How to Sell on Poshmark Tutorial
I confess I've been a little obsessed with easy ways to make money lately. Since the beginning of the new year I've been selling on Poshmark, an online boutique marketplace to buy and sell fashion items. Within the last five months, I have made over $3,000 through the app (what!), and thought you might want to learn how to sell on Poshmark!
In my post 11 Side Hustles You Can Start From Home, I shared about selling some items from around your house on apps like eBay, Mercari, and Poshmark. I have been selling as an online reseller for over 20 years (that’s before I had kids!). I absolutely love it! When I began, I was selling antiques, but soon I started selling many different items like clothing, shoes, overstock, clearance items, thrift store items, you name it.
Poshmark is a newer venture for me. If you aren’t familiar with Poshmark, think of it as Pinterest or Instagram meets eBay. I’m sharing some of my best tips with you on how you can sell on Poshmark to make some extra money to pay off debt, travel, or even earn a full-time income.
How to Sell on Poshmark Tutorial
1.) Set Up a Free Poshmark Account
Head over to Poshmark.com and sign up either through your Google account, Facebook, or your e-mail address. While you can create an account on mobile, it may be easier to fill out all the settings on your computer. Once you have signed in, click over to account settings and fill this out completely: upload a profile picture, your info, gender, residence, website (if you have one), and link your social media profiles so you can share your items there easily.
The most important thing is setting up your payment methods. There are options for Venmo, PayPal, Google Pay, Apple Pay, Affirm, and major credit or debit cards. I have chosen to link it to my Venmo account, so all of my payments come out of my Venmo that I have connected directly to my checking account.
Within your account profile, you can choose to offer a seller discount. I recommend setting up a bundle discount of 10% when someone purchases two or more items. This is automatically done when a shopper creates a bundle by adding at least two items from your closet into their cart. It encourages them to look around at your closet more because everyone loves getting a discount. You can adjust your seller discount within your account tab however you choose: offer 20% off a bundle of 3 or more items, etc.
You can also set up shipping label settings within your account tab. While this is optional, if you will be selling a high-volume of items on Poshmark, I recommend investing in a label printer. Dymo’s is my favorite because it prints quickly, rarely jams, and doesn’t use my expensive printer ink.
One thing I love about Poshmark is that the buyer always pays for shipping. When someone purchases from your closet, Poshmark automatically emails you the label, which can be printed from your phone or the computer. This is why a label printer is especially helpful since it saves time and money. You don’t need to make additional postage purchases. Bonus: all of your profit has already been calculated for you and won’t be affected by excess shipping, unlike eBay and Macari platforms.
2.) Start Your Closet
I currently have over 400 items for sale on my Poshmark account, and I will honestly tell you 99% of them were purchased from thrift stores. Make sure the items are in excellent condition and something you would want to buy yourself.
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- Tap the Sell Button on your app
- If you took photos of your item, upload them here. It’s important you include your personal images of the item. Sometimes you’ll find stock photos are available online, but not all companies allow you to use them. Rather than research the permissions, be safe, and just take your own photos.
- Add a title (50 characters) and your description (500 characters). Add in helpful measurements, fit, and any relevant details that are helpful to know. Be sure to include keywords, or in other words, what people would search for if they were shopping for this.
- Add other details like correct category, size, condition, brand, color – the more you fill out, the easier it will be for shoppers to find your item.
- Set your pricing.
Just a quick note on pricing: Poshmark does take 20% of your sales, so keep that in mind when setting your prices and when looking for items to sell. For example, if you sell something for $10, you would make $8 (remember your buyer is paying shipping). I always try to make sure I am making double my money back when I buy things from thrift stores or clearance to resell, but this may not be the same rule when re-selling from your personal closet.
Easy as that! Your closet is set up! If only taking care of your closets at home was so simple, right?
3.) Choose the Right Items to Sell on Poshmark
If you don’t know the history of Poshmark, it started as a fashion website. This ethos still carries through to today. The target market for the site is young, fashionable clients, usually Millennials. They don’t want anything that looks like “old-grandma clothes.” (sorry, nana).
Take the time to look through your own personal closet in your home and choose clothing you are no longer using. The most important things to remember when evaluating your items are style, cleanliness, and condition. Check out sites like Shopbop or fashion-forward online retailers such as Taylor Loft or Anthropologie. These are the best things you can start to list in your Poshmark store.
4.) Take Great Photographs
Since people are shopping your closet online, they won’t have the advantage of seeing, feeling, or experiencing the items you’re selling. Therefore, great photos matter when showcasing products for sale.
Find a nice background. Don’t lay clothes out on your couch or your floor – this will come across in your photos and just not look attractive at all. Instead, look for a plain wall in a neutral color, maybe use a command strip to hang the clothing in a flattering way. If you don't have a blank wall space, I suggest investing in a portable photo background like this one I use for my Poshmark photographs. Take the time to steam or iron the clothes, so they are wrinkle-free and look their best. Remember, you are trying to entice people to buy, and you want them to think of you as a reputable seller with quality merchandise for the price you are asking.
Make sure you have good lighting. If You have natural light from windows, this is best. You’ll want to avoid harsh shadows or lights that affect the color of the photo. Some indoor lights are almost orange or yellow, while others give off an almost bluish tone.
I only use my cell phone to take photos of my Poshmark items; there is no need to invest in a DSLR. Most cell phones allow you to choose shooting in a square frame. This is a huge time saver because you don’t need to go back and crop only to find out it cuts off a piece of the item you are trying to showcase. Take time to capture your item from a few different angles, and capture any important details you want to feature. For example, if you have a real Chanel purse you are selling, make sure you take a close-up of the stitching, the back of the bag lock, or the logo to help your buyers authenticate it.
If you can, batch your days so you can do your photographs of several items at one time, and then create several listings. I recommend this, especially if you have to clear out a space for pictures, steam several pieces, or catch great lighting when you have it.
5.) Be Social and Go to Parties (Really!)
Poshmark is a social sharing community. So remember when we set up the account, we linked your social profiles.
If you have listed things on Poshmark and find they aren’t selling as quickly as you’d like, there might be a few reasons. It might be because you don’t have any followers, and you are not following anyone. You might also not be sharing the items in your closet with your followers or going to parties.
Poshmark has “Posh Parties.” They run about four or five of these each day, and they are specific to brands of clothing types. So, for example, there may be a party for Anthropologie, and that means everyone on Poshmark and has items under that brand is sharing those items in the specific party room. Shoppers who love Anthropologie and are looking for new pieces to buy will go and shop the parties because there will be lots of merchandise to choose from in a central location without searching around other people’s closets.
Not all parties are for brands; some are for Best in Shoes, Best in Jeans, Best in Dresses, etc. So definitely take the time to share your items in relevant Posh Parties and get more eyes on the items in your closet.
Helpful Tips Before You Sell on Poshmark
If you plan to sell on Poshmark on at least a part-time basis, I highly recommend setting up a separate checking account. Use this to purchase any inventory or shipping supplies, and also keep any deposits from your sales.
Once I hit a certain amount in profit for me, it’s $1,000), I will transfer this into my savings account. I can use my savings for whatever I have designated: an emergency fund, paying off debt, college savings, or travel.
Although I mentioned sourcing items from thrift stores, I don’t recommend you start this way. This is especially true if you are trying to sell on Poshmark to get out of debt or make some money. First, list your items from your own clothing that you have in your house. This might be shoes, purses, or whatever you don’t need. You DO NOT need to start your Poshmark Closet by spending other money and going further into debt.
Once you have some money set aside from selling your own personal items in your checking account, NOW you can start looking into sourcing items from different places. I like to look for items in thrift stores or clearance sections of department stores like Saks Fifth Avenue, Nordstrom, TJMaxx, etc. Everyone has a different profit margin, so stay with what’s comfortable for you and always remember your goals. You will get a higher profit margin from thrift stores, but it may take more time to find quality items.
Plan time each day to be active in the Poshmark App. You have to be engaged in the app. I mentioned above Poshmark is a social site, so be an active seller. I schedule time each morning and each evening to share my entire closet – all 400-plus items! It takes me about 15 minutes, and I usually do this while drinking my coffee, saying my prayers, and getting my head ready for the day. Having it on the app makes it very easy and convenient. Instead of scrolling through Instagram, I just share my closet and know I am potentially making money.
Within your scheduled time, be sure you go through and follow other sellers, like their items, comment on things in their closet, and share items for them. Like with social media, since this is a social sharing site, there is expected reciprocity that other sellers will engage with you. This is exactly what you want to find success on Poshmark.
Set your notifications to alert you when a party comes up for Poshmark. This way, if you have any relevant items to that category or brand, you can stop what you are doing, take a few minutes, and share your items to the party.
I hope you have found this tutorial on how to sell on Poshmark helpful. I have loved my experience so far, and even though I have only been actively selling for about five months, I have made about $3,000 through the app. While I don’t know about you, this would be a great way to pay off some debt, plan for a vacation, or start an emergency fund. If you want to check out my post about four more other ideas for setting up an emergency fund fast without getting a second job, I’ve linked it here.
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