Selling online - Alternatives to eBay
Posted: Saturday, March 11, 2006
by Pamela Bruce
Love Beads Unlimited
If you are new to the world of online auctions, you might have the impression that there is nothing but eBay. While eBay is massive and constantly advertises the fact that you can find "it" on eBay, there are other services available. Whether you are just setting out as an online seller, want to switch sites, or diversify your sales channel, it might be worthwhile to look at alternatives.
You should be aware, though, that using eBay has its advantages. It is much larger than its competitors (see http://www.powersellersunite.com/auctionsitewatch.php), which translates into an anormous amount of traffic. And it is a recognized brand that spends a lot on marketing.
However, eBay also has its disadvantages. The fees for sellers are relatively high, many categories have fierce price competition, and there are recurring technical glitches and dubious "improvements" (such as giving sellers overly optimistic arrival dates during the holiday shipping season).
Where can you find alternatives? Here are some URLs to get you started:
As you can see, there are numerous other sites out there. Before signing up with one (or several) of them, you should ask a few questions:
The last question is particularly important. A low-cost or even free auction site will be useless for you, if there is little traffic in your category. Even a free listing costs you the time you need to create it!
Once you have answered these questions, you may decide to go with one of the established competitors (yahoo.com, overstock.com), choose a smaller site (bluejay.com, ecrater.com) or go for a niche site that specializes in such items as pinball machines (pinballmachines.com) or bead jewelry (justbeads.com). Of course there is always the option of building your own web store to sell your items.
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Top-level comments on this article: (4 total)Jay Brokers is another great alternative to eBay. They buy everything from laptops to cell phones. They still sell on eBay, but they do it for you and they pay you a guaranteed amount upfront before selling the item on eBay.
Since the fvf increase I'm now looking for a good alternative to eBay such as eBid etc. I found out more about ebid at ukebid dot com eBid has been running for 10 years and operates sites for 14 countries so like eBay it's a trusted and well established auction site and not a "Here today gone tomorrow" auction site.
every time i try and access the site bluejay dot com, it goes directly to yeah dot com. why is that? can someone help me figure out how to get to bluejay dot com?
I've found a new place to list my items it's called theshopnswap.
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