If you also want to have that ‘just out of the salon’ look then update yourself about the commandments of control and you will be the one whose hairlooks will make all women go green in the eyes!

1. Use Rollers Right

Rollers, such as hot rollers, Velcro or self-adhering ones, are the in-thing these days. Use unheated rollers on damp hair. Wait for the hair to be barely damp, roll up rollers, keeping broadest ones at the top. Let the hair dry and then unwind rollers carefully.

In case of hot rollers, allow the rollers to cool. Now gently remove them. With the help of your fingers, gently comb your hair to open the curls slightly. This will give a more bouncy and curly look. Lastly add a small measure of hair or finishing spray and you are ready with that sexy style!

2. Get Regular Trims

Regular trims are essential to avoid the bad hair day. Gap between two trims should not be more than 3 to 4 weeks. Do not go lazy on trimming even if you growing your hair longer. Gel smoothens and flips up ends of hair, which have lost their shape in the process of growing.

3. Start with a Great Cut

Falling right into place and simple to style - this is the definition of a great cut. The more time the hairdresser spends in finishing your hair, the less chances you have of re-creating that look on your own.

A good cut complements your hair texture and type, manages your hair even on windy days and surely controls that irritating frizz. Another way to recognize a good cut is that even after six weeks, it still is easy to style. Result - gap between trims becomes longer. Inform the stylist about the drawbacks of your hair. Educate yourself about the solutions.

4. Think Roots First

Concentrating most of the products at the roots and blow-drying root area first give you more volume and height.

5. Don’t Fight Nature Too Much

Do not try to fool nature. Perming and bleaching finally do affect the hair because of presence of chemicals in the both the processes. So, be a little innovative and look for alternatives to such harmful processes.

6. Don’t Overuse Products

How much product you should use depends on the density, length and texture of your hair. A few products give you control. However, too many may lose your control over your hair.

Compared to super-hold gel, one can use lots more of mousse. Start with small quantities, gradually increasing depending upon the feedback your hair gives. Use a drop or two of pomades, shiners and glossers. Give up finishers, conditioners and volumizers.

Remember, you can always add more!

7. Add Body

Limp, flat lifeless hair days are considered as bad hair days. Do you want to add body to your hair? Bend at waist, start drying your freshly washed hair as you finger style it. When half of the moisture has disappeared, add gel or mousse. Finally use a large-toothed comb or vent brush to lift the hair. If it is humid, use a tiny amount of mousse. Finger style it into dry hair.

8. Tame That Cowlick

Cowlicks are mostly at the back crown area or at the hairline. A hairline cowlick can look smart when you lift it to get more height, or brush hair in the opposite direction. Little gel before drying gives it the wanted look.

In case of back crown cowlick, use hot rollers only for that portion. For short hair, two rollers are set in alternating directions. Once rollers have cooled, backcomb the area, smoothen the surface and comb the ends.

9. Easy Up do

The golden rule for a great up do is to gather all your hair together high and neatly high enough on your head. Carefully rolling or wrapping it in the desired direction hide the pins under a seam or a bun.

10. Be Prepared

A small bottle of water can be handy for misting the hair if it leaves its setting by midday. If it is humid, carry a small size of a frizz control product. Getting a shorter cut, a body perm or a root perm can control hair limping in humid weather.

Separated curls are trendy and convenient. Wrap your long hair into an up do during the day; when you undo it, it will fall in great volume.

Nowadays, there are many easy to carry purse-sized curling irons and setting tools. Use them for quick touchups.

About the Author

My name is Marquetta Breslin and I’m a professional hair braider with over 12 years of experiance. I own http://www.braidsbybreslin.com where I sell intructional hair braiding and weave DVDs teaching the world how to braid and weave.

The good thing about this move is that you don’t need to go a gym to do it, you don’t even need to find time in your day.

Why?

Because you will do this move while you brush your teeth!

How does it work:

Standing straight in your bathroom, bend your knees slightly.

Tilt your hips forward while contracting them, then pull them back.

Remember to make a very strong squeeze when you finish the forward move.

As you brush your teeth a minimum of twice a day, that’s 6 minutes a day of Brazilian move.

Along with a healthy eating, this will guarantee you will get a nice rear for this summer, yeah!

Tip #2: Use your Hands!

There are some chores you would be better off doing by hand!

For instance, washing dishes by hand will burn 78 calories per half hour…..

Knowing that a pound is about 3,500 calories, and assuming you will wash dishes half an hour over 45 days, you will have lost 1 pound without knowing it….(translated on a year, this amounts to about 8 pounds!)

Tip #3: How to get your 60 minutes of accumulated exercise a day….

The General Surgeon’s orders are to get 60 minutes of accumulated exercise per day (this can be sliced up into 6 small walks without any problem).

Beside burning calories, when you walk you will build the big muscles of your lower body.

Muscle tissue uses up more calories to maintain than fat, even at rest.

Again, you don’t have to go for a 60 minute walk if you don’t fee like it.

You can slice it up into 4×15 minute walk:

-1- one at home when you wake up (will also help wake up even more )

-2- two at lunch time to go to your lunch place and to come back (just select a place that’s 15 minutes away from your office)

-3- one in the middle of the afternoon to help you remain focus until the end of the day.

Tip #4: Manage your food cravings by being proactive!!!

Your body produces endorphins when you do aerobic exercise — which means getting your heart rate up for at least 20 mn.

Aerobic exercise produces endorphins, body chemicals that induce euphoric and pleasurable feelings. These are the same chemicals produced in response to eating fat/sweet foods.

Tip #5: Improve your posture

This is a great exercise to improve your posture hereby making you look great when you walk, when you are on the beach, when you enter a business meeting room.

On a yoga mat, stand straight.

Breath a few times: inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale slowly.

Tuck your toes under and push back into a low squat, with fingertips lightly touching the floor.

Drop your chin so it’s relaxed toward the chest.

Slowly rise from the squat position by pushing your heels toward the floor until your torso hangs froward and down.

Keep the knees slightly bent and aligned over the center of each foot.

Breathe, relax the upper body, and hang like a rag dool.

Inhale in that position.

Exhale as you engage your powerhouse and slowly roll up to a standing position.

When you are standing, straighten your knees with your arms relaxed at your sides.

Inhale once again, and as you exhale, rise slowly to balance on the balls of your feet.

Breathe, relax the shoulders, and maintain this balance for several seconds.

You can do this exercise 3 times each time you finish a work out.

It may sound complicated by reading this text; I suggest you print this tip, take it with you wherever you do your workouts, do it once with the paper and once you have understood the move, re-do it without reading.

Tip #6: Easy 6-pack abs

I have been doing 100 abs a day since I was a teenager. As a result I have a 6-pack without having to sweat over abs sessions at the gym.

Those who know my approach to body strengthening know I am a *lazy* person when it comes to getting in shape.

How long do 100 abs take to perform? Depending on the move and the speed with which you do them, it will take you anywhere between 90 seconds to 3 mn.

Hardly un-squeezable!

You don’t really need to warm up before such a short session therefore you can decide when to do them without having to re-arrange your day around this very very short session.

Suggestions per day:

20 straight crunches (your hand supporting your head, not lifting it).

20 straight crunches with a stop of one second at mid- raise.

40 bicycle moves alternating right elbow/left knee and left elbow/right knee.

20 seconds in the V-Pilates position: you rest on your bottom in a balanced position with your legs straightened out and your arms reaching out straight and parallel to your legs.

This sequence allows for deep abs (V-Pilates), superficial abs (crunches) and obliques (bicycle) to be worked on every single day.

Tip #7: Short is good!

As part of My Private Coach weight loss approach, mini- workouts (or MetaBoost as I call them) can do wonders for those who don’t feel like sweating for hours in a gym.

“Something is really better than nothing. If I come in and I can work out vigorously for 30 minutes, I would consider giving it a try,” said Dr. William L. Haskell, an exercise researcher and professor of medicine at Stanford University. The express workouts typically require only one set of 8 to 12 repetitions instead of the 2 or 3 sets of 8 to 16 repetitions that physiologists recommend for an optimum workout. ” Copyright the Associate Press - 12/15/2003

Still, these MetaBoost workouts should come in addition to the daily 60 recommended minutes of accumulated exercise.

Write to info@myprivatecoach.com if you wish to receive FREE MetaBoost cards.

Tip #8 : 10,000 steps a day keep the doctor away!

Invest in a pedometer and make sure you are getting these famous 10,000 steps I have been brainwashing you for the past weeks!

10,000 steps start when you wake up. Wear your pedometer on your waist a all times.

10,000 = 3 miles = 300 calories approx (a little bit less than a bagel).

Take advantage of all opportunities to walk: choose your lunch place 10 mn further, get off the bus 1 stop before, take a 5 mn break every hour or so and go a *around the block walk*. Everything counts towards this daily goal.

You will not lose weight (this is not enough really) but you will prevent new pounds from accumulating and you will improve your general health.

No sweating required!

Tip #9: Invisible chair day

Each time you get to be by yourself, sit against a wall without a chair and hold the position for 1 minute.

Try to do this 3 times a day.

This count as a strength exercise and will help shape nice thighs.

Feel free to apply this tip on other days as well!

Tip #10: How to get a really flat stomach with no abs work

Each time you walk, think about sucking in your stomack (lower and upper part).

This will work deep abominal muscles that NO crunch work can reach.

This will help you get a REALLY flat stomach.

No sweating required!

About The Author

Valerie Vauthey is the founder of http://www.myprivatecoach.com” target=_new>http://www.myprivatecoach.com and the president of the Silicon Valley Coachville Chapter. She brings long years of successful experience in the areas of Personal Coaching, Weight Loss, Financial Coaching, Time Management, Motivational Techniques and Behavioral Science.

valerie@myprivatecoach.com“>valerie@myprivatecoach.com

A while back, one of my young daughters (who I hope wasn’t getting any ideas), asked me which 10 recipes I thought every newly married person should be able to make. After thinking, off and on, about it for a few days, I came up with what I believe are the top ones. Before we get to the recipes, I’d like to just share a few words that would have made life a lot easier on me had someone shared them with me when I first began cooking!

Cooking is an art. It isn’t a chore to be endured or a duty to get out of the way. It truly can be one of the most rewarding and satisfying things you’ll ever do. Just like most things, anyone who wants to become good at it can. Anyone who wants to become great at it can. There’s an ancient Chinese Proverb that says, "The only difference between a good housekeeper and a bad one is an hour a day." I took the liberty to edit the proverb to tell you, "The only difference between a good cook and a bad one is an hour a day." If you make up your mind to become a great cook and dedicate even just one hour a day to honing your skills, you’ll earn your apron’s stripes!

A few things you should always remember:

Never leave the kitchen when you’re baking cookies or biscuits. I wouldn’t advise ever wandering away from the kitchen while cooking, but when it’s something like cookies or biscuits, doing so is usually disasterous. They’re just looking for a reason to burn and take your departure as the open door they need.

When getting cookbooks, go to the used bookstores - or check online auctions or Amazon.com. The cookbooks that were written in the 70s and 80s were some of the best. You’ll find ingredients you’ve actually heard of, for one thing, plus they tend to have more of the basic recipes you’ll need for starting out.

Watch Food TV! It is really addictive, and even more informative. I’d suggest you not ever, under any circumstances, miss an episode of Paula Deen’s "Paula’s Home Cooking", Rachel Ray’s "30 Minute Meals" or Alton Brown’s "Good Eats". They’re the top, in my opinion. After you’re more familiar with your way around the pots and pans, you’ll be ready for Emeril, but you have to work up to him!

Now, to the top ten recipes you’ll need. Either consult some of those cookbooks I told you about, or a website, such as http://www.foodtv.com or http://www.buttermilkpress.com, or ask various family members for their favorite recipes for each. They’ll get a real kick out of that. Plus, if you happen to ask an inlaw for their favorite recipes, you’ll get off on an especially agreeable note!

Breakfast/Brunch:

1. French Toast and Pancakes. Nothing will impress him or her quite like a tall, warm stack of delicious pancakes with butter melting off the sides.

2. Egg dishes: Scrambled, fried and poached. Note: When cooking eggs, remove them from the skillet before they actually look completely done. They continue cooking even after they’re removed to the platter.

3. Buttermilk BIscuits. Buttermilk in a recipe makes everything instantly better. Whether it’s biscuits, pancakes or cornbread, it’s presence improves the flavor ten-fold.

4. Great coffee. You absolutely must be able to make a sensational pot of coffee. Do your research, try out different beans and always, always grind your own coffee. You can get a grinder for under $20.00, and it will be 20 of the wisest dollars you ever invest.

Lunch:

5. Hamburgers and their cousin, Cheeseburgers. I’ll let you in on a family secret, a little garlic salt is the difference between, "Honey, this is good." and "Wow! My mom (dad) never made burgers like this!"

6. At least one really good homemade soup. I know, the little red and white cans are awfully convenient (and you’ll find about 10 in my own pantry), but being able to make a sensational potato or vegetable soup is a great big feather in your culinary cap.

Supper/Etc:

7. Fried Chicken. Back to the Buttermilk for a minute, soaking your chicken in buttermilk (in the fridge) for about an hour before coating and frying makes for a juicier, more flavorful meat.

8. Mashed potatoes. Never. Under. Any. Circumstances. Use. Instant. Potatoes. Don’t even look their way in the store. Peel, boil, and mash your potatoes with milk, butter and….pssst, another family secret, sour cream. It’s worth the effort.

9. Yeast rolls. Okay, I’ll admit it, these aren’t as easy to make as the other 10 or so foods talked about here. That’s because yeast is tempermental. It can be likened to Goldilocks, of all things. It gets angry if the liquid is too hot, it gets angry if the liquid is too cold. It wants it just right, and when the temperature isn’t just right, whereas Goldie laid down, your bread will lie down. Flat rolls. Ugly rolls.

10. (3-way tie!) Chocolate Chip Cookies, Apple Pie and Your sweetheart’s favorite cake. Master the desserts and even when the main meal isn’t up to par it’ll be okay. The last thing a person eats, after all, is the thing they’ll most recall. You know the saying, all’s well that end’s well.

Cogratulations, good luck, and have fun. It may sound like something out of a 1940s cookbook, but that really is the biggest secret. To most things in life, actually.

About the Author

This article, and others, can be found at http://www.buttermilkpress.com">http://www.buttermilkpress.com, as can recipes, cooking tips, products, and more. Feel free to contact the author at joi@buttermilkpress.com

The proof was attempted in court. During the trial, Mr. Ford was asked a series of simple, general information questions, such as,

· Could you name the Presidents of the United States?
· When was the Civil War?; and so on.

Mr. Ford, who had little formal education, could answer very few. Finally, in exasperation, he replied, “I don’t know the answers to these questions, but I could find a man in five minutes who does. I use my brain to think, not to store a lot of useless facts.”

A similar story is told of Albert Einstein. Someone once asked him how many feet are there in a mile. “I don’t know,” he was reported as saying. “Why should I fill my head with things like that when I could look them up in any reference book in two minutes?”

Both of these men, giants in their respective field, knew what every good leader learns sooner or later: that the ability to get information and act on it is what gets things done.

As one business leader recently put it, “I want people around me who can solve problems, not recite facts.”

History and the Internet are filled with many instances where individuals, many without a high school diploma, became successful businesspersons because they knew how to gather information they lacked and they acted on it promptly. They are examples of people who know how to maximize their potential and do. What are you doing about yours?

Remember: When you maximize your potential, everyone wins. When you don’t, we all lose.

© MMIV, Etienne A. Gibbs, MSW
About the Author
Etienne A. Gibbs, Management Consultant, offers a free health survey at http://eagibbs.usana.com; free state tourism guides at www.ExecutiveAndGroupTravel.com; travel updates at
www.executiveandgrouptravel.blogspot.com; and Identity Theft protection at www.prepaidlegal.com/hub/gibbs54. Reach him at eagibbs@ureach.com or at 502-386-1175.

Feeling Like You’re Starting Over

You may feel like you’re starting over - that you’ve lost everything that was important to you and you’re not sure what to do anymore. It may be hard for you to imagine your life without your partner - your lives have been so intertwined.

Let yourself know that you will get through this.

Having Difficulty Trusting Again

You may find yourself questioning who you can trust, including your own judgement since you may not have expected the break-up. You may wonder if you were wrong to have trusted your partner. You may begin to question how real your relationship was because if it was real how could it be over?

Your ability to trust may feel shaky. You probably trusted your partner, and expected your relationship to last. You may feel alone and abandoned, even if you’re the one who decided to leave.

While it takes time, you can re-build trust in yourself and others again. Even though this relationship is over that doesn’t mean that you were wrong to trust her/him, and even if you were that doesn’t mean that you’ll make that mistake again. You can learn from this.

Having an Identity Crisis

You may experience an identity crisis, not knowing who you are any more without your partner. Not necessarily because you didn’t have your own identity while in the relationship, but that your relationship had become part of that identity.

This too will change and you will feel more secure in yourself again.

Feeling Triggered

Break-ups can hurt immensely and shake us to our very core. They can throw us right back to the feelings we had in our first relationships - the ones we had with our parents.

If as a child, your relationship with your parents were loving and supportive, you may find yourself wanting to be with them, even wanting to be a child again when it felt safer and easier.

If your relationship with your parents was difficult, lacking, or abusive you may feel some of the feelings that you felt with them (even if you weren’t aware of them as a child.) You may feel as though you are drowning in grief and feelings of abandonment. If you feel as though you are being punished or that the break-up means that you are unloveable, or unworthy of love, you are probably triggered - those are messages, beliefs or feelings that usually originate in childhood.

At times of loss, it is very common for feelings, beliefs and memories from past hurts, traumas, and losses to come up. Not only are you dealing with the present loss, but your past losses as well. No wonder, it hurts so much! And, there are ways to cope with triggers.

How To Survive The Triggers

It is really important that you try to separate out which of your feelings, beliefs and responses belong to the present situation and which ones belong to the past. This is hard to do when you’re feeling overwhelmed but it can also help you to feel less overwhelmed. Separating past and present feelings will help you to attach less of your pain to the break-up and can help you to feel more hopeful about getting over this break-up, because maybe you are not as upset about the break-up as you thought. You’re still just as upset but it can be helpful to know that it’s not all about the break up, that some is also coming from the past.

When you know that you are triggered (past feelings and issues are coming to the surface) you can find ways to comfort or reassure yourself, or to deal with those issues in other ways. The first step though is to separate the past from the present.

Ways of separating the past from the present include:

Ask yourself where your feelings are coming from, and notice what you become aware of, including later on in the day.

Notice whether your feelings are familiar to you - whether you’ve felt this way before - and if so remind yourself that some of your feelings are probably coming from the past.

Spend time being aware of the past origins of your feelings if you know, and if that’s not too overwhelming for you.

Let yourself know that even if you don’t know where all of your feelings are coming from, it’s likely that some of how you are feeling is from the past.

Stages of Grief

You will get through this, even if it doesn’t feel like that right now. Grief moves in stages - it has a beginning, middle, and an end phase. It might help to know where you are in the process.

In the beginning, you may feel in shock, denial, or numb. It may be hard for you to believe what has happened. It may be hard to make sense of it all. You may find yourself expecting to come home to your partner or for her/him to call at a regular time only to discover that’s not the case any longer. It may take awhile for you to fully comprehend that the relationship is over.

During this phase many people operate as if the relationship is still on even as they grieve the loss. For example, even though you may be really upset, you may not have fully accepted that the relationship is over. Deep down you may be waiting for her/him to come back. (People do this even after a death, it’s normal.) This period of disbelief or shock is the body’s natural protection against pain.

You may try to get back together even when you know it’s over. You may go over and over in your mind and with everyone you talk to what you think led to the break up or what might have made a difference and resulted in a different outcome. This is the “if only” stage - “if only I had…or, if only I hadn’t…” we might still be together. If you are doing this, you are likely trying to make sense of what has happened, trying to understand and take it in, and trying to change it too. It’s hard to take in that a break up is permanent. You’ll need time to fully absorb this reality.

At this stage, you may have trouble remembering things, focusing, and feeling a sense of purpose or direction in their lives - you may feel as though you are drifting through the day. This is a natural initial reaction to loss.

The Second Stage of Grief

The second stage involves feeling fear, anger and depression. This stage often lasts the longest and can be filled with feelings of insecurity, panic, worry, crying, anger, and feelings of depression. Some people don’t allow themselves to feel, while others have trouble letting go of how they are feeling. Both are essential - feeling and eventually letting go.

Some people worry that if they let themselves feel that they’ll be overcome with emotion and never come out of it - they’ll drown in their feelings and not be able to function. Others feel their feelings but can’t seem to let go of them even after a lot of time has passed. Either way, it’s important to give yourself permission to feel and at some point to let go so that you can move on.

In the beginning, you may think that you will always feel this way, but you won’t. Your feelings will pass. You’ll discover that the time between down periods increases. Too often with break-ups we don’t feel that we have the right to feel upset much longer than a few weeks when the truth is it usually takes longer. I have found that grief tends to run a cycle of at least one year unless of course the relationship wasn’t very important, was short-term, or you were grieving before you actually left her/him. But, if you spent a number of years together, and the person was important to you, even if you’re the one doing the breaking up you can still be grieving for approximately one year. Of course with very long term relationships, it can take even longer to feel back on your feet but it is still possible to recover.

The Third Stage of Grief

This is the stage where you begin to accept that the relationship is over, and that you’re going to be okay. You realize that you haven’t thought about your ex-partner in awhile, and that without realizing it you are moving on. You’ve gained back some of your zest for life, and are beginning to see a future ahead of you.

Sometimes the process involves a little movement forward and a little back. This is okay and perfectly normal, afterall you need to get used to your forward steps and occasionally may need the comfort of what you were feeling before. Try not to be hard on yourself, change is not a linear path. It’s full of up’s and down’s. It’s okay to feel good and then feel hurt and angry again, especially if you see her/him in the community or dating someone else.

In the acceptance stage, you’ve done a lot of thinking about the relationship and the break-up and you realize things that you hadn’t before. You understand yourself better, and you aren’t as angry or hurt. You find yourself laughing more, and feeling hopeful. You begin to notice that you’re feeling better and that you are ready to trust again, or at least to try.

Try not to lose faith if you fall back into a funk - each time that you feel better will have an accumulative effect. Grief comes in waves - up and down.

Sometimes letting go just happens after you’ve let yourself grieve and rage and whatever else you need to do. Other times, people have to deliberately and consciously focus on letting go. It is tempting to hold on, and scary to let go. Saying to yourself that you are letting go of your ex-partner can be helpful. Interrupting yourself when you get stuck thinking or talking about her/him and redirecting your focus onto something else is all part of letting go.

Filling your life with activities that you enjoy - creative, playful, sociable, soulful activities - are all ways to nurture yourself back to health.

Breaking-up can feel unbearably hard and so permanent. Let yourself know that you won’t always feel this way and in the meantime let yourself grieve your losses fully. You will feel stronger and lighter for having done so.

Kali Munro, © 2001

About the Author

Kali Munro, M.Ed., is a psychotherapist in private practice with twenty years experience. She offers free healing resources at her site, KaliMunro.com

Many people know what products they want to
sell. However, they don’t know how to do this.

Should they physically stock the products
themselves or promote other companies through
affiliate programs?

Drop shipping may be the answer for some website
owners who want to become stockless retailers,
whereby they keep no stock themselves.
Instead they promote products on their website
and get a drop shipping company to despatch these
products for them.

Here are the steps involved in drop shipping:

1) You open an Internet Store with a shopping
cart and accept credit cards on your site.
You can also sell on Internet Auction sites.

2) You find a distributor who will “drop ship”
the products you want to sell.

3) You open an account with the “drop ship”
distributor(s) you choose.

4) You receive descriptions and images of the
products you wish to sell from the distributor
and put them on your Internet Store or Auction.

5) When a customer buys from your Store or Auction,
they pay with their credit card. Your Store or
Auction charges their credit card plus shipping.

6) You email the order to the drop ship distributor
with the customer’s name and address.

7) Then the drop shipper despatches the product to
your customer from the warehouse with YOUR
business name on the package.

8) The drop shipper charges you the wholesale price
plus shipping. Remember you have already passed
the shipping charge on to your customer, so the
shipping costs you nothing.

So that’s how drop shipping works. You don’t have to
buy products in bulk and store them, hoping to sell.
You don’t have to pay to have it shipped to you,
and then pay again to ship it to your customer. All
you had to do was send an email to your drop shipper.

(C) John Lynch

(For details of drop shipping companies for your website:
http://www.merchant-account-service.com/drop_shipping.html
For a review of Site Build It - the leading website
building software for home and small business:
http://www.merchant-account-service.com/sitebuildit.html )

About the Author

None

“EBay: No Way…Yes Way (Ten Seller Themes) by Barbara Snyder M.A.” at http://www.sbmag.org/howtosellonebay.html)

Yeah! Wow! … Make a million! Open a store on eBay and get rich! Man this is easy!!! –NOT!!!

It’s way to easy to get caught up in all the hype out there about eBay and to start thinking all you have to do is set up an eBay store and you are on your way to the life style to which you would like to become accustomed. Don’t believe it.

Before you start primping for your own segment of “Life-styles of the Rich and Famous,” there are a few things you should learn about eBay and small business start-ups in general.

The rate of survival of a traditional small business reads something like half of all new business start-ups fail in the first year and half of the survivors do not survive the second year, and eBay is probably no different. In fact, it’s not easy at all anymore (if it ever was) to carve out a fortune on what has been dubbed “the world’s largest garage sale”.

“But Floyd, take a look at all that money”, you say. Sure eBay is doing just fine, but of that three billion dollars, how much of it is actually spent on items in “your” category or product line “you” have for sale?

Everyone has to decide exactly what business he or she wants to be in. Then they have to decide if they are going to be a niche player or try to carve out significant market share. Either way you decide to go, you may find out that the pool you are swimming in is not as deep as it may first appear. Unless you are selling automobiles or real estate, not all or even a large percentage of that three billion dollars is spent in your merchandise category. Make sure you check the water before you dive in head first.

When you do decide to jump in, make sure you are ready both financially and mentally to go through a learning curve of some months. Back in the earlier days this may not have been the case, but today eBay has become extremely competitive and significantly more expensive for sellers. And don’t expect a lot of help from eBay directly. They are not the greatest company in the world at customer support. They have a lot of information available, but they also have a tendency to answer help questions with loads of boiler plate “fixes” that usually serve more to confuse then to actually help.

Speaking of fees, this is how eBay lives. They literally nickel and dime you to death (actually its more like quarter and dollar)… thirty cents for the cheapest insertion free, thirty-five cents for a gallery picture, a buck for “bolding” and on and on. And then there’s the fair value selling commission and the PayPal fees (PayPal is a must have!). All these small fees add up fast. Don’t forget, you pay the listing and insertion fees whether your item sells or not. You will quickly learn that your selling percentage becomes crucial and why it is so important you learn how to make very efficient listings at the lowest cost possible as fast as possible. If you fail to learn this, before for you know it, eBay is taking half or more of your total sales just in fees, not counting your cost of product and shipping.

eBay has been called the “world’s largest garage sale” for good reason. You know what people are looking for at garage sales, cheap prices. In the beginning, if you were the only one on eBay selling a specific product, you could demand and get higher prices. Today it’s a bit different. The competition is brutal. You are competing against people and business of all sizes, and there is always someone selling your product at very, very low prices, or worse yet, using it as a loss leader. Some of these people are huge jobbers and or the manufactures themselves, hard to compete against. Some sellers are part time or hobbyist and don’t need or care if they make much money (and they probably don’t). Unless you have a very unique product or are in a position where you can bring a new, hot product to eBay first, you must be prepared for extremely aggressive pricing competition in a market where the average buyer is looking for cheap beer prices on high quality champagne.

So, all said, you may be wondering if it’s even worth the effort. That depends on you and how well you prepare.

Before you open your eBay Store or run out and buy a bunch of product, visit Strictly Business Magazine’s “How to Sell on eBay Resource Center” at http://sbmag.org and read all the “free” articles. Then buy and read a series of books about eBay, there are a number of them listed there. Start out with a book on the basics and then the more advanced volumes.

After you have read up on the basics, set up a seller’s account. Not a Store yet, that starts the meter running after the thirty day free trial. Not a lot of money, but why pay it until you have the necessary education you are going to need to be successful.

Once you have a basic education, experiment with a few items you have lying around the house you’d like to get rid of. This will give you the chance to experience the eBay process and give you an idea of what you are in for. Pick items that sell for under $10, this will give you the cheapest listing fees to experiment with. (A $9.99 item lists for half the price of a $10 item, same thing as $24.99 vs $25). Also make sure you pick items that are easy to ship. Check with the post office for shipping fees and packaging. If you use Express Mail, most of the shipping materials are free and in some cases will more then offset the higher postage fees and will get your product to your customer faster, resulting in better a Feedback Rating, something you will soon learn is very important in eBay.

As you’re reading the books you have just bought, watch for important subjects such as Feedback Rating, shipping and handling, product selection, effective listings, taking and using photos and using hmtl in your listings. Also make note of other tips and ideas on keeping your listing professional but at the same time keeping the cost down. Other topics of importance include “keywords” and how they affect eBay search engines and auctions vs fixed price listings.

Don’t be misled into believing that the buyers are clamoring all over themselves to bid up every item you offer up for sale. Go browse the listings in the category that you will be listing in. You may be surprised to see that most items don’t have a single bid and will not sell at all and others have only a single bid. You may also want to find out what are the best days and time frames most successful auctions close.

The price you pay for a few books and the time it takes to read them and do a little research may be returned ten fold or more in just the first few months after opening your eBay store.

About the Author

Floyd Snyder is the founder and former owner of Executive Advertising, Camera Ready Art and Strictly Business Magazine. Currently he is the owner of Strictly Business Magazine at http://www.sbmag.org, http://www.FrameHouseGallery.com, http://www.EducationResourcesNetwork.com/and http://www.TraderAide.com.

The Small Business Owner

These people tend to be involved in every aspect of their business from being the bookkeeper, marketer, human resources manager, mediator, customer liaison officer and cleaner.

The smaller the business the harder it is for the owner to delegate these functions because they dislike spending any money and, in fairness, the dollars can be much tighter. However, many fail to realize that if they invest their dollars wisely in accessing the right type of goods and services to grow their business and be more effective, they will see positive changes occur over time. They can become more productive and profitable. It takes time to build a good “business mindset” and to be an effective leader.

The Manager

Many of the managers I have coached suffer from similar challenges as the small business owner. The key difference of course is that the business owner is responsible for his business and cannot escape that responsibility. If the business is profitable or non-profitable it will impact on that person personally, particularly financially.

10 Habits of Highly Unsuccessful Business Owners
Check out if you regularly practice these habits:

Don’t practice what you preach
Tell other people what to do and don’t do it yourself. Set a poor example.

Do not invest any time and money into developing yourself and your people.
Forget ongoing personal and professional development. The less you and they know the more time, money and energy you will waste. A surefire way to have an unmotivated and unproductive team…not to mention the loss of opportunities.

Avoid planning at all costs
Continue to be reactive and do things on the spur of the moment. Don’t write a list of things to do each day and definitely do not use a diary to plan out what you will do. This will ensure you have no time and no life.

Eat whatever you want to and don’t exercise
Being unfit and overweight will ensure you’ll feel tired and look awful. You’ll also be susceptible to sickness. A great way to ensure you won’t be able to cope with the pressures of your personal and professional life.

Spend most of your waking hours at work
Start work early and stay late. This will sap you of energy and creativity. A surefire way to have unsatisfactory personal relationships. Next time you’re in a social situation outside of work you won’t have anything else to talk about except work, work, work. In fact people will avoid you because you’re boring!

Avoid looking after your clients/customers
Ignore them unless they contact you. The fact that without them you wouldn’t be in business won’t matter. Do your utmost to not deliver on your promises, avoid following them up or returning their calls. After all you’re a multi-millionaire and it wouldn’t matter to you if there was no one to purchase your goods and services…you can retire whenever you like.

Procrastinate at all costs
Avoid making decisions and taking action. This will frustrate your people and they’ll keep their ideas to help you and the business to themselves because they know you won’t take any action. A boss who procrastinates, affects everyone else around himn/her.

Be a Know-All
Avoid asking your people for their feedback. Keep them out of the loop. Regular team meetings? The unsuccessful business owner or manager doesn’t see the need to talk with his/her team… it means they take time off and waste valuable company time. No need to listen to what they have to say…what would they know? If meetings are called it’s only when there’s (another) crisis.
Never ask your clients/customers what they think about your products/services and the customer service (or is that disservice?) …you may be pleasantly surprised or horrified to find out the real truth. Better not to know then you don’t have to change.

Say ‘yes’ all day
Let everyone interrupt you all day long. Keep your office door open so people can wander in and talk to you. You can guarantee that you won’t get much work done. But that doesn’t matter, does it?

You’ve been doing it for so long now, why do anything differently? You want to be liked by everyone, regardless of the cost to you personally. As long as everyone else gets their work done, who cares if you work late to catch up?

Avoid Delegation at all costs
After all, no one is as good as you. Delegating or outsourcing means spending money if you run your own business. It’s better that you waste your time on secretarial tasks and doing the bookkeeping, because what else are you going to do with your time?
The Final Word

If you are a business owner or manager and you can truthfully say that the 10 habits mentioned don’t apply to you because you do the exact opposite …then congratulations, your business/department must be thriving. Keep up the great work…you deserve to succeed.

On the other hand, if you already have these habits firmly in place, then you are guaranteed not to succeed. You will leave work most days feeling stressed and unfulfilled. Is that what you really want? If so, then continue doing the same as you’ve always done. If not, then you must do something different. What are you prepared to do?

If you know where to go or what to do to make the changes, then go ahead and do it. If you’re unsure then call me but you better be serious about moving forward. I’m into making the most of my time and yours.

The choice is yours…continue doing the same things or change. As mentioned many times before, “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different result”.

Have a great week

Lorraine Pirihi

About the Author

Lorraine Pirihi, principal of The Office Organiser is Australia’s Personal Productivity Coach. She specialises in working with businesspeople showing them how to dramatically boost their productivity, reduce the stress and the mess in their lives and have more time for enjoying their life.

Unless you’ve been under a rock for the last year, you’ve
heard the term “blog” once or twice.

To most people, a “blog” simply represents a glorified
online “diary” where geeks, computer nerds, and lonely
teenagers record their thoughts in cyber-space.

However, many people don’t realize that “blogs” are quietly
revolutionizing the way companies and customers interact
about everything from existing products to new ideas and
improvements in customer service.

In short, “blog” style communication has come of age and
anyone with an online business better sit up and take
notice fast!

In the beginning, “blogs” were basically an online diary to
record your thoughts; but “blogs” have now evolved into
dynamic websites that non-technical people can update
immediately without html editors or ftp programs.

Blogs allow their authors to make instant website updates
through a computer anywhere in the world with a Web browser
and Internet connection.

Blogs also allow readers to respond to the author’s posts,
provide additional information, links, expanded opinions,
and more.

In short, an active “blog” creates an interactive community
with the author as the hub and the readers as the spokes of
the wheel that keep the whole cycle turning round.

Unlike traditional “static” web pages where content rarely
(if ever) changes, an active blog evolves in a state of
constant and never-ending renewal.

With blogs, smart online businesses re-discovered a
principal that small “mom and pop” stores understood for
years: know your customers and stay in close tune with
their wants, needs, and desires.

Large companies throw billions of dollars down a black hole
every year to literally “guess” what people want to buy.
Most call it the “Marketing Department.”

On the flipside, smart online businesses understand that
blogs allow you to avoid guessing what’s on your customers’
minds and provide an active and up-to-the-minute means for
them to tell you exactly what they do and don’t like about
your services, products, and virtually any other aspect of
the market.

This lightning fast communication makes it possible for
small companies to literally snatch huge market share away
from more traditional companies.

Blogging also has a distinct advantage over traditional
email newsletters in that subscribers can get udpates
without having to receive an email message. Through the
power of RSS (real simple syndication), subscribers get
notified of updated content though an rss news reader.

Bottom Line: publishing a blog with an RSS feed that your
readers can subscribe to means your content NEVER gets
blocked by a SPAM filter.

Blog software basically comes in 2 flavors: hosted and
stand-alone. Hosted blogging solutions make it extremely
easy to get set up with a blog, often in just a couple of
minutes.

If you know how to type, you can create a blog. Log on to
Blogger.com and you can set up a blog free of charge and
start posting in just a few minutes.

Blogger.com (owned by search giant, Google) will even host
your blog on their servers.

Typepad.com, which charges as little as $4.95 per month, is
also an excellent hosted service offering additional
features that enable you to quickly get your own blog up
and running.

The alternative is stand-alone blogging software installed
on your own website.

A very popular solution is Moveable Type, available from
moveabletype.org, which provides a very versatile and
powerful suite of tools for creating a full-featured blog
to rival that of any size company in the world. Which ever blogging solution you choose, if you plan to
successfully conduct any form of business online,
understand that a “blog” must form an integral part of your
overall plan for customer communication and interaction.

–

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