Friday Marketwatch - January 30

As of today, January 30 the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: 184
Sell-Through: 49.46%
Average starting price: $7.92
Average final price: $37.17

Highest Single Card Sale: Allen & Ginter Presidential Candidate Barack Obama, $120.05
Highest Mult-Card Sale: 2008 Allen and Ginter Yankee Stadium Tribute Set, $135
Highest Graded Sale: 2001 Kobe Bryant, BGS 9.5, $24.95
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: 2005 David Wright, $152.50
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: 2007 Adrian Peterson BGS 9, $137.50

Other best sellers:

* 2008 A&G Yankee Stadium Patch Card
* 2006 LeBron James
* 2007 Kevin Durant
* 2007 A&G Presidents - Bill Clinton

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 2008 Allen & Ginter Presidential Candidates Barack Obama: 20 bids

How to Win Over Sports Fans: 6 Insights from Online Gurus

I read this on marketingsherpa.com this morning. Interesting stuff about sports fans. No mention, though, about collectibles.

How to Win Over Sports Fans: 6 Insights from Online Gurus

More sports fans than ever gather online. They stream games, blog about their favorite teams, and get involved in fantasy sports leagues. So, marketers have plenty of opportunities to reach sports buffs without costly TV and radio ads.

Three marketers of the top sports websites share tips on how to reach fans online:
o Patrick Herde, VP of Marketing and Product Management, CBS Sports
o Perry Cooper, SVP, Digital Marketing and Fan Analytics, NHL Direct
o Hal Trencher, VP National Sales, Sports and Music, Yahoo!

They’ll tell you why sports fans are such a desirable audience, and how and when to get your message in front of them for the highest impact.

Their six key insights:

Insight #1: Characteristics of the “typical” online sports fan, according to the marketers we interviewed:

o Male
o Married
o Children in household
o Suburban lifestyle
o Average to high income
o Multiple computers in household
o High affinity for technology

Two of the marketers emphasized that they target “wired” sports fans – those who are more likely to consume sports content through the latest televisions, computers and mobile devices.

The typical sports fan is a generalization that does not represent every fan online. So, you need to segment and customize rather than use general messages.

Insight #2: Offer fans plenty of content

Sports fans go online primarily to consume content. It can come in text or video formats. The more content the better. “Sports fandom is a lifestyle,” says Herde. “The real team fanatic has a thirst for content seven days a week.”

Types of content fans crave:
o Scores
o Updates on fantasy teams (more on fantasy sports later)
o Highlight videos
o Streaming game video
o Stats on favorite teams
o League news
o Preview, review and analysis of games

Sports are a visual hobby, which makes video content extremely popular. “Video is one of the top reasons that users come to our site,” Herde says. “I’d say, primarily, they come to our site for information about their favorite teams, and scores, and to play fantasy [sports]. After those things, I think video is a top draw.”

Sponsorships are a popular way to get in front of a sports audience without disrupting content consumption. Special event coverage, weekly updates, and tools for fantasy sports analysis are often sponsored. If you sponsor content, make sure your brand is prominent and is only one of a few brands mentioned. You do not want to have to fight for attention.

Insight #3: Sports fans love fantasy

Another reason fans go online is to interact. Writing comments, blogging and sharing content is popular, but fantasy sports trumps all other reasons for interacting – by a long shot.

Fantasy sports fans build teams of professional athletes to compete against one another. A fantasy team’s performance depends on how well each athlete performs in real games. Fans that organize teams are called “owners” and can cut, trade, and sign players at will.

Fantasy leagues for professional football, baseball, hockey, soccer, auto racing, and other sports prosper. There are free leagues and paid leagues across a range of sites. The most popular sites receive tens of millions of visitors each month. Almost 27 million adult Americans participate in fantasy sports, according to the Fantasy Sports Trade Association.

Fantasy sports offer a range of ways for fans to interact – from live chats during player drafts to messaging during the season.

Insight #4: Sports fans love technology

The marketers we interviewed deal with tech-savvy audiences. More than half of their fans are comfortable getting content through TVs, personal computers and mobile devices. Many have a high-quality television and multiple computers in their households.

CBS Sports.com launched their first mobile strategy about six years ago and have been refining it ever since, Herde says. Through testing, his team designed the CBS Sports WAP site (see creative samples below) to give fans what they want most at the top of the page.

From top to bottom, the fans want:
o Scores from various leagues
o Fantasy sports scores
o Headlines

“What we know, and what some of my colleagues at competitive sites have also confirmed, is that the top handsets for fans getting content are primarily smartphones. For us, it’s the iPhone and a couple of BlackBerry devices,” Herde says.

Tech-savvy fans get content three ways: television, computers and mobile devices. Each platform holds a special place in their habits, Herde says. (See research charts below)

During football season, CBS Sports sees the highest spike in visitors and viewers on Sundays, Herde says. “It’s very clear that the work week is the prime time for the desktop. The weekend is the prime time for the broadcast, and that’s also the prime time for mobile. Because people are at a bar, at a friend’s house, or basically away from their laptop, and they want to immediately get the scores and real time stats and updates. The pattern of those three platforms is consistent.”

Insight #5: Favorite teams matter

An overwhelming majority of sports fans have favorite teams. Your marketing campaigns will have a greater impact if they relate to favorite teams. You can determine fan allegiance during registration, or by making assumptions based on a site visitor’s browsing and purchasing history.

Do not be too quick to assume a site visitor’s fan allegiance is based on their location (determined through an IP address). Many fans love their hometown teams, even though they now live in a different region. Other fans jump on a team’s bandwagon – they like a team that’s winning, regardless of region.

Displaced fans are prime targets for the NHL’s live streaming games, Cooper says. “You communicate to a displaced fan very differently than how you communicate to a new market fan. The displaced fan is highly attractive. They don’t have access to their favorite team,” Cooper says.

Cooper has the most success when considering team affiliation, along with the rest of his audience’s data points. He has found that standards, such as number of purchases, lifetime value, time of last purchase, and demographics, are useful additions to team affiliation, when segmenting.

Insight #6: Events are critical

Sports are event-based hobbies. Every game and match can be considered an event, but some of the biggest ones include:
- Games between rivals
- Tournaments, playoffs, and any game where elimination for the season is possible
- Finals: the best of each league facing off to end the season

Sports fans live for big games. If you can incorporate major upcoming events into your marketing messages, you’re sure to capture more attention. Event-based marketing plans have to be well-timed and planned long before you know which teams are facing off in the big game.

Cooper uses a “heavily integrated” effort when ramping up for a major hockey event, he says. “We’re using every single touch point, every single channel we have to make sure that events like the Winter Classic, the Stanley Cup, the All-Star game, even the Race for the Cup…that it is a thread through all our media, all of our touch points, all that we own, or through all of our extended partnerships,” he says.

Some sports, such as football and hockey, have schedules that fit well into the winter holiday season (unlike baseball). That makes the holiday a great opportunity to market in some leagues. “Being able to really capitalize and invest strongly in the holidays is really important for us,” Cooper says.

Useful links related to this article:

CBS Sports Traffic Research and WAP Site: Creative Samples
http://www.marketingsherpa.com/cs/cbssports/study.html

Marketing Charts: Top 10 Sports Websites
http://www.marketingcharts.com/interactive/top-10-sport
-websites-october-2008-6947/?camp=newsletter&src=mc&type=thumbnail

Fantasy Sports Trade Association
http://www.fsta.org/

CBSSports.com
http://www.sportsline.com/

NHL.com
http://www.nhl.com/

Yahoo! Sports
http://sports.yahoo.com/

Friday Marketwatch - January 23

As of today, January 23 the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: 201
Sell-Through: 40.80%
Average starting price: $2.09
Average final price: $12.55

Highest Single Card Sale: Allen & Ginter Presidential Candidate Barack Obama, $167.50
Highest Mult-Card Sale: 2001 Baseball In-Hand Set, $490
Highest Graded Sale: 2003 LeBron James, BGS 9.5, $30.08
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: 2002 Tom Brady, $161.50
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: None

Other best sellers:

* 2001 Albert Pujols
* 2003 LeBron James
* 2004 Ben Roethlisberger
* Ted Williams Classic

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 2008 Allen & Ginter Presidential Candidates Barack Obama: 24 bids

What To Do With Your In-Hands?

We've joked on the etopps message board about using in-hand cards as beverage coasters on our coffee tables and other unorthodox ways of having them around the house but what about more practical uses in our day-to-day lives?

• If you know someone in your life who is a sports fan: your dentist, your UPS delivery person, your barber, give them an in-hand of the team they like.
• Give one to the kid up the street who you here is just starting to like your favorite local team and wants to collect anything he can get his hands on.
• Hand out in-hands in the children's ward of your local hospital.
  
• Give an in-hand of the one player your client loves to talk about when you talk about football.
• If your boss is a Dolphins fan, why not an 08 Chad Pennington on his birthday?
• What about the family that lost everything in a fire in your town or neighborhood? Their son is a big Carolina Panthers fan and you would make his day if you placed a Panthers team card in his hand.

My point is: sure you can make money online selling in-hands but what about connecting with others with in-hands?

As some in-hands are worth a few quarters and the shipping discount is underway, isn't the smile on someone's face worth more than the one bid at 99 cents you get running an auction?

Friday Marketwatch - January 16

As of today, January 16 the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: 251
Sell-Through: 39.04%
Average starting price: $5.50
Average final price: $13.37

Highest Single Card Sale: Allen & Ginter Presidential Candidate Barack Obama, $97
Highest Mult-Card Sale: 2007 Allen and Ginter Super Bowl Champs Set, $126.39
Highest Graded Sale: None
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: A&G SB Champs Terry Bradshaw, $149.99
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: None

Other best sellers:

* 2003 LeBron James
* 2001 Emmitt Smith
* 2003 Mark Teixeira
* 2008 Cole Hamels

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 2008 Allen & Ginter Presidential Candidates Barack Obama: 10 bids

47 Ways To Improve Etopps

1. Show a calendar on the home page. By moving your mouse over a day on the calendar that's in bold, a small window pops up, showing upcoming IPOs, autograph offerings, scheduled availability of in-hands, and fantasy baseball and football days.
2. Mark Sapir updates us via blog that has an RSS feed so you can subscribe rather than having to check the updates section each time you're on the etopps website.
3. Make the availability of the message board more prominent than a text link at the top of the home page.
4. Offer a vote before each baseball season to determine which veterans will be IPO'd
   
5. Offer a vote before each football season to determine which veterans will be IPO'd.
6. Secure hockey availability when Upper Deck's contract runs out (next year).
7. Have a blog for IT updates by the Topps IT guy and for feedback by the community for what works and what doesn't when new features are introduced to the website.
8. Provide a myspace.com widget, giving members the option of providing a slideshow of thumbnail pics of etopps cards from their portfolios or any cards they want to include for this feature.
9. Same for facebook.
   
10. Give the tradepost more flexibility. Currently a trade can only be one card you want for x number of cards you're willing to trade (up to 5 different) or in the ratio of 1:x. Why can't we have x:x or x:1?
11. Have a dedicated etopps shop that sells products with the etopps logo on it (a la cafe press or zazzle) and offer t-shirts, baseball caps, jerseys, magnets, keychains, mouse pads, coffe mugs, buttons and patches. Members can purchase either with their credit card or for reward points. Since these products are really free advertising for etopps, offer these products discounted or offer free shipping.
12. Offer in-hand baggies in the etopps shop.
13. Post an etopps policy about their role if an etopps member wants to sell etopps in-hands at a card show regarding promotion, recruiting new member incentive, etc.
    
14. Expand the tradepost to be able to trade items from the etopps shop for cards and/or reward points.
15. Be able to use reward points for purchases on the Topps website store.
    
16. Analysis of each allocation like woot.com's stats for each order. Show where purchases were made, how fast, which days of the week the orders were placed, who was the first, who was the last by username or other fun ways to see our ordering behavior.
17. For IPOs, have a raffle based on order number. In the email that informs you how many you were allocated, you'll also receive a four digit number. After each allocation, announce on the blog which order number was selected at random for an extra card. It will be up to the member to claim based on their order number and four digit number that will have to match.
18. Have a contest for each IPO season's design. Use a website or software program we can download and be able to design based on templates for poses, backgrounds, location for player's name, colors and where to place the etopps logo. Winning design gets reward points or gift certicate for the etopps store.
19. Create a video to promote each upcoming IPO season's design with kudos to the winning designer in the video that appears on youtube, the home page and the Topps home page.
20. Create a video to show how the etopps allocation works and show highlights of past econs, Nationals and include pics of cards from each sport to appear as a link on the home page in big letter banner.
21. Have a temporary blog that outlines the progress of each econ as it gets prepared
    
22. Get a new tag line for the home page. Are you fan enough? needs to be updated.
23. Have moderators (2-3) who use the message board and decide which posts should be nuked.
24. On every post that shows up on the message board, provide an link to report abuse to the moderators.
25. On the home page, provide a video of the etopps storage warehouse for what occurs between receiving an order and shipment.
26. Fix the online damaged card return request feature.
27. Include a free etopps card stand with the purchase of an etopps autograph.
28. Include a photo of athlete signing his etopps cards (on the home page) along with a signed etopps card scan whenever an autograph is offered.
29. Offer photo of athlete signing etopps card with COA in the mailing of the etopps card.
30. Have an etopps raffle in which the winner gets to have an online meet & greet with the athlete at the time of the signing of his etopps cards.
    
31. Provide buying stats (like on woot.com) after an autograph offering after it sells out.
    
32. After each season's IPO, have a vote for which veterans to be autographed for the following season.
    
33. Coordinate promoting each new speciality set (such as the Allen and Ginter Super Bowl Champs series 2) on Beckett's website in a video interview with Mark and a representative from Beckett.
34. Offer a limited-time grading discount for etopps cards on at least a yearly or semi-annual basis.
35. Same offer for PSA including a discount on yearly membership.
36. Launch a kids version of etopps in which the cards are only available in-port. Redemption code scratch-off cards are inserted in certain sets of Topps cardboard products and after registering, kids can "claim" up to 3 cards from a set of X cards. They are not randomly allocated these three cards but instead they can scroll through the list to see what's available, giving them the incentive to collect the entire set and give a prize (like with the fantasy games) for collecting the entire set.
    
37. Introduce a non-sports set that has a huge following like Star Wars.
38. Etopps starts using Twitter to promote the website by announcing IPOs and any other updates.
39. Provide a sitemap on the website to make it easier to find what you're looking for.
40. Add a Welcome section on the message board for new members.
41. Add a FAQ thread that's locked and only updated by the moderator in the Welcome section before newbie questions are posted over and over and over again.
42. Offer a customer service phone number to members for the in-hand storage warehouse.
43. Offer a Q & A for the design team for etopps
44. Post a video that shows the high quality standards of what goes into etopps in-hand cards.
45. Start using SEO (Search Engine Optimization) on Google.
46. Remove the emoticons on the message board and replace it with a signature section so we can include member ids for social media websites, ebay, or other message board ids.
    
47. Show this list to Michael Eisner :)
    

Etopps Offers Discounted Shipping

If you sell in-hands take advantage of this to reduce your overhead:

Exciting Shipping Announcement from eTopps!

Announcement: Special Discounted Shipping Offer!

eTopps is offering special discounted shipping rates from January 19^th, 2009 through February 9^th, 2009!

During this three-week period, users can request shipping for a maximum of 300 cards per port. See below for reduced shipping rates.

Cards	Regular	Special Rate	% Savings
15	$18.95	$13.99	26%
50	$49.45	$35.99	27%
100	$91.95	$64.99	29%
200	$176.95	$129.99	27%
300	$261.95	$189.99	27%

* Continental US and Canada only; additional fees apply for shipments to Canada.
** We apologize, but points cannot be used for this shipping offer.

NOTE: This offer applies to shipping requests. Your deliveries are subject to regular shipping schedules.

We look forward to seeing you on eTopps through 2009 and into 2010, and we hope you take advantage of what we have to offer you! As always, please do not hesitate to contact us at 'support@etopps.com' if you ever have any questions regarding our service.

Thank you once again for your continued support of eTopps!

Sincerely,

The eTopps Team
http://www.etopps.com/

Autograph Offering: Allen & Ginter SB Champ Tom Brady

It's Allen and Ginter week on the etopps website between this week's IPOs and this autograph offering of Tom Brady.

I think etopps did a better job at offering fewer and for less money than previous offerings from this set. Though the offering would have been sweeter if etopps was asking $99 rather than a penny less than $140.

This etopps in-hand seller has the once bitten twice shy attitude about this card. If I can't sell the Allen & Ginter Joe Montana autograph at cost on a 7 day auction, how am I expected to do more than cost on Tom Brady who's been out for the current season?

I don't think people are that willing to open their wallets to pay more than what etopps is asking. Maybe there are a lot of Tom Brady followers out there and we know from the quick sell-out of Wes Welker that there are a lot of Pats fans who buy etopps cards but at $140 this auto would be more of a hold that a sell considering the economy. Hold until the start of next season to see that Brady is back and see if his other cards are selling better. You can hope that the economy will turn a corner by then since the hobby has taken a beating this last quarter.

Joe Torre Signing, Friday Marketwatch - January 9

Earlier today, etopps announced the following:

Due to popular demand we are excited to announce that we will continue the Allen & Ginter Super Bowl Champions collection in ’09! The first six cards were launched in ’08 and have created much demand and excitement in the marketplace and we expect this years additions will perform equally as well. Although Allen & Ginter has been traditionally limited to baseball releases, this series allows collectors to experience the beauty of Allen & Ginter with top NFL Superstars and now coaches as well! To celebrate the Super Bowl we will begin offering cards from this collection on Monday, January 19th at 1PM EST and continue offering additional cards on Monday, January 26th. The collection will include NFL Super Bowl greats including Brett Favre, Peyton Manning, Tom Landry, Emmitt Smith, Jerry Rice, Tony Dorsett and Walter Payton.
Similar to last years cards the collection will be beautifully presented and delivered via the classic Allen & Ginter design (even staying true to the original Allen & Ginter size), but brought to life on stunning eTopps technology. Cards will be offered individually, encased and be sequentially numbered* . *While the Allen & Ginter eTopps cards differ in size from regular eTopps cards, they will continue to be encased in our standard sized eTopps tamper-evident, plastic case with eTopps sticker. The cards will be placed into a fitted frame and then fixed inside of the case. Be sure to visit eTopps on Monday, January 19th! Cards go on sale at 1PM EST and be sure to come back on Monday the 26th for additional cards.
As always, please feel free to contact our Customer Service team at 'support@etopps.com' if you ever have any questions, comments or suggestions. A customer service representative will be available to assist you between the hours of 9:00am - 4:30pm (ET), Monday through Friday. Thank you once again for your continued support of eTopps! Sincerely, The eTopps Team http://www.etopps.com/

My only question is: will the discounted shipping be available?

* * *

If you live around the northern New Jersey area, Joe Torre will be signing his new book at the Yogi Berra museum.

The signing will occur on Tuesday, February 3rd from 7:00 PM - 8:00 PM

$40 includes the book, tax and the autograph. Joe will only be signing copies of the book. No inscriptions and no photography will be allowed due to time constraints.

Pre-Orders are recommended. Call 973-655-2378 to place your order or visit www.yogiberramuseum.org

***

As of today, January 9 the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: 184
Sell-Through: 54.89%
Average starting price: $3.41
Average final price: $9.65

Highest Single Card Sale: Allen & Ginter Presidential Candidate Barack Obama, $119.99
Highest Mult-Card Sale: 2007 Allen and Ginter Presidents Set, $119.99
Highest Graded Sale: 2001 Albert Pujols, BGS 9.5, $99.99
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: 2006 Bo Jackson Classic Football, $140
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: None

Other best sellers:

* 2001 Albert Pujols
* Classic Baseball Mickey Mantle
* 2005 Barry Bonds Classic Baseball Event
* 2004 Ben Roethlisberger

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 50 Card Etopps In-Hand Lot: 22 bids

Wanted: Etopps 2.0

In August, I posted about introducing web 2.0 to etopps which you can read here. After posting this, I emailed Mark at etopps and he said etopps would look into this after the Cardtarget project. Now that this project is complete I thought it would be worth revisiting (read getting back onto my soapbox) this topic.

I'll be emailing Mark to inquire if this can happen. And if it does, what is a realistic timeline.

Autograph Offering: Wes Welker

Etopps first autograph offering of 2009 and for the fiscal quarter is Wes Welker this Thursday (1/7): 50 total at $29.99 each.

This offering is about as exciting as a glass of milk. Because Welker had a good post-season last year for a rookie, does he really deserve to be autographed and offered to us? Is Welker the last of the scrap pile from last year to be offered since the 08 football in-hands haven't arrived yet to be signed by Matt Ryan and Joe Flacco? Will etopps/topps get to sign "Matty Ice" before Upper Deck swoops down to claim his signature as their property?

Rather than offer any more sophomore-slumping rookies from last year, give us a big list of football players who haven't been offered that UD doesn't have first dibs on and let us vote on who we want, pick the top 5-8 vote-getters for next season and include the (much) better rookies from this season. This way everyone is happy, saved their money for another week. Isn't this worth the $1500 etopps makes from this autograph If it sells out?

Friday Marketwatch - January 2

If you haven't seen my new website, please visit simplysuperheroes.com, dedicated to superhero merchandise for children.

* * *

As of today, January 2 the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: 340
Sell-Through: 37.94%
Average starting price: $1.38
Average final price: $9.84

Highest Single Card Sale: 2001 Albert Pujols, $54.99
Highest Mult-Card Sale: 2008 Allen and Ginter Yankee Stadium Tribute Set, $93
Highest Graded Sale: 2003 LeBron James, BGS 9.5, $39.05
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: 2007 Joba Chamberlain, $169.95
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: None

Other best sellers:

* 2008 Jay Bruce
* 2008 Allen & Ginter Yankee Stadium Tribute Pope Benedict
* 2006 Reggie Bush
* 2003 Classic Football Eric Dickerson

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 2003 Classic Football Eric Dickerson and Cards That Never Were Set: 10 bids