Question
I found this article on AOL and feel it provides a good overview.
I disagree with the last suggestion of using ProStores. If you have reached the point of wanting a webstore I expect you will have had enough of eBay management's business practices that you will want to be independent of their services for your webstore. There are many excellent alternative choices for webstores and the experiences shared by ProStore users on the eBay chat boards seem mostly negative. (Many tried ProStores, have already closed their sites and moved on to other service providers)
Five Tools for Selling on eBay
By Entrepreneur.com
4/26/2006 12:52 PM EDT
Whether you're a new or veteran seller, the great thing about eBay is that you have lots of options to choose from to help you sell better. The only problem with this is that sellers often find the many offerings available to be very confusing.
I get emails from sellers all the time who've become bogged down with the choices and are wondering if they're properly investing their time and money into the right tools. What should they subscribe to? What should they do?
There are so many tools and features to choose from that this dizzying display can cause the average seller to begin to question his or her own sanity. In this column, I'd like to tell you about a few of the most important (and often overlooked) tools and how to integrate them to boost your bottom line.
Turbo Lister.This super eBay software that resides on your own computer is free, and is an excellent tool to use for almost any size seller. It's a must-have listing tool, allowing you to input hundreds of listings at once and launch them on the site in one huge bunch. It's a great tool that I've seen used by beginners as well as high-level PowerSellers.
Selling Manager and Selling Manager Pro. I honestly don't know what I would do without my own trusty Selling Manger Pro. Both versions of Selling Manager replace the Selling area in your "My eBay" pages. They help you in your listing management by supplying you with many tools to automate your sales. These reasonably priced products are worth their weight in gold as they expedite many of your eBay tasks (including automating feedback!) and will save you hours of time when it comes to organizing your business.
The Pro version adds the features of inventory and bulk relisting, among others. The products are reasonably priced (the standard version is $4.99 a month and the pro version is $15.99) and are available free for eBay Stores subscribers.
Sales Reports and Sales Reports Plus. Here are more valuable tools that can make you aware of just how successful your eBay business is. Even the basic version will supply you with key performance metrics for your business, including data on total sales, average sale prices, your fees as a percentage to sales, and much more.
Many sellers don't have a clue that these reports exist because eBay requires you to sign up for the service in order to get the basic reports at no cost. (Sales Reports Plus is free to eBay store owners.)
eBay Stores. Somehow eBay stores has become a mystery to sellers. It shouldn't be. Opening an eBay store is just the same as considering a brick-and-mortar store -- you don't open up one if you don't have a regular source of merchandise. I highly recommend an eBay store to anyone who's serious about selling on eBay -- but only after they've become established on the site.
Don't open a store as a beginning seller. You really need to learn the rhythm of an eBay business before you open a store. Sell at least 50 items a month, have a good source of merchandise, and prepare to be creative when it comes to servicing your customers.
ProStores. eBay's newest offering is possibly the most misunderstood. ProStores are not a replacement for your eBay store; ProStores give you your very own e-commerce enabled Web site. They work in concert with your eBay sales and your eBay store.
In my eBay classes, I always teach that once you get the hang of eBay selling, you need to open an eBay store. Once you have your eBay store management mastered (and are running a successful enterprise), it's time for you to expand and open your own Web site. It's the Web site part that causes many sellers to stumble.
eBay sellers aren't usually masters of HTML and the idea of running and setting up a Web site is a huge, daunting task. ProStores supplies you with practically everything you need to set up a Web site. If you want help you can always search eBay for ProStores support or Web site graphics and you'll find people who'll help you make it perfect.
You won't find more reasonable Web site hosting, especially when you consider that it includes a shopping cart and e-commerce specialties. You can jump aboard with ProStores for as little as $6.95 a month.
eBay is coming up with great, new features each day. A serious seller needs to keep up.
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I did not realize selling manager pro is free for store members.
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Quote:
"eBay is coming up with great, new features each day. A serious seller needs to keep up."
Should read:
"ebay is foisting upon us thoughtless, counterproductive or antagonistic new features each day. A serious seller can't spend their valuable time constantly adapting."
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Originally Posted by commentary
I did not realize selling manager pro is free for store members.
I thought Selling Manager was free for store owners, but not selling manager pro
Is this really true?
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Selling Manager Pro is free only to Featured and Anchor store, not to Basic stores.
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I use as few ebay "tools" as I possibly can and always have. I find I avoid a lot of problems other sellers run into but not using ebay's tools. I do have an ebay store and I look at the sales reports.
I'd like to look at my recent traffic reports too but ebay hasn't seen fit to let me do that for the last 2-3 days now. *sigh*
Jo
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Originally Posted by joflora
I use as few ebay "tools" as I possibly can and always have. I find I avoid a lot of problems other sellers run into but not using ebay's tools. I do have an ebay store and I look at the sales reports.
I'd like to look at my recent traffic reports too but ebay hasn't seen fit to let me do that for the last 2-3 days now. *sigh*
Jo
When you are in MyeBay, click on Manage Store and then Traffic Report -- If you are getting this message " The feature you are trying to access is currently unavailable. Please try again later.", I am too and here is what I have to do because the message is NOT TRUE. On that same page click on the Sign Out, then on the right side of the screen that comes up there is a Sign In, do that. It will sign you in and take you back to MyeBay and you can do the Manage Store, Traffice Report clicks again and then going to Omniture works. This only seems to happen when it's been a good while since I logged into MyeBay even if it is showing I "am" signed in. Would have been nice if they had a better message. I spent days thinking I couldn't get in and that something was wrong with the site. Hope this helps.
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Than you , Laura! It worked! Geez. Anything to keep me confused. Unfortunately, it's so easy to do.
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Originally Posted by joflora
Than you , Laura! It worked! Geez. Anything to keep me confused. Unfortunately, it's so easy to do.
You're very welcome. Glad it worked for you. I was frustrated for days before I vaguely remembered reading something about signing in which I had ignored because after all it said I WAS signed in. If the message were decent than we would have known right away.
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Originally Posted by joflora
I use as few ebay "tools" as I possibly can and always have.
I use none of eBay's tools.
I find I avoid a lot of problems other sellers run into but not using ebay's tools. I do have an ebay store and I look at the sales reports.
I don't have an eBay store and I doubt I ever will. Oh, I try it about once a year, and then I remember everything I've ever hated about eBay stores and close it before the 30-day free trial ends. As far as I can tell there's nothing in the sales reports that I don't generate by hand in five minutes every day...
Even the basic version will supply you with key performance metrics for your business, including data on total sales, average sale prices, your fees as a percentage to sales
Yup. Just what I thought.
Lest you think I'm a two-bit seller, I have 330-some auctions up right now.
fLufF
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