Hi, this is Neil Waterhouse.
Today I want to talk about
how to build an eBay business while you have a full time job.
I received a letter from Michael Ray
Hi Neil, Thank you for sending all the information.
My wife and I work full time,
can we still build an eBay business after hours?
Well, the answer is definitely, yes.
Most people who started their businesses
do start on a part-time basis while they have a full time job.
Today, we are really lucky
and really blessed to be living
in a day and age where we can get
so many resources and tools that show you of
how you can build a business
while at work, had it automated basically.
It doesn't matter whether you're building
a drop ship business or an import business.
Doing used items is tougher
and there's people who've been doing
them for a while, don't know
I don't specialize in used items.
I prefer the new items
whether it's importing
or drop shipping
because you can buy them once
list them once
photograph them once
and just keep selling over and over and over again.
Now, and the beauty of this
if you're doing drop shipping, you can
obviously, you don't have to pack your items
you don't have to wrap your items
stack them, warehouse them et cetera.
For those who don't know what drop shipping is
it simply is, you're selling items on eBay
that you don't have in your possession.
In other words, a store has them
like an online store has them
you list them to eBay
they sale
you get paid first
and then you order them
and the supplier ships them for you.
So, that's all done for you.
Now you can try and staff with
an overseas staff member which can cost you
less than $2 an hour,
you can run the whole show
So when an order comes in
that overseas staff member
enters your order in,
and use a program like Google Docs,
which is what we use.
Google Docs is a Google product,
it's free.
Google Docs is a software,
it's like a suite of software like Microsoft Office.
You know, Microsoft Office.
Use like a spreadsheet
and in your browser
your Internet browser
you have the tab for the spreadsheet.
So, your overseas person enters that data in
when orders come in and you can see it live on yours as well.
So, you go in to your browser, whether it's,
you're using, Firefox, Chrome or whatever,
Safari and you can watch as they type, it fills it in.
So in your spreadsheet, you can have the name of the operator,
the date,
the eBay user ID who ordered the product,
how much they paid for it,
the supplier name,
how much it cost from the supplier,
shipping,
eBay fees,
Paypal fees,
et cetera,
and all the way to order number,
and then the tracking number.
Then another column that shows
has the check been entered in?
And that means while you're at work,
you can just simply go in Google Docs,
Yep, it's all being done,
all populated and you just keep on working.
Now, this cost less than, you know, $2 an hour.
And we're paying US$1.44 an hour for this work to be done,
so makes life really easy.
Now, if you're importing,
it's the same deal.
You can use, what we call, 3PL or third-party logistics companies.
A third-party logistics company,
you send your goods to them
So if you're an importer or you buy goods or like whatever,
you send your goods to the 3PL, they store them
it doesn't cost you much,
it'll cost you $2.50 for a pallet per week,
it's not a huge cost.
And now, again, when the item sells,
you can have an overseas staff member
get the information, put into Google Docs
and also send it to 3PL,
and they will pick the item,
pack it, post it, ship it to the hauler for you,
all while you're working.
It's very important when you build an eBay business
or in any business,
you build the business to work without you.
It's really creating, you're
giving somebody else a job.
Learning to do this while you have a job
it's actually really good
'Coz it's teaching you
to make this work without you.
One thing I always teach is
always put an extra strategy in place from day 1.
It doesn't matter you're building
an eBay business or any business
make sure you have an extra strategy.
So, if you want to sell it down the line, you can.
Now, the bonus of an extra strategy is
you build a business that works without you.
Say, you could sell.
So if you try to sell a business and it requires you,
you'll not gonna have much money from it.
So, by building a business and putting an extra strategy
means you're building a business to run completely without you.
Which is a great thing
And that means you can take a time off
and you know, giving somebody a job.
Back to when I started in eBay, back in 1999
until we went full time in 2005,
using virtual assistants as a non-issue of the eyes
wasn't really done back in those days.
But now, there's so many virtual assistants
places you can find virtual assistants,
they come in dozens. It's very easy, so we're very very lucky
to be living in this day and age.
Likewise, 3PLs weren't very known then
and now, Amazon has massive 3PLs,
you can run an eBay business from all over the world.
And you can have Amazon shipping your goods out for you, as a 3PL.
Plus there's many other 3PLs out there as well.
Also, you know, somebody was saying to me,
"Do I have, do I need to go to China from where I import?"
Well, you don't.
I used to go to China all the time.
Now, I very very rarely go.
Why?
Because we can do all online.
As an example, one
there once I went to Stanzic Global Sources,
they have over 4000 booths.
Each booth is between 6 to 10 feet long
See, if you can imagine walking through 4000 booths.
It took me 3 days and a pair of sandwiches to do it.
And by the time you get on the plane,
your mind is as completely bamboozled, you know.
If I got looking at a some real estate, I look at,
let's say 6 houses, by the time I come home
I can't picture which bathroom and
which kitchen was in which house
because my mind's confused.
Now, when you go to China
you have a similar problem,
You're not even half of the equation.
To work out if the product is good,
you've gotta know a couple of things.
1. Velocity - How often is this product selling?
2. How much is it selling for an average?
And then, you can get the cost price from the supplier
to work out your profit.
The problem is when you're in China,
you don't have all of those figures on hand.
You see an item,
a green frog, you know
it's a foot long,
and you haggle with the supplier, it's US$10 as an example.
Well, so what?
How much is that selling for in eBay?
Now, trying to go there, getting bandwidth
and trying to log on and do your research while you're in China
is pretty challenging
'coz this place is full
and every one else is challenging
trying to get some bandwidth in there as well.
Likewise, you don't know the velocity.
So you need to know these information.
But now, in today's age, you can use sources like
Global Sources, Alibaba, et cetera
to find products and do you research
while you're sitting at home.
And then, better still, learn how to do it,
outsource it to somebody overseas,
for less than 2 bucks an hour,
and get them to do it for you.
So, the moral of the story is,
you can certainly build an eBay business while you have a full time job.
And it will teach you a lot of things
about how to make this business work without you.
That's all I've got for you this week.
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Have a great week, guys.
This is Neil Waterhouse, list more, sell more.