How one small eBay seller quickly became a power seller
In the year since Craig Zimmer’s startup Remarketed Systems Inc. began selling laptops on eBay.com, sales have surged from a monthly average of $25,000 to $150,000. The growth has come despite a rising presence on eBay of major retailers and manufacturers selling similar products. Zimmer ties part of his success to a hard-earned understanding of web-based selling and willingness to make changes to his approach. For instance, to attract more customers, he changed keywords to describe his products from technical specifications and configurations to more common words like laptop and notebook. In addition, he built a system of links for cross-merchandising products and he changed his online selling name to “Laptops!” Even though he sells more than laptops, these steps have driven up traffic and sales, he says.
He received help in making these improvements from third-party services provider ChannelAdvisor Corp., to which he pays about $30 a month for a range of services including auction scheduling and e-mail management. He also works closely with an eBay category manager for electronics, resulting in his firm’s recent inclusion in a pilot of a new warranty program for computers and consumer electronics that eBay is launching. So far, the warranty program is proving popular with customers, Zimmer says. He says he expects it will help drive sales among consumers seeking more assurances of quality. It’s also another source of revenue for sellers, who earn finder’s fees for each warranty sold equal to half of the final value fee eBay charges for each sale, he says.
Zimmer, who runs his company with a staff of five including himself, says he often offers the same laptops and wireless handheld devices at the same prices as brand-name companies, but strives to offer more personalized service. Because much of his order management is automated, requiring his staff to do little if any manual entering of data, he says, his small staff is able to respond as necessary to requests for information from customers. His firm sells 200-300 units per month, and replies to 1,000 or more customer e-mail messages through a combination of personal and automated responses.
Still, selling successfully on eBay isn’t easy, says Zimmer, who is writing a book on how to succeed as an eBay seller. “You have to commit 100% time and energy, and you have to constantly reevaluate and reinvent what you’re doing,” he says.
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