I've had an account on this site for about six months, and I've spent a lot of time reading conversations in a variety of forums here, but I haven't participated in any. I've also watched a lot of good deals go by in the buy/sell forum, and argued with myself about whether to buy several items, but I never have.
I'm about to do a major (well, major for me) gear sell-off, including a 7D body, three EF lenses, one EFS lens, a 430EXII, as well as some odder pieces like a sweet little Electro35 and a Fuji Strobe GA that I used to pair with a GA645zi.
I have sold a lot of things on the big auction site, and I have 100% feedback there. But I've had several irritating experiences on that site, and of course their fees are high, and managing a dozen auctions all at once is going to be a major pain. The way you folks do it here seems to me a much more civilized way to go about this business, especially since I'm planning to sell a bunch of items all at once.
So I'm considering signing up for Upload & Sell here, putting reasonable prices on the items I have, and going about my sell-off that way. But here is my question (at last! -- thanks in advance for reading all this): Are people here going to be willing to send money to the PayPal account of someone like me, who has no pre-existing reputation on this site at all? I can point people to my auction site feedback, and there are also plenty of photographer friends on Flickr who would vouch for me, but I wonder if that's enough to win the trust of prospective buyers here.
FWIW, if you can somehow make yourself known to prospective buyers here, that will go a long way to helping you. E.g., if you have a Flickr site, or Facebook page; if your Fleece Bay site shows that you have 100% feedback on items that sold for the kind of money you're talking about listing here, that may help. If you do NOT use "PayPal Gift Only" that'll be a help: even amongst some folks here who have a good track record, why the hell would I send somebody a gift if I don't even know them If you can find a board on here that reflects your photographic interests and make comments about other folks' contributions. Indeed, and even better, if you posted your own pictures in that (those) board(s), that would help. If you decide to buy a posting subscription here, and you get a reply from somebody, be as forthright as you can with them about where in AL you are located; give them your telephone # and a hard street address. That also is likely to help.
HTH, tony (and you won't find a better site than this one)
My sincere thanks to each of you for taking the time to reply. You've been very helpful indeed, and I'm grateful. I think I'll try to get involved with some conversations here and post some pictures, and I also think I'll maybe start out small by trying to sell some lower-value items before moving on to the larger things. Again, my thanks. JB
If you can find a board on here that reflects your photographic interests and make comments about other folks' contributions. Indeed, and even better, if you posted your own pictures in that (those) board(s), that would help. If you decide to buy a posting subscription here, and you get a reply from somebody, be as forthright as you can with them about where in AL you are located; give them your telephone # and a hard street address. That also is likely to help.