Craigslist Research

So you want to write killer Craigslist ads so that your product or service sells?  Here are some tips I found to help me out tremendously.

Outsource Your Startup

Just because you can create an affiliate campaign online does not make you a real web marketer or web-trepreneur.  

With everyone and their mother calling themselves Online Marketers, who are the real marketers?  Who are the real web entrepreneurs?  Who are the real movers and shakers of new ideas and ways of thinking?  One trend that I am seeing among the big boys (like Jeremy Shoemaker, Tim Ferris, etc ) is a new way of going about creating products, services, and opportunities online.  They simply sub it out to other people online.  

The idea of only doing a fraction of the real work, and reaping 100% of the profits is very attractive.  You just have to have the cash on hand to pay your contractors, and the time and patience to finish your projects.  With the large majority of people looking to start home-based business using an online platform, it seems they want a turnkey operation that costs them almost nothing upfront and can start making them money NOW!!!!  Most of them not having the skills and abilities, nor the desire to learn how to create the product themselves, this leaves the door wide open for those who can actually CREATE the tools to succeed........or who can bring the developers together to create the tools for them.

What a wonderful opportunity for entrepreneurs online.  Because there are sites like www.elance.com and www.odesk.com that offer programmers, developers  and creators to earn extra cash by working for those who are willing to pay them for their abilities.  The smart entrepreneurs are already employing these bright individuals to work on their projects.  And in most cases, completely outsourcing their design and operations online.  Say bye bye to the days of hiring a graphic designer making you a business card and charging you $300 to do it.  You can now go on Odesk and post your job and the price you are willing to pay, and developers from all over the world will respond.  Many of which will work for pennies on the dollar to do your work for you.  My good friend and entrepreneur Jon Giles pays less than $10 for a guy to develop quick-site designs for small online ideas.  They are quick, professional and responsive...........and CHEAP!  But you can also hire guys who are at the top of their game (in the world) for what they do.  They just charge a bit more than most.  What got me excited, was that I found a guy who specializes in Facebook Marketing and he only charges $4/hr for his work.  Why would I spend my time learning FB Marketing when I can employ a specialist for $4/hr to run my campaigns?  

If you are not using these tools for your business or ventures, then you are wasting your time and money!

You can hire the personnel who have the expensive software that you don't have, and you can employ them for dollars on the hour.  Exciting...I know, but do be warned that not all developers are equal or as cracked up to what they say they can do.  You must be aware that you might find some guys who just are terrible designers, but at least they are super cheap.  If you are afraid of poor quality, then just pay more per hour or per job.  Hire those who have better ratings, completed more projects and can communicate well. 

I am well aware that there are more sites than Elance.com and Odesk.com.  They are more well known and written about, and maybe I will compile a list of legit sourcing sites for labor/talent.  Good Luck!

How to Make Money on CraigsList

One of the best ways to earn cash online is through classified sites such as CraigsList. But most people simply over look it and most are afraid of it because of all the make money CraigsList scam stuff. Since Craig Alexander Newmark started CraigsList in 1995, CL has come a long way. It serves over twenty billion page views per month! CraigsList is one of the most popular websites in the world and millions of people visit it each month. And that makes it easy to earn money on CraigsList.

If you know how to make money on eBay, you may have a little easier time making money on CraigsList as it has some similarities. To make money online with CraigsList for free, you have to look into “For Sale” category. In the “For Sale” category of CraigsList, there is a section called “free stuff”. In this section, people give away stuff they don’t want, for free. You simply have to go pick them up. Some times people even include pictures of these items.

Register for free
Go to CraigsList and register for a free account, if you already don’t have one. You can register for free and it only takes a few seconds.

Find free items
Search your local CraigsList and look for free items that are in good shape (whcih most of them are). Sometimes you have to contact the owner to let them know you are going to pick it up, but in most cases, they will put the item in front of their drive way, which you just have to go there and pick it up.

Clean up
This step is the “hardest” part of making money with CraigsList. If possible, spend a few minutes to clean it up or whatever it needs to make it look better. For example, if its a desk, put a fresh coat of paint on it. Just make the item look as nice as you can.

Take pictures
When people look for stuff to buy on CraigsList or anywhere else for that matter, they tend to click on ads with pictures. People want to see what it looks like. So, spend a few minutes taking a few pictures of the item from different angles.

List your item
Now you need to list your item on CraigsList. Log in and list your item in the “for sale” category, under the appropriate section. This is very important, make sure you find and list your item under the right section. For example, if the item is a chair, listed under “furniture”.

If the item has some history to it, or there is anything interesting about it, use that to add a nice description of the item, even if its just a few words. In your ad, make sure you put your phone number or email address, so people can get in touch with you quickly.

Repeat the process
Now that you have listed your first item, go back and keep looking for other free stuff. Do this over and over again. After a while, you will know what items sell easier and faster, and what kinds of items don’t. As you do this over and over, you will gain some experience and the process becomes much faster and easier.

This is all it takes for making money on CraigsList, free. In a few hours or so, you will start to get calls and emails from people who want to buy the item. It is unbelievable how easy it is to make money with this method.

You may not believe it, but there are people who make (close to) living picking up free stuff from CraigsList and selling them back on CraigsList. It doesn’t take any skills, you don’t need any money, you don’t need a website, nothing. You don’t need anything but a free CraigsList account and internet connection. Its as simple as that.

If you want to make money without spending a dime and you don’t have any skills to offer, this is the way to do it. Finding free stuff on CraigsList and selling them back on CraigsList is how you can make money on CraigsList.                          

by Satrap

Origional article found on http://www.blogstash.com/how-to-make-money-on-craigslist/ and has  been written by Satrap

Buying Storage Units

Recently, I met some thrift store owners who stock their thrift store with items from purchased storage units. They attend storage auctions and pay for storage units of people who do not pay their storage bill. "It's a lot of fun, but a also a lot of headache" says Marvin, one of the owners. You may find some really good stuff, but also things that are just JUNK! He said that when you get these units, you are responsible for removing all of the contents in 24 hours. And if you don't comply with that, you could be put on a blacklist and not able to attend other auctions at that location. Oh, and you also may be responsible for a month's rent too. Getting the units cheap is exciting, but you also get quite a bit of junk. It's junk that you don't want to deal with, but it is your junk now! There are also people that are bidding against you that don't know when to stop bidding on a unit, and drive the price up. "You have to know when to walk away from the bidding, or you can definitely spend too much", says Marvin.

But Marvin and his wife Sherry have been doing this since 1994, and they love it! They started by buying 5 units at once and having to deal with it all. Sherry said that they recruited their family to help them move it to their home. They had soo much stuff, that it filled up their garage and driveway (all the way to the road). After several garage sales, the cops showed up and said that they would have to remove the remaining items. They told her that there is a rule about how many garage sales a residence is allowed to have every year. So the couple ended up renting a retail space to get rid of the rest of the it all. And the rest is history.

Marvin and Sherry have been doing this for 18 years and still enjoy it! For more info on getting started with buying your own storage units go to... Click Here!

Make Money Off Of Fiverr.com Deals

There are many services on Fiver.com that are listing for great price.  A great way to make a few bucks, is to find services on this site that you can promote and sell to potential buyers.  And use your contacts to fulfill orders.  You then market those services on other sites, as services you are charging for.  And please put a decent markup on your services, so that you have extra cash to spend at your favorite stores.  All your customers know, is that you are delivering them results they want.  And you are, you just have other people doing all the work for you.

Start Your Own Craft Business

Alissa Harvey quit her boring job and decided to start her own business, 'Mew Paper Arts', where she makes and sells stationary.

Turn your craft into cash by creating it, then selling it online.  Places for you to sell your products are Craigslist, eBay, Amazon, and Etsy.  You can even build yourself an easy WordPress site and put your products up for sale on it.  Although being online can be a very lucrative for your business, don't forget about all the shops around your town that would like to carry your products in their stores.  I would suggest making a list of stores that your crafts would fit well in (product wise), and then approaching the store owners to carry your hand-made items.

If your having a hard time coming up with craft ideas, I would suggest perusing Etsy.com.  It is a popular site for the creative community, and you will definitely see some cool things that you could make yourself.

Once you have the product ready to sell, you should create a Facebook Fan Page for your product and market it to all your Facebook and Twitter friends.  If you don't know how to do that, then head over to Fiverr.com and find someone to do the work for you.  Best of luck!

Write An eBook

One way to make some cash online, is to write an eBook and sell it.  People everywhere are looking for all kinds of information on the web, and at times, good, quality information is hard to come by.  So maybe there is a topic that you know a lot about, or a hobby that you have had for several years.  If you want to see what eBooks are selling online, then go to eBay.com and type in "eBook" in the search bar.  Once you click the search button, go all the way over to the right and click on the word "advanced."  This will take you to an options page to sort out the listings.  Go halfway down the page and select "Completed Listings."  Again go click "Search" at the bottom of the page, and only the completed listings of eBooks will be on the page.  This is a great way to see what kinds of eBooks have sold and how much they have sold for.

If you really don't have anything to write about, then start researching an area of interest you may have.  Research and then write your eBook.  It's not that hard.  It may take a little time, but after it is done you will have a sell-able product.

You can also set up a simple blog and sell your eBook from your blog.  But Please!  Get off your butt and DO SOMETHING!  Use your brain to help make you CASH!

The Measure of an Entrepreneur

"A true measure of an entrepreneur / successful-person is how they deal with adversity."          -Noah Kagan

 I totally agree with this statement! As a wannabe entrepreneur.....I always try to dream up ways of making enough money to pull off the next idea. A lesson I had to learn was that...Having an idea fail was not a big black badge on my chest, but was learning experience.  A seasoned entrepreneur looks at a failed idea and seeks to learn as much as possible from the experience, and tries to milk the failed attempt for anything else it's worth (if it's worth his or her time).  And for some people, there is never failure.....just feedback.  

And that feedback will let you know if staying in the game is worth the effort, or even how you want to continue what you are perusing.