Small success story

[drewd96]

Hey guys I just wanted to share a quick success story and it might help others out!

I used to sell on eBay and make about $100 a week and have troubles with account suspension and vero and stuff like that. I've mAde probably 40 accounts and still have some. About 3 months ago I switched to amazon and my sales have actually increased a lot and with higher amounts of money. I also decided to make a website using shopify.com and advertise through Instagram. I currently make about $2500 a week in revenue with a net profit of about $1000 a week while being a Freshman at University of CT (USA). Just wanted to thank all of you for posting and commenting because it helps a lot!

[outofluck]

Awesome!
How are u running your eB accounts?
Do u still have many active?

Ps. What is your major in college?
Pps. What are u finding better about amazon compared to eB?
What's the difference? Or is it specifically because of the type of product you are selling?

[jeffweico]

Wow! Congrats! Glad we were able to help.

And I'm jealous!

My website does about $6k per month in gross sales, but that is after 5 YEARS+ of promotion.

SO I HATE YOU!!!

[Klemantina]

The problem with opening a website is traffic, so many people wasted their time and eventually lost more than earned. Would you share your traffic secrets? how much time and money you invested in your website? can we see it? do you have employees?

[jeffweico]

Aspkin has written a guide on website traffic called Six Figure Boss. It is a very good read and has great ways to boost traffic.

In my case, I enclose a flyer for my website - and a coupon - with every order I receive from Amazon and eBay. Technically this is not allowed, but it has not caused me any problems. Their position is that the orders are from THEIR customers. My position is that once they order from me, they are MY customer as well. But I DO take a risk by doing this. Maybe 5% respond. But I LOVE that 5%!!! No eBay fees! No risk of being shut down!!! But I am also VERY GOOD with customer service and offer a 30 day money back guarantee on EVERYTHING I sell.

I use Google Adwords for traffic. At first it was costing me a fortune and my conversions were few and far between, but Aspkin showed me how to reduce my costs and increase my conversions and it now works pretty well for me.

I have had a person do some minor SEO on my site, just to make sure everything was set up correctly. I am NOT trying to get on page one of Google, but I didn't want my site disqualified either. I just try to have good content. I write my own descriptions for everything rather than use the ones that come from the manufacturer. I always try to add some special insight where I can.

No, I won't "uncloak" myself, but if you want to see what my site looks like - in general - go to Volusion.com and take a look at some of their example websites. Volusion does a great job and has a lot of features that make your site stand out with quality. But they are also not cheap. I have another site that I use chrislands.com for which mainly sells books. The site is not as nice, but it IS effective and I can list 30,000 slower selling items for cheap. I could never do that on Volusion. Everything is a tradeoff.

Of course, I am guessing your question was more directed to the original poster.

[jjohnson777]

Key to website is offering incentive to join your mailing list with auto-responder. Or can just use email list comes with store software. Amazon best with there list they mail you about items related to stuff you bought.

I seen others do almost as well I have major book chain emailing coupons almost daily. I have video chain emailing daily deal.

I never buy books weekly with Amazon but have since joined book chain yearly membership that offers free shipping due to their often coupons.

Some even mail postcards with special codes nice as emails get ignored but postcards remind you of site.

Can even buy pens with name and URL include with first order. Than include business card with each order.

[bananaappeal]

A perfect little setup there OP.

Personally my eBay sales drives me traffic in which I include a flyer like fridge magnet. (everyone chucks fridge magnets on something)

Also adwords and fb ads.

[drewd96]

If any of you have questions you can PM me. I have no employees. I get costumers by paying large instagram pages to give me shoutouts. I have one ebay account active and i have 12 feedback and 100 item limit. I bought it from Prowaskater on this forum.

@outofluck i am a business major and i prefer amazon because my listings dont get taken down and for some reason they sell more often. In my opinion it is much more confusing but also people are willing to spend more for amazon. My items are the cheapest in their catagory and i have good feedback. I made the website through shopify and it was quick and simple. I spend a good amount of time answering questions and adding products and shipping. I do MANY discounts and promotional offers to get people involved. I won't share my website sorry, i don't need any competition (; but i do sell clothing.

[drewd96]

Also lets say i have about 20k followers on instagram. When i post a picture of my product, many of those people see and then i will pay someone else on instagram to advertise for me and i will get more and more views. I sometimes tell my followers to advertise for me to get $5 off for an order. I have about 10k followers and i advertise alot and i get about 1000 views on my website on a very good day. Sorry if that was confusing

[Dmshark25]

Originally Posted by drewd96

i am a business major and i prefer amazon because my listings dont get taken down and for some reason they sell more often. In my opinion it is much more confusing but also people are willing to spend more for amazon. My items are the cheapest in their catagory and i have good feedback. .

I agree, I shifted my time well more focus towards Amazon for the last 5+ months, and the traffic and Sales are incredible.

I have a popular item that many sellers have except I have the item in a color all to my self the last few months

I ship myself, and The estimated shipping times on Amazon are great unlike eBay where sometimes they factor nothing in like handling time or type of shopping sometimes and it comes to be 4 days

Now Amazon's estimates are always a week or more later than the package will arrive

Since the item I have just sells so fast I wait till the Tuesday of the second week to start selling and once I get the disbursement that Monday I ship the orders priority mail and they arrive that Wednesday and Thursday a week earlier than the estimates

So I risk nothing , I'm paid before I ship and I ship myself so no worries of FBA lost products

And with one account and basically 8 selling days a month I profit 5K+ every two weeks and 10K+ a month something that I never thought possible in just 8 days of selling

I actually had one week where I had 6K in sales in one day, and got a velocity review but that Monday I still received a disbursement of $5200 and 2 weeks later the other orders were released from pending

So now I control it and once I reach a certain amount I kill my inventory.

What's great with Amazon besides the sales Is I rarely have any problems almost 0 emails from any buyers, it's great buyers just look for what they want order it and that's it where eBay is totally different

And where I can sell the item for $100 on eBay it goes for $150 on Amazon and on eBay I could never sell as many of this product on one account

So I receive 2 nice steady pay checks a month and it seems like no work, I ship all orders out on the 2 Monday's I receive disbursements

Than the rest of my time I put the icing on the cake and work eBay

[trosky]

Very nice business plans guys, gives us starting guys hope and goals to reach as inspiration

[a311hanna]

I have tried to switch to amazon. I have read the Amazon Ghost also but every time I get kicked off either that day or the day after I make the acccount.
I have even gotten new computers and still I get kicked off. I wonder if I'm doing something g wrong maybe something obvious that I'm looking over? Idk?
Also should I be taking the info off my pics for amazon when I use my own pics like we do for ebay?
Thanks for any tips I always like reading on this forum. I have learned alot.

[solefoodbk]

Originally Posted by a311hanna

I have tried to switch to amazon. I have read the Amazon Ghost also but every time I get kicked off either that day or the day after I make the acccount.
I have even gotten new computers and still I get kicked off. I wonder if I'm doing something g wrong maybe something obvious that I'm looking over? Idk?
Also should I be taking the info off my pics for amazon when I use my own pics like we do for ebay?
Thanks for any tips I always like reading on this forum. I have learned alot.

Its hard to know what you are missing. I advise to live on this forum for a while and study it like your trying to pass a test.

With Amazon you literally have 0 room for error. Amazon is a different beast.

[a311hanna]

Thank you @ soulfood I will be doing that before I try to make another amazon for sure.

[rsot]

Congratz OP - all while being a freshman