For instance, your customer may have grown up in the 1980s, and because of this, he or she has a deep appreciation for anything and everything that represents their retro childhood. From Carebears to Strawberry Shortcake, Transformers to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, any toys or childlike items from this period of time will appeal to your buyer.

The trick is to find a niche that is not yet overly saturated with buyers. While you may have quite a few relics from the heyday of Pink Floyd, this market is already bursting at the seams with the same products you are looking to sell on eBay.

So, find a market that interests you, but is a bit dried up in terms of available products. When you can offer something fresh and new that no one else can, you’ll have better luck establishing your successful eBay business, as well as recruiting loyal customers who buy from you again and again.

It’s not always possible for a single mom or full-time college student to buy that laptop they so dearly need in order to keep up with the changing technology. So, looking for refurbished products becomes the next best thing, as they’re able to get these on the cheap, without sacrificing the quality of the product.

So, whether you want to sell used cameras, iPods, or TVs, you’ll undoubtedly have more than enough eager buyers to stir up a bidding war over your products. The only tricky step to focusing your business on these types of products is actually acquiring the products themselves.

If you have an outlet mall in your area, this is one of the best areas where you can begin looking for refurbished electronics. The products at these stores are a bit outdated, and oftentimes are the products of returns from fickle customers, but they are still in perfect working condition. They just can’t be sold as new products, since they have been opened and used for a short period of time.

You can also focus your attention on one specific brand and product, and contact the manufacturer of that product directly. You can usually do this via the Internet and the manufacturer’s website. More often than not, the purchasing department will handle all transactions involving refurbished goods, so be sure to contact that department directly for all of your product acquisition needs.

You can find used products to sell as nearby as your living room or as far away as an antique mall three states over. It really all just depends on what you want to sell, and what you think will bring in the highest profits.

Some of the most commonly sold used products on eBay are:

• Used sports equipment
• Secondhand clothes
• Cell phones
• Jewelry
• Children’s toys

More likely than not, you have just about all five of these things either in your garage, basement, or attic, quietly waiting to be rediscovered. So go through your items in storage and see if you have anything that just might make some eBay buyer’s dreams come true.

The best way that you can tell for sure that the product you’ve found will sell big on eBay is take a look at the current auction listings and figure out what is selling successfully right now.

Also, you can’t expect an item in bad shape to sell well on eBay. Sure, used goods are going to have a little more wear and tear than new ones. But if your item is on its very last legs and may not even make it through the delivery, you’re only going to be dealing with the hassle of a return and a dissatisfied customer leaving you very negative feedback.

Even for those items that show just a few signs of aging, you must be up front about these defects with your bidders in your product description. Outline the state of the product detail by detail, and include pictures of the defects, if possible.

Setting up your own website is one of the smartest moves you can make as an online business person.  The following are some of the many ways that having your own website can help to boost your profits:

• It can increase the traffic driven to your auctions and eBay store.
• It can attract more people to opt in to your mailing lists.
• It can help build your credibility.
• It can lower your total fees.
• It can improve exposure in search engine results.
• It can boost profits by giving you another way to make money.

Your website doesn’t have to be anything flashy or fancy.  All your website has to do is give visitors more information about the products that you are selling, and maybe a little more information about yourself.  You want to just give them basic information like opt-in forms, content that includes your keywords, and maybe a few links directly to your eBay store.

All you really need to do to get started is to come up with a domain name, like www.mysiteissocool.com.  This will give your visitors an address to type into the search bar so that they can access your website.

Below are four ways to drastically improve the amount of traffic to your off-eBay website:

1.  Using RSS feeds for your store and websites: As a special feature, eBay offers its users access to its RSS feeds.  All you have to do to use them is log on to your “About Me” page or your feedback page and click on the link titled, “View Items for Sale.”  Once you have done this, click on the RSS button near the bottom of the page and then copy the URL of the page you are taken to into your off-eBay websites.

2.  Using other shopping sites: One of the best places to put your products on display is Google Base.  Google Base allows you to post your products, with descriptions, links, and keywords included, onto their webpage free of charge.

Using a site like Google Base betters your chances of people buying your products who don’t use eBay.  Even submitting short descriptions of your products on a site like Amazon would greatly increase your exposure and draw more people to your auctions.

3.  Sending out press releases: This is another powerful way to get people to your sites.  Writing just a short, but informative, article that is entertaining about a popular event in society and then submitting it to a press release website has been proven to help people gain exposure for their businesses.

But don’t just write about any old thing.  You really want to try to find topics that are current and popular.  Writing about something that has been written about a thousand times makes it hard for you to take a unique approach to the issue.

Once you have written the article, do a quick search for “press release distribution” and you’ll come up with a list of services that will send out your press releases.  Some of them are free, while others charge a small fee for their services.  The most popular of these is PRWeb (www.prweb.com).

4.  Internet and affiliate marketing: The affiliate program that is run by eBay offers members an easy way to make money by promoting products.  Whenever a person clicks on your affiliate link to visit eBay, and signs up as a member through your link or makes a purchase, you get paid commission.  It’s really that simple.

A good way to increase your exposure, as well as your earnings, is to take advantage of this and become an affiliate.  Then, put links into your off-eBay website that directly link to eBay and every time someone goes through your affiliate links and buys something or signs up, you’ll be making instant money without having to lift a finger.

The best way that I’ve found to answer that question is to think of a field of interest that you have some expertise in. When you pick a product that you are already familiar with, the following advantages are on your side from the start:

1. You know the market — When you are an expert in something you know the value of an item and what is a fair price for it. You’ll also be able to find the best deal for your materials.
2. You know how to sell your products — It’s easier to sell a product when you know everything about it. You know what people will want to know or should know to make them see the worth of the item. You can write as an informed seller, and not as someone who doesn’t know what they are talking about.
3. You are a credible and reliable source — Your passion and knowledge for the product will show through to your customers, and as a result, they’ll be able to trust you as a seller.
4. You’ll be able to see all the angles — Since you are an expert in your field, you’ll be able to spot deals and opportunities when they present themselves. You’ll also know the best places to do research and look for supplies.

Don’t limit yourself to just focusing on your interests and what you are truly an expert in. Think about expanding your knowledge to fields related to your interests. For example, if you grew up collecting comic books and know everything about that, think about collecting and selling something like baseball cards as well.

Even though you don’t know as much about collecting baseball cards, the rules and criteria for baseball cards are very similar to comic books. It would be easy to use the knowledge you have on one subject to give you an edge in another. Look for opportunities like this to help you expand the catalog of possible products that you will be selling.

Once you’ve done a little brainstorming and narrowed down your fields of interest to a few potential products, you must then analyze your top prospects to determine their viability. After all, there’s no sense in trying to sell a product that will only return a small profit to you—or worse, nothing at all.

Whenever I embark upon this step of my potential product research, I always ask myself the following three questions:

1. Is it rare? — Rarity is fundamental to getting people to buy your product. People can go to any store down the street to find a household item. To find something that they can’t find anywhere else, they’ll go to eBay. It could be something like the new video game that all the stores are selling out of, or it could be antique coins.
2. Is there a market for it? — There is obviously a market for products like mp3 players and movies. However, there may not be a market for a specialty cook book that only has recipes for liver and onion pastries. You need to have a product that is both rare and that there is also a market for. Just because an item is rare doesn’t mean that people will want it.
3. Is it in constant demand? — Is your product something that people are always looking for? If your product is seasonal, then probably not. You can sell seasonal items, but you’ll also want to have another product that sells well throughout the entire year.

Obviously, if the market is right, the item is in demand, and it’s rare, you’ll have a better chance at selling that product for a higher price, especially if the product suddenly increases in rarity or in demand. If you can find a product that meets all of the criteria, then you have a product that will quickly take you to the top!

And not only will this product be extremely profitable, but because you already know quite a bit about it, you won’t have to waste any time learning your way around the market. So whenever you are considering a new item to possibly sell on eBay, ask yourself those three questions, and this winning formula will be sure to deliver a profitable product that exceeds your expectations.

Negotiation tactics are truly some of the hardest to master, and that is especially true when negotiating your terms with a manufacturer or distributor.  However, I’ve drawn from my own years of experience and summarized the art of negotiation down to two main points for you.  Before you enter into a negotiation, be prepared to:

1. Know everything there is to know about your product, your market, your partner, etc.  The more you know, the less likely it is that you’ll make a wrong decision or agree to a poor deal.
2. Tell your partner what’s in it for them when it comes to doing business with you.  This benefit may not be huge profits, but there is some stake in entering into a partnership with you, so make sure it is known.

Preparation is key to coming out on the right side of a business negotiation, and you should give yourself plenty of time to study before your meeting takes place.  You must know what to ask your distributor and when to ask it in order to achieve the best results.

As you can imagine, these types of companies are never going to give you the low prices that you want right off the bat, so you’re going to have to do a bit of pushing and prodding before they are willing to take their prices down to where you need them to be in order to make the best profits.

Don’t be afraid to be aggressive or to ask the uncomfortable questions, either.  Sometimes you need to catch your opponent off guard and surprise them a bit in order to get them to a place where they simply can’t tell you no.  While trying to process your requests and questions, it’s likely that your distributor will lose their ground, and, therefore, become more apt to ease up on their terms and prices.

So, before you get into a negotiation, be sure that you know more than the average distributor expects you to know about their business.  Research past deals that they have given to other businesses like yours and explain that you’d like to achieve the same terms and prices, if not better.  Your knowledge of these situations in and of itself will be enough to take your opponent by surprise, if even for just a few moments.

Study your distributor’s catalog, pricing structures, policies, and past history.  Perhaps you’ll discover that their sales have gone down in the last year or so, which means that the distributor will be more willing to negotiate a deal in order to secure your business.  You could mention that you know this throughout the course of your conversation, in hopes that the distributor will give you what you want in order to keep you on board, despite their falling sales.

But don’t leave your distributor hanging in terms of what you want; in fact, be sure to spell this out in nothing less than the clearest terms.  If you want a smaller order, say so, instead of just sighing when the distributor first quotes you.  Negotiating is about being honest and direct about your needs, and your distributor will appreciate it if you get straight to the point.

However, be sure that you do not act condescendingly towards your prospective distributor.  Be polite, and ask for what you want, rather than simply telling your distributor what to do for you.  Recognize that this would be cutting you a deal, and be appreciative of that—but don’t sacrifice holding your ground for the sake of manners.

Be confident, but not cocky.  Be firm, but not overbearing.  Just be honest with your potential partner, and allow them to feel like they’re doing you a big favor that you will return by committing to doing business with them for the long haul.  If you can manage these tactics, you will undoubtedly master the art of negotiation with your distributor.

Materials in the public domain include:

• Materials published before 1923,
• Materials that are more than 28 years old, and
• Materials that are not properly copyrighted.

It’s a bit hard to tell whether or not a work is properly copyrighted.  In order for a book to be properly copyrighted it must contain something that looks like this:

© Copyright 1988, Beacon Publishing

So, if you find a work without an appropriate copyright, you may have just stumbled upon your next great investment!

Some profitable works that you can find to resell or reference in the public domain are:

• Recipes from old cookbooks,
• Old editions of popular classics,
• Collector’s items,
• Religious books,
• Recordings of old folk songs,
• Rare performances by famous musicians,
• Early educational texts and other historical reference texts, and
• So much more!

If you find an old book that you would like to resell, you’ll have to rescan the pictures and reprint them.  To do this, you’ll need a scanner and a high quality printer—or you can send the pages and images over to a print shop to be printed there.  The pages will also have to be scanned and cleaned up, or completely retyped altogether.  This can add up to a great deal of work over time, so you may want to think about posting this job to one of the freelance websites we discussed if you have a few other projects in the works as well.

You can piece together bits from a few old books in order to create one whole book that you can copyright yourself.  For instance, if you find a number of old poems in the public domain, you could gather all of these together and publish them in one whole collection.  Just be sure that they all relate to each other in some way—whether they be from the same era or about the same theme—so that your book is cohesive and meaningful.

Another way that you could use works from the public domain is to create your own audio book.  You may want to record the poems that we referenced earlier—as long as you have a good speaking voice and are able to translate the rhythm of the poems with your voice.  Audio books are in high demand these days, as people can listen to them on anything from their mp3 players to their car stereos.

When you’re looking to reprint and resell old books in the public domain, one of the best resources you can use to find these products are the used bookstores in and around your town.  Used bookstores are literally everywhere, some large and some small, but each store will offer its own unique variety of old books in the public domain.

Once you’ve found a book that you’re interested in reselling, all you have to do is check its copyright standing at www.copyright.gov/records/cohm.html.  If you find that the book you’re interested in has no legal copyright, you can proceed to the next steps of reprinting and reselling.

You can also search for books that are in the public domain by utilizing the University of Pennsylvania’s public domain database at http://digital.library.upenn.edu/books.  Not only will this website provide you with the names of books in the public domain, but you’ll also be able to download these books right to your computer from this website.

Old and used books can honestly be found everywhere, especially online.  Amazon has a huge inventory of used books—some that you can buy for as low as $1!  As long as you have the time to spare to look around, you should be able to find a wealth of potentially viable books in no time at all.

One other resource that you may want to consult to find works in the public domain is the Library of Congress.  You can download books, music, photographs, and more right from their website at http://www.loc.gov/library/libarch-digital.html.

However, before you decide to reprint and resell any work of any sort, be sure to check its copyright with the government website that we provided to you earlier.  You’re out to make a profit, not to get into legal trouble—so be sure to safeguard your business by researching your products beforehand!

So forget the fancy equipment and years of experience; the only things you really need in order to produce persuasive photos are my tips and your digital camera.

Tip #1:  Take photos of your products from several different perspectives.

Your goal as an eBay business owner is to recreate the shopping experience for your bidder.  In order to do this, your bidders should be able to feel as though they are getting the same information from your listing as they would if they were physically viewing your item in a store.  You can accomplish this by providing several different views of your item, which your bidders can then use to examine the overall quality of your product.

Tip #2:  Get your products ready for their close-ups.

It’s obviously important to give your potential bidders a view of your entire product, but the smallest details are just as significant.  In order to take an effective close-up, use the “macro” feature on your digital camera.  This setting typically has a flower symbol on it, and it will allow you to depict even the tiniest attributes of your product.

Tip #3:  Use bright lighting for your photos.

As a serious eBay business owner, you should take a few extra steps to ensure that your photos are as clear as they can be, which usually means acquiring light from an outside source.  To effectively light your photos, place several spotlight lamps around the area where you will position your product, use only lighting that radiates white light, and set up a white sheet or white poster board as a background for your product.

Tip #4:  Get rid of the glare from your camera’s flash.

It’s a hard habit to break, but be sure that anytime you take photos of your eBay products that you turn your flash off.  Not only does it create unnatural looking light and colors, but it can also prevent your entire product from showing up in the photo.  Any products that have a reflective surface, such as a plastic CD case or metal appliance, will produce a glare in the photo.

Tip #5:  Compare your product’s size to that of an everyday item.

Unfortunately, close-up photos of small items make it difficult for your buyer to determine the actual size of your products.  Because of this, you should provide a point of reference to your buyer using a common item that is comparable in size.  For instance, if you are selling an action figure that is the same size as a can of soup, you can use that as a size reference in your product’s description.

Tip #6:  Prepare a plain background for your product.

The color of your background should be one solid color that enhances the appearance of your product.  For example, if you are listing a glass punch bowl for auction, you will want to position this item against a black background so that it clearly shows up in your photo.  Any items that are not clear or white in color can best be seen against a white background.

Tip #7:  Edit out the extra space surrounding your product.

The purpose of your photos is to enhance the appearance of your products and compel your viewers to place higher bids.  To do this, you want to be sure that the product is the only focus of your photo.  Remove any extra space that might take away from the presentation of your product.  You can use the “crop” feature available in most image editing software programs to eliminate extra space.

If you follow all seven of my tips, you can almost guarantee that the result of your concentration and preparation will be professional, clear, and compelling photographs of your products that are sure to turn any prospective eBay buyer into a loyal customer.

I just published my latest free article!  It’s called How to Establish Your Credibility as a New Seller on eBay, and you can get it by clicking on the “Press Release” tab above.  Then, just click on the newest press release and the link to the free download is contained within.  Enjoy!