For eCommerce merchants who want to track their inventory stock levels and per-item gross profit, we’ve now made it easier for higher volume sellers to load their inventory information into Seller Ledger.
If you make large purchases from certain vendors, and don’t want to type all of those items into Seller Ledger, there’s now an easy way to upload your items (and cost information) via a CSV file. Simply generate a comma-separated file that contains columns with headings of “sku“, “product name“, “quantity” and “total cost” and upload it inside of any of your inventory purchase transactions.
Not only can this help you save time when entering purchase information, but it comes in particularly handy if you want to start the year off fresh, or import inventory from another platform.
eBay cost of goods sold tracking has been a challenge for years (as we have heard from both customers and members of the eBay management team.)
Not too long ago, Seller Ledger rolled out inventory tracking, complete with some nifty automated cost of goods sold calculations. But for eBay sellers, that functionality depends on the use of an optional listing field called “Custom label (SKU).” And it turns out, that field is not shown by default when creating listing templates. So, we thought we’d help folks learn how to find and use that field, and what magic it can potentially unlock.
When you start to create a listing, one of the first things you’ll do is create a title for your item. By default, you will see two fields: Item title and Subtitle. However, if you click on the link to the upper right, called “See title options“, you will see a few more options pop up. One of those options is “Custom label (SKU)”.
Click on the selector to turn that field on, and you should see an updated form that looks like this:
Now, you have the ability to enter information about this item in the Custom label (SKU) field. But what should you put there, and why is it important?
You can choose to put anything you’d like in there, but, if you follow this guidance in conjunction with Seller Ledger, you will see two major benefits:
Have your inventory reduced and your cost of goods sold automatically calculated when an item sells
See how much money you make on each sale
The key concept here is to have a unique identifier (SKU) for each item you sell on eBay. How you create that identifier is up to you. Some people put a combination of letters and numbers, with some parts relating to the product name, or the bin number in which they are are currently stored. Others simply choose ever-increasing numbers. What matters most is that each SKU value is unique to that eBay item.
In Seller Ledger, when you purchase items for resale, you now have the ability to create a product/item, complete with a Product SKU field.
If you enter the same value in your eBay listing under “Custom label (SKU)” that you enter in Selller Ledger under “Product SKU”, you can sit back and watch the magic happen. When one of those items sells on eBay, Seller Ledger will match the order to your inventory, reduce the number of “in stock” units in inventory, and automatically calculate the cost of goods sold for that item, and show you the gross profit for that sale, as seen below.
eCommerce sellers, large and small, now have the ability to track inventory with Seller Ledger. Until now, customers could only write off inventory as “cost of goods sold” when purchased. But no longer!
Why track inventory in Seller Ledger?
There are a number of reasons to track inventory:
For most eCommerce sellers, the IRS requires that you do so.
It better aligns costs with your sale.
If done properly at the item level, it can help automate accurate stock levels (avoid stockouts,) as well as tell you how much money you make on individual orders and items.
So what does Seller Ledger offer in terms of eCommerce inventory tracking?
There are now 2 main ways to track inventory in Seller Ledger: what we call “balance-level” and “item-level” tracking.
Do you already keep a spreadsheet of all of your inventory, including how much you paid for each item? When an item sells, do you have to go back and update it? Have you tried to figure out how much money you make on each sale? If you can answer “yes” to any of these questions, then this option is for you.
While a bit more effort is required, the steps are quite simple:
When you purchase goods for resale, categorize them as Inventory purchases
Within each purchase, enter each item, including a unique SKU value, and the item’s cost. This process works very similar to splitting transactions.
Alternatively, you can start from your list of sold items (the order history we’ve already imported for you) and just tell us which purchase transaction included the item sold.
If you provide Seller Ledger with this level of detail, we do a few things for you automatically when an item sells (matching first based on SKU first, then by name):
We reduce the stock level for that item in your inventory
We calculate and generate the cost of goods for that item
You do not. If you would prefer to just categorize inventory purchases as “cost of goods sold,” you are free to do so. But, you might want to make sure you understand the risks with that approach. We’ll be writing another post about that option soon.
How do I try this out?
Just discovering Seller Ledger? Start a 30 day free trial right now – no credit card required.
For existing customers, just log into Seller Ledger, and you will see two new changes to the website. First, on the left of your Dashboard, we have added and made visible a new “Inventory” asset account. Second, there is a new top-level navigation link for Inventory. For those who previously categorized inventory purchases as “cost of goods sold,” you can elect to switch to properly tracking inventory. We explain more about how that works here.
Is there an additional charge for tracking inventory in Seller Ledger?
No – this feature is available to all customers at no additional charge. Unlike other accounting/bookkeeping platforms, we think even the smallest sellers should be able to see how much money they make on each item and keep on top of their inventory stock levels.
Please tell us what you think
This is a pretty big release, and represents weeks of work and planning. It’s also something we never got to tackle with Outright/GoDaddy Bookkeeping. As such, we’d love to hear from you as you try this new functionality – the good, the bad and the ugly.
