The Ebay Entrepreneur

eBay Niche That Requires NO Product

by Tristen OBrien on December 1, 2011

Everyone knows that you can sell products on eBay. You can sell everything from pencils to a new car if you wanted to. Have you ever thought about selling a service instead of a product? Did you know that eBay even has their own category called Specialty Services. They even have sub categories like Advice, Artistic Services, eBay Auction Services, Media Services, Web Services, and More!

So, what is your talent? Can you write a good resume, or maybe you are good at picking sport scores. The services industry is booming right now, and eBay is making a lot of people money because of this. Lets take a look at a couple of services that are being offered.

1. Résumé Writing/Editing. As we all know, there are people all over this nation looking for jobs. Some have been laid off and some are right out of college, but they need a way to stand out. If they don’t have the best writing skills, then they are turning to an outside source. There are many eBayer’s who are offering a resume service that will help others out in this area. Of course you want to make your listing stand out, so give examples of what you offer, and give them a return on their investment. Here is a completed listing

2. Ask me a question. People want advice or they want someone to talk to. There are plenty eBay sellers out there offering up their own advice, but the ones who do the best are the ones who claim to be “psychic.” This one is out of my league, but if you think you have that special something, then there is tons of money to be made here! Check out this completed listing

3. Sports Picks. Of course there are a lot of sport fans in the world, and even some sport nuts! That could be your advantage! There is a huge niche on eBay right now for sports predictions. Do you have to be right all the time? No.. But that will get you more repeat business if you are. If you know your sports, then this service is for you. Let me help you out – The Colts are going to loose. Check out this completed listing

4. Twitter. With small businesses opening up everyday, owners are looking for cheap and fast advertisement. You typically would not think of eBay when you want to hire some one to advertise your business, but some clever eBay sellers are taking advantage of modern technology. They are offering to advertise on their Twitter account. These people have over 100,000 followers on Twitter, and can reach some serious customers. Don’t worry if you do not have 100,000 Twitter followers. Anyone can do this. These people are using a service like TweetAdder found HERE. This service allows you to automatically add random Twitter members, and if they don’t follow you back it deletes them from your list. You can get 100,000 followers pretty fast with a service like this. Here is a completed listing

These are just a few of the thousands of different services you can offer. No product needed, just you. Everyone has something special or unique that can be offered. I hope this gets your creativity flowing!

For more eBay tips and tricks, check out The Keys to a Successfull eBay Business at: http://www.theebayentrepreneur.com/e-books/

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eBay Money Makers

by Tristen OBrien on November 30, 2011

Ahh, the time has come… I have been really excited to share this with you, and now I officially can! eBay is launching a new program called Money Makers this Thursday. It’s a series of short Web Documentaries that will feature parents who use eBay to make money. Well, as it turns out, my family is the first to be featured! So you may think, okay they send a camera to your house, and ask you a few questions then leave, right? No, the process of them filming at my house was the coolest thing I have ever been through. So today I am going to give you a sneak peak of the eBay Money Makers project, AND a behind the scenes view!

First lets check out one of the eBay Money Makers videos:

Just to give you a little background, in September I shared my story with one of the team members that was putting this project together. Over a period of a month, we emailed back and forth and I explained my eBay life in more detail. Long story short, I received a notification that they want my family to be a part of the eBay Money Makers project! I had a few pre-production calls to figure out all of the logistics, and in two weeks they were at our house. When I say “They were at our house,” what I mean is a team that included 3 film crew members, 2 creative directors, 1 public relations director, and 1 person to interview.

Day 1: The first day of them being at my house was a lot of fun! We went through each room and talked about lighting, camera angles, and other things that were over my head. One of the creative directors was a fashion expert, so we showed her what we were planning on wearing, and she gave tips and tricks on what would look best. They were only at our house for an hour or so before they left, but the expectation was set that we would start the next day of filming at 7:30 A.M.

Day 2: 7:30 A.M. came around, and right on time the crew showed up. Jack was still sleeping, and the crew was very respectful of that. They also brought tons of food, which makes me happy! As they are telling me that its going to take a hour to set up, I see huge lights and T.V. monitors being brought in. This was the real deal! I’m a big tech and gadget kind of guy, so of course I was amazed with the amount of awesome technology in my house. They had to put film on our windows to keep the natural light out, and as you can see in the picture, they had lights everywhere. So, they wired me up, and we started with the interview. I’m going to be honest here, at first I was really nervous. One of the creative directors is also a Mary Kay consultant, so she kept putting powder on my face all day. Also, the person who was doing the interview was a true professional, and I ended up feeling as if I was just having a conversation with her.

After my interview was done it was Amy’s turn. She did a great job, matter of fact, everyone said she did better than I did (she always has to one up me). That brought us to lunch time, and of course they hooked us up with some great food. The rest of the day was spent filming me “doing what I do” on eBay like Taking Pictures, Listing, and packing.

Day 3: This was the last day of filming, and they called it B-Roll day. It meant that they really were going to just film us eating breakfast, playing with Jack, and follow me to a Goodwill store. Overall, this was one of the best experiences we have ever had. Everyone on the crew was AMAZING, and made us feel as if we were naturals. From what I understand, this is where the hard part began. They had to take all of the footage, and edit it down to five minutes. Well, I have to say that it turned out great! Here two other videos that are going to be apart of the eBay Money Makers series:

For more eBay tips and tricks, Check out The Keys to a Successful eBay Business HERE

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Put the Internet to Work for YOU!

by Tristen OBrien on November 29, 2011

Recently I stumbled upon a service that has changed my life. I see app’s everyday that peak my interest, but this is something different. This app is called IFTTT, thats right IFTTT. It stands for If This Then That. They brand it as putting the internet to work for you. You may or may not know this about me, but I have been on a quest over the past year to automate my life. I think that we should enjoy life, so everything that can be automated – should be! This is just one small, but powerful, step in that direction.

Okay, so what does IFTTT do, and how can we apply this to our eBay business? Well its simple really. IFTTT will complete a task for you based on a trigger. For example

If it is going to rain, then send me a text

If someone tags me in a photo on Facebook, automatically download it

Those are just a couple of the thousands that you can do, but really this is the tip of the iceberg. Do you have trouble waking up in the morning? Then it will send you a wake up call. Do you ever need to get away from a “long talker?” Have no fear, press one button on your phone and IFTTT will call you with an urgent message. Don’t want to forget some ones birthday? Then IFTTT will send you a text to remind you, or they will even post on the persons Facebook, and wish them a Happy Birthday. It will look like it came directly from you.

So what about eBay? This FREE service is still new, and it does not directly integrate with eBay. With that said, I still use three features that really have helped me with my eBay business. Here they are:

If a specific item I am looking for gets posted to Craigslist in my area, then send me a text. I can’t even tell you how many of these I have set up. I have a trigger set up for every hot item I can think of. This way there is no need for me to look on Craigslist for eBay inventory. It just does it for me!

If I check in at a location, then send it to my Google Calendar. This is really handy because I need to track my mileage for tax purposes. This is a really easy way to automatically track where you have been and at what time. It also helps me determine if I am wasting gas with the route I had taken.

If I star an eMail, then automatically back it up in Evernote. This is a great tool because I only star the important eBay emails. This is just another way to back them up for security purposes.

Your creativity can be endless with this FREE service. Each combination is called a recipe, and I probably have close to 100 of them at work for me. HERE is a link to the IFTTT website. Once you sign up, you are good to go. Check out the Recipe page for ideas on how YOU can use this service HERE.

For more eBay tips and tricks, check out The Keys to a Successful eBay Business HERE

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