Wednesday 26 April 2017

Selling things on eBay and Amazon

I've sold quite a few of my unwanted belongings online now and thought  I'd write a bit about it.

First of all, which is better: eBay or Amazon? Overall, I feel eBay is better.

  • Both eBay and Amazon now let you put your item online indefinitely until it sells

  • eBay obviously offer auction listings, as well as 'buy it now' fixed price items. I get quite excited to see how much my eBay auctions will go for in the end, but sometimes it's a disappointment!

  • Amazon's fees are higher. For a £30 item, the difference is small – eBay and Paypal fees would be about £4.00, Amazon fees are about £5.50. But for a £2.00 item, eBay charge about 20p, and Amazon charge £1.50! I've sold a lot of cheap things on eBay because it's a few quid I wouldn't other wise have, but on Amazon it's not really worth it.
  • eBay lets you decide how much you want to charge for postage, but Amazon doesn't. This is only a big problem if you want to sell outside the UK as the pre-determined postage charge is nowhere near enough. This means I can't offer anything I sell to buyers outside the UK. This is a shame as I imagine it could be quite a good niche market to sell English-language graphic novels to people in countries where few people know English.

What sells? I find it hard to predict what will sell and what won't. Basically, if you were going to chuck it out – search for it on eBay and tick 'sold items' in the menu on the side. That'll let you see if anyone's bought one. Prices are hard to predict as well. I've been disappointed by my clothing sales on eBay, but found that fabric fetches a really good price.

Some of it just isn't fair. When I sold a pair of Dr Martens boots, I noticed that fake ones were selling for more than real ones. I got less than half as much as people were paying for a pair of fakes! Feedback can also be unfair. I once got a bizarre email from a seller stating how they had managed to break their previous copy of an album I was selling. I took a few days to reply to this as I was unsure what to say. They then bought the item and I sent it off quickly as usual. They then left me 'neutral' feedback because I didn't respond to their pointless email quickly enough.

Finally, the fun. It's a rewarding feeling for me when something sells. It's a little success and a little extra money. Considering most of what I sell is worth less than a fiver, it's a particularly great thrill when the post office ask me “Are the contents worth more than £20?” and I say “yes”. Oh, and selling the knee and ankle supports I no longer use feels like a good deed. They can cost £40 new and there will always be people with a painful knee/ankle who don't have £40 spare.

I have a bit of fun with the packaging. I always have some patterned or sparkly duct tape, so a lot of packages get fastened with that. I've probably made someone's day more interesting by using scrunched up old biology notes as packaging when I ran out of bubble wrap. I decided not to include the sheets on the male reproductive system.

It's interesting watching where sold items go. I sold a graphic novel to a university library. I sold a CD to a funeral home. I sold a black corset to someone with 'Gothic' in their address. I sold some pliers to an address that contained the word 'cartel'; I hope they are for legitimate use.

I've still got a few things left for sale. If anything else interesting happens, I'll let you know.