The Obvious "Secret" All World-Class eBay Sellers Obey

Home-based eBay sellers are constantly assaulted by temptations, distractions and diversions. The Tivo is full of your favorite recorded shows. Your children need some sort of assistance. The fridge beckons. A new article (or blog post!) grabs your attention. All these things take you away from your most profitable activities – which include listing, site design, promotion, PR, branding, direct mail and so forth.

Everyone talks about how “ACTION” is so important. But, beneath that little secret is the real one – “The START.” The start is crucial to action. Starting something -- anything -- is often the eBay seller’s biggest challenge. There are so many reasons not to start. But the accumulation of false starts, and start denials eventually adds up to poor performance and results. The mind that doesn’t start is the bad mind at work. It’s the same one that doesn't want to get up at 5AM. The one that goes for chocolate rather than broccoli.

If you start something.. anything.. however.. it eventually produces good stuff. A plan, process or outline that’s in place helps guarantee good stuff. Because, everyone knows that some do’ers do the wrong thing. That can be very dangerous.

There’s a science that studies “bad actions,” and it’s covered quite well in a book called Deep Survival. This is where people make rapid, “blink” decisions in survival situations and fail miserably (usually resulting in death). Fortunately eBay is a more forgiving environment. If you fail, you get tons of data that shows you where you went wrong. And you can always fix things and try again. That’s not so when you’re climbing Everest.

Now.. in the interest of starting something, I’ll clam up and let you launch that next critical action.

Fear, eBay and Jack Canfield

I read the following Jack Canfield article this morning. It’s a good general piece, but it’s also particularly useful for new eBay sellers or even eBay veterans that need new ways to make money, test products, open new markets and innovate. Part of your job as an eBay seller is to be creative. Creativity requires boldness and a healthy approach to fears. The article offers useful strategies for moving past fear and/or using it to guide your decisions and creations. I especially like the “taking a 2-year-old to the market” analogy.

Putting Fear in Its Place
by Jack Canfield

As you move forward on your journey from where you are to where you want to be, you are going to have to confront some of your fears. Fear is a just a natural part of living.

Whenever you start a new project, take on a new venture, or put yourself out there, there's usually some fear involved. Unfortunately, most people let fear stop them from taking the necessary steps to achieve their dreams.

Confronting your fears is a very necessary step in achieving success.

There is simply no other way.

Fear can be a helpful emotion, as it tells you when you need to be extra careful, keenly aware, and cautious. Fear is not an emotion that is telling you to stop. In fact, it's telling you just the opposite!

Acknowledging your feelings of fear helps you know when you are stepping out of your comfort zone. It points your awareness to areas where you could improve and grow.

Successful people also feel fear. Yet they don't let it get in the way of anything they want to do--or have to do. They understand that fear is something to be acknowledged, experienced, and taken along for the ride. They have learned, as author Susan Jeffers suggests in her must-read book, to "Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway®."

(Susan Jeffers has been a friend of mine for twenty years now, and her work, which is very powerful and transformational, has helped millions of people overcome their fears and move forward to create success in their lives. I highly recommend her as a resource.)

You see, fear is more of a signal that we should stay alert and cautious. We can feel fear, but we can still move forward anyway.

Think of fear as a 2-year-old child who doesn't want to go grocery shopping with you. Because you must buy groceries, you'll just have to take the two year old with you. Fear is no different. In other words, acknowledge that fear exists but don't let it keep you from doing important tasks.

Also realize that so many of our fears are self-created. We might frighten ourselves by fantasizing negative outcomes to any activity we might peruse or experience. Luckily, because we are the ones doing the fantasizing, we are also the ones who can stop the fear and bring ourselves into a state of clarity and peace by facing the actual facts, rather than giving in to our imaginations.

If a fear is too great for you to overcome, try breaking it down into smaller challenges.

Try starting out doing the parts of the project that don't scare you so much. You need to give a speech in front of a large group? Try giving your speech in front of a small group of people who care for you. Work your way up until you are able to feel the fear but still move forward. As you do, you will build your confidence and eventually you won't feel fear surrounding those issues because you'll have done them enough to count it as a skill.

As you move toward your goal, don't attach yourself so much to the outcomes.

Keep moving toward your dream doing everything you can to create what you want, then let it go and see what shows up. Sometimes the universe will have a better idea in mind for you and present a better opportunity when you were expecting something completely different. Don't let fear keep you from moving forward. Even if the horrible outcome that you imagined happens, the universe will always provide for you another way to succeed. So be on the look out!

Trust that no matter what occurs, you are smart enough and strong enough to keep looking for, and attracting, opportunities.

If you are willing to try new experiences in spite of your fears, then more new experiences will present themselves for you to try. And the more you try, the more you are likely to succeed!

For even MORE inspiration about overcoming your fears, you can learn from this Video Clip of Me on YouTube discussing some tactics you can use right away!

© 2008 Jack Canfield

Jack Canfield, America's Success Coach, is the founder and co-creator of the billion-dollar book brand Chicken Soup for the Soul and a leading authority on Peak Performance. If you're ready to jump-start your life, make more money, and have more fun and joy in all that you do, get your FREE success tips from Jack Canfield now at: www.FreeSuccessStrategies.com

What All eBay Sellers Should Know About Blog Post Timing

Most progressive eBay sellers are now blogging to sell products, educate customers, manage public relations, and provide customer service. Most simply post when they can.

A new study discovered that there are advantageous and disadvantageous times during the day and week to blog.

Ah data analysis. I love it.

In a nutshell (hey, I’m in a nutshell get me out of here)… here’s what they found:

After lunch, between 1:00 PM and 3:00 PM (PST – Pacific Standard Time) is the best time to post on any given week day. Between 5:00 PM and 7:00 PM is also good (after work). Thursday is the best day.

What’s the worst time to post? Between 3:00 PM and 5:00 PM PST on the weekends. Everybody’s out doing something else. That makes weekends a good time to get posts together and then schedule them for posting on weekdays in the optimal time slots.

Now get out there and post.

eBay Sourcing Resource - How to Reliably, Quickly Find Good Products

Online auctions are still a great way to make money online, but you have to be very careful about your pricing and you need to have reliable, genuine sources. One of the toughest challenges is finding a steady supply of high-quality, genuine goods at a cost low enough for you to turn a decent profit (after you subtract all your expenses and fees). While many sites claim to offer listings of wholesalers for eBay sellers, in reality, most of the information you will find is either out of date or untested.

It helps to have a community of peers and expert power sellers to sort through all the supplier information out there, so you can get feedback about what suppliers are reliable and who will work with small home based businesses and individual auction sellers. While you can find wholesalers in every part of the world, even just by looking in the phone book, most of them probably won't fit the bill for your average eBayer.

One option to find product sources is SaleHoo. SaleHoo describes itself as a global product sourcing community. Its updated directory has over 5,000 wholsalers and dropshippers for almost every type of goods. More than just a simple supplier list, SaleHoo has some advanced functionality. It gives you the information you want and it never makes you jump through any hoops to get the details, unlike other directories. You can organize and save favorites, and you can instantly search the SaleHoo forum database for community entries about a particular supplier. The supplier page also allows you to go straight to the whois database for more information, and it also allows you to register a complaint or leave feedback.

SaleHoo's forums are very active (over 40,000 registered members) and there is a lot of good information that is shared and posted by experienced sellers. The forums focus heavily on auction selling, so if you're just looking to get products for your own online store or shopping cart - there's not quite as much value. But overall, SaleHoo is probably worth checking out, particularly for people new to eBay selling.

Conversational Writing and eBay Descriptions - Marketing Mojo

We talk a lot about conversational voice and tone in these pages. Conversational style engages and persuades people. That's the gist of it.

A lot of businesses still shy away from this type of writing in their Web sites, eBay listings and marketing collateral.

I came across validation for the conversational approach in another book (which is great, by the way). It's called Presentation Zen: Simple Ideas On Presentation Design and Delivery.

Here's a quote from the book (p. 83):

"When you are in a conversation with someone you are naturally more engaged because you have an obligation to participate. You are involved. Formal speech and formal writing devoid of any emotion whatsoever is extremely difficult to stay with for more than a few minutes. Your conscious mind has to remind you to "stay away, this is important!" But someone who speaks in a natural, human, conversational style is far easier to stay engaged with."

I urge you, as always, to write with conversational tone and style. That means speaking as if in a one-on-one conversation, adding emotion, using imagery, and communicating as you would with a friend.

Me Blogging About RSS Photo Feeds -- Are You Blogging about Your Products?

If you’re interested in technology trends, I wrote an article for D-Link about RSS photo feeds. This kind of application is simple, like ring tones – hence the title of the article. Yet it’s so much more clever and elaborate.

I write blog posts for D-Link from time to time, and this is the latest one. Which reminds me… are you blogging about your products and services? It’s a great way to communicate with consumers, explore new ideas and uses for your products, and learn from your user/consumer community.

Downright Fascinating Social Media and Web Commerce Trends

The following is important fodder for eBay sellers, ecommerce sites, and general Web commerce audiences. It’s even fascinating to the lay person. That said,…

Marianne Kolbasuk McGee wrote a great article on Web trends in the November 26, 2007 issue of InformationWeek. There is so much going on in this market.. the mind reels. Here’s a taste from the lead:

“The old days of companies tightly controlling a marketing message are gone…The interactive forces of the Internet - including social networking sites, online discussion boards, and blogs - are arming consumers with tools that can quickly and exponentially spread the word to other would-be customers if a product stinks or a company blunders... Companies such as Charles Schwab and OnStar are creating Internet platforms to literally read the minds of consumers, seeking out insights that directly drive their new product strategies.” [my emphasis]

This reminded me of AdWords, of course. AdWords is great for driving business or clicks to your site via general advertising techniques. However, what a lot of people don’t realize is that AdWords is a great tool for testing promos, floating new ideas, and reading the minds of consumers. And it’s cheap!.. given the right niched-out keywords.

The article details various ways companies like FedEx, eBay, Schwab and others are using the social connectivity of Web 2.0 (I hate saying Web 2.0, but I did, shame) to their advantage. FedEx’s CIO Rob Carter says, (paraphrased from the article) “The explosive growth of this connectivity has been ‘completely underestimated’ in how it will affect society and markets.” I concur.

The article also talks about some fascinating new trends, like having your Second Life avatar or character purchase things for you or book reservations for you online. I know, that sounds crazy. But think about it. Why the heck not? If you build the right character, with all your tastes, desires, wish lists and so forth, why not set him free on a shopping spree? I’ve never played Second Life, but I assume there are vendors in there, like Amazon.com. (If you know how this works, please comment below and enlighten us.) FedEx’s Carter comments in the article, “Second Life has enough momentum to make us wonder: What if this identity I’ve built could spill over into my daily life and get things done for me?” Your avatar would be like an information robot – tuned to all your preferences and guided by “business rules” that determine decisions.

Carter extends the concepts further, saying, “The greatest opportunities lie in socially networking corporations together – horizontally, across business processes, which don’t necessarily live within your four walls anymore.” Great example = Gaming like Second Life supporting commerce like FedEx and Amazon.com.

The article describes how some companies like OnStar use Nielsen BuzzMetrics to analyze how they’re performing in “consumer-generated media.” This is another hot topic, worthy of another post, probably.

There’s a cool story about Dell’s celebrity advertising campaigns, too. I’ll blog more on that later, too.

In the mean time, read the article. It’s a mind bender.