As you’re learning how to sell liquidation pallets as a reseller, there are a few tips to think about to ensure your success. Think about the tips below before you begin looking for merchandise from pallet sellers. A little pre-planning will help your business get off to a strong start.

1. Protect Yourself from Scamming Liquidation Sellers

Not all places that sell pallets of merchandise are reputable. Unfortunately, many liquidation suppliers take advantage of inexperienced pallet resellers by:

  • Profiting a large amount of money for very little work or value offered
  • Passing off trash or salvage condition merchandise and claiming they are selling Amazon pallets of returned items or returns from another well-known retailer
  • Pulling valuable merchandise out of loads and selling the rest like all items are still included
  • Demanding prepayment for backordered merchandise and then never delivering it
  • Accepting payment for unseen merchandise and delivering different, cheaper product than promised

Some of the above actions may make sense for a buyer in certain situations depending on your relationship with the supplier. However, in most cases, the signs above are indicators that your supplier may not be trustworthy. Remember to be careful, ask questions, demand proof, and ask more questions when doing business with a supplier.

Quick tip: Ask yourself, “Where can I find a trusted supplier?” rather than, “Where can I buy pallets of merchandise to sell?” This mindset can help you stay focused on thoroughly vetting prospective suppliers.

2. Decide How To Sell Pallets of Merchandise First

So, how are you going to sell your merchandise? This decision will direct the type of liquidation merchandise you should buy and many of your other decisions, such as:

  • What type of merchandise you need to purchase
  • The time required to receive and inspect the merchandise
  • The time needed to prepare the merchandise received
  • The amount of time you will have to spend on customer service or other administrative tasks

3. Develop a Smart Pricing Strategy

Your pricing strategy will ultimately determine the success of your business and whether you can make money selling liquidation merchandise. Before you buy, determine whether you want to price items individually as a percentage of retail or at a flat price. This decision will also have a major impact on the type of merchandise that you want to sell. Think of your pricing strategy as part of your marketing strategy. It all works together.

4. Determine Whether You'll Work Alone or Have a Team

Decide whether you need help to complete all of the work. When initially starting out, it is often ideal to do everything yourself, so you can learn each part of the process. It will also help keep your overhead low, so you can put as much of your profit back into the business as possible.

If you need assistance, consider hiring someone on a part-time or full-time basis. If hiring help isn’t the right choice for your business model, research software solutions that can help you perform certain tasks in your workflow faster. For questions about the types of software tools on the market, feel free to contact BuyLow Warehouse anytime.

5. Find Who Sells Pallets that Fit Your Niche

Now that you’ve determined how you’re going to sell your merchandise, how you’ll price it, and if a team will help you sell it, you need to find pallets that fit your business needs. There is a lot that goes into finding the right supplier, so you should spend some extra time on this step. Talk with people in the industry already, join Facebook groups, and ask questions to vet suppliers to make sure they are trustworthy before you buy.

6. Get To Know Your Customers

Adjust your mindset to serve your customer demographic, not yourself. The qualities that you value (brand name, item condition, time spent getting a deal, etc.) may not be of value to your customer.

Here are some common mistakes that sellers face when choosing products for themselves instead of their customers.

  • Choosing against using certain types of sales methods because you personally would not be interested in shopping that way. These sales methods may work great and the merchandise may sell wonderfully if you try methods outside of your comfort zone.
  • Deciding against offering certain types of merchandise for wholesale because you don’t know how to sell them If you experiment and have an open mind about merchandise you’re unfamiliar with, you may end up providing a niche to customers who are searching for it and will buy it.
  • Choosing to buy certain merchandise at a premium price because of the brand If the audience you’re trying to sell this product to doesn’t care about the brand, they will most likely not buy the product at such a high cost.

If you don’t understand your buyer, your sales will suffer.

7. Calculate and Track Your Profits

Decide how to calculate your profit and how you are going to track it. Business is a game, and profit is the scoreboard. If you are not tracking the profit on your sales, how do you know if you are winning or losing?

8. Offer a Better Deal

Learn about the market you are entering and educate yourself on how business is conducted in that market. People generally expect to negotiate. For example, eBay shoppers do not care about the price they pay for an item—they only care about getting a better deal than what is offered.

Buyers in the liquidation market expect deals too, and they often try to negotiate those deals even further. Many times, it is a better idea to accept the first reasonable offer for less than the listing price than it is to let time go by and drop the price later. You will eventually end up at the original offer or even less.

Understand the Liquidation Business Better

Are you looking to learn more about buying and selling liquidation merchandise? For those who are experienced or just getting started, our eBook will prepare you to make better decisions for your business. Download your copy today.

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