My EBay Life
(A series of essays about what it is like to sell stuff on EBay)
First of all I want to be clear that while I hope that some of my blathering on about EBay will be helpful to others I don't intended for these posts to be a lot of instructional how tos. Although I may throw one in here and there. I believe that there is plenty of information out on the Web and on EBay about how to put up a listings or how to take better photographs. I don't even remember how to put up a listing through EBay as I have been using listing software for the last several years. I also doubt if there will be any specific order to my posts. My next post might be about packing and shipping or how to find things to sell and I might not even post about the listing process itself. Sorry but at this point I just don't know precisely where these posts are going to take us. I do intended for my posts to be more about what has and hasn't worked for me. What things have helped me the most. What things I still need to learn and even some of the of the things that I have stopped worrying about.
As I stated before I believe that there are plenty of "how tos" out on the Web already. And if you are familiar with EBay you know that there are tons of people out there selling (or trying to sell) their stuff. There are also plenty of people ready to teach you what they know (usually for a fee.) But what seems to be missing is the honest assessment of how well any of these sellers is doing. How much money are they really making? How much of their time do they spend on EBay? What does there sales number have to do with their actual profit?
I have found that you don't get many numbers out of EBay sellers and I can appreciate peoples right to be private. I certainly don't intend to spill all of my financial information out in these posts. But I do think there could be more disclosure on the important matter of money and what you can make on EBay. After all isn't that the point? Maybe some of you want to sell your stuff just to clean out your garage but if making some money on it isn't part of your game plan than save yourself a lot of trouble and hall it to the goodwill.
A few more little bits about me. If you are interested you can read about how I got started on EBay here.
Other things you should probably know:
1) My two sources of income are from Waitressing / Bartending and from EBay. Sorry but they are in order of importance as far as income goes.
2) My personal goal is not to make a full time income from EBay but I would like to know that I could and I do want to increase my income from EBay.
3) The reason for item number two is that I have way too many other interests, for example: blogging (I have two blogs this one obviously and my Upcycled Design Lab Blog.) I like crafting mostly from upcycled items and I have started selling or should I say trying to sell items on Etsy. I am fascinated by Cafe Press and have just started trying a little graphic designing at Loop the Moon Designs. Have you heard of Pintrest? It is a fun way to keep track and share all of the things you love on the Internet. And of course you all know about Facebook (I have my personal account and two pages one for EBay and one for my Upcycling blog to maintain. Lets not forget Twitter although I do most of the time and then there is Youtube which I also feel compelled to dabble in although so far I only have this one video.
Oh and I fancy that I am going to write a novel someday. So far I have a sketchy outline in my head and a couple of pages written. So don't hold your breath for that one.
Sorry I promise never again to bombard you with all the me me me stuff but I thought that it was important to share that my attentions are divided and while I don't aspire to make my living solely from EBay I do aspire to make my living solely on my own terms hopefully adding income sources perhaps from some of the items noted above or elsewhere in the future.
However going forward you have my word that these post will be about EBay. You can follow my other antics if you choose but I will try not to bore you with them in future EBay posts.
Happy Ebaying!
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