What Do I Sell on eBay?

By Sean Eyring, HammerTap Consultant

In this issue of the HammerTap Newsletter you'll find:

  • Information on what to sell on eBay
  • 12 Top eBay Gurus who want to help you!

Probably like me, most of us started off selling anything we could get our hands on. After we became more comfortable selling and learning the tricks of the "online" trade, we want to increase our inventory and sell more products. But how can we know what products are likely to sell? We don't want to invest in a product that is over-saturated and unlikely to sell.

One way to find out what sells is to spend countless hours on eBay (like we don't spend enough time on there already) monitoring products and determining their success rate. (Before I had HammerTap, this is exactly what I did. Unfortunately, the item I chose to sell still didn't sell.)

With HammerTap, there is an easier and faster way. For example, let's say that you want to build your inventory and start selling boys' clothing, but you don't know which brand is likely to sell or how much money, if any, you can make.

To find out, I'm going to open HammerTap and perform a Category Search. First, I am going to search in category number 3038, which is "boys' clothing size 8 and up." (Note: When performing category searchs, it's best to search through more auctions for more accurate results. For this search I used 5,000 auctions.) With HammerTap, performing a Category Search brings you back 90 days of data. That should tell us what has been the hot brand for the last three months.

Utilizing Keywords to Find What Sells

To find out which brand sells, I went to the Keywords window and sorted the keywords by the number of auctions. (This is done by clicking on the top of the column titled # of Auctions.) I found that Old Navy had the most auctions (out of 5,000) with 416, followed by Abercrombie with 327, Ralph Lauren with 271 and Gap with 268. But, you don't want to stop there; you want to see which one has the highest success rate and highest selling price.

To do this, I put the data columns in the order I wanted to. I put the # of Auctions column next to the Listing Success Rate (LSR) and Average Selling Price (ASP)/Item columns.

This is how I do that:

  1. Sort the auctions by clicking on the # of Auctions column. This will sort the auctions in descending order.
  2. Click and hold the Listing Success Rate column (the 5th column in the Keywords window). Hold that column and drag it to your left and drop it next to the # of Auctions column. Green arrows will appear to guide you where to drop it.
  3. Click on the ASP/Item (which stand for Average Selling Price per Item) column (the 7th column in the Keywords window) and drag and drop it next to the Listing Success Rate column.

I love how HammerTap allows you to arrange your search results the way you want to!) The picture below illustrates how I have arranged my results.

Once you have arranged your results, you want to look for the highest LSR (Listing Success Rate) and highest ASP (Average Selling Price). Here is the breakdown for these four brands.

  LSR ASP
Old Navy 35% $6.90
Abercrombie 64% $11.47
Ralph Lauren 60% $12.65
Gap 48% $6.87

It looks like Old Navy is saturating the market, while Abercrombie has the highest success rate and Ralph Lauren has the highest average selling price. Now you can take this information and compare these figures to your cost of obtaining your inventory. (It's a good thing I did this research. I was thinking about selling Gap clothes.)

What Else Could You Do With This Information?

Now that you have come this far, do the same thing and find out what specifically sells. Is it pants, shirts or shorts? I would look for the Keywords PANTS, SHIRTS and SHORTS. Find out which item has the highest LSR and ASP and you are set. In this case, shorts had both the highest Listing Success Rate and Average Selling Price. Size also plays a factor, with XL selling for $56 each. The possibilities are endless! You can pinpoint exactly what sells and for how much.

Even though summer has just started, school will be starting up just around the corner. As the start of the school year approaches, if I was going to start selling boys' clothing, I would perform the same research, but instead of looking at current auctions, I would look at Last Year's Auctions. (You do this by selecting the Last Year's Auctions checkbox in the Category Search window. This would look at auctions from today's date last year to 90 days ahead.)

Looking at Last Year's Auctions will tell me what to sell as school approaches and when to start selling. My results will also tell me what Ending Day is best, what Keywords to use and what my Starting Price should be to increase profits. It will also tell me when the back-to-school rush will die down.

Now go on and try this for yourselves. Search in a category you want to get a foot into and make sure you are investing in a product that not only sells, but that makes you some money too!

12 Top eBay Gurus Want to Help You!

Exciting news!! The 4th 100 Best book from Lynn Dralle, the Queen of Auctions, is hot off the presses! Lynn hits one out of the park with the fourth book in her "100 Best Things I've Sold on eBay" series. Drawing from tens of thousands of eBay sales, a decade of eBay experience, and the wisdom of a beloved grandmother, Lynn puts together a roster of stories that will teach, inspire, and entertain her readers!

Sound good? Well, it gets even better...

For the next 48 hours ONLY, purchase Lynn's new book "Home Run" and you will also receive more than $534 in downloadable resources from ten of the most successful, well-respected entrepreneurs in the eBay community. All free of charge - no gimmicks, no catches and no hidden fees.

Click here to purchase right now:
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When you purchase Lynn's book in the next 48 hours you will receive free access to some of the best learning tools and resources the eBay community has to offer. So, in addition to Lynn, you will have access to secrets used by industry experts including Lisa Suttora, Skip McGrath, Janelle Elms, Auctiva, and HammerTap. This is a combined value of more than $534.00!!

Click here to learn more about the bonuses:

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Think about it, for less than the cost of a dinner out, you have the opportunity to learn from 12 of the most successful entrepreneurs in eBay history. These people are truly living the dream - making a lot of money doing what they love and doing so on their own terms.

Imagine the freedom you will have when you are your own boss. You get to decide when you will or will not work. You can take as much vacation time, or as many days off as you wish. And, the best part is, you can do all of this and be extremely well-paid.

Take the opportunity now to start living the dream. Lynn did it, and so can you. Success is simply a click away.

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P.S. Check out this quote form one of Lynns readers.

"I've learned so much from you! Everything you¹ve created--and I mean EVERYTHING--has been of tremendous help to me."
Susan Kilpatrick, Oklahoma City, OK

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P.P.S. If you have friends or family that would be interested in this great opportunity, please feel free to forward this email to them.

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