Ebay and other online auction powerselling tips and information

The laundry list as you so eloquently put it is basically made by some sellers to slow down the dumb scammer buyers….but I guess you have never come across this

eBay is not all sugar coated frosting in Never Never Land…it full of stupid people who basically never read anything …. So what recourse does a seller have…YES THE LISTING CONDITIONS OF SALE ….DUHH?

Hi, TJ, thanks for visiting. I am not understanding your comment about these issues exist to “slow down the dumb scammer buyers.” Perhaps you can clarify.

Granted, scammers and dishonest people exist in all realms of the business world, not just on eBay. A successful seller will present herself as professionally as possible, regardless of who is viewing her listings. She will hold herself to high standards at all times. Many new sellers are not aware of the impact of poor photos and spelling. This article was meant to help them, not harm.

I will have to disagree with your statement, “it is full of stupid people who basically never read anything.” I don’t find that true at all. Many of my customers are intelligent, professional people who just want a bargain on eBay. I know many eBay sellers who are also buyers, and they pretty bright people.

Yes, a seller does have to protect himself with disclaimers and well thought out conditions of sale. Running a business with the attitude that all your customers are “stupid” – well, that is just a recipe for disaster.

Best of luck to you in your eBay ventures.

Being a seller myself I have seen a difference in learning the "correct" way to list items. Clear pictures and a good backround definitely make a difference (I have altered my ways of taking pictures and have noticed a huge difference in sales).
As for the "little people" that sell on ebay, they do need to learn how list correctly with correct key words and spelling and stop complaining that their items don't sell. Everything in this world is trial and error and you learn as you go, and yes there are people who just plow through without reading the small print but that doesn't mean they are stupid.

I don't think the ability to retaliate with a negative was stopping many scammers. Scammers start new accounts all the time, and when they get enough negs, or get kicked off, they just start another account. And what is a scammer buyer anyway? How can a buyer scam the seller? By not paying? Well, they're keeping the NPB dispute in place, which gets non-paying bidders removed from eBay. I think that's pretty effective. If you mean PayPal chargebacks, if you're getting alot of those, I would suggest only accepting PayPal from buyers with confirmed addresses. Other than NPBs and chargebacks, I don't know how else a buyer can scam.

I think the people who are upset are sellers who deserve negatives every once in a while, but haven't been getting any because they've held the buyer's feedback as collateral. They've been able to jack up their handling charges, they ship a week after receiving payment, and didn't have to worry about feedback because they knew the buyer wouldn't take the risk of getting a negative in return.

Now that buyers can neg without the fear of retaliation, sellers are almost forced to cater to the customer, and offer the service they should have been all along. I love it, because I offer exemplary customer service and feel my feedback should stand out and serve as a competitive advantage for me, against other sellers who don't provide as good customer service.

In response to TJ's comment ~ Marketing 101. "The Customer is Always Right." Without customers, a seller would be out of business. Like so many who are complaining are finding out. I started out on eBay by Buying first~ for my family. From friendly, amicable listings & stores. Folks that had inviting About Me pages, making the sale feel more personable, as if I was shopping in a Brick & Mortar. It's easy to walk out of a B& M if you don't care for the owner or salesperson's attitude. Same thing with eBay. I click out of a store as soon as I see a laundry list of "don't bid if you don't intend to pay". I'm out of there. Not that I don't intend to pay, it's just that it's an immediate turnoff to me and I wouldn't even consider buying from a seller who is so full of negativity from the get-go. With good buying judgment & some wonderful dealings with terrific Sellers, I turned to selling myself, first auctions, then a store, and in less than 6 mo. after finding some great (friendly) forums & finally "meeting" Suzanne, I became a Power Seller. I continue to buy on eBay for my personal needs, those of my family, and my eBay store supplies. But you can bet your sweet bippy that I don't buy from sellers who read me the riot act before I even get past the photo on the listing. And by the way, I have 3 college degrees, so I don't consider myself one of those "stupid people who basically never read anything". Not that that makes any difference, but I believe in the premise that the majority of people are "good." And back to Marketing 101 ~ The Customer is always Right.

The comment that eBay is "full of stupid people who basically never read anything" illustrates exactly why eBay has made these recent changes. Customer service should always come #1, and how can that happen when buyers are thought of and treated as the enemy? As a buyer, I look forward to seeing fewer of these negative and threatening listings. As a seller I'm excited about the feedback changes, because I know my excellent customer service (and the respectful language in my listings) will help me to stand out.

I would only like to comment on the remarks regarding "Marketing 101: The customer is always right" I agree; yet with a slightly different perspective. The customer is not always right, however, the customer is a customer until the merchant does something to make the customer go elsewhere. I understand the philosophy of the customer always being right. It is a steadfast simplification of the necessity to do what it takes to make that customer happy. They are not always right, but what are you willing to do to get and keep that customer?

The problems with ebay are the fees mostly. If you want to sell a .99 item, you can't. It will cost you .75 out of pocket, so you Loose money. In other words, if you sell an item for .99, the costs will be in excess of $1.74, so do the math, and realize if you use ebay and paypal, you are going to loose money on low priced items. It isn't about little people or big companies, it is about feesible selling, and ebay has made that impossible for low priced items. Get a Grip, they (eBay) are greedy to the point of self destruction. I will be sad to see them fall, but if they don't make the necessary changes to their fee schedule, and if PayPal doesn't quit charging fees from the recipiants funds, well, they are doomed. It is just Bad Buisness ethics. I am a buyer, I was a seller. I am on strike for as long as it takes! I Say use the month of MARCH 2008 to March on eBay and give them the strike of their life. With test pages upping their financial statistics, even Trump (I'm pretty sure) would say they shuffled their papers a few too many times. Reality? eBay is self destructive, and if the fee policies are not TUNED up, the strike will hurt, maybe even make the CEO think a bit more before calling sellers and buyers "Noise". I take it he just doesn't want to listen to his customers, so what the customer thinks is of no importance to eBay management. That is proof.