Use of Color in Logos and Design

The meaning of colour is debated all the time. Some articles or blogs that say that colours do have strong meanings and ties.

Does the colour black mean power and authority? White is purity and safety? Purple is wealth and prosperity? Green means money, and darker green is masculine money? Orange is fun and flamboyant?

I could go on. But I want to say that I don't really subscribe to that. Maybe I'm special, but I've never looked at something with a black background, and felt that it meant power and authority. Sure, bleached white socks say purity and cleanliness, but I'm not sure they say safety! I'm drinking out of a purple mug, but I don't feel like it represents wealth.

So I just don't go for that. But colours are important. My approach is that colours are more about mood, and how you use colours together can really help project your company, product, or service personality and image.

Black and pink. Does that mean "whatever black means" plus "whatever pink means"? Not to me. Black and pink looks like modern punky. A bit left of centre. The contrast between something dark and something light. The fishing pole company is unlikely to go with black and pink. :)

Blue and green. They're sometimes equally dark or light shades of blue and green, so this may not be about contrast. These are colours used for nature a lot... eco, water, sky, grass.

People may say that red means passion, but I think it depends what you put it with. Put it with blue, and I'd say you have gone USA patriotic in your theme or mood! I don't look at red and blue, and say WOW... the passion of the red and the confidence of the blue. The colours in combination now have their own meaning to me.

Put red with pink, and I'd say you have something that's probably just feminine. I wouldn't say oh, it's red for passion and danger and pink for whatever pink means. I'd say we're selling to women. :) Also, the pink being a shade of red will give the logo or design a certain mood. Shades can do that!

Orange is flamboyant? Um, I don't think so. Put it with brown, and I'm going to say that 1972 wants its fridge and wood panelling back! Orange and yellow I'd say are bright and sunshine-y. Orange and blue are, well, the NY Mets I guess. :)

So do think about your colours when designing a logo, website, or anything else. I personally don't subscribe to the idea that a single colour will make people all feel the same thing... like we all think of riches and royalty when we see purple. It's also cultural. Wikipedia points out that purple is a colour of mourning in Thailand. So not every person will have the same reaction or connection to a colour.

What about the As Was logo? Did we pick those colours so that you'd imagine the spirituality of the colour violet with the flamboyance of orange? Nooooooo. I chose those colours and looking the way they do in our logo to look like the sunset in the New Mexico (I had been living in Santa Fe just before I had the logo designed). The sunset looks like this in Tucson, AZ (where I was just living for years) as well. The sky gets a really bold and warm violet, just above the horizon is a burning orange-red-orange, and in between, it's a gradient. An old version of our logo used to have the gradient. We now just use the two colours... easier for embroidery. :)

But do think about boldness, warmth, contrast, neutrality, and other "effects" of colour combinations when you're having something designed. It's all about projecting the message of your business!

Posted at 02:00 AM in That's Good Marketing | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

TwitPay Helps Amazon Battle PayPal

This morning, from a tweet (Twitter message, for you uninitiated :) ), I found out about TwitPay, which is TwitPay.ME and not .com. It's interesting, but I think it needs a few tweaks before it'll really take off...

It's really easy. If my company just did a change to your eBay listing template, and that was a $50 change, you can tweet, "@aswas twitpay $50 for template change." TwitPay will then use Amazon Payments to make that payment. You use the TwitPay to "settle up," which I assume means connecting your Amazon Payments account to TwitPay, or maybe you have to approve each transaction. I'm honestly not sure about that detail yet.

Amazon Payments takes their cut, which is a bizarre matrix of fees. For every payment 99 cents or greater, TwitPay takes a nickel for their role in the process.

I think it's interesting that the people building this new services chose Amazon and not PayPal. They could have integrated both, and asked which one you want to use. And they could have picked PayPal. But they didn't.

I was never able to get anybody into the idea of sending me money with PayPal through their mobile phone. Both Amazon and PayPal allow you to register your mobile phone, and then send payment to somebody if you know their mobile number or email. Nobody ever did that. Every client I had went to the PayPal website even though it WOULD be shorter to text, "send 50 to [my PayPal email address]" to 729725. Yet nobody seems to do it!

I wonder if tweeting money to people will pick up. My theory? It will once it's done through DM'ing the TwitPay service. Using "@" means that the payment is public, and you've just typed in someone's email address in a place in a public place that can be scraped for spam lists. So I don't like that. Anybody following me or reading my public timeline would see how much I paid and to whom.

So to TwitPay, the only problem I see so far is that one nice thing about people and companies paying each other is that it's a private transaction. You're making it public. Make it through the Twitter direct message system, and I think you have a shot. The convenience could be worth the nickel.

Posted at 05:09 AM in That's Good Marketing | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

How To Approach Your New Logo

One thing that every seller needs is a good logo. I've always said there are two main approaches to logos: the symbol and the text treatment.

The symbol is something that can stand for the company, product, or service even when no words are there. I hope the As Was logo is that for you! You see our design and colours, and you know it's us even if "As Was" aren't there. Or think of the Nike swoosh. It doesn't have to say "Nike" for you to know. That's a symbol, to me anyway.

The text treatment is when you are really just writing the name out. Maybe you write it plainly like Coach or Prada, or maybe you write it with more pizazz like Yahoo or eBay. But ultimately, this is mostly about font and colour, and not about symbols.

This article in the Positive Space Blog goes further than my breakdown, and identifies 5 types of logos. As this may help you think about what kind of logo you want, I'll quickly run through them here.

What I call the text treatment, Positive Space calls the "wordmark." You're using text and font and colour for your logo.

Their 2nd type is "letterform marks." This is where the logo revolves around the use of individual letters that are designed or styled. I guess I'd think of Qwest or ADP as letterform logos.

Their 3rd type is "marks," which are like what I call symbols. Though in this case, they seem to categorise "marks" more as characters. Think the Trix Rabbit or Linux Penguin. Positive Space says these types of logos relate to the company or a brand attribute. I guess I'd put the Apple "apple" here, though I'd say the "iPhone" and "iPod" logos are really just text treatments.

Their 4th type is "abstract marks and symbols." These look at symbols that aren't any particular character. I think I'd put the Windows logo (the 4 coloured blocks that seem to be flying) here. Positive Space says these logos are about the brand message.

Their 5th type is the "emblem," which Positive Space describes as a combination of words and pictures that relate to the company, product, or service, and how they're positioning it. As an emblem, the slogan might even be part of the logo. I couldn't think of any off-hand. UPS maybe?

Remember that logo design is a really important aspect of your branding and identity. This may not be an area to cheap out. When we've seen cheapy logos, they look like someone stuck together one or two clip art images, and then threw in the name. Well, that's worth what you paid for it, especially since the same company might put together something quite similar for someone else. 

The logo should be memorable, which is why symbols often have more impact than just a text treatment. Think about what will be best for your business!

Posted at 02:00 AM in That's Good Marketing | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

In-Person Conference on Virtual Events... Huh?

I just got an email inviting me to the Virtual Edge Summit. In theory, I'd like to attend that, but I'm not sure I can budget for more conferences and travel. I already have what feels like 100 events coming up in the next 3 months.

The Virtual Edge Summit should cancel itself out. It is an in-person conference about virtual events and online communities. Huh? Why not prove the point of virtual events BY HOLDING A VIRTUAL EVENT?

Like don't have me fly to Santa Clara, CA (or assume I'm already in that area)... have a virtual event to show how awesome virtual events are! Jeez.

Posted at 08:37 AM in Just An Observation | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Ticketmaster Convenience Charge

Ticketmaster Convenience Charge. I barely know enough four-letter words for you. Ticketmaster is the only company I can think of that surcharges ME for experiencing convenience, and allowing them to use fewer resources and workers. If my clients took work off my plate, I would DISCOUNT our prices because now, we have less work to do on the project!

Ticketmaster Convenience Charge, you are SO convenient that you add often 15% to the ticket price. All of this for the glory of using nearly none of your resources since I'm buying tickets online. I didn't have to talk to a phone rep. I didn't make you rent more office space. You didn't have to hire for my purchase!

And then $2.50 for the TicketFast service or TicketsNow or whatever they call emailing you a PDF so you can print your own tickets. So if you print my tickets and mail them to me, which takes paper, postage, and resources, that's free. But if you use no paper, no postage, and no resources, that's $2.50... AND it comes with a full page of ads. My last one came with a coupon for FedEx Office and the Mexican chain place next to the venue. I bet those people paid to be there. Ticketmaster made money emailing me a PDF of my tickets, first from advertisers, and then from me. I am literally being charged to view paid ads.

The ticket business is down. Ticketmaster, in many cases, is the only place you can get these tickets. I have to get them from you, not go to the show, stand outside the theatre box office, or get them from a scalper, broker, or reseller. And remember that the tickets aren't your only expense. You will pay for gas to drive to the event, and you'll pay for parking. Or you'll pay for mass transit, and sit on busses and subways. You'll probably go out and eat. You might buy a drink at the venue. You might be a souvenir CD, DVD, shirt, pin, etc... There are plenty of expenses tucked into an evening at an event.

$8.50 Ticketmaster Convenience Charge on a $60 ticket (14.2%). $5.95 on a $37 ticket (16.1%). Add $2.50 for the PDF service to a $37 ticket, and you've added 6.8% to the price. Ticketmaster would have collected $8.45 on a $37 ticket (22.8%).

People complain about eBay fees being 10% or 12%, and they should complain. That's HIGH. Ticketmaster is charging more and giving people way less. eBay fees expose your item to millions of shoppers every day. Ticketmaster Convenience Charge does nothing but keep me from buying more event tickets.

If your show didn't sell out in my town, you can thank Ticketmaster for making it 23% less appealing to buy those tickets.

Posted at 02:00 AM in That's Bad Marketing | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack (0)

I Want To See Higher Standards

People can't afford to waste time and money with sub-standard companies, products, or services. In this economy, that is magnified. Nobody should be sending ANYBODY to any company, product, or service that they don't really, deeply believe is the best choice.

I still see blogs and websites with lots of ads and affiliate links, and they take people to all sorts of things like "systems" for selling on eBay. These systems are pretty much always endorsed by some sort of "expert" or "big PowerSeller" to win your trust. They will take your money, and many of them don't work... especially if they are based in having you get most of all of your inventory from traditional "drop shippers."

I'm reminded of the controversy that swelled around an eBay "expert" who often recommended products and systems to his readers and fans. People started complaining that one of the companies he recommended was a scam. The "expert" finally admitted that he was just recommending them for the cut he got, and he had never actually checked them out. His readers were pretty angry, and I think they rightly felt like they had just been used for the "expert" to make money off of. Some people thought this was not totally ethical.

Similarly, a company recently told me that they don't really look into their partners. They push business to whomever comes in as the bigger sponsor of their events... but don't really check them out. It sounded like they had no standards other than who paid them. I think this company's clients should get recommendations based on quality companies who are good matches to their needs, not who paid the most in sponsorship money.

And I think that's sometimes true for websites and blogs that have ads and affiliate links. These are sometimes chosen for where money can be made, and not necessarily by who that website thinks you should be doing business with.

Who do you want recommended to you... by someone you trust?

So I am calling for higher standards. I'm calling for an end to "enabling" scammers and low-quality companies, software, and services. Sure, they may offer you a cut. But remember that that cut comes from your fans and readers paying that company money. If nobody hires them, you get nothing. Which means you might be pushing your fans and readers to spend money with someone who may not be good.

If that company, product, or service ends up "disgraced" like my previous example with that "expert," you could end up with "guilt by association." Your fans may want to know why you plugged a scammy service or rip-off e-book. Your readers may want to know how much money you made off of something that was trouble for them. Your readers may want to know why you pushed so hard for them to use a certain online marketplace if there are very few sales happening there. Your fans may have good questions, and those questions are really questions of your credibility.

I'm at the point where when I see ads on a website or blog, I just assume someone paid to be there, and the website probably didn't run any kind of quality check. I don't think they Googled the business to see if there are complaints. I don't think they checked BBB complaints. I assume these are paid ads, and as paid ads, they had NO standards to live up to. The advertised company, product, or service could be great, or could be a waste of time and money, it could be ineffective, or it could even be unethical.

We don't accept ads on our website, in our blog, or on our radio show. The companies who sponsored our events and the people I chose to speak at our events last year were chosen by my trust for them. Anybody who did anything to break that trust wasn't invited back. Companies I don't like, who offered me a lot of money to sponsor those events, were turned down. I didn't want to sell my attendees/fans/readers on something I couldn't totally stand behind.

Those are my standards. They're not everybody's standards. But I think now is a good time to take a look at having higher standards. Relationships are important. Your fans and readers trust you. Every suggestion you make to these people can make or break that trust. So I think websites and "experts" should be more careful about who they recommend. :)

Posted at 02:00 AM in Just An Observation | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0)

As Was is Hiring (Spread the Word!)

Hey there! We've been redefining some of the jobs at As Was, and we now have some open slots.

Our open jobs page has all the information. You can then follow that to our Account Manager and Integrations Manager jobs.

We expect you to have the skills and talent to match what we want. We'll teach you how to do things the As Was way. :)

Thanks, and pass it on!

Posted at 09:42 AM in That's Good Marketing | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

eBay Partner Network Income

OK I think I've tried just about everything, and I just can't make the eBay Partner Network (ePN) into any sort of decent revenue-generating thing. I'm sure if I "sold out" more, maybe it would work, but I can't bring myself to do that. I already hate how much I pushed some of these links, and for what?

Experiment 1: Dropping eBay items into an existing Twitter account with a following

I have a twitter account called yourppl, which mostly covers the music business, focusing on concerts and touring. I had a small following, and I thought I'd see what happens if I had a feed drop a few tickets from eBay sellers every hour. I figured people who wanted to know concert news might be interested in concert tickets.

In a month, I had 6,000 clicks on those concert tickets, and ZERO purchases. So if this was to see if anybody cared, it looks like some people were interested. But from the world of making money, I made none. Nobody bought a single concert ticket. I just pissed people off, evidently.

The outcome is that I lost some really nice followers. They hated the ticket listings, even though they were not the main "content" in the account. People called me "scalper scum," and HATED me for listing tickets for sale. I mean venomous hate. It was really bizarre. Someone even suggested that I should be shot. None of these listings were mine anyway, so it was really interesting to be so hated for something I wasn't even selling.

So after a month or so of that, I have removed that feed. I'd rather not plug tickets to people who will hate me for it. I don't want to sacrifice what I'm building up with my @yourppl account just for the experiment of who will click on tickets, and would it make me any money. I have shut the feed off, and promise people who follow that account: no more eBay ticket listings.

Experiment 2: Creating a blog and twitter feed just for stuff from eBay

On the assumption that stuff in blogs and twitter would get attention in search, I ran a separate twitter account just to dump stuff from eBay in there. An expert suggested that I dump higher priced things that are very in demand so that if I do make ePN money, it'll be decent money. So I dropped in high-priced things based on what I thought was in demand... concert tickets, Coach bags, iPhones, Wii systems, a real hodge podge of stuff, all higher-priced.

I got some clicks, and I think a couple of purchases. I think I got around $20 last month from people clicking on these. Barely worth the web hosting I set up for the domain name. So I consider this a failure.

Could I work harder at this? I guess. But that would be work. :) And for what I bill for an hour of my time, I'm not sure this is how my time is best spent. I don't think I've ever received a payment of more than $40 in a month from ePN. Barely worth the time.

Experiment 3: The blog and twitter thing tried by someone else

Someone I know decided to try a similar experiment. She set up a blog and and twitter feed, but rather than go for the higher-priced thing, her idea was to do focused items for a narrower audience. She aimed at items around $50 that were housewares and craft-related things like for knitting.

It sounds like she got some action and some purchases, but not enough to call this any kind of part-time living. Maybe it'll pay for one dinner out each month.

What is your experience?

Have you been able to make serious revenue from the ePN without "selling out your friends" and getting your life threatened like my experience? :) I have only found one person claiming to make more than $50/month, and I wasn't able to reproduce that person's results, even though he gave me clear directions on things to try. I tried a BUNCH of things (not all listed here), and couldn't get more than $70 in a month.

I think that until ePN allows more links to be commissionable, it's not that viable as a real revenue source. I believe that more links SHOULD be allowed to be commissionable, but that'll be a blog post for another day. :)

Posted at 02:00 AM in That's Bad Marketing | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0)

Web Design Has Evolved Past Columns

For 14 years now, my company has been on the cutting edge of website design. We did some things that were considered out there... until everybody was doing them. The very warm and visual style people are doing now with backgrounds, lots of mood, etc... is what we've been doing for years.

I'm always looking at where website design is going next, and one amazing thing I noticed was that some time in the 2nd half of 2008, major websites removed their columns. Best Buy, Target, and Office Max are some main ones I tend to watch. I assume they pay for research and focus groups. :) And all three removed their mult-column website format. What do they look like now? Click for larger versions.

Columns are gone. Left side columns full of categories are gone. You can still search sites. And some do categories by having a "categories" button. When you run your mouse over that, categories pop up. Or they have categories along the top, and when you run your mouse over those, sub-choices pop up.

Have you seen the new View Item page eBay is testing? I believe that you will not be able to drop your eBay Store categories down the left. We had said for years to get those out. We thought they were more distracting than helpful, plus who wants to read a gigantic list of words. But now, I think that the new View Item page isn't even letting you put those there.

Left side categories are dead. Long live web design that is more visual, bold, vibrant, and focused on making shoppers feel engaged. Anybody who wants to give you lots of columns is probably not up on where website design has been going for years.

Once you click into a site, it makes sense for a left side column to be used to help you narrow down your search. But this is functional, and enhances your experience. If it makes shopping easier, then it makes sense. But to have those old-style home pages that dump EVERYTHING on there no longer really make sense. Shoppers' attention spans are WAY down. They're not reading. They want something catchy and obvious.

Here is someone who hasn't caught up with the times. :) Very texty. Lots of lists. Lots of messages... join site-to-store, top navigation, see all departments, left navigation, search box, backyard fun, nintendo, find gas prices, prescriptions... I think that's just too much for someone to digest. Too many messages. I look at this, feel overwhelmed, and just want to know where the search box is. :)

Posted at 02:00 AM in That's Good Marketing | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0)

Advanced eBay Store Design is Dead

I saw that a conference a week or so ago had a seminar about Advanced eBay Store Design. I'm surprised to see that someone is out there talking about this or trying to sell you on this. Advanced eBay Shop Design is dead.

In January 2009, eBay dropped the axe on "advanced" eBay Store design. This seems to have been the practice of using coding that broke an eBay rule in existence since 2004 to give the eBay Store a very different look and layout. All through 2008, I was waiting to see if eBay would embrace this style of design, or if they would kill it. I believed eBay would kill it, so my company chose to NOT offer this non-compliant style of design.

eBay chose to kill that style of design. Among other things, they felt that changing the Store's look and layout that much was confusing to eBay users, who get accustomed to how an eBay Store looks and works. This meant that hundreds of people paid a lot of money to get an eBay Store that not only broke eBay's rules, but was possibly less effective than a more "simple" eBay Store design.

What's left of "Advanced Store Design" seems to be an overdesigned eBay Store home page. Once you click past that, you get an eBay Store with minimal design (as it probably should be). My question now is: why sell the overdesigned home page when time after time, we hear that these are less effective?

Let me put it this way. I used to call someone on the eBay Stores team every year, and ask the same question. I'd say, "Tell me that your data shows that custom eBay Store home pages work. Tell me you have proof that they are more effective... they make shopping easier... they make shoppers stick around longer. Tell me ANYTHING, even if you don't give me the data, tell me you HAVE data that shows that custom Store pages lead to more sales. I will make sure every client I have gets a custom Store home page if you tell me this." And year after year, there was silence on the other end of the phone. They could not tell me that a custom Store home page, especially one with a lot going on, would be better for a seller.

And then they drop the axe on "advanced" Stores. I get the message. I believe that these designs are often not effective, and have the potential to distract and confuse shoppers. eBay would know if custom Store home pages lead to more sales, and they would be comfy telling me that they do, even if they give me none of their internal and confidential data. So we still recommend that sellers NOT use eBay Store home pages at this time.

What's left of Advanced eBay Store design is evidently just a custom Store home page, which in my opinion are often overdone.

Advanced eBay Store design is dead. Long live simple eBay Store design that brands the seller, makes shopping easy and obvious, and excludes distractions, microscopic text, and the "let's throw everything on the home page" idea that most online retailers abandoned in 2008. I'll explain that one tomorrow. :)

Posted at 02:00 AM in Just An Observation | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

Don't Get A ProStore

With ProStores offering something for free to some sellers (in response to Vendio's new Stores, I think), some clients are asking me if they should just get a ProStore. Some are thinking about shutting of their other eCommerce sites to get a ProStore. I think I need to say something out loud here. Sorry if anybody's offended, but you know me. :)

Don't get a ProStore. Just don't. They're not ready for eBay sellers. If you do NOT sell on eBay, a ProStore may be fine. If you sell on eBay, a ProStore is not what you probably think it is.

1. ProStores won't list to other marketplaces. If you are looking for a multi-channel solution that will take your items, list them to eBay, put them on an eCommerce site, and list them to other marketplaces, that's unlikely to be a ProStore any time soon. When do YOU think eBay will build in the feature of listing your items to Amazon? :) So if you're looking for multi-channel, as most sellers are right now, ProStores won't be your solution.
2. ProStores can't take custom HTML templates for eBay listings. Yes, you can design a ProStore, but you cannot take an item in your ProStore, and send it to eBay with one of our templates wrapped around it. Many of our clients are used to doing this with their Vendio, Inkfrog, ChannelAdvisor, Marketworks, Kyozou, Auctiva, Infopia, Blackthorne, etc... ProStores does NOT do templates for eBay, so if you are our client, there is no good way to deal with our HTML templates inside ProStores.
3. Last I heard, eBay thinks you should list with Blackthorne, manage things with Selling Manager Pro, and then also use ProStores. So eBay suggests three tools where I suggest ONE tool (like Vendio, Inkfrog, ChannelAdvisor's Marketplace Advisor Premium). I think that the more tools you use, the more likely you are to work inefficiently.
4. ProStores is not an eBay listing tool. It's just really not. 3 years ago, ProStores was a company called Kurant who build their eCommerce system. eBay bought it, renamed it ProStores, and has confused people ever since. eBay never built this to seamlessly integrate with all that is eBay. They've been adding these features over time, though don't get too excited by the word "adding" since I haven't seen that much added in 3 years.
5. ProStores says hey, don't worry. We'll import your items from eBay, and you won't have to work too hard putting in your inventory. I say hey, don't totally believe that. Yes, they can import from eBay, but your items will come in from eBay EXACTLY as they look now. If you use a listing border, that will come in. If you use one of our templates, that will come in. If your listing has links to your eBay Store, About Me, or other areas of eBay, that will come in too. That means someone shopping your ProStore might see a designed listing dropped inside a designed eCommerce site (ugh) with links OFF your eCommerce site back to eBay. I'm going to call that not a good idea!
6. Don't rush to shut off another site. What many sellers don't realise is that each eCommerce site is a different experience for your shopper. Some are awesome, easy, and more likely to make sales. Some are clunky. Some eCommerce systems go REALLY well and naturally into search engines like Google, helping your items show up more and higher. Some eCommerce systems stink at this. Don't just go by the price of a system. There is more to think about when it comes to a successful shopping cart website. Best to let multiple systems run at the same time, and test them. When you searched Google, what came up higher? Which had people staying on the site longer? Which had people making more sales or higher $ of sales? These are the sites to keep. :)

Sorry I'm not towing the eBay line on this one, but I just can't in good conscience recommend this tool for anybody who sells on eBay or is looking to do the multi-channel thing. If you are looking for JUST a website with NO other marketplaces, maybe ProStores could be a solution for you. I'd still want you to compare it to BuyItSellIt.com, Vendio, epages, etailcomplete, and maybe a few others.

But if you sell on eBay and especially if you sell on multiple marketplaces, a ProStore is just not the right solution, even for free.

Posted at 04:34 AM in Just An Observation | Permalink | Comments (16) | TrackBack (0)

Beware of Hippies with Guns

Something really interesting happened recently in my yourppl Twitter account. Normally, that account tweets about music business news as well as concert and touring news and updates. I also have an RSS feed sending some tickets for sale on eBay to that Twitter account. Around 3 post to the account each hour, so it's not overwhelmed with tickets.

My idea is that people interested in concert and touring news and updates might be interested in concert tickets. I've seen all kinds of tickets go by from Jonas Brothers to Jimmy Buffet to Springsteen, Allman Brothers, Billy and Elton, Britney Spears, Lady Gaga, etc... Tickets for just about every popular act drop into my Twitter account.

A few weeks ago, Phish tickets started getting posted through that RSS feed. I only know this because I got a reply tweet calling me an asshole. Huh?

A Phish fans twittered to tell me I was an asshole, and followed that up with, "Sorry man, I know that isn't your auction, but it hurts like crazy to know that I may not attend bc I don't have $k for a ticket." I had no idea some links to concert tickets would get me called an asshole, but I REALLY had no idea that someone would tell me I deserved to DIE.

A tweet said, "it's too bad that you're making a quick buck off of good people. people like you deserve to be shot." A stranger thinks I deserve to be shot. A Phish fan who, according to his Twitter bio, likes to ski and do .NET software development wants me dead. I wonder what the members of Phish would think of a fan saying this to another human being, a total stranger, and most importantly, THE PERSON WHO WAS NOT SELLING THE PHISH TICKETS.

That's right, I have no tickets for Phish. I'm not going to see them. I've bought no tickets, and I don't like the band (sorry --- don't shoot me!). The links in my tweets were just random items from eBay. I got a death threat for something I wasn't even DOING. Classy! Is this guy going up to scalpers outside of the venue and beating them with baseball bats? Is he mouthing off to these people in person? Probably not. Another case of the anonymity of the internet giving people some extra courage.

I've now set the eBay RSS feed to "-phish," which means no Phish tickets will be posted. I hope this will keep my life safe. In February, there were 6000 clicks on those ticket links. I think people are interested in them! I'd just like to NOT have my life threatened, please.

Posted at 02:00 AM in That's Bad Marketing | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

How Sprint Can Fix Things

This blog post last week talked about how Sprint lost 1.3 million customers in Q4 2008 while Verizon gained 1.4 million and AT&T gained 2.1 million. The post suggests that the main issue is customer service, and Sprint Nextel ranking near the bottom of a survey.

I've had Sprint for many years, and I've actually been really happy. I'm just that rare person who is really happy with their service, and how much lower their prices are than other carriers.

Now that being said, when I DO need customer service, and I call in, I get an Asian support team (Philippines I think) who has messed up what I needed 100% of the time I've called them. But when I get the American team, like when we turn on the international Blackberry data plan when my husband travels to Europe, they've been GREAT.

I think Sprint lost a lot of people to AT&T in pursuit of the iPhone. In that case, the customer service and pricing wasn't enough to keep them because of the choice in equipment. Considering how people feel about the iPhone, I'm not sure Sprint could have done much to keep those people. Millions of iPhones have been sold, and I saw a graph recently that claimed that iPhones had 66% of the market share.

I would think Verizon would be down from people jumping ship to get an iPhone. But I wonder if Verizon is counting Alltel subscribers as theirs now, which would probably make numbers go up for them.

So I say to Sprint what I want to say to just about every company out there. Americans are out of work. Many Americans are willing to work for lower wages than they got before just to have a steady job where they get paid. I remember back in Tucson, people thought that a $10.50/hr call center job for AOL or Intuit was a GOOD job.

Stop sending the work overseas. Bring it back here. We customers will get better service from friendly people who will be happy to be working again and making money. We're worth it, right? We paying customers are worth getting friendly Americans on the phone. That's the change I want to see Sprint make. And release the damn Palm Pre already. :)

Posted at 02:00 AM in Just An Observation | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Vonage Visual Voicemail

I have been playing with Vonage's Visual Voicemail feature for a couple of weeks now, and wanted to give my review. Firstly, I should mention that it currently costs extra. You can pay per Visual Voicemail message, or get a bunch as part of the "Vonage Companion" upgraded service with more features. I'm trying the whole Companion thing.

Visual Voicemail uses technology that tries to transcribe your voice mail. It can then text your phone and/or email it to you. I have it doing both. My emails look lovely. The SMS texts tend to come in a bit slowly and out of order... like a long message might take 4 texts, and I might get 3 of 4, then 1 of 4, then 2 of 4, then 4 of 4. Eek.

But here is a sample of how well it transcribes things. This is a message I got from AAA about renewing my roadside assistance (and it IS time to renew so this was not spam):

Anything the system isn't sure of comes with parentheses and question marks. Sometimes it's a whole missing word they're not sure of. Sometimes they shoot for the word, and they're not too sure. For example, one transcribed message I got said, "(Tusan Newspapers?)" when they really meant Tucson Newspapers. One message I got started with, "Hi, daddy." It was actually, "Hi, Debbie." So they must have been darn sure he said Daddy to not give it the (??) treatment. Still, I got the message.

This feature has been GREAT. I have been able to sit at a meeting or on a plane or in bed :) and get the message in without having to dial in, listen to the message, write down what people said, etc... I have seen the message come in, and then just responded... like shooting someone an email that I'm on a plane about to take off, or seeing the message come in, and then calling them right back. I think it's making me respond faster, and that can only be good for customer service! :)

Each email comes with links at the bottom that ask you to rate the transcription as "good" or "needs improvement." I haven't clicked yet since I only just noticed the links!

So far, I have to give Vonage Visual Voicemail (and Vonage Companion) a thumbs up. I currently have no plans to downgrade or cancel. I'm liking it!

By the way, if you want to sign up to Vonage and give it a try, we both get some perks if I have referred you as a "friend." Just go to www.vonage.com/friend, and when it asks what phone number sent you, please say 617-996-9020. :) Thanks.

Posted at 02:00 AM in That's Good Marketing | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

eBay Fee Calculation Tool

Last year, we took down our eBay fee calculation spreadsheet when it just became too hard to keep current. Sorry!

Recently, a client emailed me a link to another eBay fee calculation tool. I didn't build it, so I can't say anything about how correct or current it is. But hey, it's something!

Posted at 02:00 AM in That's Good Marketing | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)

What If eBay's View Item Page Looked Like This?

I've been thinking about eBay's View Item page, and I think it's possibly one of the most important things eBay can "decide" this year. To me, it's simple. If the page is really effective, sellers should see sales go up and "stupid" questions go down. If the page is not effective, sellers might see more questions, fewer sales, and who knows what else. So it's a big thing. Huge, if you ask me.

And this is my realm. As someone who runs a company specialising in eBay template design to make listings more effective and more likely to make the sale, this is close to my heart. So I decided to mock up the "top" of an eBay View Item page.

The only thing to ignore is my icons. I decided to stop trying to find icons for what I wanted sections to say, so I just used my ? icon everywhere. Imagine that other icons would have an appropriate symbol, as in a ? would NOT be next to "item description." :)

My goals? People don't like to read or think, so we have to make this really obvious. And to me, a new View Item page needs to SOLVE problems, and create ZERO problems.

• To give shoppers the info that makes or breaks sales, DSRs, and trust RIGHT at the top.
• Make it really obvious and clear.
• Remove things eBay has scattered or repeated. Consolidate, and make it a no-brainer! I consolidated Watch This Item, SMS updates, and email to a friend.
• I tried to make the most important policies DARN obvious so sellers can stop being asked, "What does shipping cost" or "when will you ship this?"
• I got rid of icons that won't mean anything to shoppers so that they don't wonder what they mean. This will mostly be newbies, but hey, let's face it, the shooting star is nice, but means nothing and could confuse a newbie. Yes, I can put it back. :)
• Get the bidding/buying right up top, including the quantity.
• I made some things bigger and bolder, and some things smaller. I think that the current design has nearly all the info in the same size and plain with just a few bold things. I think that's not "enough" to draw people's eyes to important areas.
• I used phrases like "your seller" and "your item" to plant the seed in the shopper's mind that this item is HIS OR HERS. :) Go, psychology!
• I know eBay is designing tabs for detailed policies. I didn't get to that yet. But you can be SURE that my tabs will not be grey with grey writing on white! My tabs will be NOTICEABLE. Un-miss-able. :)
• I didn't design/mock-up down this far, but I AM against any right or left columns that have the potential to distract. Just about everything, especially towards the top of the page, should work toward encouraging THIS sale rather than trying to drive people to individual, other items.

So please click on this to enlarge it (full size is 1200 pixels wide, so this is nearly 1/3 the size), and comment to let me know where you think this would be a better or worse eBay View Item concept! Thanks. :)

Posted at 07:20 AM in That's Good Marketing | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack (0)

eBay and Adults Only Items

I've noticed a few interesting things happen recently, and I don't think they're by accident. :) I promise I am trying my best to make NO puns in this post, but it's not so easy. Every word sounds rude! OK, here we go...

eBay sellers who list in Adults Only (formerly "Mature Audiences") used to NOT be allowed to have an eBay Store. I was recently told that these sellers can now have eBay Stores. So there's some new revenue for eBay.

On a side note, I have always found it very bizarre how many overtly sexual devices are listed under Massagers: Other, which means they're outside of Adults Only. Anybody can see them. I know this is the biggest euphemism ever, but some of these titles have words that make me blush! No, I'm not buying these. We have a new potential client who sells such things, and evidently, I needed to freshen up on what's going on in Adults Only. I didn't even know the category had changed names... not like eBay put that in their Announcement Board! :)

For what seemed like forever, eBay sellers were not allowed to accept PayPal for Adults Only items. PayPal seemed to be staying mostly or completely out of anything porn-related. Very recently, eBay changed that policy. Adults Only items can now be paid for with PayPal. We all know that online sales of "devices" and sexual materials is always a big business, and now PayPal will get a piece of that.

I went to PayPal's "help" area, and tried to type in relevant words. I wanted to see if PayPal was going to allow people to use them for any website that might be pornographic or sell adult devices. Every word I put in gave me no search results.

I tried PayPal's automated help chat person, "Sarah." Luckily, she was NOT offended when I asked if PayPal can be used to pay for pornography. She directed me to PayPal's acceptable use policy. That page says that PayPal cannot be accepted when selling, "certain sexually oriented materials or services." I guess "certain" means that some will be allowed and some won't. The page said nothing else about what will or won't.

So I'm guessing that eBay will relax this rule for PayPal so that they can get a cut from all the Adult items being sold out there. Maybe in this economy, any revenue is good revenue.

Posted at 02:00 AM in Just An Observation | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

How eBay Can Fix Things

I still have hope that eBay can fix things. But they're going to have to do things differently, and not just talk about making changes. I think it was in November that we saw Pierre tweet that he was stepping in to fix things. It's March. I'm trying to keep my hopes up, but I'm not really seeing the change I wanted to see by now.

I think the best way for eBay to fix things is just turn back the clock roughly to 2007. I had a very good year in 2007, as did most of our clients! :)

• Get rid of Best Match. If we got 100 eBay buyers in a room, and asked them about their experiences, I doubt many (if any) would say it was hard to find what they wanted. Finding wasn't a problem. Real problems on eBay include fraud, slow shipping, sellers who don't follow through on promises, etc... Finding is not the problem, so why are we working SO hard on it. Jeez, even the guy who had something to do with the origins of Best Match blogged that he didn't like where it had gone!
• So get rid of Best Match. It's gone. Sellers no longer have to scramble to change listings and strategies for unannounced reasons. Shoppers won't be shown sellers whose greatest quality (as of how Best Match is currently tweaked) is that they have a lot of inventory. DSRs are no longer the most important part of the algorithm, which leads me to....
• Forget about DSRs. DSRs are a binary system of good/bad. 5 stars= good, everything else = so bad eBay could stop you from listing ever again and shut down your business. I still shop by feedback percentage on the assumption that bad sellers will get bad feedbacks. Which leads me to...
• Let sellers leave negatives OR get rid of feedback completely. If you want to be more Amazon-like, remember that Amazon doesn't encourage conversation between buyer and seller, which means the buyer doesn't really get the chance to threaten the seller. If eBay wants to stop buyer blackmail, just follow through on all communication going through My Messages. Then, if you get a threatening email, you can click a report button, and the buyer won't be allowed to leave feedback at all. DONE. Nobody blackmailed or extorted. Feedback system can stay meaningful and honest.
• Advertise to bring buyers to the site. In 2008, I saw no ads on TV from eBay while I saw zillions from Walmart, capturing feelings about the economy. eBay could have jumped on that and didn't. Fewer buyers. Sales down.
• Get back in Google. Ever since eBay and Google broke up, I am seeing very few eBay items come up in Google searches. eBay says they are sending fixed price and Store format items to Google, but when I search, I am mostly seeing Amazon items in search results. eBay needs to fix that because that drop in traffic will help that drop in sales (while Amazon is up in sales).
• Don't change the View Item page the way eBay is saying that it plans to. Based on the incarnations I have seen of the View Item page, I believe that it will inspire fewer sales. There are too many distractions on it. The only thing that was wrong with the old one was that people didn't scroll down to see shipping pricing. SO FIX THAT and you're done. Don't re-lay out everything. Don't make designers design for a NARROWER space when the whole world is buying bigger screens. Our templates now look like bacon strips on huge monitors.
• Go back to the old fee structure. eBay is now taking too much of a % of sales. Most sellers can't afford it. In this economy, you need more sellers making more money, or you're putting them out of business. And what do sellers get for their fees? Right now, lots of scrambling and changes and trouble. Insertion fees aren't the problem. Stop lowering those. Insertion fees are a good barrier to entry for people who think they should put 50,000 items from drop shippers on eBay. It's the FVF that needs to come down.
• Stop with the self-fulfilling prophecies and junk science already. At this point, you have to offer free shipping or you'll be pushed down in search. You have to list things certain ways or you won't be placed higher than page 8 of search results. Whatever eBay wants to hand shoppers they float to the top of search. Then they can say, hey, that's what buyers want because that's what they buy! Well, if you hadn't put it at the top, maybe they wouldn't buy it.
• Get rid of off-site ads. You used to have one banner ad at the top that we could all ignore. Now, you have ads all over the pages. My question to any website owner looking to put ads everywhere is: which is more important? Keeping people on your site, or giving them lots of easy ways to leave your site? These ads are making it easy to leave eBay, which according to the numbers... people are doing, and in some cases, these ads are competing with sellers. Get rid of AdCommerce (for the third time), and get rid of all the other ads. Here is a good page to take from Amazon... every link on the site should keep you on the site!

eBay was better in 2007. Sure, it still had problems. Seller fraud and fakes needed to be fixed. An imbalance of power in feedback, and how meaningless feedback had become, needed to be fixed. VeRO needed to be fixed. And guess what. These are all still true. But things WERE better because you didn't have Best Match or DSRs making things difficult for good sellers, while being mostly meaningless to shoppers. Now is not the time to play Daily Deal or discussion forum upgrade. Now is not the time to fix things that aren't broken. Now is the time to fix what has been broken all along, and in some cases, is now worse. So we have the old, inherited Meg things to fix, plus the new John things to fix. It's a lot to fix, but it can be done.

I still shop on eBay. A lot. :) I always try buying there first when I am shopping online. And I still have the same % of bad transactions that I did before Best Match and DSRs. So to the buyer, this hasn't helped. These sellers are still frustrating. Clearly, DSRs and Best Match aren't keeping them away from me, so if that was the point, that's failing.

I do NOT want to see eBay try to become Amazon. I think Amazon and Zappos will handle that area quite well. eBay should be the eBay that millions of people loved and were passionate about. Shopping on eBay was fun and exciting! It can be that again.

I believe in Pierre, even if I didn't believe in anybody else at eBay. I believe in Pierre because people are basically good, and you can't be that into caring and charity, and not want to see this fixed. You can't watch your stock price drop below IPO price and be less than 1/3 of what it was in late 2007, and not want to do a lot to change it.

Posted at 02:00 AM in Just An Observation | Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBack (0)

How To Uninstall a Custom eBay Store

We've heard from some Frooition customers in our blog and via email who decided they didn't want to pay to have their eBay Stores "upgraded" (aka fixed). Since those Stores are going to break in a few weeks when eBay moves everybody over, some sellers have asked us to show them how to just uninstall these Stores.

http://www.viddler.com/explore/aswas/videos/19/

I shot a video explaining how to undo custom Store designs and custom Store home pages. This should answer everybody's questions, and help them uninstall what they have now.

Good luck!

Posted at 03:00 AM in Just An Observation | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

Handling Time: 1 Biz Day

I was recently tweeting with other eBay users, and told them that I was wondering when is the right time to email a seller and check on a purchase I had made.

Monday night, pretty close to midnight, I decided to take my own advice and buy a spare laptop battery. :) The seller promised "1 business day" handling time. I wanted to get it by this coming Monday because I leave early on Tuesday for another biz trip. So I upgraded to UPS 2nd Day shipping.

Someone tweeted that I should ask for a refund of my shipping upgrade because it should have been shipped Tuesday. I disagree, but as this is something that probably affects "shipping time" DSRs, let's talk about it!

I bought and paid late Monday night. The seller was probably sleeping. He wouldn't have seen the order until Tuesday, assuming he was all caught up and ready for Monday purchases! To me, Monday doesn't count as a business day since he wouldn't have seen my order that day.

I didn't expect him to ship on Tuesday. That would have been nice, but I didn't EXPECT it. He did NOT say, "We ship the same day that your payment clears our account." If he had said that, I'd have assumed a Tuesday shipment.

I expect him to ship Wednesday since that would be within 1 business day of getting my order and payment. I would expect him to ship it UPS 2nd Day, and if he doesn't, I'd expect him to refund the upgrade charge for that shipping. And I'd expect to get it Thursday or Friday since it's going UPS 2nd Day from New York to the Boston area.

If all goes as planned, there is no reason I wouldn't give this guy all 5 stars and a positive feedback. So please, think about what "1 business day" means, and when the seller is likely to see your order. After business hours? Pretend you ordered it the next day, and give the seller that extra day. According to PayPal, I paid for it Monday night at 11:13pm east coast time. There is NO good reason to treat this guy like his first day of "1 business day" was Monday!

Be patient and understanding with your seller. :)

Posted at 03:00 AM in Just An Observation | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

eBay Stores Traffic... What's Going On?

Some sellers were reporting that when they opted into the new eBay Stores experience, their traffic and sales were dropping. I asked eBay about this, and got some information. I'm going to share it in my own words, so this is not some sort of official statement from eBay. I'm just trying to help explain this stuff!

So let's look at some concerns, and what I've found out, so far.

Google Base. eBay submits your fixed price and Store format items to Google Base every day. It takes up to 3 days for them to show up. Auctions are NOT sent to Google. If you want to send those, go to Manage My Store, and find "Listings Distribution."

eBay Stores Traffic Reports from Omniture. Those WERE broken. Many were showing low or no traffic when you really did HAVE traffic. So it looks like for a month or so, traffic reports were not accurately reporting the traffic you DID have.

The eBay Store URL is now different. This is actually just temporary. eBay is using two different URLs to differentiate between opted in and opted out Stores. If you opt in, your old URL points to your new Store. Once everybody is opted in, BOTH URLs will work for your eBay Store. So for those of you worried that you need to change links or reprint business cards, you don't. Both URLs work for your Store. Just don't change your Store name!

Is there anything that would make traffic go POOF when opting into new Stores? The answer is that nothing SHOULD do that. With URLs staying the same or forwarding, that's not the issue. With items still being sent to Google Base, that shouldn't be the issue. eBay is using all the SEO stuff they had in "old" Stores with new Stores, so that shouldn't be it.

I am not an SEO expert, so I have to admit that this is not my area of expertise. But I will say that in theory, I don't see anything glaring that's hurting new Stores or keeping your items from being found in Google searches. It looks to me like eBay is going what they can to continue bringing traffic from Google to eBay items. And obviously, eBay gains nothing if your traffic and sales suffer. eBay makes money when you make money, so there's no good reason to work against your business!

I'm curious to see what happens in a few weeks when everybody gets opted into New Stores, but has the new Store under the old URL. Maybe that'll make a difference because of how Google ranks a Store with so much "history" and links. So just remember that you don't have to opt in early if you are concerned. Maybe this will all just work itself out in a few weeks. :)

Posted at 11:30 AM in Just An Observation | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0)

I Don't Want a Mini Laptop

I used to dream about a UMPC or a mini laptop... I still wonder if I'd like one. But ever since I got my replacement Lenovo last fall, I am thinking this is as small as they should be.

My Lenovo X200 Tablet is the size of a letter sheet of paper when closed (around 8.5 x 11 inches), officially, it's 10.8" x 9.5" x 0.83". It's fairly thin. No CD or DVD drive, so I have to get an external. And no trackpad... just the "pointer." But the whole screen is a touch screen, which is plenty cool. It weighs under 4 pounds, but feels like 2 pounds. It's very light. Lots of ports including Express Card, ext monitor, and 3 USBs. You can get a dock for if if you want. And I have 4GB of RAM in there.

The screen is 12.1" widescreen, so I have a good amount of real estate (1280 x 800 max). As a tablet, the screen swivels, and can even be folded down flat on top of the keyboard. It comes with a stylus pen that snaps into the side of the computer, so it's your mouse, and it's your pen for "writing" on the screen.

Sony has the sexy new P series, a laptop that they advertise by showing people putting it in their back pocket. OK, you have my attention!

It's under 2 pounds, and an 8" screen in widescreen. Eeek. They say it does 1600 x 768, but that has to be weird. That's like a slice of a web page, especially after your address bar, toolbars, and status bar. 9.65" x 4.72" x 0.78"(H). I think that's the size of my wallet. :)

So I'm starting to not feel so hot about these really tiny computers. I like the comfy keyboard on the Lenovo, and can't imagine having to do heaps of typing (as I do) on these smaller keyboards. Are they touch screens? Probably not. The Sony looked like it had very few ports. No microphone jack?

I love portable, but I'm even starting to think the screen on my Windows Mobile cell phone is too small. I'm starting to really want functionality, and especially when I think about real web usability or something like Photoshop, I think the microscopic laptops just won't cut it. The coolness factor is high, but I don't want to drop $1K or $2K for coolness!

I like the Lenovo X200 Tablet. It's not cheap, but it's really light, really portable, the touch screen makes it really easy to use, and very reliable.

Posted at 03:00 AM in Just An Observation | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0)

Travel Tips

Airlines are changing rules again, so it's time for you fliers to hear my latest travel tips! These will save lots of time and money.

Baggage

I just flew Delta. They charged me $15 to check one bag, which weighed in at 50 pounds exactly. I asked how much they now charge for overweight bags, and they told me anything over 50 pounds was $90. NINETY DOLLARS. To check a 2nd bag? $25 (on top of the $15 for the first).

So where you used to pack fewer, larger bags, and maybe pay that $25 or $50 for overweight, now the math doesn't work. It would make more sense to pack smaller, lighter bags and pay $40 to check two than to pay $15 to check one + $90 for it being overweight.

So tip #1 is to pack smaller bags that are lighter so that nothing is overweight. I bought two 25" Samsonites. They're too big to carry on board, but they're great! Carry ons must be less than 22" x 14" x 9" on most planes.

Food and Drink

Airlines now barely give you food or drink. You can have a half ounce of peanuts, and a beverage when they feel like giving it to you. It's increasingly a good idea and money-saver to bring your own. I pack lots of food, and after sitting on a plane that was delayed for over an hour before taking off (with no food or drink service while we sat there), take it from me! This is what I tend to bring on a flight:

• Peanut Bars (or any granola or snack bars you like). Don't go wild with calories. There's only so many calories you need to sit in one place and do nothing! You just want to feel NOT starving.
• A Snickers bar.
• A bag of pretzels. I buy the Glutino gluten-free ones from health food stores like Whole Foods. You can eat fewer and feel fuller for longer. That's good... see above about calories. :)
• Some other healthy snack. This time, I brought peanut butter sandwich cracker things from the health food store.
• Beef with broccoli in a collapsible Rubber Maid container. You read that right. I go to my local Chinese take out, and get beef with broccoli, usually with white rice or pork fried rice. This stuff can be out of the fridge all day, and not go bad (by my standards). So if you're really hungry, you have something healthy that's not mystery meat airplane food. Just pick something with no dairy or mayo... like a turkey sandwich with mayo will get funky after a few hours out of the fridge.

When it comes to beverage, water is the best thing. Flying can make you very dehydrated, and most airlines want to serve you 4 oz of soda. I bring a Camelbak with me. These are those bladders with tubes that people take hiking. You sometimes see soldiers with them. You can get them at many army surplus and hiking stores. They're not cheap, but they're worth it. If you get a Camelbak for say $40, that will quickly pay for itself in $3 bottled water you're NOT buying in the airport.

You CAN go through security with a Camelbak. It has to be empty. No liquids. It doesn't have to be bone dry, but empty it out as best as you can. Once you're through, find a water fountain, and fill it up! Or I went to Starbucks in the airport, and asked for 2 giant ice waters, which were free. That only half-filled my Camelbak, but the ice made the water nice and cool for a long time.

Spare Batteries

My last trip sitting on the tarmac, delayed, reminds me to buy a spare battery for my new laptop. I have a little Lenovo that's meant to be very compact, which it is, but the battery only lasts 2 hours on a good day. So I should pony up the $100, and get a spare battery, maybe the big one. That would have been nice during that delay!

But I had my cell phone, and it has the mongo spare battery on it, which did last. But for those of you with the original or tiny batteries, best to have a spare. I say buy them on eBay of course. :) If you're going to talk through the delay, please talk quietly. We all wanted to kill the woman we sat near for how loud she was and the somewhat uncomfy nature of some of her loud topics.

Prepare for Comfort

This means dress comfortably, and in ways that'll make going through security easy for you.

And I'm tired of nobody giving me a blanket on a flight. I think I'm going to take myself to a hiking store, get a fleecy blanket that rolls up really small, and attach it to my backpack. I have a blow-up pillow already, but have to find it.

Also in the realm of comfort is the size of your carry on. I talked before about the allowed dimensions, but don't forget that the under-seat area of most aisle seats is narrower than other seats. A wide bag or backpack won't fit under there, plus you'll kill any room for your feet with a giant bag. If you like aisle seats like I do, then you too will want to switch to a narrow backpack. I got mine at the army surplus store for $50.

And those are my travel tips! Many are the same as they were last time, but as travel evolves, my tips need to evolve too! Happy and safe travels!

Posted at 03:00 AM in That's Good Marketing | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

Tweeters I Recommend

Here are my fave people to read on Twitter right now, in no particular order...

colderice is an online seller, vlogger, blogger, and media mogul. He's the man in the know with a great sense of humour, and buckets of integrity. When he says, "BS walks," it's because he personally showed it out the door. :)

sweetcherrypop is an online seller and all-around nice person. Tweeting with her is like going out for sushi with someone you really like. :)

lbphilatel is an online seller and funny guy. I always appreciate his honesty, and he stands up to BS. So he's my kinda guy!

g_licious works for eBay, and is one of the nicest people I know. Just an all-around beautiful person. eBay should give her a raise. :)

effle works at Vendio, and seems to live in a world of non-sequitors. One can only imagine how his mind works. But in real life, he's a smart and funny person that I wish I saw more often.

thesavvyseller is an eBay seller, blogger, Education Specialist, and all-around expert. She's the kind of person who everybody likes, even when they disagree. A rare gem!

And honourable mentions to some other tweeters... @vintagegoodness, @oldworldlimited, @brookeboutique, @onechicboutique, @marshacollier, @hillarydepiano, @softersilk, @rocketplace, and @yourppl.

Posted at 03:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)