136: 5 Things Missing From Most Auction Proposals

I hate taking auctioneer’s misdirected money. I typically don’t up-sell. In fact, my clients will tell you that I often advise against extraneous media. That said, I regularly accept paychecks to build ineffective proposals. It’s true. Sure, they will represent aesthetic upgrades from their old materials; but the final product doesn’t always have my confidence

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135: The Magic Formula for More Efficient Advertising

You can have hundreds of people click to your website from your email blast or thousands from social media. If the only people who show up at your auction are the ones who saw the sign, though, that traffic is empty. If your YouTube video went viral or your phones have been ringing off the hook from a press release that’s hit all of the local news, but most of your bidders all brought your direct mail piece to the auction, then the buzz didn’t bring you buyers.

134: The Other Way to Get More Sellers: Convert the Unbelievers

The hardest part, though, is making changes in our company culture, business practices, and auction terms to remedy those stigmas and barriers. You might lose some of your faithful. You will definitely lose time and money—at least in the beginning. You might be criticized by your peers. At the same time, you might build an organization that becomes a model that others study for their own growth strategies.

133: An Advertising Lesson from a Dead Skydiver

The auction industry has a similar stigma to that of the sport of parachuting. Both are seen as risky business to the uninitiated and inexperienced.

132: 4 Common Mistakes of In-house Mailing Lists

I’ve bumped into multiple auction companies that tout their decades-old prospect list or the quantity of people on their in-house list. It’s an odd boast, since those lists are filled with budget-sucking ghosts. The age of a list isn’t inherently bad, but it can contribute to the following four issues most auctioneers face with their in-house database.

131: An Advertising Lesson from a Vegas Pothead

I’m not trying to make the case that auctioneers should use repurposed cardboard to promote their auctions and their businesses. It’s just that we would all benefit from more succinct, more candid, and more restrained advertising media.

130: 5 Rules for Celebrity Spokespeople

No small business can afford this level of celebrity endorsement, but many use this marketing approach at a much smaller scale. Regardless of the number of zeroes in the deal, the same rules of engagement apply. These five celebrity criteria should be true, if you want endorsement deals to work for your brand.