Posts Tagged ‘website’
Mondayitis Hyaitus
Welcome to another edition of Mondayitis, it’s not actually Mondayitis today as I’m having a little break from it today. I hope my reasons are good enough.
Sharp eyed viewers will have noticed some changes in the categories on the right hand side. I’ve delisted all the books as they’re all leaving the premises. I took advantage of the Brotherhood of St Laurence’s 1300 donate number and had them pick up 25 boxes of books last Friday, today I took another seven boxes down to a small op shop in Oakleigh and tomorrow I’ll sort out as many as I have time for and take them to one or more unspecified op shops on my way out to pick up some stuff for a market on Saturday. My books have been whittled down and with a little more judicious whittling tomorrow they will be no more.
It’s been an interesting time going through the books. I’ve found I have quite a few books I don’t remember seeing before so I’ve obviously had them a while, some of them are really interesting so they’re being added to my To Be Read pile and then find a new home for it somewhere. I’m really tempted to put a few into BookCrossing just for the fun of it. It does take time and last week I also went into supermarkets and did taste testing for people of this Ginger Ale I’m selling, I only did two supermarkets and it was fun but it takes time.
I still have the part-work magazines and a handful of books or other magazines in related categories. I’ll continue selling these as I have some passion for them, some people think passion is important in selling.
I still have friends in the pre-loved book business so if you’re looking for something just send me a mail or leave a comment on one of the pages here, I check all comments individually and will be able to pass your request on.
There must be a problem. I finished a book and have started two others but haven’t managed to finish either of them yet. One if the Life of Pi by Yann Martel, this is problematic. Having started it I put it down and on coming back to it later that day I couldn’t remember anything about the book or the introduction or anything so I’ve put it down again and will come back to it in a few days. It looks like I need a break from reading.
Which brings me back to Mondayitis. It’s challenging to write something when I haven’t been able to read and find something to write about. So, here’s looking forward to next week when things may be different! Cheers!
Forgot to tell you…
I’ve got a head like a sieve at the moment. I turn around to do something and completely forget to what I’m going to do, open up a web page and forget why I’m there. I went to cook potatoes the other day, 20 minutes later I figured I should check if they were burnt as I hadn’t been back to turn them down, there was no possibility of them burning as I’d forgotten to turn on the gas, I had put water in though.
Anyway, what I wanted to tell you about but forgot is my new method of telling people the condition of the book. It’s an idea I had when I was at a conference a few weeks ago, the presentation was on webinars and the idea just sprang out at me so I wrote it down and started implementing it this week. I still type up the details in the body of the description and provide a photo (mostly) but I’ve also started recording videos. This is the first one I did, personally I think it’s a little long but this one is awkward as it only shows one folder out of five.
Why did I do this?
Mostly because I’m a little bit mad, I must be to give myself extra work like this. I won’t be doing it for absolutely every book or magazine as it’s far too labour intensive but I will endeavour to include one for every book over $30.
If you like my dulcet tones then you can hop over to my Youtube Channel for more. Can’t think why you’d want that but I don’t like my voice, it’s totally unsexy. I do have people who’ll happily listen to me talk, people I don’t pay.
There you go, something new for you.
Backs are important
Backs are sort of important, they’re the cornerstone of your whole body and when things go wrong with them then you’re in trouble. I have an uncomfortable relationship with my back and see the physio regularly for a tune up.
Just wondering
The last six months or so I’ve been wondering how much longer I’d be able to continue with the books and I’ve tried to minimize the number of books I buy and maximize the number I sell in an effort to reduce my stock and this has worked to a small extent but I still have a lot of books and at the rate I’m selling I have enough stock for at least 20 years without actually buying any more. The problem is my back and with the amount of trouble I’ve had in the past few weeks I’m thinking I really need to stop trying to earn money by selling something heavy which aggravates the whole back thing.
I have been anticipating this as while I only admit to being 18 I do realise I’m not and am feeling the effects of age, I started the process of repositioning my blog to try and make money with other means, you will have noticed the recent competition. I’m also attempting to sell my proofreading and writing skills, hopefully a part time job will be on the horizon as well as other income streams. I’m hoping something will work.
I was very careful, took all my pain meds and did so little around the house and I was given clearance to do the market only two days prior on the understanding other people help me with the boxes. I was worried my physio might tell me I have to stop lifting boxes of books completely. I thought I might be forced to get rid of them all very quickly, thank goodness everything I didn’t do paid dividends and I am back to my normal aches and pains.
How do I feel about this?
Mostly relieved, I am getting very sick of having books all around, there are so many boxes and I’d really like to tidy up and move on. There is a little regret as some of my books are worth quite a bit and I’d hate to give them away but if I keep any part of the selling I will slip back into having lots of books so I’m developing a clear plan to get rid of all of the books I have to sell and only keeping the ones I want to keep or read. That will still be far too many and will add a couple of boxes to my already groaning shelves but I will be getting rid of books as I read them and will be focussed on not keeping them unless they’re ones I want to read again. Having said that I am finding it problematic to find a buyer for the part-work magazines and as I don’t want to just give them away to an op shop who might not see the value in them and send them for pulping I have decided to keep them going for the time being. I guarantee it will be interesting continuing to look for part-work magazines and the few books I want to flesh out my collections while not buying other books to sell.
How can you help?
Go through the stock listed on the website, buy what you want and then email me your list of wanted books as I have at least a thousand books still uncatalogued, I will give you a good price and reduce postage if I can. By this time next year I anticipate being totally clear of books to sell.
What am I resigning from?
Just selling books. I still plan on writing the blog, Mondayitis will continue and Squid Ink will continue for as long as he is capable. I will be continuing to bug people on Twitter but I’m not certain about the Facebook page, it does have a cool name, I Like Books is awesome but people don’t really seem to be as interested in it and while I’ll be diverging a little most of my focus will remain on books.
Freedom
This will give me the freedom to speak on a wider range of topics so you will read more about current affairs and my thoughts on them. Until now I’ve felt I really had to focus mainly on books and bookish related topics.
Yet more…
I’ve been talking recently about the problems I’ve had with the discount voucher and other things and how I just couldn’t seem to get them working. Thanks to a wonderful anonymous person in the community on my shopping cart plugin I’ve now got the important codes working and to celebrate you should be able to put mazaltov into the promo code section of Checkout to receive a 15% discount. I’ve extended this until 31st July. I’ve also managed to get the postal charges working and you should now receive a correct quote for the postal charges, well, correct for a given value of correct as I now need to update all the weights on every listing so until I manage to do that you’re likely to get a vast discount on postage. Why not take advantage of this and buy your favourite books?
As you know I’ve been studying too many things at once and have been finding it more than challenging to keep up with everything. Last Tuesday it was midmorning when I suddenly remembered I hadn’t scheduled Mondayitis, I went on strike with my writing and am going back to normal as of today. I’d just had enough and needed a short break, fortunately or unfortunately depending on your point of view, I now have more books to review and as I’d really like to delve down to the bottom of the piles and find my desk I’m going to review them fairly regularly until I get there. The good news is that I’ve finished all my studying and I’m trying very hard not to pick up anything more for at least two months to give me some time to catch up and find my desk underneath all these books and magazines.
There’s a common theme there and it might have something to do with finding my desk, it’s improved a little this weekend, I now have my scales sitting on an empty part of the desk. Enough of me for today, tomorrow is Mondayitis by someone I consider very special, tune in tomorrow to find out who.
Upgrades and updates and stuff
Earlier this month I posted about the problems I’d been having with my discount code and the set backs I’d received in trying to fix them. I talked about needing to upgrade plugins and as part of the process needing to do a backup. Things have moved on, I’ve solved my backup problems, there were only three, and backups now work like a charm. I’ve upgraded WordPress and have been working through upgrading the plugins which includes the all-important shopping cart, this last is proving intransigent and I’ve had to ask for help again. It looks like it’s working until you try to put in your postcode to get a quote for postage at which point you can send out a search party to no avail, it just ain’t there. I put my request for help in on Saturday night and will now have to wait until Monday morning US time to even find out where I am in the queue. I’m sure it’ll only take them five minutes and then I’ll be able to check everything out before moving back to the problem of the discount codes. With the magic of the internet I’m able to add in an update here before I even publish! They replied by Sunday morning my time and that little problem is fixed! Now I’m moving on to another problem and I’ve had to ask for help again, I’m hoping it’s a simple fix but it seems I need an API Key for the AusPost plugin before it’ll work. It’s been quite a saga and I’m not going to write it up.
I’ve been working far too hard on so many things outside this business that on Friday I completely forgot to scribble a few words for publication. The good news is that in the past two weeks I’ve successfully passed two deadlines and after the last lot of deadlines this week I will have less pressure so will be working hard on my writing and listing books for sale both here and on eBay. I will have finished all my study and will be resisting everyone’s attempts to get me into any further study for at least a couple of months.
Sisters can be very persuasive. My eldest one has talked me into setting up a stall with her at some markets during the year. I was never going to do another one but having company will make things easier and she is selling the best Ginger Ale so I’ll be able to have a lovely drink to inspire me. The first one we’re doing together is at Elwood on the 4th August. I’ll be bringing a selection of books and part-work magazines with the aim of selling at low prices, I don’t want to bring them home again. Might even wear my hat!
A fake post
I’m writing this on Friday night as I’m going to be at a conference almost all weekend, from Saturday night through to Monday night I probably won’t have time to turn on my computer so I’m scribbling a few words right now while I have a few moments.
Things have been interesting on the website front recently. If you’ve been trying to access it over the past couple of weeks you might have noticed it missing occasionally. I’m testing you out to see if you’re paying attention…actually, what’s really been happening is my webhost has been experiencing several different issues and they’ve had to take them up with their vendors to get them fixed. It must have been traumatic for them and I suspect some of the techies haven’t had much sleep.
A few weeks ago I announced my promotion to that of great-uncle, my first great-nephew was born and according to someone’s logic that makes me a great-uncle. I wanted people to help me celebrate this auspicious and very exciting occasion so I announced a discount until the 14th May, it wasn’t happening as there was a glitch with the voucher process and it just wouldn’t recognise it. I apologise to those hoping to grab a book or two at a discount and couldn’t make it work, my system doesn’t remember your details until after that process so I don’t know who you are. As these things always go, when you try to fix a problem there’s always one or more problems that need fixing before you can move ahead with this problem. In order to try and fix the discount vouchers I decided I’d better bite the bullet and upgrade my plugins etc but the first step of that is to get a good backup…I hit stalemate as I can’t download without problems. So the problem of the discount voucher was shelved while I tried to update various plugins on my website, but that was shelved as I couldn’t download all the files and be certain they were all here.
So here I sit, stuck. I’m asking for help on the download and hope to have some answers and a fix in a few days at which point I’ll then move back to the problem of the upgrades and then hopefully that will fix the discount voucher problem and I’ll announce the extending of the discount.
I hope everyone is at the end of a very good long weekend. I’m going to need a holiday to recover from mine. There’s only 12 streams to choose from at my conference! 12!!!!
I’m late, I’m late…
Not really, just trying desperately to catch up after the rush of Passover. I’m getting there with some things but others I’m still way behind. I’m meant to have finished module 8 of my current studies by last Saturday and I’m still part way through module 7. I have some special stuff coming this week. Tomorrow is a special Mondayitis (aren’t they all special?) then I have an idea for an article which some people might find familiar as it’s heavily based on a conversation I had on Twitter last week, after that is the regular Squid Ink. Friday may or may not happen. Part of my studies this weekend included doing a Powerpoint presentation and I chose to focus on a segment of the business, it looks like something that could be of interest, if I can figure out how to work that into an article I will. With all of that foreshadowed I must now go back to my studies and attempt to finish module 7. Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye and be grateful you can’t hear me singing.
Social Media
I’ve read a lot about business and I’ve been in a lot of forums, they all say my type of business is perfect for social media; I’m not about to disagree with them. I do happen to like talking and like telling people things but I’m supposed to be in the business of selling books. I currently have this blog which should bring readers in and hopefully have them spill out onto the right side of the page when they see the categories and explore, that’s the logic. I also talk on Twitter and have a Facebook page; while I also have a Google+ profile I haven’t done anything with that.
I’ve decided I’m going to change things somewhat. At present I have Twitter and the Facebook page set up so that anything I post on one goes straight through to other which means if you follow me on Twitter and like/friend me on Facebook you see the same thing twice. I’m going to change that. I’m going to separate them and use the Facebook page as an archive of interesting articles I want to read that may be of interest to others and to discuss points of grammar or interesting typos. Twitter will be used for connecting with people, should you feel you want longer conversations you can connect with me on Facebook or send me an email.
Apologies to those people who’ve been seeing the same thing multiple times. It will change. I’m afraid I won’t change, I’ll still talk a lot.
Respice, adspice, prospice
This is the time of year when everyone writes a retrospective post and talks about what they’ve done and haven’t done and what they still have to do. Maybe I should write this and maybe I shouldn’t. I’m starting this fairly late on Tuesday night after some rather hot weather during which we didn’t sleep much so I’m prepared to bet I won’t finish it and get it ready for published by the appointed time of 10:15am Wednesday morning.
This year has been rather tumultuous for me. It’s included working the Census, going to blogging conferences and talking to people about starting a twitter chat using my other ID and that’s been going fairly well. I finished my Year 12 English Literature class and passed it, did a three week driving tour of NZ with the OH and read countless books. I have actually stopped reading two books halfway as they just weren’t what I was looking for in a book.
I’ve joined a Fructose Malabsorbent group on Facebook and learnt so much more about food than I ever wanted to know. The class I’ve been wanting to attend for 10 years finally started with the best teacher and a wonderful system, it shouldn’t take more than a few minutes a day to do my homework, says she hopefully.
Anyway, that’s enough for the past, it’s onwards and upwards for the future! With the new website now well underway and a deeper understanding of how these things tick I’m planning to deal with the self increasing boxes of books in the house, I’ve already started, some are going up on the website, others on eBay while others are going straight back to the op shop. I look at these boxes and wonder why I bought some of these books, maybe it was to read and maybe to sell but I seriously don’t remember which. I’m going to work my way through my house, garden and website cleaning and revamping.
As for the wider book community? It’s going to be an interesting time. Some of the Borders and Angus & Robertson stores have been taken over by other book stores, the fittings are rather familiar to your average Borders shopper, the books are remainders.
Do you drop ship?
One common question I’ve had has been “do you really have your books on hand”? The short answer is, yes, I most certainly do. I take individual photos of each book/magazine/part-work as opposed to taking scans of them on my scanner as you can see whether the book is damaged or not. I do my best to take the best photo ensuring there is a bit of space around the book so you can see if there is damage, you should be able to zoom in and see any problem areas, if you’re still uncertain I describe the physical damage and if that’s not enough you can always email me and I can send more photos or if you’d really prefer, I do answer the phone on most occasions. Until recently I was surgically attached to my mobile I am trying to cut the apron strings. I could scan them now as in my new location the scanner is right behind me, but I won’t as I believe photos are best for my buyers.
Back to the original question. I don’t drop ship, the book is physically on the premises and I’ve handled it every step of the way. The photo is original and is of the book being listed.