Selling Jordan cards through eBay can be a profitable and rewarding business. And let’s face it - if you’re visiting this website you’d probably enjoy nothing more than scouring the internet for that bargain card to on-sell online. Of course as a dealer you get to keep the best, or put the profits back into growing your private collection.
So here are my tips to help turn your hobby into an online business.
- Honesty is the best policy. Its a cliche - but no other point is more important.
- State the exact condition of the card clearly.
- Show the actual card in your listing and say so. Make sure the photo is clear, sharp and shows all corners and edges against a contrasting surface.
- Describe the brand, season and type of card correctly.
- Learn how to describe the condition of your cards. Beckett have published a very good card grading scheme. Learn this well and always state the exact condition of your card.
- Take care with your listing. Make sure your listing looks professional - learn HTML or use eBay’s designer to help. Basic text listings almost always sell for less than well planned and thought out listings.
- Imagery is everything. You are selling a trading card - a visual piece. Make sure you list the card and take full advantage of the card’s power as a visual element to evoke desire. Remember not everyone knows the year/brand/name of cards they might like to add to their collection so browsing a set of images can be a very powerful tool.
- Take a good photo/scan of the card showing all corners and edges. Place the card on a contrasting surface and don’t crop the image exactly to the card so your buyers can see it’s edges clearly.
- Don’t be lazy and include several cards in the one image. This can confuse buyers and reduces the amount of detail in the image.
- Include a photo/scan of the card in the search results pages to evoke interest in a good looking card that some people may not have considered before.
- Slowly release your cards for sale. Don’t list everything you have available at once. By slowly releasing your merchandise at regular intervals you add value due to scarcity of your items. In particular never release multiple versions of the same card at the same time or too quickly.
- Try to only sell nrmt-mt or better cards. By showing the community you only deal in the best people will value your items for sale higher.
- Ship cards carefully to maintain quality. I once bought five cards from a dealer who lived one state over from me. The dealer pushed all five cards into a flimsy (cheap) ‘protector’. The cards moved out in postage and one was damaged. I will never buy from that dealer again. Put each card separately into a soft sleeve, then into a top loader and secure with a tapped down card bag for domestic sales. For international orders you may like to use a one-touch. This may add to your expenses but will maintain your customer’s appreciation.
- Describe your shipping cost (including combined purchases) and process. Don’t make your customers guess what to expect from you.
- Detail the exact shipping cost for single and multiple purchases.
- Explain how you will ship the item. Will the item be ‘shipped in a soft sleeve inside a top loader’?
- Also explain how long it normally takes you to prepare and ship a package and notify your customer by email immediately after doing so.
- You might also like to offer free shipping for purchases over a certain amount within a certain timeframe.
- If you can, give away a free card with every purchase - but don’t tell people in your listing. This might sound strange - why throw in something extra without telling people in advance? Well when a customer buys a spectacular card and there is a free (nrmt+ condition but with low value) card included your professionalism increases. They trust you more and if you didn’t make a fuss about including a free card in your listing they don’t feel like you’re using marketing hype to make a sale. The best don’t need hype do they?
- Earn a reputation. By applying the above tips you will slowly earn a reputation among repeat purchaser’s (and there are a lot). As people vie for your merchandise and trust you more you can watch your sales increase.