I've posted about being efficient and talked about how I do things. Being efficient isn't simply about being able to list quickly, it's about being able to grow your business. I think too many people get discouraged and overwhelmed with the process and never really achieve their potential. I know when I was growing my business I would see sellers who had well over 1,000 listings and wondered how they got there and how many employees they had that allowed them to do that kind of volume. Now that I am at that level, I can see it really does not require employees. It requires work.
While selling a few items per month and making some extra cash is ok for some people, others want to either replace their current income, or need an income. The question is, how much can you really make? How many items can you realistically handle on your own? It really is all up to you. You are only limited by your own processes and abilities. Ebay is not a get rich quick scheme. Unfortunately the scammers who have put out books claiming to reveal the "power seller secrets" have given ebay selling a bad reputation. Don't get sucked into believing any of that crap.
Ebay is a numbers game. The more you list, the more you sell. There is no secret sauce contrary to what other sellers who are trying to sell books tell you. You alone control the amount of income you want to make. A general rule of thumb is you will make $500 per week in sales for every 500 items you have listed. Of course this also depends on your average selling price, but that is the basic rule. If you want to make $2,000 a week then you should have at least 2,000 items listed.
So many people get caught up in the mind set that there is something missing that is holding back their sales. Take a look at your amount of active listings. That is the best indicator of what you can expect. Of course there are other factors that play into this, but having a large amount of inventory really is the biggest determining factor.
So, the question you need to ask yourself is how far can I go? How many items can I list? Set your goal and stick with it. If your goal is to have 1,000 items listed, break that down into manageable chunks. Figure out how much time you want to allocate to reaching that number, and divide it by 1,000. That will give you the number of listings per day you need to get done. Don't try and do 100 listings a day and get yourself burned out. Be realistic and stick to your goals.
As the old saying goes, how do you eat and elephant? One bite at a time.
What a great post! I would love to hear what a typical schedule, for a couple of days, look like for you. How do you source your items? I shop a limited number of thrift stores and on a good day I can bring home around 30 items per store. But that's on a good day. Do you have inventory "stockpiled" to list? How do you keep your inventory level up?
ReplyDeleteI typically source on the weekends. I actually have routes that I run so I am not hitting the same stores each time I source. I will normally hit anywhere form 5 - 10 stores per trip. A normal run will get me around 60 items. I do have smaller runs I do during the week, but that is usually a one or two store run. I can normally source around 100 items per week.
DeleteI do things differently than most. When I come home from sourcing, I will inventory what I have purchased into my spreadsheet. The next day I will clean and picture everything. The rest of the week I just list. By doing this, I can list in excess of 100 items per week. When I get ready to list for the week, I look at how many items I have ready to list. I will divide that number by 5 days. That is how many per day I will list. If the number is over 20, then those extras will go towards the next weeks listings.
I don't usually have a stockpile. If I have a good week sourcing then I might have it for a couple of days, but I always make sure everything is ready to list before I source again.
Good plan. I get depressed when I have too much "backlog" on inventory. It makes me feel overwhelmed sometimes, plus it's a pain to find a place to put it without cluttering up the house. However, when the weather turns nice and the garage sale season starts, I buy everything I can to put away for when picking is lean. :-) I also like your idea about how to list, and how many listings you need. I am currently working on increasing my listings--why not earn more? Thanks for your blog.
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing your schedule!! I am aiming to get to your level. I agree with what you said, you have to put in the work!!! Thanks for sharing your wealth of knowledge.
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