Have a Garage Sale
If you're starting with no money and no merchandise, and your goal is to build an eBay business, you'll need a little seed money. Whatever you make from a garage sale will be enough to get you started. To learn more, please read How To Have A Successful Garage Sale.
Get Acquainted with eBay
Register first, then play around. You want to be very comfortable with browsing, searching, watching, bidding, winning, losing, communicating, and getting help, before you list anything. eBay has lots of audio and video tutorials, plus a very active community to help you get acquainted. For detailed information, please read Step Into eBay, Slowly.
Policies and Procedures
Details can be deadly in this business. Before you can play the game, you need to know the rules - yours and theirs. What are you allowed to sell? Who will you sell to? Where--local--national--international? How will you ship and what will you charge? What form of payments will you accept? What will you do with the money when it comes in? Where will you keep the merchandise? How will you package it? What will you say to your customers? How will you keep track of it all? You need these answers before the questions come up.
Learn How to List
Words, pictures, timing, categories, tracking. Remember the guy on TV with all those plates in the air on little sticks? Well that's you from now on. For help with this step, please read Your First eBay Listings.
Keep Track of Your Money
If this is a business, you must know where your money is at all times. Don't mingle your eBay funds with the grocery money. It's okay to squeeze a few dollars out of the egg fund, but once it gets into eBay, be sure it stays there. The easiest way to manage your eBay finances is through PayPal. Read Do You Need PayPal for more information.
Customer Service
Your customers are always right, so keep them happy. Prompt, courteous, friendly emails are the key. Never let an unanswered email sit your box for more than 24 hours. Build an emergency stash for refunds when problems can't be resolved any other way. Sign up for PayPal's autmatic email notification service, so your winning bidders will get a prompt email even if you aren't online.
Time Management
eBay is a very time-consuming business. If most of your items are unique, you'll be constantly shopping for new merchandise, taking new pictures, writing new blurbs (product descriptions), and calculating new shipping costs. This business will bury you if you don't manage your time wisely. Spend some time getting familiar with eBay and PayPal auction management tools. If they don't work for you, consider shopping for auction management software or developing your own systme from scratch. DON'T WAIT UNTIL YOU'RE OUT OF TIME TO START TRYING TO MANAGE IT. By then, it's way too late.
Products and Pricing
eBay is like a poker game--you can win with a dud or lose with a great hand. You might list an item for $24.99 this week that goes off without a bid. Next week, you drop the price to $9.99 and relist it. That time it sells for $45 - go figure. There's no way to take the luck out of it, and that's what keeps the bidders hooked, so all you can do is work out the best percentages and hang on for the ride.
The Four Selling Seasons
Winter, Summer, Back-to-school, and Christmas (maybe five if you have a market niche for spring gardening). Plan ahead for Mother's Day and Father's Day. eBay will keep you notified, and they have a calendar of upcoming promotions, but it's still a good idea to keep the seasons in mind when listing. You may get a whole lot more for an item if you wait a few weeks or months, rather than listing it, now, just because it's handy.
Advanced Hints and Techniques
To appreciate some lessons we learned the hard way, get some helpful hints we figured out for ourselves, and take advantage of some tips we've picked up from others along the way, please read eBay Advanced Selling Hints.
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