E-commerce for Beginners - Selling on eBay, Shopify, and Amazon (2023)

FAQs

Should I start with Shopify or Amazon? ›

Shopify lets you build your online store and website, making it a good fit for entrepreneurs selling exclusive products or building their brands. On the other hand, Amazon has a lower barrier to entry. Just create an account and you can start selling anything from brand-new to used products.

Connect your Shopify Store to all the leading marketplaces

Manage your Shopify Store as well as Amazon and eBay and a range of other marketplaces all from the one place. Manage orders, stock levels, suppliers and prices with our Shopify Integration.

Yes. Listing the same products on two or more sales channels like eBay and Amazon is a good sales strategy to implement, as this enables you to widen your reach and improve your sales potential.

Another way to sell on Amazon is by selling your own products. Many Shopify store owners will use a free Shopify app to sync inventory and sell products from their own stores to Amazon. That way you don't have to create separate selling plans and can control inventory management in one place.

You can be one of the over 1.75 million merchants selling on Shopify and selling at Amazon simultaneously. Shopify's sales channel offers many benefits to businesses looking to expand to Amazon. For example: From Shopify, you can create Amazon listings in several categories.

Is Shopify worth it? This depends on your ambitions and vision for your online shop, but essentially yes. While it might be pricier than a non-ecommerce specific builder, its rich sales features are all but essential for businesses that want to build large scaling online stores.

Is Shopify a Good Platform for Beginners in Ecommerce? Yes. Shopify is one of the most user-friendly ecommerce builders to help beginners and small business owners set up and run their online store for the first time.

There are no additional Shopify fees for selling on eBay, but you do need to pay for a Stores account.

While Shopify does not charge additional fees for eBay integration, Shopify gets a cut from net revenue for sales made through eBay. The rate may vary according to product categories, but Shopify store owners can expect Shopify's cut to be roughly 2%.

Can I sell my eBay items on Shopify? ›

The eBay Shopify app helps sellers manage their business through one cloud-based interface. You can sync your products, manage your eBay orders, and increase sales, effortlessly.

Final value fees

If your item sells, eBay keeps a portion of the sale. This final value fee for most categories is 13.25% of the sale price or lower, plus $0.30 per order.

Generally, eBay charges a flat 10% selling fee (this varies per category), but this does not include payment processing fees via PayPal. These are typically an additional 2.9% + 20p. Amazon charges a typical 15% commission which includes payment processing fees as well.

Is it Legal to Resell Products on Amazon? Yes, it's completely legal to buy a product at a store and resell it on Amazon. You don't need a permit or to be an authorized reseller. Once you buy an item it's yours and you're free to resell it if you wish.

Choose a selling plan

With the Individual plan, you'll pay $0.99 every time you sell an item. The Professional plan costs $39.99 per month, no matter how many items you sell. For both plans, Amazon also collects a referral fee on each sale, which is a percentage of the total transaction and varies by product category.

The most obvious option for selling on Amazon without storing your own inventory is using the fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) service. FBA lets you outsource the work of storing and shipping products to Amazon fulfillment centers. Of course, using FBA does mean paying Amazon more in fees.

Most states only require a seller's license if your online sales reach a specific dollar amount or number of transactions annually. For example, if you sell over $200,000 or have over 200 transactions. The good news is that eBay will collect and remit the sales tax for you.

If you know what you're looking for, buying and reselling on eBay can be a profitable business. You might be able to pick up something at a good price outside its peak selling season, or buy items in bulk and sell them on individually.

Do people actually make money with Shopify? ›

As long as you have an idea and be ready to start something new, you can always make profit on Shopify. So how Shopify help you make money with POD business: Hassle-free Integration with the best Print on Demand companies, including Printful, Printify, Custom Cat and 24+ other Print on Demand app.

Overall, Shopify has a much more sophisticated range of ecommerce features than Amazon. Its dropshipping integration also makes it a better platform for those looking to reduce costs related to inventory storage. Amazon offers a decent range of sales tools, but they aren't quite as powerful as Shopify's.

Crafty business owners can use Shopify to sell handmade products, both on their own websites and on other online platforms. Shopify offers social media sales, so you can market your products on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok. You can even use a third-party app to integrate Shopify with Etsy and reach a crafty audience.

Research has shown that an average Shopify merchant in the United States makes about $72 of profit from each customer–high-earning merchants on Shopify earn about $149 on a per-client basis, while low-earning merchants make a profit of about $44 per-client.

Conclusion About how much money can you make on Shopify

For example, many Shopify businesses make at least $50,000 per year. And some businesses make much more than that. So if you're willing to put in the work, starting a Shopify business can be a great way to earn a good income.

Shopify Starter is $5 per month for limited sales tools. Shopify Basic is $29 per month, Shopify is $79 per month, Advanced Shopify is $299 per month and Shopify Plus starts at $2,000 per month. All plans include an online store and all sales channels.

Dropshipping is one of the easiest ways to start a business without money, since you only pay for inventory when a customer buys it. There are no warehousing fees or excessive product manufacturing costs. Get started with a free 3-day trial and then, from $5 per month with the Shopify Starter.

You don't need tons of cash to get started. Start selling online with Shopify's Starter plan. For just $5 per month, you'll get all the tools you need to sell via social media.

Can I sell on eBay for free? ›

When you're just starting out on eBay, you have access to a free seller account—meaning there are no monthly fees to run your business. As you grow your eBay business, you will have the option to create your own eBay Store, a paid monthly subscription offers traffic- and sales-boosting benefits.

With features like Smart Pricing and Smart Offers, Mercari gives sellers the tools they need to be successful. However, eBay is still the top dog when it comes to list of features and expansive audience.

Shopify charges 2.6% + $0.30 per transaction for the Shopify account. These are the charges for online credit card transactions. A 2.5% transaction fee applies to in-person card transactions. If you use any payment gateway other than Shopify Payments, there's an additional 1% fee per transaction.

The Shopify Success Rate of eCommerce stores is around 5% to 10%. This means that out of every 100 businesses that use Shopify, only about 5 to 10 businesses of them are successful.

Seller's permit. This type of license, commonly known as a seller's permit, is typically required where your business sells a product or service that ordinarily would be subject to retail sales tax. Even many ecommerce businesses must obtain a seller's permits for sales tax registration. Occupational license.

You can run your Shopify store as a sole proprietor and use your SSN (social security number) or SIN (social insurance number) for tax purposes. The federal government does not require business licenses for all types of businesses. Instead, it only requires them for businesses operating in certain industries.

Referral fees

Remember, Amazon takes a cut of every item sold. This ranges from as low as 6% (personal computers) to as high as 45% (Amazon device accessories), although referral fees for media products are 15% of the total sales price of a product, rather than the item price alone.

When the item sells, the seller collects a shipping fee from the buyer. The seller selects the appropriate shipping method, prints the appropriate shipping label, and pays the appropriate postage from his/her PayPal account. PayPal is a service available through the PayPal website (www.paypal.com).

How much will eBay take from a $400 sale? ›

The item sells immediately for the Buy It Now price of $400. Since you aren't charging the buyer for shipping or any other costs, $424 is the total amount of the sale (includes 6% sales tax). You make $343.17, or approximately 86% of the sale price, not including shipping costs.

Listing and selling fees

Additionally, Etsy and Amazon Handmade both deduct selling fees at a flat rate across categories and price points—for Etsy, this comes in at 6.5% of the total sale price plus a 3.5% plus 25¢ payment processing fee, and for Amazon Handmade, the selling fee is 15% of the total sale price.

Half of people who sell real products on amazon make between $1,000 and $25,000 per month in sales. The top 6% of sellers make even more, up to $250,000 per month in sales. It takes a lot of work, but you can make a lot of money from selling on amazon.

Currency, Coins, Cash Equivalents, and Gift Cards

Selling collectible coins, precious metals, stones, or jewels is an Amazon restricted category. To sell on Amazon with these products, you must be ungated or approved by Amazon.

No. You can use Amazon FBA to sell packaged items you already own, items you find while antiquing, or even items you received for free. It is possible to use FBA in many ways, as long as you are willing to get creative in building your inventory.

Consumer law doesn't prevent you from doing Amazon to eBay arbitrage. However, as the seller of the item, it is your responsibility to deal with any problems, including complaints and returns.

Selling plan

The Individual plan costs $0.99 per unit sold, and the Professional plan costs $39.99 per month no matter how many units you sell.

In addition to reporting earnings to the Internal Revenue Service at year-end, most retailers, including Amazon sellers, must collect and submit sales taxes. Sales taxes on FBA sales vary for each transaction.

What are the average monthly sales for Amazon sellers? Most Amazon sellers make at least $1,000 per month in sales, and some super-sellers make more than $100,000 each month in sales. 45% of Amazon sellers make $1,000 to $25,000/month, which could mean $12,000 to $300,000 in annual sales.

How much is Shopify Basic per month? ›

Shopify Basic – $29 per month

The Shopify Basic plan includes solutions for businesses interested in offering in-store transactions, such as card readers. With Basic, online purchases have a per-transaction fee of 2.9% plus $0.30, while in-person purchases have a 2.7% fee.

If you're new to selling and don't have a list of customers already, use Etsy if you sell handmade goods or artisan services. Shopify is great for retail sellers with an established customer base.

You can sell multiple brands under one Amazon account, brand registered or not. You don't need to be Brand Registered to sell on Amazon.

Now, you don't need to own a warehouse to do business on the platform; Amazon has a program called FBA or Fulfillment by Amazon where it picks, packs, stores, ships orders, and handles customer support on behalf of third-party sellers.

Final value fees

If your item sells, eBay keeps a portion of the sale. This final value fee for most categories is 13.25% of the sale price or lower, plus $0.30 per order.

The total amount of the sale is the amount the buyer pays, including any shipping and handling charges, sales tax, and other applicable fees. Per order fees will remain $0.30 per order, leading to a total maximum per-item final value fee of $1 per qualifying sale.

Why do I need a Form 1099-K? For 2022, the IRS requires eBay and other online marketplaces to report total sales exceeding $20,000 and 200 transactions on Form 1099-K.

Why do I need a 1099-K? Your sales on online marketplaces like eBay are considered reportable income once they are over a certain amount. Because eBay processes payments for these sales, IRS regulations require us to issue a 1099-K for US sellers who sell $20,000 or more in 2021 and $600 or more in 2022.

As of Mar 9, 2023, the average annual pay for an EBAY Seller in the United States is $39,555 a year. Just in case you need a simple salary calculator, that works out to be approximately $19.02 an hour. This is the equivalent of $760/week or $3,296/month.

How to make $500 a month on eBay? ›

Does Shopify report to the IRS? Yes, Shopify reports most account owners' business transactions to the IRS every year, in a form called the 1099-K.

Yes. Shopify is one of the most user-friendly ecommerce builders to help beginners and small business owners set up and run their online store for the first time. Shopify is user-friendly, and even those with no prior ecommerce experience or coding knowledge can create an online store fairly quickly.

Pros and cons of Shopify vs Amazon

It's considerably more customizable, and lets you create a much more 'on-brand' presence than Amazon. It's much a better solution for dropshipping. It's a better option for small businesses in need of local selling and point-of-sale applications.

Dropshipping on Shopify can be a great way for entrepreneurs to keep costs low, since products are only paid for and shipped after they're purchased.

With Shopify, it's hardly difficult to make a great site, even if you've never done it before. Using Shopify's great apps and theme templates will help you give your customers a great first impression.

Shopify is still profitable for E-commerce startups whether you're looking to sell your wares online as a side gig or intend to turn it into a full-fledged enterprise. In 2022, the results reported by Shopify were better than predicted, with more substantial revenues and a lesser loss than anticipated.