The Power of eBay

This story is about eBay, not my car. If you don’t care about my car, skip ahead to the middle of the story. You may recall my column from two weeks ago I was shopping for a new wheel/tire package for my car – well they arrived (all the way from Texas), they’re mounted, and they look fabulous! The trouble with modifying your car is that the first mod is seldom the last – once you get started there’s no going back.

And so it is with me; I have now become addicted to eBay Motors in my quest for more upgrades for my car. This is a fabulous place to hunt for hard-to-find parts, and the savings are definitely worth the effort. For example, I wanted a new high performance muffler. I researched the muffler and found the one I wanted – but its retail cost was $275 US – a bit rich for me. I found the same (new) muffler listed on eBay, and the bidding had reached $90 US. I started bidding and eventually won it for $128 US – less than half price of normal retail.

I have shopped on eBay before, and I’ve sold one or two items as well, but I never really got right in to take a proper look around. After finding the muffler I wanted, I started poking around a little deeper. On a recent visit to Vancouver I picked up a magazine called “Entrepreneur’s eBay Startup Guide – Start a Business on eBay TODAY!” Inside I found out many interesting facts about eBay that I didn’t know before. For one thing, eBay Motors, added to eBay in 2000, has become the biggest online automotive marketplace in the world; eBay Motors sells a car or truck each minute, and achieves over $6 Billion in annual sales. eBay is considered one of the safest places to buy an automobile, because of a thing called Feedback Rating. More on this in a moment…

There are many entrepreneurs doing many interesting things with eBay; it has spawned quite a number of success stories - even millionaires. One popular eBay business is the Drop Off Centre, or eBay Consignment Store. Basically this is a place where a person can take the item she wants sold, and the item is then listed on eBay on her behalf. When the item sells, the store takes a commission and turns over the remaining money to the seller.

A variation on this is the eSpecialist. This is an eBay business whereby the eBay businessperson comes by your house or business and takes pictures and descriptions of the item you have for sale and then posts it on eBay on your behalf. Basically the same as a Drop Off Centre, except that no warehousing is required. The eBay professional roams to your location, lists your item, then takes a commission once it sells. There are people out there doing this and grossing $1M + p/year. What a great business – no inventory to purchase or stock!

The great equalizer on eBay is the Feedback Rating system. When considering purchasing an item, the buyer can check the seller’s Feedback Rating. Most businesses on eBay have a 95% or better positive feedback rating, or they don’t survive. Feedback shows the published satisfaction comments from previous buyers. Without this, the eBay business is dead. And a good Feedback Rating provides a great comfort level for potential buyers. If you haven’t been on eBay lately, go and take another look.