• Welcome from Brian McGregor 
• Inspirational Quote of the Day
• News and Views
• It Pays to Know How to Spell
• How To Enjoy Lucrative eBay Opportunities By Communicating With Your Buyer
• Getting Noticed
• A Gift from Me to You
• Someone's auctioning what? Unusual items currently available
• Finally
• My Products Catalogue
• Back to Newsletter Archive

Hello and welcome.

A particularly warm welcome to you if you're a new subscriber. It's good to have you as part of the family taking my eBay auction newsletter.

I don't know about you, but recently I've noticed a significant increase in phishing emails relating to eBay.

If you haven't heard the term, a phishing email is one sent by fraudsters who are attempting to deceive you into giving them your username and password to important sites like your bank, your credit card company, or your PayPal or eBay account.

The trick the fraudster uses is to attempt to give the phishing email the look of familiarity. They do this by copying the logos and layouts which the authentic companies typically use in their email communications with you.

There are several ways to determine the authenticity of an email from your bank, credit card company, or PayPal or eBay.

The very simplest is that fraudsters don't know your name, so they will always address their emails as Dear Customer, Dear Valued Customer, Dear Account Holder etc. If you ever get an email addressed in such a way "from" your bank, credit card company, PayPal or eBay, delete it. It is an attempted fraud!

And this also applies if they place your email address after the Dear. They've managed to get hold of your email address from somewhere, but they know nothing else about you, so they say Dear brian@workwinners.com hoping to convince me that they know me. They don't! They're phishing.

The other element which all phishing emails have in common is that there will be a link in the body of the email text which they ask you to click on. NEVER do this. Never ever click on a link in the body of any email purporting to be from your bank, credit card company, PayPal or eBay.

I mentioned earlier about the increase I've noticed in eBay phishing emails. This isn't the only problem in trading on eBay. You may find an article I wrote about this in a previous edition of the newsletter to be helpful.

You can read about safe trading on eBay here.

Keep yourself safe online, and I look forward to speaking with you again.

Brian
-----

1. Drive Away a Bargain?

I know that eBay Motors UK is increasing in popularity, although I've never bought on there myself.

One of the reasons for my reluctance has been the complication of insurance. If I purchase a car from an eBay auction, chances are the vehicle wouldn't be local to me. So what about insurance? How was I going to get the car home if I wasn't insured to drive it?

eBay now have a solution to this problem. They offer free 7 day comprehensive insurance to eBay Motor sellers and buyers.

This provision is made in partnership with Norwich Union, but as far as I can see there is no hidden charge or cost. All you have to agree is to accept a no-obligation annual quote for the vehicle in question.

You can read all about the free 7 day comprehensive insurance facility here.



2. Who Says Competition Doesn't Work?

You may be aware that Google is working on their own payment processing service. It's called GBuy and is in beta phase now.

Also, Cybersource has just announced it is to re-launch BidPay. If you're an eBay veteran, you will remember BidPay as being one of the early electronic payment systems available to buyers and sellers on eBay.

I wonder if the impending Google services or the BidPay re-launch has anything to do with a recent change in charges announced by PayPal? Let me think about that for a .......... nanosecond!

If you want to see the new PayPal fees you'll find them here.



3. Proof of the Phishing Pudding

I covered phishing in my welcome notes. Blow me if I didn't receive an email from a newsletter reader with another angle on this topic!

Geoff received the following email

***********************

"I am new on eBay and i want to buy your product but first i want to know few details about it, this is the product that interested me : "

Geoff continues,

This was followed by a string of characters, (in blue) which had 'ebay' within the string. Upon clicking it, I was taken to the ebay startup screen, where one enters ones Userid & Password. Normally I can click upon the Userid box and my Userid is revealed below that box, as my computer memorises it for me, but on this occasion, it failed to appear. This of course alerted me, so I have forwarded it to Spoof@ebay. What I had failed to do, but normally would, is to copy the item number only, into the ebay search facility to determine what the item was. This failure by me was because the E-mail had no suspicious look about it. But as I was almost taken in, I would appreciate it if you could please warn all your ebay friends.

***********************

Well done Geoff for not falling for this one. A lucky escape.


4. Talking of Lucky Escapes!

A Marriage Story

My wonderful girlfriend and I had been dating for over a year, and so we decided to get married. There was only one little thing bothering me. It was her beautiful younger sister.

My prospective sister-in-law was twenty-two, wore very tight miniskirts, and generally was bra less.

One day "little" sister called and asked me to come over to check the wedding invitations. She was alone when I arrived, and she whispered to me that she had feelings and desires for me that she couldn't overcome.

She told me that she wanted to make love to me just once before I got married and committed my life to her sister.

Well, I was in total shock, and couldn't say a word.

She said, "I'm going upstairs to my bedroom, and if you want one last wild fling, just come up and get
me." I was stunned and frozen in shock as I watched her go up the stairs.

When she reached the top she pulled off her panties and threw them down the stairs at me. I stood there for a moment, then turned and made a beeline straight to the front door.

I opened the door, and headed straight towards my car.

Lo and behold, my entire future family was standing outside, all clapping!

With tears in his eyes, my future father-in-law hugged me and said, we are very happy that you have passed our little test.....we couldn't ask for a better man for our daughter. Welcome to the family."

And the moral of this story is:

Always keep your condoms in your car........


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One of the best sources of goods to sell on eBay is, well, eBay.

Don't be daft Brian, I can hear you say!

Can you really buy something on eBay, and then sell it back on eBay and make money?

You certainly can. You see, it's all in the price.

If you buy an item for a particular price, and then sell it for a higher amount, you've made yourself a profit.

And one of the best ways to locate items which sell for low amounts is to take advantage of misspellings.

Not everyone is as diligent as you when it comes to listing their items for sale on eBay. They make mistakes. Sometimes very simple spelling errors. And it is these mistakes which can enable you to net a real bargain.

You are helped because the vast majority of eBay buyers use the simple search box to find items of interest. They probably don't realise but by using this search box, the keywords they input are only getting checked against auction titles. This means that if the seller has made a spelling mistake in the title of their auction, they won't get returned in search results.

If they don't get returned in search list, then bidders can't click through to read the auction description. The result of a misspelling can be a neglected auction.

And this can be YOUR opportunity to step in and get a bargain.

This probably works best on brand names which have been given incorrect spellings in auction titles.

For example, today I searched on eBay for electric products made by Remington.

But I didn't key remington into the search box, I used remmington. Note the double m spelling. Note too that capital letters are treated identically to lower case in eBay searches.

Of the 63 items in the search return list, 23 were for Remington products (or remmington as these sellers called them).

And of the 23 Remington items, only 5 had bids on them. This isn't surprising as very few bidders will ever find them!

On this list there were several Remington products which I could pick up for next to nothing. And then, with the correct spellings of course, I could list them back on eBay and look forward to making a nice profit.

Just one word of advice if you're going to try this technique. Do make sure you place a bid on any items of interest. This is because the seller can de-list their item before the end of the auction period if there are no bids. And if they realise there have been a low number of viewers they might discover their error and try and remove their auction.

Now you say, how on earth am I going to know all the misspellings of items I might want to buy?

That's a good question.

But here's a better answer....

You simply use some free software I'm going to tell you about.

Called Lost Auction, this software is your key to finding those misspelling bargains.

Lost Auction takes your legitimate word, such as Remington, and searches eBay for auctions which contain any spelling derivation of the key word.

Better than that, it lets you go straight to these auctions to check them out!

If sellers have been too lazy to use correct spellings in their auction titles, Lost Auction is a very useful tool to track down those potentially rewarding errors.

You can download Lost Auction here.

Guest Article by
Melody Smith

In order to make money on eBay you need to create sales. Follow these tips to help generate more sales and profits for your eBay business.

As an eBay seller, one of the most important tasks you must do is communicate with your buyers. Actual person-to-person contact with your buyers is absolutely necessary to continue generating sales from existing buyers and making eBay sales to new buyers.

Actual communication with your buyers and would-be buyers do not involve the use of some automated ‘suggestion’ or ‘FAQ’ system. This system is for an entirely different purpose.

Person-to-person contact is a way of giving personal thanks to buyers who have trusted you, as the seller. Once you personally contact your buyer, you can make them think you’re doing them a favor while you create a few extra sales.

Apart from establishing personal contact with your customers and getting other eBay sales opportunities, you may also gain a few more customers through your original buyer.

Think about it, you can gain a lot of eBay selling opportunities just by establishing a personal contact with your existing buyers.

What scenarios could bring you the ideal opportunity of establishing personal contact and make a ‘friendly’ extra sale? There are potentially lots of situations where you can start creating eBay sales opportunities.

Shipping the product
Whenever you ship a product to a new or repeat customer always make sure you put in at least one flyer with a special offer on it, your eBay store url if you have one and your contact details. This is the easiest way to make extra sales and profits but a lot of eBay sellers aren’t doing this.

“I can throw in…”
Let’s say you received an order for an item that will cost you a lot in shipping and needs some kind of packing material in order to be safely shipped. Here’s an e-mail pattern practically guaranteed to get you a response.

“I’m emailing you to ask if you’d be interested in getting a mouse or keyboard for the computer you are buying. I can throw in any accessory that you may want along with the computer without any additional charge in the shipping expenses. But if you’re not interested, then don’t worry about it. I just thought I might help in any way.”

The “I can throw in…” part of the message is put in there with the hope of creating an extra sale. Still, its main motive is subtly hidden due to the informal way the letter is written and the off-handed way of asking.

An unsuspecting customer would be highly flattered and thankful of your ‘suggestions’ and personal email. In the eBay business, a grateful and trusting buyer brings about positive eBay opportunities. You gain assurance that he/she will probably become a regular customer and encourage friends to buy from you.

Know Anyone Else?
Here's another eBay opportunity to gain customers. Send a thank you note to your buyer after your transaction has been completed. Then, simply say that if they're pleased with your product and services, then you'd really appreciate it if they could spread the word.

Once an eBay buyer feels they got a good bargain along with receiving excellent customer service, you can be pretty sure that they’ll go out and start writing down your eBay store's url on pieces of paper and distribute it among their friends.

If you notice a lot of orders coming from the same town, then you'll know that this eBay opportunity technique is working.

Any Problems?
Contact a buyer a few months after your transaction with him and ask if the product is still working. It’s a chance to create another eBay sale if you find that they're having a problem you can fix.

Anything to Sell?
One of the numerous eBay opportunities to be aware of is finding sources for products to sell. If you've just sold your customer a brand new item, ask if they have an old one that they might like to trade. Often, customers are delighted with this offer since it guarantees them a much better bargain. Besides, they might just be thinking at that exact moment how to get rid of the old one they’re going to replace.

Communicating personally with your customers really helps in creating more eBay sales for your online business and takes it to further heights of success!

Want The Inside Scoop On Creating Your Own eBay Powerseller Business?
Melody Smith has created a detailed eBay site that is essential viewing for anyone wanting to become an eBay powerseller. Visit www.ebay-powerseller-tips.com today.

Let's suppose you've optimised your auction titles so that you will get returned in search lists.

And let's imagine you've used short durations to get your auctions near the top of the results, can you make your auction stand out from the crowd?

Well, yes you can, but unfortunately it means you have to give eBay some more of your hard earned money.

What we're talking about here are eBay's listing upgrades.

Sometimes this can pay off. This is especially true for high priced items.

Gallery
This is probably the most basic of features. It shows your photo on the search results page as well as inside on the item’s description page. This is usually always worth having, unless your item is of very low value.

Current Cost
eBay.co.uk 15p
eBay.com 35c

Subtitle
Subtitle enables you to convey pertinent information that you couldn’t squeeze into the auction title. Useful for technical items where the auction title isn't long enough to hold the key features of the item. Also useful for selling phrases, and offers, such as free shipping.

Current Cost
eBay.co.uk 35p
eBay.com 50c

Bold
Helps your auction to stand out on search results pages, although costly for low value items.

Current Cost
eBay.co.uk 75p
eBay.com $1

Border
This places your auction within a coloured box on search results pages. It can be effective, but again is of questionable value on low price items.

Current Cost
eBay.co.uk N/A
eBay.com $3

Highlight
Puts your auction within an eye-catching coloured band on search results pages. Useful for high priced items.

Current Cost
eBay.co.uk £2.50
eBay.com $5

Featured Plus!
This shows your item at the top of the page in the Featured Items section of search results. It will also appear in the Featured Items section to those eBayers who browse by category. This can pay for itself with an item that’s worth more than about £55 ($100) and getting a decent number of bids.

Current Cost
eBay.co.uk £9.95
eBay.com $19.95

Gallery Featured
This shows your item first when someone chooses to view items using the ‘Picture Gallery’ view. In my experience not many people use this view, but the feature might be useful for some kinds of items.

Current Cost
eBay.co.uk £15.95
eBay.com $19.95

Home Page Featured
Although the ultimate in listing upgrades, the value of Home Page Featured can be questionable. This shows your auction title in a special display on eBay's home page, however, eBay doesn't guarantee that purchasing the upgrade will result in this happening! What you're buying is an eBay "best endeavours" to give you Home Page exposure.

If you feel you could pull a lot of buyers into your auction through the first four or five words of your title, by all means try it. You also get Featured Plus! feature as part of this upgrade. Note the disparity in this upgrade cost if you use UK eBay.

Current Cost
eBay.co.uk £49.95
eBay.com $39.95

Finally, as with many elements of eBay trading, no results can be guaranteed. You must test and test and test. Try different upgrades and keep records of the results you achieve.

You might just find the ideal combination for your auctions.

Many people ask me about where to source goods to sell on eBay.

Here is a useful ebook which covers several ways in which you can find suppliers of goods which can be sold on eBay.

Before I give you the download information, here's an idea for eBayers who don't currently place any auctions on eBay.com.

Dropshipping is a method of selling where you as the seller never see the product you're offering. There are thousands of suppliers in America who are prepared to let you sell their products on a dropship basis.

The great news here is that no matter where you are based in the world, you can sell products from these USA based companies to USA based buyers via eBay.com. When you make a sale, you merely email the supplier with your buyer's address, and they supply the item direct to the buyer.

The ebook I'm giving you has a list of dropship suppliers!

Get your Auction Sources Big Book here.

Nothing surprises me when it comes to internet auctions. Amuse yourself with some of these beauties.

Do you think this is a load of hot wind?

That's great! All we need now is to find a mouth to fit.

It could be you!

Know anyone who deserves this?

Spooky, or what?

Disclaimer - I have no association with any of the sellers of the above items.