Will The eBay Fee Increase Lower Your Profits?

[Terry Gibbs wrote the following article for his monthly newsletter. Terry is a consultant to antiques and collectibles dealers, and teaches advanced eBay selling strategies.]

Will The eBay Fee Increase Lower Your Profits?
by Terry Gibbs

I read an article earlier this week in the Wall Street Journal. The writer interviewed a few full time eBay sellers who complained about how the higher fees would cost them money and hurt their businesses.

I thought this was quite funny. My eBay fees have declined from about $2000 a month 18 months ago to under $100 a month currently while my inc0me tripled.

The article said 21,000 people have signed a protest petition. That’s a lot of whiners who are doing nothing constructive to improve their businesses.

One of the complainers moaned about the ten cent increase in eBay picture hosting. This is absurd because anyone who is serious about selling on eBay should not be using eBay photo hosting.

You see, while the average person spends 90 cents per auction on eBay photo hosting, serious eBay sellers host their own images for next to nothing. Just by spending a few hours learning how to use an FTP program, you can host your own images for as little as 4.95 a month. That’s for all your images.

Additionally, when you host your own images, you get more control over them. Rather than using a 300 by 400 pixel image, use any size you want. Because there are no additional costs for extra images, you can put as many images as are needed into your auctions.

Another seller complained that her margins were so low, the higher eBay fees would consume all her profits. That’s just sad.

In fact it breaks me up. . .

Not into tears, but rather into laughter. Here’s a woman who is too lazy to spend her time sourcing higher margin items with low competition.

Then again, maybe she is too cheap to spend a few dollars of her meager profits on a book or video learning how to find higher profit items she can sell on eBay.

Another one of the complainers said he was going to learn how to do Pay Per Click advertising and stop selling on eBay. That’s quite short sighted.

Have you ever heard the phrase “multiple streams of income?”

With online businesses you need multiple streams of traffic.
eBay is one of the top places on the web where people who spend money hang out. To walk away from eBay because of a small fee increase is just plain stupid.

Obviously these fearful sellers have never heard the phrase.
. .

“Work Smarter Not Harder.”

All these sellers have one thing in common. They started selling things on eBay, and never improved their skills.
They never learned how to get the highest prices on eBay, and just blindly continue to waste time and money.

I’ll give you an example of wasted money spent on eBay fees.
I did a search on eBay for items listed with a ten dollar opening bid. I got so many responses the eBay search system rejected the query, so I limited it to just auctions with the word old in them.

Right now on eBay there are 4233 items with an opening bid of $10.00 and the word old in them. (Feb 2, 2005)

That’s over a thousand dollars in wasted listing fees right there.

You see, it costs 25 cents more to list an item with an opening bid of $10.00 than at $9.99. These are sellers spending quarters to get pennies.

When I first looked at how many people were listing items with a $10 opening bid, I found over 40,000 auctions. That’s ten thousand dollars a week. Now, six months later, the number is even higher.

This same behavior applies at all starting prices, with even higher wasted amounts.

The difference between starting an auction at $49.99 and $50.00 is $1.20. Right now on eBay, there are 1203 auctions with a fifty dollar opening price and the word old in them.

I said all these whiners had one thing in common. Actually they have two things in common.

First, they never increased their skills.

Second, they are still caught in the treadmill of selling one item to one buyer, and then listing another item to find a second buyer.

Let me say that again in another way. These people make all their sales through eBay selling one item at a time. Maybe they do store listings or multiple item listings, but each sale is a unique event. There is no follow up with buyers.

Even worse there is no attempt to get people who just look at their auctions to leave eBay and check out their websites. Think about it.

Last week one of my eBay listings was looked at by 140 people but had only high bidder. The other 139 people are interested in what I sell. Over the course of a month about 60 percent of the people who visit my sites come from eBay.

Now I know some of you are thinking, “but eBay won’t let me put a link to my site in my auctions.” That’s true, but you can still link to your site from your eBay me page.

It just becomes a matter of getting your auction viewers to go to your me page. That’s not hard at all. It just takes time to learn what to do within the rules.

I mentioned earlier that these whiners featured in the Journal article would be better off improving their skills than complaining. That’s learning.

You are on the right track because reading Auction Riches News is a great way to improve your skills.

There are other free ways to improve your eBay selling skills.

For example, you can spend an hour or two reading the articles online. Ask questions on discussion boards to get advice from others. Or learn by testing different things in your auctions.

Do these free activities, and you will certainly improve your skills.

But, there is a better, faster way to become a skillful eBay seller. Learn from someone who has spent the time improving his skills.

Someone like Robbin or me. My Auction Revolution package is based on selling over 12,000 items on eBay. I was one of the first big eBay consignment sellers. I learned this the hard way. One auction at a time.

You won’t have to sell thousands of items on eBay to figure out the best ways. You won’t have to use trial and error.

If any of the whiners in the Wall Street Journal article had read the Auction Revolution, they wouldn’t be complaining.
They would be looking forward to the lower level of competition that will result when the whiners stop listing items on eBay.

The Auction Revolution explains how to host your own images, what eBay listing options are worth using, and everything else you’ll need to know about eBay to maximize your profits.

More importantly, you’ll also learn how to drive people from your auctions to your websites through your eBay me page, and even get a special free report you can personalize and offer on your me page as incentive to check out your website.

Remember, I spent seven long years to learn everything you will learn in the Auction Revolution.

Use this link to find out how the Auction Revolution will revolutionize the way you look at eBay:

http://auctionebooks.com/revolution

The link above will take you to a page with an eBay Seller’s quiz. The quiz is a great way to identify areas you need to improve.

I hope you enjoyed reading Terry's comments on the effects of the fee increase. You should check out Terry’s site and at a minimum take the free eBay seller’s quiz.

To Your Success,
Robbin K. Tungett
http://AuctionRiches.com


PS If you are looking for products to sell, eBay Consignment is a great way to get products without any risk. For a limited time, when you click on the order link on Terry’s Auction Revolution Site, you will get the opportunity to add his eBay Consignment manual to the Auction Revolution for only $10.00 more. That’s a great deal.

PPS If you choose to purchase both the Auction Revolution and the eBay Consignment Package, you will also get The Power of eBay. This interview will open your eyes to the possibilities of eBay.

http://auctionebooks.com/revolution