Selling on Yahoo Japan from the US

triplemm · Joined: 10 Oct 2006 Posts: 6

Does anyone know of a service (selling agent) that would allow me to sell items from the US on Yahoo Japan?

It seems as if there are many items selling on Yahoo Japan that are priced at a premium compared to eBay for example.

If I can find a "selling agent" do people think there is real opportunity there?

domo arigato!

arupacino99 · Joined: 12 Oct 2006 Posts: 4

I speak, read and write fluent Japanese, yet I do not sell in Japan from US. Why? First people there do not like to buy from outside of Japan, second they do not like to use credit cards(forget about paypal) and most of the transaction are done direct deposit into bank account. third, one little mistake, most likely you'll receive a negative feedback - you provide perfect service, thats consider normal service in Japan. fourth, unless item you are selling is rare items, you will not able to sell it for premium(which means if you list a lot of it no longer becomes rare item). If you are using a service or agent to sell in Japan, you have to pay commission for that service, so your profit will not be better than selling on eBay(you'll have more headache though). If you do not have any family or good friends that you can totally trust, I would not recommend at all for you to sell in Yahoo Japan because it will be impossible to compete again Japanese sellers in Japan as they are so maticulate and service orineted that in my opinion 99% of sellers service in US does not even come close to there level of service. Oh, one last thing, they do not have auction management software like the one we have here so that makes it even harder to provide good service and do not leave negative feedback to your customer in Japan, because they are always right in Japan and whatever excuse you may have does not matter to them since they expect perfect service at the minimum you should provide. Sorry, my comment was not too encouraging, but in my opinion, yes eBay is very competitive place to sell, but I still think its one of the easiest place to make money if you have the right products. if you cannot handle ebay, you certainly won't be able to handle Yahoo Japan.

lotr · Joined: 12 Mar 2002 Posts: 98 Location: New Zealand

arupacino99 · Joined: 12 Oct 2006 Posts: 4

How much do you make in Japan a month this way?

lotr · Joined: 12 Mar 2002 Posts: 98 Location: New Zealand

arupacino99 · Joined: 12 Oct 2006 Posts: 4

Good for you. Thats the advantage you have over people in US. I been to NZ many times(infact thats my favorite place to live) and you do have many niche products there that we don't have here in US(I use to bring a lots of stuff from there to US) and having a good friend you can trust is a big plus. Problem here in US is that people from all over the world are always checking US eBay and there are many Japanese buyers too. So any hot items will be also sold by Japanese sellers which means its lot easier to just sell to Japanese buyer on eBay. So what I am saying is unless you are doing very well (survive) on US eBay, you are not going to survive outside of USA if you are US seller. You might wonder how am I doing on US eBay? I am doing very well and also doing very well in Japan. How am I doing well in Japan? thats the million dollar question which you probably have to go through many try n error to find out. Yes its possible to make 400% profit, but can you make 400% profit on 500, 1000 items in a month instead of 10 is the question. having right products are not good enough anymore. Just concentrating on niche products and lowest price is no longer the right formula to be successful if you are serious about selling on auctions.

triplemm · Joined: 10 Oct 2006 Posts: 6

thanks everyone for the input.