Selling Your Stuff on Amazon Part 13 - Advice for newbies in first two posts

soolin

Dear All – In the absence of the original ‘founder’ (Apprentice Tycoon – gone but not forgotten) of this thread I have been asked to start Thread No 13. Thanks also to Funkyfunkymonkey for the last thread.

I have not changed too much, but if there is anything that needs updating etc please let me know.

Thanks goes to Apprentice Tycoon for the following sections:

NEWCOMERS - PLEASE READ FIRST......this is the thread for discussing our collective attempts at selling our stuff on Amazon Marketplace, the thread can get very long but please don't be intimidated by it, you don't have to read every word before you can get started with selling on Amazon, just look at this and the next 'overspill' post and that should provide enough information to get you going and there are some FAQs too, we've all asked these questions at some point and as Martin says, there is no such thing as a stupid question so if you don't find what you want to know here in these posts then jump in and ask away, someone will either know the answer or will find out for you.

You can make the pages easier to read if change the default setting of 10 posts per page to 40 posts - look at the USER CP in the pink band (this runs horizontally across the page, it's midway Martins photo and the start of this post) from there find 'edit options' then look down the page of things you can do to alter how you view MSE and you'll find 'thread display options' so you can change the post count to 40 post per page.

You'll see that we are very fond of chatting on this thread and we report our good days and bad ones too so please join in and let us know how you are getting on, we have an unofficial club of sellers too so just ask what the next number is and it's yours.

Get started

If you don't already have a sellers account you will be asked to fill in your bank details etc and there are a few security things that they go through but nothing too arduous

To list a book for sale you click the BOOK tab and from there go to POWER SEARCH, key in the ISBN number and it will take you to the page where all the other identical books are, go to SELL YOURS HERE and fill in the details.

You have to choose a description of the book's condition -like new -very good etc and then you have a large space for more descriptive words. I always put in 'smoke free home' if it smells nice and clean and 'same day dispatch' - because I'm working at home all day so I can get the orders out - comments like these can make a book stand out from the rest. There are a number of sellers from the USA with books listed on the UK site so you might want to add 'UK seller' to the description - and anything else that is truthful that you can think of to make your book sound a better deal than the others, there is lots of space for 1000 characters so you can get creative with your description.

When you list a book for sale there is no photo needed or fee charged, it's only when the book sells that you have to pay (out of your takings) so you can have a book listed for months or years for free.

Also when you list the book you will see the price that others are charging for the same book, you might want to get yours sold quickly and undercut them slightly (see 'price matching' below and consider the wisdom of this) or you could decide to stick it out for a better price, check them all out and see what you think is a realistic price for that particular book, you will see some extremely low ones and ridiculously high ones.

Listing CDs & DVDs

At the top of the Amazon opening page you'll see tabs including DVD, Music etc, for DVDs click on the tab then look for 'SELL YOUR DVDS', key in the bar code numbers in the box marked with ISBN, UPC, or ASIN: this will make sure that you have the correct copy.

For CDs click the MUSIC tab, then BUY AND SELL USED MUSIC, this will take you to another page with a search box at the top, key in your CD and then click on the SELL YOURS HERE box, to be absolutely certain that you have the correct listing with the year and record company look at the top of the listing page and see 'enter your ASIN, ISBN, EAN or UPC, this will take you to a page where you can enter the bar code.

Carry on then with filling in your details of condition etc.


High priced books - why?

If you see some books like yours with really high prices don't get too excited yet, this is often a ploy by some sellers to sell for a silly price, then they bend over backwards to buy the book in - can't see how it would really work in practice though. You can check how realistic these high prices are by looking at www.bookfinder.com if there are a few others like yours at a similar high price then that's great! it doesn't really mean that it will sell for that price, you could end up lowering the price as the weeks go by but you might have a nice surprise.

The crucial point to remember with Amazon is that you have to be prepared to sit it out and wait for a buyer to come along, this could be weeks or even years so your cash may well be tied up long term so if you are buying books purely to sell on only spend what you can afford to set aside without missing it

We also have a thread where books that have sold for good prices are listed, this is here, you might find this useful when out on buying trips

The condition of your book

The condition of the book is important to get the best price so watch out for creases and bends also gift inscriptions, notes and highlighting etc, you will have to mention them all in fairness to the buyer and you don't want any awkward emails later or poor feedback in your ratings. This may make your book less attractive than the others but if it's a sought-after book it may sell even if it looks a bit tatty so it's worth listing it to try it out

If the book doesn't turn up using the SEARCH it may be by a different publisher or be from a book club, you can still list it but you must state why yours is different to the others in the description but it may not sell for the same price as the others.

Buyer waiting

You may occasionally see BUYER WAITING in a box to the right hand side of the books details, this is a very nice thing to see! The buyer has preordered your book and so long as the condition and price of yours matches what the buyer requested then the book is as good as sold, you list it as normal and you will get the sold email a few hours later. If there is more than one buyer waiting there will be a note giving the average price that the buyers are willing to pay, if you are happy with this go ahead and list yours around that price, or if you fancy a gamble and you're not in a hurry to sell then list it for a higher price and see if there is someone out there that hasn't pre-ordered and would pay a bit more than the waiting buyers, you can always reduce the price later if you get fed up with waiting.

Selling fees and postage allowance

There are fees when you sell the book, these are made up of a fixed amount of 86 pence plus a percentage of it's sale price. You get to see what these are when you list the book, it shows you what the charges will be, and what you'll be paid so you can see if this is acceptable to you before you commit yourself to selling it, having said that you can withdraw it at any time. Amazon gives you £2.26 to go towards the postage (look here) so if it's a light paperback there will be a little money for yourself left over on just the postage allowance alone, this is how you can sell a book for as little as 1 penny and still have a small profit.

The opposite is true with heavy books - the postage allowance of £2.26 will be paid regardless of the book's size so it may cost you over £4.00 to post it, if you can get a really good price for the book then this will balance out but check your weight carefully, if it is over 1 kilo have a look at the Standard Parcel chart on the Royal Mail website (address below) this will be cheaper but it's a day or so slower than 1st or 2nd class.

Postage costs

The critical thing to bear in mind when you look at these figures is how much the postage will cost, this could mean your profit will get severely dented if you get it wrong.

When you list the book check the weight on kitchen scales, add a little on for a padded envelope then look at the Royal Mail website www.royalmail.com to see how much it will cost to post, second class is OK if you send it the day that it sells, if it goes the next day then it will have to be first class. You will need to get a Certificate of Posting from the PO just in case it gets lost and you need to claim, when you go to the PO ask for a few blank certs to speed things up next time.

If you are lucky enough to sell a book with a value of over £36.00 you will need to send it by Special Delivery so that the full value is covered if it goes astray, you will need to build the extra cost of this into the price of your book, it will be at your expense not Amazon's.


Where is your information stored?

All your OPEN and CLOSED listings are to be found on the SELLER ACCOUNT page (VIEW YOUR CURRENT INVENTORY). From this page you can look at VIEW YOUR ORDERS and VIEW YOUR PAYMENTS ACCOUNT this is your imformation hub, all your coming and goings are here.

You can close the sale whenever you want if you change your mind and also you can edit it later to change the price and details if you like, you will find that other sellers will be undercutting your prices so you could decide to reduce and undercut them or sit tight and let their book sell first giving yours a clear run.

Price matching, not undercutting

The other way to approach this is to match the price of the lowest book, if you go even lower the competitor will see in his OPEN LISTINGS that he isn't the lowest priced any more and the knee jerk reaction is for him to undercut you and then it will spiral downwards with you both getting less and less for your book. Also there are some of the big sellers that use a software programme to reduce the price of their book as soon as they are not the lowest price listing.

If your book matches the lowest priced book then the alarm bells won't ring when he looks at his list, the buyer has to decide from the description which he prefers, hopefully yours is better

After a book sells

When your book sells you will get an email advising you of the sale and the money will be paid to your bank account at 2 weekly intervals.

Sale is pending?

On occasion you may get an email telling you that the sale is pending - this is usually because there is a problem with the buyers credit card. You are advised to wait 72 hours, if they haven't sorted the snag out by then the book will be automatically relisted.

Wrapping your book to post

You will need some light padded envelopes for postage, get them anywhere but the post office, they are so expensive there, you will see some on ebay or if you need loads then viking directis the place to look.

The cheapest wrappings are the free pieces of bubblewrap or foam that supermarkets use to cushion fruit and veg, the book gets wrapped in this then put into a sturdy envelope. Pound shops are a good place to look for bubble envelopes, you may be able to get an assortment of sizes for very little cost. Thick sturdy plastic has been suggested as a covering for the bubblewrapped book too, this is very good if the book is larger than a normal A4 envelope. Use the address that's on the packing slip and add a return address too just in case.

If your book doesn't sell

If your book doesn't sell after 60 days the listing will close and you will get an email to tell you of this, it's easy to relist, you just click on your list of closed listing on your Seller Account page, they will all be there, you can edit them if you want and click to relist. If you don't do this within around 2 or 3 weeks the listing will be lost and you have to start from scratch.

Sell overseas?

You can choose to sell your book to overseas buyers - you can select this option when you list you book but you need to be really sure of your postage costs because even though you are given an extra allowance you can go seriously astray with your profit if you get this wrong.

If the the parcel is worth over £36.00 in value it won't be covered if it gets damaged or lost when it is sent by normal Royal Mail air or surface mail. You can send it by either Airsure or International Signed For - these are both Royal Mail services and you can read the details on the website. For example a parcel to the USA can be covered up to £500.00 for the normal cost of the airmail + £6.40 (Airsure) or £5.70 (International Signed For) so you will need to add in that extra £6.40 or £5.70 to your figures.

If you're a real pro

If you find yourself selling quite a number of books per month you may want to consider taking out Pro Merchant subscription, this means that the 86 pence standard fee is waived and you never have to relist a book again - well not for 3 years at any rate, the monthly fee is £28.75 so if you can sell over 33 items you're up on the deal. You can cancel at anytime and only be billed for that current month.

What sells best?

The books that I've found to be the best sellers are paperback self-help books on any kind of off the wall subject you can think of like angels, reincarnation, astral travel, psychic stuff, stopping smoking etc.

University text books are often a good find but tread carefully if you think that they are more than 2 or 3 years old, there may be a newer edition which will be the one that the students are now buying but check them out with the Amazon listings, you may be OK with them, if there isn't a new edition you might find that your book will have a very good price. These kinds of books are harder to buy from High Street shops like WHS so they sell well second hand.

What doesn't sell very well

Given time and the right price probably every book will find a buyer but this could take years, if you are in this to buy and sell for profit the books to avoid are the current popular chart novels, slightly more obscure novels might be OK for a modest profit.

Other books to avoid are the glossy coffee table books that are mainly photographs, I have a Rolling Stones book and a Prince William biography that are going to be with me for a good long time, with heavy books like these you can't reduce them to a really low selling price because they will cost more than the postage allowance to post so you will be subsidsing the postage cost out of your profit - having said that there is always a newbie selling these big heavy books for next to nothing oblivious to the fact that he will be actually losing money if it sells.


continued into the next post............

soolin

Thanks continues to Apprentice Tycoon for the following sections:

Charity shops

A few sellers have been a bit reticent about buying from charity shops to make a profit, I don't have a problem with this, the shops need the cash in the till, not unsold books on the shelves and from my own experience the books that sell well on Amazon are the ones that won't sell in a little charity shop...example...I bought a book on the practice of anaesthesia, a medical student that needs this book is not going to even consider looking around the local charity shops for such a specialist book, they will just go straight to Amazon for it. I'm sure the staff at the charity shops assume that a book like that will never sell so they are delighted when they do. Car boot sales can be very good to buy from!

Tax - are you now a trader?

On the subject of buying books etc to sell for profit you need to bear in mind that, like with ebay you are straying into the world of trading and you may find yourself in a taxable situation so take advice from your local tax office and be sure to keep all your receipts from the books, packing materials, printing ink refills etc & the post office.

What if a buyer wants to return their purchase?

I'm afraid that if a buyer requests a refund for any reason within 7 days of receipt of the goods then all they have to is post it back to you (at their expense) in good order and you have to refund.

There is a fuller explanation on this Amazon page from a buyer’s point of view and from a sellers point of view there is this too.

If there was an error on your part it would be unfair to expect the buyer to pay for the postage back to you.

How do I make a refund?

You need to go to your sellers account page, then 'View Your Orders' you'll find a refund tab alongside each order, you can refund any amount up to the original sum of money paid

Lots of books? How do you find them when they are sold?

You might get in a bit of a muddle if you have lots of books in many places around the house and you can waste a lot of time looking for a book that you thought was in one place only to find it somewhere else (ask me how I know this ) If you decide to go for Pro Merchant subscription you can use an SKU this is a stock keeping unit which is basically a code of your own devising to locate your book, you could have a number for each of your storage boxes and include the date listed if that will help you find the book and for real efficiency put the weight of the book in your code as well so if you do any price lowering at a later date you'll know how low you dare go before the cost of the postage cuts too far into your profit.

If you are not a Pro Merchant you can do a similar thing in the description of your book, just add it at the end of your description, the buyer won't care that you've put, say, ref b3.9/7 for box 3 listed on the 9 of July. When you get your 'sold dispatch now' email you can click on the link to take you to your original listing with your ref at the end.

Another idea is to take photos of the spines of all the books in each box or shelf so you have a record of where the book is and you can locate it without leaving your chair. Print the photo out and cross through the book when it's sold and if you put a new book in it's place write it's details on the back of the photo.

No feedback yet?

It's not unusual for an Amazon buyer not to leave feedback so you can have had quite a number of sales but still appear to be new, this is a bit of a pain but it won't put a buyer off so long as you describe well and look as if you know what you're doing.
You see a lot of listings with new sellers just using the category to describe the book with no actual description of their own, this doesn't look good in comparison with other listings.
If you wanted you could email your buyers to ask for feedback and explain that you'd like to get your % rating started, this may work or it may put your buyers back up, in any case Amazon will contact them a few weeks after the sale to invite them to leave feedback, this may prompt them or not.
Feedback just doesn't have the same emphasis that it has on ebay.

Your list of open listings - you can adjust the columns to sort them

On your 'open listings' list there are columns that you can click on to alter the display, the one that seems to be the most use is the price column, if you click on the column heading it will sort all the listings into price order so you can see all your penny listings together on the one page

1p books - are they worth the bother?

Penny books are the books that there are so many copies up for sale the price has been driven down as far as it can go and as mentioned earlier you make your money on the postage allowance that you're given not on the price of the book - the key to making a profit is the weight of the book. You will be paid £1.41 in TOTAL for the sale of a penny book so if your postage and packaging costs are low you can probably make more money than if you were to sell it at a boot sale. Pro-merchants will be getting 86p more which makes it a better prospect.
Mills and Boon books are usuallyvery light and there are suprisingly few listed so don't dismiss them out of hand if you come across some good condition copies, you will make a reasonable profit on these when they sell. Also don't be too deterred if your book has competition from 200+ others, Amazon rotate the first page so that all of the copies get a turn at being the first that the buyer sees and if your description is clear and you look to be offering better service than the others then the buyer will choose your book.

You’ve sold 2 items to the same buyer at the same time?

Your buyer will be charged double the postage charge, they might be a bit miffed at this because they'll assume that it must be cheaper posting 2 things in the same jiffy and they'll remember this when they write your feedback.

This is a bit tricky because if it's 2 light items you'll be making your profit up on the postage allowance so it's not really a great thing to have a multiple purchase but you don't want to set up bad feedback about high postage costs either.

If they are light items I give a refund of £1 or so but explain why in the email I send, this is what I said last time......

'Thank you for buying my books, they were posted earlier today so they should be with you tomorrow

If you've used Amazon Marketplace before you might have guessed that the allowance paid by Amazon to the seller for the postage costs is considered to be part of the profit from the sale of the book, this is why you'll see 100's of books selling for just 1 penny, the seller makes the profit on the postage allowance assuming the book is light to post.

With heavier books it works the other way around and the seller has to subsidise the postage costs out of the profit of the book.

So as you ordered 2 very light books from me I don't think that it's fair that I keep ALL of the postage allowance so I'll process a small refund as a gesture.'

I always get a nice email back thanking me for the refund and good feedback is assured!

Going on holiday?

You can put your listings on hold when you need to close down for a while, on the sellers account page look for 'store settings', it can take up to 36 hours to activate but in practice it can be less.

The books aren't selling, give them away?

I'd say keep them, I've been selling on Amazon for 4 years and still sell books that have been listed for thatlong, it's not very unusual, other thread users have reported 'pensioner' books selling after being seemingly dormant for a long while.
You can't tell how many views your book has had so you're in the dark, you could reduce the price of course but on the other hand it could be that the prospective new owner hasn't even started looking for your book yet and he may have been happy to pay your original price so your price reductions could have been in vain.

If there was an Amazon sellers motto it would include the word Patience

The next section is a compilation of Amazon wisdom, I've thanked people where I can but a general thank you goes out to all thread users, everyone has something in here somewhere!

A big thank you to all

How do I know if I have a 1st edition? (Thanks FFM and Amazombie)

This site has lots of help and this site is interesting for a bit of bookish information

Smelly books?(thanks to many amazonians!)

There are a number of ways to counteract the smell, most involve using a product to assist, fresh air alone doesn't seem to do the job.

Products that our Amazonians have mentioned are nappy sacks, tumble dryer sheets, neutralising cat litter, Neutradol, Oust, Shake and Vac in its varieties. The methods used are either enclosing the book with the product in a bag etc or with the sprays you flick the pages in the mist of the spray.


What if you've got the bug and bought loads? tips for listing quickly(thanks to FFM for this section)

This is just a few ideas on how to list quickly, or at least it's how I do it with large lots - not necessarily the right or best way but might give you some ideas - would love any ideas/feedback from you guys - 'cos I'm sure I still have loads of room for improvement.

Use a hand held scanner

I've heard you can get these worth the money on Ebay, but I bought mine direct from www.barcode-solutions.co.uk it's a ZEBEX Z-3080 the man there was really helpful, I placed my order over the internet and he then phoned me to check which type of connector I needed, he asked what it was for and when I said Amazon sales he set it up for me before sending. The price was quite high (£75 including next day delivery) but I had just bought 2000 books and it proved to be a god-send - but not worth it if you are only listing a few at a time. When the scanner arrived it really was 'plug and play', I didn't have to set it up or anything else.

Use standard descriptions

Start a word document and set up some standard detailed descriptions depending on the condition of the book eg

• acceptable - First class despatch, UK seller, spine and covers creased, edges of pages yellow
• good - First class despatch, UK seller, spine creased
• very good - First class despatch, UK seller, spine uncreased
• like new - First class despatch, UK seller, looks and feels unread

If you look through some of your own existing descriptions you will probably see that they are all very similar like the examples above - but do make them 'your own' and make sure the seller knows what they will be getting. You should find that you then make sales before other sellers who can't be bothered to describe the book and only tell you about their fast postal service (if anything at all). I regularly sell before one of the big players who never puts in a description - I know from experience he is a good seller, but other buyers wouldn't necessarily know what the different Amazon Categories mean eg Very Good should mean no creases on the spine etc

You can then quickly click between the Amazon listing page and the word document and double click on the correct descriptive paragraph and then copy and paste into the Amazon description.

Sort before listing

When you first get your books sort them into those that have an ISBN and those that don't and then into piles of small paperbacks and large paperbacks.

Then when you do a batch of listing you can get through the ISBN books quickly - the sooner they are listed the sooner they will sell. You can spend more time later searching out the non ISBN books, they can sometimes take a while to pinpoint (but they are also often the rare ones and sometimes worth the extra effort and time needed)

Sorting into sizes allows you to put similar sizes together and keeps storage space/boxes tidier eg small pbs into small fruit boxes, large pbs into the larger size boxes.

Use SKU's (if you are a convert)

By sorting before listing the chances are you will be putting alot of books into the same box at the same time, this makes the job of filling in an SKU much easier because the 'drop down' lets you see the SKU's you have already entered. eg you could use 270606 box 01 - 1, 270606 box 01 - 2 etc as you fill up your box - you would only have to update the 1 to 2 to 3 each time you listed a new book on that day (not sure if that makes sense - you may need to try it to see what works for you)

Been given bad feedback? (AT)

If your buyer has given you feedback that you think is unfair, maybe there was a problem and you corrected it promptly but this isn't apparent in their comments or score then it's worth trying to get it altered. You can try this 2 ways, firstly you can ask your buyer to reconsider their feedback and change it, here's how.

"How to remove feedback"(Snax)

It is possible to remove feedback up to 60 days after you left it. You may choose to do this if a seller makes an effort to resolve a difficult situation after you have already left negative feedback:

1. Go to http://www.amazon.co.uk/feedback.
2. You'll be asked to log in.
3. After logging in, you'll see a list of your recent orders.
4. Find the order you want to remove feedback for and click the "View Order" button on the right.
5. On the next page, you'll see a "remove feedback" link.

If that doesn't work you could try contacting Amazon to see if they can help, in the past our thread users have said that if there is a comment about the cost of the postage then they may remove it because it puts them in a bad light so it is worth a try.

To contact Amazon use this link and click on 'by email' or 'by phone'

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/cust...deId=200038780

Would it help you find your sold book if you knew when you listed it? (FFM)

If you look on your Sold, Dispatch Now email there is a 'Listing ID' the first four numbers represent the month and day the item was listed eg Listing ID: 1123A862945 means it was listed on 23rd of November. Although this doesn’t tell you which year it was listed.


Contacting your buyer (particularly when your item is not quite perfect)(amazombie)

this is in response to a question about iffy feedback when you've pointed out the flaws/ differences in the description but the buyer appears not to have taken this into consideration

Firstly, a very high percentage of buyers never read the sellers descriptions so in order to avoid problems later and risk bad feedback its always worthwhile trying to contact the buyer before despatch to see if they noticed that the item was less than perfect. It not only puts them on notice but is also useful in the event that problems do subsequently emerge and you can point out to Amazon that you tried to contact the buyer.

Secondly, many buyers do not use email as a means of communication, they order books off the Amazon website but never access their email account whatsoever. Consequently, you see dozens of cases of sellers saying that they had tried to contact a disgruntled buyer numerous times by email to try and resolve matters but had never received a reply. Its simply the case that a buyer wouldnt even know. One answer in these cases is to see if they are in the phone book or if that doesnt work and in extreme circumstances send the buyer a nice letter to try and resolve the matter.

The whole of the listing page is taken up by multiple copies from the same seller?

Amazon don't like this either, if a seller has more than one copy of an item they can show this by keying in the quantity (obviously if they are all in different condition then that's an exception) and not fill the page with the same book over and over. This 'page hogging' should be reported to [EMAIL="sentinel@amazon.co.uk"]sentinel@amazon.co.uk[/EMAIL]

Printing out your own postage stamps - no more trips to the post office (katchambers)

Just wanted to say that I have been using royal mails online postage for 2 months now and I am more than happy with it. Firstly is looks much more professional and you can include your name and address so you don't need labels ( saves a bit of time) and there is no q'ing in post offices - can't get better than that!! I love it and it saves me sooooooooo much time, plus it keeps track off all my postage for me which helps with my tax and stuff. I highly recommend it to everyone, except of course the lady who wants to save her local post office, but everyone else who has a printer, give it a go, it's sooooo good - all you need are weighing scales (I use my ww electronic ones) and a printer. Here is the link:

http://www.royalmail.com/portal/rm/j...diaId=26800663


Royal Mail pricing in proportion - some tips for packing safe but slim (katchambers)

I bought a pack of 25 C5 sized brown envelopes and 50 c4 sized, just plain thin envelopes without the padding for £1 from Poundland, also has them in Tesco, slightly more money though. Then I bought a big batch of foam from ebay.

The foam is only 1mm in thickness which is less than jiffy padding. It cost £4.90 inc postage on ebay, could be less though if you look around for more, its 20 metres in length so will last a long time.

What I did was cut the foam into book sizes and then wrapped it round the book, only one layer thick otherwise will not fit in envelope. I then put in the thin envelope and voila it fit nicely through the 25mm slot, when I tried the same book in a jiffy envelope it did not fit. I managed a couple of normal sized paperbacks and even 2 textbooks!! My textbooks saved the most money as the price would have doubled if didn't go through slot.

continued into the next post............

soolin

A 'how much profit' chart using the new postage rates(redcar)

When I was taxing apprentice tycoon’s brains and mine last week to see if I could come up with a formula for how much Amazon pay you for each price book (non pro seller), it was so I could make a grid to see what profit I would make on a book for each postage level, weight of book and selling price.

Anyway for penny books, non pro sellers get £1.41 back after fees etc so if its large letter size and assuming you are quick to PO and sending the cheapest post, your profit for each weight would be:

00 -100g -> 99p (postage 42p 2nd)
101-250g -> 75p (postage 66p 2nd)
251-500g -> 51p (postage 90p 2nd)
501-750g -> 10p (postage 1.31 2nd)
751g-1kg -> -08p (postage would be £2.49 - has to go in packet size post as heavier than LL 2nd class max)

If its going to need to go in the packet size post
00 -100g -> 46p ( 95p 2nd)
101-250g -> 17p (1.24 2nd)
251-500g -> -22p (1.63 2nd)
501-750g -> -67p (£2.08 2nd)

So probably the realistic limit to make a profit once you take into account other costs for a penny book is going to be up to 750g for a large letter size book and up to 250g for a packet size book ie very unlikely that any but the thinnest packet size books will make a profit at a 1p sale for non pros.

IMPORTANT – THE SECTION BELOW HAS NOT BEEN UPDATED – MY BRAIN HURTS AT THE MOMENT – IF I CAN WORK IT OUT I WILL – IF SOMEONE ELSE WORKS IT OUT PLEASE LET ME KNOW

The cheapest to sell books of each weight and make a profit excluding the packing and other costs (have only gone in 10p book price steps and for three profit levels (absolute minimum ie >0p, bare minimum (ie >20p) and reasonable >50p). For example book of 501-750g going at packet size will give you 4p profit if sold at 50p, 29p profit if sold at 80p and so on…

Packet size
250-500g: AM 1p -> 2p; BM 30p ->25p; R 60p -> 51p (£1.63 2nd packet)

501-750g: AM 50p -> 4p; BM 80p -> 29p; R £1.10 -> 53p (2.08 2nd packet)

750g-1kg: AM 90p -> 2p; BM £1.20 -> 27p; R £1.50 -> 52p (£2.49 2nd packet)

1-1.250kg: AM £4.10 -> 5p; BM £4.30 -> 22p; R £4.70 -> 54p (postage £4.30 1st class)

1.251-1.5kg: AM £4.40 -> 9p; BM £4.60 -> 26p; R £5.00 -> 59p (postage £4.95 parcel)

1.5-2kg: AM £4.80 -> 6p; BM £5.00 ->23p; R £5.40 -> 56p (postage £5.31 parcel)

Large letter size
Can make profit at 1p up to 750g, after that as for packet as 2nd class LL limit only goes up to 750g

Hope that helps – have double checked prices but if any errors let me know.

And to finish

Good luck with your selling, don't be disheartened if you go for days without a sale, just when you feel that it's all gone pear shaped you will get a small flurry again to keep you going.

Please join in the discussion, it's all about sharing ideas and experiences,
everyone is welcome :hello:

soolin

I am aware that I need to update the postage, but I will do that shortly.

May everyone have a very prosperous 2010..go look for books!

katsu

I listed a textbook last night and have logged on today to find an email saying it has sold already My first ever Amazon sale Now I just need to skim through it for the assignment I'm writing and post it later today. I didn't expect to sell anything so quickly!

Thanks to everyone who contributed to the info at the front of the thread. It helped me feel confident I could do this, and I understand issues around packing and dispatch properly, which I don't think I would have fully appreciated otherwise.

soolin

katsu wrote: »

I listed a textbook last night and have logged on today to find an email saying it has sold already My first ever Amazon sale Now I just need to skim through it for the assignment I'm writing and post it later today. I didn't expect to sell anything so quickly!

Thanks to everyone who contributed to the info at the front of the thread. It helped me feel confident I could do this, and I understand issues around packing and dispatch properly, which I don't think I would have fully appreciated otherwise.

Congratulations on your sale, you will be hooked now like the rest of us!

You have until tomorrow to ship the book if you can't skim it fast enough but just remember that many POs close at lunchtime New years Eve so be careful.

INSPIRED

On 2 December I sold an item on Amazon. I stated that it had been used. Today, I have received a message from the buyer stating that she was disappointed as she was unaware that it had been used. She also states that it is not working. I know for a fact that it was working when I posted it. I have a feeling that she has changed her mind and wants her money back.

Am I right in thinking that I have to accept whatever she says even though the advert said "used" and she may have broken it? That now, I ask her to return it to me by trackable means and then issue a refund? Do I have to pay the return postage? Am I able to dispute her claim through Amazon?

Please bear with me as I have a bad cold/sinus infection and am having difficulty in both reading and thinking logically. I have been searching for the answers on Amazon but with my head feeling like this, nothing makes sense. Today, I need a step by step idiots guide.

Add to this frequent power cuts due to blizzards - so I may not be able to respond quickly to any replies this might receive.

cake21

Thank you soolin and everyone who has contributed the info at the start of the thread, very useful :T

I have listed quite a few items today, and on one book (french) I got the following message:

**Please note: The item you indicated is ineligible for Amazon Marketplace selling. Some products listed at Amazon.com cannot yet be sold using Amazon Marketplace. Please consider listing a different item at Amazon Marketplace, or list the item you indicated at Amazon.com

Does this mean if I hang on I will be able to sell it using Amazon Marketplace?

It's not currently listed on amazon.com. It is listed on amazon.fr, but currently unavailable. On both sites I've been going round in circles trying to create a seller's account. I already had buyer's accounts on both with the same email/password combination as my amazon.co.uk account. (Seemed like a good idea at the time ) I get so far and then I get flicked back to the amazon.co.uk site

Is it because I'm logged into amazon.co.uk at the same time? (I was trying to follow the steps on the UK site in parallel because it's easier for me to follow.) Is it the password combination being the same?

Has anyone sucessfully opened a seller's account on a different amazon?

And if so, does this still apply to opening a seller's account on amazon.com? (found in the previous amazon selling thread, posted by teapot2)

they can in theory but apparently its not easy [this is re book sellers and you may be selling other things but presume the same applies]. You have to have a US bank account which is tricky to open because you need a US address. I've read of sellers trying to jump through the hoops but giving up

And would it apply to amazon.fr as well?

Sorry for all the questions but I've got loads of foreign language books to list and I'm worried it might be same for more...

Bexterragga

katsu wrote: »

I listed a textbook last night and have logged on today to find an email saying it has sold already My first ever Amazon sale Now I just need to skim through it for the assignment I'm writing and post it later today. I didn't expect to sell anything so quickly!

Thanks to everyone who contributed to the info at the front of the thread. It helped me feel confident I could do this, and I understand issues around packing and dispatch properly, which I don't think I would have fully appreciated otherwise.

I also logged a couple of books last night and when I got back from work today, one had sold! I've caught the Post Office before it closes, so fingers crossed it gets there. I think I'm going to be a bit cautious about running away with myself and listing loads of books.

I also agree that the info at the start of the thread has been a great, in-depth guide to selling books on Amazon. Cheers :money:

Jenna_Appleseed

Got a good result from the Rage for No1 campaign - somebody bought the album with Killing In The Name on it just before Christmas. Hope they didn't think it would count towards the charts.

soolin

I got an email from Amazon over night giving me all the books that people have tried to buy that could not be sourced, a sort of 'buyer waiting' email. Did anyone else get it? If not I'll post it here.