By Chris Malta & Robin Cowie's Profile
By Chris Malta & Robin Cowie's articles
The Basics of Optimization Many online sellers get frustrated with search engines regularly changing algorithms. But there are basic principles that haven’t changed through the years. Apply these tips to increase your rankings: Tip 1—Don’t be too quick to change domain names. Google has an aging delay for any new domain—it can take up to a year for your keywords to start showing in the searches. Tip 2—Optimize your site for your target audience, not the search engine...
Posted: 2006-07-20
Category: SEO
Get Creative with Community Resources If you’ve ever picked up a trinket for $4 at a yard sale and sold it for $65 on eBay, you know how exciting translating your treasure hunts into cash can be. But yard sales are not your only local source of goodies. Dennis Hester of http://MillionDollarDeals.com has built a successful online business using local providers almost exclusively. Flea markets, antique stores, auction sales, craft shops, Hester attends them all. One parti...
Posted: 2006-07-20
Category: eBay
What’s a Virtual Assistant? Virtual assistants are independent contractors or entrepreneurs who provide administrative assistance to multiple clients. Unlike regular assistants, they work out of their homes rather than at your business’ physical location. There are numerous advantages to using a virtual assistant: • Location. If you work from home, you don’t have to find a place to put an employee. • No Overhead. They provide their own office supplies, desk, compute...
Posted: 2006-07-20
Category: Small Business
Testing the Waters If you’ve ever dreamed of quitting your job and going into business for yourself, you may have considered online retail. But opening your own website is quite an undertaking—you’ll need to get a URL for your website, acquire a shopping cart, have someone design your web pages, get listed with the major search engines. And you’re going to have to pay for all those services up front, which means you’ll need to have some capital set aside. So before you tel...
Posted: 2006-07-20
Category: eBay
Advice from an Auction Genius Renowned eBiz author Sydney Johnson created the now-famous Auction Genius courses (http://AuctionGenius.com) to aid people wanting to create their own e-businesses. She shares some important tips for anyone looking to learn the online retail industry: Tip 1—Start Small. Many of Johnson’s students are eager to dive in head first, ready to invest all their savings into overseas imports or shopping network returns. But Johnson discourages s...
Posted: 2006-07-20
Category: Business
Thrift Shops and Consignment stores can be an excellent source for your product inventory—they always have fresh items to pick thru and you can find some great deals! • Consignment Stores, are commission-based. People bring in products for the store to sell on commission—what doesn’t sell is returned to the owner. • Thrift Stores are often ‘not for profit’ and get most of their goods via donations. In comparing the two, Thrift Stores are typically more willing (and a...
Posted: 2006-07-20
Category: Business
What is Interactive Marketing? We’re all familiar with the popular pay per click advertisements that many eBiz owners employ a very effective tool for driving traffic to your website. But according to Jackie Peters, Chief Creative Officer of http://HeavyBagMedia.com, the real question is, “once they get [to your site] what is their experience going to be like?” Peters’ company helps many of its clients launch campaigns designed to pull, not push, customers in through a ...
Posted: 2006-07-20
Category: Advertising
The ability to detect trends and to interpret that knowledge can tell you what consumers want now, but also help you predict what they’ll be looking for tomorrow. This can really give a retailer a big edge, particularly when it comes to selecting product lines. What is a Trend? A trend is not a group of popular items that everyone is buying. A trend is an expression of what matters to consumers at the moment—it’s a sign of what they’re excited about. A trend can actuall...
Posted: 2006-07-20
Category: Business
A Retailer’s Bargain Paradise? We have all heard about the amazing deals you can find at government auctions—the planes, trains, and automobiles your neighbor’s uncle’s cousin picked up for a song. But how true are these stories? Are government auctions really a good source for purchasing products for resale? The answer to that is they CAN BE, but you have to know what you are doing. Where do Govt. Auctions get their products? Government auctions are can be held onli...
Posted: 2006-07-20
Category: Shopping
You wouldn’t think of going to a job interview unprepared—you’d never get called back. Yet many eBiz owners approach wholesalers and manufacturers without any preparation at all. You need to realize it costs a manufacturer time and money to set up an account. If you seem like you won’t be a profitable distributor, they’ll probably turn you down. Says manufacturer Charlie Hall, owner of Charlie’s Woodshop, “I spend a lot of time helping [online retailers] get going with my pro...
Posted: 2006-07-20
Category: Business
You may not realize it, but you deal with intellectual property (IP) every day. If you own a website, that website is your intellectual property. The way you deal with IP—yours and others—can directly impact the success of your business. What’s Intellectual Property? Registered patent attorney Patricia McQueeney (http://BrinkleyMcNerney.com) explains, “[Intellectual property] can be broken down…into four types: patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets.” • A...
Posted: 2006-07-19
Category: Management
You have most likely seen Google AdWords, even if you don’t realize it. It’s that list of sponsored links that runs down the right side of your computer screen when you Google a word. You’ll often see links at the top in a little blue box as well—we’ve all seen ‘em. So what is Google AdWords? Google Adwords is simply an online advertising solution that companies who have a web presence can use to drive more traffic to their site. At-a-glance: 1. Google sells the s...
Posted: 2006-07-19
Category: PPC Advertising
Running a One-Man Show Transitioning from working in the corporate world to working from home requires a lot of adjustments, but the biggest one is probably organizing your time. Because, in a very real sense, it is your time now. It’s not your boss’ time or the companies’ time—you answer to yourself. That’s a tremendous amount of freedom, but it’s also a great deal of responsibility. You’re now in charge of every aspect of your business. It’s your job to find your clie...
Posted: 2006-07-19
Category: Management
