Brian McGregor's |
If you've been selling digital products on eBay, you will know that they haven't made it too easy for you. And yet, digital products are THE ideal product for eBay sellers. You can define digital products as having (almost) 100% profit, cost nothing to deliver, may not have any competition, is available in unlimited quantities, costs nothing to re-stock and can sell very well. So many people are now selling digital products on eBay, that eBay.com is now making it easier for us. If you're based in the UK, you too can list your digital products on eBay.com. You can take advantage of the new digital goods listings process and offer your products to the vast US eBay market. Simply go to www.ebay.com, and log in with your usual eBay ID and password. Now you're ready to us the new selling forms. First, however, just what are digital or downloadable products? eBay defines a digital item as "a computer file or special information that you can access online or have delivered electronically." Examples of digital items are a word processor or pdf file (usually called ebooks), an image taken with a digital camera, an MP3 file of an original song, software, an original recipe etc. Here are some of the benefits of selling digital goods: 1. No shipping cost for buyer or seller 2. Virtually NO competition 3. Swarms of customers if done right 4. Very high profit margins 5. No restocking expense 6. No boxes to pack 7. No visits to the Post Office 8. Immediate confirmed delivery to customers 9. Sellers can grow a mailing list with every sale 10. Facilitates useful 2-step marketing tool (i.e. sell a $1 report on eBay for leads) Until recently there was quite a bit of confusion for some people when it came to selling digital items on eBay, however eBay is now embracing the concept of selling digital goods. Let's talk now about what eBay has created to help us sell digital products.
At Last, eBay is Helping You to Sell Digital Products
by Brian McGregor
It looks like eBay is at last embracing the fact that many sellers want to offer digital products on eBay, and many buyers are interested in buying them.
They have produced a whole new section on the selling forms for us to complete.
They explain everything fully here.
This is a massive step forward.
It answers most of the questions sellers had about selling digital goods, removes most of the obstacles that were previously there, and indeed goes much further than most of had hoped.
You can now, for example, establish a download page where customers are automatically sent after paying for a digital item through PayPal. This could be quite a difficult task before, but now it's automatic.
Also, if you have a web address where you host your digital files for sale, eBay can provide your
buyers (after they pay) with direct access to the files they have purchased. All you do is to "Provide Web address for download" from the pull-down menu when creating your auction.
This is all intimately linked to PayPal, as digital item buyers and sellers want to be able to have the product delivered automatically and immediately after payment. You don't have to do this, you can still deliver by email if you wish.
It seems to imply that digital goods will be allowed in many categories now, instead of being restricted to the one "information" category that they have hitherto required digital item sellers to use. Although not clearly spelled out, the new policy does make reference to "multiple categories" being used for digital goods. Keep an eye out for clarification on that matter.
All of this is really good news.
If you sell digital items, or want to, the doors of opportunity have been opened wide by eBay. I hope you can take advantage of it. I know I will!