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Frequently Asked Questions (Selling)
Here you'll find answers to questions about selling on It's Minnesotan. Just click a question in the list below and you'll be taken to the answer.
There are more helpful resources linked on the menu to the left.
How do I become a seller on It's Minnesotan?
Who can be a seller?
Can kids have It's Minnesotan Viewer Profiles?
What is a Viewer Profile?
I'm in Canada or anywhere else besides Minnesota can I sell on It's Minnesotan?
I already have a buyer account. How do I become a seller?
Can I change my username?
Can I close my account to start a new one with a different username?
Can more than one person operate a shop?
Fees & Billing
How do It's Minnesotan fees work?
How am I billed for fees associated with selling?
Is there a fee to get started (open a Viewer Profile)?
If I edit an item, is there any fee for that?
Selling Policies
What items can I sell on It's Minnesotan?
What items can't I sell on It's Minnesotan?
Create a New Listing (Add Item) Step 1: Item Info
Is there a walkthrough for all the steps of listing an item?
Create a New Listing (Add Item) Step 2: Sort Your Item
How do Categories work?
Can my listing appear in more than one top-level Category?
How do I know what Category to use?
Create a New Listing (Add Item) Step 4: Images
How do I add/upload photos to my listing?
Can I add a photo that exists on the web?
Can I edit or remove photos from my listing?
Can I change the order of photos in my listing?
How many photos can I add?
Do I have to fill all photo slots for my listing?
Create a New Listing (Add Item) Step 5: Review & Post
What happens if I don't click Finish?
Can I edit my item after I click Finish?
Where does my listing appear?
Payment Methods
Can I select different Forms of Payment formy postings?
Expired Listings
When does my listing expire?
How do I view the listing expiration dates?
Can I make an expired listing active again?
Becoming an It's Minnesotan Seller How do I become a seller on It's Minnesotan?
First you'll need to register. Be careful when choosing your username, as it will also be your"Viewer Profile"name. Once you've registered for a basic (buyer) account, you'll need to upgrade to a seller account. To do this, click the Sell tab in the top gray navigation bar and follow the on-screen directions. Note: You will need a valid PayPal account to become a seller.
Who can be a seller?Anyone who is at least 18 years of age can be a seller on It's Minnesotan.
Can kids have It's Minnesotan Seller Profiles?
If you are under 18, you may use It's Minnesotan only with the permissionand under the guidance of a responsible adult (parent or legal guardian). This is for legal reasons, not because we think kids or teens are any less creative or capable. Consider Junior having a special section in Mom or Dad's shop instead of having a store all to himself.
What is a Seller Profile?Every seller on It's Minnesotan gets their ownSeller Profile free of charge, located at . You will have to activate your Seller Profile in your account information section. Every item you list will automatically show up in your Seller Profile, in addition to being placed in the public category you listed them in.
Can I close my account to start a new one with a different username?
If you really want to, yes you can. Note that you'll lose all data (includingposted itemsand items sold) when doing this. Contact support@itsminnesotan.com to close an account.
Can I have more than one shop?A person may have more than one account. However, it's not a practice we encourage or support. There are certain guidelines you must adhere to, including full disclosure of ALL your accounts in each profile. Additionally, your actions under one username will apply to all your accounts. So if you break the rules, the consequences effect you across the board. Please see the DOs & DON'Ts of It's Minnesotanfor more information.
Can more than one person operate a shop?If multiple people are using the same account, you do so at your own risk. This is not something we encourage, nor do we explicitly prohibit it. All we'll say here is that it complicates matters and might not be the best decision in the long run. We will not mediate disputes between two people fighting over the same account. Please see the DOs & DON'Ts of It's Minnesotanfor more information.
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Fees & Billing
When you list an item there is a 3.95% (USD) fee on the total $ value of the items listed. This covers an item listing period of one year. For example, if I list abasket at $100 (and there's only 1 in stock) it'll cost $3.95 for one year. Ifyou gave the listing a quantity of 3, it would cost $11.85. When an item sells, there's no fee on the final sale price. All fees are in US dollars. All listings are created equal, with 5 images included in the price.
How am I billed for fees associated with selling?
When you sign up as a seller, we require that you keep a valid paypal account on file. At the time of posting we will bill your account for the total amount due before your items are posted.
You can sell anything that ispersonally createdor, a bit more loosely put, hand-assembled or hand-altered. For example, screen-printed shirts are OK. A custom-built computer is OK, as long as you're making the case and not buying prefab. Furniture is OK as long as it's nothing mass-produced (yes, you can use power tools to build it). If your human hands put some love into the object, odds are you can sell it on It's Minnesotan. Reselling of handmade items is not allowed. Please note: music, poems, books and the like are all permitted.
Your Item Listings
There are three ways an item can disappear from your shop:
If an item that has a quantity of 1 (in stock) sells, the listing is removed and you'll see it under yourSeller Profile> Items Sold.
- If you start editing an item listing and don't click the Finish button on Step 5 before you navigate elsewhere on the site, the item will be left inactive.
When does my listing expire?
One year after the date it was listed.
Can I change the order of my listings in my Viewer Profile?Right now the items in your shop are sorted by date listed (from new to old) as the default setting.
What if I have multiple sizes/variations of the same item?For now, you'll need to create separate listing for each item. We're working on a way to sell variations on an item within a single listing.
How do I see the public view of my shop?If you're already at It's Minnesotan, go to Your It's Minnesotan and click the link at the bottom of the left-side nav bar.
Go to Your It's Minnesotanaccount, sign in and go to My Postings.Click edit on the item you wish to change. This will take you back into the 5 step-listing process. Click the pencil icons as a shortcut to edit the different parts of your listing. Make sure you click Finish on Step 5 when you're done editing.
How do I make a listing inactive (on hold or "Vacation Mode")?There's a trick to doing this. After you've fully listed your item for sale, go back into edit mode. This time, make sure you don't go to Step 5 and click finish. Navigate away from the page. Your item is now in limbo. You can find it and relist it by going to your shop Listings, going back into edit mode and clicking finish. Items in limbo will not show up anywhere on the public site, but their time in limbo is still being counted as part of the four month period.
How do I delete a listing?Click the Delete link on your Items for Sale page in the row of the item you wish to delete.
If I delete a listing is my listing fee refunded?Listing fees are non-refundable, with the exception of reported transactions.
I sold an item in person at a craft show,can I mark it "sold" on It's Minnesotan?No. The sold items section of your shop if just for items sold through It's Minnesotan. If you sell an item off-line, just delete the listing from your shop.
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Create a New Listing (Add Item) Step 1: Item Info
How long can my title be?
155 alpha-numeric characters.
How long can my Item Description be?
Create a New Listing (Add Item) Step 2: Sort Your Item
How do Categories work?
Categories are all based on tags. The first tag on your item is its top-level category. You choose this from a drop-down menu.
Nope.
Create a New Listing (Add Item) Step 3: Selling Info
Yes, for the time being all prices on It's Minnesotan are listed in United States Dollars (USD).
Create a New Listing (Add Item) Step 4: Images
Click the browse button and locate the image on your computer. Then click the upload button, and you'll see a thumbnail of the image show up just below.
No, the image must reside locally on your computer.
Yes, at any time. And there's no charge for this.
Yes, by removing an image you can reshuffle the order. This can be tricky and we recommend that you have your images in their desired order before uploading. The first image you upload will be the primary thumbnail and detail photo.
You can have up to 5 photos per item listing.
Nope, you can leave as many blank as you like.
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Create a New Listing (Add Item) Step 5: Review & Post
What happens if I don't click Finish?
If you don't click the finish button when you're first listing an item, and then navigate away from the listing steps, everything will be lost.
Yes, at any time. There is no cost to edit an item unless you increase the quantity available.
Every new listing appears on the front page of the site. This page is constantly updated with the newest items to the site.
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Expired Listings
Relisting a Sold Item
To relist an item, go to Your It's Minnesotan > Sold (orders), and click the listing you would like to relist. Click the "relist" link at the top of the transaction page.
Yes, the same .3.95% fee applies.
When you sell out of an item and have more of it in stock that you wish to sell.
Yes.
Image Help
Ensure that the file is 250k in file size or below,most users will timeout before uploading larger files than that. Ensure the file is a properly encoded jpeg, gif, or png. Is there a firewall that could be blocking your uploads? This might be the case if you work for a large and/or slightly paranoid company and you're trying to upload from work. Try to alter your firewall settings or take the firewall down briefly to test the transfer.
Thumbnails on It's Minnesotan are a perfect square, and gallery images are rectangular. Your original image will be cropped for at least one of those views. We crop from the center point of the image. Your entire original photo will show on the item listing page.
Make sure your original image is at least 430 pixels wide. If it's not, we'll stretch it to fit the page and this will cause unpleasant effects.
We're not very fond of them but you're welcome to use them.
The following file extensions are valid: JPEG, JPG, GIF and PNG. All images are resampled as JPEGs with a quality of 90. Uploading animated GIFs won't work.
The detail image in all item listings is500 to 600pixels wide. We retain the aspect ratio of your original, so the height is variable.
The minimum size for your photo should be300 pixels wide (with variable height). We recommend using an image that is around 500 to 600 pixels wide. Using an original image of this size lets your customers use the Zoom button to see the larger image.
It can be up to 2mb, though that is rather huge. Most images should be around 250k.
Every image on the web is displayed at 72dpi (dots per inch). Anything greater than that will create very large file sizes without adding anything to the quality.
You should use RGB, which stands for Red/Green/Blue. CMYK is only for print (and stands for Cyan/Magenta/Yellow/Black). CMYK images will not work on the web.
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Transactions: Items Sold
When you sell an item, you are sent an email containing all the pertinent info for the sale (item, buyer, etc.). The item's quantity is automatically reduced by the number that were sold, and will show up in the Items Sold section of Your Shop. We'll include a link to PayPal for the buyer to follow for quick payment. Add transactions@itsminnesotan.com to your email address book to make sure our messages don't get caught in your spam filter.
You canfind their email address in the receipt It's Minnesotan mails to you for every item sold.
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Transactions: Buyer Payment
When do I get paid by the buyer?
PayPal
PayPal is an online payment processing company widely used on the Internet to facilitate sales transactions. It's Minnesotan is not affiliated with or subsidized by PayPal.
When the shipping charge on your PayPal invoice is incorrect, you'll need to adjust your PayPal account settings. If you need to revise the invoice for the customer, go to your PayPal account and click on "request money" to send a corrected invoice.
To check your PayPal settings:
- Log into PayPal at www.paypal.com
- Go to My Account > Profile > Shipping calculations (in the Selling Preferences column)
- Select the Shipping Method and click Edit
- Select Yes for "Override shipping methods per transaction" and press Save Changes.
Please note that if you have not set up any Shipping Calculations in PayPal, the default is to override shipping methods per transaction (you should not need to change anything). Also note that the above instructions are for www.paypal.com; other country-specific versions of PayPal may differ slightly.
I made a sale, but the money doesn't show up in my PayPal account. What happened?
This is how PayPal transactions work:
- Buyer clicks on "buy" button and chooses credit card/paypal payment
- It's Minnesotan links buyer to PayPal to fill in billing info
- It's Minnesotan sends buyer email with PayPal link in it
- Buyer need to click on PayPal link to complete payment
- Seller will see money deposited into PayPal account
Do I need a PayPal account to sell on It's Minnesotan?
Yes, It'srequired.
Yes, PayPal requires anyone selling goods on the Web to have a Premier or Business account.
Buyers can submit payment by credit card through PayPal without having a PayPal account. Check out this helpful walkthrough of that process:
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Transactions: Disputes & Problems
If a buyer has failed to pay or backed out of a transaction, we will refund the listing and sales fees, and remove all record of the transaction. You'll just need to fill out the Transaction Report linked to in the sidebar of the main Help page. Be sure to leave feedback now, as once we remove the transaction, the option for leaving feedback is also removed. Also, relist your item first so that you don't loose your listing descriptions, etc.
Are both the listing fee and the transaction fee refunded when a report is complete?
Yes, they are both refunded.
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More Help
I didn't find my answer here. Where else can I get help?
Check out these other resources:
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