How to Make Money Selling Used Books on Amazon

If you are looking to sell some books and avoid having a yard sale you can try this out.

Things You'll Need

• Time to research what price to charge for your books.
• Time to list the books.
• Mailing/packaging materials.

Instructions

1. Go to the Amazon website and set up your seller account. You will see a button on the top rt. of the screen, Your Account. If you already have a buyer account you can log in at this point.

2. 

   Then you'll see a button on the right, Sell Your Stuff. There is an easy to follow system. You will be asked if you want to get your payments in gift certificates or have your earnings deposited to your bank account. I chose the bank account deposit method and that has worked fine for me.

3. Once you have signed up your seller account (you'll need your business name) then you are ready to research/list books. I read articles on what books are most likely to sell. But I started listing right away. Non-fiction, hardcover books seem to often have a higher resale value.

4. Click on List Single Items. You will see a drop down menu for type of item. Book is the default. You can type in the name of the book or the ISBN number. Look on the back of your book and the dust cover usually has the ISBN number right there. Type in the number and following the next few steps.

5. VERY IMPORTANT! You will be asked about the condition of your book. Honesty here is very important, people will be buying these items from you and they have the ability to rate your overall service. Be honest about the condition of your books and you will have some success. There is a drop down menu for New or Used. Then you will need to choose Used-Like New or other choices are available. Read the description of these Used choices and look your book over. If the book has no writing or highlighting and the dust cover looks new you can sell it Used-Like New.

6. If you are wanting to clear out your old books and just make some extra cash I recommend you consider listing your books at the lowest price whenever you can. I've found that just by listing my books .50 cents less than others of the same quality, I've sold some fairly quickly.

7. Wrapping your items for shipping is very important too. You can find bubble envelopes at the 99 cent stores, 2 for 99 cents. One online book seller recommends you buy the roll of bubble wrap and brown paper. This works best for hardback books and is one of the least expensive ways to wrap your items. If you have a larger paperback book, you will get better results from a large bubble envelope. Look around online and in stores to get the best prices.

8. If you are considering Ebay vs Amazon. The main difference is with Ebay you pay to list a book and Amazon charges a commission on anything you actually sell. Amazon takes a commission of 6 to 15 percent of the sales price, a per-transaction fee of $0.99, and a variable closing fee. The $0.99 per-transaction fee is waived for Pro Merchant Subscribers.

Tips & Warnings

• Aim to list items close to Thanksgiving and through the Christmas season. Many people shop online during the Christmas shopping time.

• Here is a link to an article outlining the busiest online shopping days of the year. http://www.revenews.com/adamviener/2006/12/what_day_was_the_busiest_onlin.html

• Rate your books according to the online descriptions at Amazon. You want to give great customer service so that your online ratings remain positive.

Resources

• Amazon seller info!