I’ve been using Neofill for years, and I have a few tips that’ll help you out…things I’ve learned the hard way!

If you learn anything that’ll help me out…please feel free to leave a comment.

 

If you upload a .png or .gif logo to the auction sites, and notice a black background...and the image looks funny....chances are that’s because it is set up to have a transparent background. To fix that, you can open up the image in Photoshop, and save it as a .jpg…which will take away that background transparency. You’ll run into this sometimes with .jpg or .png images.  (If you don’t have Photoshop, you can probably do the same thing in whatever image software you have)

 

On the ½ price gift certificate site, if you've noticed that you have a "more" button at the bottom of your listings...just email support and tell them that you’d like all of your listings to show up on the side. I find that people get a little confused when you have the “more” button.

Do you have to list seperate promotions on your 1/2 price program, that are the same promotion? If you do, just email Neofill and ask them to combine your promotions! They'll be glad to combine them...making your site a little less confusing.

 

One last tip…when you paste your descriptions into either the auction or the ½ price platform, you should always paste into Notepad (included on all PC’s), then copy and paste into the Neofill platform. The reason is, Notepad strips the formatting and extra code that programs like Word include. The extra coding from Word has the ability to mess up your site…not to mention your listing. The other benefit is that it will keep your font types, font sizes, and formatting more consistent when pasting into and out of Notepad.

 

 

        

Cellit has made 3 notable changes to their sites. Here's an overview:

*Custom Content Player: You can customize a player with content, and by size

*The static widgets have been modified as well to accept custom content (instead of the standard most popular, most recent, etc)

*Contesting Tools: Cellit has greatly enhanced their contest tools...you can set a start and end date for contest...you can set up your contest to accept entries for a certain period, then begin voting...you can also download the results into an easy to read excel file...and last but not least, you can make customized changes for your contest channel including text and graphics

        

Here's a great idea from the ECO blog:

I was reading a blog posted earlier this month entitled "Touching Your Audience" and it reminded me of a very similar and successful tactic we used at KBIG with the legendary Charlie Tuna using the "store" feature.  

As you know, we suggest using the store for small items that easily can be replenished such as T-shirts, key chains and client coupons.  However, another fun way to use it that gets your team involved and also markets the station is to offer custom outgoing voicemail greetings voiced by your well known personalities.  You'll find that your members will love the custom greeting and many will not change it for years, if ever.   Not to mention, everyone who calls them will hear a message about your product.   

        

Cellit, the company that provides our video/picture sites is now on Twitter. Here's the url: http://twitter.com/cellitmedia

Add them to your follow list, and get the latest updates on new functions, and sales ideas.

**Note, there is an issue with viewing Cellit in Internet Explorer version 8. This issue should be resolved by Monday June 22.

        

Check out this nice customizable widget:


http://www.thingsmyfathersaid.net/


Thanks to Wes in New Bern for finding this!

        

Below is a very detailed explination of every step to take to create a system to reward our listeners on the stream.  It breaks down into 4 main steps: (takes about 15 minutes)

1)  Create the auido and the banner.  Just like sync ad..it should sound something like "thanks for listening, if you are a (club name) click the banner now for 25 free points, if you are not a fan you should join today (have the join link on player or have them go to the front page)..  The banner image should scream "CLICK NOW FOR 25 FREE POINTS"...Create it to the same size you do all the other sync ads in Abacast.  Upload the banner to a private site (intertech or whatever you use) and get a URL, again just like any other time you set up a sync banner.

2)  Log into your M2o back end and click "engagment", then "click thrus",  then "schedule new".

3)  Schedule the new click thru.  Dates and times, etc..The URL should be WWW.m2omedia.com/(your call letters)  Keep the max clicks 0, the cool down period 15minutes (so they can only earn every 15 minutes) make it worth 25 points and hit save.

4)  Go back to the "view live" click thrus, copy the long URL from that particular click thru (it should end with "ctid and a number".  Set this link aside.

5)  Go into your Abacast back end.  Schedule the auido to run 

6)  Once the auido is uploaded, enter the URL for the banner in "banner image URL" and enter the URL M2O gave you ending in ctid and a numnber in the "banner link"...


That's it, it will run as long as you scheduled the sync ad and the click thur promtion..

        

With Mother's Day around the corner, now's the time to start planning for a "Mother's Day Extravaganza" on your auction.

Sell :30 Mother's Day greetings. Here's a sample of the description that New Bern is using for their greetings:

Let eastern North Carolina know how special your mom or wife is by giving her one of our Mother’s Day greeting messages!

You are bidding on a :30 second commercial slot to send your mom or wife a special message aired on your favorite Next Media radio station.  Once you have won this item  you will need to record your message (use your computer mic) and send us the audio file. We in turn will run it on Mother’s Day for all to hear. 

We will send you the exact run time the Friday before Mothers Day so  your friends and family can listen in.  All recordings will run from 10am through 5 pm. 

You can choose from WRNS, WERO, WQSL, WXQR or WSSM. Good luck and happy bidding..If you are not the winning bid, check back next week as we will be auctioning off these slots up to April 25th.

These greetings can be sold for several weeks leading up to Mother's Day. Here's a handy graphic that I made that you may use on your auctions. Just right click and save it!  Plus, it's a good idea to include all of your logos in your "photo gallery" portion of the auction...this way people can see a visual representation of all of your stations.





Next, you can set aside the week or 2 prior to Mother's Day for a special themed auction. Consider the following categories...basically anything you'd give mom:

Boutique/Clothing Gift Certificates

Anything to Pamper Mom (spa, hair, nails…etc)

Very nice restaurant gift certificates (like Melting Pot, and other high-end restaurants)

Mother’s Day gift baskets

High-end purses

Jewelry

Family Portrait Packages (mom’s love if you can get the family together for group portraits)

Limo ride for mom

        

Visit this link: http://cgi5.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?SellHub3Visitor to find out what an item sells for on eBay. Remember, your audience is much smaller than eBay's...so you'll need to adjust your pricing accordingly.

Find hot sellers by going to: http://pulse.ebay.com/ to find the top 10 selling items on eBay.

        

When gathering items for your online auction, you may want to take in consideration the list below. This is a list of ebay's restricted or prohibited items. You may see the list here: http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/items-ov.html where you'll get additional information on how or why the items are restricted or prohibited.


Prohibited and Restricted Items List:
·         Adult Only

·         Alcohol (see also Wine)

·         Animals and Wildlife Products - examples include live animals, mounted specimens, and ivory 

·         Art

·         Artifacts - examples include Native American crafts, cave formations, and grave-related items 

·         Catalytic Converters and Test Pipes

·         Cell Phone (Wireless) Service Contracts

·         Charity or Fundraising Listings

·         Clothing, Used

·         Coins

·         Contracts

·         Cosmetics, Used

·         Counterfeit Currency and Stamps

·         Credit Cards

·         Drugs & Drug Paraphernalia

·         Drugs, Describing Drugs or Drug-like Substances

·         Electronics Equipment - examples include cable TV de-scramblers, radar scanners, and traffic signal control devices

·         Electronic Surveillance Equipment – examples include wiretapping devices, and telephone bugging devices

·         Embargoed Goods and Prohibited Countries - examples include items from Cuba

·         Event Tickets

·         Firearms, Weapons and Knives - examples include pepper spray, replicas and stun guns

·         Food

·         Gift Cards

·         Government and Transit Documents

·         Government and Transit Uniforms

·         Government IDs and Licenses

·         Hazardous, Restricted, and Perishable Items - examples include batteries, fireworks, and Freon

·         Human Parts and Remains

·         Importation of Goods into the United States - examples include CDs that were intended only for distribution in a certain country

·         International Trading

·         Items Encouraging Illegal Activity – examples include an eBook describing how to create methamphetamine

·         Lockpicking Devices

·         Lottery Tickets

·         Mailing Lists and Personal Information

·         Manufacturers' Coupons

·         Medical Devices - examples include contact lenses, pacemakers, and surgical instruments                           

·         Multi-level Marketing, Pyramid and Matrix Programs

·         Offensive Material - examples include ethnically or racially offensive material and Nazi memorabilia 

·         Pesticides

·         Plants (see Weeds and Seeds)                           

·         Police-Related Items

·         Political Memorabilia

·         Postage Meters

·         Prescription Drugs

·         Prohibited Services

·         Real Estate

·         Recalled Items

·         Slot Machines

·         Stamps

·         Stocks and Other Securities

·         Stolen Property and Property with Removed Serial Numbers

·         Surveillance Equipment

·         Teacher's Edition Textbooks

·         Tobacco

·         Transit and Shipping Related Items - examples include blueprints of transit facilities, airplane operations manuals, and flight attendants’ uniforms                 

·         Travel

·         Weeds and Seeds

·         Wine (see also Alcohol)

        

Check out: http://theradioauctionshow.com to see the Radio Auction Online.  You can listen to our show online at wrnn.net on Saturdays from 8am-until 8:30am on Saturdays.

The 30 minute show starts out by explaining how the auction works. Then, we hi-lite items with various taped interviews from our dj's and/or descriptions of the merchandise.  Bidding begins online at 8am on Saturday and ends on 8am on Thursday.  CLICK HERE to listen to the first edition of The Radio Auction Show.

We've promoted the auction on all of our stations, as well as used eblasts, banner ads, hover ads, and peel back ads online.

Neofill will give you a setup form, that just takes a minute to fill out. You may then email or fax it back. Within a week or so, they'll have a site set up for your use.

After you decide on your name, you need to start promoting it HEAVILY...on all stations. Make banner ads (and spots!) to solicit items. This part is VERY important, because the more traffic you have on your site will lend to higher revenue.

Next, you'll need to start collecting items. You need 1 person as a go-to at your station. This person should receive a copy of your "merchant set up forms" and work with the business manager to make sure the trade has been approved. DO NOT put anything up without trade approval first!

Your go-to should use an excel, or something similar to keep a running total of all of your items. I keep one that includes the retail value of the item, the minimum bid of the item, and the final sell price of the item. At any time, I can forward this to my business manager so she can reconcile her trade forms.

Your go-to person can either send the information to Neofill for them to input, or can be trained to do it themself. I do it here, because it allows me to put an item online up until Friday. If you have Neofill place the items online, you must submit it a week in advance of your auction. If you require Neofill to make a certificate for the item, you also have to give them enough time to make it, you approve it, and mail it to the station. I find it's much easier to make the certificates in-house and upload the items myself. We've also purchased an embosser (similiar to a notary embosser) to emboss our certificates so that they may not be copied.

We require all winners to pick up a gift certifcate for the item at the radio station. When they pick up, they must present a photo id (that we photocopy), and sign a "winning bidder form" so that we have a record that it has been picked up. This is nice for 2 reasons, we have record of the item being picked up, plus our winning bidders have to go into our client's showroom to pick up the item (up sale!!!).

Once the items have been paid for (you can see this in the backend), I input all of the orders...this is nice because I don't have to follow up with the reps...and they don't have to worry with the extra work. We've created a new "agency" listed as Neofill Agency and set them up to take off 8%. This is nice because I don't have to worry if my math is correct. I just give the orders to traffic, and they use the "Neofill Agency" and automatically deduct Neofill's portion. All orders are "Interactive" revenue type.

We do not use reserve amounts, because Neofill does not believe this is a good idea. A reserve is basically a secret amount that the bid has to get to before it will sell. We do, however, set mimimum bids. After playing with pricing, we've now established a structure to use for our minimum bids:

30% of retail for very large ticket items
25% of retail for everything else
If item does not sell, we reduce the minimum to 20% of retail on week 2
If item does not sell after 2 weeks, we'll reduce to 15% of retail