eBay trading assistants etc.

wheresmydoshat

Hi,

I am interested to hear people's thoughts on using eBay trading assistants, or more specifically using a company which specialise in selling your items for you on eBay.

It would be useful to see whether people felt they would benefit from using one if they didn't have the knowledge and/or time to do it themselves ?

And what are peoples opinions on the fee's they tend to charge ? (usually 35%)

I have searched previous threads but could not find anything that recent.

computergenieuk

Hi,

I have not used them myself but i think if you got time to list items yourself then forget them and pocket the money yourself.

You would have to sell something of high value or buy something extremely cheap and sell it very expensively to earn a decent profit.

Personally i would not use them as such services are expensive.

CGUK

ceanothus

Never used one, but in the 'new ebay' world I think they could be worth considering. It's more difficult to be a small seller on Ebay these days, so in theory there should be advantages of scale in going through a trading assistant.

It probably depends on what kind of thing you have for sale. A good trading assistant should take great photos, make excellent listings, use mannequins and a lighting studio where appropriate, get better rates on Ebay and might be able to offer your buyers cheaper postage if they do enough business. All that might get you a better price than selling it yourself. I'm sure there's room for negotiation on fees if you can supply them with a few items for sale or are a regular customer.

Being a TA can potentially be a great little business to run, don't know why there aren't more MSE folk doing it or at least getting together with other ebayers locally and selling as a little co-operative :-)

(I'm not a Trading Assistant BTW, but am busy enough already!!)

wheresmydoshat

Hi,

I think as with any service you use, the time it can save is the key. We get our garden done, I am more than capable of doing it myself but a. it would take me a lot longer, and b. i don't have all the tools to do a great job.

I suppose the same applies to this. It certainly wouldn't be for everyone tho.

I should own up and say that I have been a trading assistant for about 18 months now. It is something I would like to do more of, and am hoping with some extra marketing this can happen.

The feedback I get from people is pretty positive but it is far from a proper income of any sort, just some extra money every now and then. I believe it has potential though. And in 18 months I feel I have made a lot of progress.

Any more comments would be appreciated, it is interesting to see what people think when they do not have to humour me (!)

ceanothus

Volume is the key in my humble opinion :-)

If I wanted a new business selling for others, I would leaflet drop an area and invite people to come along to a local drop off point at a specific time to check in their stuff. Chances are there's loads of people who have stuff to clear out, they always mean to do a car boot and don't, they always mean to take it to the charity shop and don't, and a lot of it ends up as clutter and gets junked in the end. Sounds just like me!!

Add in those who've spent time listing something on Ebay and had no bids or a NPB and there's a lot of stuff out there to be sold, especially in hard times. The more you can list, the better your visibility on Ebay, lower fees, combined P&P, business postage prices etc, it just all gets easier.

Confidence is the other thing. Good marketing should show potential sellers why it's a good move to use you. Time saved, better sell through rates, better end prices, hassle free drop off, insurance for their property while in your possession, etc, all things you should be able to market with and back up with facts. I would use someone who could show me all that (and happily pay 30%), because I'm basically lazy about my personal clutter and overworked in my business life. At the end of the day, getting £2 for a piece of clutter isn't as good as getting £3, but it's a lot better than getting nowt and having stuff everywhere.

Interested to know what kind of terms you set for your sellers, do you have size and weight restrictions for example? Do you release the money on successful sale or hold on to it until the customer has received and is happy? Just being nosey and have an overactive brain lol!

wheresmydoshat

Hi,

Be as nosey as you want !

Until a few weeks ago I was having to work a normal day job and try and fit this around it. This just wasn't working, and I purposely did not leaflet drop too much as I just could not take the calls.

Luckily I have been given an opportunity. A friend asked me to run his shop for him, and has given me his blessing to take calls and use it as a drop off centre. This is still very early days (I only opened the shop again last week), but is a much better scenario than previously.

Plus it means I can do the marketing I would like to do, which until now I chose to purposely restrict my potential as I could not have dealt with it (which was very frustrating !). So leaflets and business cards are at the ready !

In answer to your questions;

No size and weight restrictions although obviously passed a certain point it is likely to be collection only and this can greatly restrict final sale value or whether it sells at all. For the time being I am a little short of storage space, so in some cases the item would remain with the owner until sold.

Officially I would wait for delivery of item, and positive feedback (or at least no negative !) and then clearance of funds from paypal. This can take some time and I use my judgement as to whether to pay a little earlier.

Items generally need to be valued at more than £30/40 as the figures just don't add up under that figure, but my fee structure means that there is a minimum fee applicable to cover this. And the commission is lower for items over £200. And of course a completely different set of figures apply for regular business.

I'm very keen on the idea, and hope that it catches on. I enjoy doing it which is the main thing !

ceanothus

What a fantastic opportunity, I wish you all the luck in the world with it :-) With the right marketing this could be a really great business for you.

I totally understand what you're saying about size and weight, but this is where using a professional TA can be really attractive to sellers. If you get a great courier deal on anything up to 30kg (about a fiver give or take), you can open up the whole of the UK to your sellers. If you can arrange pallet deliveries for about £50, even better. The amount of stuff I've seen listed by owner that is 'collection only due to size and weight' is staggering, and they would achieve 50% better prices minimum if they only had the nous to arrange a delivery service.

Hope I'm not teaching you to suck eggs here! Best of luck, I really hope it does a bundle for you.

wheresmydoshat

thanks a lot

i have to admit that although i can courier upto 30 kg there is a point where the safety of the item is questionable.

again tho it is a matter of judgement as to whether u feel the item you are selling is sought after enough that people will travel a little to pick it up.

wheresmydoshat

^^ any other opinions on this anyone ?

StaffsSW

One of the posters on this forum, db7 - is one of the leading trading assistants and commercial disposal agents around at the moment. Not seen them on here for a bit though.

Personally I would not be comfortable with the risk, not knowing the history, legitimacy etc. of the products, and the risk of chargebacks after the client has been paid but then I guess that is why they charge a high %. There is also the issue of unsold stock - who pays the insertion fees.

That said, there seems to be plenty of people offering the service - http://tradingassistant.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?TradingAssistant&page=main

wheresmydoshat

you are quite right, there are risks involved which need to be considered.

i used to charge a small listing fee to cover unsold stock etc. but decided i preferred keeping the fee structure simple by only having a commission payable. i think insertion fees are low enough to take the hit, and there is an element of judging whether an item will sell at the price the client wants (sometimes i have misjudged that, easily done).