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www.ecommerce-guide.com/essentials/ebay/article.php/3732611
By Frank Fortunato March 7, 2008 Book Review: Starting an eBay Business for DUMMIES 3rd Edition Marsha Collier John Wiley Publishing, 2007 362 pages, index. The author Marsha Collier is a one-person eBay conglomerate. She began selling on the site in 1996 to help fund her daughter's education. Soon eBay selling grew into a full-time venture, she became one of their first Power Sellers and instructors at eBay University, the traveling tutorial, and the annual eBay Live! events. We are told that thousands subscribe to her monthly newsletter, "Cool eBay Tools," emphasizing changes on the site, and she hosted the PBS special "Making Your Fortune Online." In addition, she manages a large eBay store, "Marsha Collier's Fabulous Finds" and her own Web site. Then there are her books — eBay For Dummies, eBay Business All-in-one Desk Reference For Dummies, and Starting an eBay Business For Dummies —which combined, have over one million copies in print. Here we are reviewing her latest book offering, the 3rd updated edition of Starting An eBay Business for DUMMIES. In general, those who are new to the auction site will find this tome worth the price, as it provides lots of tips for getting started and managing a successful e-business. And, while veteran sellers will find a lot of the information to be fairly basic, it's still a worthwhile reference. With plenty of folksy, first-person anecdotes — both hers and from other sellers — tips and warnings (all indicated by icons in the text), the book breaks down into six parts in 19 chapters, designed to be read on a stand-alone basis wherein you can skip chapters, read the book backward or forward, or as the spirit or necessity moves you. Covering the Basics of eBay In Part I, the simple requirements for using this book are laid out: have an Internet connected computer, the desire to start a small business, to work when you feel like it, dress as you like and a solid familiarity with how eBay works. Immediately Collier seems to contradict herself by starting her 362-page tutorial from scratch. After notifying us in the intro that this book is for those who have participated in at least 100 eBay auctions, she goes on to give instructions on how to select an eBay User ID, a process that must be completed when joining the site. This seems contradictory, but she goes on to caution sellers away from negative sounding user IDs such as "ISellJunk," "trash for sale," "mystuffisgarbage," which, we suppose, is good if common-sense advice, at least for the densest of "dummies." The book is sprinkled with hundreds of tips, hints and warnings, which often seem to oscillate between simplistic and savvy. For instance, she tells of a friend who received no bids when she counter-intuitively listed a black lace bra in the adults only 'Mature Audiences' category; Collier had her move the sale to 'Apparel, Lingerie' where she received five bids. "I guess it wasn't sexy enough for the adult crowd," the seller inanely comments. On the other, savvy side, she relates how her daughter put up "Pirates of the Caribbean" posters for $9.99 each and could not get more than the starting bid for them — until she changed Caribbean to its more popular misspelled 'Caribean' and sold the posters for up to $30 each. She then bought 10 more on the misspelled page for $5 each which she sold for between $15-$27 each. For years buyers have trolled eBay for misspelled brand names, successfully landing bargains; this remains solid advice. The mix between elementary and savvy advice continues throughout the book. In Part II, which covers 'Finding Merchandise,' the advice is germane, if elementary, for anyone who is starting from the ground up. "Buy off season, sell on-season" Collier cues us, for instance Christmas decorations are available for a song in January, as are cashmere sweaters in June, summer sporting goods in November, and so on. Product Sources for Profits She then moves on to sources for cheap, viable eBay merchandise:
Nuts and Bolts of an eBay Biz
In Part IV and V Collier devotes nearly 70 pages to basic tax, license and incorporation info, but with the suggestion that the reader consult a professional regarding the thornier issues. She goes on to building an "eBay backoffice," and 10 eBay success story bios for inspirational purposes. Then, in a bit of heresy for someone so closely aligned with the site, she suggests off-eBay (and offline) venues for selling merchandise, that are pretty widely known, such as flea markets. One interesting tip, however, was her idea to resell to other eBayers, even to your competition if they do better with a particular item than you do. She says to use the words "liquidation," "wholesale" or "resale" in your title and place the lot — of at least a dozen —in one of eBay's wholesale categories. The remainder of the book is devoted to a glossary of terms and acronyms and a 16-page index, showing the length and breadth of this effort. Not surprisingly given her close association with the site, Collier's views are quite eBay friendly, perhaps to a fault. The tone is consistently upbeat and optimistic and there's little mention of the pitfalls that all sellers face in today's super-competitive eBay market. That said, Collier does cover virtually every other aspect of eBay selling here. The sheer volume of the material and diversity of the topics is impressive. The simplicity and redundancy of many of the ideas may turn off some people, however, the book is probably best suited to those who have bought on the site but are completely new to the concept of selling, whether on eBay or other venues. Frank Fortunato is a seasoned eBay seller and frequent contributor to ECommerce-Guide.com.
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