Have you recently decluttered your closet and need a way to sell your clothes online? Well good news for you, because there’s an app to help you do just that! The app that I’ve been using is called Poshmark, and it’s helped me generate $2,000 to date by selling my lightly used clothes. In this blog post, I’m going to be sharing my secrets to selling on Poshmark successfully!
What is Poshmark?
It’s an app and website that allows you to buy and sell clothes, accessories, shoes, and other items directly from the platform. All you need is a phone to get started!
What Poshmark is not?
It is not a platform where you can take a quick sloppy photo, upload it to the app, and forget about it. You can definitely do this, but you’re not going to turn a large profit by doing that method. Which is why you need to keep reading to learn my tips and tricks to increase your sales and improve the visibility of your items to your future customers!
For new users, sign up for Poshmark using my code “SNOWBALLIN” to earn a $5 credit!
Take good photos
The number one secret to selling on Poshmark is to take quality photos of the items that you’re selling. If you can, I highly recommend modeling the items on yourself, or someone else, to show what the item actually looks like on the body. Clothes on a hanger can sometimes be deceiving and less appealing to the eye. The clothes that you are selling no longer fit you? No worries, you can definitely use a mannequin to elevate that problem.
When you’re taking the photos of the items, take the photos in a well-lit area that allows for the true colors and condition of the item to show through. You’ll also want to be consistent in how you take your photos for your account and upload as many photos that you think is necessary for someone looking to purchase from you. Poshmark allows up to 8 photos per listing so you have enough space to capture any details you want to show, including any damage, stains, sizing tag, etc.
Join Posh Parties
Posh parties are destinated virtual shopping events that happen two to three times a day that allow you to share your pieces with other members who are online at the time. These are a great way to gain more exposure for your items by a larger audience, so you’ll want to participate as often as you can. Some of the parties do have themes or rules to follow, such as “Best of Pants Party” or “Nike, Adidas, and Under Armour Party”.
Sell high quality or popular brands
People gravitate towards brands and companies that they are already familiar with, which is why this tip is hidden secret to selling on Poshmark. If you have more high-quality or popular brands that you are selling to sell, definitely do so! More well-known brands get more searches on the platform which typically means more people are looking for the item that you’re selling.
But on the flip side, you can definitely sell other less popular brands on Poshmark, but it may take a little more time to sell than your other items. Don’t get discouraged by this information! Just keep a mix of both in your closet to get the best of both worlds!
Shipping
One of the many conveniences of Poshmark is that they handle the process of shipping for you. When an item sells from your closet, you will get an email with a shipping label to print. All that you have to do is package the item in an appropriately sized priority mailbox (free from USPS), slap a shipping label on the box, and drop the package off at the post office. Boom, easy-peasy!
Go the extra mile for your customers by packaging your items with a handwritten thank you note and some tissue paper. You can even add beauty samples if you’re the person that always has extra stuff lying around. While you don’t have to go above and beyond for your customers, I promise you it’s the little touches that will keep bringing customers back to your Poshmark closet.
Post regularly
Another hidden secret to selling on Poshmark is to post regularly and increments. When I first started my closet, I would post everything all at once and overload my followers with new items. But I actually noticed a big difference in my sales and engagement when I posted new items on a weekly basis in small groups, instead of everything all at once.
By posting increments, you’ll constantly have new items listed to your closet. This technique will also train your customers to continuingly checking your closet for new pieces on a weekly basis.
Use descriptive titles and descriptions
When a customer is looking through Poshmark for a particular item, they are not typing in “red top” or “lace shorts”. They will be looking for an exact name or brand for whatever item that they are looking for, which means your titles and description need to include keywords. Keywords could be the exact name of the item you’re selling if you can find it online or descriptive terms to share what the item is. For an example if I was selling a pair of Adidas slides, I would use the title “Adidas Adilette Slides – (Color)”. By using that title, I not only show up in searches for Adidas slides but also if someone was looking for a particular color.
In your description, you’ll want to make sure to include condition, sizing, measurements (if necessary), material of the item, and anything else that you think may be important for the buyer to know. This is the spot where you want to be as descriptive as you can! Don’t leave anything out!
Price & Accepting Offers
Pricing your items is totally up to you, but I would highly recommend doing some research on what other sellers are pricing their items. You’ll want to consider how much the item originally cost as well as how much time and effort it takes you to list items and take them to the post office. Just like a yard sale, I would recommend pricing your items at a higher price than you necessarily want to allow for customers to negotiate the price with you.
There’s an option on each listing to “make an offer”, which is 100% always going to be lower than what you were originally asking. Now if the offer is obnoxiously low, then you can definitely “counter offer” to a price more reasonable or “decline” the offer all together. But you may lose the sale like I have because you wanted to gain a few extra dollars from an item!
Price Drop
One of the new features that Poshmark added was the ability to do a price drop. On your listings, there is a button that allows a “Price Drop” to “Offer to Likers (private), which gives the people that liked the item a special discount on the price and shipping costs. The shipping through Poshmark is $7.11 and is something that the customer has to pay to purchase your item (aka which is pretty steep!). Giving them a discount on the item itself and shipping will help push them to buy your item!
Offer a bundle discount
If a customer likes a few items from your closet, they can actually buy all of the items together in a bundle and only have to pay for shipping once. One of the hidden secrets of selling on Poshmark is to offer a bundle discount for those customers who like more than 1 item from your closet. Under your profile, click on “My Seller Tools”, then click on “My Seller Discounts”. This is where you can decide what discount you will offer to your customers if they buy more than 1 item. You can do up to 30% off and change the minimum items up to 7, if you would like.
Utilize the vacation hold
If you’re going to be traveling out of town for a few days, then you’ll definitely want to utilize this hidden tool in the Poshmark app. If you click on “My Seller Tools”, you’ll use a button for “Vacation Hold”. This will allow you to set a start and end date for when you’ll be out of town, which makes your items temporally unavailable for purchase. Poshmark likes to see items shipped within 2 business days but you have up to 7 days to mail out your items. People like to receive their purchases quickly so if you’re going to be out of town for more than a few days, then go ahead and use the “Vacation Hold” to avoid any issues.
Strive for 5-star reviews
Remember when I talked about shipping and packaging earlier? After the customer receives their item in the mail, they can leave you a review about their experience shopping from your closet. The goal is to strive for 5-star reviews because other customers can read your reviews, which may determine whether or not they purchase from your closet. Plus you want everyone to have a great experience shopping with you!
To improve your reviews, you’ll want to make sure that you are:
- shipping quickly (preferably within 2 business days)
- you fully disclose about any damage to the item in your closet
- personalize the package with tissue paper and a cute note
Be active and respond quickly
Another tip to selling on Poshmark is to be consistently active on the app and to answer any questions quickly. Future customers can actually see the last time you were active on the app by looking under your profile. By no means am I saying that you need to be on the app every minute of the day, but I do highly recommend checking in once or twice a day. This way you can answer any questions quickly, re-share your items to your audience, and share other seller’s items too.
Be patient
Some items in your closet will sell within a few days of you posting the item, but others may take longer. You really won’t have a way of knowing what item will sell quickly versus something else. Be patient and work hard to make your listings look appealing to any future customers. If you love the tips outline in this guide, then you shouldn’t have any issues making your first sale!
I know this was a long post, but hopefully you found it helpful and insightful about how to make some extra money on Poshmark. I’ve been using Poshmark since 2014 and have always had a great experience using the platform, which is why I highly recommend it. Sign up for Poshmark with my code “SNOWBALLIN” to earn $5 for free! If you need more ideas about how to make some extra money, then definitely check out this post on the Rover app and this post that shares 5 more ways to make money from home.
This post was originally published in May 2017 and has been updated for accuracy and comprehensiveness.
