eBay Not Generating Enough Cash? Try These Ideas!

Money making opportunities are all around us, if we pay attention to them. In many cases, the key to making money is to be prepared when others are not. Think ahead, anticipate needs, and make money.

I was looking around Jim Cockrum's My Silent Team on Friday, and found this guide in the Bonus Pool: "101 Emergency Cash Generators." I am always skeptical about these kinds of things, so I downloaded the 176 page eBook and started reading it. I couldn't put it down. These ideas are fantastic, and stuff you can really do - most with zero start up costs. And I am already trying some of them. Here are some examples.

Emergency Cash Generator #21: Rain, rain, don't go away. This one is great for parents who have kids in outdoor sports like baseball, soccer, or football. Go to the dollar store and stock up on rain ponchos for $1. Always keep them with you. When you are sitting at the ball park for an 8 hour softball tournament, and it starts pouring rain, pull out your stash of rain ponchos and start selling them to unprepared spectators for $3-$5.

Emergency Cash Generator #37: Trash Runner. Teenagers can do this one. Talk to the senior citizens in your neighborhood about hiring you (or your teen) to take trash cans to the curb on trash day, and bring them back to the garage once trash has been picked up. Some seniors just aren't physically able to drag the trash cans to the curb. This works well if a person lives on a steep hill or has a long driveway. Also works for the able-bodied lazy person or neighbors who travel a lot. Charge $5-$10 a month per household. Teens can do this on their way to and from the bus stop or after school.

Emergency Cash Generator #71: Christmas (holiday) Gift Wrapping Service. Stay at home moms, this one is for you! Some people are overwhelmed by all there is to do at holiday time. Many people (myself included) would gladly pay someone to wrap their gifts. The target market here is single, divorced, or widowed men. You supply the paper, bows, and boxes, and the customer gives you the items with a list of who gets what. Buy your paper at the dollar store or at Sam's or Costco, get free boxes from Sam's, Cotsco, or grocery stores. Advertise (place 1/2 page flyers or business cards) this business at places that men frequent like dry cleaners, automotive repair shops, barber shops, driving range, the gym, or coffee shops. You can wrap the gifts at home, on your schedule, in your pajamas.

This eBook is full of ideas like these, and even some eBay tips I was not aware of. You are covered by the author's 8 week 100% no hassle guarantee: If you are not satisfied with "Emergency Cash Generators Version 3.0" for any reason, just email the author at jjones@business-ideas.biz within 8 Weeks of receipt and he will refund your money. No questions asked.

The author says, "Money making opportunities are all around you. But it is up to you to accept these opportunities when they present themselves." Click here to give it a try. Take these ideas and run with them. You have nothing to lose, and there is money out there waiting for you.

Source for eBay Inventory - Woot

Ok, so what is Woot? According to the website, "Woot.com is an online store and community that focuses on selling cool stuff cheap. It started as an employee-store slash market-testing type of place for an electronics distributor, but it's taken on a life of its own." It is a good place to get stuff to sell on eBay. Here is how it works. Go to woot.com and look for the daily deal. Today's deal is Razer Salmosa Gaming Mouse for $13.37. Here is a screen shot of the deal:



Ok, so what, right? I don't even know what this item is (my 13 year old would) or if it is a deal. So I searched on Google, and found it at Walmart for $38.73. See here:


Razer Salmosa 3G Gaming Mouse at Walmart

Good, we have determined this is a deal. Now, let's see what it sells for on eBay using my very favorite research tool - Hammertap. And, drumroll please, looks like we have another hot one! 87% sell through rate.



Sell through rate = 86.67%. This means that if you listed 100 of these, 87 would sell.

Average sale price = $46.71

Click here to see the completed listings on ebay for this product.

You can see that I did the search today, November 8, right after checking the daily Woot. Woot will only let you order 3 of the daily deal item. But if you check the daily deal every day, you can rack up some great products and many sell exceptionally well on eBay. In theory, if I ordered 3 of these and sell them for a $15 profit, I've made $45 on just this one item - and I didn't even have to leave my chair to do it.

Now I am going to lecture you. If you are not using Hammertap, you are missing opportunities to access this kind of information on a daily basis. Why wait for me to tell you what's going on? You could have already figured this out for yourself in about 2 minutes, and ordered your 3 gaming mice to sell on eBay. Hammertap only costs $19.99 a month, is easy to use, and provides valuable information that your competitors don't see. This is a business investment. 20 bucks a month can help you make hundreds, or even thousands more dollars in profit. Click here to take the 10 day trial and see for yourself. Information is power, so get your information from Hammertap.

Happy Selling!

Clearance Item to Sell on eBay - 100% Sell Through Rate

I found Nicorette Commit Lozenges on clearance at Publix this morning while I was doing my grocery shopping. I ALWAYS check the clearance section no matter where I am, you never know what gems are hiding in there. The box of Nicorette Commit lozenges, Cappuccino, 72 count, 2 mg, was marked down to $12. Regular retail price is about $40. You may remember a post a while back about Nicorette orange flavor gum that was discontinued and was a hot item for a while.

So here is the research. Whenever I find something like this, I check it out on Hammertap to see the sell through rate and average sale price. When I searched for the terms NICORETTE LOZENGE 72 CAPPUCCINO, I got these results:



Then, using Hammertap, you can go to this screen and see the actual listings:



Hammertap is a couple of days behind, because the data is extracted from eBay and sent over - it isn't like looking at completed listings that are up to the minute. So you always want to check completed listings, too. Here is listing for this exact item that ended yesterday, November 6:



See the listing here: COMMIT Lozenges--CAPPUCCINO FLAVOR--72ct--2mg Each

Now you may ask, "How did you know to buy it?" I kind of already knew that the stop smoking products are expensive, and this seemed like it had been marked down quite a bit. I went up to customer service and asked if they could tell me what the regular price was, and they looked it up - regular retail is $44. I asked if this flavor had been discontinued, and they said they didn't know. The expiration date is 5/10, the package is sealed, so I took a chance. I will let you know how it goes, and please let me know if you find any or learn if this product is discontinued. If it is discontinued, it will probably be selling for much more in the future.

Happy Selling!

Super Hot Toy Tip - Little Tunes MP3 Player

Little Tunes MP3 Boom box is going to be sale at Tuesday Morning starting on Friday Nov 6 - Sun Nov 8. Original price, $69.99, sale price $19.99. (Click here to see the ad.)

According to Hammertap, the sell through rate is a whopping 87.5% with an average selling price of $41. Here is the data:



And here is a completed listing for a Little Tunes MP3 Boom Box:


The listing closed on October 18. Click here to see the listing.

For more hot holiday tips like this, be sure you are subscribed to my blog! See the subscription button on the sidebar.

You may also want to check out Hammertap so you can do this type of research yourself when you see items on sale. Click here for a 1 week free trial to see just what Hammertap can do.

Happy Selling!

How to Use Twitter for eBay Marketing - Part 2

Ok, so now you have a Twitter profile and you are following some people. Let's go over the Twitter lingo so you will understand the site and what everyone is doing there.

Following. These are the people whose tweets you've selected to read; their tweets appear in your "feed" or "stream."

Follower. This is someone who is reading your tweets.

The @ symbol. Put this before any other Twitterer's username to refer to them. Why? It creates a link to their profile automatically, which is handy for your followers to track conversations or look at people you're referring to. So when you are set up on Twitter, give me a shout out: @ebaycoach Hi, I made it to Twitter!

The hashtag (#). A hashtag is a method to pull together global Tweets around some particular topic. So you may see something like, #ebay, #followfriday, #giveaway, etc.

RT or Retweet. The same as forwarding an email; re-sending a tweet sent by someone else. Include the @username of the person who authored the tweet. You are basically saying "I like what this person said, I want to pass it on, and let the person know I liked it and passed it on." Great use of this feature: Missing child alerts.

Ok, so now you are set up on Twitter, and understand some of the lingo. Let's start finding customers. Let's say you got lucky and found some Zhu Zhu pets and have them listed in your store. Go to the search box on the right, and put in Zhu Zhu Pets. You want to find people who are talking about them. You will find plenty of sellers, but look for those who can't find them, want them, etc. The search box looks like this:



And here is someone looking for Zhu Zhu pets:



Now, open another window with your eBay store, pull up the item you want to promote, and look for the SHARE button on the right hand side below your seller info. It will look like this:



Click on the SHARE ON TWITTER button, and the item will pop into your update window on Twitter. It will look like this:



But wait, you aren't done yet. Remember the potential customer we found who was looking for that item? Let's give her the @ sign so she will see your Tweet. So now, your tweet looks like this:



Not only will that customer see your tweet, but anyone else who searches for the keyword will see it, and your followers will see it.

So, play around with that and stay tuned for part 3 coming up in a few days. (Click here to see all the posts in the Twitter for eBay series.)

Happy Selling!



eBay Store Critique - $19.95, Money Back Guarantee

Source for eBay Inventory - Tuesday Morning

Tuesday Morning is often overlooked as a source for eBay inventory, but definitely a place you should check out. If you have never heard of Tuesday Morning, according to their corporate page on the company website:

"Tuesday Morning is a retailer specializing in upscale closeout merchandise, with more than 800 stores across the United States. Our successful concept was founded on a unique philosophy: sell first-quality, famous designer and name-brand merchandise at extraordinarily discounted prices on an event basis. Our 10 major events usually kick off on the first Tuesday of the month. We receive new merchandise shipments daily, and customers can return often to find the shelves replenished with new items."

I have found really great stuff in there. (No, nothing like Joes Jeans - more on that later.) I found some Beatrix Potter ceramic items that sold well, and also a $300 home espresso maker marked down to $75. (By the time I researched it and came back to get it, the machine was gone.)

Click here to go to the Tuesday Morning store locator and see if there is a location near you.

Click here for a comprehensive list of where to get items to sell on eBay. You will be surprised where you can find things to sell right in your own community.

Happy Selling!

eBay Seller Success Story - Z-Coil Shoes

Thanks to Shannon P. for sending this in:

I reported this in the FB Discussion board but I wanted to share it with you too. I found some Z-coil shoes at a thrift store recently. I was very excited, because I had sold some men's Z-coils for a friend and we got about $100 for them. I would never have known about them otherwise. These were women's and in excellent condition. They didn't have a price and so the cashier gave them to me for $5.99. They ended at $61!! Thanks for your tip about Remington Tight Curls..I found a NIB set at a thrift store for $4. They went for about $103!!

~Shannon

Here is Shannon's listing:



Z-Coil ZCoil Women's Size 7 Zueco Clogs Grey Mesh EUC

Shannon's cost: $5.99
eBay sale price: $61
Profit before fees: $55.01

Click here to see all completed listings for Zcoil shoes.

Great find Shannon! I will be keeping my eye out for Zcoils.

Click here to check out my ever growing list of thrift store finds, and please send in your success story to eBaycoach@yahoo.com

Also take a look at my colleague Julia Wilkinson's newest eBook, Big Bucks Flips. It is 81 pages of garage sale and thrift store finds just like this. The same kind of info you get right here on my blog, but way more of it! Julia is the author of several published eBay works, and is a yard sale expert. Click here to read more about Big Bucks Flips.

Have a great day on eBay!