What if, you could market to millions of people, give them the latest and greatest products and NEVER stock a single item? Sound too good to be true? It’s possible if you utilize the ease and strength of drop shipping. In a nutshell here is the definition of drop shipping:
You act as an agent for companies (or possibly manufacturer) you buy at wholesale and resell at a price above wholesale, edging toward retail (but of course on eBay, it’s never retail).
If you do this properly you can easily become an eBay powerseller with...
Product lines covering a wide range of categories.
Never worry about shipping or customer service
And here is a big one, NEVER pay for something before it is sold (that’s sweet)
You do not have to have a large inventory sitting in your garage, possibly no inventory at all.
Can The Little Guy/Gal Do This?
Absolutely, you’ll just need to do some homework, find out which drop shipper has the product(s) you want, and then set up an Ebay Auction.
Homework...
Ever heard the expression “there is no free lunch”? It’s a truism, but what we’re going to do is this... get someone else to pay for lunch, the buyer. The only difficulty is finding the buyer and to do that, you MUST give them something special. I mean if you offer the latest and greatest gizmo, only to find out they can get it just as cheap (maybe cheaper) at the local Walmart, you haven’t given them any incentive to buy from you.
So do this when choosing a drop shipper (and product)...
1. Find out if they have a sufficient amount of your chosen product in inventory. If they do, great, if they don’t, keep looking. You DO NOT want to sell something at auction only to find out your drop shipper no longer has inventory. That would lead to a disappointed buyer and potential “negative feedback” something we don’t want.
2. What are the shipping costs? Make certain to find out this IMPORTANT PRICE and include that in your auction price, if you don’t you might find you’ve sold something and end up with little or no profit.
3. Find out what your competition is doing. eBay searches and categories (not to mention eBay pulse) can immediately tell you what is selling and how it is being sold, as well as the average asking price. Don’t be scared of competition, but DO understand it. If the market is flooded with the same product, pick something else, no matter what your potential profit is.
4. Are you psychic? No... well neither am I, but do everything you can to spot a trend and get in front of the crowd, don’t follow the crowd. If you do... and if you can find a winner, you might just have a VERY profitable day, month or year.
5. There are many places to sell online, the focus of this article and this site is eBay. Find out as much as you can about what it cost to sell on eBay? Do you have an eBay store; will you be doing multiple auctions? What are your final value fees, etc.? Again, do some homework and you can easily have a profitable eBay business.
Drop shipping and eBay, teamed with a little bit of market savvy, can provide you with a very profitable business in record time. Do your homework, it might very well be the best study lesson you’ve ever had.