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UK eBay Auction Newsletter
The newsletter for buyers and bidders on UK eBay
January 28, 2004 - Issue 4201
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This latest issue is now also available online at
http://www.workwinners.com/newsletter/040128.htm
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1. Hints and Tips
2. Some Really Useful eBay Contacts
3. How Snow can Change Your Life
4. eBay in the Dock!
5. From Strength to Strength
6. Someone's auctioning what? Unusual items currently
available
7. Finally
8. My Products Catalogue
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Inspirational quote of the day
"Appreciation can make a day, even change a life.
Your
willingness to put it into words is all that is
necessary."
Margaret Cousins
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Brian McGregor speaking - you receive the UK Internet
Auction
Users Newsletter because you have bought from me or
enquired
about my auction items on eBay or QXL.
If you do not want to receive this newsletter, the only
one
dedicated to UK bidders and sellers, please send a blank
email to
remove@workwinners.com
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1. Hints and Tips
I thought it might be useful if we start off every
newsletter
with some hints and tips for eBay UK buyers and sellers.
a) I get many requests from eBayers about the name of
wholesale
contacts who they could use to buy products for sale on
eBay. Far
be it from me to promote my own wholesale source eBooks
on
http://www.workwinners.com, but today I can give you the
address
of a UK wholesale online directory. It's in early days,
but
doesn't cost anything to use, and it might just give you
that
single contact you have been looking for.
You'll find it at http://www.wholesale118.co.uk
b) An eBayer contacted me recently as his eBay user ID
had been
"taken over" by someone else. This pirate had
used the ID to try
and buy a number of items. His/her plan was to get the
goods
delivered to them, but leave the bill to be paid by my
emailer.
Although it doesn't happen often, the stealing of eBay
IDs does
happen. By far the best way to prevent it is to change
your eBay
password regularly i.e. every 30-60 days. Also, if you
have an
account with PayPal, change that password regularly too.
And, it
goes without saying, you should never use the same
password on
eBay and PayPal. If you've kept the same passwords for
months -
or even years - I strongly recommend you change them
today. On
eBay, you do this from your My eBay page, under
Preferences.
Incidentally, this advice applies to any internet
passwords you
might use, particularly in the financial area.
c) eBay UK have revamped their Help screens. If you've
used them
before, you will know they were small screen and not too
easy to
read online. Now, Help is full-screen, with everything
you need
in front of you. Try it - it's a great improvement.
d) When you're buying, you will know that eBay defaults
to show
you only items located in the UK. If you wish to extend
your
search to include items which are being made available
from
eBayers all over the world, go to Advanced Search - which
is an
option under the Search menu item. Under
Location/International,
in the Items Available To box, select United Kingdom.
This means all items which sellers are willing to post to
the UK
will now appear in search results - including items from
non-English sellers.
e) If you're buying or bidding on something which by its
very
nature will probably only be of interest to you if it is
available locally, did you know you can choose to view
only those
auctions in your region? You might be looking to buy a
car over
eBay, but naturally you want to test drive it first. You
might
fancy a ticket which you've seen on eBay for the Shania
Twain
concert, but it has to be for a venue near you. You might
like to
buy a large or fragile item, but are worried about the
costs or
dangers of shipping.
Well, eBay has kindly divided the UK into (currently) 13
regions.
These regions are each associated with a major town. If
you go to
Advanced Search, and under Location/International select
the
appropriate town from the drop-down menu under Items from
eBay
UK.
Your searches will now only show those items which are
based near
the selected town. Now you can have that test drive, or
examine
that 3 piece suite, or go and see Shania Twain (if that's
your
scene) at your local concert venue.
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2. Some Really Useful eBay Contacts
One of the common gripes I hear about eBay is that you
can never
find anyone to speak to when you have a problem. They
prefer to
operate entirely by email.
I know how frustrating this can be, when what you really
want to
do is TALK to someone. After talking, the next best thing
might
be to write.
Here is an address you might find helpful if you wish to
write to
eBay.
eBay (UK) Ltd
1 Heron Square
Richmond upon Thames
Surrey
TW9 1EJ
And here are a couple of senior people at UK eBay. If you
have
suggestion or a complaint that you wish to convey to a company,
I
always believe in starting at the top.
Douglas McCallum - Managing Director, eBay UK
Jennie Reed - Marketing Communications Manager, eBay UK
By the way, I find it encouraging that PayPal, which is
owned by
eBay, has recently opened a Customer Service Centre for
UK users
which is telephone based. Their number is 0870 7307191.
Even eBay.com won't give its USA based members a
telephone number
to call. Although they do offer a Live Chat facility. In
this you
can at least "talk" online to a member of
eBay.com staff. I
wonder if there are any plans to introduce this to UK
eBay?
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3. How Snow can Change Your Life
As I'm writing this, snow is falling heavily. The biting
wind is
whipping it up into what the Americans call a whiteout.
I think to myself, how lucky I am. I'm doing what I love
best -
tapping words into my computer. What's more, I can choose
to stay
in all day if I wish. And tomorrow, and the next day. I
don't
have a boss or anyone else that I have to call to explain
that
getting in to work will be difficult today!
On days like these, working from home is a real benefit.
And I
realise how fortunate I am to be able to do it.
I know many people have a desire to work for themselves,
and they
believe that the internet has the potential to turn that
desire
into a reality. The question is, where do you start?
For most people, the only option is to begin their
internet
business alongside their normal work. This for many
probably
means some evenings and weekends have to be invested in
the
internet.
If you are one of those who aspire to making money at
home from
the internet, I have a simple but sincere message.
I have said this many times, and in many forums - there
is no
easier or better business to get into on the internet
than eBay.
Easy, because you can start with one auction of one
unwanted item
you already have in your house. And in eBay's own Help
screen
they will show you how to create your first auction. It
isn't
difficult. There are millions of people doing it.
Better, because the biggest problem of any internet
business is
solved for you by eBay.
Do you know what that problem is?
You will know Google is the king of internet search
engines. If
you look on Google's home page you will see exactly how
many web
pages Google searches. It's currently standing at a
little over
3.3 billion.
If you have a web site, and you're trying to sell
products from
it, what chances that your web pages will get returned in
Google
searches against 3.3 billion others?
And that is the biggest problem for an internet business
- how
does anybody know your web site exists? It's a massive,
massive
problem.
I know I said eBay solves this for you, but I guess you probably
don't believe me.
Let me try and show you how.
Instead of creating a web site and adding it to the 3
billion or
so already there, you submit an item for auction on eBay.
Immediately your auction is available to 5.6 UK eBay
members,
some of whom will be prospects to buy your item. They
won't all
want what you're selling. But the ones who do, will come
to your
sales page (auction listing) precisely because they are
in the
market for what you are selling. How will they find your
auction?
Whenever a member is interested in a certain type of
item, they
use eBay's search facility to find auctions which offer
such an
item. If you're offering this type of item, your auction
listing
will be returned by the search. If the prospective buyer
likes
the title of your auction, he or she will click through
to read
your auction page.
And this "sales page" is where you have the
opportunity to
convert these visitors into bidders and buyers.
Plus, bear in mind that around 10,000 new people per week
are
registering with eBay. So, the eBay market place is
constantly
expanding. The name is already well known, and it is
promoted and
re-promoted by every new member and every auction
listing.
You can have as many auctions running as you like, and it
will
cost you pennies per day per auction.
There really isn't anything else quite like it in the
business
world. On eBay you can have created an auction, sold an
item,
collected the money, despatched the goods all within a
matter of
days.
Like the man said, "You start the journey of a
thousand miles
with just one step". If you want to do something in
eBay selling,
why not start today?
You don't need to wait for the snow.
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4. eBay in the Dock!
You may have missed this one, but eBay.co.uk were in the
"dock"
on 10th December, 2003! Well, not quite the dock, but
certainly
under the cosh. The Trader Media Group decided that
eBay.co.uk
had run a misleading advert in a specialist magazine, so
they
reported eBay to the Advertising Standards Agency (ASA).
eBay.co.uk's advert broadly claimed "Every 7 minutes
a vehicle
sells on eBay Motors UK, so aged stock will be a thing of
the
past".
So, the question I found myself asking is, who are the
Trader
Media Group, and why would they be interested in
eBay.co.uk
being shown to have placed a misleading advert?
The answer to my first question, quickly answered the
second!
The Trader Media Group is probably best know as the
publishers of
a magazine called Auto Trader. This is a highly
successful weekly
publication which sells over 350,000 copies per issue.
The penny
should be dropping now!
TMG clearly see eBay.co.uk as a competitive threat - in
the
nicest possible way. Many people who advertise their
vehicle for
sale in "Auto Trader", might consider that eBay
Motors offers an
attractive alternative proposition.
I have absolutely no axe to grind at all here. I'm all
for fair
competition. As a consumer, I believe strongly it is only
by
competition that we can hope to get better value for
money from
everyone seeking to supply us with products or services.
Incidentally, talk about David and Goliath. Auto Trader
has
250,000 plus vehicles for sale at any point in time,
whereas
eBay.co.uk has a mere 4,500.
I guess if I worked for TMG, I would be suggesting
instead of
battling with the competition, it may make more sense to
"join
it". They could start their own online auction on
the Auto Trader
web site, which gets over 2 million visits per month. In
this way
they could offer their sellers two methods of selling
their cars.
Mind you, this might antagonise eBay into diversifying
themselves. Say, by going into auto magazine publishing!
Oh, I almost forget - TMG lost their action. eBay UK
proved to
the satisfaction of the ASA that they do indeed sell a
vehicle
every 7 minutes.
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5. From Strength to Strength
I'm trying hard not to be too enthusiastic about eBay -
but I
can't help it. I hope at least that I'm realistic. I know
there
can be problems sometimes in using eBay. Indeed, regular
readers
will recall I have had my own difficult times when
someone got
hold of my credit card details which I strongly suspect
was
obtained via my eBay account.
Having said that, I continue to be a big eBay fan. Here's
another
reason why. On 21st January, 2004, eBay published figures
for
Quarter 4, ended 31st December, 2003, and for the full
year of
2003.
Many people know eBay revenues and profits growth is very
impressive, but there are some not so well known figures
in this
report which might interest you:
Confirmed registered users at 31st December, 2003, is
94.9
million. A 54% increase over Q4 2002.
Confirmed active users (who bid, bought or listed in the
previous
12 months) is 41.2 million, a 49% increase in the same
period the
year previous.
Auctions listed in the quarter ended 31st December, 2003,
was 292
million. 49% higher over Q4 2002.
Value of items sold in the quarter ended 31st December,
203, was
$7.1 billion, a 53% increase on Q4 2002.
As mentioned earlier, eBay owns PayPal. At 31st December,
2003,
PayPal had 40.3 million accounts, a 73% increase on Q4,
2002.
eBay now has ten main categories which produce more than
$1
billion of annual auction sales value.
All in all, the performance of eBay continues to impress,
and is
great news for you and I as we use this unrivalled market
place
to buy and sell.
By the way, if you're that way inclined, and you want to look
further at eBay's 2003 business figures, you can do so
here:
http://investor.ebay.com/earnings.cfm
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6. Someone's auctioning what?
Unusual items currently available
Nothing surprises me when it comes to internet auctions.
Amuse
yourself with some of these beauties ...
Just type the auction number into the Search Box on eBay.
Well, you learn something new every day with eBay. There
I was,
thinking about buying a piece of land in Arizona, as my
better
half says, "just in case", when I read
something that is truly
amazing. Near the bottom of this auction you will find
that this
piece of land is near one of the "seven wonders of
the world".
Now I don't know my ancient Greece too well - but
Arizona?? You
can make your own mind up at auction 2375786758
I'm occasionally interested in a wee dram - with a name
like
McGregor what do you expect? I came across this nifty
device on
eBay, which I think I could probably find useful -
infrequently
you understand. You'll see what I mean at 2983039463
And, if I have too much by way of the wee dram, this
might be the
perfect cure. I can just see myself in this - auction
2591861404
OK, OK, I've seen everything now. If you want to get to
the
bottom (sic) of this, take a look at auction 3657773972
With
apologies to the squeamish!
And lastly, the answer to the eternal question. Just how
old is
Roger Moore? You can get a good idea from this auction
3657660625
Disclaimer - I have no association with any of the
sellers of the
above items.
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7. Finally
If you are changing email addresses soon please put a
note on
your calendar to send a blank email to:
after you get your new email address.
I don't want to lose touch with you!
If a friend sent you this newsletter, you need to send a
blank
email to:
That way you can get your own copy next time!
Increasingly, email filters are preventing genuine email
communications such as this newsletter from reaching
subscribers.
If you use any method of checking on your email, and you
wish to
continue receiving the newsletter you may need to include
my
email address in your safe list, whitelist or address
book.
Thank you for continuing to take my newsletter - I hope
it gives you as much enjoyment to read, as it does me to
write.
Regards
Brian McGregor
Editor - "UK eBay Auction Newsletter"
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8. My Products Catalogue
All the following are original products, services and
opportunities written, created offered by myself.
"The eBay Formula"
How to sell successfully on UK eBay - time, after time,
after time.
http://www.workwinners.com/ebf/ebayformula.htm
"UK Dropshipping Sources"
Nine genuine UK dropship companies.
http://www.workwinners.com/UK_Dropshipping.htm
"eBay Keyword Selling Service"
The top 4 buyer keywords by eBay category, emailed weekly
to subscribers.
"Sourcing DVDs, CDs and Videos at Trade Prices"
Where and how to buy at trade prices, and how to sell for
profit.
http://www.workwinners.com/DVD_CD_Video_at_Trade_Prices.htm
"Sourcing and Selling Electrical Products for Big
Profits"
Where and how to buy at trade prices, and how to sell for
profit.
http://www.workwinners.com/Electrical_wholesale.htm
"Sourcing Maternity Clothing and Baby Needs at Trade
Prices"
Where and how to buy at trade prices.
http://www.workwinners.com/Maternity_baby_nursery_at_Trade_Prices.htm
"Sourcing and Selling Jewellery for Big
Profits"
Where and how to buy at trade prices, and how to sell for
profit.
http://www.workwinners.com/Jewellery_wholesale.htm
"Sourcing Mobile Phone Accessories at Trade
Prices"
Where and how to buy at trade prices, and how to sell for
profit.
http://www.workwinners.com/Mobile_Phone_Accessories_wholesale.htm
"The Streetwise Buyer's Guide to Radar
Detectors"
Don't buy a Radar Detector system until you read this.
http://www.workwinners.com/Streetwise_Radar_Detectors.htm
Oil Painting Marketing Business
Become my partner in this pleasant money-making venture
http://www.workwinners.com/oil_paintings.htm
See the whole catalogue here: http://www.workwinners.com
=============================
"UK eBay Auction Newsletter" is published two
weekly.
In each issue you'll get ideas on how to make the most of
buying
and selling on eBay sites from a UK perspective.
If you would like to unsubscribe please use the link at
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bottom of this email.
Finally, be assured that your email address will never be
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or sold - ever!
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Copyright Information
Copyright © 2006 Brian McGregor. All rights reserved.
No part of this newsletter may be copied or published
without
prior permission, but do please forward it to your
friends and
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McGregor, as publisher, disclaims any liability for the
use of
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or articles. It is the readers responsibility to practice
due
diligence in any product or service acquired based on
information
contained in this newsletter.
To unsubscribe, send a blank email to
remove@workwinners.com
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