I just wanted to give everyone a quick update on what is going on and appologize for the lack of posting!
School work has been kicking my butt recently and then on top of that the different organizations that I am involved in have been taking up a lot of time. So once I do get home from campus, I am doing work until 2 AM and don’t have much time to post on here. But hopefully that will change soon.
Anyway, a couple weeks ago I had an interview with the school newspaper for an article on Radford Auctions, my eBay start-up business. Well, it was finally published on Wednesday 🙂
You can read the article here.
The publishing of the article got delayed because the editor had a few extra questions but overall, it turned out pretty good. There was one minor mistake made, he mentioned that my partner, Zach, and I are roommates. But, in fact, we are not, we just run the business out of our respective apartments.
Now, normally most people would probably demand a reprint or something along those lines for a mistake in a newspaper, but when you are just starting out your business, you can not complain about free press. This article will hopefully lead to another one in my partner’s school newspaper which goes out to many more students then the one here at Radford does. The great thing about free press, is that, well, its FREE. The article appeared front page and then also continued on the inside, and I was very impressed by this. I figured it would have shown up at the very back of the paper or hidden somewhere else.
So, my lesson for all of you to learn today is to accept any free press you get (whether it is good or possibly bad, its still press) and do not stress over little minor mistakes such as this one if it really is just minor. However, if there was a bigger mistake in the article, I would be complaining 🙂
Anyway, I hope everyone is doing well and thank you all for your continued support. I continue to receive emails on a daily basis saying how you all enjoy reading Dorm Room Biz (when something new is added) and I appreciate the feedback, because that is ultimately what keeps me going and blogging (when I do have the time).
I am looking at the idea of recording a couple podcasts in the future as opposed to be writting different posts on topics just to get my ideas and comments out there quicker and in a better manor, so be on the look out for this. I will also be looking for people who may be interested in speaking in the podcasts and even being interviewed about your companies, so if you would like some free exposure, then feel free to drop me an email.
Have a great weekend everyone! I know I will. I will be in West Virginia at the Gauley Fest, so I will see you all on Monday!
I’m a little confused. How can you justify taking 20% of the final sale? Honestly, for 20% you should come pick the item up from your customers. There are similar outfits like iSoldit but they don’t pick your stuff up. That could be your competitive advantage. Personally, I’d not target college students. Most students are savvy enough to sell on their own. Target people in the age range of 30 and up. These people generally don’t even want to be bothered with selling anything online.
If you research the iSold It franchises, you will find that they take a percentage of around 30% (http://www.i-soldit.com/fees.asp), so we obviously come in under the competition on the percentage that we take. In my research, I have also heard of companies taking as much as 40% depending on the amount and item.
as we do not currently have a store front, picking the item up from customers is an option that we are offering. Most of our advertising is currently being done through flyers and other mailing advertisments. If someone calls us and wants us to sell an item, we then offer them the option of dropping the item off at a set location (our temporary storage facility) at a convient time for both parties orwe will pick the item up from them after normal business hours if needed.
In speaking with other students, we have found that many would actually use our service. The fact that it is one less thing that a busy college student would have to keep up with and handle appeals to many students. If we are able to take care of all the listing, shipping, and collecting payments, a majority are very willing to pay for the 20% fee. However, we will of course be focusing our marketing more on the older generations 25+.
nice job at the published article… How did you go about getting that done? DId they contact you or did you contact them? Anyways, I don’t believe anyone could have put it better, “free press, is good press.” Web Enterpriser did give you a pretty good advantage when dealign with college students. Depending on where you are located, most are prolly too lazy to get up and make a simple trip.
keep it up.,..
cheers.
Opio, thanks for the comments. My partner got the editors contact information from another friend, who happens to be the SGA President. I emailed the editor, told him a breift overview of our story, and he said he would be happy to write an article. So there we had it!