Thursday, June 14, 2007

Live Life the Ebay Way

I am a huge fan of Ebay and have talked at length about my wins and losses to anyone who will listen.

Ebay offers a medium to find almost anything you could imagine and gives you a chance to get it for less than face value if your lucky.

Log on, search for what you want, put in the maximum price you are willing to pay for the item and go about your life until the auction ends. Ebay is so helpful that you don't even need to check back to see if you won, they will email you directly as soon as the auction ends to let you know you've won.

Yeah right!

I have bid on many auctions and can't remember one that didn't end with a flurry of last minute bids by people outdoing the current high bidder by $2.50 and in the interest of full disclosure I can't remember one auction I bid on where I wasn't one of THOSE PEOPLE!

The trick here is knowing what your MAXIMUM is...and if you know this you won't only be a power seller on Ebay but a master at life!

Outside of the Ebay world this concept can be referred to as your "Walk Away Position". At what point are you simply going to say this price is too high? Knowing the answer to this question before you log on to Ebay or walk into a car dealership will save you a lot of time and agony.

Understanding if your walk away position is stronger than the other bidders, the car salesman or your potential clients will make you a master at negotiation!

What Makes You So Special?

On the surface this question seems sarcastic, especially when you hear it from your Mother as a young boy or girl caught taking the last cookie without offering it to at least split it 50/50 with a sibling.

Fast forward to a time in your life when your priorities extend beyond cookies and this question should be at the top of your list as consumers looking for a new mobile provider, as clients looking for financial or legal advice and most of all as charitable donors!!

Let's ask the question a little differently, "What makes you relevant?" In a crowded marketplace of nonprofits a great answer to this question will separate you from the rest of the crowd.

When looking to donate dollars would you be compelled by some carefully worded, all encompassing mission statement or an organization that could say, "If our organization were to disappear tomorrow the world would lose XYZ"?

It's not an easy question to answer but remember, nothing worth doing ever is! This article can help you start the process of understanding your value proposition.

When you can tell me what makes your organization or business relevant I hope to hear from you!

Wednesday, June 6, 2007

Blogging Cadence

The topic of blogging cadence is widely covered throughout the blogosphere and opinions run the gamet but since this is my first post in nearly two months I thought it was a good time to weigh in!

I can offer excuses about my lack of postings (e.g. my home internet connection has been shoddy, I was sheparding a herd of 11-12 year-olds to a championship lacrosse season, etc) all true, but again, just excuses! Having said that, not only did my own blogging disappear but so did my daily review of my RSS feeds, granted I did check in a bit more frequently than once every two months!

At last count I am tracking 32 different feeds, not sure where that falls in terms of average volume so let me know. That being said, if every link had 30 posts I am going to need some real free time to get through that. Fast Company was the ongoing winner, in my longest abscence I logged on to find more than 125 postings to review...I probably gave the first 30 headlines a quick glance and I was done.

Other bloggers were well within my threshold at 10, 15 or even 30 posts. As like most people my threshold varied based on the value I assigned to each blog. Hence, I assume this will be the most important factor in each individuals "threshold"!

The blogging experts would likely destroy me on this post but surely there are people like me who appreciate the valuable content blogs provides and try to put in their fair share as time permits.

For those of you still checking in on my blog let me know what you think is the best cadence and I will act accordingly!