Secrets of the eBay

Appendix B: Becoming an eBay Millionaire: The Twelve-Step Program 245
The point is that you need, as one e-commerce merchant told me,
“to plan for success.” It’s well and good to put ten items online each week
when you’re starting out, but you’ll never have a chance of selling more
merchandise if you don’t put as much as you can online in the first place.
Think like a successful merchant, and invest a few dollars in your eBay
business up front. You’ll at least be giving yourself a chance to succeed.
Step 7: Find People—or Software—to Help You
People who are self-employed are, by nature, the do-it-yourself type. I’m
one of those types myself. The problem is that do-it-yourselfers have
a tendency to try to take on too much. They think that the more they take
on, the more they have to do themselves. It doesn’t naturally occur to them
to look around for assistance, whether it comes in the form of a human
being or a computer application.
The fact is that very few PowerSellers do everything themselves. In
almost all cases, they have a friend or relative, or one or more employees,
to help them. Pam Thien and her family (see Chapter 2) use Infopia to run
Shiana.com. Even Alan Warshauer, a true do-it-yourselfer described in
Chapter 4, turned to an auction management service called Zoovy to help
automate feedback and other tasks. In order to put more sales online and
make more money, you need help. Look around to your immediate family
or your immediate circle of friends and see who’s available. Hire a high
school student to help you with packing and shipping one or two days
a week. The point is to stop thinking you have to do everything on your
own, and to turn your one-person activity into a business with employees
who are there to keep things moving along smoothly.
Step 8: Act Like a Salesperson
One of the most interesting things I ever did as a seller on eBay was to try
my own personalized brand of “upselling.” Once, someone bought a pair
of shoes that didn’t fit. He asked to return them, and I quickly consented.
I looked in my inventory and found another, different pair of shoes that
I thought he might like and that were in the size he wanted—and that were
more expensive than the ones he was returning. Rather than having to return
his money, I suggested a trade; I sent photos of the shoes I had available.
I felt odd doing this because I was selling on my own rather than through
eBay: For the first time I was doing direct person-to-person sales. When he
accepted, I felt terrific. I was a real salesperson.