How to Connect With Your Buyers

Well it is Saturday and Saturdays here at My Auction Empires mean it is “How To” day. This Saturday I want to talk about how to connect with your buyers.

Whenever you reply to an email it could be the first email to a new customer, they have found you, looked at your listing and site and liked what they see, the next thing they do is send off an email to you, now I would hope that the email address you use is a real one not a hotmail or yahoo etc, something like info@myauctionempires.com or sales@ etc etc. This makes you look like a real business.

Now when you reply to your customer be kind, make it look like a real email from you, at the start this will be case in the early days but as your business grows you might start to use auto replies, but even when you use these make them look real and personal.

Next way to connect with them is use words that they know and understand……… each niche has their own words and “speak” use this, this one tip will help you connect straight away. Do not use cell phone words such as txt, or nite etc, unless the market use these.

Use colors, pictures that your buyers can connect with.

Well hope this “How To” has helped people, and will open this up more over the coming weeks and months.

Happy Selling

Andrew Milburn and My Auction Empires

USA Product Source 005

Hello and welcome to the USA Product Source section. Each week I will try and find a matching company from what I have found in the UK.

Comany Name : Beauty 21 Cosmetics inc

Address : 8676 Rochester Avenue,
                     Rancho Cucamonga,
                     California
                     91370
                     USA

URL :        http://www.lagirlusa.com

email : cyu@lagirlusa.com

Phone : ( 909 ) 945 2220

Wewll thats it for the USA Product Source this week, hope you find it useful.

Happy Selling

Andrew Milburn and My Auction Empires

Uk Product Source 019

Well today is Friday and as regular people know Friday is Product Source day, and as usual the post will be broken down into two.

Post one will be a UK Product Source and post two will be one for the USA.

Let us not waste time and get down to this weeks UK Product Source.

Sandy’s is a long established fashion wholesaler based in the UK and makes an ideal UK Product source for car booters, market traders, e-comeerce and Party Plan.
In fact Sandy’s covers two main fashion areas,  Fashion Jewellery, and Cosmetics. The Cosmetics that Sandy’s stock cover some of the worlds leading brands (Max Factor, Revlon, Rimmel, Maybelline and the list goes on and on)

Our chosen UK Product Source this week offers both a cash and carry service and also a mail order service. Sandy’s have a low order amount and this allows for those just starting out or want to test the water.

To Contact this weeks Uk Product Source :

URL : http://www.sandyscosmetics.co.uk

eMail : enquires@sandyscosmetics.co.uk

Phone : 0113 245 3885

Hope you find this weeks UK Product Source useful and keep a look out each Friday for a new and exciting Uk Product Source.

Happy Selling
Andrew Milburn and My Auction Empires

OSI Rock Stars

Thursday’s here at My Auction Empires is Product Review Day. Each week on a Thursday I will do a Review on a product that will help people grow and maintain their online business.

My choice this week is OSI Rock Stars. Osi Rock Stars is the baby of Janelle Elms.

OSI Rock Stars is a paid monthly / yearly membership, and for your money you get access to the webinars and podcasts already on the site (well over 350 hours) – these teachings cover aspects such as Blogging, Keywords, Twitter, Newsletters, life outside eBay, interviews with movers and shakers, research and the list goes on and on.
Also there is and will be regular monthly content added to the OSI Rock Star Education Forum. 

Apart from the education area, you have the forum. This again is a very active area, that is broken down into different areas, and each area is run by people who are active in that area.

If you have a pressing question or are stuck, pop along to the forum, post your question and very soon you will have people give you hints and tips. 

For example the other day I did something silly with my blog and could not get it back as it should, so at 10pm UK time I posted an urgent help question, woke up the next morning and there was the answer to my problem sorted.

One thing that makes OSI Rock Stars stand out from the crowd is that all the classes are taught by people who are working the buisness, and they use their everyday knowledge to teach us.

As with any review you finish with any downsides of the plan, course etc, and …………………. I could not find any, and I think I would know as I have been in OSI Rock Stars as a beta tester and moved on from there. I guess the only downside of OSI Rock Stars is the fact that people who join do not take the action they are taught, sadly they are the losers.

Marks out of 10 = Well 10/10. it is well put togther, the content grows on a daily basis with the forum and is good for new people and those who have been selling online a long time. 
 

 Keep your eyes peeled each Thursday for the latest on the Products to help you grow your online buisness.

Well as they say if it does not work the first time delete and try again. Sorry the last time I posted this great Interview with Marlene – The Savvy Seller, the posting became very sick with MS Word Tags.

So as a bonus lesson do not copy and paste word Word Documents direct into your blog or funny things will start to happen as in my case the right side bar just went, it was there but could not been seen by human eye. Lesson ends

Onto the interview. The first interview of this weekly series is with a very special person. Marlene Gavens is a person who walks the talk. She is active in selling, buying and in education. When Marlene talks about a subject she knows it from first hand knowledge.

So Come on down The Savvy Seller

Fill in the blanks:

I should have not procrastinated as much yesterday.

I wish that I could make miracles happen.

The first thing I do in the morning is drink coffee.

In 5 years time I want to be enjoying life as much as I do now.

Well there you have it……………………………………………. Each week I will try and interview one of the movers and shakers in the great world of online selling. Keep a look out each Wednesday.

Happy Selling
Andrew Milburn and My auction Empires

Learn from Yesterday
Live For Today
Hope for Tomorrow

UK Trade Show 011

Well as promised here is my UK Trade Show, each week I shall be doing a seperate posting on a Tuesday one for the UK and one for the USA, so please keep your eyes and ears open, and tell your friends and mates to pop on over for a look.

So lets get going with this weeks choice of a UK Trade Show.

UK Trade Show Name : Autumn Fair 09

Date : 6th -9th September 2009

Venue : NEC Birmingham UK

Full Details can be found at http://www.autumnfair.com

Well thats it for today, each Tuesday there will be a new show put up for people here in the UK. So mark Tuesadys down as your UK Trade Show and USA Trade Show days.

Happy Selling

Andrew Milburn and My Auction Empires

USA Trade Show 003

Well living over in the UK has caused me a few problems on this weekly post, but if I promise I try and follow through on that promise and when I said I was going to do a weekly USA Trade Show post along with my UK one I was not going to let people down.

After a lot of searching I think I have found a few places that I can use to help me with my USA Trade Show postings.

So here goes for this weeks USA Trade Show.

USA Trade Show Name – The Atlanta International Gift and Home Furnishings Market.

Dates : July 8th – July 15th 2009

Venue – AmericasMart Atlanta

Phone – (1) 404 – 220303

Organizer – AmericasMart Atlanta

Products – Gifts, Home Furnishings, Home Decor, Garden / Outdoor lifestyle, Holiday and Floral, Gourmet and Housewares.

I hope you find this USA Trade Show helpful and I amsorry I could not give you more information. Each week I will try and post a USA Trade Show for you.

Happy Selling

Andrew Milburn and My Auction Empires

PS – Will post a UK within the next few hours keep a look out and tell your friends

Why Use Trackable Mail

In this posting I will try and explain why I use Trackable Mail and why I think everyone should use Trackable Mail.

And before I get those emails saying I know why you want us to use it you work for the Postal services, sorry the answer is no I do not.

The reason I use it is because it covers you the seller if the item goes missing in the postal system and it gives the buyer a sense of feeling important. Here in the UK if we use the Royal Mail there are two main types of trackable Mail one is Recorded Delivery and the other is special Delivery (this is next day guaranteed delivery).

Now the one I use is Recorded Delivery with 1st class post (at times I do use Special Delivery if the item is very urgent or is a certain weight).  The cost is an extra 0.78p on top of the stamps.

But I budget this into my product costings and I offer this as well even when I give free postage to buyers. Now why do I do this !!!!!

@  Reason One why I use Trackable Mail gives me a piece of mind and makes the buyer feel special.

@ Reason Two why I use Trackable Mail is that I can see when it has been delivered.

@ Reason Three why I use Trackable Mail if the customer says they have not had the item and I can see it has been delivered, I play it cool, I say I have checked online and it tells me that someone has signed for it, and I will email them a copy of the signature. And if it is not theirs I will take it further with the post office.  – Normally they say sorry someone signed for while they were out.

@Reason four  why I use Trackable Mail is if they say it has not be received I then tell them thats OK it is insured and covered by a trackable means, again normally you get the oh I had it. At this stage if they do not say this you explain you will get the refund out to them within 48 hours, and in the meantime you have emailed Royal Mail and put in a claim.
I then go on to explain how the claim process works, Royal Mail write or visit them and get them to fill out a few forms and sign some documents to say that they not had the items.

Now at this stage they will say sorry but it was had the other day and so and so signed for it.

Or it’s ok do not bother it was only a few quid, thanks for all your help and leave you positive feed back (they had the item but)

Or it was real and the item never turned up.

@ But another reason why I use Trackable Mail is if you read the terms and conditions on PayPal and eBay this is what they recommend you use.

So yes it does add a bit to your costings but well worth it end, so thats why I use Trackable Mail

Happy selling
Andrew Milburn and My Auction Empires

PS keep your eyes open, for every Monday I shall be bringing you tips and ideas on how to improve your eBay and online selling

Save Money When Brain Storming.

Saturdays here at My Auction Empires are now known as ” How To ” days. Each Saturday I will try and tell and later show you how to do something that will either save you time, money, or just show you how to make some extra money. And sometimes it might be tell you how to cook some cool dish who knows. But come back each saturday and you will find out what the ” How to ” is

So lets get going this weeks How To. Today I want to show you how you can save time and also get better brain storming time, something all business owners and leaders need and want.

I guess like many people when you are brainstorming an idea you will often pop down to your local magazine seller and see what magazines there are, and also buy a range of them.
Next step will be buy a few books or DVD’s to see what other people are doing. All this adds up.
Next you come home and spend some quiet time locked away seeing what is what. Now if you are doing this often the bills soon add up.

How about if I was to tell you, you can do all the above and much more for zero cost. Yes that is right zero cost to you.

How I can hear you all shout, well I am going to tell you How To, go to your local library there you can read magazines by the load and also you can read back dated ones this is very helpful to see which adverts keep running.

Also at the libary you can hire DVD’s books etc again at no cost to you, and you can bring these home with you.

Another thing with the Library you have access to fast broadband, and it is quiet in there to this allows you to brainstorm very well.

Well I hope and trust this How To lesson has helped you, and come back next saturday for the next how to.

Happy Selling

Andrew Milburn and My Auction Empires