal to get to 100 items listed.

If you have at least 100 but not up to 300 items yet, then set a goal and work toward 300.

If you have at least 300 but not 500, set a goal and work toward having 500 items listed in your store.

If you have at least 500, but aren’t close to 1,000 items in your store, then set goals in 100 item increments to get your store up to 1,000 items listed.

I guarantee you that each time you get to the next 100 items listed in your store, you will see your sales increase.  In my opinion, you can never have too many items listed.

eBay Selling Strategy: FREE Shipping

Here’s an idea presented to me during a little brainstorming session with my friend Sandy.  Everyone needs someone to brainstorm with and Sandy is one of those people. When she hears an issue, she almost immediately has a good solution in mind.

Keep in mind that I’m a little hard headed, so she had the idea for me right away, but it took her and Ginger together almost an hour to convince me to give it a try.

Here was my dilemma:

In the month of January, I was sooooooo close to earning Top Rated Seller status, but I got marked low twice on the dreaded “Shipping and Handling charges” category.  The category that I have been fighting with for so long.  I thought I had it beat, and no, it came back to haunt me.

I wasn’t too happy about it and shared my dilemma with Sandy.

Immediately, she told me that it would help my DSR’s to offer free shipping on my lighter weight items.  That way, I’d automatically earn 5 stars in that category, and it would bring up my average.

I was skeptical.  I thought of the 800+ items in my store and the task of revising them.  Plus, I don’t charge very much to ship light weight items, $2.99, how on earth am I going to get marked down for $2.99 items.  “It’s not the light weight items causing me to get marked down.” I told her.  Yet, she insisted and Ginger reinforced Sandy’s reasoning……..there might be one or two light weight items that you got marked down for this year that wouldn’t be there if you’d have offered free shipping on them. (I found out after pulling a report later, that yes, that was true.)

So, I went through my inventory and put FREE shipping on over 150 items in my store.  I’ll let you know how it goes as far as improving my DSR’s in the “Shipping and Handling Charges” category……and you never know, it might even increase my sales

My New eBay Store Graphic

I am now the proud owner of my very own eBay store graphic.

No more using something generic or some picture I like…..Mortenview’s Gifts & Treasures now has it’s very own graphic thanks to Lizzie.  She is so good at this stuff!  What would I do without her?  If you haven’t looked at her letter art already, stop by her Etsy shop and take a peek.

If you want your very own letter art graphic, guess what?  I know where you can get one!  Lizzie can make you one for just $25!

So, make sure you take a look at my graphic (I just LOVE it!!!!) and look at Lizzie’s Etsy shop to see what she has made out of her letter art for sale.

**Aww thanks (blush)

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