Successful eBay Holiday Sales Tips

eBay selling is a challenge year round. For the most success this holiday selling season, make sure you are taking advantage of all of eBay's features to boost your holiday sales. Here are a few tips to help you increase sales and stay organized during the busy holiday selling season.

• Add Best Offer to all inventory items. You never know what people will purchase once they have already bought something from you and are browsing your store for deals,or to take advantage of your combined shipping rate. Adding Best Offer will result in more sales. You don't have to accept the offers, but you will give your customer more options, appear to be a more flexible seller, and be able to capitalize on more opportunities to sell your items.
• Use Buy It Now on all auctions from now until Christmas. Decide on what you will accept for a BIN price. As the holiday gets closer, people procrastinate, sometimes even panic, and don't want to wait for an auction to end. Offering BIN will result in more sales. (Just do your research and make sure you have your BIN price set high enough.)
• Order packaging early. Go to the USPS website and order plenty of boxes and Tyvek envelopes. Take an inventory of what you will need such as bubble wrap and packing peanuts, and order it several weeks in advance.
• Know the shipping date deadlines. Again, visit the USPS website to see a chart with all of the shipping deadlines for the various services. You may want to print out this table of shipping deadlines and post it by your computer.
• Stay focused on operating your business. Complete your income producing activities first before getting caught up in holiday activities like baking, shopping, wrapping, and decorating. You still have a business to run.
• Prioritize. Choose your top 3 business related tasks each day before starting to work, and stick to that list. To keep your eBay business running smoothly, accomplish your business tasks before getting involved with personal tasks.
• Stay caught up with your shipping. It is very tempting to want to list more and more items when sales are hot. You don't want forget the customers who have already paid you and are waiting for their product. The USPS is slow enough over the holiday season - don't risk a neutral or negative because you aren't keeping up with your shipping.
• Set your limits. If you are doing the "crazy toy thing" (going on the 2 AM Wal-Mart runs to purchase large quantities of the hottest toy), keep in mind that you can't be all things to all people. Select a few hot toys to concentrate on and don't let yourself get overwhelmed. Remember you are going to have to pack and ship everything in addition to listing, running your business, and preparing for your own family's holiday. A few hundred dollars in hot toy profit is not worth having a personal meltdown and ruining your own family's holiday time.

Have fun and happy eBaying this holiday season!