Friday, March 27, 2009

Friday Marketwatch - March 27

As of today, March 20 the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: 190
Sell-Through: 43.68%
Average starting price: $2.81
Average final price: $7.09

Highest Single Card Sale: 2008 Joe Flacco, $13.79
Highest Mult-Card Sale: None
Highest Graded Sale: (tie) 2001 Albert Pujols BGS 9.5 & 2003 Dwyane Wade BGS 9.5: $125
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: 2003 Classic Baseball Johnny Bench, $110
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: 2003 Classic Football Troy Aikman PSA Auto, $135

Other best sellers:

* 2004 Pittsburgh Steelers
* 2008 Ken Griffey Jr.
* 2007 Brady Quinn
* 2008 Jeff Clement

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 2005 Classic Football Herschel Walker - 6 bids

Friday, March 20, 2009

Friday Marketwatch - March 20

As of today, March 20 the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: data not available
Sell-Through: data not available
Average starting price: data not available
Average final price: data not available

Highest Single Card Sale: Allen & Ginter Barack Obama, $91.88
Highest Mult-Card Sale: Mickey Mantle Set, $400
Highest Graded Sale: 2005 Chris Paul BGS 9.5, $49.95
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: 2007 Allen & Ginter Terry Bradshaw, $149.95
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: None

Other best sellers:

* 2001 Albert Pujols
* 2003 LeBron James
* 2008 Allen & Ginter Babe Ruth
* 2001 Ken Griffey Jr.

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 2008 Allen & Ginter Barack Obama - 15 bids

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

The Dilemma of Etopps In-Hands

When you sell etopps in-hands, it is only a matter of time until you will have to make a choice about two directions you can take.

The first one is about being the middle-man between etopps and your customers. You market yourself as an in-hand dealer. Anything online with etopps is about making the sale whether on ebay or another site where you can sell your in-hands. Off-line you do the same at card shows and/or elsewhere.

The second direction you can take is less about selling in-hands and more about being a guide about etopps. You are the go-to person to explain how the online platform works and how the etopps online cards become accessible as in-hands. You make reference to the etopps website and all that it offers - the IPOs, the rewards points and rewards catalog, cardtarget, the autograph offerings, the trade post, the fantasy games, etc. You are a teacher and a mentor and you earn credibility and trust.

Here lies the problem: the more you take the second direction, the more you will lose potential customers for your in-hand business. Once they "get it" they won't need you anymore.

But the more you take the first direction, the more you depend on the customer's shrinking ignorance. You are not telling your customers about how and when to take their online etopps cards delivered at a discount or for free with reward points. You are not trying to teach them how you are getting your inventory the way you do because essentially you're conveying to them you can do this too.

Sometimes it's better to hold some of your cards than to let the buyer see all that you're holding.

Through experience you will have to decide how much you will be telling your customers about etopps. It's just a matter of time before they want to know how the online platform works. It's up to you to decide how much you will tell them.

During card shows we would get this question asked as often as once every hour. And each time we would spend a considerable amount of time telling them about the different aspects of etopps. They'd stand there in front of our table and listen, arms folded. When we were done, more times than not they would thank us and walk away without buying a card from us. We also noticed that those who bought from us didn't really care about how the online program worked. They just wanted to know how much the card cost that they wanted to buy.

Sometimes it's a simple as this: you will have buyers who don't trust ebay or the internet for buying, who will want to see the cards in their hands before they buy them, who go to a hobby store as much for socializing as for buying.

While this is fine, these buyers are shrinking in size. The hobby, in a nutshell, has never been the same for card store owners since ebay started more than 10 years ago. More and more people are going online to do more than just use google to search or buy something cheaper than at a brick & mortar store (ie, web 1.0). These same old-school buyers are becoming more savy online and are less willing to spend than they did before our current economic crisis.

So how will you be an info-guru about etopps while selling these cards in-hand?

Friday, March 13, 2009

Friday Marketwatch - March 13

As of today, March 13 the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: 202
Sell-Through: 41.58%
Average starting price: $2.47
Average final price: $8.66

Highest Single Card Sale: Allen & Ginter Mickey Mantle, $29.99
Highest Mult-Card Sale: Allen & Ginter Presidents Set #35/999, $108.50
Highest Graded Sale: 2003 LeBron James BGS 9.5, $54.95
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: 2002 Willie Mays, $213.50
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: None

Other best sellers:

* 2008 Allen and Ginter Hillary Clinton
* 2007 Kevin Durant
* 2007 LeBron James
* 2005 LeBron James

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 2007 Ben Roethlisberger - 10 bids

Something About Myself

I posted this on my website blog about what happened to me in the summer of 1972.

Monday, March 9, 2009

Outside The Ebay Box

There are a lot of etopps in-hand sellers. How do you stand out from the pack? Customers have a lot of choices. What is it about you/your brand that makes them want to buy from you instead of them?

  • Make a video for each year/sport
  • Join sports collectibles discussion groups online
  • Form a meet-up group to trade in-hands in your area
  • Become an expert on etopps cards. Strive to be the go-to guy on the internet for etopps in-hands.
  • Sell your etopps cards off ebay…like Amazon.
  • Research a niche that incorporates etopps cards (team, sport, collectibles, player, year, encased cards)
  • Have a contest to give away etopps cards. Idea: give away an etopps card in your town/city to the first person that has the same first name or last name as the player you’re giving away. Make the announcement each week (make sure it’s the day/time is consistent each week to help make it more viral)
  • Show off/sell your etopps in-hands at your local street fair/festival
  • Knock your customer’s socks off with customer service skills
  • Create a business page on facebook
  • Create a page on myspace and friend everyone in the sports/sports collectible industry on myspace and keep them informed of everything pertaining to you and etopps
  • Post interesting tidbits about etopps on twitter.
  • Have athletes sign your cards. If they say anything complimentary about their etopps card, ask to quote them on your website.
  • Offer free shipping on single cards
  • If you have web design skills/software, create new etopps designs and send them to Mark. Have your customers vote on which ones they like the most.
  • Offer discounts on multiple card orders
  • Idea: Get permission from Mark on this – using zazzle or cafĂ© press, place the etopps image of your favorite or best-selling card on a t-shirt, (even cooler back of the card on the back of the shirt). If the player is active, go to a game that the player is in to promote it…don’t forget business cards if you do this.
There are a lot of things you can try. You may fail but don't let that discourage you. Just try something else from this list or come up with something on your own. Share it here if it works.

Saturday, March 7, 2009

Friday Marketwatch - March 6

As of today, March 6 the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: 159
Sell-Through: 60.38%
Average starting price: $3.11
Average final price: $8.42

Highest Single Card Sale: 2001 Albert Pujols, $36.89
Highest Mult-Card Sale: 2006 Mickey Mantle Set #001/999, $510.10
Highest Graded Sale: 2001 Albert Pujols BGS 9.5, $73.99
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: 2007 Cameron Maybin /100, $71.31
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: None

Other best sellers:

* 2008 Matt Ryan
* 2008 Allen & Ginter Mickey Mantle
* 2008 Allen & Ginter Babe Ruth
* 2008 Steve Slaton

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 2007-08 Kobe Bryant - 10 bids

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Recipe For A Cool Etopps Promo

1. Go to the etopps website and save a bunch of classic baseball etopps images into a folder on your PC. And include a few Baseball Classic Event images.

2. Find and download .wav or other audio files in the same folder for theme music and for broadcasts of great baseball moments that correspond to the images you saved, especially the Baseball Classic Event images.

3. Using your installed movie editing software (Windows I think it’s moviemaking and for Apple it’s Garage Band), make a movie that just shows each of the images you saved. Show the image for the duration of the audio file. No more than 15 seconds so you’ll likely want to extract the most relevant snippet of the corresponding audio file (i.e. “I Can’t Believe What I Just Saw” to go with the Kirk Gibson Baseball Classic Event image, “It Gets Behind The Bag” to go with the Mookie Wilson Baseball Classic Event card).

4. You can also just get a cool baseball song to play while all the images are shown to cover the duration of the song. You may have to go to itunes for this. Few songs to consider:
  • Centerfield by John Fogerty
  • Take Me Out To The Ballgame
  • Fanfare for the Common Man
  • Music from the Ken Burns Baseball documentary soundtrack
  • A cool instrumental or instrumental part of a song (my favorite sports-related instrumental is the opening theme to America’s Game from NFL Network)
5. Once the movie is complete. Post it on youtube and make sure to include tags such as baseball, topps, etopps, opening day.

6. Post what you've done on the etopps message board.