So, Can You Really Sell EBooks On EBay And Make Cold Hard Cash?

Selling eBooks on eBay, and making any worthwhile profit from doing so, is becoming more and more difficult.

Gone are the days when you could sell someone else's books on eBay, and it's becoming considerably more difficult to sell ebooks that you might have written yourself or via Public Domain Publications.

Many people seem to think that ebooks should be freely available (because so many good ones are)and there are some excellent ebooks for sale on ebay but rarely do they sell for more than a few pennies.

So purchase ebooks from eBay by all means, there's just no money in trying to sell ebooks on eBay.

There's also the problem of who owns the copyright to the ebook you are trying to sell. This has become so much of a headache that eBay has come up with it's own policy to try and deal with this situation.

HERE'S AN EXCEPT FROM EBAY'S VERO POLICY.

* eBay's Verified Rights Owner (VeRO) Program

* eBay's VeRO Program was developed to facilitate cooperation between eBay and rights owners protecting their intellectual property rights.

* Highlights of the program include:

* Expeditious removal of listings reported to eBay by over 5,000 intellectual property rights owners

* Specific, detailed warnings designed to deter the listing of potentially infringing items before a listing is posted on eBay

* Voluntary daily monitoring and removal by eBay of listings offering potentially counterfeit or otherwise infringing items

* Voluntary daily monitoring and removal by eBay of listings that violate eBay policies designed to prevent the listing of infringing items on eBay

* Ability to save searches and have the results emailed to you through Favorite Searches

* Suspension of repeat offenders

* Continuing efforts to identify and prevent previously suspended users from reregistering for eBay

* Cooperation with rights owners seeking personal information on alleged infringers.

* However, because eBay is not an expert in your intellectual property rights, and cannot verify that sellers have the right to sell the millions of items they post on eBay each day, we need your help in identifying listings which do not appear on their face to infringe your rights.

To read the policy in it's entirety go to:-

http://pages.ebay.com/help/confidence/ia/protecting_intellectual_property.html

KEEP IT SIMPLE AND STRAIGHTFORWARD

Now there is a way around this that is easier to achieve than most people believe.

The easiest way of making sure that you don't fall foul of eBay's VeRo Policy is:

* Create The Products Yourself

The easiest way of overcoming peoples beliefs that your ebook should be freely availablen is.

* Don't have your ebook look like an ebook!

So when is an ebook not an ebook?

When it is perceived by the visitors to your eBay Sales Page as something else.

For example, if you bundled together your ebook with a printed version of the book, and or an Audio CD or Video DVD, your product would have a much higher perceived value.

SO.

* You create a printed version of your ebook contained in a nicely printed folder.

* You take a digital photograph of the cover of your printed version, surrounded by the audio CD and or Video DVD and use this as your Gallery Picture when you start to create your purchase It Now, eBay auction page.

* You use the same picture or pictures throughout your eBay Auction sales page.

People are used to seeing software generated ebook covers on eBay but by using the above method your product will not be perceived as an ebook.

* In your sales page include the information that the entire package can be digitally downloaded by the customer if they wish.

Do this and you will be one of the very few sellers on eBay using this technique and take my word for it, this technique is very powerful indeed.

Now this might sound like a lot of work or seem over complicated, yet when you come to think of it, most PCs and Laptops come complete with hardware and software for creating Audio CDs and DVDs? and if you don't have this kind of equipment you can get it on eBay relatively cheaply.

SO HOW DO YOU DO IT?

With this technology it is fairly simple to create Audio CDs and Video DVDs.

* You could record or have somebody else record your ebook onto Audio CD or DVD and provide it as an audio product within your product bundle. Many people find it easier to learn by "listening" than by reading.

* If the subject matter of your book included information on how to use a particular type of software for example, you could use a video capture program such as "Camtasia" to capture the sequence of steps that would need to be gone through in order to use the software effectively.

* If your ebook covered a practical subject like gardening for instance you could use a Camcorder to take actual "videos" of the various aspects of gardening, copy them to DVD and make it part of your "bundle". Many people find it easier to learn by "seeing" than by reading or listening.

Remember that your product bundle can be downloaded by your customer (assuming you have set your product up this way) but don't be afraid to provide them with the printed version of your book along with the Audio and Video DVDs if that's what they prefer.

Your ebook presented in this way will represent a much higher value than the traditional way of selling ebooks on eBay and therefore you can ask a much higher price than you would otherwise.

If all this sounds a little daunting to you I suggest that you carry out some research into what you've read here. More information on how to create Books and Videos to sell on eBay can be found at the end of this article.

Earn Money Now from Selling Childrens Items on Ebay

Kids Items You Can Sell

Clothes, toys and videos are good money makers on eBay.

Go to eBay and look up a "lot" of size six girl's cloths. You will find they are expensive! The average price for a lot of 20 good conditioned clothes is about $35.00.

When your kids grow out of their seasonal clothes do not throw them out. Bundle them into different lots by category. For example bundle girls dresses separate from girls play clothes, but only do that if you have at least six of each different type.

Lots of any item sell better than single items unless the item is unique or high priced. For example, a hand embroidered dress that you paid a lot for would sell better by itself instead of bundled with other basic dresses.

The next item to lookup on eBay is toys. Most toys in good condition will sell for a lot of money. One idea that works well is to buy hot items in October at Wal-Mart or Toys-R-Us and sell them on eBay. Busy people are willing to pay extra for the convenience of getting the items delivered to their home. For example, last year a Mega Power Ranger came out in stores around October and sold at Wal-Mart for about $45.00. The same item sold on eBay for up to $65.00 plus shipping. The Yellow Power Ranger is yet another example where the store price was about $6.00, while the same item was selling on eBay for about $20.00.

Have your children ever received duplicate birthday or Christmas presents? You can sell those on eBay also. Look at the eBay listings for items of interest to see if selling on eBay is worth more than returning the item to the store.

Kid's videos and DVDs are also good money-makers. Bundle about three of these together, and you can usually make about $7.00-$12.00 per bundle. Bundle more and the money goes up. Disney movies in hard cases can go for a higher amount. This also works for other types of movies as well.

Save those McDonalds toys. Some Kids Meals toys sell high. Take the new Star Wars toys from Burger King...very collectible. You will find them selling on eBay from $1.00 to $5.00, not including shipping.

Ebay has a whole section devoted to dolls and bears. If your daughter doesn't want her collectible dolls anymore sell them on eBay.

Kids Crafts You Can Sell

Around the holidays, especially, have your children place their hand in paint and make a print on some quality paper. Add a holiday related poem and you have a great craft to sell on eBay.

Have your kids make gift jars with ready made mixes. For example, hot chocolate mixes in a jar with a plastic spoon tied to it with a ribbon. Dip the end of the spoon with white chocolate.

Baby Items You Can Sell

Used baby items are very profitable. Baby items cost a lot of money, especially in their first year. Any "gently" used items are generally good sellers on eBay.

If you have baby coupons that you will never use, sell them on eBay! Left over diapers and formula sell well also. A lot of 35 used cloth diapers usually sells for around $38.00 plus shipping. Four Fuzzi Bunz diapers (cloth diapers with hemp inserts) can sell for as much as $40.00.

There you have it. Plenty of ideas for selling those leftover kids items on eBay...and you can even make a nice profit while you are at it!

Hurricane Katrina Donations Could be Many Millions More - EBay Sellers Try in Vain to Help

Yesterday I saw a mention in someone's email ezine about a kind person who had an eBay auction with the proceeds going 100% to help victims of the horrible Hurricane Katrina.

It struck a chord with me because I had wanted to set up something similar, but found that the "eBay Giving Works" charity program seems to be terribly flawed for us small sellers. I had researched it the day before, eBay goes through Mission Fish to handle the administrative tasks and distribution.

Here in a nutshell is how I understand it works. You set up an eBay auction and pledge a percentage of the proceeds to go to a charity. You pick the one you like. If the auction sells, the buyer pays you, and Mission Fish charges your credit card, taking out $3.00 per transaction for their fees, plus 3% to cover credit card fees. That's reasonable, they need to cover their overhead and payroll expenses. Then Mission Fish sends the balance to the charity.

The minimum donation per item has to be $10.00. Again, so far so good, I can understand that.

Now, I noticed in the auction that I visited that the seller had set up a dutch auction, with 1000 "lots" available, each for $1.00 each, with the proceeds going 100% to her favorite charity that would get food to the Katrina victims. I was about to place a bid for several $1.00 lots (a dutch auction lets you "win" as many of the item as you like, all at the same price).

Then it hit me, why couldn't I do the same kind of dutch auction, maybe she had found the way to get around the $10.00 per item restriction, and found that it was a minimum $10.00 per auction. It would only make sense that it would work that way, since Mission Fish charges the seller's credit card, if all 1000 lots sold, that would be $1000 for the charity, Mission Fish would take $3.00 plus 3%, the seller would collect (hopefully) the $1000 from the buyers, and all she would be on the hook for would be the eBay fees. Those fees, plus her hard work, would be her personal contribution.

So I went back to eBay and Mission Fish and researched the deal again. I found out that sure enough, in a multiple item auction, Mission Fish requires a $10.00 donation from the seller for EVERY ITEM that sells in a multiple-item auction (dutch auction).

So, if the seller had 1000 lots at $1.00 each, and they all sold, Mission Fish would have charged her credit card on file for $10.00 for each lot, a total of $10,000.00! And they would have taken their $3.00 + 3% fee for each of those 1000 lots, more than $3,000.00 for their trouble!

At that point, I realized the seller either had deep pockets and was matching contributions 10 to 1, or she misunderstood what would happen to her. I sent her an email, and to end a long story, she indeed misunderstood, was obviously fairly upset at the prospect of paying $10,000, and ended the auction early.

Now, I'd like my readers to do one of two things. If you think that eBay and Mission Fish are mishandling the charity program, as I do, please contact one or both and point them to this blog entry, or just write your own letter with your thoughts.

You can contact Mission Fish here:
http://www.missionfish.org/Help/contactus.jsp

eBay is always more difficult to contact, but you can try starting here:
http://pages.ebay.com/help/contact_us/_base/index.html

The other thing you could do is support the eBay seller's cause, she had to end the auction but she took the trouble to set up a web page for donations, you can access and support it here:
http://www.flipidy.com/secondharvest.htm

Perhaps with enough pressure on Mission Fish, they'll get together with eBay and allow dutch auctions to be counted as a single donation, instead of multiple individual items, and encourage more charity in the future.

For those with homes, families, relatives or friends in the devasted area, my hearts and prayers go out to you. I hope this information will in some small way help someone somewhere.

EBay Feedback, 5 Key Things All EBayers Should Know

eBay's user feedback system is one of the site's most important components. Without the conscientious comments recorded by both buyers and sellers, there would be no way for anyone to build up a trustworthy reputation in the nearly anonymous realm of cyberspace. And without a good measure of trust among users, eBay would be a difficult, if not impossible, environment in which to safely conduct business.

By learning how eBay's feedback system works you can use it to your advantage. Understanding the numbers and feedback comments will go a long way toward making the online trading venue a safer place for you and your pocketbook.

1. How Feedback Works

The eBay feedback system operates in a straightforward manner. Every time you complete a transaction as either a buyer or a seller, you leave feedback for the other party. This feedback is made up of a score of +1, 0, or -1, as well as a one-line comment that sums up how smoothly -- or how poorly --- the process was completed.

A +1 means that you were happy with the way the transaction ended. A 0 score is neutral, meaning you weren't particularly pleased with the efforts of the other person, but you didn't feel taken, either. A -1 indicates that you were unhappy with the transaction as a whole. In addition to the numbered score, you can submit a short comment that explains the reason for your score.

As you browse the scores and comments on eBay, you'll see the vast majority of member scores are positive, and most have form-letter comments that indicate an effortless transaction. Neutral scores are relatively rare. Negative comments are more common than neutral ones.

eBay users often don't realize the importance of the feedback system in terms of establishing a good reputation. Not only do users benefit from garnering a lopsided positive-feedback-to-negative-feedback ratio, but they reap rewards by advancing upward through the various star symbols used to designate successful users.

2. You are a Star

The star symbols displayed next to a username show, at a glance, how many transactions the user has completed with positive feedback. With fewer than 10 feedbacks, users remain starless. With 10 to 49 positive scores, users will receive a yellow star.

There are many other star symbols, but as an example, after an eBay user snags anywhere from 500 to 999 positive scores, will get a purple star. Once a user moves into the stratosphere of eBay, she'll receive a shooting star that indicates she's gathered more than 10,000 positive scores. eBay sellers who reach this level of activity indicate that when they achieve a new star status, their number of sales increases, often dramatically, especially when it's paired with an excellent feedback rating.

3. Feedback is Forever

One of the reasons feedback is so important, and so potent, is that once you've left a comment, you can't go back and edit it later. That means your comments, both positive and negative, say online for all eyes to see, for as long as that member is active on eBay.

eBay does reserve the right to remove inappropriate comments, such as those that use racist or overtly sexual wording, or those that include hyperlinks. however, eBay does not typically delete most other comments, even those that seem unfair or unjust.

When both the buyer and seller agree to retract feedback, there is a procedure called Mutual Feedback Withdrawal, but this option's effect is limited. If two parties initially had a disagreement about a transaction, but they'd like to change the score they left for the other person, they can do this feature. This removes the score from both parties' feedback rating, however, it does not delete the comments that were left, which often makes this option less effective, especially when those comments were damaging to a reputation. You can start a Mutual Feedback Withdrawal request within 30 days of either party leaving feedback or within 90 days after the transaction, whichever is later. To start the process, enter the item number into the online Mutual Feedback Withdrawal form in the Feedback Forum.

4. The Negative Curse

Negative feedback, or "negs" in eBay-speak, is something to avoid because negs are a virtual curse for buyers and sellers. Serious eBay users evade bad feedback as best they can, and those who depend on eBay for a substantial portion of their livelihood will stop at almost nothing to keep these marks from marring their online reputation.

One of the primary reasons for preventing negative feedback, of course, is that a buyer who's browsing for a product is likely to skip a seller who has more than a couple of recent negative comments.

When you leave feedback for an eBay user, he has the option of responding in kind, os his comments land on your profile. If you leave a nasty remark accusing a seller of extremely slow shipping, you'll likely see an indignant comment denying any wrongdoing in your own profile, even if your claim was true.

This kind of retaliatory feedback is the reason most users think twice before leaving negative comments, even if that comment is true. One user posts a negative comment for another party, and as an act of revenge, the slighted party leaves a neg for the first user - in many cases, the retaliatory feedback has no grounds in truth and is intended only to punish on member for leaving a read mark on another user's profile.

Retaliatory feedback is a problem because negative feedback of any kind carries real weight. Not every buyer or seller takes the time to investigate negative feedback, preferring instead to find another user who doesn't have recent angry comments directed at him.

On the other hand, the good news is that one or two negative comments aren't the kiss of death. The more positive feedback comments you have, the more unlikely it is that a negative score or two will cause you problems. Remember this as you deal with other users on the site, but also remember the feedback system doesn't work unless you're honest about transactions.

5. Final Feedback

eBay's feedback system has its share of flaws, but for building trust and creating a safer buying and selling environment, it's indispensable. however, to make the system work best, you'll have to learn to read comments appropriately to get a better idea of how to discern trustworthy users from online swindlers.

Do your research on the items you want to buy and check the feedback of buyers and sellers before you commit to dealing with them. The effort will help you avoid financially draining scams, give you peace of mind, and make eBay a much more productive place for you to do business.

About Adam

Selling on eBay and the Internet is still a relatively a new phenomenon with unprecedented opportunity. Adam Ginsberg, recently featured on NBC's Today Show is an author and educator and has built a small fortune selling on eBay. As an early Internet pioneer, Adam discovered a system for generating wealth - through the power of the eBay marketplace.

Boosting Your EBay Auction Profits: Just Add Audio

According to a recent report, adding audio to your eBay auctions could increase bids by as much as 22% over auctions without audio.

A recent trend showing up on a lot of websites is the addition of an audio clip. The clip is a personal message by the author or the website owner encouraging you to take advantage of what they offer.

The psychology behind this technique is really Marketing 101. It's called personalization. An audio clip added to your eBay auction allows you to personally tell the potential bidder about the product. Using your own voice allows you to make contact with the bidder on a personal level that written words cannot. Because, that's what your eBay auction really is...It's just a long written classified ad asking the bidder to make an offer to purchase your item.

Prior to the advent of the telephone the only reliable way to communicate long distance was by writing letters. It was not unusual back then for lovers to write each other daily or weekly. The decline of letter writing is a well documented event that coincides with the advent of the telephone.

With audio you can describe the item, tell the bidder why you are selling it or even communicate with them about your refund policy or provide your contact information. The possibilities are almost unlimited as a way to establish a rapport with the bidder.

But, the most important reason to add audio clips is that it makes it easy to convey excitement and invoke emotion, giving you a really powerful selling-edge.

How to add audio to a web site:

The simplest way is to upload a .wav or Mp3 file to a website and provide a link to the file. When the bidder clicks on the link his or her computer will automatically recognize the file and play it with the audio player on the bidders computer.

There are some drawbacks to this method. If the bidder's computer doesn't recognize the file it won't play. The overall effect is not as professional as it could be and it distracts the bidder. If you are a reasonably tech savvy type you can easily deal with the drawbacks of this approach.

For the rest of us, there are a number of software solutions and websites that will simplify the task of adding audio to our eBay auctions.

5 Ways to Drive Traffic Away from Your EBay Auction

eBay is a one-stop solution to any one who wants to make money online. Whether you just selling a few unwanted items from around your house or your want to develop a work from home business, eBay removes many of the obstacles for you. Not many other websites can help you drive targeted traffic towards your sales, process the order on your behalf and accept payment though paypal. All you need to do then is dispatch the item to your winning bidder.

And let's not forget the biggest advantage over selling on eBay. The majority of users have money in their hand just waiting to find the right item.

So if eBays so great why would you want to drive traffic AWAY from your auctions?

Well there are a few reasons why you'd be better off selling from your own website, rather than though eBay. Firstly & most importantly, think of all the listing fees & final value fees you could save if everything you sold on eBay you could sell on your own website. Personally it would save me thousands of dollars per year alone in listing fees.

Secondly, you'll be protecting yourself from eBay policy change. Imagine you were selling thousands of ebooks weekly and then suddenly eBay policy changed to prevent any ebook listings.

Overnight your business would simply disappear & your income would vanish. It's the same with listing fees - A sudden hike in fees could wipe out your business & profit overnight.

With any business, especially an online one you need to safeguard yourself against measures that are out of your control. So by driving traffic away from your auctions to your own website you'll slowly start building up an alternative source of revenue. The following methods can be used on eBay. Some are on the borderline of eBay policy & you should check out any policy violation before using them. Saying that, a huge proportion of sellers use these on a daily basis.

1) Image Hosting

All the best sellers have auction templates developed to maintain a professional listing. And of course those sellers ALWAYS use images or graphics to accurately show the condition of the items their offering.

eBay itself allows you to upload the images to their servers, other commercial & free services are available. However really you want to store any images on your own server. Not only will search engine robots follow the links from your listings to your site (helping in improved visibility in any search engines), but many browsers will show the address of where the images are loading from in the status bar - For instance "Loading Image From http://www.visitmyshop.com" or "Waiting For http://www.visitmyshop.com". This is a great way for your visitors to see to become familiar with your site.

2) Feedback

Many sellers include their own website in the feedback comments they use. Strictly it is against eBay policy but many Powersellers use comments like "Thanks for your custom from http://www.Visitmyshop.com" as standard. This is perhaps one of the widely violated policies on eBay. I've never known of anyone receive a warning for this policy, but use it with caution as you could be the first.

3) Email Address.

eBay allows your listings to contain one email link address, in addition to the "Ask The Seller A Question Link" they already provide. Use the opportunity to show the an email account associated with your domain name for example sales@visitmyshop.com. The only condition about showing your email address is the one shown must also be your registered email account with eBay. Before you list it, make sure they match up.

4) About Me Page

eBay actually allows you to link to your own website from your About Me page, as long as the actual page does not directly offer to sell items. Therefore make it an information or about us page that you link to, BUT one where visitors can easily navigate to your catalog of items for sale. Additionally drive traffic to your About Me Page by including a link on every listings, for example "Click here to learn about me". An average basic shop on eBay will get over 1500 item views within a month. If you can drive just a small proportion of these to your about me page & then to your site you'll certainly see a difference in your non-eBay sales.

5) User Id

While eBay does not allow your user id to be that of an website, you should have it as closely to resembling your site name as possible. You CAN NOT attach .com, -com or *com to the end of your user id - this is strictly against eBay policy. However nothing would stop your id being VisitMyShop. The idea is to get your eBay visitors comfortable with dealing with you away from eBay.

I hope these tips help you drive traffic away from your auctions towards your site & lessens eBays grip on your business. Remember, Ignorance is not an excuse eBay accept if you do violate their policy. While you initially get a warning for policy violation continuous offences may result in your account being suspended. Having said that, eBay mostly rely on policing from other users to enforce their policy so as long as no reports you should be in the clear.

EBay Income Possibilities

If you've ever read an article about eBay, you will have seen the kinds of incomes people make - it isn't unusual to hear of people making thousands of dollars per month on eBay.

Next time you're on eBay, take a look at how many PowerSellers there are: you'll find quite a few. Now consider that every single one of one of them must be making at least $1,000 per month, as that's eBay's requirement for becoming a PowerSeller. Silver PowerSellers make at least $3,000 each month, while Gold PowerSellers make more than $10,000, and the Platinum level is $25,000. The top ranking is Titanium PowerSeller, and to qualify you must make at least $150,000 in sales every month!

The fact that these people exist gives you come idea of the income possibilities here. Most of them never set out to even set up a business on eBay - they simply started selling a few things, and then kept going. There are plenty of people whose full-time job is selling things on eBay, and some of them have been doing it for years now. Can you imagine that? Once they've bought the stock, everything else is pretty much pure profit for these people - they don't need to pay for any business premises, staff, or anything else. There are multi-million pound businesses making less in actual profit than eBay PowerSellers do.

Even if you don't want to quit your job and really go for it, you can still use eBay to make a significant second income. You can pack up orders during the week and take them down to the post office for delivery each Saturday. There are few other things you could be doing with your spare time that have anywhere near that kind of earning potential.

What's more, eBay doesn't care who you are, where you live, or what you look like: some PowerSellers are very old, or very young. Some live out in the middle of nowhere where selling on eBay is one of the few alternatives to farming or being very poor. eBay tears down the barriers to earning that the real world constantly puts up. There's no job interview and no commuting involved - if you can post things, you can do it.

Put it this way: if you know where to get something reasonably cheaply that you could sell, then you can sell it on eBay - and since you can always get discounts for bulk at wholesale, that's not exactly difficult. Buy a job lot of something in-demand cheaply, sell it on eBay, and you're making money already, with no set-up costs.

If you want to dip your toe in the water before you commit to actually buying anything, then you can just sell things that you've got lying around in the house. Search through that cupboard of stuff you never use, and you'll probably find you've got a few hundred dollars' worth of stuff lying around in there! This is the power of eBay: there is always someone who wants what you're selling, whatever it might be, and since they've come looking for you, you don't even need to do anything to get them to buy it.