1. If you are new eBay auctions, I recommend you spend some time as a buyer first. In addition to learning and understanding how ebay works you will also build up some feedback. Nobody likes to buy from a seller with no feedback.

2. When you create your auction ad, try and anticipate what questions your potential bidders will want answered and then address them clearly in your listing.

3. Every auction needs a picture, even informational products that you can't physically touch. Research proves that buyers respond more positively towards auctions with pictures versus auctions without.

4. Take high quality photos. Make sure you can clearly see your item. Use a simple background. Make sure the picture is in focus. Put yourself in the bidders shoes…would you buy because of your photo? Learn more about auction photography in our photography section.

5. 7 day ebay auctions run Sunday to Sunday typically sell the best as compared to weekday auctions.

6. Start your auction so that it ends between 4pm and 6pm on Sunday. These are after church hours when the most people are shopping on eBay.

7. Make your auction listing look professional. Ebay provides you with several templates that are fine for a beginner, but the person who wants to have a successful eBay business need to create unique and distinctive listings. My favorite tools for creating auction listings are Virtual Auction Ad Pro and Auction Tamer.

8. Your product description should include all relevant data including: condition, what it is, what its for, what it can do, value, anything else it comes with, how big it is, ect. Basically anything you would want to know about a product you are buying.

9. You auction page must load quickly. Typical auction surfers will give your page 10-12 seconds to load before they move on. It must load quicker than that if you want your items to sell. Images slow down your page load time, but you must have them. The way to solve this problem is to compress your image file down as small as it will go and still look good. The Hands-Down best image compressor can be found here.

10. Save your image files as jpegs. Do not use gifs they load slower.

11. Try to anticipate your target market (who will buy your product) and schedule your auctions so that they are available when your target market is online.

12. Clearly state in your auction descriptions your payment instructions, shipping and handling instructions, feedback policy and your return policy.

13. As an ebay seller you need to have a guarantee/refund policy and you need to state the policy clearly and prominently in your listing.

14. Utilize backend sales. Include an advertisement for your product(s) or a coupon with every item you ship out. Think of your credit card bills, they come loaded with sale offers…why do they do it? Because it works.

15. Give some good background on your products. People like stories. Remember Facts tell and Stories Sell

16. Make your auction ads easy on the eyes and easy to read. Use colors that go well together and always use dark text over a light background.

17. A great tool for your ebay business is a personal website where you can sell more and different products or services and not have to pay any eBay seller fees. In my opinion a website is a must for a serious ebay seller.

18. If you already have a website where you sell products and/or services, then ebay can be a great promotional tool to help you promote your website. Add a short description of your website and a link to it in all your auction listings. You will generate more traffic to your website and if your auction doesn't sell, you won't feel as bad since you still got more potential customers coming to your site.

19. Do not use one of the free web hosting services for your website. How comfortable do you feel buying from someone who can't or won't spend 7.95 a month for their own domain?

20. If you already have a website or if you are going to create one, you can use your website to promote your ebay auctions. Drive prospective buyers straight to your auctions and bypass the competition.

21. If you are selling high priced items, offer your buyers the option of paying with escrow. This will help alleviate their fears and they will be more likely to place a bid.

22. Build your own mailing list. Keep track of all your buyers email addresses and then once a week or once a month send out a professional sales letter outlining a few of your best products with links to where they can purchase them. Here is a great tool for helping you create your sales letters.

23. If you are using an email mailing list to sell more products, you will have a better success rate if you include free and useful information. Then your customers won't feel like your trying to force a sale and will be more willing to give your products a try.

24. Keeping track of your Mailing list can be quite a chore, fortunately thanks to autoresponders controlling your mailing list can be very easy. Autoresponders take care of adding new addresses as well as removing people who don't want to receive your emails. The best part is they can continually send out tons of pre written sales letters at intervals for as many days as you want. My favorite autoresponders are aweber and auction ware.

25. Learn how to spell or use spell check on your auctions. Nothing turns me off faster that a seller who can't use a spell check. Make sure your auction ads and titles are spelled right, otherwise people may never see your add, because the auction search engines don't make allowances for bad spelling.

26. Give your buyers some peace of mind and join Square Trade. Square Trade rates ebay sellers on there professionalism and seller must also meet Square Trades expectations in order to be able to display the square trade seal in their auctions.

27. Use USPS delivery conformation to protect yourself from buyers claiming that they never received their item.

28. Provide your buyers with an second email address in case they are having problems with the other one.

29. Create a "template" of all the information that is standard in all of your auctions, this will save you from having to retype the same stuff every time. Just cut and paste.

30. If you don't have very much feedback or its not very good, don't waste your time trying to sell high-dollar items. At least not until you have built up your feedback.

31. When searching for something to sell, don't discriminate. Search for items that you can buy cheap and sell for profit. Don't buy a dvd player for $90 and sell it for $100, when you can buy a doormat for $3 and sell it for $20. You don't have to buy only sexy products. Doormats aren't sexy but if they sell then go with it.

32. Look for items to resell that you can make at least a 40% profit on after all the seller fees are paid. You can't make it if your only making a dollar profit off of each sale.

33. Avoid using reserve pricing in your auctions. Many bidders shy away from auctions with reserves. I know I do.

34. If you are going to accept personal checks as payment for your items, then do not ship the item until the check clears. Otherwise your SOL.

35. If you accept personal checks and hold them until they clear, then state that in your auction and let the bidder know that their item won't be shipped until the check clears. I usually use a 10 day holding period, because you never know how long the bank is going to take,

36. Find your niche markets and concentrate on them. Once you have items selling good in one market move on to another and so on. You can stay specialized and make a lot more money than if you try to sell everything under the sun.

37. You must have a Verified PayPal account and you must accept PayPal as a form of payment. And why wouldn't you. It allows you to accept credit/debit cards and electronic checks.

38. Send your winning bidder a professional email invoice as soon as possible after the auction closes. If you don't use some type of auction manager. Use the invoice that eBay gives you it is very good.

39. If you are going to be running many auctions at once (and you should be if you want to make money) I highly recommend you find some way to help you control and manage your auctions. Organization is crucial to success. The auction manager that I use is called Auction Tamer. It is an excellent tools and will make your business run much smoother.

40. Check you email several times a day. When potential bidders email you, you need to get back to them fast. The quicker you answer their questions the sooner they will bid.

41. Provide your buyers with excellent customer service and they will become repeat customers. Answer all their questions courteously and promptly and help them out in any way that you can.

42. Never lie in your ads or in your emails. Eventually you will get caught in a lie and it will destroy for reputation and business.

43. After receiving payment Ship your customers items out quickly and without delay. Customers love fast shipping. I recommend you use priority mail whenever you can.

44. You can get free priority mail shipping supplies at http://supplies.usps.gov.

45. A great resource for more information about selling on ebay and other online auctions is Auction Riches. They have a member's area that will knock your socks off. I highly recommend you join.

46. Hundreds of buyers are using auction sniping software to get what they want for a better price. So why do you do the same thing? Use a sniper to score items at ridiculously low prices and resell them your self. I have found this to be a highly profitable addition to my business. I recommend you use an auction sniper program, as it is very hard to do on your own. My personal favorite auction snipers are Powersnipe and Stealth Bid.

47. Run promotions for your repeat customers and customers on your mailing list. Offer them a coupon or a discount on their next purchase.

48. Offer combined shipping for buyers who win more than one of your auctions. They will save a little money and feel better and you will feel great because you made lots of money and its easier to ship.

49. Charge fixed shipping costs, so that the buyer knows beforehand how much it will cost. To learn how to do this effectively and make a profit off it click here.

50. Feedback is crucial to successful eBay auction selling. You must have great feedback. Do what ever you can to keep from receiving a negative feedback, but if it does happen make sure you respond too it and explain what happened. A great tool that I use for getting the most out of my feedback can be found here.