Book Links

As Seen On The Internet 9-20-07

Posted by hughlh

Fellow blogger and all around good guy Steve has a post on his blog from his wife, Christine who is an online bookseller. She sells new and remaindered books but is on track to gross $120,000 this year. The post has some great pictures of her workspace and shipping area ( I love seeing other peoples work space!). She blogged about her business before and promises to again. If you would, leave a comment or two over there so she knows we want more articles like this.

On my newest blog, Small Business Owner Insights, I talk about a free site to compare shipping options and print postage.

My favorite blogger Wendy at eMomsatHome has added a new blog to her portfolio about eBay selling for work at home Moms and Dads. It is authored by Megan Jordan of Velveteen Mind fame. I highly recommend you subscribe.

Over on The Politically Incorrect Entrepreneur, I am writing an ongoing series about how traditional businesses can use eBay… might be worth a look.

Also, a note of thanks to all of you who subscribe to book-links; as you can see from the little button on the right, we are hovering just under 100 subscribers. You can subscribe by email (just put your email address in that form and hit subscribe me and follow the directions) or by RSS. I would really like us to break 100 soon..

Book Hunter’s Holiday Sacramento Book Fair Report

Posted by hughlh

The awesome and exuberant Chris Lowenstein “did” her first fair over the wekend and she tells you all about it with two posts on her blog; First with a colorful metaphor and then with brilliant pictures of her very impressive booth.

Go over to her blog and say hi. It is hard to believe she has been at this less than a year. I remember her tenative questions on my old blog. It does me good to see I did not scare her off!

I tell you, if she does not burn herself out, we will hear big things from this lady.

Handy Tool Helps You Find Offline Auctions

Posted by hughlh

Buying at auctions has consistently been one of my better sources. There are several reasons for this, among them a big one is lack of competition. In a thrift store, say, you are competing against not only all the other dealers who stop by, but also the general public, the lady who puts the books out and who knows who else. At most traditional auctions, you might have 3-4 people who are interested in the same lot you are (at most), you usually can get a list of the items in advance so you can do your research in advance and you can schedule your buying time in advance and know the “good books” will not sell before you get there.

One problem with most traditional houses (barring the biggies like Swanns and Pacific Book Auctions) is finding out about them. Some of the better ones are almost in-house secrets.

Enter Auction Zip. Just enter your zip code, drill down through some parameters and you are set. You can even have them send you updates based on the criteria you select. Oh; and it is FREE (free is good).

Baltimore Antique Show - A Collector’s Report

Posted by hughlh

Jed Birmingham, a Burroughs collector of some note, gave a stirring write up on his blog of the Baltimore Antique Show. He mentioned several booksellers of note, including Between The Covers, Lux Mentis and Royal Books.

He goes into tremendous detail and waxes so nicely about Ian at Lux Mentis, you would swear he is being paid.
Thanks to Ian for pointing it out.

Root Out Bad Feedback on eBay

Posted by hughlh

If you are buying from (or selling to) someone on eBay with tons of feedback, there is no easy system in place to only see the negative feedback. If someone has 500 feedback but 10 negatives, I want to see what those negatives were. If they have trouble shipping in a timely manner, if they pack everything in a shopping bag, if they are going to ship me my book in a Count Chocula cereal box, I want to know about it.

That is why I use the feedback tool at Toolhaus. If you enter the seller ID of the eBayer in question, they will root out the bad feedback and put it all in one place, saving you from scrolling through pages and pages.

Basic HTML For eBay and Other Places

Posted by hughlh

If you sell on eBay, have your own website or just want to post in your favorite web forum, it helps to know some HTML.

Most of what I know about HTML, I learned by cutting and pasting. Here is a good list of cut and paste HTML tags.

If you want to write your own, here is a practice board where you can try your code.

If, however, you are too lazy or just can’t be bothered, you can always use this online HTML editor to write your own code.

How Much Does PayPal Cost?

Posted by hughlh

A while back I wrote about a very simple tool that would allow you to determine the cost of doing business on eBay. I thought at the time (and still do) that it is a neat tool; the problem comes up when I just need to figure out my PayPal fees.

To just determine your PayPal fees, there is this nifty tool. I like it especially because If I want you to receive $50, say, it is nice to know that I should send you $51.80 for you to net $50 after fees.