Welcome back to another episode of the Reseller's
Mindset Podcast. My name is Mike, also known
as the Used Book Guy on YouTube, along with my
friend and fellow full -time reseller, Johnny
B. We help people start and grow their reselling
businesses from the ground up. We also have a
weekly Zoom call and private Discord for all
YouTube members. Head on over to youtube .com
backslash usedbookguy to join the channel and
gain access to the full -length podcast, Zoom
call, and private Discord today. Let's get into
this week's episode. What is up, everybody? Welcome
to another episode of Reseller's Mindset Podcast.
Mike next to Johnny, as always. Today is going
to be a fun topic, especially since Johnny's
more versed in the eBay space and I'm the Amazon
guy. are we doing too little or too much for
the platforms and when we talk about this i guess
the first thing that jumps out is like what are
the actual platform expectations and what extra
things are we doing i think the big one in amazon
land is people over prep their items it's not
required on 99 .9 of media but people will still
you know polybag their items even though they
don't need to be polybag People will still wipe
things down that don't need to be wiped down.
I think in eBay land, as much as we make fun
about it, people put like little chotskies, little
candies in the packages and give free things
away. See, Johnny's like, I'll never do that.
But Johnny's never bought, you know, like something
from like somebody that made something handmade
and you just get their item and you get candy.
Like this has literally happened to me and Deb
because Deb likes to buy a lot of little handmade
stuff off eBay. And like, I think. I think it's
a balancing act. And I think I personally think
overall resellers hold themselves to higher standards
than the platforms do. Yeah, I mean, there's
a lot of that. And then I think in our own heads,
we get caught up more so in customer expectations.
And we want the customer to have a good experience
because. We are dreadfully afraid of the negative
repercussions, like a negative feedback in affecting
our account score or getting a return. And both
of those negative feedback and returns apply
to both platforms there. I think it's a fear
more than anything. Amazon and eBay both have
a this is what's required line, and we tend to
go above that line unnecessarily, I think. Just
out of pure morbid fear. Also, they changed the
rules unexpectedly on us from time to time. And
we were talking about condition notes in one
of the calls we did recently. And we don't got
to do pretty much a lot of the stuff. a lot of
us probably do um i think we over condition our
under greater condition our books like no it's
good or acceptable and it's like no it's kind
of like new and kind of very good and there's
other things of pricing i think we especially
in ebay land we we tend to undervalue our items
and Yeah, you can look at sold comps, but use
your noggin for a second. And here's where you
can play the customer angle. What's the most
you think a customer, you can put yourself in
the customer's shoes here, would actually pay
for it? You should probably price it there. Because
I tell you, I sell $4 books for $30 every day.
And just because I know that's what the customer
is willing to pay at maximum. Now, if you want
a higher sell -through rate, and a lot of you
focus on sell -through rate, that's perfectly
fine. Price your items at $4. Good luck with
that. I think you hit it on the head, dude. A
lot of people, like, they... it's I want to be
the opposite I want to be the guy that like barely
does enough right like they're like hey Mike
if you want to keep selling you need to do this
I'm like okay I think I can fit that in and like
I fitted it at the last second I think a lot
of people either go one way or the fully the
other way it's hard to find the middle ground
people are either like I'm going to take care
of my stuff so good right it's remember like
I remember when I used to merch and fulfill on
Amazon And people would be up in arms because
I put CDs and DVDs and bubble mailers instead
of boxes. And I'm just like, guys, have you ever
gotten an Amazon package? They'll put a single
item in a. box that's 36 inches long, 36 inches
wide. It'll be completely destroyed or they'll
just slap the label on the actual item and throw
it out front. And I think in eBay land, you have
the same thing. You got people that buy like
the most expensive boxes or you got the people
that use the DiGiorno boxes, right? But if you
look at the actual shipping guidelines on eBay,
it doesn't say, you know. please don't use recycled
food boxes. Right. So people were like, well,
I'm kind of, you know, if I'm just going off
what they're telling me here, then when I'm done
eating a DiGiorno, I can ship something in it,
dude. It's, I don't know, man. It's crazy. Yeah.
I mean, and then I think we focus a little too
much on being in the business as well. As far
as. There's a lot of boxes to check in, especially
Amazon, I think. Because you've got to check
for stranded inventory. You've got to check for,
is your repricer working? You've got to do this,
you've got to do that. And all these little subsequent
things. A lot of that for a whole, I don't know,
$3 to $5 an hour can be outsourced to somebody
else to do. There's that whole trust factor.
And you've got to have the capital to, well,
can you afford 3 to 5 hours for 10 hours of work
or 15 hours of work a week? or a month depending
on the level of what's needed um and people i
get it people don't want employees or they don't
want to manage people because a lot of this is
about freedom right and reselling we all just
want personal freedom we don't want anybody else
involved beyond our own hands touching it but
we lose a lot of our freedom when our hands are
touching the little minor things that are kind
of unnecessary for us to touch and And I think
to get that freedom you're claiming you want
and desire, a little bit of outsourcing. I'm
not talking factory -level assembly line, big
warehouse, forklift kind of nonsense. But everybody
can afford a VA once you get past that six -month
hurdle if you're new. If you're new listening
to this, you've got to wait a minute before you
can hire somebody because you've got to figure
out what the heck you need to be checkboxing
on Amazon. On eBay land, since we're pretty much
merchant fulfilling, you can hire a shipper.
It's a no -brainer to print out a label and weigh
an item. Once you scale, you got to be selling
enough to justify that as well. That's the other
benchmark over in eBay land. So I think outsourcing
when you need to, to get your personal freedom
back is kind of a big deal that's undervalued
and most people resist and a lot of them never
do when they need to. Yeah, I think I think it
actually ties into people like trying to do too
much for the platform too fast. Right. Like maybe
they hire somebody because I want to ship my
stuff immediately, but I don't want to ship it.
I'm going to have pay somebody else to ship it.
So like it's it's tough because eBay doesn't
tell you, hey, you need to ship within two days.
Right. Amazon only gives you two days as merchant
to pack and ship your order, regardless whether.
you know you you can't get to the storage unit
it's snowing outside you think amazon cares they
don't give a shit if you're like you're in the
middle of the twister movie and there's cows
flying by your house and it's the second day
and you got to get that out of ship he may monitors
the weather they know there's a blizzard and
they let you know it's okay it's okay your account's
not going to be affected you're a -okay we're
going to give you a week bonus time it's all
good it is kind of scare tactics though man i
think a lot i think in amazon honestly feedback
doesn't matter uh once you get your first view
uh it has no effect on especially if you're fba
even if you're fbm i see people selling on these
listings that have like under 70 feedback they
still exist and ebay it's a little bit different
i don't i think ebay does penalize you if you
do get a lot of uh there's a financial repercussion
if you go under certain scores I don't think
in both platforms, the actual customer feedback,
typing up something matters or your score, but
it does matter. And if the fact, if you get too
much, you're going to take a 10 to 30%, depending
on where you land on being bad out of your payments.
And that's not, I don't like a 10 to 30 % hit.
I agree. It's, you got to know what the line
is. And even if, even if you're the. greatest,
nicest, you put a freshly baked apple pie in
every single one of your orders, right? Or you
ask the customer, what's your favorite pie? And
you bake them one and you send it to them along
with the dirty pair of socks you sold them, right?
You can still get a negative feedback. We see
it all the time in Amazon. Somebody will leave
a feedback for something that's not even a damn
book, right? It's not even something we've ever
sold in our life. And thankfully, we can go get
it removed. Now, I'm not sure what it is in eBay
land when it comes to selling something or you
get a feedback that's for a book and it says
like, hey, this item was broken upon arrival.
It's like, I don't know what the eBay kind of
land or the laws when it comes to that. But Amazon.
If it's FBA, you can get removed. But if it's
FBM, even if it's for the wrong item, you're
fighting an uphill battle just to try to get
this one stupid feedback removed. My mentality
is just go sell more items and eventually the
percentage will just kind of balance itself out.
I think that is the solution to all these crazy
fears that we have about like, if I get a negative
feedback and oh no, what's going to happen? I
think they want us to think that because they
want us to provide the best customer service.
But if you're wasting time and you're spending
extra time on shit that don't matter, it's just
detrimental to your business. Even though you
feel like, oh, this is great for the customer.
Well, if it's not required, I'm here to tell
you, you're playing by the platform rules, not
your own rules. A lot of us have these own requirements
when it comes to our reselling business. I get
it. We have high standards, 100%. But if it's
not required of me, right? Like people that polybag
every single item. I'm happy for you. I'm glad
you have the time to polybag every item. I'm
glad you enjoy polybagging every item. But for
me, Amazon don't care. Listen, I'm right here
in cahoots. I don't care either. What's up, Amazon
sellers? We wanted to take a second to talk about
GoToLister, the software me and Johnny both use
to list and manage our inventory and grow our
businesses. With the fastest listing speeds out
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.com backslash Mike or using the link in the
description below. Yeah, I mean, at EB Land,
it's hard to get something negative reversed
these days. It used to be a lot easier. You could
even do agent shopping if you didn't like what
the agent told you. But they kind of cracked
down on that because the system was being very
much abused. So it kind of just sticks with you
unless you can buy eBay legalese weasel your
way out. Because a lot of the time those issues
the customers have, they're legitimate. I mean,
there's some fraud. There's fraud always across
the board with returns and all that. People sending
rocks back and or using the item for a day and
then returning it. And it's nonsense, right?
What I think we do too little in is. instead
of muddling through and thinking about the day
-to -day, how can I make my business better?
I think those thoughts are, we all have them,
right? But I don't think they're, we kind of
talked about this about my call a little bit.
And I asked the question, how much dedicated
time a week do you put into making your business
better? And the answers varied from a set amount
of time to whenever I'm thinking about it, even
if I'm on the toilet kind of deal. And I don't
think there's a wrong answer there unless you're
not doing it. You have to be doing it. The frequency
and the duration I don't think matters as much
as long as it's being done. It could be a once
a year evaluations. That's what corporations
do pretty much at a council of witches and warlocks.
But I think that's the necessary to not long
suffering. You want to suffer less in your business
because. The more money you can make and the
more streamlined you can make your business,
the better off you and your business will be
as a whole. You'll be able to sleep better, maybe
get a few extra hours sleep, get a few extra
hours of free time and make more money with less
hours being done. That's what we all need to
be focusing on. Yeah, I think you're right. Because
even if we just look back from like the years
since we started doing this, like every year
we've had like some big breakthrough on like.
How we're going to do things differently and
how much more money it's made us that year. I
just give some quick references. We started sending
in the stuff that had no FBA offers on Amazon.
We started sending in the fast moving stuff,
regardless of the amount of offers on the listing
on Amazon. Like those two things alone in the
past two years have probably made me an extra
$50 ,000. So it's like you always have to be
looking for ways to get better. And I think getting
better is not just doing more just to do more.
I think that's that's where people fall down
the slippery slope. I'm just going to do more,
even though there's no monetary gain and the
platform doesn't expect it of me. But hey, I'm
doing more now. I'm spending the extra time and
I'm touching each item for an extra five seconds
than I was prior. I think that's the wrong way
to do it. And I think that's what a lot of people
turn to is like. Yes, I'm doing more now in the
business. Well, are you doing more than what's
expected? Because I'm just going to sit here
and argue with that person every day. Instead
of wiping down and polybagging every single item
that's not required, why don't you just go scan
more profitable items and send them more profitable
items if it's not required? Yeah, and then like
me, I check for interior water damage, not the
exterior that you could see. I start in Amazon.
I wouldn't do this on eBay, but in Amazon, I
question if that's even needed. Probably not.
Because to me, as a book reader, that's a big
deal. But I also look at people's return percentages.
We talk about this frequency. The people not
checking for that, which is like everybody but
me, is nil. It's like a percent difference. So
my caretiss factor, at least in Amazon land,
it's probably got to go down there. That's probably
a change I'll be making soon. Again, I'm not
doing that in eBay because... I know my eBay
customers and I know they check for that stuff,
but Amazon customers probably don't, or they
just, well, I paid 10 bucks for it. Screw it.
I guess it's tough. I guess it's toughest for
you, right? Because you have this Amazon business
that you treat like your firstborn child or every
book has, you know, 300. It's hard for me not
to treat my Amazon business like my eBay. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. You got really, really hard. Yeah.
Yeah. Cause you're like, all right, 300 photos
for this book. Right. And then you go to Amazon
and you're like, well, this thing's probably
acceptable. I'm like, no, dude, that's new. You
got to like flip a switch when you're like, I'm
going to, I'm going to send stuff. I do. I do
have to do that. I'm like, okay. Can't care as
much in Amazon. Even though I make more money
in Amazon. Dude, that is Johnny's guidelines.
That's not what Amazon expects. It's what Johnny
expects. And that's where people get tripped
up. It's easy for me because I don't care about
this stuff. You care like zero. Yeah, I'm just
like, let me max out how much money I can make.
Max out what condition I can send things in.
Oh, the book's in two. I got some scotch tape.
This will be good as new in no time. It's easy
for me, but I think more people are like you
than they are like me when it comes to selling
media or anything in general. I think people
take a lot of care and pride in what they do.
But if it is, I do feel like in a lot of situations,
it does slow down their financial growth and
it does hinder them, the financial aspect of
it. But if you get enjoyment out of... you know,
doing those things and you can account for it
and you're comfortable with the money you make.
We talk about this all the time. I never inspired
to be the mega warehouse seller. I never inspired
to have employees. So for me, I'm comfortable
with the money I make. And if you're that person
and you're comfortable with what you're making
and the results you're getting and you enjoy
doing the extra steps, I don't think there's
anything wrong with it. It's the people that
are like, I want to keep growing. And we're like,
guys like, OK, well, what are you spending your
time on? well it takes me three hours to pack
my five orders for the day right like the bells
go off right away for us and we're like well
what the hell are you doing right and then all
of a sudden it's like well i had these super
nice boxes and i got to get the perfect size
box for the item and then i got to get the perfect
dunnage inside of it like that's those are the
people that suffer yeah i agree with that and
here's the other thing i i see it everywhere
and it's not platform specific is people spend
way too much time in conspiracy theory land either
reading or contributing to and where's the money
in that it's always my question i see no money
in that because that is a thing that is out of
your control and we're just speculating now people
bank on if i can get ahead of the conspiracy
theory craft i can make a lot of money I want
to see how many people have actually done that.
Is there a poll somewhere? Because I'm going
to guess it's a small number. No, I think you're
right. I think a lot of people get easily sidetracked
and they take things into account that don't
exist. Like you said, right? People will literally
change things in their business because some
bozo on YouTube said that if you do this, eBay
will give you more sales, right? I guess that
like, wasn't that whole like... is relist, delist,
relisting like a conspiracy or am I wrong, right?
Like that, I feel like that's the biggest one
I've heard of in resale is like in eBay, you
delist your item or I don't know how it works,
but it's some shit where you delist it and relist
it and it's like magically all of a sudden it's
going to sell. All that is, is you do get a little
algorithm that bump when you list a new item.
So ending your listings and relisting or that
doesn't work in itself, but ending and selling
similar. which is you just made a new listing,
you're going to get a 24 -hour bump because that's
a newly listed item. Ending the listing does
not work. It's the same item. You're doing nothing.
And that's why when our items renew once a month
because the timer goes for 30 days, it gets treated
as new because it's been that same process as
being done automated by eBay. You're just forcing
the hand doing what I've described. You're just
doing it ahead of time. Conjecture on, is your
item going to sell anyway? I mean, putting your
item in front of the right customer at the right
time, yeah, there's a little bit of merit there.
But for your efforts, I don't think the margin's
that great. But anyway. The one I loved on eBay
Conspiracy Land is there used to be, there's
a little door icon on eBay, and it would be two
colors, red or blue. And when you got I think
it was blue, you're going to get more sales for
the day. When it was red, you're not going to
get any sales for the day or less sales. It was
a big thing. And people swore by it. It was like,
I got the red door today. Guess I'm not working
today. Yeah, that's I didn't I didn't really
realize that like eBay did that automatically
because I remember your listings will automatically
renew. It is funny, though, because there's probably
a lot of people that still like. That's like,
that's, it's still a thing, right? It's like,
even if the platforms come out and say it's not
a thing, there's still people that are going
to like die on these hills, right? They're going
to be like, no, it is a thing. They just don't
want us knowing about it. Right. And then if
you do this process and you get one sale out
of it, the question is, was that organic or,
or did it, what you did work? And then if it,
they'll, they'll die on the hill. I did it. So
it must work. I made one sale. Whoa. Yeah, it's
kind of like the promotion, the promoted listings
things too, where people are like, well, if everybody
promotes at 2%, then in theory, none of us were
promoting on this. Guys, why are we wasting our
energy and time worrying about if every single
reseller promotes at 2%, then theoretically,
nobody's promoting. Yes, but that's not the case.
Not everybody. Everybody's at 2, I'm at 3. Everybody's
like... You give people, I think this is another
thing, is resellers give other resellers too
much credit. I think every reseller thinks every
other reseller is like the greatest business
owner ever. And I'm like the complete opposite.
I think every other reseller is a complete Patrick
Star. What am I doing today? And people are like,
I got to be the best because all my competition
is the best. Guys, just look around. Go on eBay
and look at some of the photos. Go on Amazon.
Look at some of the feedback. These anybody can
be a reseller. Any single person, any single
Joe Blow you meet walking down the street can
be a reseller. And I think people overcompensate
for their competition and think they got to do
all this extra stuff because. Sure, if I'm going
to compete directly with Johnny and I'm going
to sell the same type of books he sells, 100%,
you're up against something here that makes sense.
But for just our average sellers, you just listen
to average stuff, we are giving way too many
people way too much credit. Because in the reselling
lane, there's only a handful of people that are
really doing this profitable at a six -figure
scale. That's just the facts of it. No matter
what you see people talking about on the internet,
a lot of people you see talking aren't. aren't
putting the numbers they say they're putting
up until you see a screenshot of somebody's sales
uh then guess what you hold no no water uh to
me at least yeah we get in our own way too much
we are the problem it's us and it's not amazon
it's not ebay do they do some crappy things from
time to time 100 but that's just expected and
if you're new and don't know that's expected
this is me telling you it's expected and You
getting mad about it. Everybody's entitled to
60 seconds of frustration once they get the news.
You can punch a pillow, throw a baby, do whatever
you want. You should probably edit that throw
the baby part out. But anyway, after 60 seconds,
you've got to get back in your business. It's
out of your hands. It's out of your control.
100%. There's nothing you can do. Going on the
forums does nothing. Screaming to Mike about
it during a one -on -one does nothing except
puts money in Mike's pocket, and you should do
that. Going on Discord, going on Facebook, going
on anything and just complain, complain, complain,
or conspiracy, conspiracy, conspiracy does nothing
for you. Maybe it makes you feel a little bit
better getting it out, but there's therapists
for that. You don't need to... Don't waste your
time. Stop wasting your time with this nonsense,
please. I think that the whole call should have
just been what you just said, because I don't
think there's anything else to this. So we're
going to wrap it up here. I will caution you.
If you have a baby, watch out around Johnny,
because he just went on record. Babies will be
flying in Texas somewhere. So that's going to
do it for this week's episode. We appreciate
you watching on YouTube or listening on the podcast
platform. And we'll talk to you all next week.
Thanks for listening to another episode of the
Reseller's Mindset Podcast. Today's full episode
and all previous episodes are available to all
YouTube members, along with the weekly Zoom call
and private Discord. Head on over to youtube
.com backslash to use book guy and consider joining
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