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Step 1
The biggest time saver is preparing your postage at home. There are many options for online shipping such as through the USPS website, through Paypal, or through Stamps.com. Consider the amount of time you spend loading your packages into the car, driving to the post office, standing in line at the post office, and waiting for the postal clerk to process your packages. You already have to package the item at home, why not spend 2-3 more minutes per package and print and attach the postage? You’ll save hours each week.
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Step 2
Create a shipping preparation kit. Using a plastic tub or box, create a kit with everything you need to package and ship your items. Include items like USPS Flat Rate and Priority mailers, poly mailers for First Class, Delivery Confirmation slips, international customs forms, labels, tape, scissors, packaging material (bubble wrap, or cushioning material), and a magic marker. When you are ready to move into shipping mode, clear off your desk, pull out your shipping kit, and get to work. You won’t waste time wandering around the house looking for all your supplies.
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Step 3
When you are ready to begin shipping for the day, close out all your internet windows except your eBay items awaiting shipping and your online postage program. Close out your instant messaging, email, Facebook, Twitter, and anything else that will distract you. Social networking is great, but there is a time and place for everything. You need to concentrate on shipping and focus on this task.
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Step 4
Add photos to your shipping view on your eBay Awaiting Shipment page. This setting prevents mistakes and makes shipping faster as you can just look at the photo to see what you have to ship. In your eBay summary; go to your AWAITING SHIPMENT screen. Click on CUSTOMIZE DISPLAY in the top right hand corner. You can customize the columns you want to see. Look near the bottom and you will see PICTURES and a box to check. Check the box. Save your changes. Now go pull up your AWAITING SHIPMENT screen and you should see the gallery images next to each item.
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Step 5
Arrange for carrier pickup. On the USPS website, you can schedule carrier pickup for up to 3 months in advance. Just enter the date, approximate number of packages, types of packages (first class, priority, international) and approximate total weight of the pickup. This information helps the post office predict how long the mail carrier will be at your stop and how much room he will need on his truck for his route. Of course, there is no way to know exactly what you will have, so just give an estimate of an average day. Printing your postage at home and scheduling a carrier pickup in advance will eliminate a trip to the post office all together.
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Step 6
Set limits. Some days, you could sit at your computer for hours and not finish your shipping. Set a time limit (such as 2 hours) or an item limit (such as 20 packages) and move on to another task.
Comments
workingfromhome said
on 7/21/2009 Great article! I had no idea you could add pictures to the shipping page, I usually open the link to see what it is exactly... thank you!
FacePro said
on 7/18/2009 Excellent article! Thanks you for the details on how to do this. 5*
ScarlettOHairy said
on 5/30/2009 Great tips on shipping from home.
musicdeb said
on 5/27/2009 Thanks for the great organization ideas to same time shipping on ebay.5*
vyeshi said
on 5/18/2009 Great ideas about shutting down social networking. Also about adding photos to your 2b shipped list. Didn't know you could do that!I've found that you need to have at least 1 Priority mail package for the usps to do a pickup. The rest can be parcel post, first class, whatever.