How to Open an Ebay Store

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by Bonnie Large
September, 2004

There are many advantages to having an eBay store; number one being that opening an eBay store has the potential to save you vast amounts of money.

Saving Money
The basic eBay store is only $9.95 per month and each listing is only $0.02 and you can add a gallery picture for just a penny.  With insertion fees starting at $0.30 for regular auction listings, you can see how quickly the savings add up if you list a number of items every month.  Final value fees are the same whether you sell through your store or through a regular auction listing.

Here is a great way to save a little money and also get people to look in your store. Run a regular auction on an item that you have multiples of, and also list the same item as a store listing.  Somewhere within the description on the regular auction listing, include a blurb stating something to the effect that if they don’t want to wait until the auction ends, they can “Buy it Now” in your eBay store. Include a hyperlink that takes them directly to your store.

This saves you an additional $0.03, as the Buy it Now fee is $0.05 cents and the store listing is only $0.02.  And really, it saves you even more because the store listing is good for 30 days and the max listing on an auction without paying $0.20 cents for a 10-day listing is only 7 days.

Categories
Categories are another big advantage of having an eBay store. I know that when I find an item I like, I will usually “view seller’s other items” to see if they have anything else I want so I can save on shipping. However, if the seller has pages and pages of items, it does get tiresome scrolling through them and I will usually not make it all the way to the end.

On the other hand, if the seller has an eBay store, they have the ability to list their items in Categories, which is fantastic as I can just scroll through the categories that interest me.

Quantity discounts
There are times that a customer might ask for something slightly different than what you have listed (maybe you make custom items), or you might want to offer them a quantity discount for purchasing multiple items.

We all know that it is against the rules to sell items off eBay, and this is another time that having an eBay store can save you big money.  In this case, you could create a custom listing for the buyer in your eBay store and save the heftier insertion fee of a regular listing.

Promoting your Store
It used to be that you as the seller had to do heavy-duty marketing and promotion to get people to see your eBay store, but eBay has recently made big improvements to store items coming up both in eBay searches, as well as on search engines.  Still, it is very important to promote your store yourself.  The easiest way to do this is to put a clickable link right in the beginning of each of your auctions to encourage buyers to visit your store to view similar items.

Store items are listed as Buy it Now, so you are sure to get the price you want.   You might list most of your items in the store, but list several HOT items as an auction, with a teaser to get people to search your store for other items.  This way, you will save so much money on the items that you listed in the store as opposed to on regular auction, that you could use some of that money you saved on additional upgrade features, such as bold and highlight.

If you are selling clothing or other items that come in multiple sizes, you might list one as a regular auction with a spiel in the listing about visiting your eBay store to find like items in different sizes.

Inventory Control
One final suggestion I have is to use your eBay store to help control your inventory.  With eBay stores, it is comparatively very inexpensive to list every single item you have in inventory. Then, when eBay offers free or reduced listing days, it is extremely easy to take advantage of it. 

All you have to do is go through your store listings and “sell similar item”, but change the format to an auction listing.  Just remember to end the store listing if it is an item that you only have one in stock.  Then, when your auctions end, you can re-list them and change the format back to a store listing.

These are just a few ideas of ways to get the maximum mileage out of your eBay store, but the possibilities are virtually endless. With time and creativity, you will figure out what works best for you, and you might be amazed at how much your eBay store can help keep your eBay fees in check.
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Bonnie Large is a single mother of two who owns Alpha Pet Products and regularly sells on eBay. Visit her eBay store.

©2004 This article was written exclusively for Internet Based Moms™ and may not be re-published or copied without permission from Internet Based Moms™, except to print one copy for personal use. Any questions regarding use of this article should be directed to Linda. Comments and general questions about the article's content can be directed to the author.

NEW! Learn how to start your own eBay Business with the Moms Talk Biz Guide to Making Money with eBay.