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#22
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hello,
thanks to everyone for your replies. i found some of your tips and comments extremely helpful. i tried posting 80 or so of my books on half.com and amazon. so far i have managed to sell 9 or 10 in just one week. so my previous calculation of the typical sell-through rate (i.e. one book/day for every 1700 posted) on half and amazon was way off. of course, at $3-$5 a piece i lost a lot of money on these books (they were purhcased for $10-30 each), but i figured that if these books can be obtained for 25-50 cents each, selling them online may be a worthwile endeavor. perhaps my "success" on half and amazon is due to the fact that i'm selling the "right" books. i found that my philosophy and religion books sold very well, whereas my computer and business book has not sold at all. i did a search on google and found a few companies that sell books by the pallet, but when i checked some their titles on amazon, i found that most of them are being listed for less than dollar, and in many instances, for just 1 cent (yes, 1 cent!). i guess the only place to get cheap quality books that can sell for $3-10 on amazon is a book sale or garage sale, but i doubt i can find 1000 to 1500 of such books a month to sell to make a living from it. what do you think? stacy |
#23
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Stacy Chung wrote:
thanks to everyone for your replies. i found some of your tips and comments extremely helpful. i tried posting 80 or so of my books on half.com and amazon. so far i have managed to sell 9 or 10 in just one week. ..[snip] ...perhaps my "success" on half and amazon is due to the fact that i'm selling the "right" books. Yes, having the "right" books is the key to success to selling successfully. The question you have to ask yourself is "can I keep getting the 'right' books with a minimum of unsellable titles?" I don't want to discourage you, but you might find that the other 70 books will sell at the rate of one a year - good stock sells quickly, bad stock is forever. i guess the only place to get cheap quality books that can sell for $3-10 on amazon is a book sale or garage sale, but i doubt i can find 1000 to 1500 of such books a month to sell to make a living from it. what do you think? It can be done, but you will work hard for your living. The occasional high value book will make it a little easier. I know someone who does this - he has been in the used book business for 20 years and carefully watches the market to keep his feel for what will sell. He spends 3-5 full days a week scouting for books and lists them on many databases. He avoids books in areas he does not know about. B |
#24
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#25
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"Stacy Chung" wrote in message om... hi, i did a little reseach on the sellers on half.com and found that on average it takes an inventory of approximately 1700 books to sell just one book a day. Considering an average profit of $3 per book, one would have to sell 45 books a day to make a living ($4000/month) selling books on half.com. That would mean an inventory of 76,500 books, enough to fill a decent-sized warehouse. Has anyone here tried to make a living selling used books online, and if so, what do you think of my calculations? thanks in advance Stacy --------------------------- WHAT ABOUT : Abe.com (abe books?) |
#26
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Yes, having the "right" books is the key to success to selling
successfully. The question you have to ask yourself is "can I keep getting the 'right' books with a minimum of unsellable titles?" I don't want to discourage you, but you might find that the other 70 books will sell at the rate of one a year - good stock sells quickly, bad stock is forever. actually, i don't think it's that bad. $3 is just the average profit. if you were to pick out some books from a book sale that "look" saleable (i'd avoid computer and business books that tend to become obsolete in a year or two), you may get some that sell for $10-15 and others that sell for a buck or less. sooner or later, i think you'd develop an instinct for spotting more profitable books and raise the average profit to more than $3. It can be done, but you will work hard for your living. The occasional high value book will make it a little easier. I know someone who does this - he has been in the used book business for 20 years and carefully watches the market to keep his feel for what will sell. He spends 3-5 full days a week scouting for books and lists them on many databases. He avoids books in areas he does not know about. B |
#27
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---------------------------
WHAT ABOUT : Abe.com (abe books?) i'll definitely sign up with abebooks if i decide to get into the bookselling business. abe charges a monthly fee for listing on their site. i don't know how much business abebooks can generate from people visiting abebooks.com. abe crosslists to other databases but marks up your prices, rendering them less competitive than if you just list on their partner sites (eg half, amazon) yourself. |
#28
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as jonathan said the first upload will have the biggest sell rate,
especially if you were selling $30 books for $3. how do u define a "good" stock vs a "bad" stock? i found an article with interesting take on how fast a book might sell based on its amazon sales ranking: http://www.fonerbooks.com/surfing.htm according to the author, if you have a book that ranks 600,000 (which makes it a "bad" stock), you should be able to sell it in about 100 days if you price it lower than your competitors'. once-popular books often sell fast but for only a few cents each, whereas some more obscure books sell for a higher profit, but it'd have to sit on the market for a while. |
#29
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Stacy Chung wrote:
abe crosslists to other databases but marks up your prices, rendering them less competitive than if you just list on their partner sites (eg half, amazon) yourself. Exactly. You can count on abe (and often alibris) to have the highest listings for most books on half.com, and sometimes outrageously so: check Ted Hughes _Flowers & Insects_ as an example. And I've been seeing a lot of oh-so-dignified scoffing of half.com here which I find unfounded. I don't want to break some of you people's elitist lovefest, but if you are selling for abe or alibris, then you are also selling for half.com, and effacing your own personal identity and reputation there to boot...but, hey perhaps this anonymity is preferred by some people. OTOH, Half.com's poor reputation to you is not because half.com provides poor service (the listing cost is the lowest of all the major services and the help desk is very knowledgeable and responsive, at least in my past experience) but because it is a *buyer*'s market, not a seller's, thus providing good value to casual purchasers and not a living to die-hard sellers. For someone just starting out selling or just cleaning out their closet and shelves -- not looking to make a new career -- half.com is a good placel. Many buyers are also sellers and vice versas, and the feedback and ranking system (a la Amazon) works to provide reliable transactions. When you have more inventory than you can reasonably handle and have (hopefully) built up your own experience and reputation, then perhaps you might want to try alibris...but not, I think, for the "common" paperbacks. -- Ht |Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. --John Donne, "Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions"| |
#30
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How does it compare to Amazon.com? Amazon seems to have severe problems for
the casual seller and the small but full time bookseller as well. Randy -- "Htn963" wrote in message ... OTOH, Half.com's poor reputation to you is not because half.com provides poor service (the listing cost is the lowest of all the major services and the help desk is very knowledgeable and responsive, at least in my past experience) but because it is a *buyer*'s market, not a seller's, thus providing good value to casual purchasers and not a living to die-hard sellers. For someone just starting out selling or just cleaning out their closet and shelves -- not looking to make a new career -- half.com is a good placel. Many buyers are also sellers and vice versas, and the feedback and ranking system (a la Amazon) works to provide reliable transactions. When you have more inventory than you can reasonably handle and have (hopefully) built up your own experience and reputation, then perhaps you might want to try alibris...but not, I think, for the "common" paperbacks. "| |
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