I just finished watching the Super Bowl --or should I say the Super Rain Bowl. It rained more during the game than it does during a week here in Seattle. Could you imagine paying $300 for a ticket and sitting in all that rain? (Stick with me I will relate this to eBay). But it was a great game. I really though Chicago was going to win an upset for a while, but the Colts are just one of those "grind you down" teams that wins by sticking to the basics and never giving up. Remember they got to the Superbowl by coming from 18 points behind to beat the Patriots. I often get emails from readers who find my web site and email me asking for the “instant secret to eBay success,” or "the hot product to sell" or the “wholesale source where they can buy iPods and Plasma TVs for 50% below what they are selling for on eBay.” My standard answer is probably similar to what the Colts Coach, Tony Dungy tells his players: "Master the fundamentals, practice, stick to the basics, never give up –and a little prayer doesn’t hurt either." You can’t win a football game in the first quarter and you can't get rich overnight on eBay. But you can get rich slowly and steadily on eBay if you learn the fundamentals, focus your efforts and don’t quit when things aren’t going your way. I also learned something else about selling on eBay during the Superbowl. In my books I teach sellers never to list items on eBay that will end during events such as the Superbowl, the World Series, the finals of American Idol or election night. But I had a bit of a brain fade last Sunday. I launched a lot of 7-day auctions completely forgetting that the Superbowl was today. Boy was I shocked when I checked the computer after the game and saw that I had several sales on eBay during the game and even more sales from my website. I guess not everyone is as big a football fan as I am. So maybe that's not such great wisdom after all. Another bit of news hit this week after my newsletter posted on the web site. eBay ended a little gold mine that a lot of experienced sellers used to take advantage of and one that I cover in The Complete eBay Marketing System. Until this week, you could lower your eBay fees by extending your auctions. You could list a 3-day auction and then extend it to a 5-day auction if the item didn't sell and then again to a 7-day auction. So you got 15 days worth of listing exposure for one listing fee without paying the 10-day listing surcharge. But this week, eBay woke up to the practice and decided it comprised Fee Avoidance and stopped the practice. So if you read about this strategy in The Complete eBay Marketing System, it doesn't work any more. I will be updating the book with this fix and the new fee schedule when I get back from vacation in a couple of weeks. One last item and I'll let you get to the newsletter. In the posted newsletter I mention the special deal for my readers who subscribe to the WorldWide Brands OneSource service. You can save $50 on the introductory offer and another $20 by signing up through a link they set up for my readers at www.worldwidebrands.com/skip . I would like to point out two things: 1. I got a lot of email from people who had purchased the WorldWide Brands Drop Ship Source Directory (DSSD) from my earlier recommendations. The DSSD is included in OneSource --and YES you will get credit for what you paid for the DSSD or any of their other products if you upgrade to OneSource. If the credit doesn't happen during check-out, just email them and they will send you a refund. If any of you have already upgraded to OneSource and didn't get your credit, please email them through the support link on their website (not my website) with your information and they will take care of you. 2. The $50 + $20 special discount offer will not last much longer. You can still get it if you follow this link: www.worldwidebrands.com/skipmcgrath. I am going to meet the folks at World Wide Brands later this week on my way to the Bahamas for vacation and I will try and negotiate keeping it as long as I can, but I wouldn't wait too long. The sales of OneSource have exceeded their expectations, it is getting great reviews and people who bought it are really stoked by what it delivers for the money. The February 2007 issue of The eBay Seller's News is now up on the web site at: http://www.skipmcgrath.com/newsletters/current.shtml
| 
