How to sell unwanted goods online

It’s common knowledge that the web is a great place to pick up a bargain. But as well as helping you save cash, the internet can also be a great place to make a bob or two.

When it comes to offloading unwanted stuff online, many people’s minds instantly turn to Ebay. Of course, Ebay is very popular and with such a big audience it is a reliable way to sell everything from a single unwanted DVD to an entire loft-full of old junk or even a high-value item, such as a car.

But Ebay doesn’t have the monopoly over second-hand online sales. These days, it’s just as easy for sellers to put their goods up for sale in other well-known online shops, such as Amazon, which cater to specific products such as CDs and DVDs.

Many people dismiss the idea of selling goods online, assuming that it is far too complicated. In fact, it’s surprisingly straightforward and in this article we are going to provide you with all the practical knowledge needed to flog all kinds of items.

We will also reveal some clever selling techniques that can vastly improve your chances of getting a good price for the products you sell.

Where to sell
While it’s possible to set up a bespoke shop of your own (see ‘The bigger sell’ below), for most private sellers there are three main routes to choose from: auction sites, classified listings sites and online retailers that offer a platform for users to sell items directly to one another.

Ebay is easily the best-known and biggest online auction but certainly isn’t the only one. Others include Ebid and CQ Out. There are also any number of pay-to-bid ‘penny’ auction sites, including Madbid and Bidbid, though we won’t be covering these in this article, since they don’t allow users to sell their own items.

Classified ad websites include the online incarnations of familiar print-based listings services, such as Loot and Auto Trader, along with web-only private-sales sites, such as Preloved. There are also dozens of local and regional classified sites that provide the facility to sell directly to people in your area.

Other classified websites specialise in particular types of product, such as maritime or sports goods, for example. Click here to see a useful list of local and specialist classified websites.

And then there are the marketplaces provided by big-name online retailers, such as Amazon and Play. Squaring up to monolithic outfits such as these may initially seem like a David and Goliath situation but, in fact, it’s something that both companies actively encourage via their respective user sell-through services, Amazon Marketplace and Playtrade.