Hello Raus:
First of all I want to thank you for providing me another opportunity
to answer your question. As I am not very adept at answering a few
questions, I am just providing you a feedback about my knowledge of
the eBay and its communities. I will not post it as an answer. Please
feel free to ask other researchers if you need more information on
this topic. I sincerely apologize.
Professional eBay Users:
There are thousands of eBay users who use this service to either sell
or buy a variety of products but professional eBay users have a
different profile. Most of the successful sellers on the eBay are
actually those people who have already a retail store somewhere or the
people who have access or power to buy wholesale from not so common
locations.
EBay really helped those retailers who had plenty of goods to sell and
they were willing to sell it for a bargain price. Think about it, if
you have a great product to sell but you live in a remote town of
Wisconsin, what then? EBay helped these kinds of retailers from around
the world to market their product to the world without spending big
bucks. Again, not all of the retailers were successful as there are
different methods to run a successful online auction. If you check the
profiles of the EBay powersellers, you will notice that most of them
have a valid presence on the web. Either, they have their own website
or they have a website on EBay.
There is yet another community on the EBay that doesn?t have a retail
store neither do they have a large quantity of goods to sell. Even in
these circumstances, these people are successful. These are the people
who you might call successful part-timers. These are the people who
have access to the bargain goods in the real world. They buy these
goods at a cheap price and sell it successfully on the internet.
Again, you have to know the auction game in order to succeed.
It is also noticeable that the people working for the EBay are also
successful in selling goods in these auctions. Yes, they know how to
sell but if someone doesn?t have the access to the cheaper market,
they won?t be able to sell. It means that the management certainly
knows where to get their stuff.
I myself tried to sell on the EBay but without any huge success. I
certainly did my homework and paid special attention on the inner
workings of the auctions but couldn?t really get over the break even
point. My strategy which lots and lots of people are trying these days
was to get a product from wholesalers by becoming a re-seller. This of
course didn?t work because most of the products that the wholesalers
sell are already on the EBay. When it is not, the product is a little
expansive and there doesn?t seem the need to buy.
Getting back to my point, it seems that all professional EBay sellers
have access to the bargain resources otherwise they won?t be able to
compete with other savvy sellers.
INTERACTION AMONG THE PROFESSIONAL COMMUNITY
It seems that there is a lot of interaction among the EBay community
and they really share their secrets among each others. One prime
example of this interaction can be found in the selling history of the
semi-professional EBay seller. We will notice that the so called
successful part-timers not only sell their products but also buy a
large quantity of products from other eBay sellers. I wonder what the
reason behind this is.
EBay provides an overview of its community on the webpage of its
corporate website. Take a look at
http://pages.ebay.com/community/aboutebay/community/index.html.
Every few weeks, EBay is starting to feature a profile of one of the
members of the community. Check the profile of the recent member. You
will notice that how she was able to market her products. Definitely,
she had something unique to sell and EBay helped her market her
business.
WHERE DO THESE PROFESSIONALS MEET?
The simplest and easiest ways to meet other eBay members are the
extensive forums started by eBay. Access this page to find out about
several groups http://pages.ebay.com/community/index.html?ssPageName=h:h:over:US
EBay also holds online events to guide its members. Anybody can start
a forum to discuss business with like minded people. A few of these
forums also have a local or state chapter.
On of the two excellent places for the online auctioneers to meet is
Auction Users http://www.auctionusers.org and Meet up
http://www.meetup.com. According to Auction Users, they provide
education, research, lobbying efforts and a collective voice in
matters concerning the interests of all members. Meet up is a
community of internet users who meet in an informal place to discuss
their issues. There is also a community of EBay sellers at
http://ebaysell.meetup.com
These might be the type of communities that you are interested in creating.
TECHNOLOGIES AVAILABLE TO EBAY SELLERS
There are ever increasing technologies available for the eBay sellers.
In fact, it is becoming very easy to set up an online store front and
deal with the complexities of online transactions. Andale
http://www.andale.com/corp/index.html is a prime example.
You may find a couple of technologies under the ?Seller tools?. A list
of useful resources and other software that is helping EBay sellers is
listed at http://www.windweaver.com/ebay/ebay.htm
I hope this will help you. You might know all of this but I did not
write with the intention of providing an answer. These are just a few
comments.
You may post this to another researcher, now. I am very glad to serve
you again and hope that I will be considered as a possible candidate
for future answers.
Sincerely,
Leader-ga. |
