All About eBay Live; Transcribed from The eBay Radio Show, 4/19/2005

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Griff: Well, eBay Live. That’s what we’re going to talk about here.

Lee: Yes. Exciting.

Griff: Yeah, I am kind of excited, you know, I get jaded very easily, but not about eBay Live because it’s really three intense days. We just got finished doing an eBay University in Portland and when I was telling people up there about eBay Live half of the attendees had no idea what I was talking about. So, they were scribbling down the information so they could go and register. You know, this is going to be the fourth eBay Live that we’ve done. So, we did Anaheim four years ago and that was fun. We were kind of afraid that a lot of people weren’t going to show up and then at the last minute over 4,000 people signed up.

Lee: How exciting.

Griff: And I’m talking about like the day before and it was quite amazing because we were all at the event. All the employees of course, who were staffing the event were there the day before and we had our first nightly meeting the night before and I remember Abby Green and Tom Cotton were there and they said, “we were a little nervous, we didn’t know if anyone was going to come, but we just got 4,000 people who showed up at the last minute.” So, that was really cool. And then the next year we were in Orlando.

Lee: I was there.

Griff: You were there because eBay Radio premiered.

Lee: Yes.

Griff: Did you have a good time?

Lee: Oh my gosh, it was so exciting. First of all it was exciting for us to be producing eBay Radio, that was big, you know, for our little company.

Griff: Yeah, same here.

Lee: That was very big. And, then to have it premiere at the convention was even more exciting.

Griff: And remember that’s the year that Weird Al came. He was a surprise guest and he sang the eBay song…

Lee: Yes.

Griff: …which I’m not going to sing.

Lee: Oh good.

Griff: And then last year we were in New Orleans.

Lee: Yes.

Griff: What fun, I mean, how much fun was that?

Lee: I wasn’t there.

Griff: Oh, that’s right, you missed great food, great event. It was extraordinarily hot and humid, but not as bad as it can get in New Orleans, so…

Lee: Well, I’m a southern girl, I can handle that.

Griff: You can handle it. Are you from the south really?

Lee: Of course.

Griff: Oh I wouldn’t have guessed.

Lee: Virginia and North Carolina.

Griff: I don’t hear that accent.

Lee: Well, in radio you have to kind of, you know, dig a little deeper inside yourself and not get it and it left me about forty years ago really. When I’m tired or something it comes back.

Griff: Or when you go down there, right?

Lee: Oh yeah, or I get around anybody from there.

Griff: I’ll remember to keep you away from people from the south (laughter). And now we’re going to be in San Jose, right in our backyard. And there’ll be classes and round tables and networking, tons of vendors. We have the biggest vendor floor we’ve had so far, and games, prizes, collectibles, this year’s pins, I got a quick glimpse at them, the schwag that we’re going to be giving out, eBay schwag is extraordinary. It gets better every year. You’re going to want to be there to get in on the ground floor. Fantastic entertainment and I can’t tell you who is online to be our secret entertainment guest, because then…

Lee: Then you’d know.

Griff: …they’d have to kill me.

Lee: Yeah. Who’s going to do the keynote speech?

Griff: That’s usually Meg.

Lee: Oh good, good.

Griff: I believe it will be Meg. Our education specialists, a lot of them, are coming the night before. They’ll be there on Wednesday evening. We’re all going out to dinner at Original Joe’s. They’ve got a room on the second floor at that San Jose landmark and they invited me. I think they didn’t think I was going to come and I said I’d love to go, so we’re going to have fun on Wednesday night as well. You’ve got to come to this event. If you’re at all interested in eBay this is something that you have to do. It’s like going to Mecca every year and all you need to do is go to www.ebay.com/ebaylive and all of the instructions are there and, of course, if you register now you get a break on the price. I believe it’s $20 off the regular registration price. There are lots of hotels in the area, but of course they’ll book up fast. You may end up, if you wait until the last minute, staying at a motel a little bit farther away, so make sure that doesn’t happen. Still though, San Jose is such a great place. You’ll have a great time there. The weather is perfect in June, not too hot, not too cold, sunny every day. So, again, it’s June 23rd-25th in San Jose, California.

Lee: How far are you from San Francisco?

Griff: Right now?

Lee: Yeah, because I knew that I drove over there the last time, but…

Griff: 42 miles.

Lee: 42 miles.

Griff: Yeah, it’s not bad at all. Lots of events happen this time of year, especially when it comes to conferences for business, for example, and there is a company that is starting a new conference in May and eBay is going to be a part of it. It’s in Chicago on May 6th and 7th. It’s the M Networks conference Small E-Business World and we’re part of it. We’re going to do our small business eBay University content with all of our instructors. We’re looking forward to being there. With us from M Networks is Paul Berger to talk a little bit about the event. Welcome Paul.

Paul: Thank you, thanks for having me.

Griff: My pleasure. So give us a little idea of just what this Small E-business World Conference is all about.

Paul: Well, the conference is really for people who understand that they need to get their business online or are thinking about starting an online business, but really don’t know where to turn, and that’s really the goal of this conference. We’ll help you understand everything it is that you need to do to get a business online. It’s how do I start selling on eBay from how do I open up a sales account to listing my first item to opening up an online storefront, online advertising, etc. That’s really the goal of this event. If you’re at all curious about the world of online commerce, we have all the answers there for you.

Griff: And it’s a really complete package. So, there are all types of seminars and courses and guest speakers for all aspects of doing a small business.

Paul: Exactly. It’s probably the largest technology conference for small businesses in the U.S. Ebay, of course, will have a major presence there. Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, etc., most of the major technology companies are there that offer products and services for small business owners.

Griff: Now, what’s the background of the conference?

Paul: You know, we’ve been working with eBay for a while and the conference really started because what would happen at our education, what we would run on training people on how to use eBay, we get a lot of people who say, “hey, eBay’s great, that’s really where I started, I sell on eBay, it is a huge part of my business, but I know that eBay isn’t the only universe out there. There are some other things that I really need to learn more about.” And, that’s really where it came from. It started where our company writes a lot of books. We work with McGraw-Hill and we produce a series of books with McGraw-Hill, we write some very successful eBay books and we started getting from the books, more and more people saying, “hey, can you give us the education on some of these other subject matters as well?” That’s really where it came about. Griff, you know if you want to be a successful online businessperson, eBay is a huge component of your business and it’s a great first place for people to start, but it’s not the only place.

Griff: Yeah, and there are also a lot of aspects of doing business that, quite frankly, even eBay doesn’t go into in great detail, but in our little areas of the conference we’re going to have some folks like Cliff Ennico and Janelle Elms, and Catherine Seda who are really good at tying in things like marketing on the internet plus into your eBay business and taxes, for example, and accounting that applies to everyone regardless of where you’re doing business. So, it’s a great opportunity to actually get this information in one place. I did want to mention that one of our contributing editors to eBay Radio will also be there. Rieva Lesonsky, the editor of Entrepreneur Media and a frequent guest on our show, will be there with Entrepreneur Magazine and Media to do some, I guess she is a panel speaker.

Paul: Well, not only is she a panel speaker, Rieva is conducting a free seminar for people who are thinking about starting their own business to really help people who say, “what should I be thinking about when I want to go start my own business?”

Griff: Wow, this is a great opportunity.

Paul: And it’s free, which is the best part.

Griff: If anyone in the Chicago area or anyone who wants to travel to the Chicago area for May 6th and May 7th to attend this free conference held by smallebusinessworld.com, Paul, where do they go to sign up?

Paul: It’s very easy. They go to smallebusinessworld.com. all the classes are up on the web. They can register. You’re one of our key instructors, so we’re thrilled to have you there and if they want to learn live from you and can’t make the trip out to California if they live in the local Chicago market, it’s fantastic. And, actually, everybody should come to eBay Live as well. I’ve been to the last couple and if you’re curious at all about eBay, both as a buyer and a seller, it’s really fantastic to go to as well.

Griff: Yeah, it’s going to be a great opportunity. We have our eBay instructors for our bit of the conference with, like I mentioned, Cliff Ennico, Catherine Seda, Janelle Elms, who is one of our eBay instructors, and they have put together some incredibly good content. I’ve been editing it for the last two weeks. So, we’re all looking forward to it, Paul, and we’ll see you there.

Paul: Great. That’s fantastic.

Griff: Thanks for joining us. We’ve been talking to Paul Berger and he’s the CEO of M Networks. They’re putting on a great conference in Chicago May 6th -7th and you can go to the Small eBusiness World website to sign up. We’ll be back after a short break with your phone calls here at eBay Radio 888-327-0061. It’s eBay Radio.

To Read more Transcripts, or Listen to the Audio Archives of this Radio Show on your computer, and to find the the eBay Radio Show Resource Center, please go to www.eBayRadio.info