The Garage Sale Queen strikes gold again!
Hugh Tafel
Business Coach | I help aspiring & established business coaches close all the high-ticket clients they can handle in less than 90 days via our proven turnkey system | Free 12 min Video Explains How ??
May 6, 2024 Canmore, Alberta
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“Help! Can you get out here? Water is drenching everything!”
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Every spring, my wife likes to put on a garage sale. Being the “muscle” in the family, I get to move all the heavy stuff. Needless to say, I am never a big fan of the event for that reason.
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To make matters challenging, winter had returned at the beginning of the week – bringing fresh snow to the valley floor – for 3 straight days. Skiers were celebrating.
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But the forecast for the first day of the sale promised to be a “balmy” 50 F, with sunny skies. So on with the sale.
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My role, after moving heavy objects, is to disappear lest I accept all the low bids for our stuff. Since we have been away for a few months, that was fine with me. I had plenty of work projects to catch up on.
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All was going according to plan when I was suddenly interrupted by a call for help. Water was flowing unceasingly, over the eavestrough, onto the driveway – soaking everything my wife had placed there.
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It took only a few seconds to realize that the downpipe was blocked and thus water from all the melting snow on the roof was escaping over the wrong end.
Now I had to quickly shift roles from marketing strategist to eavestrough expert. Grabbing a ladder from the back and some old gloves, I was able to unblock the eaves where it was supposed to flow and prevent a “catastrophe” on the smooth operation of the garage sale in process.
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To say it was a cold, wet process is an understatement.?
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This incident does recall, however, two business principles.
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The first is the matter of managing one’s time or – how to prioritize it. All too often, we get confused with being busy to being productive. Furthermore, it is very easy to get distracted. Vendors, promoters, family, and employees – everyone wants a piece of your time, which if you let them, prevents you from doing what is important.
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What is important??
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All those tasks that if you do them consistently and regularly, gets you to your goal(s) – whatever that is. And these important tasks are rarely urgent.
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Basically, you can break down all activity you do, or need to do into 4 categories.
Number 2 is usually where those tasks that will get you to your goals reside. And all too often these are the ones that get neglected or moved to another day.
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My wife’s call for help was important and urgent. You always need to respond to these.
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All the others – you should do your best to avoid and ignore.
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The second lesson is marketing 101.
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If you want to succeed at selling, you need to tap into a relevant traffic stream. Online, off-line – doesn’t matter.
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My wife’s success at garage sales is a good example.
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She decided last minute to run it, based on an improved weather forecast. This meant that she hadn’t been able to get an ad into the weekly paper and social media posts were made the night before.
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Yet she has still managed to sell several thousand dollars’ worth of stuff. Which is huge in the garage sale world.
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How?
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One word – signage – in appropriate places.
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She uses old real estate sandwich signs, covers them with coloured paper and writes “garage sale”, “yard-sale” or “moving sale” in large letters with a directional arrow. These are then placed at strategic points radiating out from our house to where a lot a traffic flows to and from downtown.?
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I am constantly amazed at how well this works. People take spur of the moment decisions to check out the sale – because, who knows what kind of deal might be lying in wait for them.?
This is a good lesson for you?
as business owners. If you want to increase sales – make sure your promotions get in front of the right audience using the right medium to maximize numbers.?
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Until next week,?
Stay healthy and focus on profit!?
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?- Hugh? The “Profit Accelerator” Expert
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P.S.?Do you have a burning question, challenge or business issue you’d like an answer to? Look no further.?Click here and ask me anything you’d like, and I’ll get back to within 24 hours – no cost to you.?
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