Episode 9 - Theme

For the Episode 9 Challenge and in honor of October finally being here, we are challenging you and ourselves to find something halloween related to resell on eBay!  The purchase price limit is $8.00, you have to post a video response by the end of Tuesday Oct 4th and your item has to end by the end of Saturday Oct. 8th.  This should be a spooktacular challenge (sorry for the corniness, but we had to lol).  As always, if you have any questions please don't hesitate to ask!
~T&D

Picker Tip of the Week: Making the most of your listing titles

 A large majority of buyers use the title search to “look up” items on ebay – I know we do – in an effort to maximize views and hits to your item it is very important to include in that title as many key search words as possible, even if it doesn’t really make sense or make a sentence description per say. 

It can be very hard to create a title without making a complete sentence so it is always a good idea to type in your title read it and then eliminate words such as: as, a, the, and, with, also, etc…. and then if you have any extra space you can readdress words to make the title read better. 

It can also be helpful when you are doing the listing of your item to take a minute and view a couple of other similar or like items that have recently sold to see what kind of search words were included in their listing – once you see a word or phrase come up a few times it might be a good idea  to use those for yours as well.

One last important step is to prioritize your keywords by putting your most eye catching words towards the front of the title b/c with the new extended title the last words get cut off on the quick scan that buyers also tend to do.   The name of the maker or designer is usually a good starting point

Here are a couple of examples:  

Old cap with logo – you could have

Vintage (insert logo name here) snap back hat cap trucker style retro mesh  

Pair of denim pants – you could have

Levis boot cut denim jeans pants western casual work size 36 mens

Again the more descriptive search type words you can fit the better! 

Hope this tip helps out -

Thanks much T&D

Picker Tip of the Week: A Picture's Worth a Thousand Words

We can't tell you how many times we've researched an item that we're listing to set a fair starting price or a BIN and at the end of the auction it ends up selling for more than the average sale price.  And we're left scratching our heads wondering why the heck it happened.  We've also seen where you'll have several similar items and some sell high while others sell low or not at all even though it's the same thing in the same condition.   The trick is to open the different listings and more often than not the listings that sell for high have several more pictures than the ones that sell for lower.  Also, the quality of the pictures are usually much better.

We, as pickers have to remember that while we can touch, feel, hold and see every detail of the item, our buyers cannot do that until they receive it.  Put yourself in the buyer's shoes and think about when you purchase something off of eBay...are you more inclined to put a bid on something that has a single, semi out of focus, dark picture? Or are you going to be more interested in the one that shows even the smallest flaw so that you know EXACTLY what you are buying?

While we realize that it's going to take extra time and effort to take a few nice photos, it could make the difference between a sold and unsold item.  It could also mean a significant difference in sale price.

Things to remember when taking photos:
Light (Brighter is Better)
Focus (It's not easy looking at blurry pictures)
Quantity (cover as many angles as possible)
Close Ups (it gives your buyers the opportunity to "examine" what you are selling)
Issues (if there is an issue, it's better to point it out in a picture than to write about it)

~T&D

Picker Tip: To Calculate or Not to Calculate?

This week we are going to talk about shipping...Should you use calculated shipping or flat rate shipping???  Well, that depends.  If you ship the same thing over and over again, so you know how much it weighs and how much it costs then go ahead and use flat rate shipping and spread the ups and downs amongst all of your buyers becuase eventually it will even out.
HOWEVER if you are like most of us pickers, you buy all sorts of things to resell that are all different sizes and weights.  It will be extremely beneficial to you to invest in a 50 lb scale (you can find one for under 10 bucks on ebay...a little more if you want to buy from a U.S. seller).  We feel that it is beneficial for the following reasons:

1. No more guessing, all you have to do is weigh it, put the weight into ebay and ebay does the rest
2. No more losing money on shipping and very rarely over charging on shipping (no more refunds!)
3. Your international sales will increase (if you want them) b/c for every one person that asks you how much shipping will cost there are 10 other buyers who wont bother (also with the dollar being weak right now, a lot of international buyers have more buying power).
4. You can ship from home and when you buy postage through ebay, click-n-ship or paypal,  you save money on shipping (ebay top rated or power sellers get even more savings)
5. It saves you time, no more standing in line at the post office and you can even have your postal carrier take the packages to the post office for you (as long as you are sending at least 1 priority package and notify them the day before pick up)

We hope this has helped, let us know what you think about this.  And if there is a subject you would like us to cover, let us know!
~T&D

T&D's Pickers Challenge Episode 5 picks from w/e 9/4

We have 6 pickers joining us this week and it looks like there is some tough competition in the challenge!  This weeks participants are... RJ, theyardsalepicker, marionsprings, thepapervault, randomantiquepicker, somelikeitused (us) and our returning champion laneywag. 

RJ graciously offered a Pickin Militia t-shirt or hat to this weeks winner so the challenge should be really fun and exciting! 

Who do you think the Picker of the Week will be this time??  Cast your vote in the poll to the right! ~T&D

P.S. Check out our Picker tip in the post below it can have a major impact on your business!

Ebay Finally Does Something to Benefit the Seller!

This week Ebay added an additional 25 characters to the listing title!  What does this mean for you?  Now you can add several more search words to your titles!  If you're like us, you quickly fill your title bar and haven't put the most important search words in it yet and have to go back and edit to figure out what will fit and what is really really important.  Well, now you can!

Our Picker/Ebayer tip this week is to take advantage of this "gift", take a few minutes and revise all of your existing listings to include as many search words as possible b/c this could have a very positive impact on your views, sales and income!

Do you like having more space in your title bar? Let us know!  We absolutely love it and feel it was a long time coming.

Thanks for stopping by
~T&D