Yes it's that time of year again. People often use the new
year as a basis for setting resolutions such as go to the
gym more, lose weight, quit smoking etc. As an eBay ebook
seller I find it very useful to use the new year as a time
to reflect on my progress during the past year, see if I
achieved all my targets and then set new targets for the
year ahead.
So looking back at last year's article I set myself the
following targets:
- TO INCREASE THE SIZE OF MY EBAY STORE AND TO KEEP TO MY
TARGET OF UPDATING MY EBAY STORE AT LEAST ONCE A MONTH:-
50/50 on this one. I did increase the size of my eBay store
but I haven't updated it every month.
- TO INCREASE THE NUMBER OF SUBSCRIBERS ON MY MAILING LIST
BY AT LEAST 350 SUBSCRIBERS:- I didn't get an additional
350 subscribers but I came close.
- TO CREATE AT LEAST THREE MORE PREMIUM EBOOKS AND SELL
THEM VIA EBAY AND MY WEBSITES:- No progress here. I still
just have one premium product.
- TO INCREASE MY MONTHLY AFFILIATE EARNINGS:- Yes I have
increased my affiliate earnings, largely through increased
adsense earnings
- TO CREATE FURTHER RESELLABLE PRODUCTS TO PROMOTE MY EBAY
STORE, WEBSITE AND PRODUCTS:- Yes again I have created
further resellable ebooks although the majority of these
are to promote a new website of mine.
- TO BEGIN A GOOGLE ADWORDS CAMPAIGH FOR HOW TO SET UP A
SUCCESSFUL, AUTOMATED EBOOK BUSINESS ON EBAY:- Yes I did
experiment with Adwords using the advice in Perry
Marshall's Guide to Google Adwords but I found it was
costing me a lot more than it was making me. Maybe I need
to experiment more but at the moment I don't have the funds
to carry on.
So in summary I didn't achieve everything I wanted to but I
did achieve a good few of my targets. This is partially
down to me not putting in the neccessary effort and
partially because my targets changed during the year. As
the year has gone on I've found that eBay has become
increasingly competitive. As a result my returns from eBay
have been declining. I decided that if I was going to be
successful online I couldn't rely solely on eBay and eBay
related products. I needed to diversify.
In October I started a brand new website, blog and
newsletter in a completely unrelated niche. Since then a
lot of my efforts have been focussed on setting this up and
generating traffic. I'm not going to reveal the website or
blog address in this article because I want to see if I can
make it successful without using my existing subscriber
base. However, as you can see part of the reason I didn't
achieve all my targets is because my focus changed. A year
is a long time and in that time it is likely that your
goals will change whether it be a marginal change or a
signficant change. I'm still going to continue with this
newsletter and keep adding to my eBay store but it is not
going to be my sole priority online. Overall, I'm pleased
with my progress during the year. The only thing I'm
dissapointed with is that I didn't get more premium
products out there.
So now that I've measured my progress I need to outline my
targets for the year ahead. Since I now have a new website,
blog and newsletter my targets will take these into account:
- TO INCREASE THE SIZE OF MY EBAY STORE AND UPDATE IT AT
LEAST ONCE A MONTH:- Even though eBay isn't going to be my
only focus over the next year I do not want to neglect it.
The best way to do this is through regular updates.
- TO INCREASE THE NUMBER OF SUBSCRIBERS ON BOTH MY MAILING
LISTS:- I still want to increase the size of this
newsletter. However, I also want to increase the size of my
new mailing list too.
- TO CREATE AND SELL MORE PREMIUM PRODUCTS:- I really want
to get some more premium products out there. In particular
there are plenty of opportunities for the creation of
premium products for visitors to my new website, blog and
newsletter.
- TO INCREASE MY MONTHLY AFFILIATE EARNINGS:- I have
already increased my adsense earnings in the last few
months as a result of my new blog. I want to continue to
increase my adsense earnings during the coming year and
also increase my earnings from other affiliate programs. My
new website, blog and newsletter provide a lot of affiliate
opportunities so this is a big one for me.
- TO CREATE FURTHER RESELLABLE EBOOKS TO PROMOTE MY VARIOUS
WEBSITES:- I already have resellable ebooks out there to
promote my eBay store and related websites, plus a few
resellable ebooks out there to promote the new website,
blog and newsletter. In the coming year I want to create
even more.
- TO IMPROVE MY ARTICLE MARKETING EFFORTS:- In the last few
months (pretty much since the creation of my new blog,
website and newsletter) I have spent a lot of time reading
up on article marketing. In particular I've been looking to
improve the title of my articles and improve my resource
boxes. Since I've done this I've really noticed an
improvement in the traffic my articles have been
generating. In the coming year I plan to improve my article
marketing further and generate even more traffic.
- TO FOCUS ON SOCIAL BOOKMARKING:- I'd heard of social
bookmarking before but never really tried it until a few
weeks ago. Social bookmarking sites are basically sites you
can submit your webpages, articles or blogs too. In
particular they're very useful for submitting blog posts.
Once you have submitted to a social bookmarking site other
people will see the post and if they like it they can vote
on it. If your post proves popular you can get a large
amount of traffic from these sites. I've posted a some of
my blog posts from the new blog to various social
bookmarking sites and really noticed the increase in
traffic. My aim for the new year is to submit all my posts
from all my blogs to the social bookmarking sites.
- TO SETUP SOME SQUIDOO LENSES:- Squidoo is another thing I
hadn't tried until a few weeks ago. Squidoo lenses are
similar to blogs and have the potential to generate huge
amounts of traffic. I plan to set up a squidoo lens for my
eBay ebook store and newsletter plus one for my new blog,
website and newsletter.
- TO UPDATE ALL MY BLOGS REGULARLY:- I have been keeping my
new blog up to date but I have been neglecting this blog
and The Ebook Cavern Reviews Blog. Therefore, I want to
maintain the standard I have set with my new blog try to
update my other blogs more regularly.
- TO GET THIS NEWSLETTER OUT ON TIME EVERY MONTH:- As
regular subscribers to this newsletter will know I have had
problems getting this newsletter out on time. However, with
better organisation I know that I can get it out on time
every month and that's my intention for the coming year.
So there you have it. Quite a lot to keep me going for
2008. But what's the relevance to you? If you haven't set
targets for your online business in the past nows the time
to start. Think about what you have achieved online in the
last year. What are you happy with? Where do you think you
need to improve? Then use this as a basis for creating some
of your own targets for 2008.
Another key point to take from this article is that the
Internet is constantly evolving which means your targets
are likely to change during the year. If you don't revise
them accordingly you will get left behind? When I started
my eBay store I never thought that I would be running a
newsletter or blog and I had never heard of article
marketing or social bookmarking. I never thought that I
would be diversifying from my eBay related business either
but that's exactly what's happened. To be a long term
success on the Internet you will have to keep up to date
with these changes and set your targets accordingly.
The third thing you should take from this article is that
it does not matter if you don't achieve all your targets.
By setting yourself targets and trying to achieve them you
are doing more than most by taking action. Even though you
may not achieve all your targets you will make progress
during the year and ultimately that is what you want.
So what have you achieved in 2007? What are you going to
achieve in 2008? If you don't take the time to reflect you
are unlikely to achieve your goals. Write down what you
want from the coming year and 2008 could well prove
prosperous for you.
----------------------------------------------------
Tom Parker is an eBay Ebook PowerSeller who has been
selling ebooks and software on eBay for a number of years.
He trades under the eBay ID: EbookCavern and has an eBay
store at: http://stores.ebay.co.uk/theebookcavern . If you
want to learn Tom's top eBay ebook tips sign up for The
Ebook Cavern Newsletter at:
http://newsletter.theebookcavern.co.uk/
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