John and Denise are the owners of Sarge & Red's Hobbies and Games. John "Sarge" is a Marine Corps veteran and his wife Dee "Red" began their store to with donated items to raise funds for an adoption. They have been buying and selling on eBay ever since.

• John started to sell on eBay with a duffle bag full of cards as donations from friends. The cards are still in boxes and are in good condition.
• This is at the time when John's parents were raising funds for the adoption of his son. His friends helped too. Instead of cash, they donated magic cards.
• John remembered too well the magic cards. He used to play it back in his junior high school. But, he sold his collection to a guy in the Marine Corps.
• He checked the prices of the cards to see what they are going for. Much to his dismay, some of the cards that were valuable when he was a kid are no longer valuable now. A $20 card then is only worth 20 cents now. He started to list it on eBay.
• Since then, John was drawn to eBay. He has met some people. In fact, after this interview, he will meet with a gentleman to buy a collection from him.
• Most of his buyers are players, and there are sellers too. Some of John's items are collectible items. He sells more than magic cards. He also has hobby games and catalog cards. He has roughly a million and a half cards.
• He has a file cabinet for his cards. The cabinet looks like a library using Dewey decimal system.
• ***insert picture of the file cabinet***
• He sorts, breaks down, and alphabetize the cards by set. All the cards are in the different sets. The ones he has listed online are in the catalogs behind him (see inserted picture).
• Down in his basement, he has all the rest of the cards in white cardboard boxes by set, in color and alphabetized.
• When he got started, he did not know much about cards. But now, in most cards, he can tell if it is worth $2, $5, $10, or $100. He knows if the card is worth something.
• The price of cards fluctuates daily like that of a stock market. It is an MTG stock. MTG Stock has a stock market trigger price that goes up and down.
• Considering the MTG stock, John does not list every single card he has. He first monitors the prices of the cards and sets the price accordingly.
• If the price goes up and one buys 300 pieces for a lower price, John will run out of money. But if he lists only 20 pieces and sells fast, John will check the prices. If the price is going up, he will adjust the price for his next set of listing.
• The other day, he has cards that went up by $4. He went downstairs and grabbed 30 pieces, listed it and started to make money.
• There are rare and hard to find cards from the first set. John knows what they worth but, has not come across those for a while.
• For the card that he typically gets, he checks it first because there are counterfeit cards. Once, John had a jeweler looked at the cards and made some test. The jeweler confirmed that the cards are worth $10,000.
• There are different tests to tell if the cards are genuine or not. One can check the different sets and patterns.
• There are cards that cannot be sold on eBay. Those are the ones that he packs and donates to kids.
• John has been selling on eBay since 2003, part-time. He still has a full-time job and does eBay on his off days. He does all the listing. His wife does the packing. Their nanny helps sort the cards when the kids sleep off. John is looking to get some help in sorting.
• He has systems in place and he knows exactly where every card is.
• When he started, he used small white card boxes. He had the cards sorted by color. The system had taken him longer to look for the sold items.
• But, when he started advertising, he had the cards by set. It makes it easier when he pulls out the orders.
• He also knows when the cards are out of stocks. He has this little slips that he would pull out and see which needs to go and refill it. That way he can keep his inventory stock.
• The most valuable card John has ever sold is worth $3,000.
• If it is a cheaper card, John ships it with a plain white envelope. He would put the card between cardboard sheets to protect it.
• If the card is more expensive, John would put the card in a heavy top loader like a plastic protector. Then, he would put a bubble mailer and ship it that way.
• John uses his phone to take pictures of the cards when needed. Like if the card is an expensive card or has excessive wear and he wants to show it.
• Most of the pictures of the cards he uses are stock photos. He will put the condition after the name, like LP for light play or NM for near mint. If it is worst, he will put an actual photo of the card so people know what they are getting.
• Today, people still play the Magic The Gathering card game. In a couple of weeks from now, a new set will be coming out. There will be 3 or 4 more sets that will be coming out this year. The game usually comes out with 4 to 5 sets in a year.
• It is an international game. John has cards that are in Russian, Spanish, Korean, Chinese, and Japanese.
• It is also a strategy game. The card represents a spell. Each player is like a wizard or a planeswalker. Each card has a casting colors called Mana. Each card is represented by a land. Forest makes green mana. Island makes blue mana. Swamp makes black mana. The casting colors are on the top corner. It could be one green and two of any of the 2 colors. You cast it and you play a creature card. Each player has 20 life points and you can go back and down.
• John is from Michigan but lives in West Virginia now. He is looking into a commercial location to put a store where people can come in every tournament.
• He is thinking to start with a hobby shop and a little coffee shop inside of it. He aims to bring people in, not necessarily to come in and play the game but create other games like a family game. He wants to draw more customers.
• John only has 5 years left before he can retire from his job. He will see how it goes depending on everything that is going to happen within his 5-year plan.

• John receives and maintains a 100% positive feedback on the last 12 months.
• If John or the post office makes a mistake and the card gets damaged, he shoulders the cost. He considers it as the cost of doing the business online.
• He tries to help the customers out to make them happy at the end of the day.
• If there is an error in the transaction, John would call the buyer. He would ask the buyer what he can do to make things right. Doing so goes to show that he conducts business in a personal way and not only with a computer screen.
• For anyone doing an eBay business, whether it is a million cards or clothes that you are trying to list, you need to have an inventory system to find it. Because if you lose something, you get a negative feedback. You can't tell a customer that you can't find the item. You need to have a system whether it is bins or UPC Code.

• "I enjoy it. It's fun!"
• "I think people lose the fact that you are dealing with another person."
• "My feedback, my integrity, my honor is worth more than the $18 out of mail order."
• "The more I save time packing, the more I have time to list. The more I list, the more I sell!"
• "The faster you get something to the market, the better chance you can sell it at a premium before everyone else flog the market."
• You need to have a system whether it is bins or UPC Code.

• Website: www.sargeandreds.com
• Facebook: Sarge & Red's
• eBay: Sarge & Red's Magic & Hobbies

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The Cowboy House is a hobby gone wild. Everyone knows that the Dallas Cowboys are America's team. In 2009, Chris and his wife Jennifer, took a risk and purchased the entire upper deck and half the lower bowl of stadium seats at public auction from the Old Texas Stadium in Irving Texas. From this, they grew a small business opening the first Sports memorabilia store in a 4 town area known as the Lake Cities.

They provide custom a framework, autographs, game used equipment, actual game turf and stadium seats from the old stadium. They also have NY Yankees seats, Ball Park in Arlington seats. SMU Moody Coliseum seats, etc... They do many promotions with local businesses where they bring professional athletes to openings of

They do many promotions with local businesses where they bring professional athletes to openings of sports-themed restaurants or simple shows where the public can meet players like Roger Staubach and Bo Jackson!

• Dallas Stadium is the only stadium built with a hole in the roof. Why is that so? So that God can watch His football team play on Sundays, Chris quipped.
• Chris grew up and went to high school in Irving, Texas. He played football for Irving in the Old Texas Stadium. When he graduated from high school, the stadium had risers set up on the 5th-yard line of the stadium.
• The Old Stadium means a lot to Chris. It was his first master gym. He was sad when he found out that Dallas would implode the stadium to build a new Jerry Jones World.
• Chris saw in the newspaper that Dallas would sell some of the stuff from the stadium. He wanted to go in as a hobbyist and a Cowboy's fan and create a new business model out of Texas Stadium's memorabilia.
• He signed up to become a bonded bidder. A bonded bidder must have $3 million worth of bonded insurance to even be a bidder. He was bidding against Jerry Jones and some of the big people who did it before.
• Chris has never done any bidding before. He has been in oncology and medical sales all his life. But, he took the risk and bid. After 32 days of bidding, he won the bid.
• Though Chris had a good year in the medical sales, he took a month off. He acted as a project manager for the Texas Stadium seats. He hired 35 to 50 people daily to unbolt the seats from the concrete risers.
• On August 2010, they worked 46 days under a temperature of over 100 degrees and no air conditioning and electricity.
• They only had hand tools working on with rusted bolts, nuts, and removing the 60 lbs. cast iron of the authentic historic pieces of memorabilia.
• Chris had 32 trailer trucks loaded up with seats and transport them out of the stadium. He stored the trucks in the truck yard. As he needed, he would unload 100 to 200 seats into a flatbed trailer and move them into his store.
• Texas Stadium seats come with versatility. It looks good indoor or outdoor. It can be on a fishing dock or give it to charities. Some were given as gifts for anniversaries, Christmas, graduation or even birthday presents. Young and old people enjoyed the seats.
• He made cool, customized items out of the stadium seats and sell it on eBay.
• Last year, Chris had a United Way Auction. He had one single seat and 4 people were bidding against that one seat. He earned $2900 for that single stadium seat.
• Chris also purchased the last game used football field. Jason Witten played on that football field and scored all his touchdown. Dez Bryant, Troy Aikman, Michael Irvin, and Emmitt Smith also played on that football field.
• Every year, Chris and Jennifer, donate to 70 to 80 different 501c3 charities in their area. They are able to give back to their community the cost of the seats.
• Chris has a Certificate of Authenticity from the City of Irving. He also has his hologram with his Texas resellers ID. It certifies that he was the winning bidder of 25,000 plus Texas stadium seats.
• One of the items that he bid on is the scoreboard that was hanging in the old stadium. Little did he know that there was no crane in the state of Texas that could go down and remove the scoreboard. It would have cost him a $100,000 to remove the scoreboard than he won in an auction.
• He got in touch with the construction crew who is in-charged with the demolition of the stadium. He made an agreement with them to let the scoreboard go and crash to the ground. Chris would then pick up the pieces on the next day.
• He was able to collect the field goal steel, sheet metals from the tunnel, and pieces of the rafters, roof, scoreboard and the time clock. He gave these metals to the National Museum - a very prestigious museum in Dallas. The National Museum took the imploded debris and developed a sculpture. The sculpture is in the Museum today.
• Chris eBay store drives his Cowboy House Sports Memorabilia brick and mortar store. He realized that in his Sports store, he lost 40% margin on shipping. He would be losing more money if he cannot control the cost of shipping.
• Shipping is expensive and the seats are heavy. He ships to soldiers in Afghanistan and to customers in Australia. He even shipped 20 seats to a bar owner in Barcelona, Spain who put the seats on the beach.
• So, he opened up their own shipping business, especially that there's none in their town. The town people now have an option other than their Post Office.
• It is called QuickShip Mail & Business Center and is right next to his Sports store. They also have a car wash and an ice franchise. Their businesses are all along the same street.
• Chris does a lot of local picks up in his listings. Customers can come to his store for local pickup. His store is by appointment only except for Saturdays. They are always in their store on a Saturday.
• Some of his stumbling blocks are because of eBay. Sometimes, they do sell things that rock his business.
• A month ago, he sold Green Bay Packers rings. He has an over-sized Balfour rings. All have NFL licensed and manufactured in the USA by Balfour Jewels. He threw it online.
• eBay sent him a message that he is not authorized to sell the Green Bay Packers ring. He has to get permission from the NFL. eBay canceled his account and he lost his listings. He has to pay somebody to relist thousands of items. eBay let him back on with the same user ID.
• There were 16 other sellers selling the same rings, but he is the only one kicked out because he has the majority.
• Recently, he has a customer that bought the stadium seat. Chris disassembled the bottom from the cast-out frame so that he can get it into a 2 cubic foot size box. The customer sent him an email asking for help in assembling the seat. Chris told the customer to call him. Five minutes later, eBay kicked out the buyer and shut down Chris account. He got a notification from eBay that says "Hey, you are trying to do sales outside of eBay and this is not allowed". Chris called eBay and explained that he is not trying to sell outside. Instead, he is trying to provide customer support.
• Chris would only do stuff Buy in Auction whenever he wants to stimulate people back to his stuff. He would offer $0.99 so people would visit his website and check out the other things that he has.
• Chris was the Vice President of an international business when he left his job. He took a calculated risk and paid it off. They were able to sell almost all. They sell it on Amazon, Groupon, and multiple other websites. Even in Markes catalog, you can find the Texas stadium seats.
• As of this interview, Chris only has 62 seats left, out of the 25,000 seats he purchased.
• Selling the stadium seats gives Chris the opportunities to meet some of his heroes. They are cool and ones which he never expected.
• At one point, Roger Staubach, America's quarterback, called him up and asked to come by to take a look at the seats. Roger wants to give the seats to his mother and to some charities. Chris, in return, asked Roger with some autographs.
• Chris was also given access to attend a Super Bowl. He was able to be in a suite with Jerry Jones, Troy Aikman, Michael Irvin, and Emmitt Smith. He was able to play cards on a Thursday night with the likes of George Tee. Sometimes, he gets invited to birthday parties of Dallas Cowboy Players.
• Chris has always been a collector. When he got married, he learned that he was no longer a collector. He started selling on eBay to empty his closets as he was preparing to get married.
• In his eBay store, you can find everything. From dresses to tools, to all kinds of sports memorabilia, from baseball, hockey, soccer. He's got over 10,000 autograph items in his brick and mortar store.
• He enjoys having outlets other than a walk-in crowd.
• Chris is well-versed in international travel. He used to be traveling on an American airline. Two years ago, he was in London airport 4 times and in Dubai a couple of times. He enjoyed traveling and enjoyed the chase.
• Today, Chris does not travel anymore. He sees his wife a lot more. He becomes involved with his daughter and her soccer team.
• He likes better and enjoys running his own businesses. He found it cool getting to work for himself and be his own boss.
• Chris finds himself listing more on other platforms. He finds other platforms a little bit more seller friendly on the fees. Amazon's fees are high, but Amazon's buyers pay more. Some of the demographics showed him that Amazon's shoppers tend not to price-shop. Amazon buyers pay for prime so that they can order prime items.
• He joined Amazon and he got twice as many items on Amazon than on eBay.
• eBay has been good and loyal to him for so many years. But he noticed that eBay is no longer customer-centric.
• Chris promised though to check again the new guidelines on having an eBay store.

• "You have to swing a bat to hit a home run. You have to swing it 10 times."
• "You've got to be careful what you asked for!"
• "If you can buy all that is out there, you can control the marketing and the price."
• "I got there because I always push myself to surround myself with people that I can learn and grow from."
• "You can sell anything. You have to tell the right story. You've got to find the right person that needs you. You've got to find the right niche."

• eBay Store: The Cowboy House
• Facebook: The Cowboy House
• Website: Cowboyhousesports.com
• LinkedIn: Chris Gordon in Lake Dallas TX
• Phone Number: 214-551-5978

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In 2012 Gabe & James co-founded human-I-T, a nonprofit focused on digital equity and sustainable e-waste management. Their humble beginning in a cell phone repair shop has crystallized their vision into what human-I-T is today. human-I-T breathes new life into your unwanted electronics; converting e-waste into opportunities for others.

• Gabe and James both have a passion for technology. They don't have a formal training in IT. They learn things only by day-to-day tinkering. They wanted to share their passion for technology to others. They founded the human-I-T and do it full-time since 2012.
• human-I-T is a non-profit business that takes in unwanted or inoperative technology. Instead of recycling the said technology and breaking it down into the commodities, human-I-T refurbishes the technology and redistribute it into the hands of the low-income families and non-profit organizations.
• Gabe and James's mission is to offer low-cost technology not only to their recipients but to the community at large.
• They also open the doors of their warehouses to the communities. This way people could come and learn the importance of reusing and repurposing technologies. It also provides people with vocational skills that they could enter into their resume and have a better chance of employment.
• Most companies across America are paying e-waste recyclers to take their equipment away. Recyclers grind those up to try to take some gold and silver out of it.
• As a social enterprise, human-I-T offers FREE services to businesses to get unwanted or inoperative technology. human-I-T would either show up with its truck or coordinate shipping of palettes of equipment from different companies that are getting rid of laptops.
• human-I-T also provides corporate data desynthesization. It means that human-I-T wipes out customer information from the hard drives for free.
• human-I-T has a very expensive software. The software produces a Certificate of Destruction. It does not only captures the serial numbers of the hard drive but also confirms that it has wiped, how it was wiped, and whether it is still reusable or not. In its day to day due diligence, human-I-T stays on the edge of data desynthesization.
• If something is too broken and there is no way some parts can be used, recycle is the last resort or it would be completely shredded.
• Hospitals and banks can work with human-I-T. Its processes are compliant with other certifications and regulations.
• human-I-T is one of the 2017 eBay Shine Awards finalists for the Charitable Business category. With over 2,400 applications, Gabe and James felt lucky enough to be chosen by eBay. Their business is given the opportunity to be featured. They meet some great people not only at the Conference. It was a great experience for them.
• eBay has always been a part of their business plan from day one. They were both 25 years old with limited business experience when they started out. They knew that they have to generate revenue on their own. They knew that they wanted to use eBay as a way to generate revenue, keep them sustainable and grow their vision.
• They identified items that every family can use like computers. But they also offer their services to businesses so it gives them not only computers but office phones, servers, network switches.
• They created a business model where they refurbish and resell outlier technology on eBay. They monetize it for their mission to offer or donate computers for free to the community.
• Today, though technology has value, one has to put a lot of work in to actually realize that value. The businesses are not only giving items with a value to recyclers if they are not giving the items to human-I-T but is actually paying a business to take away the $150 laptops.
• That creates a huge opportunity for human-I-T to grow fast because it has a no brainer offer. Its biggest limitation now is that businesses do not know that human-I-T services exist.
• human-I-T has a lot of partners who help get the technology from various businesses. It has partners too who help get the technology out to the families.
• It took Gabe and James a lot of trial and error, in the beginning, to figure out how to price used technology. They also trained their staff on how to price the items depending on the specs and the condition. They want to be competitive in the eBay marketplace. They knew that a lot of their customers don't have the expendable income to get the technology in.
• Like any brick and mortar shop, they offer a 30-day money back guarantee. Trust is the number one thing for them. They want their customers to trust them. And they find a big way to convey trust by accepting returns if customers are not satisfied with the items.
• They offer the money back guarantee because they test all their items before selling.
• They use eBay Promotions Manager and Markdown Manager with their sales plan. They see the drastic difference having a sound system around the sales and promotions compare to just shooting in the dark and doing it whenever they have the time to do it.
• In the beginning, James and Gabe did everything. From marketing to pick-up and distribute, then to sales. They wear all the hats. But they reach a point in their business where they can't do it just by themselves. They needed to find good people to help them. They are lucky enough to convince a lot of people to help them out. 90% of their employees started out as volunteers.
• James is very good in the IT side of their business. His skills helped them in the early stage of their business before they got some real gigs in their warehouse to do the dirty works. He also has previous experience selling on eBay and how to be successful on eBay.
• Gabe specialty is on creating a business. He makes sure that logistics are set up. He compartmentalized every aspect of their business.
• Over time, they learned how to systemize the random technology in. Everything is broken down into a system. They keep producing a standard quality brand image and sell those items. If they don't sell, they can't do their mission to help the community.
• One breakthrough that Gabe came up with, from a pricing standpoint to a selling standpoint, is to spend only 5 hours on a $30 item. They would get a raw material, working or not. They would assess how much does the item worth if it is working and not working. Depending on what those price ranges are, Gabe developed a system to where their team is presented with the exact amount of time they should spend on an item assessing it if they can get the item to a working condition. They know when they need to stop and send it through. If it has a value, they assess it and get it sold. If it doesn't, then it gets to e-waste. The simple cutoff time, knowing what you should do helps scale their operations.
• eBay for Charity is an amazing program that eBay develops. On all the human-I-T listing, 100% of the proceeds go to a non-profit through eBay charity program. human-I-T pays zero seller fees on all its items because 100% of the revenue generated go to its 501(c)3 non-profit.
• With eBay for charity, eBay sellers can donate a part or all their proceeds to a charity on eBay. Depending on what percentage they are donating, they don't have to pay eBay fees. On top of it, they can receive tax deductions because they are donating to a charity.
• Millenials or the younger customers on eBay seek out a business that supports a good cause. It gives the business a competitive edge if it is associated with a good cause. It does not matter what you donate, 1% or 20% or whatever it is. Once a business is aligned with a good cause, it can actually help its sales.
• Today, the two 25-year-olds who started their business from their bedroom, operate their business in 3 locations in Southern California. They have 2 warehouses: one in Downtown Alley and the other is in Commerce, California, which is about 15 minutes south of Alley. They have an administration office at Longbridge, California, where they do all their HR and Accounting stuff.
• They have 30 employees. 20 people are working in the warehouses. They do the pickup, handling of the inventory, testing the equipment, and shipping the items once they sell. The rest of the people are focused on the marketing and spreading the awareness to the companies that there are better solutions dealing with unwanted technology.
• They have a photo booth and one staff is assigned to take the picture. The staff puts the data made by the other staff, then make the item live on eBay.
• One of their challenges is to have a clear and crisp picture. Sometimes, they may have an item that is as small as M&M or something as huge as a giant printer, the size of a person.
• human-I-T also provides low-cost internet to couple to a lot of the technology that they sell. Because when it comes to a digital buyer, a computer is not enough to do anything today. You need the internet. So they try to pair those two together.
• Opportunity is a big word around in human-I-T.
• Gabe and James want an opportunity to make a difference. They want an opportunity to show people what they can do.
• They observe that consumers are purchasing technology at a rate faster than any other time in the history. e-waste is the fastest growing waste stream in the world. Gabe and James both believe that human-I-T is needed in every single major metropolitan in the United States. Their vision is to provide services nationwide, connecting people to technology all over the country.
• Once, Gabe and James, have distributed 100 computers in one day. It seemed that the family received their first computer ever. It is really what it is all about. It is why they do everything they do. It is why they create an eBay store.
• They are both thankful for this interview. Let's help them spread awareness that any business can call them up and work with human-I-T tomorrow, save some money, and help their community.

• If you think about all your business processes at once, it is too overwhelming. You have to compartmentalize it. You have to make sure that you have protocols and a system for every scenario that you can think of. Measure everything that you do because you can't manage what you don't measure.
• In building trust, the customers have to know what they are buying. human-I-T is upfront on any kind of damage or scratches. The technology arrives at the customer's doorstep exactly as how they saw it.
• You need to listen to the customers because they will tell you what they expect from you. human-I-T does not want to lose the trust of its customers. Without the eBay buyers, there is no human-I-T.
• It is a need to have a consistent backdrop for all items. Clear and crisp pictures improve sales.

• "eBay is absolutely the key component for us to keep doing what we are doing and help many people as possible."
• "Trust is the number one thing for us!"
• "Everything is broken down into systems."
• "You can't manage what you don't measure!"
• "The customer has to know what they are buying."
• "Trust is everything! Without that, we won't be here."
• "Without the eBay buyers, there is no Human IT."
• "Google puts the world at your finger and it creates an opportunity."
• "American dream does not really exist unless you have a computer with an internet."
• "We are just trying to give what we have received."
• "Every single business in the country is getting rid of unwanted technology."

• Promotions Manager
• Markdown Manager

• Website: smarthuman.org
• eBay Store: human-I-T

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Keith is a former factory worker turned professional dropshipper. He has been dropshipping on eBay full-time since 2014. He employs virtual assistants to make his life easier & enjoys learning new skills and traveling. He also enjoys teaching others how to make a living online through e-commerce.

• Keith defines Dropshipping as simply taking a product from one store or one vendor and placing it on a marketplace or website for sale with a markup.
• He likes MAP (Minimum Advertised Pricing) price for wholesale, as long as there is profit.
• He said that you will find good wholesale companies that police their MAP. There are some that don't care. And those are the ones that you have to let go.
• When Keith was still doing the wholesale, he would look and monitor the competitor's prices. Then he would make a phone call to the company and report a competitor who is breaking the MAP. He would then see what the company would do. After 2 to 3 times that the company would not do anything, he would not continue to dropship.
• When he first started, he would give a virtual address, a phone number, and a professional business email. He would come up with a big beautiful building when in reality he is only in his living room.
• Dropshipping has a small barrier to entry. You need to know what you are doing. It is not something that you dive in and not have any direction. If you have a solid system and guidelines to follow, you'll be the next success.
• Keith cited that the good thing about eBay is you are not necessarily competing on the price. You can change your keywords or images. You can do other things your competitors are doing to drive those buyers to your listings.
• He uses the stock images of the manufacturer. He would resize them to make his stuff stand out in the searches.
• Keith does Dropshipping for full-time since 2014. He used to work 6 to 7 days a week in factories. He would get as much overtime as he wants it. But when 2008 came, he gets lucky if he can get 48 hours of work.
• Like any other people, he is looking for stability. Then came the great recession, and boom! He was gone.
• Keith did not like his factory job anyway. He took his job out of desperation. He has to pay the bills. While doing his job, he listens to a podcast or an audio to feed his mind and help his belief.
• He is selling on eBay and working at the same time. One time, he made an $80 profit out of a sale. That is almost his entire day's wage. He thinks of ways to improve and have more sales. He is trying to build enough so he can quit his job.
• One day at work, he told a guy in-charged that he would quit. The guy looked at him and said "there is nothing I can do. Once you say it, then it's done". The guy asked him if his decision is final and Keith said yes. So Keith ended his employment that day.
• Keith always wanted to look for different ways for ways out - an entrepreneurial spirit. Then, he stumbled across dropshipping and decided to make it full-time.
• He started and found Dropshipping half worth. It was in the later part of Q4 (late in November, early December). Everything was selling. So he thought that it is easy money. In the mid of January, it came to a screeching point. He can still sell here and there, but he learned that he should have treated it like a business, as it should have been.
• At the time of this interview, Keith got a negative feedback. It is a product review. The customer bought the product 5 or 6 months ago. They did not like it. So Keith called eBay and talked to a representative.
• Keith created a dropshipping course - Easy Dropshipping. This is the kind of dropshipping from online stores. It is not a wholesale account. It places an overstock, that is, how to find items that are already selling and make them better.
• In his course, he shows his system. He shows the different tools he uses to list and revise an inventory. He also teaches sourcing. He covers as much as he can in the course. What he does not cover there, he answers in the group. He is constantly updating the course.
• He has a private group for all the members of the course. There are seasoned Dropshippers. There are brand new people too. He also has another Facebook group, All Out e-Commerce. It is a bigger community for multi-channel selling and dropshipping.
• With dropshipping, you get paid first. Then you spend the money to buy the item and you keep the difference.
• A lot of people have misconceptions about Dropshipping. They are scared to death of it. If you do not know what you are doing, you are likely to fail. If you get in there, start to dropship items, and you are not keeping track of your stuff for the price changes, you will only get broke.
• It took Keith 94 days to get the $50,000 in 31 days in sales. For someone who has a selling history on eBay and with a big selling limit, it will not take you long to hit your target.
• If you are a new seller and you have smaller selling limits, it may take you for a while.
• Making it work depends on how dedicated you are. It depends on how much time do you have to put into it to make it work.
• Keith's business grow leaps and bounds when he started employing Virtual Assistants (VAs). His VAs do product listings, place orders, all kinds of stuff that he no longer has to do.
• He can now afford to travel because he got people who list, track information, and do different things for him.
• Today, Keith praises God every day that he has the freedom. His only regret is not doing it years before.
• For the listeners of this podcast, you will get a $50 off discount if you join Keith's course now. Click on this link: soyouwannasellonebay.com/easydrop You will get an email from Keith with instructions on how to create an account, how to log in, and how to join their private group.
• His private group now has only 20 members. It is the best time to get in so you can get all the attention you need.
• Don't forget to click on this link: soyouwannasellonebay.com/easydrop and get your $50 off.

• 1. Feel each of your suppliers on how soon can they deliver the items. Keith put in his listing how many days is the handling time.
• 2. If the buyer message you, give an excellent service. Be happy to help. Be happy to answer any questions.
• 3. Learn how to handle customers even if they come out of the gate like a real jerk. Don't snap back. Apologize, even if it is not your fault. Apologize, even if you did everything you could. Say something like, "I'm sorry for the inconvenience. We're doing the best we can."
• 4. Say up front that you are selling on eBay. If a wholesaler/company would not let you do it, ask for reasons why they would not allow you. If they insist, let them go and move on. There's a ton of accounts.
• 5. There are name brands that would not let you list their items on eBay. The best thing to do is to get all the name brands. Do a research before you list their items.
• 6. It is exhausting when you get to several 100 items and find yourself checking your inventory twice a day. When Keith reached that point, he decided to outsource, took the leap, and train the VAs.

• "It is a blessing in disguise."
• "You need to know what you are doing."
• "There is just no way of controlling. There is just a way of handling."
• "Everybody does it differently."
• "If you are doing it right and you have a system in place, you are pretty well on the road to success."
• "I wanted to learn to be able to help people. To help people do what I did and get away from the grind."
• "As long as you are dedicated, you can get results."
• Only do the things that only you can do!" - Jim Cockman

• Facebook Group: alloutecommerce
• Facebook Page: alloutecommerce

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Candace is a 34-year-old disabled mom. She has a daughter who is 7 years old. She has a Lupus and a Lung disease and she is on chemo and oxygen. But, she also runs a plus sized clothing store on eBay for men and women's items.

• Candace is a registered nurse.
• On April 2014, she got hospitalized for 33 days. She found out that she had a Lupus and a Lung Disease. The doctors told her that she has a few months if she got lucky to be around.
• Due to her disability, they moved to a smaller and manageable house - a 2-bedroom trailer. They use every space they have and put up shelves and racks in the corner for her eBay stuff. They even have clothes rack in their living room.
• Candace started selling on eBay when she was in her early twenties. She only wanted to make a couple of dollars, nothing serious then.
• When Facebook groups selling stuffs started, Candace sold their kids old toys. She made some money there. But she needs to meet up with people who bought the items. So she switched back to eBay.
• On eBay, she started selling their extra stuff. Then she started wearing big sizes. She found out that big sizes or Plus Size clothing were selling well. She stuck with it. It has been 3 years now and doing well.
• Candace runs her eBay biz alone, except that her husband does the shipping for her. She purchases the shipping materials ensuring that all are complete when needed.
• She goes out to source her items. She goes to thrift stores in their area, mostly Salvation Army. She also goes to Savers and Goodwill stores, an hour away from their area. Sometimes, her mom would take her into the stores and help her source.
• Her daughter, Destiny, when tagged along, helps pick up things when they are sourcing. Destiny can find things that are colorful.
• Candace has membership cards that give her a percentage off. In the Salvation Army, she gets 35% off on her purchases.
• A couple of days before the interview, Candace broke 8,000 in 60 days.
• Candace has sold more than 600 items. She targets to make a thousand items listed in her store for the next couple of months. And stay around it because of limited space. She plans to take an extra room to store her eBay stuff in.
• Candace defeated the odds. Now, she can drive anywhere she wants to go. She can do pretty much anything she wants to do as long as she takes her oxygen tank with her.
• She is not trying to make a million dollar on eBay. She is only trying to make an extra few dollars so she can take her kid to McDonald's or to the beach.
• Last year, Candace took her daughter to Disney World from the sales she made from her eBay biz.
• Candace does not rush. She does not push herself too much. If she only makes 5 sales in a day instead of 25, she is okay with that.
• eBay keeps Candace going. It makes her feel good to receive good emails and feedback. It is mentally helpful to her.
• eBay gives her the opportunity to take care of people. She believes that some of the items she sells are for people who can't get out of their house like the elderly.
• eBay gives Candace a big purpose, besides her daughter.

• With her physical limitations, Candace lists as much as she can. It takes her a couple of hours to list 15 items. But if she can list only 10 for a day, it is 10 more items than she had yesterday. She considers it an accomplishment. Whatever she feels enough is enough.
• In writing a good description, she makes it a point to include the item's:
  • 1. texture
  • 2. different colors
  • 3. patterns, if there is
  • 4. the kind of material use (stretchy, silky, cotton)
  • 5. thickness
• To maintain a high and positive feedback, she treats her customers with kindness. There would be one or two people that you could not make happy no matter what you do, but it is best to try to be kind.
• A day before her interview, she has a buyer who ordered 2 shirts, but Candace could not find the other shirt. So, she messaged the buyer and apologized. She gave a full refund and the other shirt for free. The buyer turned to be the happiest lady who gave a positive feedback. What could have been a complete disaster, Candace is able to turn it into good.
• Candace uses her Apple iPad Mini to take photos of her items. She takes pictures against a poster board. She has one piece hollow plastic mannequin hanging up on her window. Behind it is a poster board with a black sheet that serves as the background of the photos.
• To get a lot of attention to their store, Candace runs Low Price Auctions. Auction draws people's attention to the store. It puts your store higher on the search engine because auctions will be ending in a few days.

• "I just utilize all the space I can and do the best I can with what I've got!"
• "The harder you work, the more you can make!"
• "It gives you a purpose and it keeps you busy. It makes you feel good that you are doing something."
• "Whatever you feel is enough is enough."
• "If you do a few things today, don't get down on yourself because you do a few. You did something! It is better than nothing else."
• "I do whatever I can possibly do and whatever I need to do. It is definitely good for the mind and the body to keep going like I am."
• "There is so much in one piece that you can find to talk about."

• eBay Store: http://stores.ebay.com/Plus-Size-Clothing-Shop
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/CandacePitt1
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/clacossecook?fref=ufi

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Dave is a family guy; 5 kids and so far one grandchild. He spent 30 plus years working with cows, people, and equipment in the dairy and farming industry. He contributed to feeding a lot of people. Now five years later, he is selling supplies to animal agriculture industry primarily dairy farmers. He did eBay in the early 2000's for a short while. Then he got back in in 2014.

• Dave has a full-time job that requires him to travel a lot. He does eBay at night and on weekends. His wife and kids help him in the packing and shipping when he is out of town.
• It was in 2004 when Dave and his wife started on eBay. Dave was on the farm and his wife was laid off from her corporate job. They only stopped eBay when they relocated to Colorado.
• Since eBay has always been in Dave's mind, he got back to eBay in 2014. His whole family enjoys eBay too!
• Dave has a variety of items he sells on eBay. He sources from thrift stores, estate sales, garage sales, and southwest collectibles.
• He collects native American items, and trade them for some items. The rattlesnake skin on his listings is from a guy he traded with some books.
• He also trades items from a close friend who buys storage units.
• But the main thing he sells on eBay is antler and antler-inspired handcrafts.
• Dave provides antlers for their dogs to chew. His family is very passionate about their dogs and considered those as part of their family. Their dogs enjoyed chewing on deer's antlers. Antlers go well with his dogs and decided that he is going to help pet owners by selling those.
• An antler is an extra skeleton that grows outside of the body. It is the fastest growing bone in the planet which makes it a very nutrient product for dogs.
• The antlers that they provide their buyers are naturally shed. Every Spring and Summer, the deers' and elks' antlers naturally fall off and then they grow a new one. So no animals are harmed in sourcing antlers.
• It is a natural and renewable resource.
• Finding antlers turn out as a great exercise and their family's hobby to walk in the woods.
• Dave has antler's buyers who are jewelry craft makers.
• Antlers are best for knife handles. Dave sold antlers to people who were making knives for the super war re-enactment. He sold antlers to a gentleman who is a curator of a Museum in London.
• Dave also made crafts from antlers as well. At the time of this interview, Dave is making antler ink pens. He also sells his finish products. His buyers are from the US and Canada.
• They have repeat customers buying from their eBay store on a weekly and monthly basis.
• He finds it fun when he gets pictures from pet owners with their dogs in the background chewing antlers.
• He's got many buyers who send him pictures of their finish products - pieces of arts that are functional. Dave finds it cool.
• It is rare that Dave has a return. Out of a thousand items, he would only get 5 returns.
• Dave's travel schedule has increased in the last 7 months. He listened to this podcast when he is on the airplane.
• When he is out, he has the ability to source from the road. It brings him an opportunity to source from different locations.
• He is thinking of opening another store which is more niche oriented. He wants to build a website to generate more traffic to his eBay store as well as an information source. He also wants to increase his handmade crafts made from antlers.
• Dave enjoys buying, sourcing, and selling. It is a passion that he always enjoys. eBay brought a way to do his passions electronically.
• His eBay store ZIAFAMILY is all about family. He does it to increase their family's retirement fund.

• He prices his items based on the competitors' prices he saw on eBay and other platforms.
• His prices represent huge savings for the buyers and pet owners across the country. Because his price is half lesser than the big store.
• To increase his results in people's searches, he tweaks his prices constantly. He would get his items listed for a week and put them on a sale of 20% off.
• He does Best Offer to the majority of their listings to increase his presence when people search on eBay.
• It is only rare when he does a price increase. When he revises the items, it is always at a lower price. When he sees that there are lesser views or no views at all, he changes the price to Best Offer or put it on sale. That way, his item's visibility would increase.
• He would bend backward if there is a return, yet rare it is. If it is a buyer's remorse, he would accept and pay for the return shipping. He is going to do whatever is the buyer's needs. He would not want to concern with the return at all. He would move on to the next item.
• How To Improve Your eBay Biz?
  • 1. Don't take anything personally.
  • 2. Separate emotions from business and you'll go a long way.

• "Life is fun!"
• "Finding antlers is like the adventure of Easter Egg Hunt."
• "Feedback is vital!"
• "Customer satisfaction is our primary goal."
• "Life is too short!"
• "eBay is still the place to be!"
• "At the end of the day, it is not all about money. It is about enjoying what I do and having a blast."
• "eBay has a good feel to it!"

• eBay Store: ziafamily13
• Email: [email protected]

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Casey AKA the Rockstarflipper is a full time Ecommerce Ebay & Amazon Reseller. Specializing in clothing & electronics the rockstarflipper sources locally from thrift shops pawn shops, goodwills and Salvation Army stores.

• Casey saw his father and older brother worked all their lives. Both do have good lives, but they don't have the freedom.
• So, he decided he did not want to work for anyone. He did not want to listen to anyone. He wants the freedom to be what he wants - be it a $50,000 per year or $50M per year guy. He does not want to have limits. He wants a limitless life.
• He used to work for a reseller who had a communication niche. His work gave him a full-time paycheck to build the money he needed to start his own business. While he was working, at night time, he did his research and learned. He started working for his own store.
• He started to sell a few items to have the feel of having his own business. He had a niche for several times and turned his vision into ex-merchandise. He realized that when you are good at something, you can be really good at it. But when its market slows down, you have nothing to rely on or fall back on. That is when he opened his horizon.
• In 2012, he saw how cheap you can get merchandise from thrift stores, garage sales, and goodwill.
• A day before this interview, Casey went to a store. It was around 10,000 to 12,000 sq. ft big. One corner is furniture, while the other is house goods. But most of the store is filled with clothing arranged per sections like men, women, children, maternity, etc...He tends to gravitate on the men's section and works his way up to the store, row by row. He went around the store in an hour or two and move on to the next one.
• Casey calls himself a flipper because that is what he does for a living - he flips things.
• Almost seven days a week, wherever he is, Casey goes sourcing for inventory of his stores. He spends 7 to 8 hours a day sourcing.
• He has 2 stores - eBay and Amazon. He has to keep his stores supplied seven days a week.
• He uses BMW I8 hybrid electric car when he goes thrifting. He can put 3 or 4 garbage bags worth of clothes in his car.
• Casey loves the thrill of the hunt. He loves going out and sourcing. He loves finding an item for a dollar that is worth a hundred dollars. A day before this interview, he bought a coat for $10. People are watching it for $250.
• He sold before a 1920 fire truck doll. He bought it for $60 and it was sold for $900.
• The weirdest thing he sold on eBay is a shrunken head in a glass. It came from South America. He paid 10 bucks for two items. He sold it for 50 or 60 bucks per piece.
• Casey's fiancee helps him in the business. She is the one doing the "behind the scene" tasks while Casey is out sourcing. She can get the things bought the previous day photograph and listed in just a day.
• He has a small office, about 600 sq. ft size where some of the items are stored. In their garage, they have 40 storage bins for clothing and crafts. The bins can hold 30 to 40 items. Each bin is labeled with letters and numbers. So Casey knows what bins to go when an item sells. He can pull items in seconds.
• Casey wants to continue to grow his inventory. He plans to buy in bulk. And with that, he needs to search for suppliers.
• He also considers hiring 2 employees who will come full circle in their office. By that time, Casey would get a full-time warehouse for his employees to do everything in a system where Casey won't have to be there physically.
• Casey loves to go around and he will never stop his circles in thrifting.

• Even though Casey has sold many things, he still does research. He admitted that he does not know everything. He does not know a lot of things. So, he always uses his phone to research on some things.
• For a unique item, he suggests to put it on the auction. Start at the lowest price you would want to take it for. If no one bids on it, then you will know that you have overpriced it. If they bid on it and you make money, then it's great!
• Casey does one-day shipping. That means, everything that sells before midnight has to go out the next day. In the evening, before going to bed, Casey and his fiancee print all the labels for the next day shipping. When he woke up the next day, he pulls the items and put them on top of the labels. His fiancee would stick the label and the shipment is ready for pick-up.
• On refund issues, Casey suggests that if you made $15 to $20 profit, send it to the customer. Because the amount of time you are about to waste on a $15 refund, can make you a sale for 3 to 6 times or more. So, it is best not to waste your time and then move on. But if refund issues happen over and over again, you need to fix what you are doing to prevent it from happening again.
• He suggests to schedule your pick up for your packages even if it is a two or a day. That way, you don't have to leave your house and line up for hours in the post office.
• Casey noted that most of the times that he lost money is because he was not careful and did not take the time. Like when bought a video game system and forgot to fully test them. Later on, he discovered that the joysticks were not working. Now, he learned to slow down and take his time.

• "If you have to do something, be a Rockstar at whatever you do."
• "If it is cheap and you can sell it, by all means!"
• "As you gain experience, you can go thrifting quicker and quicker."
• "One of the most important thing about being a thifter is planning."
• "You can have all the inventory and all the profit in the world, but if you don't have a system, you will crash."
• "Take your time. Nothing is worth losing money over."
• "If I make it, it's because I did it. If I fail, it's because I failed."

• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWsVWcWpjU-G4dCoBrMu_Ww
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RockstarFlipper/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/RockstarFlipper
• Instagram: @rockstarflipper

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Nathan Hirsch is a serial entrepreneur and expert in remote hiring and eCommerce. He is the founder and CEO of FreeeUp.com and the co-founder and COO of Portlight. Nathan started his eCommerce career on the Amazon Marketplace and successfully built a $7 million business within 4 years. After seeing the potential of using remote workers within his first business, he founded FreeeUp to make the remote hiring experience simpler for all eCommerce business owners. FreeeUp now provides reliable eCommerce workers to hundreds of clients around the world. Nathan is an expert at building efficient systems and processes, sales strategies, and business management. He currently lives in Orlando, Florida.

• Nathan's Dad is a Teacher. He had always wanted Nathan to take the conventional route and get a full-time corporate job. His Mom is both a Teacher and an Entrepreneur.
• He saw her mother's business grow from its small beginnings to reaping the benefits. He saw his mother's drive and the hours she put into her business. He was impressed and made him decide that Entrepreneurship is what he wanted to do for life.
• Back in college, Nathan used to buy books for $100 and sell it to the bookstores. In return, he received a penny for a dollar. He did this to earn extra money. But, later, he got pissed off to the bookstore ripping him of his money.
• So, he started buying other people textbooks and make money himself. He offered better prices than the bookstore. Before he knew it, people are lining up at his door wanting to sell him their books. He made a decent money on that.
• Books led him to Amazon and eBay. He found it nice to sell it to the third marketplaces. He made some experiment first. Then, he became addicted and obsessed with Amazon. He came up with the idea of dropshipping, even before the word dropshipping is coined. His business had blown up. He found himself running a multi-million dollar business from his college dorm room. He hired anyone that would want to work for him.
• One of his good hiring decisions is having his business partner Connor. Until today, Connor still works with Nathan.
• Nathan hires people that were the exact opposite of him. He hires people who could do things he could not do. Hiring has always help Nathan expands and grows his business and led him to build FreeeUp.
• Nathan started FreeeUp small. There were only his self and his part-time assistant. Then, he made her to full-time as the workload gets bigger and he got more budget. His growth is a gradual thing.
• FreeeUp is a one-stop-shop for the top 1% eCommerce workers whether it is listing, customer service, PPC campaigns, and whatever it is.
• Nathan's team gets hundreds of applicants every week. They have a great interview process based on 9 years of hiring. They pre-vet workers and get only the 1% of the network. They have 15 pages of communication guidelines. Their workers have to memorize the guidelines and will get tested on.
• Today, FreeeUp has 300+ network of workers. Their workers are available to their clients on a first come first serve basis.
• With FreeeUp, Nathan helps clients achieve their dreams and grow their business. He is also helping the network of 300+ workers provide for their family. He provides the workers an opportunity where they could focus on what they like doing and good at.
• At some point, though, Nathan fired a person quickly after he hired him. The person did nothing wrong. Nathan totally misread his skill sets. Nathan felt terrible after. He never got to sleep for over a week.
• When Nathan started FreeeUp a year ago, their software broke and they lost about a week's worth of hours. It took a team of 10 different people to fix and get the hours back and imported to the system. The team contacted all the clients and the workers. Within 24 hours, everything is back on smoothly.
• Nathan is a baseball guy. He works 50 hours plus a week. A lot of his time is spent on building processes and talking to clients which he really enjoys.
• For him, work is fun. He likes doing it. He has a team of assistants that monitors his emails and Skype when he is not available. He has 15 people working for his Amazon store. He has 20 people as the internal team of his FreeeUp business.
• FreeeUp have worked with eBay clients and they offer 3 levels of workers: 1. Lower Level People - are workers who have experience, but still, needs training on how things are done. 2. Mid Level People are more specialized in their skills. They don't need training. They can do optimized listings and answer emails. They can do a lot of specific things. 3. eBay Experts are people who can audit your business from top to bottom. They can come up with a game plan and do it with due diligence. They can take your business to the next level because they have 5 to 10 years of eBay experience.

• The time to hire is when you have the budget.
• There are two reasons why you need to hire: 1. To expand your business. It is so hard to expand your business because you are too caught up in the repetitive tasks. Instead of answering customers emails and doing the bookkeeping yourself, you can hire lower level people. Doing so will give you more time to focus on sales, marketing, and expansion of your business. 2. To grow your business to the next level. You are stuck in your business. You could go to a lot of directions. But, you don't know what lies on the other end. So, hire an expert to come in and tell you what to do. Have the expert take your business to the next level.
• To start a business, you need to have: 1. Work Ethic and Right Attitude There are so many ups and downs in a business. You have to have the mentality that you have to work through the ups and downs. That there is nothing that could stop you because anything is possible. 2. You are capable of making business decisions at a very high level and solve problems. To do that, follow these steps: a. Gather the information before jumping into the problem. Make sure you do your research. b. Lay out the different options - the pros and cons of each option. And see who would be affected, besides you and the company. c. Build a game plan to follow. d. Execute the game plan at a high level using the team and the talent around you to help you in different things.
• If you want to be an Entrepreneur and want to grow your business, you have to be working hard in the first 6 months. Because there is a competitor out there that is working harder than you. You have to put in more time unless you have other people to do it for you.
• Hire different people for different skills on a part-time basis. So that if anyone leaves, they are very replaceable.

• "Focus on what you are good at."
• "The time to hire is when you are making a little bit of money."
• "If you are going to hire, make sure you can commit to it."
• "Hiring is an investment."
• "Put money and training into hiring to get what you want from it."
• "The only solution I could think of is to build the solution."
• "You'll never know what is going to come next."
• "I can't stress how important having a good team around you is."
• "Time management is a huge skill."
• "In any business, make sure the clients are happy!"
• "The client may not always be right, but it is in your best interest to make them happy at all times."
• "The people who listen to their client and find out what their clients want are the people who can be successful in the long run."
• "At the end of the day, without the workers and the clients, I am nothing!"
• "Do everything you can to give a good experience to everyone."
• "The mentality of freeing up your time is to focus on areas of your businesses to expand."

• Skype
• JIRA
• Trello
• Asana
• Slack

• Website: FreeeUp.com
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/freeeup
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/freeeupcom/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/OnlineHiringMastermind

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Aaron Walker is, without question, a veteran entrepreneur. Starting his first business at 18 and selling to a Fortune 500 company nine short years later demonstrates Aaron's passion for succeeding. Unwilling to rest on past success Aaron started, bought and sold eight successful companies over the past 37 years. Having a strong desire for personal development has kept Aaron in a weekly mastermind group for more than a decade with Dave Ramsey, Dan Miller, Ken Abraham and seven other notable Nashvillians. Aaron has enjoyed a 36-year marriage with his beautiful wife, Robin. Today Aaron spends the majority of his time HELPING MEN GROW IN SUCCESS AND SIGNIFICANCE as President and Founder of VIEW FROM THE TOP, a premier life and business coaching resource. Aaron's new book, View From The Top is guaranteed to motivate and inspire you to live a successful and significant life.

• Aaron loves to create things. He loves to grow things. He loves to figure out what is going to make it stick and go.
• At 13 years old, Aaron started working for his Dad who has a construction company. They remodeled the pawn shop in Nashville, Tennessee. Aaron fell in love with the business. And at 15 years old, he is sure of himself that it is what he wanted to do for a living.
• He met some friends in school who has a lot of money. He encouraged them to open a pawn shop and they did. He was 18 years old then. He worked day and night in the pawn shop. When he was 21 years old, he was able to pay off a $150,000 loan. He continued the pawn shop and opened 4 other stores.
• At 27 years old, a Fortune 500 company in Texas came knocking on his door and made him an offer he cannot refuse. He sold his pawn shop business.
• 18 months later, Robin, Aaron's lovely wife, urged him to get a job or start another business. So, he bought back the pawnshop he was working for way back when he was 13 years old. He spent another 10 years rebuilding it. He rebuilt it four times the size it was when he bought it.
• In the midst of their success, Aaron's family lived in $18,000 a year for nine years. He put his money back into his company. He learned to delay gratification.
• August 1, 2001, at 41 years old, Aaron's life came to a screech and halt. He was heading to his office when he ran over a pedestrian crossing the street. He killed the pedestrian.
• The incident made Aaron sell the business and retired for the second time. And in the next 5 years, Aaron's family traveled, change location, and built a new house.
• God gave him the grace to deal with the past and overcome it. Again, with the urging of Robin, Aaron opened a construction company. He built high-end residences and small commercial buildings. They were able to build $500,000 to $2M houses. They did it for the next nine years. They took the business to number 1 for 3 consecutive years.
• With his successes, Aaron decided to retire when he turned 50 and he did.
• However, his fellow in the mastermind group told him "You are too young to quit. You need to teach other people!"
• So, his fellow taught him into coaching. Not long after, Aaron launched his business View from the Top. He coaches men nationally and internationally. He has 8 mastermind groups that he facilitates. He has a community wherein men from all over the world participated in.
• He works Monday to Thursday. His day off are Friday to Sunday. He has employees. He also has virtual assistants.
• Aaron's book View From The Top is available at Amazon.
• He is giving away 3 documents to this podcast listeners. These are: 1. Personal Assessment - where you can look deep into your identity, ideals, values, and career 2. Productive Day - helps you understand how to live and get the things you want 3. What Do I Want? - helps you know what would you do with your life tomorrow
• To get the documents, visit viewfromthetop.com/ron. Aaron hopes his giveaway would help you live a more successful and significant life.

• When you have responsibilities at home, the worst thing you could do is give up and quit. Because that would cause more stress in your life. Aaron recommends these:
  • 1. Read Brian P. Moran's book The 12 Week Year. It focuses more on the task you will do every day for 12 weeks. It teaches you to focus on the goal and the dream, not on the task.
  • 2. Read the book Essentialism The Disciplined Pursuit of Less of Greg McKeown. The way of Essentialism is to focus on 1 or 2 things and make a plan. Every day you need to work on your plan for 2 hours.
  • 3. Read the book Deep Work by Cal Newport. It teaches you to quit doing the shallow work and get in there and do the deep work.
  • 4. Only read a couple of books at a time to avoid information overload. If you do repetitive things, day in and day out and you focus on 1 or 2 things, a harvest will come that you would not be able to take in.
• You cannot multi-task because you cannot give 100% to two things.
  • 1. Give your 100% focus on one thing at a time.
  • 2. If you want to get a lot done, turn off all your devices and notifications. Have focus blocks on your time.
  • 3. Lock inside a hotel room and plan for the next quarter. Write what you want to do every single day for the next quarter.
• Prioritize your priorities. You've got to put the big rocks in first - the things that really matters. Then keep focused on what matters every day.
• Get rid of the people with a fixed mindset. Instead, develop a growth mindset, that is, with enough training, education, discipline, and instruction, you can get your plans done.

• "Happiness is a choice, not a trait."
• "Every day I decide, 'Today is the day I'm going to be happy!'"
• "No amount of money will ever keep you anywhere."
• "You'll be happy unless you are meeting your purpose, your desires, and the things that you would want to do."
• "CAN'T could not do it, but COULD do it all!"
• "Don't just do what did not work. But do more of what does work."
• "Fear missing the opportunity more than you fear failure."
• "You can't let other people steal your dream."
• "Failure is in not trying, not in succeeding."
• "Go out there and go forth. You can't just let other people hold you down."
• "Procrastination is your biggest enemy."
• "It is not about information. It is about execution."
• "If you don't write it down, it is just a dream."
• "If you don't plan your day, somebody else will plan it for you."
• "You've got to have a plan to implement your strategies."
• "You've got to know what you want."
• "If you do the redundancy day in and day out, it will energize your body mentality, and you're going to win."

• Website: http://www.viewfromthetop.com/

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Scott and Hunter are the co-creators of MyCostPro. Scott has been a part time eBay reseller for the last 17 years. Hunter is a software engineer with 13 years of application development experience. Together they developed MyCostPro, an eBay Certified app for Excel that connects to your seller account, downloads your sales, automates reporting, and generally makes seller's lives easier.

• Scott and Hunter went to college together. They have worked on the same job in an Electronic Boutique in the mall selling video games.
• Now, they both have separate full-time jobs. Scott is a Business major and works in a corporate world. While Hunter is a programmer for 13 years.
• Scott sold spreadsheets. He used to give manually his customers a spreadsheet when they purchased from him. At one point, Scott asked Hunter if it could be automated. Hunter is an application developer but never did a website development. It was a challenge to Hunter to learn it on. They set up a server to distribute Scott's old spreadsheets. At the same time, they worked on a new spreadsheet. That is how the MyCostPro came about.
• Since they have different backgrounds, they do separate jobs in MyCostPro. Scott does the website stuff that he is capable of. While Hunter does all the technical stuff.
• Hunter treats Scott as a customer. Scott would come to him with technical requirements and Hunter make this happen.
• Scott has a YouTube channel for basic excel tutorials. He has 2400 subscribers.
• MyCostPro runs on an excel framework. With the click of a button, it will download up to the last 90 days of your sale. It gets everything from the item description, the sale date and price, the shipping cost, customer information, etc...You can also relist your items from there. It can keep your email list up to date.
• Here are some Cool Features of MyCostPro: 1. It can extract your Profit/Loss performance. 2. It can extract a Product Master List where you can list all the products that sell and its cost. For sellers who sells the same thing, you can put the cost at one time. 3. It can import an unsold item and re-list it on eBay. 4. It can edit the current quantities in bulk.
• Every feature that they put in the sheet is borne out of the desire to make the lives of eBay sellers easier. With an automated data recording, sellers would have more time to spend on sourcing, selling and helping their customers.
• Scott and Hunter get more new ideas as they continue to interact with their customers. With this, they promise to add more features to make things more efficient and better for them.
• Their spreadsheet works on all eBay platforms. They have customers in Australia, Singapore, Portugal, UK, and all around the world.
• If you can figure out how to open an excel and paste the download code, then you can manage the whole MyCostPro thing. Because it is pretty much a "point and click" thing.
• Their website has video tutorials to guide you through. They have forms where people can comment or ask questions on technical challenges. People can also call or email them directly.
• Go to their site, MyCostPro.com/download and review the features before you make a purchase. They set up a coupon code for this podcast listeners to get a 14-day FREE trial. To get the 14-day FREE trial, type in the Ron and Ali in the download code. If you don't like it, you can cancel it and you won't be charged anything.
• They might integrate their product to Etsy and Amazon. But right now, they focus more on adding features on eBay.
• They want to see that their customer base will grow. They rely on the word of mouth of their present customers. And they hope their 14-day FREE Trial will push their product a lot.

• 1. Make sure you know your profit margins so you would not waste time selling and not making money.
• 2. Focus your efforts on something that would make you the profit margin for the amount of time you spend on it.
• 3. You need to understand your high-margin products so you can focus more time on selling this stuff.

• "It is important to get people started. Show people how to do basic things to make them comfortable."
• "It is great to learn new things, have fun, and see results in a matter of months!"
• "In any business you are doing, you need to understand how much money you are making."
• "The very basic of any business is: You need to make money!"
• "It is not so much on what you like to sell, but it is what making you the most money that you need to focus on."
• "There is something about working for yourself. You can work so much harder and work for yourself, but feel so much more rewarded for the time."

• Website: https://mycostpro.com
• Email: [email protected]

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