Wednesday 27 April 2011

Book Money keeps rolling in.......

From sales of my own books:

Payment made to: ROCK HARD BOOKS(ROCFZ)


Our Supplier No.: 11910749

Paid to bank: Hidden for security

Paid to account: Hidden for security

Payment number: 1343784

Payment date: 26-APR-2011

Payment currency: GBP

Payment amount: 18.22

Hey Mr Postman!


   With hours of 8.45am to 1.45pm, and wages of £8.08 per hour, being a Postman is definitely something which could fit into the System.

Monday 18 April 2011

Amazon Analysis



  Here are some stats regarding my last 50 sales on Amazon:

  • 46% Non Fiction
  • 24% Fiction
  • 14% Music
  • 8% Kids
  • 6% DVD
  • 2% Computer Games

   The above figures don't mean anything, until you figure in the fact that my inventory is at least two thirds Fiction. Also note that Music is a loser - I challenge anyone to turn a profit selling CD's on Amazon. The DVD's and Computer Games were house clearout stock.

   To sum up, if you want to make money on Amazon, list Non-Fiction.

Best Amazon Week So Far

Dear ross.taylor1@tesco.net,

We initiated a transfer to your checking account (last three digits 484) of £107.15 on 18/04/2011.

Sunday 17 April 2011

Nice Betfair Session Yesterday.

   Yesterday went more to plan on the Betfair front. £76 profit over the course of the day - with no sweats. I only wish every day could go so smoothly.

Thursday 14 April 2011

Even more walking



I missed the obvious walking money-earner off - LEAFLETS.

A quick Gumtree ad last year created over £1000 worth of business. The other beauty of leaflets is that the business can be farmed out, and the work can be completed at any time (within reason).

The System - Walking

   The whole idea of my system is that you have lots of little jobs that can be either:

1) Done early in the morning and forgotten about (book writing, betfair trading, amazon).
2) Fitted in whenever (Shiply)
3) Laid off to another family member (for example, the Newsagent doesn't bother if your Mum turns up to do the paper round).

   By having tasks like these you should see a lot of free time open up during the week, where a big fat 50hour soul crusher used to sit. My main aim to fill this gap would be to do things which increase your "quality of life" - quiet time, time with the family, day trips, fun.

   Being enterprisingly minded I would want to add regular walking to my timetable. These walks would comprise:

  • Youtube videos about your hillwalking exploits. At the bottom of each Youtube page you'd have a link through to your website promoting guided walks. I want to be the new Tom Weir.
  • Dog Walking. Lob an ad on Gumtree. Even if you only walk one dog a month, it's still gravy as you'd be out and about anyway.

More to "The System"

   Here are some more things that need to be included in "The System":

1) Writing Books - as you will see from my earlier posts, I feel it is important to include some Book writing in the System. By taking just 15 minutes per day, you could churn out a quiz book every fortnight.

2) Amazon reviews - I am convinced that sales of my own books go up the more reviews of other books that I do. This guess is backed up by some of the literature around the subject. Doing an Amazon review of a relevant title and a Listmania everyday would keep you ticking along.

3) In order to do relevant Reviews etc, you'd need to keep reading books so that you have something to talk about. Everyone knows tha reading is the best way to switch off in the evening as well. As part of the System, I'd make the last half hour of each day reading time.

It's a bit nippy outside

Poundlines back to life - £2.50 for a £1 item

   After a brief rest, I listed some Poundland stock on Ebay again last week. As before the emergency blanket sold again (Buy at 2 for a pound - sell at 99p + postage).

   A new seller was 150 water balloons for £1. This sounds like a lot, but in reality, 150 are less than a handfull.

   After a while you could build up a nice little sideline on things like this.

Tuesday 12 April 2011

Tess Daly

What a bloody good looking woman.

You've gotta have a system

   I've mentioned things like this before, but I'm really keen on systemising my work so that it can be repeated daily, and possibly be repeated by someone other than myself (i.e. a Virtual Assistant).

   Here are some of the things I'd put into the system:

1) An hour's worth of comping every day. (Small profits - estimate £10 per week on average - but huge potential returns every now and again).

2) Write a letter to all the national papers. There is ways to hide the fact that you are sending the same letter to all the papers (other than BCC). Once tyou get in the swing of things this would take literally 5 mins a day (Small profits - estimate £10 per week).

3) Ebay - if I could get Ebay right then this would be a big part of "The System". The way I see it, you'd go online every morning to see what sold between £30 and £120 (Tim Ferris pricing) in the previous day. Using Aliexpress you'd then search for Gold Suppliers (very important - see previous posts) who will dropship such items for you at a profitable level. You then list. If the item sells, then you note and continue selling that item again the next day. If the the item doesn't sell, you go back to square one and try again. Eventually you will have a notebook full of items which will sell from time to time.

4) Amazon - I'm beginning to think that Amazon is the easiest Money Spinner of them all. Yet again I've went out and bought a joblot for pennies (I don't pay more than 5p per book), only to then see my investment paid back within days. If you lived in a property with a double garage, you could easily house 4000+ books - as many as a small shop. My recommendations would be to watch your weights, and to buy Non-Fiction. I'm sure I'll come back to these points in the future.

5) Betfair - I've fucked up Betfair at the moment, which has caused me a crisis in confidence this year so far. I must remember though that I am well up overall. As part of the system I'd suggest a daily "Guaranteed" profit bet. Of course, nothing is guaranteed, but everyday there is something akin to it available. For example, Arsenal 3-1 up at Blackpool with two mins to go. These sort of bets are 1/100 shots. The first rule of Betfair is to never lose money.

6) Martingale - I'm only throwing this after the success I've had in the last few days. Imagine you had a bank of £1000, and you were quite happy to grow that bank by £2/ 2% per day (which is a hell of a lot more than you'd get in the bank), you could easily manage this with a £2 martingale such as the ones I have been doing over the last couple of days. Let's imagine the worst happened: £2 loss, £4 loss, £8 loss, £16 loss, £32 loss, £64 loss, £128 loss, £256 loss - you'd need 8 losers on the trot to bust. Now if you sit at a roulette wheel long enough this will eventually happen. However if you are only sitting down for 10 minutes a day, and you walk away with your £2 profit every day, then you'd have to be a pretty unlucky chump to get stung. I know, I know, I know this doesn't make mathematical sense, but in reality it just works!

7) Shiply - One part of the system would have to be to get Shiply right. Every morning you'd place your bids, and then if you win any, you would orgainise them around anything else you may be doing. The trick to Shiply, I feel, is to get your route planning right so that your never driving an empty van. I've not made Shiply profitable as of yet - but it can be done, and it should be part of "The System".


More to come on this................

Trumped Yesterday with a £77 profit

   Things were getting a bit lean at work again today as the clock ticked on so I had wee go on Exchange Hi-Lo. A 3 card run is just over evens at the start of each hand, so I set up a little Martingale.

   The system duly obliged, with the longest losing streak being only 3 or 4 hands. I closed up £77 (after being up almost £200 at one point).

   If only I could do that full time!

12 Public Domain Opportunities

Courtesy of Avril Harper:

  1. Write Pub Quizzes
  2. Write and Publish Cookbooks
  3. Design and sell fake personalised Newspapers
  4. Surname Research
  5. Day you were born products
  6. Headline Newspapers
  7. Your own unique Information Product
  8. Old Plans and instruction booklets
  9. Write for anniversaries and seasons
  10. Create website and other online content
  11. Vintage ephemera
  12. Private label rights author.

Garden Furinture Idea

   Garden Furinture must be on eof the biggest items sent to Landfill every year. It looks great when it is on display at your local Co-Op department store (blast from the past), but after one Summer outside it gets tatty and the need to keep up with the Jones' kicks in. Last year's stuff goes into the skip, and your back down at the Co-Op again looking for more.

   If you had a big enough space, you could uplift people's old junk, clean it up and then sell it on again from your premises.

Another win/ Amazon.

Returned home yesterday evening to find another comp win. This time it was the Hayne's Dad Manual. Reckon it'll be a £2 or £3 line on Amazon.

Speaking of Amazon, it has been going berserk recently. 18 sales in the last week. Hope it keeps up.

Monday 11 April 2011

Big Brother

I like this guy's Big Brother idea.

http://strwbrry.com/?p=95

Martingale

   Anyone who knows anything about Gambling knows that the Martingale system is fatally flawed. Either your money runs out eventually, or the table limits stop you from getting the required stake on. That doesn't mean however that it doesn't work most of the time.

   As if to prove this, I just made a quick £25 whilst during a quiet time at work.

Shiply all over again

Had second Shiply job of the year, when I took a Sideboard down to Little Chalfont on Saturday morning.

Quiz Machine App?

   How far off are we from a quiz machine app?

Two examples:

1) As you are playing the machine you read out the question and then the answer (if given). Next time you are playing the app looks through the records of previous questions and spits the answer back to you. As you play a nice big archive will be constructed. You could share your archive with others to build up a super database.

2) You read out the question. The phone picks up your voice and searches the internet V. quick to give you an answer.

Sunday 10 April 2011

Ring Sting!

All rings have now been returned. One for the lesson book.

Monday 4 April 2011

Lay, Back and Think of Winning

   Just finished reading "Lay, Back and Think of Winning" by Nigel Paul. Basically the whole 200 page book could be summed up in one sentence:

"Follow the weight of matched money on the market screen."

   In a nutshell, if there is £10,000 waiting to be matched on the back side of the screen, and there is £100 waiting to be matched on the lay side of the screen, then the lay side is going to be taken first and the price is going to drift. Make your bets in this knowledge in order to green out.

Ring the changes

   I've now had 3 of the rings returned so it is probably only a matter of time before the 4th one comes back. Lesson learned - only ever use "Gold Suppliers" on Alibaba.

Amazon ticks along....

Dear ross.taylor1@tesco.net,

We initiated a transfer to your checking account (last three digits 484) of £29.49 on 04/04/2011.

Sunday 3 April 2011

Car Parts Idea

Ok, here is a bit more meat on the bones of ideas I've discussed previously:

  • Make Low-ball offer on every new car listed in Scotland every week.
  • Assume 1% of deals will get tied up.
  • Have car checked out.
  • If car is roadworthy then remarket immediately for sale AND rent.
  • If car is not roadworthy then have mechanic remove the resellable parts.
  • Market resellable parts on Ebay.
  • Charge for delivery of these parts via Ebay.

Friday 1 April 2011

Two more wins

Hi Ross,




Congratulations! You are one of the winners of the Limitless competition. Your copy of Limitless is in the post and should be with you soon.



Best wishes,

Melanie

 
 
I've also won one of the most pointless prizes ever. Yesterday I received a Weleda 2011 calendar - it is now April 1st!