How to Sell Used Books Online:
Part II of
Rural Book Scouting Ideas
June 30, 2013
To further help me learn how to sell used books online I made sure the local librarians all got to know me.
I started getting asked if I wanted to take away everything that was left over after the little library sale they ran. For free.
I have also established a relationship with the local Boy Scouts.
I help them organize their annual book sale and I donate a lot of firewood to them for the sale. Then I pay them a premium (twice the asking price) and they let me cherry pick the books that they collect in their drive.
I did something similar with one of the auctioneers. He called me for advice when he wound up with 25,000 books to liquidate. I helped him with the organization of his sale, publicized it through press releases and Kijiji ads and I paid him a premium to cherry pick.
I scanned all 25,000 books and took what I wanted. Then he called me back for the next load of 20,000 books.
In my area I am "the Book Guy." My daughter was in the local coffee shop, waiting for me to show up for a visit with her and she heard a patron asking someone what they should do with their parents large library of books. The person told the patron, "Oh, you want to talk to Paul Stevens. He's the Book Guy around here."
Build relationships with libraries, auctioneers and thrift store staff. Pay $200 for lettering for your car...a 24/7 advertisement. Then pay attention to where you park. Close to a traffic light or stop sign increases exposure time.
Offer local non-profits the idea of a book drive and sale. Offer them a reasonable premium over whatever they could sell the books for if yo get to look at them first. Become the "Book Person" for your area. Then the books will start to find their way to you.
How many colleges (private or public),schools, hospitals, businesses, or organizations in your area have libraries, or reference sections full of books. Almost all hospitals have reference libraries. So do many businesses. Periodically they purge their shelves. They need to know about you as a place for the books to go to.
Click here for Part III of Paul's answer…
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