If you are looking to sell online or are already selling online in a product niche or several product niches then you may be aware of Trade Magazines for your niche. Now some of you may be getting these already,while others think it is just not worth the time seeing if there is a magazine then applying to receive them on a monthly basis. I need you to think again, if you are into online selling to make money either full or part time then you need a subscription to a trade magazine or several depending how many niches you are in or looking to go into.

Now some of the magazines are free of charge, and yes these free ones are normally high gloss thick magazines. But at times there will be charge and this can be for a few dollars right up to several hundred

dollars. This all depends on the niche you are in, and the type of retailer they are reaching.

So What Is In A Trade Magazine ?

Before I start I would like to say a trade magazine or publication, can be a thick gloss magazine or it can be a thin photo-copied newsletter and even at times an e -mail, plus it can be  mixture of them all. The publication can come out daily, weekly, monthly or every year, again this will depend on the niche you are in.

Within the trade publication you will find facts about products that are selling well, products that are not selling and also products companies are about to discontinue. Now have your product sourcing hat on here as you read this section, if you see a product line that sells well and is about to be discontinued, buy some, hang on to them for a bit then sell them, and you should get some very good prices for them when you sell.

Quite often there will be sections on marketing, interviews with other retailers where they share their "Trade Secrets" with fellow traders. Very often there will be a section in the Trade Publication where manufacturers, wholesalers, and import agents tell people about new products they are bringing out and the dates they will be launched.

Now the wholesale section alone is worth the price of the magazine if you had to pay. Just think you working from home will have the same information as the buyers at Walmart, Sam’s Club, Macy’s, Harrods will have, you will be on the same level as them. For a product sourcing, and product knowledge you cannot beat have several Trade Magazines and emails once a month land on you desk.

If you do not already have a trade publication or do not know where to get hold of one, go over to Google and type in what niche you are in followed by +Trade Publication this should give you the trade magazines within your niche.

As an eBay Education Specialist I am asked time and time again, “what should I sell on eBay ?”, or another question is “How do I know this will sell?” Well there are some very simple methods.

1) Ask you Children and their friends if this is a product they would buy……. Children are always up on these things
2) Ask people at work – you can get a good felling if people say yes or no, but also ask them why.
3) Ask family and friends.
4) You can look online and look at Google.

Now while all those are good and very often I will use at least one of those, for if everyone says yes I almost have the answer to “What Should I Sell On eBay “. I would buy one and it all fails at least you know you will get your money back or just make a small loss. But there is another way which can give you all the information you would ever need and then some. You would be able to see what is known as sell through rate………..

This is a % figure that tells you if a product is good or not, for instance is it says the sell through rate is 25 % then you would have a 1 in 4 chance of selling but if it say’s 100% you know for every item you put up for auction it will sell.You can see what the best day and time to list and finish an item, you can spy on what others are selling and how well their items are selling.Now the cheap way is to go into eBay, click on advanced search, the type in the item you want to search for and click on completed lists, very soon you get a listing back.Now click on sort from highest to lowest and look for all the green listing (this means they have sold), now you can click on on each listing and make a note.OK I can hear you say, Andrew I do not have the time for all this, Ok I know it takes time but would you rather take the time now than end up with boxes of item you cannot sell. But stop, take a deep breath, there is a way, there are software programs and websites out there that for a small fee will allow you to tap into their data-base (This data base is a direct feed from eBay) and from this data base it is all laid out into graphs, charts and listings. all you need to do is add the keyword, click a few buttons and within seconds you get all the information in front of you. If you use this information, you will be way ahead of others who just buy and sell blind or use the long way I mentioned earlier. And very soon your sales will go up and even better the items you list will be selling better as you now know what to list, on what day and what time. I have tried many of the programs and my currant favourite is Terapeak, they seem to know what they are doing, and lay out all the data from eBay in an easy to understand fashion.

Hope this answers your question to “What Should I Sell On eBay”