Many people use eBay as a way to run a garage sale, getting rid of old and unwanted belongings while making a few bucks at the same time. But do you know that you can make a full time income off eBay by selling wholesale products all the time? There are already people doing this – they set up wholesaler agreements with dropship companies who handle inventory and process the shipment of goods to the buyer. Here are three more things you need to know about product sourcing for eBay before you jump in with both feet.

You should sell what’s hot on eBay today. You must find a China sourcing agent for eBay partner who can provide you with the best items to sell on eBay. If this hot product is Britney Spears’ latest hit single, then find a good music CDs dropshipper.

One more thing you want to be careful of – some vendors withhold 10% of your commission every month to cater for returned products and cancelled orders. They only release this money the next month. Of course, this amount varies. Some companies withhold more, some less, some not at all.

How do you find these vendors? Just search for directories of wholesale dropship supply companies. There are both free and paid directories at various price points. These wholesaler directories list all companies which are willing to provide goods for resale by third parties like yourself. You’ll need to ensure that these listed companies also handle order processing and delivery.

I suppose my experience with Fortune 1000 eCommerce consulting and participation in several DOTCOM era start-ups made a little arrogant. I felt like I knew what was going on the internet. Yeah, right.

Ask the sourcing agents, whether they will share all the sourcing information and will be transparent with you. Most brokers don’t share the details of the source. Ask them to disclose the complete details of the suppliers.

To start an eBay business, you need stuff to sell. There are tons of ‘wholesalers’ out there, but most of them are middlemen and scammers. To succeed on eBay, you need quality products, and most importantly, REAL wholesale pricing. The stuff that you find in the search engines are mostly middlemen that will charge you high monthly fees and/or give you marked up ‘wholesale’ pricing that will give you no chance at making money. eBay charges listing fees and closing fees to sell on their site. This means you need big margins to make money. Using a simple cookie cutter solution is asking for failure.

Another component that’s important is payment options. With most storefront providers, this is included. eBay, for example, uses their own payment processor – PayPal. It’s set up to take credit cards or checks. These five areas just scratch the surface, but should give you some good ideas as to which direction you want to go in setting up your online business.