February 24, 2006
Collectors often have way to much stuff or they run across this deal that is too good to pass up despite isn’t an item in their collecting interest or they already have a similar item and definitely don’t need another one. Then the internet is an excellent way to get relived of things that is not needed instead of throwing them away.
There are many ways that your can sell your antiques online. The two most common ways is to sell online is at an auction like eBay or Yahoo or by online classifieds. At the auction potential buyers are allowed to make an offer for the item where the highest bidder get the item at the end of the auction versus classifieds where you as a seller, most of the time, has set a fixed price for the item.
How do I know the value of my item? This is a very common question with many different answers. You probably don’t want to sell your antique item for a fraction of its market value. Therefore you need to have a price overview in the category of the market that is trading with items like yours. However to get a price overview of a market takes a lot of time and work. There are however some ways that you can get a pretty good price overview without to much effort:
It is also possible to let an expert do an appraisal of the item, which means that an expert inspects and valuates it. An appraisal by an expert will however cost some money.
Now when you have an idea about how much your item is worth it is time to put it out for sale. Thanks to the internet you will be reaching a broad audience of potential buyers, this you probably know already unless you are very new to the internet. To put your item out for sale you will need pictures and a description of the item.
A picture says more than a thousand words. To have good pictures is the key to be selling online successfully. Therefore an investment in a good digital camera and most important of all, learning how to use it makes sense. You should learn how to use it so you get photos that are in focus, have good light, a good neutral background and are close enough to show details. Buyers have a tendency to stay away from items with bad photographs.
With a good picture it is time to describe the item in text. The item description should be as objective as possible, which means that it should describe the physical parts in a way that anyone would see it, like material, condition, damages, measures, etc. The description should be without the use of emotion or feelings, like “this is a super nice item” or “this is the best looking item in the world”, the buyer knows that it is a nice item by looking at the picture and reading the informative description.
Now when the item presentation looks great it will hopefully sell, preferably with a profit.
Article written by AntiqueAntiques.com (http://www.antiqueantiques.com). Comments or question about this article should be sent to info-at-antiqueantiques.com.