I've not really sold a great deal of stuff on eBay, though I do purchase items here and there. Some years back (when I was running the osC Books site) I sold one of the eBooks on eBay 3 or 4 times a week at £9.99 a shot. After Paypal and eBay fees I cleared around £7 a time. I suppose that I was spending around 15 minutes per week on this (adding new listings, sending download links etc), so it can't really be considered an AIS. Just a normal, run of the mill, Income Stream.

Recently, I sat down and worked out a plan for 2007. Part of that plan is to utilise eBay;

• for selling products
• for advertising purposes

What to sell ?

My next problem was to work out what to actually sell. Some months ago, I had a great idea for an eBay'able product, but decided not to go ahead as I would have needed liability insurance for the product (which I would have been making after purchasing the components) - the insurance was too expensive to justify. I dumped that idea.

This past week I approached an online acquaintance who used to sell on eBay (I had, years ago, made an oscommerce site for my acquaintance), so I had an inkling about the product and the demographic. I asked if they wanted to sell (as the eBay business they had been running was defunct) - after some days, they decided to sell and I purchased it. So, I now have an eBay business to set up (of course I will also be selling direct via my own website, which is where the "advertising on eBay" comes in).

The next couple of months

I need to purchase a couple of items to run the business, which will cost around £500 ($1000) in total. After I have these items it's full steam ahead. Of course, it's difficult to justify a £500 outlay, but the items I need will be usable outside the business as well, so it's not too bad. In the meantime, I can spend some hours setting up an osCommerce based website, as well as register the business and do all the legal shenanigans. I can also set up a new eBay name and make enough sales/purchases to be able to create "Buy It Now" auctions.

Projection

On eBay, I estimate that each product will return a gross profit of £1.60, based on a selling price of £2.50. I hope to sell at least 30 per week on eBay.

On a website, eBay fees are removed, so the profit potential is slightly higher - I hope to sell perhaps 10 through a website each week.

The previous owner

I looked at the previous owners feedback before approaching them, and saw that at one stage they were selling 60 to 70 items per month with no problems. If I can do that, month after month, this will be a good adventure.

Conclusion

eBay is harder work than I normally like. But it's a marketplace with thousands of buyers, who are their to spend money, not just look. It's an important piece of my "online jigsaw puzzle" for Income Streams in 2007, and one I intend to spend some time on over the coming months.

Once I have the business up and running I will post again with more details of the product etc.