How Be Become A Bookscout
By Joe Waynick
A bookscout is someone who hunts for valuable books that can be resold to a local book store or sold online directly to the general public.
Obviously, not all books are valuable. Over time a professional scout will develop specialized knowledge about two or three niche topics and learn to immediately spot collectible books.
As a general guideline, the more specialized the niche, the better the chance you'll discover hard to find books that hold their value over the years, or maybe even increase in value.
How To Get Started
There are basically two types of book scouting methods you can choose. The oldest and most prestigious kind of bookscout is one who is only interested in collecting rare books for his or her private library or for resale.
Finding rare books requires a great deal of training and knowledge about the specific niche being pursued.
| Become an expert in a niche and you'll be able to spot valuable books that other book scouters overlook. |
The second way to become a book scout is to search primarily for recently published non-fiction books that are still popular sellers and fetch a reasonable price in the marketplace.
How To Find Books
Searching for recently published books is best done with the help of barcode wireless scanners that read the barcode printed on the back of most books published during and after the early 1970s.
If no barcode is present, modern books will usually have a nine or 13-digit International Standard Book Number (ISBN) which can be punched into the keypad of the scanning device.
Using the barcode scan or ISBN, the scanner instantly returns the information needed for the bookscout to make a "buy" or "do not buy" decision right there at the booksale.
For example, the device will tell the scouter the price the book is selling for online, the Amazon sale rank, and how many copies are available for sale by other used book dealers in Amazon's Internet bookstore.
You'll look for books in local garage sales, estate sales in your area, and used book sales among other places.
How Much Money Can A Bookscout Earn?
Your earning potential depends on how much time, effort, and money you're willing to invest in new inventory.
However, earnings from $500 - $2,000 monthly scouting part-time are common. If you're scouting full-time, monthly earnings from $2,000 - $6,000 are entirely possible when you buy and sell books.
Of course, to earn top dollar you must have money to invest in new inventory daily.
Eventually, your investment capital will come from your online bookselling business.
But for the first three months you must be prepared to invest as much as $2,000 monthly to make money buying and selling used books.
If you don't have that kind of money, you can always start small. You can invest as little as $100 per month and let your profits slowly build until you're ready to expand your inventory and really make money online selling used books.
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