Selling Online, Ebay or Your Own Website?

First let me say there are many different sites own which to sell on the internet. The largest is eBay, which is where I started selling online. There are sites with auction formats or stores and some with both. I tried some of the alternative sites but they just did not work for me. Many people have very good luck on the eBay or the alternative sites. The information I am providing here is just what has worked for me. I feel, and many others do also, that even if you sell on eBay or other alternative sites you should have your own web site also.

When we first started selling online we really did not have a plan, but this is what happened.

My business plan, well let me just say we were never big on eBay only 25 to 50 listings at a time.
We started selling on eBay February of 2006,then in the summer of 2006 there was a fee increase. I started reading forums about then PowerSellersUnite included and heard from others that eBay had raised fees the year before also. I started looking at other sites and tried 4 or 5 while staying on eBay. I sold a little mostly on Yahoo auctions which closed down.

In October of 2006 I signed up for a store through PSU. There was a learning curve but with all the help I received there I got it up and running. I learned promotion and have gradually have increased my traffic. The first month I was open November of 2006 I had a total of 123 unique visitors to my website. December we had 194. Our best traffic month in 2007 was March with 2189 unique visitors.

We stayed with a small presence on eBay 25 listings in our store till the fee increase and changes were announced in January of this year. From the time we open our website till we closed closed our eBay store in January we put a flier for our website in all shipments we sold on ebay or any site. We now only sale on Our website and a few things on ecrater.

I am constantly promoting our website, I upload my products to Google Base and Windows live product feed at least twice a month.

So far this year we have had a new record number of unique vistors ever month this year.
January 2412
February 2419
March 2500
April 3508

If traffic remains as good the rest of this month as it has so far we will have another record set this month.

So far this year we have already had as many sales as we had everywhere including eBay last year. I do not do the amount of business a lot of you do, last month my sales were around $850.00. If I had sold that in an eBay store it would have cost me the store fee $15.95 + fvf $102.00 + what ever the listing fees would have come to. My PSU store cost me $9.99 a month. I accept PP and GC so I have those fees also, but over 50% of my customers use GC so I don't pay as much as I would through PP only on Ebay.

That has been my business plan and it has worked for me. It has taken time and a lot of hard work, but it has been well worth it. I do not have to depend on any one but my self now thank goodness.

Just my 2 cents
Terry

There are many different ways to start your own website. If money is no object one can find many people willing to set up a website for you. For my self I do not like to spend my money unless I have to. There is free software available for you to construct a website. You will need a domain name. When you decide on a name check and see if it is available. You will also need a company to host your site. Some company's can do both for you. I chose PowerSellersUnite for my website. The software is a combination of Joomla and Virtuemart. Joomla is the content part and Virtuemart is the shopping cart. There are many other software combinations available also. Some of the things I think a website should have:

Content: This is something to draw and keep a customers attention. On our website Paula's Herbs and Plants you can see I have pages devoted to different topics; Butterfly gardening, Herb Companion Plants, Helpful Gardening Tips, Herbal Teas and lots of other information helpful to my customers.

Newsletter: Customers can sign up for my monthly newsletter to be emailed to them with new articles and notices of new articles. This helps to keep my site fresh in there mind. Make sure to have a unsubscribe link available in case they signed up by accident. Don't make customers mad by sending something they do not want.

Links: This is very important a page where you can place links to other sites. Many sites will exchange links with you if you ask and this will help your sites ranking in some of the search engines. Make sure that the links are active, so check them often.

Privacy notice page: People want to know you respect their privacy. So tell them what information your will require and what you will do with that information.

Shipping and Returns Policy: A page that clearly states your shipping and returns policy.

Contact us: A contact us link is helpful for potential customers to ask questions easily.

Customer Comments: I think every site should have a customer comments page so potential customers can see what previous customers have to say about your service.

Shopping Cart: An easily integrated and easy to use shopping cart is a must.