Want to discover the most profitable, lowest risk idea for your home business? It's selling used books online, which is growing 33 percent annually, acording to a new study by U.S. Learn how to start your business part-time, then expand at your own pace. publishers. This step-by-step guide, written by one of the most succesful and highly rated sellers on Amazon and eBay, includes everything you need to know:
EAN: 9780977240609
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Should I buy the The Home-Based Bookstore: Start Your Own Business Selling Used Books on Amazon, eBay or Your Own Web Site?
Excellent Advice and No Rosy Glasses. Highly recommended
`The Home-Based Bookstore' is written by Steve Weber, who solicited this review from me and supplied me with a copy of his book. I expect this will not influence my review, but it is good for you to know this up front.
Before I opened this book, I posed some questions I thought the book should answer. These questions, with the author's response follow:
1. What are the criteria for choosing Amazon.com, eBay, or one's own site for selling a particular title?
The author clearly prefers Amazon over most other options, although he gives some good reasons for setting up your own web page.
2. How do you pick titles to sell? Some obvious examples, such as Stephen King hardcovers are really poor second hand sellers.
The author gives some very general suggestions on which titles to pick and which titles to avoid. I agree with him almost entirely, although I can think of some exceptions to most of his titles to avoid; however, that is based on special knowledge of certain fields such as cookbooks.
3. How do you acquire interesting titles cheaply? Whenever I browse a second hand bookstore, 99 out of 100 titles are pure junk. I have yet to find, for example, an important out of print cookbook at any used bookstore.
The author provides many good sources, including every one I could think of, plus one or two I did not think of.
4. How do you track your stock so you can quickly determine whether or not you have a title OR where you may be able to acquire a title for a book hunter.
The author gives many useful answers to this question, including some new technology options that really surprised me, based on accessing the Internet through your cell phone.
5. What is the best shipping option considering cost versus speed?
The author gives some very good analyses on the advantages and disadvantages of fast versus slow delivery options.
6. Is there any value to branching out to recordings?
The author never once discusses how to apply his suggestions to other merchandise, even though he does go so far as to consider expanding an Internet sales operation to a brick and mortar store.
One of the reasons the author does not deal with other goods is that marketing books through the Internet is so much richer a subject than I imagined, in spite of the fact that I am a major customer of these services. The amount of software written to support this enterprise is staggering.
In a nutshell, Mr. Weber has given us an excellent manual on how to do this very specialized, albeit very popular form of Internet marketing.
The first sure sign that Steve was not pulling the wool over our eyes was when he stated that while this activity can be really rewarding, it is still hard work. The plus side is that you get to keep all the rewards of this hard work.
Since running a bookstore was always one of my secret ambitions, I really appreciated almost everything Weber had to say about this adaptation of the corner bookstore. If I were to point out any one thing where the author was light on his recommendations, it would be with the fact that I think a person who really knows and loves books in the first place will do much better than the average entrepreneur. I suspect that one could get into real estate investing without a good knowledge of law, carpentry, or finance, but unlike houses, books are something which not everyone knows well. One test for an aspiring book merchandising operation would be to name the leading textbook authors in statistics, economics, symbolic logic, and organic chemistry. I cite these because Mr. Weber makes the excellent point that non-fiction books hold their value much better than fiction, especially current popular fiction. The author does not point this out, but a major exception to this rule should be manuals on computer software. No one has any use anymore for a text on Multiplan, dBase III, or Wordpro.
I especially liked Mr. Weber's recommendation that the reader consider specializing in a particular field, such as cookbooks. This is an especially good suggestion as everyone must eat and so everyone needs someone to cook for him or her. It is also a good field as there is a rich bibliography of out of print cookbooks which most foodies would love to have access to, such as English writer Jane Grigson's catalogue.
While Mr. Weber does not deal with any other type of goods, I suggest his suggestions would work almost as well for records, toys, or collectibles in general, as long as you know your subject.
I am very happy Mr. Weber provided his book to me for review as it is very unlikely I would have found it on my own, and it is an especially fertile plot of ideas, suggestions, and guidance regarding this enterprise. I am happy for him that he got his work into print when he did.
A real nuts-and-bolts guide to making money
There are untold thousands of books on the market that promise the buyer a way to make money. Most just provide an outline, or some ideas that the author claims will produce guarenteed millions, buying distressed properties, government surplus, whatever. Some are by successful business owners, but don't really get into the details of running a business. And some are out-and-out frauds.
This book, though, is almost unique among how-to business books. It's written by a successful busienssman, and it's a real, practical nuts-and-bolts guide to setting up an internet-based used book store. In fact, it's so detailed you have to wonder why the author is going to such pains to help set up his own competition.
There are chapters on where to buy books, what books to sell and which to avoid, how to grade books, the best selling venues, how to describe books, how to set up an inventory system, how to deal with problems- if you can't run a business using this book alone, you shouldn't be running a business, period.
Now reading this book won't guarentee you can make a successful go of an on-line used bookstore; you still need the kind of drive and perseverence that characterize all successful business owners. This isn't something you can make a go of in a few hours a week; it requires dedication. And you need to be flexible; I suspect that this business model won't be profitible forever, as the publishing market changes. But it's a good model for more than just books. I could see applying the same model to other used goods.
If you are, in fact, the kind of person who has the drive and the devotion to make a business work, and you're looking for a good business model to start with, you could do a lot worse than to get a copy of "The Home-Based Bokstore". I strongly suspect that this book will spawn a lot of new Internet entrepenuers.
Without exception, the best book about online bookselling.
As a fledgling bookseller I bought almost every book available on the subject and studied them all. The Home-Based Bookstore is the only book that I refer to again and again. It covered everything I wanted to know when I started selling and a few crucial things I wasn't even aware of.
Steve Weber gives step by step instructions in building your business. I was astounded to find lists of remainder dealers, innovative ideas to find decent books, the contact information for the best place to get shipping supplies.
While obviously preferring Amazon, Steve gives information and advice about the requirements of eBay, Abebooks and many other venues for booksellers.
This is a must have for anyone even considering trying to sell books online. In the first few months it will be your bible.
From One Author to Another - Great Job Steve!
As the author of another book on the same subject, I purchased Steve's book about a week before mine went into publication and found it to be very well written and all encompassing of the online bookselling fundamentals. Great job Steve!
I have been an online bookseller myself for almost five years, and I have read several books written about it, few include as much as this one and I would encourage anyone contemplating getting into the business to buy Steve's book.
Anyone reading this review might be wondering why I would want to promote Steve's book when I am trying to sell my own. The answer is simple, Steve's book is very good and I am sure there is a large enough market to go around, besides I don't really look at our books as being competitors, I think they are very complimentary of each other. We do not cover all the same things and the things we do both cover are for the most part approached from different perspectives.
I know the history of Amazon.com and the tendency of one author to trash the work of another when the books might be viewed as competitors, but I would not stoop to that level. I know a good book when I see it, and Steve has put together a well-organized and complete book about online bookselling. I learned a few things from his book myself as I am sure he would admit to learning from mine if he has read it.
I wish you the best with your sales Steve and success to those that buy your book.
Very useful guide on the DIY online bookstore
Selling stuff online has been a profitable way to make money for those who want that extra bit of cash to those who actually want to make it into a legitimate business. Steve Weber fits into the latter category, having made over $1 million selling books and having moved from a one-bedroom apartment to a house proper. A definite measure of success is the fact that his book, The Home-Based Bookstore, is published under his own imprint.
According to Weber, books are the most profitable commodity (as opposed to CDs or DVDs I imagine) to sell because of their relative inexpensiveness and their weight when it comes to shipping. And the Internet has made it possible for those who didn't have substantial capital to start their own business from home. Why hassle with high rent, advertising in the Yellow Pages, hiring employees-some who may be unreliable or dishonest-and going through the headaches of payroll taxes? Those who took a Small Business Accounting course will know what I'm talking about. It of course wouldn't hurt to take an intro business and accounting course so one can do one's own bookkeeping with Microsoft Excel and organize the business as a small proprietorship, or better still, an S-Corp or something else with limited liability.
Buyer relations are important here, and he uses Amazon's Marketplace as an example, fitting as it is user friendly, and what he humorously refers to as the "800 pound gorilla of online bookselling," plus I've used it myself for buying and selling. Weber emphasizes the importance of feedback in maintaining an online business, and has some great ideas on economic and efficient shipping, such as online postage, not to mention the URL links one can use to send customers their delivery confirmation numbers. I've always wanted to figure that out-now I know! That leads to dissatisfied customers who claim to have not received their book, where delivery confirmation is proof that one sent it. Yet again, another effect of the Net is at work, where customers expect their book within the week instead of the four to six weeks via snail mail. Weber advises the seller not to take things personally, to use courtesy in email responses, and just move on, chalking things up to experience.
He lists certain categories as being profitable sellers, and those that don't. The best ones are rare and esoteric titles, much of them nonfiction, given that there isn't the ridiculous mass production of those titles as there is in fiction. And avoid introductory textbooks, as those undergo so many editions. Sure enough, when I needed some extra money, I found that the texts used in my upper division courses sold quickly.
As a regular peruser of Amazon, I was astounded to see the many mass market paperbacks that were selling at one cent. And hardback remainders on the bargain tables, i.e. publisher overstocks aren't worth it due to their reduction of cost-I should know, as I work at Waldenbooks. And having gone to frequent second-hand bookstores to see what ends up being dead weight as well as the treasures one unexpectedly finds, I can see a lot of truth in what's being written, as I was overjoyed when finding the out-of-print novel of Fast Times at Ridgemont High and a copy of Jimmy Carter's first memoirs, Keeping Faith, at a cheaper price.
A list of wholesalers, online postage services, advanced automation services, is also included. Thus, Weber's book is a very helpful guide for those wanting to start on their own. And a big thanks to Steve for sending me a copy of his book to review.
PS. Despite working retail for nearly nine years, I never found out what SKU meant. I do now thru this book-Stock keeping unit. Thanks!
