Monday, February 26, 2007

The Importance of Good Feedback

When buying and selling on a community like Ebay Good Feedback is crucial! If the first thing you do on Ebay is start selling, you will make far less money until you get your feedback rating up. This is because Ebay is synonymous with scams. There is no way to prove that the Apple Ipod you are selling is real, or you just used stock photos, other than to see how satisfied other people have been with your transactions. Good feedback creates trust in the community, and the higher your feedback, the better your auctions will sell.

The place where the lack of feedback is not such a big problem is when you are selling low cost items, or when you are bidding on other peoples auctions. Few sellers will turn away bids on their auctions because they want a bidding war, and you can't have a bidding war with only one bidder.

So, the best way to get good feedback is to start buying on Ebay. Buying on Ebay will also help you familiarize yourself with how auctions work, and how other sellers act. If you do buy to build up your feedback, try to buy from Power Sellers, or people with a lot of feedback ratings. Then you can not only get good feedback, but you can also learn to see what they do as far as customer service goes.

When buying, make sure to be very prompt with your payment, as this is the goal and the only real thing sellers care about (besides customer complaints). And the faster you are, the better your feedback should be.

Also, do not hesitate to ask for feedback in your emails. As a seller I do not give good feedback until I receive it, so if you are pleased with your item, give the seller feedback, and then ask for some in return.

Another way to get good feedback, and make a little money at the same time is to sell low cost items. Items where there is little chance or reason you would try to scam someone. Though you will not sell as many items at first, and your final bids might not bring you as much money as you would like, this is still a good way to start getting feedback.

I would not consider selling anything that was worth more than $24.99 until I had a good 10 or 15 positive feedbacks. And make sure they are good ones, not mediocre saying things like "item arrived, and is nice," but something like "A++ Ebay Superhero, Best Seller Ever! I want to buy more!" That might be too many characters, but you get the idea.

After you get about 100 positive feedback people tend to stop reading them before they bid, and you will notice an increase in percentage of sales as well as an increase in the final bid.

Remember that when you are selling, not just while you are starting out but through the duration of your Ebay career, you should strive to be as accommodating as possible. The customer is always right, and if you want your feedback to stay positive you should try to do as much as you can for them. Quickly respond to questions, ship with care, refund when necessary.

If you buy something from me, I will give you great feedback! Check out the top right of the sidebar, for what I am selling now!

No comments: