No one can deny that eBay.co.uk has far more traffic than any other ecommerce site (an astonishing 60 million unique visitors a month!) in Britain; however SaleHoo has learned that there are some advantages to listing on the smaller, less trafficked sites.

1. No or fewer fees – admittedly sales will be slower but this is countered by the greatly reduced fees. In fact, many of these sites are free to list and some don’t even collect a final value fee either! This means that you have absolutely nothing to lose by listing and when you do make a sale, you are getting an extra $1-$5 per item profit!
2. Different audience – It might seem otherwise but not everyone is a huge fan of eBay! By listing on eBay alone you are missing out on all those other people who either just prefer other auction sites, or feel safer using classifieds where they can contact and pay the seller in person.
3. Greater profit potential - Listing on a number of smaller sites with no fees can actually make you more money at the end of the day than simply listing on eBay, depending on what you are selling.

eBay International
http://www.ebay.com/

Going international is an excellent option for getting more buyers. You’ll often find that buyers in other European countries don’t have the same access to certain products you take for granted. Frequently, items that are common place in the UK may turn out to be heavily in demand elsewhere. It’s not that hard to find out what they are either. Just compare popular searches across eBay sites. But remember: you do have to balance the increase in sales with the increased complications of shipping overseas – customs, tax and a sometimes greater likelihood of parcels going missing (this varies depending on the country).

***Hot Pick***

eBid
http://uk.ebid.net/

Currently the second most popular auction site in the UK with over half a million listings. Traffic to this site has increased significantly over the past few months and now would be the perfect time to get started. Interestingly, the average number of page views for this site is 20, slightly above that of eBay UK! What we love about ebid is that there are zero fees to list your items. You pay nothing until your item sells and final value fees are very low or non-existent! Sellers get two options – they can either get a standard account which gives them access to ebid’s standard auction format which is free to list with a 2% Final Value Fee. Or, you can upgrade to Seller+ account and use the free auction" which has NO listing fees and NO final value fees. The pricing structure for this is below:

Seller+ account: 7 Day £1.99 | 30 Day £6.99 | 90 Day £16.99 | 365 Day £59.99 | Lifetime £79.99

ebid also has local sites in US, Australia, Canada and Ireland, so you have the option of selling internationally as well. Other reasons to love this site include personalized customer support (something eBay seems to have forgotten about) and a great forum.

eCrater
http://www.ecrater.com/

100% free online marketplace in a Buy Now format. This site gets a reasonable daily traffic flow and has a great variety of products listed, making it very attractive to buyers. It’s easy to use and all payments are through Google Checkout. eCrater is extremely accommodating for sellers. You can list unlimited number of products for free with up to 10 free photos per item. You also get your own URL (http://yourname.ecrater.com/), which is excellent for cross-promotion purposes and also contains order management, a feedback system and plenty more besides. If I had to choose just two new places to list from this article, eCrater would be my second choice after ebid.

Amazon Auctions
http://s1.amazon.co.uk/

Amazon is a well-respected site with high traffic. But if you list here you have to adhere to Amazon’s strict rules for sellers, plus give them a hefty 17.25% (slightly less for electronics and photo items) of the closing price in commission for the privilege. This is not a site for new seller, but it could certainly work well for established sellers and those with high-priced items. To list on Amazon you must do the following:

Accepted payment methods: Amazon Payments only, collected at time of purchase.

Postage credit: Fixed by product line. See details.

Shipping expectation: Seller ships within 48 hours of purchase.

Returns: Sellers will accept returns and refund buyers. See details.

Preloved
http://www.preloved.co.uk/

If you specialize in selling vintage or second-hand items then this classified site is a great place to do it. Preloved is a classified site and only for second-hand items only. It has a gorgeous design and layout, reasonable traffic flow and you can list for free with one free photo.

AdTrader
http://www.adtrader.co.uk/

This is a classified site with free listings in some categories. Ads display for 1 week, or you can pay more to list for longer. I’m not sure that the traffic to this site would justify paying a listing fee, however it is worth a go. What we did like about this site was the handy ‘top searches’ for the month page http://www.adtrader.co.uk/siteinfo.php?page=top_searches. Great for market research!