Ah, the old-fashioned country auction! The idea of a country auction conjures up certain images for people. The image of a fast-talking auctioneer offering up an antique table or chair is a popular example.

People who are buying household goods or collectibles are looking to get their items at the lowest price possible. However, the people who are selling their items at auction are hoping for the highest price!

Unless a person is in the business of buying and selling antiques or other items, not a lot of thought goes into how goods are prepared for sale via the auction process. However, if you are one of the growing number of people using auction venues to sell your collectibles or other inventory, there are a few things to learn first about how to sell at auction before you bring a truckload of stuff over to the next event.

Tip 1: Make sure the things you want to sell are a good “fit” for the auction house you’ll be using.

Never bring a load to an auction house without actually having been to one of the previous auctions. It’s important to get a feel for the type of goods that the house sells. For example, at one very rural country auction it was common for the owners to sell live chickens, pots and pans, car parts, and farm equipment.

After close investigation, this would not be the right venue for selling your daughter’s “Hello Kitty” collection. On the other hand, the spare John Deere parts that you bought at last week’s yard sale might be just the right thing for the buying crowd at this auction.

Tip 2: Be sure you clearly understand the terms and policies of the auction house.

Visit with the auctioneer ahead of time. Call to find out what the best days and times are to visit. One of the worst possible times to drop in for an informational visit with an auctioneer is the day of the auction. Call ahead and ask. While you’re at it, find out what are the best days and times to drop your stuff off.

Once you have a little time with the auctioneer, you’ll be able to find out what type of commission he or she takes from consigners (which is you), and what type of paperwork might be needed. Some auction houses send out Form 1099 tax forms at the end of the year. An auctioneer may need to see your identification and have you fill out a W-9. Be prepared.

Find out what happens to your items if they don’t sell. For example, some auctioneers may have a minimum starting bid. If, for some reason, one of your items does not sell, it may be grouped with another one of your pieces. Know the auctioneer’s strategy beforehand so that you aren’t surprised on pay day.

Tip 3: Make sure the auctioneer knows what you’re selling.

It might be perfectly obvious to you that the signed print you are consigning is a rare and valuable piece of art. However, the auctioneer may not know this particular artist. Make a note of anything particularly special about your items, and leave the note with the piece. Be sure to tell the auctioneer about it as well. He or she might determine that this is something to highlight on the company website or in the newspaper listing.

Tip 4: Present your items neatly.

No one likes to have to dig through a box full of grimy and greasy car parts to see what treasures might be in there. Separate the parts and lay them out on a flat, or use more than one box to de-clutter the lot.

There is no need to buy fancy display boxes. It’s easy enough to go to the local convenience store or supermarket and ask if you can have the emptied boxes or flats that they are discarding.

While it’s good to present clean items, take care not to ruin the value of anything by over cleaning. For example, if you find some old cast iron cookware, clean the obvious dirt and grime, but don’t scrub it to its original finish. For many people, this ruins the value of the item. So, clean and tidy and organized is the key here.

Tip 5: Don’t complain to the auctioneer if your stuff doesn’t sell for as much as you’d like.

The phrase to remember here is, “You win some; you lose some.” That’s just the way it is. There are some days where an auction house is loaded with people who all seem to want what you’re selling. There will be other days where the crowd is sparse, and the bidding is simply not competitive.

Remember that it’s in the auctioneer’s best interest to sell your things for the highest possible hammer price. But sometimes, it’s just not going to be a stellar sale. The auctioneer is only human, and is also disappointed if a sale doesn’t go as well as planned.

If you notice that every time you bring a bunch of goods to sell that you’re not realizing as much as you think you honestly should, try another auction venue and compare apples to apples. That is, bring the same types of items to the new auctioneer and compare the results.

Unless the auctioneer is particularly disagreeable or inconsiderate to you or buyers, there is no reason to confront him or her about a sale. If you find you just don’t care for an auctioneer’s style or methods, find another one. Believe me, there are plenty of them out there!

The primary thing to remember as you learn how to sell at auction is that the business is unpredictable at best. You will have good days, some not-so-good days, some great days. The more you sell, the more experience you will gain, and the more enjoyable the business will be.

Facebook advertising is in full effect right now. Log in to your account and you will be startled at how accurate some of the ads are. If you don’t have a partner or if you look up certain things, Facebook advertising knows. This is great for advertisers as you can target by more specific criteria than ever before and split test until you have the perfect campaign.

How Do I Know If Facebook Advertising Is For Me?

Facebook advertising PPC is incredibly powerful, and there are many ways you can approach it. There are the paid ads and then there is the free method. Just like in Google, you have the paid results (AdWords) and the organic results (Search Engine Results Pages).

Organic Facebook Advertising

Organic basically means that you don’t pay for your traffic directly. Obviously there is no such thing as completely free so you will still have to pay for it in some way, however, you don’t pay a certain price per click or per impression. Here is an overview of organic Facebook advertising.

1. Setting Up a Fan Page or Profile. If you have a product or service you can set up a Facebook fan page for free. On this page you can put anything from videos to sales copy, product information, a link to your website, or sell straight off the page.

2. Get Traffic To Your Page. This is the tricky part that a lot of people new to the internet or to marketing forget. Once you have the page setup, somehow you have to get traffic to it to see your awesome page and Facebook advertising information. There are so many ways of getting traffic, but they all include putting a link somewhere on the internet that you hope people will click on to get to your page. Again, there are millions of places where you can put your links; however some places will help you more than others. This requires a lot of manual work; writing articles, blog comments, forum posts, messaging possible customers or other time consuming task, well worth it however, if you are looking for longevity in your business.

Paid Facebook Advertising

Paid Facebook advertising is where the serious players are and is where you should go if you have a budget for advertising. These can be the ads that pop up on the side or the ones that appear in the news feed. There are many reasons why this is such a good way to advertise, but it does cost. This is just another advertising platform like Google and Yahoo or any other ways of buying traffic, and using this method comes with many advantages.

1. Targeting Like A Sniper. With Facebook advertising, you can hone in on your exact customer, just like a sniper would hone in on his target. Facebook advertising PPC enables you to target by age, gender, likes, education, religion, ethnicity and a host of other variables. This is the type of targeting that most advertisers only dream of.

2. Pay For What You Want. If you are just starting a new product or website and you don’t have the deep pockets of Saatchi & Saatchi, you can buy as little traffic as you want. If you are just testing out a new product or website to see if you can make some money, Facebook advertising is a great way to go. You can buy some traffic for $20, track it and see how it performs, and then make a decision to either change your offer slightly or try something else.

3. Get In Your Customer’s Head. When a user is scrolling through their Facebook account, they are in a state of high concentration (although you might not believe it). This is something of an addiction for a lot of people and they are in a sort of trance, similar to television viewing. When your customer is in a altered state such as this, it is the perfect time to pitch your message to them. They will be online for a while and often don’t set a time limit for Facebook. You can see what your customer likes and set your campaign accordingly.

4. Make Instant Business Decisions. If you are planning on using SEO or organic Facebook methods, it can be months before you have any data or traffic to make decisions from. Using paid Face Book advertising gives you the ability to buy some traffic who are already hot prospects, send them to your offer and see what happens. In 20 minutes you could already have sent 100 people to your offer, have the data and either change your offer, move on, or if you are making money, scale it up and bank some serious profits.

Many people are afraid of paid advertising because it seems like wasting money. This is a narrow understanding of the process of investing in your business and is not valid in the marketing world. Every single thing you do toward your business costs you your time or your money. If you are out there writing articles, blog commenting and forum posting, you are spending your time. If your time is $25 per hour, you could have worked for one hour and then sent that $25 of traffic to your offer and you can have some instant feedback instead of waiting months to see if an offer converts.

Facebook Advertising PPC -Say Yes To 1 Billion Customers
Facebook PPC (Pay Per Click) is a truly effective marketing strategy that you should take the time to learn how to use correctly so you can get your business into profit quickly. With over 900 million users in all countries, it seems absurd not to use this platform to target your ideal customer. The staggering amount of information you can use to mark your demographics means that even a local builder in the nail polish industry can use Facebook advertising to attract customers.

The Key Here Is Learning To Use Facebook Marketing Correctly. If You Are Ready To Get Started With Your Advertising Efforts Then Let’s Get You Some Training That Will Turn You Into An EXPERT In Facebook Advertising Today!

Starting or expanding any kind of small business is difficult, but it can be especially difficult if you don’t have enough capital. Raising capital for start-up or expansion is often your biggest challenge. If a loan is not possible for you right now, and if you haven’t been able to line up any investors, don’t give up hope. There may be a chance that you qualify for government grants for small business from the U.S. federal government.Small businesses have historically played a significant role in the U.S. economy. That’s why the government has an interest in facilitating the growth of small business with government grants for small business. Even though small business is central to our economic health, the bureaucrats in Washington are not necessarily just waiting to give out government grants for small business. The government normally uses grant money to encourage business development in certain fields or specific locations, or to level the playing field for everyone. But there are quite a few bona fide government grants for small business and they can be substantial.Government grants for small business are available to new business start-ups and existing businesses. As you might suspect, you’re probably not the only small businessman looking for help in the form of government grants for small business. Be prepared for competition if you qualify and apply for a small business grant. Attention to detail in the application process can often make the difference between winning and losing government grants for small business.Depending on the amount of money involved, application procedures and forms for government grants for small business can be long and complex. The trick is to break the application into manageable pieces. If you don’t already have an existing team of business partners to help you, consider outsourcing some of the application work to a consultant or freelance writer. When it comes to government grants for small business, application deadlines are firm and turning your application in late is not an option.You can do some basic research on the availability of government grants for small business at the Small Business Administration’s website. The SBA is mandated with helping small businesses succeed, but they normally don’t give grants directly. Government grants for small business are usually provided by other agencies, depending on what the grant is meant to accomplish.If you’re interested in starting a small business or expanding your existing business, then you should start finding out all you can about government grants for small business. You may want to opt for an online directory service to help you figure out which government grants for small business you might qualify for. The structure of government can be mystifying sometimes, and you wouldn’t want to miss out on a grant you’re qualified for just because you couldn’t find it. You’ll soon learn that the secret to your small business success is to concentrate on doing what you do best, and outsource the rest.