Over this past week following Michael Jackson’s death, eBay has been totally flooded with Michael Jackson memorabilia. Thriller albums are going for two to four times as much as you can get them at your local music store (don’t expect them to be there now though). I imagine every eBayer in their respective city went to the record store and bought as many Mike Jackson albums as possible for dirt cheap and are now reaping the benefits…. Damn I missed out.
Here’s is some of the wacky stuff that has been put up for auction on eBay since MJ’s death:
My favorite Michael Jackson listings on eBay however, are the ones where people are trying to completely rip you off. There was a listing for a “Beat It” shirt - nothing special at all about this shirt - that a dude listed for $350. Of course there were no bids because all you had to do was scroll down a little bit and find that there were tons of these shirts for $10!
It’s funny how fast eBayers react to certain high’s and lows in products. Is there a market out there that can react to the idea of supply and demand faster than eBay? - I would say not. It only took minutes for eBayers to start hiking up prices and exploiting anything that remotely resembled Michael Jackson memorabilia. That’s why I love eBay. (RIP MJ)
]]>First off let’s cover the most basic part of the feedback: When to leave positive, negative, and neutral feedback. This article is pretty lengthy (though very informative) so you can skip over this part if you already know these details. Buyers and sellers will be grouped together here.
Leave positive feedback when the transaction is smooth and easy, the shipping is decently on time (even maybe if it’s a little bit late), when the shipping price is appropriate, when the buyer or seller responds in a timely manner to any questions, and when the product is pretty much exactly as described.
Leave neutral feedback if the item isn’t really as described. Maybe it was really used when it was listed as new? Leave Neutral feedback if the person takes a long time to ship the item but everything else was good (do not leave neutral feedback if the shipment is only a couple days late). Another classic case that happens a lot that people use the neutral feedback option for is when someone buys a product, but the seller says that he no longer has the item and he has to issue a refund.
Leave negative feedback on worst case scenarios. Do not be an eBay pest and do it when you do not get your way in every little detail. Leave negative feedback when the shipping is more than a couple weeks late. Leave it when the item is the exact opposite of how it was described. Do not leave it if the person simply does not communicate with you, but that would definitely be a nice add on if one of the other two things that I have mentioned happens along with that. And of course, leave negative feedback if the person was in any way strongly offensive to you - that goes without saying. Do not leave negative feedback just because someone had left negative feedback for you (although sometimes you have the right to). Know when you screwed up and act accordingly.
And that thought brings me to my next topic… Feedback Wars
Feedback wars come in many shapes and sizes and though you may win a couple of the battles, remember that it is up to the fellas over at appeal@eBay.com that actually decide who wins the war. So that is why it is always good to remain honest and fair in your feedback ratings.
Every once in a while you will get the paranoid eBay buyer that is never satisfied. He will want tracking ID, special prices, or other certain “special requirements.” As soon as he doesn’t get what he wants, he gives you a negative feedback with a nice little nasty-gram attached to it. Do not hesitate to leave negative feedback as well, and then appeal right away to eBay.
Sellers will threaten to leave you negative feedback if you leave them negative feedback all the time. Do not let them get away with it. If you feel like they deserve negative feedback, but you are scared that they will leave you negative feedback in return, do it anyways and let the eBay powers that be take care of it. If you are fair and honest, eBay will reward you and negate your negative feedback while punishing the deserving side.
Simple Feedback Rules (or more like laws)
One of the golden rules for eBay sellers is to never leave feedback first. Never. The truth of the matter is that you don’t know the other person. You don’t know what they look like, how they talk, who they are, what kind of moral standings they live by… That person that just bought something off of you may be the craziest nut on eBay for all you know, and you are only one pet peeve away from them leaving you negative feedback. If you leave negative feedback first, they are more than likely going to leave negative feedback as well. If you are a buyer, then it is common courtesy to leave feedback first.
Open up a dispute before making any quick decisions. Many times you’ll notice that an eBay member with very few feedbacks will buy an item, and never pay for it. These buyers are usually people that do not use eBay very often and are on once in a very great while. Leaving negative feedback might not even be worth it in this case, so just open up a dispute and try to get your final value fee back.
Be honest with everything you do. Do not give someone negative feedback that doesn’t deserve it and do not give someone positive feedback that doesn’t deserve it.
Watch out for Feedback Frauds
Not many people know what I’m talking about when I say “feedback fraud.” People that have once had “successful” eBay business that have been kicked off eBay know the value of good feedback. For that reason there is a loophole in the feedback world. As you may know, there are items on eBay called eBooks. Well some of them can range as low in price as 1 single cent. Feedback frauds could buy 10,000 of these items and get 10,000 positive feedbacks within a matter of a day or two. So remember to keep a lookout for them.
Feedback is all about honesty and fairness. If you are honest and fair, then its more than likely your customer or provider will be. There will always be bad seeds 9if you want example of “bad seeds” go to a power sellers feedback profile - every so often they get negative feedback and 50% of the time it’s because of someone abusing the system), but you cant let them affect your decision making when it comes to leaving feedback.
]]>Understanding the demanding tastes and needs of eBay bidders, Auctiva provides four key elements to help you create the best ads possible:
If you have sold on eBay before or sell on eBay now, you know that Auctiva’s free provision of these fine aids makes Auctiva a good service for eBay sellers (Auctiva’s Fee policies are always changing because eBay is always changing). Of course, eBay provides these services, as well, for a price. Auctiva’s services are always free for eBay users.
At eBay, a listing designer aid like Auctiva’s costs ten cents per ad, a listing scheduler like Auctiva’s costs ten more cents per ad, the addition of three ad pics adds thirty cents to your ad fees, and supersizing your pictures results in the addition of seventy-five cents to your ad’s overhead. In separate terms such as this, such addition seems small. Let’s look again. These four aids which would be free via Auctiva end up costing $1.25 per ad. Suppose you sell 10 items a week. If you use eBay services rather than the Auctiva services, you’ve added $12.50 to your eBay charges. If you sell 100 items a week, the adjustment for these eBay services is $125.00 a week. If you sell 1,000 items per week, you’ve spent $1,250.00 on services you could have had for free through Auctiva.
Certainly, now you can see why Auctiva is a good service for eBay. Don’t keep the secret to yourself. Pass it on and on and on. And put the cash you save by using Auctiva away for something special–you deserve it.
]]>What is a Nigerian Scam?
I would imagine that there are tons of different scams that people call Nigerian Scams. The ones that I am talking about are Nigerian Scams on eBay.
The reasons they are called Nigerian Scams are because they are scams that involve Nigeria. Most of the time the scam involves and eBay seller shipping an item to Nigeria, giving the scam the name “Nigerian Scam”.
Example:
The fist Nigerian Scam I ran into was very interesting. It was about two years ago during Christmas time. I had a couple of Sony Playstation 2’s up for sale on eBay. I received an email asking if I could stop the auction (I did not offer buy it now) and sell the item to this individual. He offered me about $30-$40 more then I excepted to get for the item plus an additional $130.00 for shipping.
Not knowing much about any types of scams on eBay I just got excited and thought, wow that’s pretty cool. So I stopped the auction and the Nigerian Scam went into play.
The guy/girl told me that they would send to money to me through PayPal. Not to long later I received an email from “PayPal” saying that $xxx.xx has been deposited into my PayPal account. The email also said that it wouldn’t be available to me until I shipped out the item. It was supposedly something to do with where I was shipping it to. That is when I started to think twice about what was going on.
So to make quite a long story short, I contacted PayPal and figured out that this was all a bunch of bull. Once I realized it and looked into it a little deeper, it was quite obvious that it was a scam. Of course I didn’t think it was obvious before I knew what to look for.
What to look for to avoid Nigerian Scams?
For one, if it seems too good to be true, then it is. In the above example you can see that it is just not right. Who would pay that much money for an item that can be gotten anywhere? Well of course the guy had a good story of why he needed that item now, and it was touching…but it was bull.
Next, is the stopping of the auction. If someone wants your item, they can go through the bidding process.
The more obvious, is the Nigerian part. If they are asking you to send something to Nigeria look out. Although Id imagine that isn’t the only place that the scams are going on.
If there is one thing you take from this article it is the following tip:
PayPal!
Before you ship anything out ever, make sure the money is in your PayPal account. Open up you browser, type in paypal.com, and make sure that you have received a payment from that person. If you have not received a payment, then do not ship the item.
The goal of the Nigeria Scam artists is to get your merchandise for free and that is their business. Just use your head, and pay attention to what is going on and you will not get scammed. I have deal with these types of scams daily, and now I just ignore the first email and that is the end of it. As long as the world is the world, there will always be scammers, and if there is not Nigerian Scams, there will be some other type of scam.
]]>Every time I go to play basketball at the park, go out to eat, go to a friend’s house, or hell - even when I get pulled over by the cops, I get asked, “Hey man, what’s the deal with that sticker on your truck?” It’s a beautiful thing. I never really have to go out of my way to let people know what I do, or have to throw myself out there because people come to me. People ask me about my job. It’s similar to a video phenomenon on YouTube. I don’t really have to tell anyone what I do because everyone does it for me.
I’ve gotten a lot of different eBay jobs because of this reason. As a matter of fact, I’m working on a huge project right now selling an old timer’s 60 year old book collection because when he asked someone where he should go or who he should see to sell his books on eBay for him, that someone said my name.
Now am I telling you to go put a sticker on your car too? - No (although it’s still probably a good idea). What I’m saying is let it be known in the neighborhood that you know a lot about eBay. Every chance you get, mention that you have been making money on eBay lately. Once you have obtained enough knowledge on eBay selling you can talk about it for days about it.
I always like to start conversations about eBay by stating all the ridiculous stuff that gets listed on eBay. I will be like, “Hey you know people are actually selling Imaginary friends on eBay!” (True story BTW) Just this last week there was an episode on SportsCenter that reported a story about a man who was selling his loyalty to the Chicago Cubs on eBay and I think the bid was up to $500 or something. Stories like that are a great way to break the ice and start a conversation about eBay.
Just some things you can do to let it be known you are the man for everyone’s eBay needs:
There’s an endless amount of ways to get your eBay name out there. The best ways are the ones that make it so you don’t have to do any of the work. Let word of mouth let the neighborhood know that you are the man for eBay selling in this town!
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