Ebay and other online auction powerselling tips and information

Janelle Elms highlights 5 hot companies from eBay live in her most recent newsletter. Here is the first company:

Prosper – This company blew me away at eBay Live. To see such a simple answer to a complex problem was incredible.

We have all heard stories about Entrepreneurial success...they usually go something like..."We knew we had the best idea. Uncle James loaned us $12,000 to get us started and now our annual sales are over 2 million dollars!"

Unfortunately, many of us don't have an Uncle James...and perhaps by now you have done what I did when I started - begged and borrowed $$ from any person you have ever known or been related to and maxed out all your credit cards - all with the knowledge and belief in the dream to run your own business. Or perhaps you have tried to get a loan from a bank or the SBA. How did that go when you said, "All I need is $12,000 to buy this inventory, so I can sell it on eBay."? Bet the suits promptly handed you the money, yes?

With over 1.3 million of us now making a living selling on eBay, you would think that the rest of the world would have caught up to eBay being a viable business venue, but unfortunately the financial institutions don't quite understand entrepreneurship - the American Dream. How could they - we are taught in our school system how to work for others - not how to stand up on our own and run a successful business.

Ok…I will break it down a bit for you:

Borrowing:

1. Create a loan listing for the amount you need to borrow.

2. YOU set the maximum amount of interest you are willing to pay.

3. Then people bid on how much they want to loan you and what they are willing to take as an interest rate (always at or below what you have set).

4. At the end of the ‘auction’, Prosper combines the top bidders with your loan request and creates a loan for you. Your loan could have 1 lender or many.

You can read more here: http://www.prosper.com/public/borrow/about_borrowing.aspx 

Lending: Now, you can also make some money from this new site…by lending money to the Borrowers. Plus, I love being able to help entrepreneurial start-ups. Here is how lending works:

1. Check out the profiles of the borrowers on Prosper. You can read about why they want the money, what they are going to do with it, how they intend to pay it back, and go over in detail their credit rating.

2. Bid the amount you are willing to lend and the rate you want.

3. If you are one of the ‘winning’ lenders for that loan, you will receive your monthly share of the payment in your account.

You can read more here: http://www.prosper.com/public/lend/about_lending.aspx  

How cool is this?!!

You can contact them with your questions here:

 http://www.prosper.com/public/help/support.aspx