"You should sell it on eBay!" is fast becoming today's knee-jerk reaction to anyone who comes across an item they don't know what to do with. And, like the physician who is approached at a party with a litany of aches and pains, or the lawyer who is expected to write up his brother's will for free, any experienced seller is likely to be given the "opportunity" to put things up for sale for friends and relatives. You can do it as a favor on a limited basis. Or you can apply to eBay to become an official Trading Assistant and do it to boost your sales volume and your positive feedback as well as your income.

Whether you do it occasionally or full-time, as soon as you start selling items on behalf of someone else, you realize the special challenges and issues involved. Your reputation as a professional is at stake, and you have a lot to lose by mixing business with pleasure. Not only that, but you can stir up family disputes. I recently sold an auto part for a relative who described it as being in "mint condition." When the buyer found tiny flaws in the object, he demanded a refund. Who gets the flak (and possible negative feedback) in such cases? You do, not the item's original owner. Some tips and best practices, gained from talking to some of the best trading assistants in the business, will help you do things right the first time:

Be Fair to Yourself
There's no standard procedure for how much to charge clients who give you merchandise to sell on consignment on eBay. People who've never sold before have no idea of how much work is involved. Make sure the transaction is worth your time and effort. Charging 25 to 30 percent of the final selling price is common. There's no reason why you should pack and ship for free; you might charge the owner $1 or $2 as a handling fee.

Be Clear
Define your terms clearly and stick to them. Write out an agreement and have the other person sign it, even if (or especially if) it's your Mom or daughter. You don't want to have disagreements with your clients after the sale; you've got enough trouble completing transactions with your buyers.

Be Confident
Give people the feeling that you know what you're doing, and that you have a solid base of knowledge about eBay. The way to be respected as a professional is to act like a professional to people who are used to seeing you mowing your grass.

Be Selective
Don't put everything up for sale. Learn to say no. Only sell things that are going to be in demand. Since you aren't going to be making all the profits, you need to make it worth your while. Most drop-off stores do research first and only sell items that are certain to fetch a bid of at least $50. You should do the same. Otherwise a beautiful friendship may be ruined when the money that was hoped for isn't forthcoming.

Tailor Your Description to What You're Selling
Tiffany Tanaka, who runs the drop-off store Wesellthings4u.com in Honolulu, Hawaii, uses her college design degree to create presentations that complement what she is selling. But be clear to the item's owner that even if you value the relationship, you can't make the value of the item increase just by wishing.

Selling for others is a great way to handle unique and even offbeat merchandise you don't normally carry. Expanding your product line can make selling on eBay more fun. (Tiffany Tanaka of Wesellthings4u.com sells a lot of Hawaiiana, for instance.) The problem here is that you need to know what you are selling before you can write your description, and it may take a lot longer to do research for an item that is not at all familiar to you. Many Trading Assistants require they have possession of the item before listing it online, in case the client changes her mind, but also to help accurately describe the item.

More than a few sellers function as Trading Assistants full-time. They either operate drop-off stores or sell for others on a virtual basis. One of the best known and most successful Trading Assistants, Adam Hersh of Adam Hersh Auctions, started selling for others because he was just out of college and didn't have valuable collectibles of his own to sell, let alone the money to purchase them. Still in his mid-twenties, Hersh estimates that he and his employees have completed seven million transactions. And continually working with new customers (including the South Korean government) and different types of merchandise keeps his work interesting and challenging. "I love it," he told me recently. "Every day, it's always something new."

That's the up-side of selling for other people. Selling for others is a great way to attain PowerSeller status and build up your feedback rating. Resist the temptation to sell on eBay as a personal favor. Follow the guidelines I've mentioned above, and you and your customers will both end up satisfied.

Related Books

"eBay to the Max: Be a Trading Post Owner, Trading Assistant & PowerSeller," by Ron Mansfield
http://digbig.com/4gpas

"How to Start and Run an eBay Consignment Business," by Skip McGrath
http://digbig.com/4ggjw

"FutureShop: How the New Auction Culture Will Revolutionize the Way We Buy, Sell, and Get theThings We Really Want," by Daniel Nissanoff
http://digbig.com/4gpar