I just recently did some spring cleaning and decided to unload a bunch of old books. Whenever I am getting rid of books I take a couple steps…
See how much the book is selling for
I look the book up on Amazon.com using the ISBN number to see how much used copies are going for…
As you can tell, the cheapest used copies are selling for $4.07. As I will explain below, you probably shouldn’t sell anything for less than a few bucks. You will find that some people sell books for as cheap as a penny. I am not sure why, but it definitely happens.
If the lowest used price is worth my time, I then go to my Amazon seller account homepage (you can open an account here). Once logged in, you will get to your dashboard – see the image below…
Listing your first book on Amazon
Looking at the Dashboard above, if you just click the “List single items” link, it will take you to this screen…
Here, you can select the item type, but I mostly use the ISBN number – it is quicker and more accurate. Once you pull up your specific item, Amazon will take you through a few more steps asking questions about your item. They will want to know…
- What condition the product is in. Is it new, like new, used, torn to shreds, etc…
- Comments about the condition of your product. This is where you will want to write specifics about the product. Is the dust cover missing? Is the entire book underlined in hot pink?
- The price and quantity of your product. I always recommend setting your product at the lowest price. If you don’t you will have a very slim chance of selling it. Most buyers just look for the cheapest item and buy that.
- Select your shipping method. Here you can choose to expedite shipments or ship internationally if you choose.
That is about it! I just repeat that process until I have all of my books (items) listed.
A few things worth mentioning
Amazon gives you a $3.99 shipping credit for each book. I always use Media Mail from the USPS and it normally costs about $2.50 or so to ship each one. Even including packing materials and other incurred expenses, it should be fairly easy to ship books for under $3.99.
Amazon charges lots of fees (only on items that sell). This is why you probably don’t want to sell an item for less than $2-$3. Unless you sign up for a pro account, you will be paying Amazon a fee of $2.35 + 15% of the item sale price. So, selling anything for less than $3.00 will not yield much profit.
To speed up the book-selling process
This step is optional, but will definitely increase the chances that your books will sell and will help you sell them quicker. Normally every day or so I log into my account and adjust the prices of my items to make sure they are the lowest priced.
On the Seller Account Dashboard, click the link called “View your current inventory” and it will take you to a page like this…
Here you will see all of your listed books. It will show you your current selling price and whether or not you have the lowest listed price. If you see a green ball under the low price column, you are in good shape. If you see a lower price, then you will want to click the edit link and lower your price a penny lower than the current lowest price.
If you want, you can waste your life away doing this all day long, but I prefer to do it in early evening – when many of the businesses selling these books are closed. That way I can normally have the low price until morning when they come back in.
Do you have any other tips for selling stuff on Amazon?
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I am only a casual seller and do sell books above the low price quite often. I think condition of the item and seller feedback % makes a slight difference to some buyers.
Before automatically going for the lowest price, also check the lowest price for items with the same condition as yours. If the items absolute lowest prices are all for “acceptable” or “good” condition and yours is “very good” or “like new” then price accordingly.
Going in a repricing .01 below the lowest price everyday will kick in to gear all the auto repricing software that the big sellers have, then in turn lowering their price, and the vicious cycle repeats.
Unless you have some big ticket books the return on investment is abysmal with Amazon, ebay/Half.com you can do slightly better. Amazon takes a large chunk but I finally got to the point that it just wasn’t worth my time, so instead have been bringing them in to my local Half Price books and then just use the money to get some more books to read.
@Mary B
Agreed, I know as a buyer I do occasionally pay attention to condition – but from my selling experience, it seems like I sell a lot more, a lot faster, when I try to maintain the lowest price. I have probably only sold 25 books or so on Amazon, so it could be a coincidence.
@Paul
I had poor results with books on Ebay in the past, but I haven’t tried Half.com – I will keep that in mind for next time and give it a go!
I use to do this. It was great extra money.
Friends…Instead of hassling with selling books online myself, I would go to http://www.bookjingle.com. This is a site that will make an instant offer on your used books. They will even pay to have the books shipped. If you only have a few books, this would be the way to go (no checking emails, prices, or keeping shipping supplies).
@Kevin,
I just ran a bunch of ISBNs that I currently have on Amazon and the prices offered are no where close to what you can get selling them on amazon. But, if they don’t sell on Amazon, it might be worth it to get a few bucks from BookJingle rather than nothing…
I usually don’t sell old books on Amazon, but thanks for the interesting read. I may have to do that install of just tossing my old books.
I use both amazon and half.com. They are both great sites, but if i use them both, i can post books on the site that has the highest lowest price (sounds confusing, but it does make sense).
I would have to agree with Kevin, I have never used bookjingle, I always use a site called http://www.sellbackyourbook.com but I checked out book jingle and it seems the same concept. Instant price quote and you can ship all the books together. I listed some stuff on half awhile ago and found that some sold, while other just sat and sat! With a book jingle or sell back your book kind of site you can get rid of all of your books in one stop and not worry about how much its going to cost to ship out since the company takes care of that.
Richard
Amazon shipping have kept me away from buying used books through their website.
If I buy five books from the same seller, I pay $20 (okay, $19.95) for shipping, which seems really steep to me.
So I prefer to look for my used books at garage sales and thrift shops. (Some Goodwill stores have a decent selection; their hardcovers are usually $4.99. I’ve gotten books like Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace, and Dan Miller’s 48 Days to the Work You Love (which Dave Ramsey highly recommends) at Goodwill, and with the shipping, I would never find those books that cheap on Amazon.)
Terry
I agree – goodwill is the cheapest place to buy books – I have found some real jems! As far as the AMazon thing, I use Amazon Prime (you pay $79 to have free shipping for a year) – it surely wouldn’t benefit everyone but for as much stuff as I purchase from them, it is well worth it…
I’m making a full time income for most people selling books online. I love doing it and I hope to be able to actually do it full time one of these days. I first gotta ditch the full time job.
Amazon is definitely the way to go followed by eBay just for the fact of traffic. There are so many people on those two sites so I get the vast majority of my sales on either.
don’t you have to pay to register at amazon though?
Hi Shane,
You do not have to pay to register with Amazon unless you want to sign up for the monthly Pro Merchant account which is $40/month. If you are going to sell less than 40 books/month, then it’s not worth getting the Pro Merchant account. Otherwise, it’s free to list the books.
I have a lot of books to sell and would like to sell them on Amazon. I am confused though about the shipping and handling. From what I’ve read Amazon keeps the S & H money. Does this mean you have to pay the post Office for S & H everytime you mail a book to a customer. Does Amazon reimburse you or what. It still seems like a lot of expense. Please could you clear this up for me.
Sincerely,
Jennifer
Hi Jennifer,
Amazon gives you $3.99 to cover for shipping whenever a book is sold. Then, you would pay the shipping yourself which 9 times out of 10, the $3.99 more than covers for it.
Hi, I have two books that I have unlimited copies of to sell. Is there a way to keep a permanent ad up with Amazon?
You could put up a quantity of 9999.
-Adam
sellyourbooksonline.com
I’ve seen a person at a library book sale that buys books there and sells them on Amazon. She had some sort of computer thing that she was scanning the barcodes. What is that called and does anyone here use that? Also, if you have the cost, that would be appreciated it.
Thanks.
Hi Cheryl,
That person is using a book scouting service. They are using a PDA (personal digital assistant) like a Dell Axim or HP iPAQ. They subscribe to a service that lets them download Amazon’s pricing for all of their books. Then, they hook up a barcode scanner to this device and scan the ISBN numbers. When the ISBN number goes into the software, it pulls up the price that the book is going for on Amazon and thus letting them know how much they could list it on Amazon for. I did a writeup of this at http://www.sellyourbooksonline.com/sellbooksonline/make-smarter-buying-decisions-with-book-scouting-services/.
I always sell my textbooks online at the end of the semester. Amazon is a great site but you are not kidding when you say “Amazon Charges Alot of Fees”