Beware Bad Advice and How to Improve Your Own Sales – Adventures in Reselling #12

In the world of reselling there is a ton of bad advice. Some of it free, some of it hidden behind a pay wall or membership subscription. Whether it is advice on how to handle customers that require a bit more care than others or tips on what hardware to have in your home office – bad advice runs rampant sometimes. I am not saying I am perfect, I am just saying that there is nothing better than doing research yourself based on advice from others.

One of the biggest pieces of advice that you will hear thrown around a lot when starting a home business, particularly in reselling, is to get a label writer instead of a printer. One reason touted by supporters of this point of view is speed and cost of printing labels. While I agree, a label writer is a good idea, I disagree with the common stance that you only need a label writer.

For instance, if you sell on Amazon you are required by the rules set forth by the company to include a packing slip with each shipment. This includes items that you are shipping to Amazon for Fulfilled By Amazon (FBA) or shipments you send to customers (Merchant Fulfilled).

If a packing slip is required to be included then you are going to have to have a normal printer as well because label writers are not good enough to print packing slips with. That increases the cost even more.

In the recent weeks I have seen many people over on Facebook, in various groups, touting you do not need to include a packing slip with Amazon orders. This is very bad advice and can literally get your account shut down and you will forfeit any unpaid earnings.

I do not know about anyone else but, I am not doing this for free and cannot afford to lose not only the product but the money owed for that product.

Other platforms have requirements as well that require you to do certain things. While these may seem small and insignificant, they are the rules of using someone else's platform to sell your stuff. Their playground, their rules.

Back to the label writer. The most commonly promoted one to get, by far, is the Dymo LabelWriter 450 XL. This is an investment to the tune of about $200.

Depending on your situation financially, $200 may be nothing but a drop in the bucket. For most that are just starting out reselling, $200 is quite a bit of money.

What I use is a Canon MX490 all in on printer which can be purchased for less than $50, shipped. I also pick up ink from eBay at a severe discount versus Walmart or Target (get the XL ink packs).

This may not be as cheap as the Dymo LabelWriter 450 XL but the cost of document.write('ink for the Canon is cheap');ink for the Canon is cheap enough that it will take me over a year to begin seeing an expenditure that passes the cost of the Dymo LabelWriter 450 XL.

I am not saying don't get a Dymo LabelWriter 450 XL or other thermal printer (they require no ink to print which is great to an extent), I am just saying, make sure it is in your budget and worth the investment.

Many on-line will state if you are selling more than five packages per week then you are wasting time not using a thermal printer.

I beg to differ here as well. I don't believe in the ideology that you must ship X number of packages per week to do reselling full time.

If you are shipping 100 items a week but only profiting $1 per item shipped then you are probably not going to be able to afford doing this full time. Now, if you are shipping items that sold for a $20 to $50 profit and were doing 100 of them a week than, sure, I could see just about anyone doing this full time.

Also, remember, if someone tells you they know a lot about reselling and are willing to show you for a price, run away. There is more than enough information on this subject available for free – you just have to do a little bit of research.

Not all that offer their experience for a price are bad but they are far outnumbered by the people that simply see a cash register when they see you.

I run a completely free group on Facebook for those that wish to learn for free – Resellers and Thrifters Collaborative.

This brings me to the next part of this entry in the Adventures in Reselling.

Getting sales is always a concern for anyone doing reselling. Whether you are working with physical products on eBay or Amazon or are working with your skills on a site like UpWork or Freelancer – your success depends solely on getting sales.

Some will say you have to have 300+ words for your description, a powerful SEO title and you must use all of the available photos that the platform allows.

Okay, anyone that has checked out my listings on eBay or Amazon knows, I don't abide by those “rules”.

On eBay for instance, I give just enough information for the customer to make an educated purchase decision. If there is something wrong with the product then I detail it in the description.

If the item is new and has no noticeable damage then I use as short a description as possible for my items.

The same for photos. I use just enough to cover the bases. Sometimes just one.

Many reading this may say, that is skirting the rules. Actually, no it is not. Unlike the packing slip with Amazon sales, using all of the available photos or long descriptive descriptions, etc are all suggestions by the various platforms. They are not hard set rules.

I have enough sales across nearly 10 platforms to replace my day time income with reselling of physical items alone. Then on top of that I have selling of my writing skills on services like UpWork or direct to clients I have come to work with over the years.

What I am saying is, if you can get away with a short description for your item and a couple of pictures then don't stress trying to maximize it all. You will simply waste your time banging your head against the wall.

While I think some items require longer descriptions, for the most part, if it is new, I go as short as possible.

How I improve my sales is through promotion on social media such as Facebook and Twitter.

I use the @ symbol to tag the companies or products on both platforms then use the # to get categories. This has helped me reach many more people with my listings than I probably could have paid for (organic traffic is so much more valuable).

If you are not using social media and the pages of the companies that you are selling products from then you are missing out on a lot of potential sales. I understand though, some reading this may not want to convolute their personal social media accounts with reselling posts. That is fine. Simply make a new account for sales promotion.

If making a new account just be prepared to nurture it and build it up like you did your first account. If you are doing a second account then do it all. Fix up the profile, upload a good nice profile pic, etc. Interact with others, build a reputation as being a good person and someone whose opinion can be trusted.

Until next time, be kind to each other. Help each other if you can. Remember, we are all on the same team and you were new at this at one point too.