Hello everyone. Ive decided to sell part of my collection on ebay. How is the listing fee organized and are their any other fees involved? I do know a good picture is a must. Along with actual shipping charges Is it a must to have a pay-pal account? TIA Any and other advice will be appreciated CLAW
There are plenty of fees. Listing fee, fees for timing, insertiojn, final value, etc. Need an easy way to accept payments (and paypal is one way though there are more fees with that as well).
Hi, I have been selling things on ebay for a few years now, not professionally, just personal stuff here there. Most of it is coin or exonumia stuff, but I have sold all sorts of things there. Here are a few tips, that you should take with a grain of salt, I am not a power seller or anything: Like you said, the pictures are important. Take good pictures of the obverse and the reverse of the coin(s) showing as much detail as possible. This is one of the most important things in my opinion. Be very accurate and detailed in your description. Talk up your coin, but don't over do it or exagerate...be honest. If there are any problems or flaws with the coin, mention them in the description. Make good use of the item title. Put as much information as you can fit, and don't waste space with things like, "MUST SEE" or exclamation points. This is how people find your listing when they search, try to use keywords that people who may be interested in your coin will be entering in the search box. I suggest accepting paypal, but that is up to you. You do have to pay paypal fees, but it is my opinion that you will get more bidders on your item if you accept it to make up for the fees. There are alot of bidders who don't want to send a check and only bid on auctions that accept paypal. If people ask you questions, respond right away. If you don't respond, or take to long to respond, they will probably find someone else's auction to bid on. I suggest starting your auction at the lowest price you would be satisfied in selling your coin(s) for. Some people like to start auctions out at 1 cent to drum up excitement...but you could end up selling a fifty dollar coin for a buck if you do this. Be reasonable with shipping and handling. Find out what it will actually cost you to safely package, insure, and ship the item, and charge that amount. Some people try to make a huge profit on shipping, and try to use high shipping to avoid final value fees, but that turns many bidders off. The fees I can think of off the top of my head are the listing fee, the final value fee, and any paypal fees. I don't know percentages by heart, but they are clearly stated when you list an auction. This is just my personal pet peeve...don't call your coin rare unless it really is. Rare is the most overused word on ebay. State quarters are NOT rare...lol. Anyway, I hope your auctions go well. Oh yeah, I just remembered...I like to have my auctions end on either a Saturday or a Sunday evening. People will most likely be off work and able to place last minute bids that way. I think I read somewhere that Thursdays are the worst days to have your auction end because that is ebay's slowest day, but don't quote me on that. :smile
thanks everyone for their replies. I was wondering if you listed an item or items,and offered to pay for shipping if it reached a certain amount(for example) several coins or sets may have a certain value lets say $300 . If i were to pay Ship.ping and handling plus include bonus item or items worth $20-$30 if winning bid is 300 or more? Do you think this is a good practice? Second question: what kind of penalties are there for cancelling an auction.(example) Item or items are well worth a thousand dollar bid, but winning bid is only a small fraction of that price So you decide not to sell items. ?? Next ??? For large collections. (ex) Lets say i have a large proof and mintset collection spanning 40 some odd years. Would it be better to sell individually, small lots of four to five pieces, or medium size lots of 10-20 items. ?? can you select the amount of days the auction will last ,and are three day auctions ending on sunday better than a seven day auction ending on a sat or sun?? ?? Are listing fees more for high ticket items than for low ticket items, and what kind of % ?? same ? for closing fees. ?? Does it matter if i have no experience. ex. Selling my first item or items.?? Im not out to make a killing. Just trying to sell items close to their price guide value so I can buy something nicer and more rare. Im running out of room to store all this stuff!! Oh ya one more ?? is it better to have a reserve or no reserve. Thanks once again for taking the time to reply to this thread last ?? what exactely does pay pal charge? Do they charge seller and buyer. or just seller? Thanks a bunch Seatedliberty Lover. CLAW
Lots of questions there. I don't sell on eBay that often, but it is very important to include as many relevant words in the title as possible. Some might call this keyword "spamming", but it is just plain smart business practice. As for lots, bulk sales many times go for a little less than individual sales, but individually you pay more to list the items. At auction, if you want to be absolutely safe, set a reserve, but warning, this sometimes dissuades possible customers from bidding. If you want to take a little more of a risk, you can set the starting bid at somewhere around half of the item's value, and take your chances. You can set the length of the auction, and in my limited experience as a seller, it is best to have the auction take place over two weekends, so more people will see it and more people will hopefully bid. .
Agreed. No fees, you may get more money for the stuff you want to sell, etc. Although it may require a bit more time.
The best place to get answers about the specific listing fees, etc., is directly from the EBay website.
First off, I do a fair bit of selling on eBay and am a power seller. I sell mainly trading cards and coins and my observations below are based on my experience only. I hope it helps you. As a bidder I am rarely influenced by offers like that, but you may find it successful, I just don't know. There is no official eBay penalty for refusing to sell an item at the hammer price after an auction ends, but I don't recommend it. The penalty is that your buyer will leave you nasty feedback, which can be VERY damaging to a seller, since future potential bidders will see it and avoid your auctions (rightly so). If you see that an item is going to close for much less than it's real value (or its value to you) then you can cancel all the bids and end the listing early, in which case there will be no winning bidder and therefore no one to leave you bad feedback. You will avoid the final value fees from eBay, but you will lose your listing fees with no recourse. One other thing to think about is that the vast majority of bidding on your auctions is during the final 3 minutes of your listing, so be patient, you may be pleasantly surprised by the last second bids. I recommend selling them individually. It takes more time and effort, but if you offer a good combined shipping discount, then the people who want a few of your sets will bid on them. Just make sure that you put a link to your other auctions in your listing. You will make more this way, in my experience. Lots just don't sell as well as individually listed items. yes, auctions can last 1, 3, 5, 7, or 10 days. The longer the auction, the better in my experience. Seven day auctions are the standard and even though the 10 day auctions are "better" they are more expensive and IMO they are prohibitatively expensive except on rather valuable coins. (you will have to decide what is valuable enough to warrant the additional cost). Auctions during the school year (August-April) should be scheduled to end between 6PM and Midnight Eastern time (3-9 PM eBay time) on Saturday or Sunday and during the summer they should be scheduled during the same time intervals but scheduled to end on a Monday or Tuesday. Those are the times when the most people are on eBay and since the vast majority of bidding (that matters) is during the final few minutes of an auction, then you want to have your auctions ending while the most people are available. Listing fees are based on the opening bid price and reserve and photo options that you choose. I recommend that you start all of your listings at less than a dollar to entice more bidders. I firmly believe in this and in fact I start ALL of my listings at 1¢. You will ocassionally have an item end for less than it's worth, but I've found that this is more than made up for by the extra that is made by starting all of my auctions at a low price. The final value fees range from 5.25% of the hammer price (for items under $25) to 1.5% of the hammer price (for items over $1000). The full list of eBay fees can be found here. Yes, it matters greatly! I don't buy from newbies, it is just too risky!! I can't overstress this point. If you want to sell on eBay it helps to have a record, even if that is just a few months of buying before you start listing. Also, newbies MUST accept ALL forms of PayPal. This will incur additional fees, but it provides your buyers with some protection, that will entice more bidders. Be aware that PayPal has some requirements for their "Seller Protection Policy" and you would be wise to follow them. This includes only accepting Paypal payments from the US, Canada, and the UK; and only shipping to the buyer's confirmed address (and denying payments from people with unconfirmed addresses); and always using delivery confirmation or USP/FedEx Tracking numbers. Just be sure that you state the requirements in the payment/shipping section of your listing. No reserve is better. Most bidders are turned off when they see the "you are the high bidder, but the reserve not met" notice. If you feel you have to have a reserve to protect yourself, then be sure to list exactly what it is in your listing, so that people don't get frustrated trying to figure out what it is and just ignore your auction. PayPal charges 30¢ plus 3% of the amount transferred. That charge is removed from the transfer amount, so the seller eats this fee. Good Luck!
