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Park your garage sales on the Internet
By: Donald Lee
You have been planning your garage sale for weeks now.
Your garage, as well as you whole home, is stuffed with
old records, books, clothing, vacuum sweepers, and other
odds and ends that you have no use for anymore. Instead
of just tossing your clutter into the neighborhood
landfill, you’ve decided to hold one of the most
time-honored traditions in civilization—the
garage (or yard) sale. It can be a thankless task,
becoming a pawnbroker for a day, but there’s definitely
good money in it—if you know how and, more importantly,
where to organize your garage sale.
First, of course, you need to get your sales items
together. Garage sales are a great way to recycle stuff
that you no longer have room for. You’d be surprised
what doodads and miscellany your neighbors will want—musty
books, old silver wear, framed photos of long-lost third
cousins, and other unmentionables that you’ve had no use
for since who knows when. Even more surprising, your
neighbors are willing to shell out cold hard cash for
these items. That makes your garage sale a win-win
proposition for you.
Come to think of it, though, a garage sale at your home
can be a real chore. It takes a Herculean effort to collect
and organize every last little thing you want to sell.
Then you have to tag each item and keep track of it in
a hardcopy log. To ensure that your neighbors show up
with cash in hand, you must create, print up, and pay for
flyers, which need to be distributed on telephone poles
and supermarket message boards across the region.
The work can seem endless and your chances of making a
profit slim.
Don’t get me wrong. Your garage sale was a great idea,
but as you can see, there are many limitations to holding
one at your house the old-fashioned way. Get with the
times. The garage sale has evolved thanks to the multitude
of Web sites that allow you to sell your goods online.
People are selling more stuff than ever on the Internet
because of the convenience of Web classified sites.
The Internet holds several crucial advantages over selling
your stuff the outdated way. When you compare these
benefits to the problems with home-based garage sales,
you’ll see the difference:
ONLINE: Your items are available for purchase for an
unlimited time, until they sell.
AT HOME: Your items are available until you call it quits
for the night.
ONLINE: Rain, sleet, or snow, your sales aren’t affected
in the least.
AT HOME: Better have a rain date or a very big umbrella.
ONLINE: No need to constantly watch over your goods or
interact with uninterested customers. Just wait until a
customer contacts you by e-mail when they are ready to
purchase.
AT HOME: Be prepared for countless hours of staring
down the street for customers to appear. When they do
arrive, be prepared for too many questions but too few
purchases.
ONLINE: Advertise for free to your friends and
neighbors over e-mail.
AT HOME: Shell out money for flyers, after which you
can get to know all of the telephone poles in your
neighborhood.
ONLINE: Spend your weekends the way they were meant to be:
relaxing and enjoying your time with friends and family.
AT HOME: Spend your weekend waking up early, buying and
distributing flyers, lugging boxes, and waiting for
customers.
As you can see, it’s not an even match. An online garage
sale wins hands down.
Now that you’re actually excited to get started with your
garage sale, you should know that there is one caveat.
As easy as it may seem, your online garage sale will be
even easier if you choose the right classified site.
Your best bet is to do your research and find classified
sites with the most features and benefits, such as
(1) No sign-up, registration, or transaction fees.
(2) Free ad listing with text description and pictures.
(3) Long-term ad posting and free renewals.
(4) Easy, accurate, electronic, and automatic record
keeping.
The best classified sites have these incredible features
and then some. Not only will you be able to clean out your
home’s clutter with the help of these classified sites.
Your garage sale will also park a profit in your pocket.
About the Author
Donald Lee is the public relationship manager for Buysellcommunity.com.Buysellcommunity provides free classified listing services for individuals and businesses to market their products and services online.
For global and localized classifieds,
visit
http://www.buysellcommunity.com
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