How to Source Products to Sell on eBay from Multiple Wholesalers by Worldwide Brands

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.

Blog 13: Handling low inventory for eBay Selling

Once you determine your niche and find a wholesale supplier who will support you selling on eBay, it becomes the responsibility of the seller to check the inventory levels of the supplier before posting a new listing. What do you do when you find that your wholesale supplier is running low on your most popular inventory items – or any item for that matter?

Find Alternative Sources for the Same Wholesale Product
You need to have a backup source of supply. But how do you find other suppliers offering the same brands or products – or suitable substitutes that you can list when you suspend your normal listing. eBay provides help from one of eBay’s Certified Solution Providers: WorldwideBrands.com. You can now purchase access to the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool in the Selling Manager area of ‘My eBay’. This wholesale database contains the contact details for more than 8,000 certified wholesale suppliers including drop shippers, volume wholesalers, light bulk wholesalers, liquidators and importers who together represent more than 8,000,000 products.

Find an Alternative Wholesale Supplier
You can search the database by product, product category, and brand to find alternative wholesalers who will supply the same product. It is a good practice to open an account with this alternative supplier. It is also a good practice to make a test order from the supplier so that you can verify the quality of the product is to your standards, and test the wholesale supplier’s packaging and shipping methods.

Secure Alternatives before You need Them
Without a Tool like this, you may spend many hours trying to find alternative sources of supply. It’s important to have an established relationship in place with an alternative supplier before you need them. It’s too late to start trying to set up an account with an alternative wholesaler when you have orders in hand and your regular supplier cannot fulfill orders for you.

If drop shipping, make sure to keep some inventory on hand, especially for top selling items.
At some point, you will run into an out of stock situation with a supplier for a particular product, it is strongly recommended that you keep a few items on hand to prevent any delay in shipment to your customer. Any remaining listings can then be turned off to prevent any further orders.

Being an online retailer requires constant attention to product sourcing, right priced buying and delivering excellent buying experiences. Product Sourcing is a continual but easy process when done correctly.

Check out Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool for eBay today! A 7 Day Free Trial is available.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Service Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

eBay Sellers Can Find Additional Inventory with Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.

Article #12 - Multi-Level Product Sourcing

As a new eBay seller becomes more successful with their eBay auction listings and first eBay Store sales, you will be able to fund more growth in your business. You can expand your offerings within your first niche by leveraging additional wholesale suppliers and drop shippers with complimentary products to those you are already selling on eBay.

So how do you select new niches and products, and how can you determine what works best without taking too much risk in inventory?

Market Research is the key. eBay Sellers need to identify products with demand and supply. Not all products can be sold on eBay. Some manufacturers have strict requirements. Start with your existing niche and expand the product choices. For example, tailor your eBay Store brand around your niche. Use the existing traffic to your eBay store to identify new top sellers in your Store.

The Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool in eBay’s Apps Center can be very helpful to eBay sellers looking for additional product sources to help grow their online business. Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool for eBay will research online to establish current demand and pricing on the internet and for testing different products, categories, niches and demand.

Access can be purchased to the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool. Through use of this tool, eBay Sellers will be able to drill down their options to find wholesale products in demand within a niche. The tool provides the contact details of drop shippers and wholesale suppliers willing to work with eBay sellers.

Drop shipping is most commonly used for testing new product ideas. When you notice an increasing trend in sales for one of the drop ship items, you can then start buying that item in Light Bulk (minimum wholesale orders less than $500). Of all the Light Bulk items, some will sell faster than others. Once you identify those, you can invest in volume inventory at even better wholesale prices allowing you to make more profit per item, or compete more aggressively. This is called multi level product sourcing.

Check out Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool for eBay today! A 7 Day Free Trial is available.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Service Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

Tips on How to Create a Great Buying Experience on eBay by Worldwide Brands

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.

Article #11 - Creating a Great Buyer Experience

Retail success is all about delivering great buyer experiences. For a moment, picture in your mind you are stepping into one of your favorite local retail stores. Why is it your favorite?

A great retail experience in the brick-n-mortar world starts with getting to the store easily and finding convenient parking. From store front to your experience when you walk in the door, what catches your eye? As you advance inside, what captures your attention next? Smart retailers use the power of eye level placement and end caps to draw your eyes to items they want to feature. Then typically you next notice the banners or promotional signs where color, size of print, lighting and price tags may capture your interest.

Online Retailers Must Simulate a Great Walk-in Experience
Successful retailing is more about repeat business than it is about initial sales. The most successful stores are those people want to return to frequently. eBay sellers need to replicate the successful walk-in experience with their online auction listings and eBay Stores. Here are some of the criteria for creating a Great Buying Experience:

Your customers must find you easily. eBay helps by bringing millions of visitors per day to www.ebay.com. It is a powerful selling platform with many sellers all competing for business at the same time. You need to get people to your Auction Listings or eBay Stores easily and quickly. This requires excellent use of keywords in your titles and descriptions as well as an easy-to-remember, relevant and search able eBay Store name. It requires SEO treatments with links back from Facebook, Twitter, Squidoo, YouTube etc linking back to your auction listings and eBay Store.

Your Auction Listings or eBay Store must be Recognizable as You. You need to create a recognizable and consistent brand identity of your own that sets you apart from other eBay Sellers.

Create a Great Experience on Entry. From the time browsers reach your listing or eBay Store, they should feel good. The first visual impression should be great with things that catch the eye and keep people browsing and reading on your listing.

Offer a Great Product Selection. Become known as an online retailer with a flair for what people like and need. Your range and choice of products is very important. Pricing and shipping options are critical. Your ability to find quality and good deals comes from your product research. You can apply all the right processes but if the products you offer for sale are not what people want to buy, or your quality and pricing is undesirable, you will not be successful. eBay now offers some help in this area through the Selling Manager section of ‘My eBay.’ eBay Sellers can now access Worldwide Brands’ renowned Product Sourcing Tool and Wholesale Database. Using this tool eBay Sellers can research buyer demand, seller competition, comparative current pricing across more than 8,000,000 products from within eBay’s Selling Manager or Selling Manager Pro tools.

Create a ‘Touch and Feel’ Experience. The main difference between a brick-n-mortar retail store and an online store is the ‘touch and feel’ experience. In an online store, you cannot pick up the item, feel it and smell it. In an online listing you have to recreate this experience as best you can through compelling product images and descriptions, supporting specifications and ‘use’ information – even video clips. It’s all about creating the desire to own the item.

Then there is the feel of personal attention. Online retailers can provide a phone number for a shopper to call to discuss the item and purchase during normal shopping hours or even a fast email response system.

Create a Selling Funnel. Through the use of linking, matching, color and imagery, lead potential customers to additional items of interest.

Ease of Check-Out. Once the buying decision is made, the shopper must be able to purchase quickly and easily. eBay provides PayPal at the click of a button. If you use a shopping cart and a payment processor, the process must be easy and user friendly.

Fast, Safe Delivery. Its all about speed from the second your customer places the order. Instant order confirmation. Instant alerts to you. Fast turn around of the order to your supplier. Quick and accurate pick, pack and shipping on the part of the wholesaler, fulfillment house or your own inventory handlers. Rapid confirmation of shipments with tracking numbers for your customers.

Ensure Your Customer is Happy with their Purchase. Follow up with your customer and encourage feedback on their experience. Use this feedback to identify areas of your business you can improve or leave alone because they’re working. Make the ‘Returns’ process easy if the customer is not happy about something. Always provide your seller name or eBay store name to help customers know where to return.

A great buying experience with each visit is guaranteed to bring that buyer back to your auction listing or eBay Store multiple times.

The Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool contains a wholesaler database, education modules and education series called: “The Whole $ale.” This series has many chapters to coach eBay Sellers on best practices in working with wholesalers. Sign up for either eBay Selling Manager or eBay Selling Manager Pro and you can then access the Selling Manager Applications directory and the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool.

Check out Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool for eBay today! A 7 Day Free Trial is available.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Service Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

New eBay Certified Provider, B-Stock Solutions, Brings Unique Product Sourcing Opportunities to eBay Sellers

New eBay Certified Provider, B-Stock Solutions

The eBay Certified Provider Program is excited to offer sellers more inventory and product sourcing opportunities with the addition of B-Stock Solutions to the program.


B-Stock Solutions opens supply sources for smaller resellers, like eBay sellers, who have previously been unable to buy directly from Fortune 2000 retailers and manufacturers. eBay sellers can purchase direct from the large retailers, manufacturers and liquidators. With B-Stock, sellers can bypass purchasing through middlemen that paying extra fees or markups.

B-Stock understands the challenges an eBay seller encounters when trying to develop new, reliable sources of quality inventory. They help answer this challenge by delivering private auction marketplaces allowing registered eBay sellers to bid on inventory in lots/palettes, pay securely and arrange safe shipment. B-Stock creates a predictable, dependable source of supply for eBay sellers.

Features:

Categories:

• Consumer Electronics
• Clothing, Shoes & Accessories
• Home, Bed & Bath
• Cosmetics
• Media
• New categories added frequently

Inventory conditions include:

• Brand new overstock
• Out of season
• Returns
• Refurbished

Benefits:

• Buy liquidation inventory directly from large retailers and manufacturers
• Peace of mind in purchasing authentic inventory
• Purchased inventory can be shipped to eBay seller’s location or arrange to pick-up
• Alerted to new inventory opportunities

Founded in 2008, B-Stock Solutions creates private marketplaces for large retailers, manufacturers and liquidators enabling them to offer their inventory direct to eBay sellers.

The Importance of Trial Order Shipments when Testing a new Supplier by Worldwide Brands

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.

Article #10 - Importance of the Trial Shipment

As a Seller on eBay, whether you are selling in an eBay Auction or through an eBay Store, we strongly recommend you place a ‘Trial Order’ from your wholesale supplier or drop shipper for each product you plan to sell before you put them item up on eBay. This is especially important if you are going to rely on drop shipping. There are many reasons for doing this:

1. You need to check the quality of the product your customers will receive.
2. You need to check the quality of the packaging.
3. You need to check that the wholesaler correctly inserts any marketing materials you are paying them to include with each shipment.
4. You need to check the delivery time for a shipment. [Remember eBay rewards those eBay Sellers who provide the best buying experience. Avoid those low score DSRs buy testing an order first.]

Some sellers may be concerned about ordering a test order. Remember, once you have inspected it for quality, you can repackage it and ship it from your inventory (so long as it has not been used in any way.) You will still be able to recover the cost of the item. If there is ever an out of stock situation, you will also be able to quickly supply the product from your own personal inventory to the customer.

With eBay selling you need to be confident you will provide a great buying experience for your customers. Rather than wait for customer complaints that may affect your DSR ratings with eBay, you should put the wholesaler to the test first.

One of the applications now available in Selling Manager Applications or eBay's App Store (check out your “My eBay" and look for a new tab labeled "Applications") is the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool.

The Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool contains a wholesaler database, education modules and education series called: “The Whole $ale.” This series has many chapters to coach eBay Sellers on best practices in working with wholesalers. Sign up for either eBay Selling Manager or eBay Selling Manager Pro and you can then access the Selling Manager Applications directory and the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool.

Check out Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool for eBay today! A 7 Day Free Trial is available.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Service Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

How to Contact and Build a Relationship with Wholesale Suppliers by Worldwide Brands

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.

Article #9 - Make the Call to the Wholesale Supplier

How should your calls to a wholesale supplier be conducted?

Things to Consider Before Calling

• Check the time zone and select a good time
• Have NO distracting noises in the background
• Have a prepared message in case you reach voicemail
• You have 5 seconds to capture the sales representative’s interest
• Remember WIIFM: “What’s In It For Me?” (this is what the wholesale representative is thinking!)
• Get to the point quickly
• Lead with your sales goals and your business information
• Remember that you need them more than they need you
• Remember they are thinking: “WIIFM?”
• Ask what they require from a new retailer?
• Read the suppliers policies and procedures before calling

Remember What You are Looking For

• Agreement to open an account.
• Confidential Price List
• Easy method of uploading products, product information and quality images
• Clear understanding of the purchase process
• Clear understanding of the ship cycle and order processing time frame

How to Build a Relationship with the Wholesale Representative

• Maintain regular contact but don’t repeatedly email or call your wholesale representative with one or two questions. Try to save all your questions for one email or phone call in the week.
• Provide feedback on how your website is doing
• Build a good relationship and your wholesale rep will help you with:

Early announcement of specials

• Early announcement of new product
• Promotions for your current product range
• Ensure suppliers are aware of quick shipping turnaround requirements
• Check inventory levels daily
• Provide feedback to your wholesalers about what is working best for you

For more information on dealing successfully with wholesalers, read the Wholesale Tips provided in eBay’s Certified Provider Blog and consider using the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool in eBay’s Seller Manager section of “My eBay.”

eBay Educational Support

One of the applications now available in Selling Manager Applications (check out your “My eBay" and look for a new tab labeled "Applications") is the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool.

The Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool contains a wholesaler database, education modules and education series called: “The Whole $ale.” This series has many chapters to coach eBay Sellers on best practices in working with wholesalers. Sign up for either eBay Selling Manager or eBay Selling Manager Pro and you can then access the Selling Manager Applications directory and the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool.

Check out Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool for eBay today! A 7 Day Free Trial is available.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

Understanding and Creating Relationships with Wholesalers for More Profitable Product Sourcing by Worldwide Brands

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.

Article #8 - Understanding Wholesalers

eBay beginners and PowerSellers who make money from selling products regularly on eBay need to understand wholesalers. To grow your business, you need excellent relationships with wholesalers that support you as an online retailer and understand the requirements of customers, and eBay, in delivering an awesome buying experience.

Like you, wholesalers are in business to make money. They have to take big risks to ensure continuity of product supply. The wholesaler is, of course, not the manufacturer. Manufacturers may sell directly to some huge retail buyers like Wal*Mart, Target, etc...but a manufacturer does not sell directly to a retailer. Manufacturers like to manufacture in large quantities and ship in bulk container loads to a limited number of big volume buyers. Manufacturers select wholesalers in different locations who will buy in bulk from them, store the inventory, and manage the sale of goods to hundreds and thousands of retailers who buy in large, medium and small quantities.

Wholesalers take risks in holding inventory. So how does the wholesaler make money? Wholesalers who beat the following challenges remain in business:

• Fast inventory turn
  Wholesalers who receive inventory and turn it into orders rapidly can make money. The best cash flow option for the wholesaler is to sell the entire inventory of a product and receive payment from retailers before the wholesaler has to pay the manufacturer.
• High volume transactions to build profits
  Typically, wholesalers don’t make a large profit margin per item. So they need to sell a lot of items. With more items sold, cumulatively they make more profit.
• Keep operating costs to a minimum
  Wholesalers need to ship large volumes of product without getting involved in complex handling, packaging, shipping and billing issues. Wholesalers keep staff levels to a minimum so you typically cannot expect wholesaler personnel to spend hours supporting any retailer. Retailers must know what they want, know what they’re doing, must place orders, and get on with selling without making demands on the wholesaler.
• Manage the Manufacturer’s Brands
  Manufacturers require that wholesalers protect the integrity of their brands. If a manufacturer makes a high quality product, with higher prices and good margins, the manufacturer requires its wholesaler to be discriminating about who can sell that brand, and how the wholesaler prices the brand to its retailers. Sometimes a wholesaler is not allowed to sell a brand to an online retailer because of the threat of price wars on the Internet that can drag down the perception of the brand as a quality and expensive range of products.
• Manufacturers have their own Language
  If you want to communicate well with a wholesaler, you need to know their own language – the shorthand of wholesale transactions. Wholesalers use words like: MSRP, FOB, etc. If you are not familiar with these terms, eBay has been running a Blog sequence that explains each one. It’s worth your while to review this series of twenty common wholesale terms.

Why is all this important to eBay Selling?
You need an excellent relationship with your wholesale sales representative. The sales representative can make or break your success selling their brands. eBay Sellers with good relationships have sales representatives tip them off to new products to sell well in eBay Auctions or through eBay Stores. If your wholesale sales representative likes you, and your volume of business, they might tip you off early to special deals with great pricing. If the manufacturer, or wholesaler, decides to offer promotional specials, you need your wholesale sales representative to let you know quickly.

You can only build a relationship like this if you understand how your wholesaler operates. The online retailer must always act swiftly and always in a professional manner.

eBay Educational Support
One of the applications now available in Selling Manager Applications (check out your “My eBay" and look for a new tab labeled "Applications") is the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool.

The Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool contains a wholesaler database, education modults and education series called: “The Whole $ale.” This series has many chapters to coach eBay Sellers on best practices in working with wholesalers. Sign up for either eBay Selling Manager or eBay Selling Manager Pro and you can then access the Selling Manager Applications directory and the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool.

Check out Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool for eBay today! A 7 Day Free Trial is available.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

Preparing to Contact a Wholesaler (What to Do and Expect) - by Worldwide Brands

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.

Article #7 - Preparing to Call a Wholesaler

If you are new to selling on eBay, you are probably facing that time when you must make your first call to a genuine wholesale supplier. You want to open an account with them. You need to begin a fruitful relationship where you will have a continuous supply of products to sell in eBay Auctions or via your eBay Stores. There are steps Worldwide Brands recommends you should do before making the first call:

What Must You Do Before Contacting a Wholesale Supplier to Open an Account?
It is better to do some homework about the wholesaler BEFORE you make that critical call. For example:

• Have you done your market and product research?
• Do you know what products you are going to sell and why?
• Have you studied the wholesaler’s website?
• Have you read their Terms of Use, Policies and Procedures?

If you haven’t done this research, you can now access information on wholesale suppliers within My eBay! Worldwide Brands has created an application to help eBay sellers find products and wholesalers. This new application is part of the new eBay Selling Manager Applications feature. Sellers can subscribe to the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool and access supplier, product and trend information. (See our previous Blogs on how to perform rapid product and supplier research.)

Prepare the Flow of the Call
Remember, when you call the wholesale supplier representatives, they are interested only in WIIFM [What’s in it for Me?]. When you make the call, there are a lot of things that you want to know,for example:

• Does the wholesaler allow their products to be sold online specifically on eBay? [If they say no, ask why in an informative way.]
• Do they have support for other online retailers?
• Do they perform single item drop shipping?
• What is included in the drop ship fee?
• Does the supplier offer extended service hours?
• Have they tested how their products sell online?
• Will they open an account for you?
• Will they provide a Confidential Price List?
• How will they provide product images, descriptions and specifications?

Address the Wholesale Representative’s needs first. What interests the wholesale representative?

• What products will you sell?
• To whom will you sell them?
• How many will you sell?
• When will you start selling?
• When will you start ordering?
• In what order volumes?

What will the wholesale representative want from you?

• Business credentials
• Sales Tax ID Number
• Trade References
• Business Credit Card
• Purchase Order

When you start by giving the wholesale representative information they need first, you start building a relationship. If you start by asking a ton of questions about the things that are important to you, you lose the interest of the wholesale representative within seconds.

Following a Positive Call with a Wholesale Supplier, what do you want to receive?

• Account Number
• Confidential Price List
• Purchase Order Process
• Payment Terms
• Digital images
• Product descriptions (not always best for SEO)
• Product details and specs
• Proper packaging
• Customized packaging (if available)
• Video clips (if available)

Benefit from these and many other helpful education modules with tips available from Worldwide Brands.

Check out Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool today! A 7 Day Free Trial is available.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

How to Manage Your Suppliers Information within eBay - by Worldwide Brands

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.


Article #6 - Managing Your Supplier Information within eBay


How do you get information about genuine wholesale suppliers (not middlemen) who will directly support an online retailer and allow you to sell their products on eBay? How do you keep track of all your product searches and each Supplier's details?


eBay sellers can now subscribe to the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool for eBay as part of the Selling Manager Applications, also known as eBay's App Store. Everything you need to know about a Supplier before you call them is provided in one easy-to-use location, accessed from within your Selling Manager account.

In order to subscribe/add various selling applications to your eBay account, you will need sign-up for Selling Manager or Selling Manager Pro. Selling Manager is now free! Sign up here.


What Do You Need to Know about a Supplier?
Apart from the Supplier’s name, address, website and contact details, you need to know if they allow the sale of their products on eBay. You need to know what method they will use to ship orders to your customers and you need to understand their fees - especially their drop ship fee if you are going to rely on drop shipping to start eBay selling. You certainly want to have a clear understanding of the wholesale products they carry.


In the video below, you will see an extract of the kind of information now available to eBay Sellers through the Worldwide Brands application in eBay’s Selling Manager.

In addition to what you see in the extract, the eBay Seller can view more details about brand names and the full range of product types carried by each wholesale supplier. To accelerate the process of opening an account, Worldwide Brands provides automated account setup form. The system auto fills the form with the information from your own setup file allowing you to complete the form rapidly and email it from within Selling Manager and get it to the wholesaler before you make that all important first call.

At the press of a button, the system allows you to save each of your preferred wholesalers in the “Suppliers” section of you system so that you can recall their information without repeated searching. There is also a quick reference alphabetic listing of brands and products to help you locate specific items rapidly.

eBay’s focus is to help eBay Sellers reduce the amount of time it takes to find the right products for eBay selling. View this short video to see how it works.

Check out Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool today! 7 Day Free Trial is available.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

How to Use the Selling Manager Applications Product Sourcing Tool by Worldwide Brands

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.


Article #5 - Using the Product Research Tool


To sell successfully on eBay you need a regular supply of quality products at the right price from reputable and reliable wholesale suppliers. You also need current information about demand and supply on the Internet. You need to know who you will be competing with; and you certainly need information about competitive prices.


How Do You Perform Product Research Quickly?
You can do keyword searches on Google for hours. You can explore thousands of wholesale websites looking for products to sell. You can call hundreds of wholesalers – even manufacturers – to establish if they will support an online retailer and allow you to sell their products on eBay. Doing it this way takes an enormous amount of time and is a lot of work. But you need to start selling quickly to make money.


eBay sellers can now subscribe to the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool for eBay as part of the Selling Manager Applications, also known as eBay's App Store. In order to subscribe/add various selling applications to your eBay account, you will need sign-up for Selling Manager or Selling Manager Pro. Selling Manager is now free! Sign up here.


In addition to eBay’s excellent education resources and tools, a number of additional productivity tools are offered for sale by eBay’s Certified Solution Providers. One of these is Worldwidebrand's Product Research Tool and Wholesale Database of more than 8,000 wholesale suppliers including drop shippers, light bulk wholesalers, volume wholesalers, importers and liquidators.


Quick video tour will show you how you can save time with the Product Sourcing tool.

Check out Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool today! 7 Day Free Trial is available.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

How to Research and Find Profitable Products to Sell on eBay - by Worldwide Brands

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.

Article #4 - Doing Your Product Research

If you want to make money selling on eBay, you need to select products that people are searching to buy on eBay, or searching the Internet to find. This requires careful initial product research and then ongoing product research. You need to be able to compare profits from drop shipping to profits from wholesale products purchased in volume or Light Bulk Wholesale.

Product Research can be boiled down to two things:

1. Will this product make me money?
2. Will this product fit my current budget?

You can figure this out before you start spending money trying to sell on eBay.

You need to do:

• Keyword Research - How will people find you?
• Competition Research - Who is selling against you? How, and at what price?
• Profit Research - Selling Price – (Wholesale + Advertising + Shipping) = Profit
• Advertising Research - What’s the cost of instant traffic? Which keywords are cheaper?

You need to find your niche. There’s too much competition trying to sell mainstream products. You need to identify a focused group of products that people want to buy that are not being offered by mainstream retailers. For example: Main Category: “Home Décor;” Sub Category: “Floor Items;” but a niche is: “throw rugs.” A niche is three or four levels below a Main Category.

eBay’s main focus is getting Traffic to your offerings and helping you convert browsers to customers. Through PayPal, eBay also helps you manage revenue collection. eBay also focuses on helping eBay Sellers with excellent education and tools to accelerate eBay selling. In the “My eBay” section of eBay.com, eBay Sellers can now start using eBay’s Selling Manager at no cost. Within Selling Manager are paid applications offered by a selection of eBay’s leading Certified Providers and eBay Developers.

In addition to eBay’s excellent education, these Certified Providers offer education associated with their unique and individual applications for eBay.

eBay sellers can now subscribe to the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool for eBay Selling Manager Applications and have a tool that provides product research, determining your niche, what to sell and where to source it.

From the Member Center in the Worldwide Brands Tool, you can perform the four key research tasks to determine if the products you want to sell will make you money and if it will fit in your budget. There is even education and webinars available that explain simple market research and provide help in identifying niches. You must subscribe to this application within My eBay and the eBay Selling Applications Directory in order to use this resource.

As the screen capture below shows, you can access the market research and product research tool, supplier contact information; and education all through one window and without leaving the Selling Manager section of eBay.

Below are screenshots of the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool for eBay to give you a visual idea of how the tool works and benefits eBay sellers.

Check out Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool today! 7 Day Free Trial is available.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

Building a Profitable Business on eBay by Worldwide Brands

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.

Article #3 - Building a Profitable Business

So you’re thinking of selling on eBay, or perhaps you have already started selling through eBay Auctions or an eBay Store. What’s your goal for doing this? Are you out to make money from a single ‘virtual garage sale’? Do you just want to clear your attic? Or are you serious about building a steady income from sales on eBay?

If your goal is to ‘Build a Profitable Business’ then you need to get serious about it from the beginning. There are phases most people seem to go through when building a business with eBay. The sequence may differ from person to person but these are the typical building phases:

1. Start Up Phase – selling a few products through eBay Auctions
2. First eBay Store – establishing a niche identity for a group of products
3. Combined eBay Store AND eBay Auctions – complementing each other

To build a profitable business, you’re going to need Wholesale suppliers to supply products. A common method eBay sellers use is called drop shipping. The eBay Seller creates their auction or store by uploading product images and detailed description and then waits for order the order to arrive. When a browser turns into a customer, the eBay Seller instantly places an order with their drop ship supplier who ships the product from their inventory directly to the customer.

Drop shipping has its conveniences but it also has its draw backs. The wholesale drop shipper has to charge a Drop Ship Fee to recover the cost of the extra work required in handling single item shipments. The eBay Seller earns less profit per item in a drop ship product sale. The eBay Seller is also at the mercy of the drop shipper for the quality of the packing, and the speed of shipment and delivery. Late or damaged deliveries lead to poor feedback and bad eBay Detailed Seller Ratings (DSRs).

Expanding Beyond Drop Shippers
The best way to build a business is by purchasing product in bulk quantities. Many eBay Sellers, as they make some cash surpluses, contact selected wholesale suppliers to negotiate small quantities of inventory at better than drop ship prices. This is classified as Light Bulk Wholesale inventory. Typically eBay Sellers do this with the products that are in highest demand. With better wholesale pricing, comes a better profit margin. As business grows, an eBay Seller can then contact their wholesaler and negotiate volume wholesale pricing on high demand products with even better than light bulk margins.

Fulfilling Orders from Your Own Inventory
Depending on the quantity and size of the product, an eBay Seller may find a need for storage space and also staff to pick, pack and ship per the orders received. Many sellers successfully use their own home as a storage facility; however if the need arises, there are two main options available:

• Fulfillment Centers
  Most cities have companies who act as ‘Fulfillment Centers.’ You can have your inventory shipped to them and they store, pick, pack and ship your orders and manage your inventory for you. They charge a fee for this, of course.
• Own Warehouses or Storage Unit
  The more profitable and larger you grow, the more likely that you will get into your own warehouse space and employ others to pick, pack and ship for you.
• Continuous Product Sourcing is essential to growing your eBay business
  Excellent Product Sourcing is required every step of the way in building your profitability and your business. Product and wholesaler selection, wholesale pricing and product demand is critical. An eBay seller needs to make sure they’re working directly with a real wholesale supplier who allow their inventory to be sold on eBay.

The Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool can be purchased and used without leaving the Selling Manager section of ‘My eBay.’ Sellers can find products to sell on eBay, within eBay!

With this tool, eBay Sellers can use keywords to:

• Research the recent Internet-based demand for such a product
• Obtain a complete picture of the current Supply and Competition status
• Obtain current pricing information for sales of the product in auctions and in retail.
• Obtain the direct contact details for verified wholesale suppliers who will Drop Ship or supply in Light Bulk, Volume Wholesale quantities, Liquidation lots and imports.
• Learn how to successfully conduct continuous product sourcing to grow your eBay business.

Check out Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool today! 7 Day Free Trial is available.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

Getting Started with Product Sourcing, a Product Sourcing Checklist by Worldwide Brands

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.

Article #2 - Your GPS for Getting Started – A Product Sourcing Checklist

Why do people like a GPS? It tells them exactly where to go, when to turn and even when to make that irritating U-turn! eBay and Worldwide Brands recognize that Beginners starting eBay selling may need some help and direction. We have developed a Product Sourcing Checklist with tips and videos to steer you in the right direction for excellent Product Sourcing. This checklist takes you from drop shipping to expanding and growing your business.

Beginners to eBay selling have a rich set of education materials available to them on eBay. All these tools are easily accessed through the dashboard provided by eBay’s Selling Manager. eBay’s Selling Manager is now available free in the “My eBay” section of the www.ebay.com.

One of the application solutions available for purchase through eBay’s Selling Manager is the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool and wholesale drop shipping database. You can source products from within Selling Manager without leaving the eBay selling platform.

Worldwide Brands provides a Getting Started Checklist for eBay Members looking to find products to sell on eBay. Users can access this checklist by selecting the Getting Started Checklist link from the list of menu items in the Worldwide Brands Member Center.

This checklist covers the following eleven important Getting Started steps:

1. Learn eBay’s Essentials
2. Decide whether Auctions or eBay Store First
3. Establish a Legal Business
4. Get a Business Bank Account
5. Determine What You’re Going to Sell
6. Don’t Just Call Your 1st Wholesale Supplier – Prepare First
7. Start Calling Wholesalers On Your Preferred Products List
8. Get Ready to Collect Your Money!
9. Create your eBay Store or eBay Auction listings.
10. Tell the World Where You Are!
11. Repeat These Steps to Grow Your Business

The checklist contains more detail for each step on this list. It provides pointers as to what to do and how to get it done quickly. It also has links to useful education videos and helpful resources.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

Finding Products to Sell on eBay with Worldwide Brands

Article by Worldwide Brands - this is a series of 14 blog posts providing information on how to find inventory and products to sell on eBay from wholesalers with Worldwide Brands and their Product Sourcing Tool for eBay.

Article #1 - Finding Products to Sell on eBay

Did you know you can now source products to sell on eBay without leaving the Selling Manager section of “My eBay”? The Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool is now available within eBay’s Selling Manager. eBay Sellers can access more than 8,000 wholesale suppliers, including drop shippers, representing more than 8,000,000 products. eBay selling has taken on a whole new dimension taking eBay auction listings and eBay Stores well beyond just drop shipping. Once you have purchased a Worldwide Brands Membership, you will have unlimited access to verified wholesale suppliers with details on product category, brands, product types and wholesaler contact details. This puts you directly in contact with the right wholesale drop shipper or light bulk wholesaler with no intervening ‘middleman.’ You can also enjoy video and audio education guiding you on how to enhance your customer experience and eBay selling through real product sourcing.

Why is REAL product sourcing important for eBay Sellers?

Great Buyer Experiences Begin with Excellent Product Sourcing
Successful sales depend on great Buyer Experiences and excellent buyer feedback (otherwise known as your DSR ratings). But a great Buyer Experience begins with excellent product sourcing:

• Buyers gravitate to your listings when you list the products they are searching to buy. This requires up-to-date internet-based market research and a source of products that can be sold on eBay.
• Buyers flock to competitively priced products. This requires sources of wholesale supply. You need to find quality at the right selling prices and with sufficient profit margin. Excellent supplier research is critical.
• Buyers notice products that have tempting images with compelling SEO-rich descriptions. This requires careful keyword research and correct keyword usage in product descriptions. Wholesale suppliers will provide images and basic descriptions, which can be enhanced to improve your listing quality.
• A Seller needs to have the ability to cross-sell other products within the same niche. When selecting a wholesale supplier, a seller needs to remember this and select their first supplier with a wide range of SKUs in order to list products faster. A customer is more likely to buy from a listing, which shows additional options that they can purchase.
• Buyers require good deals on shipping and fast shipments to destination. If a seller is going to use a drop shipper or wholesale supplier, they will need to confirm the policies and procedures of those suppliers to ensure timely shipping.

eBay Sellers need to perform all this research quickly. The Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool allows eBay Sellers to do all this without leaving eBay’s Selling Manager.

How the Product Sourcing Tool Helps

For the past 10 years, Worldwide Brands researchers have been qualifying and certifying drop shippers and wholesale suppliers willing to work with eBay retailers. Here’s how eBay Sellers already use the Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool. Using a selected product keyword, eBay Sellers search:

• To determine a current demand and supply for a selected product
• To find associated keywords to use in their auction listings and product descriptions
• To identify wholesale suppliers who will work with eBay Sellers including Volume Wholesalers, Light Bulk Wholesalers, Drop Shippers, and Liquidation Suppliers
• To conduct competition and pricing research

This quick video tour will show you how you can save time with this tool.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

eBay Workshop Sept 22nd - Research and Find Products to Sell on eBay, within eBay!

Workshop: New Selling Manager Applications - "Research and Find Products to Sell on eBay, within eBay!"

Host: Worldwide Brands
Date: September 22nd, Tuesday
Time: 11AM - Noon PST
Location: eBay Workshop Board

Description: Finding drop ship suppliers and wholesale suppliers that allow their products to be sold on eBay just became 1 GIANT step easier. Now you can access Worldwide Brands Product Sourcing Tool for eBay quickly and easily in your eBay account with the release of Selling Manager Applications for Selling Manager and Selling Manager Pro.

Join us in this workshop to discover why finding drop ship and wholesale suppliers is much simpler than you think. We have video, images, and lots of educational content to show you exactly how it works.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider.

Visit http://certifiedprovider.ebay.com/ to learn more about eBay Certified Providers and the services and solutions they offer to help eBay sellers.

Visit the eBay Workshop Calendar to see all upcoming workshops and also to review past workshops.

Understanding Trade Reference When Purchasing from Wholesalers by Worldwide Brands

By Chris Malta, Founder & CEO of Worldwide Brands

Wholesale Tips Series - How to find wholesalers, doing business with a wholesaler, what to expect when purchasing from wholesalers and more.

Tip #20

If you want an account with a genuine wholesale supplier, they will first need to determine your credit worthiness. The wholesaler’s credit department will ask you for Trade References. In a Trade Reference, you provide contact details for businesses that have traded with your business in the past. You provide a telephone (fax or email address). The wholesaler’s credit department will contact people you have previously bought from in order to research your purchase, payment and credit history.

If you are a new eBay Seller, you may not have any prior business credit history. You will have no option but to pay up front using your credit card until you have established a good track record of purchasing and paying on time with your wholesale supplier. Remember, this wholesale supplier will become a Trade Reference to help you secure credit terms with other wholesalers (provided your payment history with that wholesaler is good.)

This article concludes the "Wholesale Tip Series" by Worldwide Brands. To read all the articles (1-20) in this series, click here.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

Is Purchasing Product "At Cost" from Wholesalers a Good Idea? by Worldwide Brands

Article by Chris Malta, CEO & Founder of Worldwide Brands


Wholesale Tips Series - How to find wholesalers, doing business with a wholesaler, what to expect when purchasing from wholesalers and more.

Tip #19

What should Buyers expect when their wholesale supplier offers to sell a product: At Cost? It may mean different things, so do your research carefully. To sell At Cost, a wholesaler will make no profit. When they say At Cost, the wholesaler will be selling to you at exactly what it cost them to buy the goods from the manufacturer.

Think of this, if the wholesaler can’t sell the items to any retailer, how do you expect to sell the items to any of your buyers? You should always use your Product Sourcing tool (from Worldwide Brands) to determine the current demand for the product on the web before you place orders for At Cost items. If people are searching for these items and seem willing to buy, this may be a bargain that you’ll make some money out of. Alternatively, you could be selling 'at cost' or even 'below cost' to get rid of the inventory.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

Understanding SKU and Variety of Products from Wholesalers by Worldwide Brands

By Chris Malta, Founder & CEO of Worldwide Brands

Wholesale Tips Series - How to find wholesalers, doing business with a wholesaler, what to expect when purchasing from wholesalers and more.

Tip #18

“SKU” is a highly used wholesale term you hear frequently when dealing with genuine wholesale suppliers. SKU stands for Stock Keeping Unit.

A SKU is a number. It is the unique number assigned to a product type by the wholesaler. It could a product number or a model number. When you hear that your wholesale supplier carries 8,000 SKUs, it means they inventory 8,000 unique products. The wholesaler may have millions of units in stock but they are grouped into 8,000 unique products.

The wholesaler will typically assign three SKUs to identify a product that has three different colors. There will be one SKU for each color so that the wholesaler’s staff can cross-check that they have picked the correct product to match your purchase order. This is not like your Social Security Number a number with only one number per product. The SKU is a number that is unique to each item type that can be picked and packed for shipment.

It's just that simple.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

Understanding How Wholesalers Handle Shipment Returns by Worldwide Brands

By Chris Malta, Founder & CEO of Worldwide Brands


Wholesale Tips Series - How to find wholesalers, doing business with a wholesaler, what to expect when purchasing from wholesalers and more.

Tip #17

When you source or purchase product from a wholesaler or a dropshipper, you need to understand how they deal with returns. RA or RMA are terms wholesale suppliers use when dealing with RETURNS. RA is used for "Return Authorization". RMA is used for "Return Merchandise Authorization".

You cannot just return a shipment to your wholesale supplier. Your customers should be required to follow a disciplined Return Process before attempting to return something you have shipped them. Your wholesale supplier will want you first to contact them to alert them to the need for a return and to provide the reasons for the return. You should require your customers to do the same by getting them to first contact you. The required process should be clearly stated in the Returns Policy in your eBay listings.

*Note, on Sept 22nd eBay will require all listings to have selected a Return Policy. Even if the Return Policy is that a seller does not accept returns, it must be selected*

When your wholesale supplier agrees to accept a return item or shipment, they will assign you an RA Number. Sometimes the method of return may be affected by the cause of the return or the circumstances. Sometimes the supplier may arrange a UPS or FedEx pre-paid pick up. Always clearly mark the RA number outside the return package before shipping it back to your wholesaler. The wholesale supplier will pass you a credit once they receive the goods.

Wholesale drop shippers typically require a similar process and your customer or eBay buyer must know to contact you first and request a replacement. You then contact your wholesale supplier to request the RA approved number. At the same time arrange a replacement order. Some drop shippers send a replacement product after issuing the RA number and even before the return reaches them. These are good wholesale suppliers to use since they help provide a better Buyer experience and help minimize your negative feedback on eBay.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.

Learn How to Build Credit and Purchasing History with Wholesalers by Worldwide Brands

By Chris Malta, Founder & CEO of Worldwide Brands

Wholesale Tips Series - How to find wholesalers, doing business with a wholesaler, what to expect when purchasing from wholesalers and more.

Tip #16

“Net 30” is a term used in association with payments. It specifies the credit terms your wholesaler allows you. When Net 30 appears on your order and invoice, you have been extended 30 days of credit from the date of the invoice before you have to pay for the goods listed on the invoice. There’s an advantage to having terms of payment. The payment terms allow you time to sell the invoiced products, and receive the cash from your customers, before you must PAY the wholesale supplier for the goods.

New eBay Sellers cannot expect to get Net 30 terms from the wholesale supplier from the start. Wholesale suppliers credit departments determine credit terms based on your business credit HISTORY. Your personal credit history might help you secure an account but it’s your buying performance that secures you terms. Online retailers must typically start by paying cash up front for all purchases or by using a credit card. Once you have developed a good purchase and payment history, your wholesale supplier will consider your request for credit terms. The volume you buy will determine if you can get Net 30 or better.

You begin building your business credit history from the point you first order and pay for goods from the wholesale supplier.

Worldwide Brands is an eBay Certified Solution Provider, providing product sourcing access and information for eBay sellers. They are the publishers of an extensive directory of legitimate, fully-verified ecommerce wholesalers and manufacturers.