I’ve been on a year-long quest to get rid of things I don’t need in my life. I’m down from two closets of clothes to one, a garage sale got rid of some useable knick knacks, and all my jewel cases for my CDs have been replaced by those cloth album books and classified by genre. Yeah, sometimes I think I have a little too much time on my hands.
For the books and movies I don’t want, I’ve also been using Swaptree. I’ve had an account for a couple of months and one successful trade which I was completely happy with.
So how Swaptree works is you enter in books, CDs, DVDS, and games you want to have as well as CDs, DVDs, etc. that you want to trade. The website matches you up with potential trades. All you do is approve the trade, pay the postage, and mail the thing.
I think one reason why I only had one trade so far is that I didn’t have a lot of items in my have or want lists. The more items you put in both these lists, the more potential matches you can have.
Clearly, you can’t count of Swaptree to have specific items, though I’m guessing that if you’re looking for contemporary mainstream stuff (a best selling CD or paperback) that you are more likely to find it. All in all though, if you’re willing to wait for the things you want and willing to trade something for them, this is a good website for you.
1. A lot of wanted items and a lot of have items will increase your potential trades.
2. You need the ISBN numbers on items so you need to have them with you when you set up your account.
3. Accept or reject a trade right away. Keeping people waiting won’t help your rating.
4. When you do accept, mail the item as quickly as possible (the website emails you a shipping label to print).
5. Provide feedback. You want people to do the same for you.