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October 31, 2006
Happy Halloween
I love this spooky, wonderful day and hope that you do, too! Have a wonderful time and don't make yourself sick with candy. :-)
Posted by SydneyJohnston at 9:45 AM | TrackBack
October 28, 2006
How To Sell On eBay Tutorials Quite Helpful
If you're trying to sell on eBay and don't understand some of the rules of the game, then perhaps these eBay tutorials might help:
* Buying safely on eBay:
http://pages.ebay.com/help/tutorial/buyingsafely/js_tutorial.html
* Protecting yourself from scammers & spammers:
http://pages.ebay.com/help/tutorial/accountprotection/js_tutorial.html
* Shill bidding:
http://pages.ebay.com/help/tutorial/feedbacktutorial/intro.html?ssPageName=CMDV:AB
Posted by SydneyJohnston at 12:28 PM | TrackBack
October 25, 2006
Finding Products To Sell On eBay
Recently, I received an articulate and sincere email from a very frustrated would-be eBay success story. I have excerpted it here:
Subject: Finding products to sell is the easiest part??? Uuggghh!!
... I've bought and sold ~40 items on Ebay. That's the extent of my internet marketing.
... I've researched and researched 'til my brain is fried. Overture and Wordtracker are good demand and supply tools but you've got to have some idea of your product first before you can input related search terms.
... Sell what's selling. Or, sell what's in demand. Makes sense to me. But electronics are in demand and yet both Andy and Chris Malta both say that market is saturated. Others say find something your passionate about. I have two passions, golf and music, neither of which I've been able to adapt to a marketable product. Then I was reading your auction genius course sales letter and read your statement about people not believing you when you say finding products is the easiest part. And I thought......ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? Well, I guess you're right that finding them is easy. Go to WWB. But which ones? I'm using the Market research wizard and have yet to find a product in demand that results in an analysis score of greater than 1%. SEO and all the rest is meaningless if you don't have a product. CAN YOU HEAR THE FRUSTRATION IN MY VOICE? Sorry, I'm just really at a loss for how to go about this process. Everyone is looking the holy grail of ecommerce. High demand and low supply. And I don't want someone to tell me what to sell. I just wish someone would provide some guidance as to how to go about this. Sell what's selling is just too broad of a term for my liking.
... is there some method to this madness of finding a niche? Thank you for your time and sincere thanks in advance for any advice given.
...p.s. I'm really starting to understand why Andy says that most people get to this point in their ecommerce career and then quit. They get paralysis analysis on the product.
When he refers to "WWB" he is referring to Worldwidebrands, and the Market Research Wizard is also their product. And they are fine products. But his real problem is lack of knowledge on how to do market research. There is no way to take a single piece of software, type in a keyword phrase and have a Magic Answer emerge on your screen. The Wizard is one tool and only one. There is much more that goes into identifying a a profitable eBay or Internet product. Without this knowledge, his chances of finding a genuine winner are slim.
= = = <
... I've researched and researched 'til my brain is fried. Overture and Wordtracker are good demand and supply tools but you've got to have some idea of your product first before you can input related search terms.
He's 100% right when he says you can't effectively do keyword research until you know what your product is. If you're going to sell fine crystal glasses, you need to know the best keywords for fine crystal glasses if you're going to send traffic to your auctions and/or website. But isn't he doing exactly what he says NOT to do? He's researching keywords for products he doesn't have!
Example: let's suppose he does his keyword research and finds the perfect niche: huge amount of demand and very few competitors. And all of his competitors are relatively inept. Now what? If he can't find the product all his efforts are useless. There is no bigger waste of time than spending hours, days and weeks chasing an elusive product. I've been selling on eBay for over 10 years and I absolutely can NOT find a source for every product I've ever thought about. How can a total novice hope to succeed?
The point is that he's going about this backwards! Here's his method:
Do keyword research ---> Find
winning search terms --->
Look for product that fits keyword research
Here's a much more efficient way:
Locate tens of thousands of wholesale products ---> do keyword
research
based on the thousands of products already available to you
An irony: he mentions that he can't find any products in the music field yet I recently helped a friend research almost 4,000 music products to find some winners to sell on eBay. Currently, she's more than replaced the income she lost when she was laid off from her job at IBM. Selling ... music products.
Make sense? All comments welcome because is the #1 question I get about eBay. But think about it ... how many products are there on Planet Earth? Millions? Billions? Trillions? Quadrillions? (Don't know what comes after quadrillions :-) Does it really make sense that you can't find a handful of those products to sell on eBay?
Our frustrated writer has drawn the wrong conclusions:
1. He thinks there is nothing for him to sell
2. He thinks that no one else knows how to do this, either - or is teaching the "how to"
He's completely wrong on both counts. The real problem, though, is his own lack of knowledge.
Posted by SydneyJohnston at 1:21 PM
| TrackBack
Just a sample of what was in my email box from the thieves this week: 1. My supposed suspension for shill bidding: "Shill bidding" is bidding on my own auctions in order to artificially inflate the price. The crooks hope that I will panic and race to assure eBay that I am not guilty of such a heinous crime. And of course, they want me to respond via their link to "unsuspend" my account. In this piece of trash, the scumbags are trying to convince me that "digitaltrader-uk has paid me for an auction item - but I neglected to send it to him. A novice (they hope) will panic and click the "review the submitted details" button and convince eBay that it's all a big mistake and I'm innocent. An especially bad feature of this garbage is that they have used a real eBay ID. I'm sure that 'digitaltrader_uk' has no idea her/his ID has been usurped in this shabby way. Of course, in both emails, their goal is to get all my account information. The moral of the story is, as always, DO NOT provide any account information except on the eBay site! October 22, 2006
eBay Fraud: Fake Emails
Posted by SydneyJohnston at 12:57 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
October 19, 2006
How To Sell On eBay: Defeat The Non Paying Bidder
If you want to learn how to sell on eBay you will have to face the dreaded Non Paying Bidder. For some weird reason, there are people who seem to get their kicks out of bidding on items, winning them - and then vanishing into the mists. Most sellers live in dread of them, but here's a way to get around at least some of that ...
Are you familiar with the "Requiring Immediate Payment" feature on eBay? It is for Buy It Now listings and states that the item listing will NOT be removed unless the buyer pays immediately. I like this handy feature and eBay recently raised the limit from $2,000 to $4,000.
How it works:
* A buyer who clicks the Buy It Now button in your listing is directed to pay immediately for the item using PayPal.
* Until the buyer completes payment, the item remains available to other buyers to purchase for the duration of the listing. The first buyer to complete their PayPal payment officially wins your item.
* Once a buyer completes payment, the listing ends and you, the seller, are directed to ship the item.
If you want to use this handy dandy feature, you need to know there are certain requirements to be eligible for it. You must ...
* Have a PayPal Premier or PayPal Business account when you list your item
* Have an eBay seller account in good standing
* Specify a Buy It Now price of no more than $4,000
* Specify shipping costs (or include the shipping calculator in your listing) and include other related costs such as insurance and taxes, so your buyer knows exactly how much to pay
This feature is especially useful when selling something that is more expensive and it certainly is outstanding protection from the sorry Non Paying Bidder.
Posted by SydneyJohnston at 12:49 PM | TrackBack
October 16, 2006
Selling On eBay: Buyer Email Questions
If you're selling on eBay with any success, you absolutely will get email questions about your auctions from folks who won't reveal their email addresses. Currently, when an email is sent to you through eBay's system - and the sender has chosen to hide their email address - you cannot respond directly from your email system. Instead, you are directed to "Use The Yellow Button" within the body of the email, which takes you to a reply form.
According to eBay, "We've heard from members that this can be confusing and inefficient, especially when you have a large volume of emails to answer."
To deal with this problem, eBay has created 'Anonymous Email Forwarding'. This change will allow you to respond to email from your own email client, while still protecting the sender's privacy and will supposedly be available during October. According to eBay, here's how it works:
- - -
When a member sends you a message through eBay and has chosen to hide their email address, we'll create anonymous email addresses for both you and the sender. You can then reply to emails directly from your email client just like you do for any email. When your response comes back into our systems, our system will forward it to the appropriate recipient. The anonymous email forwarding service will help members communicate easily with one another while preserving the privacy of your email addresses.
- - -
I have a much easier way to dealing with anonymous questioners: I delete them. I figure if someone can't even reveal their email address they probably aren't a serious buyer. Has this cost me some money? Possibly. But the volume of email I receive every day is gigantic and I choose to spend my precious time with people who are serious and professional. Anonymous emails don't fit that definition.
Posted by SydneyJohnston at 12:40 PM | TrackBack
October 12, 2006
'Marketing Strategy To Launch New Product' Palls For One Student
There is definitely a marketing strategy to launch a new product and that's fine. There are new products all the time - some of them very worthwhile. But the promotions are escalating in hysteria and that's unfortunate. We humans often kill off a very good thing and I hope that this hasn't already happened. For instance, I received an email from a favorite student, Dennis Hester, who says:
- - -
I am going back and Un-subscribing to just about all of them {maketing newsletters}. If I read these types of phrases one more time I believe I will puke! – which isn’t going to do my key board any good:
“You must take action now!”
“Take advantage of this early bird offer”
“You are in a select group”
“This is truly time sensitive”
“Urgent”
“This is going to be big”
“Find hidden truths about making money online”
“Never before seen”
“Lost interviews and chapters”
“Secret Membership”
“My personal vault”
“This is an exclusive offer”
“Make more money than you’ve ever dreamed”
“I want to help others enjoy what I have found”
Posted by SydneyJohnston at 11:27 AM | TrackBack
October 9, 2006
Keyword Avalanche Review
Those of you who have been subscribers for a while know that I don't jump on all the hysterical launches that come along, sending out email after email promising "the greatest bonuses in the world" if you join via my affiliate link, blah, blah, blah.
However, there is a membership site that is temporarily re-opening tomorrow, October 10, that I am definitely recommending, so I would like to take a break from auctions and tell you about the awesome value in this site. Well, actually, this is related to auctions, but more on that later.
This membership site is focused on building niche websites and there's so much in this site it's simply overwhelming:
* There are 256 videos
http://auctionknowhow.com/videos.shtml
* Extensive software and services for keyword research to enable members to find the most profitable keywords, including a service that allow up to 100,000 keyword searches every single month
* There are 300 articles on profitable topics every month
* There is software that "spits out *unique* article content sites that yield an arousing 50% ClickThrough Rates"
* There is a "Master Portal Builder's Toolkit" with beginner and advanced lessons
* There is an absolutely awesome forum brimming with all kinds of information. I almost never read public forums anymore. With a few exceptions, they're just spots for uninformed people to argue. This one is different, though, and I'm there almost every day, checking to see what's new.
* There are all kinds of special support areas with quality leaders, like Sherman Hu, the Wordpress blogging expert or Sean Wu from TagAndPing.com. One of the new partners is my friend Todd Taylor who is arranging interviews with all kinds of experts on various Internet disciplines, like eBay. I am happy to be one of his future guests.
* There are "Advanced Lessons In Portal Building" from Jim Morris, the owner of NicheBot.com
* The founder of this cool site, Scott Standke, is constantly giving unannounced bonsues to members, like a program that would cost $300 to buy
http://ka.auctionknowhow.com
There's lots more but the most valuable part of the site to me comes from an awesome guy named Tim Gorman. Tim is a captain in the US army with a VERY full time military job. Yet he has managed to build a $10,000/month income with only a small amount of time. He says he will retire in two years and in 2007 his goal is to raise that income to $15,000/month. I have no doubt he will make it, either. Plus, Tim is incredibly generous about sharing everything he's doing and gives the members step-by-step details. I've followed his method just to see what would happen. Here's a report on my first results.
Virtual Real Estate For $2.99!
Sometime in the last year or two, John Reese coined the term "Virtual Real Estate" (VRE). This is a powerful concept if you think about it because John compares a web property to a physical property. If you buy an investment house, for instance, you can theoretically rent that property out to someone and (if you've done your numbers correctly) pocket a monthly profit. Own enough rental properties and you earn a nice income.
However, owning physical real estate can be a real bummer. I know. I was a real estate investor myself in another life. If you don't know what you're doing (and most folks don't - ask Carlton Sheets) there are financial risks and the possibility of some real legal hassles. And what if your house is unrented for a month or two or six? You must still make the mortgage payments whether they're being covered by your tenant or not. Then the property gets torn up and needs extensive renovation, the market takes a dive, etc., etc.
Contrast that with VRE. The risks are financially insignificant and worst case your web property just sits there, making no money, but not costing you much of anything either. A good VRE will continue to bring in money, with little effort on your part, once you have it properly set up.
Enough of that analogy and let's talk about what Tim Gorman teaches. Tim has a way of building a website that is currently earning him the previously mentioned $10,000/month. You can - literally - build a Tim Gorman VRE for $2.99 (not counting any web hosting cost). That is the cost of a ".info" domain name at our favorite domain registrar. It will take work on your part to build this site, but if you're short on money and long on time, this is a dream. And using the keyword tools on the site, you will be able to wisely pick a niche around which to build this site.
Tim lays out his method, step by step, so I decided to try it. After five weeks, I am now earning (as of yesterday) $13.27/day from AdSense. Of course, these numbers will vary by the day, but that's $4,843.55 a year. Nice, but not mind-boggling, right? But here's the thing:
1. It truly did cost me $2.99 in actual cash
2. Now that's it's up and running, it will (according to Tim) take me about 1-2 hours/month to maintain. Perhaps no time at all, depending on several factors.
3. I now have a method that I can repeat again and again and again. Because it's simple and timeless in that it gives the search engines exactly what they want. No black hat SEO or tricks.
4. What if I build 10 of those? That's $48,435.50, 100 is $484,355.00; 1,000 is - well, you get the idea.
Is $13.27/day an average profit? I don't know because this is my first one, although my second one is ready to go and I'll start promoting it today. Tim says the average site will earn between $5-$15 per day. Perhaps I did so well with my first one because of this particular niche, or because I'm an experienced marketer. And, I did all the work on the first site - not so with my second one. My writer did all the content for the second which raised the cost, of course. But with the help of my writer, I can churn these puppies out and I intend to. Cheap VRE that I can place on almost total auto-pilot. If that rings your chimes, too, sign up for notice on the re-opening of the website. Don't forget that it's tomorrow, October 10 and I doubt it will last long. Most likely hours only.
If you decide to join the site through my affiliate link, send me an email and let me know. I am going to demonstrate another site I'm building with the Tim Gorman method, except that it will have two possible income streams, rather than just one. If you're a Tim-fan, you'll want to see this. I don't know yet how it will do, but I hope it will be even better than my first one.
Oops, I almost forgot - I mentioned earlier that the material in this site IS related to auctions. In the first quarter of 2007, Jim Edwards and I will be becoming out with a product on how to use content on eBay to build your business. This website will fit perfectly! Ah, so many blessings. :-)
Posted by SydneyJohnston at 10:11 AM | TrackBack
October 7, 2006
Make Your Content PreSell Now FREE
Last entry I announced that Ken Evoy was giving away his classic ebook, Make Your Site Sell:
http://myss.auctionknowhow.com
He is also is giving away a second book called Make Your Content PreSell. If you've ever tried to sell an affiliate product, you know how important it is to pre-sell. In fact, there's a currently "hot" new ebook on affiliate marketing that spends a great deal of time discussing pre-selling. If you ever want to sell any product that isn't yours, you need to understand the concepts in this excellent book.
http://mycps.auctionknowhow.com
At the very least, these classics should be in your Internet library for reference when you're ready to use them. Grab them now.
Posted by SydneyJohnston at 9:57 AM | TrackBack
October 5, 2006
Make Your Site Sell Now FREE!
Back when I was first starting on the Internet, I was forunate enough to stumble across Ken Evoy's classic book, Make Your Site Sell. Most folks probably know of Ken and his SBI site and this book started the entire thing. It even had a printed edition, which I bought. Just like the book I wrote for Ken, Make Your Net Auction Sell, this one hasn't been updated in a while, but it's still a solid book, a gem that everyone should own. Ken just recently decided to give it to anyone who wants it and you can download it here:
http://myss.auctionknowhow.com
Posted by SydneyJohnston at 9:47 AM | TrackBack
October 3, 2006
Liar Wants Freebie Samples
Yesterday, I received a phone call from a woman who had seen the Rich Jerk video. At first, it wasn't clear what she wanted, but it became apparent that her goal was to convince me to simply give her freebie samples of all the information I'd received from Andy & Brad. There were a lot of lessons from that phone call - wish I had taped it.
1. I wasn't here when she called so when she left a message, she said, "Sydney will know who I am". Obviously, this was a ploy to get me to call her back. I had no idea who she was because I'd had zero contact with her in the past. Considering that she wanted a favor from me, lying to my office wasn't a good start to our conversation. Call me weird but I don't feel like doing favors for a liar!
2. She mentioned that she and her partner had spent $3,000 for an online electronics store that stocked 125,000 items. She stated that soon the company was going to allow skins*, which tells me that it's one of those "canned" stores. Companies create these and sell them to anyone and everyone they can. The problem is that they're all just alike and can't be individualized in any way. Unless you're a SUPERB marketer, forget them! It's almost impossible to make money from these.
* Skins = themes. For instance, I use Firefox on my computer and there are hundreds of skins with different symbols, colors, etc. to choose from.
3. After telling me about her store, and how she hasn't made any money with it, she told me all about how broke she is and asked for my advice. I told her that free search engines are a longer term investment and rarely bring immediate profits. I further mentioned that eBay is the only way that I know to make quick money.
She informed me that "eBay doesn't work". I always smile when I hear that comment because I know I'm about to hear about an auction. Sure enough, she told me that she attempted to auction one of the digital cameras from her electronics store and didn't get any bids. This one auction was proof to her that eBay doesn't work.
I didn't even bother to explain her misconceptions. I am quite sure that she used the price of the digital camera from her store and it was no bargain at all. eBay is a 'good deal' site and offering a camera at retail - or even above - will never succeed. However, I knew that trying to convince her of her error was a mistake.
Over the weekend, I put up three 3-day auctions which closed last night. My buyers paid immediately and this morning in my PayPal account I found ...
$71 + $570 + $450 = Total: $1091
Yeah, eBay doesn't work.
4. I told her that I didn't see how I could help her and we finally got to the point of the phone call: she wanted me to simply give her Andy & Brad's information - and she would pay me later, after she had made some money.
First of all, it isn't "my" information. If anyone should profit from this, it's Andy & Brad, not me.
Secondly, Andy & Brad are friends of mine and have generously shared with me over the years. Why does she think I would betray them in this way?
In other words, her proposition is that I give away my friends products - to a total stranger (who lied before I even met her) - for no money.
5. Even if I were as treacherous as she thinks, the information wouldn't help her that much. She claims that she needs money immediately. Search engine optimization (SEO) is complex, demanding - and takes time.
I received an email earlier in the week from a guy who told me how brilliant he was at his business - but he didn't have any customers. He further said that if I didn't help him, he was going to have to get a job! How am I responsible for his business?
The fact that these two folks think I can help them in a phone call or an email shows how little they understand SEO. Yes, I'm sorry they're both in a bad spot but I am not the one to help them.
