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Selling stuff on eBay


Bash Riprock

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  • 2 weeks later...

A'ight, been doing something retro that is bringing in sales.

Because I am weird, I kept paper copies of all my eBay sales dating back ten years, in little notebooks like the guy in Seven.

Went to the post office and got handfuls of blank postcards, 40 cents each. (Go when there's an older clerk there. The younger ones have no idea what these are.) Starting with my most recent ebay customers, I've been making personalized post cards telling them how to find me on Etsy. I put a quick little cartoon on each one that resembles whatever they bought from me.

I do a half-dozen a day. I am back to customers from 2017 now.

People have loved them, they find my shop, thank me for the card, and they buy things. Like, a few hundred $ extra this month.

Combined with that, I hit them with an Etsy coupon for x% off that has an expiration date a month or so out. Those are getting used.

It's a little work, but if I can get even 1/10th of my old customers to start up again on Etsy, I will be very busy.

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43 minutes ago, mulletpelini said:

That's fucking brilliant.  All I have to do is ask Ebay for all the receipts for the past 10 years

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Good news, I keep all mine too.

 

Yeah, I became a fan of paper records back when I was teaching. There'd always be a nifty new paperless system, and the teachers who trusted it would get to sit around working extra at the end of term when it crashed.

But hey, it was paperless.

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28 minutes ago, mulletpelini said:

but my app makes it simpler!

lazy mofos

Hey, if eBay kept my sales records longer than 3 months, I might not have bothered making a copy.* Etsy has my info from 8 years back.

So far. One decision at Etsy's HQ, and all that info could be switched off, for my convenience.

*obvious lie

Basically, my buyer list has value to me, so I won't leave it in the hands of a third party. These are the leads, the Glengary leads, and to me they are gold. And eBay doesn't get to keep them. Why? Because leaving them on eBay is just throwing them away.

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19 minutes ago, mulletpelini said:

I'm actually working on a new product, I might give Etsy a go to try it out.  Are they paypal setup I'm assuming?  I really would like to continue using PP, I've had it for over 20 years and really have never had an issue with it.

I don't know, maybe you can do Paypal on Etsy. I have Etsy set up to deposit directly into my bank account, which ironically is what I left eBay for wanting to do.

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13 hours ago, mulletpelini said:

If that's the only option, I don't have an issue with it.  It's when you're telling me I can't use what I've used for 20 years because you're a rip off mismananged company trying to steal more of my money in the process, that I have an issue with it.

Preachin to the choir, bro.

To eBay. we are little people having garage sales of our old clothes and GI Joe dolls, and they are like the owners of giant container ships chugging across the Pacific. Their stock price doubled since the pandemic (we shoulda bought some.) Etsy's stock went up 7 times (really shoulda bought some.)

I foolishly thought both companies had maxed out back in April 2020 when I did that cool thing and put some savings in the market. I did get some Mercado Libre stock, the Latin-American eBay, and that went up too, so I don't feel all left out when the Bitcoin Boyz talk about their electron money.

A few years back I made a Mexican Mercado Libre account and bought a few pesos of digital art just to get in the system. When I went back recently to try to sell some of my own, ML wouldn't even let me sign in without proof of a Mexican ID. Guess the fight against scammers is eternal.

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15 hours ago, mulletpelini said:

Ha, that's good stuff.  Not a ton of margin there by the time you ship though.  I guess if you sold 10million that'd still be like a thousand dollars or something.

I figure if it's $5 retail in Mexico, it's $3 if you bargain. They're probably paying Tia Maria a dollar a pop to sew them, but you'd have to know half the village before you could find her, and then good luck gringo if you try to wander in and cut out the middle man.

It's all just an excuse to fantasize about riding around Mexico again in a brightly colored bus. :)

I could probably make them myself if the urge gets overpowering. Seriously, I looked into buying bales of Baja hoodies but the killer was how bulky they are, you're looking at Priority Mail to ship. These little yappy dog jackets though, maybe they'd come in under a pound.

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On 3/24/2021 at 4:47 PM, RDCanecutter said:

A'ight, been doing something retro that is bringing in sales.

Because I am weird, I kept paper copies of all my eBay sales dating back ten years, in little notebooks like the guy in Seven.

Went to the post office and got handfuls of blank postcards, 40 cents each. (Go when there's an older clerk there. The younger ones have no idea what these are.) Starting with my most recent ebay customers, I've been making personalized post cards telling them how to find me on Etsy. I put a quick little cartoon on each one that resembles whatever they bought from me.

I do a half-dozen a day. I am back to customers from 2017 now.

People have loved them, they find my shop, thank me for the card, and they buy things. Like, a few hundred $ extra this month.

Combined with that, I hit them with an Etsy coupon for x% off that has an expiration date a month or so out. Those are getting used.

It's a little work, but if I can get even 1/10th of my old customers to start up again on Etsy, I will be very busy.

I don't post much, but read a lot and have always been especially fond of you RD, so it stands to reason that I bought something once upon a time to support you. I got one of these personalized postcards with a cartoon in the mail after purchasing something once many years ago and it really was something special and neat that felt personalized...and felt good. I made a mental note and ended up buying something off etsy just because. 

Thought you'd appreciate some semi-anonymous feedback which is nothing more than a validation of the old adage about buying things being an emotional journey and people won't remember what you say or do, but how you make them feel.

I should add, stumbling upon this post of yours and reading that it was cold-blooded, calculated Marketing is funny. Most of your customers are probably still under the illusion by not having heard you break the 4th wall like I did, but I still think it's great and respect the hustle, sir.

Edited by RubyManJack
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27 minutes ago, RubyManJack said:

I don't post much, but read a lot and have always been especially fond of you RD, so it stands to reason that I bought something once upon a time to support you. I got one of these personalized postcards with a cartoon in the mail after purchasing something once many years ago and it really was something special and neat that felt personalized...and felt good. I made a mental note and ended up buying something off etsy just because. 

Thought you'd appreciate some semi-anonymous feedback which is nothing more than a validation of the old adage about buying things being an emotional journey and people won't remember what you say or do, but how you make them feel.

I should add, stumbling upon this post of yours and reading that it was cold-blooded, calculated Marketing is funny. Most of your customers are probably still under the illusion by not having heard you break the 4th wall like I did, but I still think it's great and respect the hustle, sir.

Hey, I appreciate it! Glad you enjoyed the card. It's a cold-blooded hustle but I do enjoy getting to "meet" people so I don't really have to fake that part. :)

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Randomly found this topic, reminds me of my first eBay sale. I liked to shop Thrift Shops back before that was uberpopular. I stopped at a shop on Daingerfield Texas in the ‘90s and found David Hasselhoff Knight Rider Musk air fresheners from 1980 and a Mr T A-Team freshener. 3 for a $1. I bought all of them and gave the DH ones out to friends. Fast forward to 5 years later. I listed my first item on eBay, the DH Knight Rider air freshener. It sold for like $9. I had the funniest (in my mind) description. It was pretty exciting as a first sale! I looked for a picture of it online but couldn’t find it.

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i looked at them, and their ebay store is 404.
i'm looking for an independent work-out-of-their-garage no-overhead person.
an expert seller and i'll split 50/50 they pay the fees would be ideal.
I've sold lots of shit on Ebay. What kind of shit are you talking about selling?
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I sold OU tix on Ebay about 15 years ago. Some guy in Midland bought them for $500. A week after the game he tried to say the package never arrived... I even had friends sitting in the seats next to him. Thank goodness Ebay believed the USPS when they said the package was delivered.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 3/24/2021 at 4:47 PM, RDCanecutter said:

A'ight, been doing something retro that is bringing in sales.

Because I am weird, I kept paper copies of all my eBay sales dating back ten years, in little notebooks like the guy in Seven.

Went to the post office and got handfuls of blank postcards, 40 cents each. (Go when there's an older clerk there. The younger ones have no idea what these are.) Starting with my most recent ebay customers, I've been making personalized post cards telling them how to find me on Etsy. I put a quick little cartoon on each one that resembles whatever they bought from me.

I do a half-dozen a day. I am back to customers from 2017 now.

People have loved them, they find my shop, thank me for the card, and they buy things. Like, a few hundred $ extra this month.

Combined with that, I hit them with an Etsy coupon for x% off that has an expiration date a month or so out. Those are getting used.

It's a little work, but if I can get even 1/10th of my old customers to start up again on Etsy, I will be very busy.

@RDCanecutter thats awesome. can you PM me your etsy store?

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On 4/1/2021 at 9:30 PM, RDCanecutter said:

Started my first Etsy Ad campaign a minute ago. I've got more than 700 listings up, so I need some serious extra eyeballs. I figure I'll grease Etsy's palm for an extra 2 bucks a day for 30 days and see what shakes loose.

Results so far is I guess I've spent about $30 on Etsy ads, and they tied it to about 150 bucks worth of sales. Problem is, the people who bought "after clicking on an ad" are all previous customers that I sent postcards to, in fact one of them had bought stuff from me on Etsy right before the ad came out. My Spidey Senses are telling me Etsy is shoveling some cow patties my way.

There have been some complete strangers buying stuff too, but Etsy doesn't say those people clicked on an ad.

I plan to give it about $30 more of juice just to see if it pulls in an actual new customer. If not, I'll just keep that money.

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ebay peeps, sorry to crash the thread, but we got hit when someone hijacked a dormant ebay registered to my wife, sold a bunch crap and now ebay is trying to come after us for money they paid out in refunds.  We started getting all these return shipments from random people.  It was all flea collars for pets.  probably received 20 packages and it had info that it was an account for my wife.  we could not log in the account or get a password sent (old email we no longer had access to).  So called ebay and tried to report the fraud and that we were not in control of the account.  They were spectacularly unwilling to do anything.  would not shut down the account, would not tell us who was running the account the now or stop the auctions.  zero fucks given by them.

fast forward a couple months, the returns stop coming and we think we are done with it.  but now ebay sent some collection letter because we had not refunded money to the people send back flea collars.  

tenor.gif 

Does ebay have no way to clawback money from the seller account receiving the money?  I guess these guys just move on the next fraud account, set up to receive money and then shut it down when the returns start coming in.

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6 hours ago, gyroprotagonist said:

Does ebay have no way to clawback money from the seller account receiving the money?  I guess these guys just move on the next fraud account, set up to receive money and then shut it down when the returns start coming in.

I don't know if you can get relief through eBay, but maybe there is an angle you could use with the US Post Office since the scam sellers are probably using them to send their goods. I don't know if it's worth it to you since the scammers could be running out of a different country.

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oh they're first class pieces of shit, don't sell them short.

https://www.wired.com/story/ebay-employees-charged-cyberstalking-harassment-campaign/

So I'm still selling things, just can't relist, update, etc.

I got an offer on an item and took it, but a week has gone by and haven't received a single word.  Normally I'd just open a case, wait a couple days, no payment, relist item and move on.

Except I can't relist it.  So now I've resorted to sending them a new invoice everyday.  If they pay it, this is gonna get interesting.

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Damn, boys, it's been a day. Bartender, gimme a double.

So first I got accused of Intellectual Property Infringement. This is because a cartoon I painted included a poor rendering of Adolf Hitler's favorite People's Car. The actual company didn't complain, it was a freelancer for a trademark protection company, based in the UK. Now, I know that Europe and the UK Hate Our Freedoms, but I think they overreacted. I wasn't printing the VW logo on coffee cups, it's a damn painting, and not a very accurate one at that. Etsy took no stand other than to pull the listing (for now?,) and refund my 20 cents.

Once I got over the shock of an Englishman defending the rights of the descendants of former Nazis and current emissions cheaters not to have their only cool auto that they no longer build portrayed inaccurately in a painting, I did what Etsy said to do, and I wrote the English dude to see how I could list the painting and not bother VW. Haven't heard back yet. Then I reread my email, and saw that I misspelled his name.

Oh.

Well.

Local art show coming up this weekend, somebody gonna get a painting priced to sell.

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Next thing was, I had a bunch of new stuff to list, and when I went to list it, Etsy threw a rod and wouldn't load any of the pictures.

I did 18 things that they recommended, changed the photos, cleared cookies, unplugged the router and plugged it back in, cussed, consulted help forums, unplugged the fire stick in the TV and yelled at it (because even if I don't know what it did, IT knows...) and none of it worked.

So I decided to just go walk a couple of miles, come home, and drink a beer.

I should have done that first. Buried in the help forums was the revelation that Etsy gives you all these things to do to amuse yourself, when the problem is in their own servers.

By the time I finished my walk and my beer, they had fixed their own servers. Everything cranked right up.

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Still awaiting resolution of my alleged-trademark-violation People's Car painting. It's a moot point because I no longer own it and won't be relisting it anywhere, but I didn't delete it from the Inactive list because they said their legal team was reviewing it and would email me if there was really a violation. I want to see how that plays out so I'll have something to go on with new art.

I searched and found 1,002 other paintings of VWs on Etsy, but I don't want to be that whiny dude who gets other people's art pulled. Some of this art is close-ups of the freakin VW logo.

Other than that, no problems to report, I don't appear to be in jail, I list stuff, I sell stuff, I just leave that one item inactive.

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Maybe some of you can answer this. I was on ETSY looking to see if anyone sold mini football helmets. There was a company called Tyler Sports.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/257584649/create-your-own-mini-helmet?ref=hp_rv-2&frs=1

How is this guy able to sell college football helmets?

image.png.1c563178c725dbd31cda78835a98f914.png



Isn't there a copyright issue? Nevertheless I did buy a custom Texas Tech helmet and its awesome. I just wasn't sure how he was able to make a helmet. 

If this is legal without any potential law suit I might start doing this myself.

 

 

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2 hours ago, Bash Riprock said:

Isn't there a copyright issue? Nevertheless I did buy a custom Texas Tech helmet and its awesome. I just wasn't sure how he was able to make a helmet. 

As the latest guy who got slammed on the hood of a cop car for alleged trademark issues, I can confirm that it is perfectly alright to reproduce college logos...

IF you pay the kickback to the school.

Friend of mine paints tons of college sports prints and paintings. He says that even places like Alabama, who keep packs of mad dogs to unleash on violators, they have pretty easy licensing terms. My friend also tries to stay up to date on less rabid schools, but admits that sometimes he lets it slide if he hasn't got much of their stuff in stock.

So that's what I was told.

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On 4/26/2021 at 10:45 AM, gyroprotagonist said:

ebay peeps, sorry to crash the thread, but we got hit when someone hijacked a dormant ebay registered to my wife, sold a bunch crap and now ebay is trying to come after us for money they paid out in refunds.  We started getting all these return shipments from random people.  It was all flea collars for pets.  probably received 20 packages and it had info that it was an account for my wife.  we could not log in the account or get a password sent (old email we no longer had access to).  So called ebay and tried to report the fraud and that we were not in control of the account.  They were spectacularly unwilling to do anything.  would not shut down the account, would not tell us who was running the account the now or stop the auctions.  zero fucks given by them.

fast forward a couple months, the returns stop coming and we think we are done with it.  but now ebay sent some collection letter because we had not refunded money to the people send back flea collars.  

tenor.gif 

Does ebay have no way to clawback money from the seller account receiving the money?  I guess these guys just move on the next fraud account, set up to receive money and then shut it down when the returns start coming in.

So we moved into a new house on April 15th... today I get a couple of packages that were forwarded to my new address by the post office. They were ebay returns. One was a package of 20 Gillette razors (solid fucking gold yo), and the other was a Samsung C power cord. Both had return slips - one was for faulty product (cord), the other was just "oops i bought the wrong size" ... so I tracked down the account selling these and it looks like it's selling legit items based on the reviews. Just had a couple returns for normal return reasons. But for some reason, this person is using my last address and my name as the return address. 

So I've reported the account etc... anything else I should be worried about? I changed my paypal password just in case (no weird activity on it).. nothing weird on credit cards. My guess is this person just didn't wanna deal with return/refunds and found a random address to use for returns. 

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  • 1 month later...
13 hours ago, mulletpelini said:

Got warned a month and a half ago that past certain June xx date that all my items would no longer be visible (for not signing into their new bullshit banking terms).  Still selling, they must still be visible.  FU Ebay.

They'll get you eventually.

But one way to slip past the rule is to list things as "Good Til Cancelled." My last "listing" (actually a cartoon ad telling people how to find all my stuff that used to be on eBay) is still chugging along. Don't know if eBay would let me renew it if somebody actually buys it.

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eBay: I occasionally stumble into random stuff I know I could turn into $ if I bent the knee to eBay and started selling there again. What stops me is that the time I spent doing it would take away from my alleged career.

Etsy: I canned the Etsy Ads. I couldn't see that they were doing any good. Besides, their reports were misleading-- they'd tell me that I made a certain sale because of ads, when I made that sale because I talked to somebody on FB or whatever and directed them to my Etsy store. Now, maybe the dude got shown an ad on his way in to buy, but he was there because we'd already talked. Already living large with the saved two dollars a day.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 7/7/2021 at 12:06 PM, RDCanecutter said:

They'll get you eventually.

But one way to slip past the rule is to list things as "Good Til Cancelled." My last "listing" (actually a cartoon ad telling people how to find all my stuff that used to be on eBay) is still chugging along. Don't know if eBay would let me renew it if somebody actually buys it.

Definitely, switched to that term years ago when it first came out.  Still selling.  Just got a note that if I switch by Aug.1 they'll give me $15!!!!  Oooo can I have a booster shot too!?!?!?  Or I can wait til Aug. 15 and they'll shut me off.....again.....supposedly.

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13 hours ago, mulletpelini said:

Definitely, switched to that term years ago when it first came out.  Still selling.  Just got a note that if I switch by Aug.1 they'll give me $15!!!!  Oooo can I have a booster shot too!?!?!?  Or I can wait til Aug. 15 and they'll shut me off.....again.....supposedly.

Gone are the eBay days when Mabel was selling her grandad's pocket knife (no photo but a good verbal description) as soon as the paper check cleared. It's all aimed at big impersonal sellers at low margins, so long as the Bay skims its 10%.

(OK if you're big you're probably paying 9%.)

I guess Craig's List might still work kind of like Old eBay, but my experience with CL is that it's full of drooling crazies who want to sell dirt at diamond prices, and vice-versa when they buy. It's a good reason to take car trips to neighborhoods you may otherwise never have visited, except this time with a wad of cash in your pocket.

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Well boys, you better start callin me MR. Canecutter because Etsy told me I am a Star Seller now. Or I will be in September when they actually start the program. Unless I mess up. Basically you can be a Star Seller if you answer people's questions and send them stuff as soon as they buy it, y'know, act like you're actually interested in selling.

So far I see no extra obligations, and they say they'll bump me in search algorithms, yada yada. Seems similar to some of those incentives eBay has had for years.

Can't wait to go through the McDonald's drive through and see how much less a cup of coffee costs now.

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