eBay Sourcing Resource - How to Reliably, Quickly Find Good Products

Online auctions are still a great way to make money online, but you have to be very careful about your pricing and you need to have reliable, genuine sources. One of the toughest challenges is finding a steady supply of high-quality, genuine goods at a cost low enough for you to turn a decent profit (after you subtract all your expenses and fees). While many sites claim to offer listings of wholesalers for eBay sellers, in reality, most of the information you will find is either out of date or untested.

It helps to have a community of peers and expert power sellers to sort through all the supplier information out there, so you can get feedback about what suppliers are reliable and who will work with small home based businesses and individual auction sellers. While you can find wholesalers in every part of the world, even just by looking in the phone book, most of them probably won't fit the bill for your average eBayer.

One option to find product sources is SaleHoo. SaleHoo describes itself as a global product sourcing community. Its updated directory has over 5,000 wholsalers and dropshippers for almost every type of goods. More than just a simple supplier list, SaleHoo has some advanced functionality. It gives you the information you want and it never makes you jump through any hoops to get the details, unlike other directories. You can organize and save favorites, and you can instantly search the SaleHoo forum database for community entries about a particular supplier. The supplier page also allows you to go straight to the whois database for more information, and it also allows you to register a complaint or leave feedback.

SaleHoo's forums are very active (over 40,000 registered members) and there is a lot of good information that is shared and posted by experienced sellers. The forums focus heavily on auction selling, so if you're just looking to get products for your own online store or shopping cart - there's not quite as much value. But overall, SaleHoo is probably worth checking out, particularly for people new to eBay selling.

Downright Fascinating Social Media and Web Commerce Trends

The following is important fodder for eBay sellers, ecommerce sites, and general Web commerce audiences. It’s even fascinating to the lay person. That said,…

Marianne Kolbasuk McGee wrote a great article on Web trends in the November 26, 2007 issue of InformationWeek. There is so much going on in this market.. the mind reels. Here’s a taste from the lead:

“The old days of companies tightly controlling a marketing message are gone…The interactive forces of the Internet - including social networking sites, online discussion boards, and blogs - are arming consumers with tools that can quickly and exponentially spread the word to other would-be customers if a product stinks or a company blunders... Companies such as Charles Schwab and OnStar are creating Internet platforms to literally read the minds of consumers, seeking out insights that directly drive their new product strategies.” [my emphasis]

This reminded me of AdWords, of course. AdWords is great for driving business or clicks to your site via general advertising techniques. However, what a lot of people don’t realize is that AdWords is a great tool for testing promos, floating new ideas, and reading the minds of consumers. And it’s cheap!.. given the right niched-out keywords.

The article details various ways companies like FedEx, eBay, Schwab and others are using the social connectivity of Web 2.0 (I hate saying Web 2.0, but I did, shame) to their advantage. FedEx’s CIO Rob Carter says, (paraphrased from the article) “The explosive growth of this connectivity has been ‘completely underestimated’ in how it will affect society and markets.” I concur.

The article also talks about some fascinating new trends, like having your Second Life avatar or character purchase things for you or book reservations for you online. I know, that sounds crazy. But think about it. Why the heck not? If you build the right character, with all your tastes, desires, wish lists and so forth, why not set him free on a shopping spree? I’ve never played Second Life, but I assume there are vendors in there, like Amazon.com. (If you know how this works, please comment below and enlighten us.) FedEx’s Carter comments in the article, “Second Life has enough momentum to make us wonder: What if this identity I’ve built could spill over into my daily life and get things done for me?” Your avatar would be like an information robot – tuned to all your preferences and guided by “business rules” that determine decisions.

Carter extends the concepts further, saying, “The greatest opportunities lie in socially networking corporations together – horizontally, across business processes, which don’t necessarily live within your four walls anymore.” Great example = Gaming like Second Life supporting commerce like FedEx and Amazon.com.

The article describes how some companies like OnStar use Nielsen BuzzMetrics to analyze how they’re performing in “consumer-generated media.” This is another hot topic, worthy of another post, probably.

There’s a cool story about Dell’s celebrity advertising campaigns, too. I’ll blog more on that later, too.

In the mean time, read the article. It’s a mind bender.

Product Reviews, Social Media and New Online Buying Trends

The following comes from the Online Marketer Blog:

“Not only are 1 in 4 internet users consulting reviews before purchasing offline, but they are willing to pay more if the service is ranked as excellent. It seem that after the year of exuberance that was all about Facebook and twitter, business is finally getting around to answering the question of how social media effects ROI.

“..Users that [sic] sort the list of products by customer ratings spend 41% more than users who search with other methods like popularity or price… Emails that feature customer review content receive 50% higher clickthrough rates.”

Here’s the main article, titled Good For Consumers (And Businesses): Social Media Gets A Glimpse Of Measurable ROI.

So.. for online marketers, it’s now more critical than ever to be building review/social functions into your Web sites and product pages. Customer service performance counts bigtime, too, of course.

And, as consumers, we have to make sure we maintain clear, critical thinking when checking product reviews. I’d like to see some some numbers about the veracity and integrity of online reviews. How much of it is “bro” reviews? How much of it is genuine? Are really nasty reviews the result of competitor campaigns? That would be interesting, yet difficult to quantify.

eBay Radio Interview: Sell Mo Better by Cultivating Loyal, Enthusiastic, Super-Satisfied Customers

eBay Radio had me on last week to discuss customer satisfaction and retention topics. Here's the link to the interview with Griff.

That Friday, myself and Janelle Elms held an eBay Community Workshop on the same topic, but we covered much more than was allowed on the 8 minute eBay Radio Segment. It's called eBay Customer Satisfaction and Retention (brilliant!). There's tons of new info and insight.


Thanks & Enjoy!
Phil

50 eBay Seller Tips - Advice, Pointers, Insights

I stumbled across some useful tips while surfing the eBay community discussion boards today. Some are obvious, but there are quite a few that are intriguing. Good reinforcement and review, plus some I haven't thought about. Check out the comments, too. People added some tips (and some junk, too).