I am addicted to flipping eBay listings. "Flipping," also known as eBay arbitrage, is when you buy a very nice item for a low price that is badly presented by another seller and does not get any other bids because words in the titles are misspelled, the photos are sloppy, or the seller just didn't do a good job on the listing. This is kind of like gambling.
A few weeks ago I purchased these Eileen Fisher pants on eBay:
Fatal errors on this listing:
1. Brand name of the pants is misspelled.
2. They weren't green as the title states, they were khaki / olive shade. Not many women are going to buy green pants.
3. Item size not spelled out in title. Someone searching for MEDIUM EILEEN FISHER PANTS won't find this listing.
3. Return policy - 3 day exchange. When selling clothing, you should have a 30 day return policy. Always offer money back so the buyer doesn't feel trapped. A generous return policy helps you sell more items.
4. Shipping is too high. These pants can fit into a flat rate envelope for $4.95.
I bought these pants, took my own photo, and my listing looked like this:
My improvements:
1. I provided more photos.
2. I spelled the brand name correctly.
3. I included the words MEDIUM and OLIVE in the title.
4. I added the word NEW as the first word as this optimizes placement in search results.
5. Shipping is $4.95 flat rate envelope.
6. 30 day return policy.
My profit on this item was $13. That doesn't seem like much, but I only spend a total of about 30 minutes finding this item, taking my photo, listing the item, and shipping it. If you use this strategy several times a week, you can easily make a few hundred extra dollars a month flipping listings.
Learn how to flip eBay listings here and start making money from other people's mistakes.
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