Hi, my name is Walt. I’m an auctioneer with 25 years of experience in the auction business and licensed in the state of MA. I own Quick Auction Service, a company that specializes in building and running custom auctions, I’m also the webmaster of my own site and have been on eBay for 8 years. Besides eBay, the types of auctions I run most frequently are antiques and on-site estate auctions, although I’ve run everything from business overstock auctions to charity & special event auctions.

I enjoy sharing my knowledge and stories of the auction business. My goal for article is to help folks get the absolute most out of their auction experience.

Whether your fresh out of the package or a seasoned dealer I think I can offer something in this article to help you with your auciton adventures.

There may be as many reasons to attend auctions as there are types of auctions to attend. Maybe you want to attend an auction to buy items for re-sale on eBay, or some other market. Maybe you want to furnish your home with wonderful antiques, or you want to furnish your home as inexpensively without sacrificing quality.Some folks are just looking for a fun night out. With a little perseverance all these things are possible.

There are antiques and estate auctions, auto auctions, overstock auctions, absolute and no reserve auctions, real estate auctions, specialty auctions where only one genre of items are sold, tailgate auctions, live auctions, online auctions, sealed bid auctions, silent auctions, charity and fund raising auctions and many more.

Can you really buy for pennies on the dollar at an auction? You bet! Many times I’ve seen folks buy and re-sell at the same auction on the same night for a good profit, although be advised, this should only be done after the auction is over.

There are a lot of ways to find an auction, but here are some tips on how to find and attend the best ones.

Visit the genre of shops in the area that apply to the type of auction you want to attend. IE: If your looking for a good antique auction to attend, stop in the local antiques shops and ask for what there are for good auctions in the area. Sounds obvious right? But listen to what they don’t say as well as what they do say. Oftentimes when a dealer speaks poorly about an auction he or she attends, it may be likely that they are trying to keep a good thing secret. Think for a moment, why would a dealer keep attending a lousy auction?

Newspaper ads: I personally like to find ads in the classified ad section rather than flashy display ads. Flashy ads are usually indicative of an auction that will be high priced, may have reserves, (a set price on an item), and usually an enormous crowd. While any auction can be profitable to attend, it is usually best to steer clear of the glitzy ones, at least for the beginner.

Here’s the minimum you want to find out before you go. If there is a phone number in the ad, call and ask for the terms of the sale. What forms of payment do they accept? Is it an absolute auction? An absolute auction is one that has no minimum or reserve bids on items. These are the best auctions to attend! Is there a buyers premium? A buyers premium is like a tax that everyone who makes purchases at that auction must pay above the winning bid price. Most auctions these days do charge a buyers premium, 10% is not unreasonable but I feel much more than that is greedy, and the auctioneer that charges over 10% is counting on most bidders not doing the extra math as the bids quicken in pace.

A fair auction will have ample time to inspect the merchandise, usually at least 2 or 3 hours. Find out when inspection starts and make sure to attend! Never attend an auction if you can’t make the inspection, not unless your prepared to gamble. Most auctioneers sell at a rate of about 100 items per hour, which is why they sell “as is”. They simply don’t have the time to give a detailed description of all the items. Since almost all items at auction are sold AS IS, there are sure to be some damaged, refinished, fake and incomplete items at any given auction. Beware of any auctions that offer very little or no inspection time.

Good auctions will usually have 150 to 400 lots. A lot may be one item or a group of items. The exception to this are specialty auctions, auto auctions, real estate auctions etc.

When you attend your first sale, take note of the 1/2 dozen or so dealers that buy the most often. See if you can find out about other area auctions they attend.

When you do find an excellent auction, attend it as often as possible. By frequenting good sales, you help increase the bottom line of that business. It’s difficult for many auctioneers to keep the quality of merchandise consistent, so good attendance certainly helps. And when an auctioneer gets to know you as a buyer, he/she will go out of the way to accommodate you, to keep you coming back.

Millions of people across the world desire to work for themselves from home. Some of us want to be our own boss because of the flexibility we can gain as a result of working for ourselves. Others are very much attracted to making extra money or more money than what they earn from the 9am – 5 pm normal job, while working for lesser hours. The cost of setting up an offline business can be mind-blowing and breath-taking as compare to setting up an internet affiliate marketing business and an online home business. Only few people can really distinguish the differences cost while.Many people, who do not understand starting an online business or an online home base business involves lesser cost than starting any offline business, are very scared of starting one. Internet affiliate business and home base businesses are increasingly becoming very popular since most people have now realising that the cost for setting up one is minimal or can even cost nothing at all than they ever have thought of. This has led to the increasing rise of internet affiliate marketing business and other online home base businesses. As a result of this rise, this has fetched a fortune to many people. It is now a booming business, yet the market is just too young than you would think.Now the basic essentials for setting up your own home base business are, a computer with an internet connection, a mobile phone or home phone, and a little space in your bedroom or sitting room. Some people will even work sometimes with their top on their bed in their bedroom. Only your laptop with an internet connection will make a complete office for setting up a very big business from home.Affiliate marketing is a big business as it can provides anyone the opportunity of selling products and services to millions of people across the world via the internet. It is a very lucrative business if it is done properly.The starting point is to pick the kind of market, (that is product or services you would be interested in promoting). Ask yourself, is the product or services you have picked a hungry market? Are there many people out there who will be interested in that kind of product / services? If the answer is yes, then you have landed yourself a business and an opportunity to make some good money. If the answer is no, you must not continue with that product or service because that will not make you money. That means you have to research other markets in order to find a hot niche market that will sell like a hot cake or candies.The next thing is to evaluate your skills. Do I have the skill that is required to become successful as an online affiliate marketer, or a home base business owner? If the answer is no, then you have to learn and acquire that knowledge. Like said earlier, it is a very lucrative business / industry, and for that reason it is worth acquiring the right skills for becoming successful.There are ten thousands of already made products ready for anyone to promote them and earn commissions. Hope you have heard of Amazon and eBay affiliate programs, though as a matter of fact the earnings is not much to writing home as compare to some great affiliate networks out there.All the hard work in producing the product has all being done for you. All you have to do is promote, earn commissions and enjoy your life at home with friends and family. Choosing the right niche is the key to succeeding in your new business. Imagine promoting a hot product that pays out $45 per sale. $45 x 500 sales per month will fetch you a fortune of a whopping $22,500 in just one month. There are supper affiliate marketers who will make more than 500 sales in just one day. I know you will doubt this fact but I am going to prove this in just 2 simple ways out of several.The best way of running a sustainable and profitable internet affiliate marketing business or online home base business is by using social media and building a great list. There are some people who have up to 200,000 to 500,000 and even more than 1 million followers on twitter alone. Let us say they intend to promote a product that is paying out a $45 commission per sale. Again, let us say they tweet this product to their 1 million followers and only 1% percent of the followers choose to buy from their affiliate link. That affiliate just made $450,000 from just one tweet (1,000,000 followers x 1% followers buyers = 10,000 followers buyers x $45 commission per sale = $450,000 for tweeting that one particular product). That is a whopping $450,000 and can happen in a day.There are lots of online marketers with an email marketing list of more than 500,000 to more than a million subscribers. You compare that list to the twitter marketing illustration I discussed earlier above and decide for yourself why it is worth to set up an internet affiliate business and an online home base business. Also see for yourself why millions of people across the world are diving into the online industry. This reason has led to the increasing rise of millions of people setting up an internet affiliate marketing Business and an online Home Base Business.

Online ads, pay per click, affiliate marketing, advertising in Facebook, banners… there are several old and new methods of advertising online that has emerged in the internet today. There are some who are also advertising their advertising services all throughout the web and promising that they can give good traffic in no time. Internet marketing experts even disagree on what is the best online advertising available now.

Online advertising has become attractive to business owners, as most of these advertising methods are cheaper compared to the usual print or billboard advertising. Advertising online also allows you to deal with targeted traffic – or individuals online who are most likely interested in your business, thus it has greater chances of getting reliable results when it comes to advertising.

There may be varying opinions about what is the best online advertising available today. Internet marketing experts may have their own reasons for naming one online marketing method to be better than the other. Say if you want an advertising that will work for you long term, you can choose article marketing. If you want fast and quick results, search engine optimization may be on top of the list, or if you want cheaper and quicker results, you can also make use of pay per click advertising and if free advertising falls in your best online advertising category, there are lots to choose from. You can indeed make many choices, considering also your goals and preferences.

Below are some suggestions on how to promote your products online. It is important to remember though that these advertising methods, like any other best online advertising methods available, is focused on bringing targeted traffic to your site which is essential in internet marketing. The job of converting this traffic into sales still lies in your strategy to draw potential customers into purchasing your product or service and not just visit your site.

1. Search engine optimization (SEO) and Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
2. Pay per click marketing (PPC)
3. Article Marketing
4. Affiliate Marketing
5. Banner Advertising
6. Free advertising on social networking sites (Facebook, MySpace)
7. Forums
8. Link Exchange
9. E-mail advertising
10. Online classified advertising

SEO experts would probably argue that advertising on search engines is the best way to advertise online, thus would recommend search engine optimization or search engine marketing. Indeed, advertising in search engines is one good way to make your business visible to the online world, as these are the major tools in the internet. You can also choose to advertise in other websites by using pay per click, banner advertising and some free services like the social networking sites and forums. E-mail marketing and article marketing are also good options in advertising online. To get the most out of the various advertising methods in the internet, you can even do more than one of these methods, which for sure, will bring the best results you are looking for.

As previously mentioned, the best online advertising is not just about traffic. You also need to have good landing pages and an attractive website to convert these traffic into sales.