Shownotes
I love when I get to look the person I am interviewing in the eye. It shows my passion for the story and brings about more candid discussion. I think we both get more comfortable. Makes sense doesn’t it? They can see my eye rolls (if I had them), they could see my smile, my real getting choked up, etc.. The connection gets better and here is a good example of it with Karen Locker.
Mentioned:
Sponsors:
Gaye’s Million Dollar Arbitrage List
Transcript: (note- this is a new tool I am trying out so it is not perfect)
Stephen: [00:00] It just want to jump in and mention my sponsors doing them all in the front. So I hope people appreciate that that’s kind of a new thing that’s been going out in the podcast world and this episode is such a great episode. I’m so excited. I really am. Gail is BS. Interview I hope you listen to that number to 38 and it just blew me away because she is the real deal that arbitraged group she’s running is just rocking it. I’m in it and I’m watching just people just knocking it dead. And you know for$149 for you to be able to get in there. There is a free week that she’s giving if you go through my link and I have a link on this episode. But I mean to me that’s how you can build up this Q4 and if you even can’t get it get on the waiting list because she’s going to pull from there when somebody drops for whatever reason.
Stephen: [00:45] So get in there. Gail is BS million dollar arbitrage. I have a link. And you’re also going to get that seven day free trial silver lab scope I can’t talk enough about it. I just got another note from somebody saying hey what I was able to do was go up and blah blah blah. That is so cool to me hearing those successes and hearing that you heard it through my show it just makes me tingle because it’s like getting exposed to that stuff is how you figure it out. Right. Somebody else has somebody else smarter than me has figured it out. I’m just bringing you the information it’s so neat to see and so scope’s going to let you really work on your private label wholesale and help you get the keywords right.
Stephen: [01:23] Ultimately that’s how you get the buybacks. You got to know what people were searching for. You put that in there you get that adjusted to know exactly what they’re searching for and boom you get found right being found on that page one. How do you do it by knowing the right keywords. How do you do that. Look at your competitors and use their keywords. That’s how you do it. And sculp allows you to do that. It’s just a powerful thing. Solutions
Stephen: [01:45] for e-commerce. Karen Lochore you’ve heard me talk a lot about her if you haven’t met her you should. Smart lady who knows what she’s doing. I for example today had four items where I forgot what they called it were flagged for quality. They were quality alerts. That’s what it was and turns out there’s an image issue and she’s like well yeah there’s Amazon’s now making a change it has to be 80 percent blah blah blah blah blah. I’m like I’ve lost interest already. Could you help me. And she’s like fixed. That’s the value of having an account manager. Right. Or when I get those calls Hey I’m calling about case number blah blah blah like that goes to my other person and that just happens to be my team member who happens to be Karen her team solutions for e-commerce dot com slash momentum.
Stephen: [02:29] Saves you 50 bucks. You’re going to say 50 bucks and she’s going to do an inventory health report for you. To me that’s how you know what inventory is healthy. Q4 you still can get some inventory out of this recording for free. You probably want to do it. So jump on and get with her. Tell her I sent you. So it’s solutions for e-commerce dot com slash momentum. Go Daddy is another sponsor. And I love what they’re doing because I’m a domain order. We’ve already acknowledged that I’ve got a problem and I just love the fact that I could save 30 percent finally because I never did so try go daddy dot com slash momentum and get your domain but also buy that privacy. Look out there and one of the Facebook groups you’ll see somebody complaining about the lack of privacy by the privacy it’s not that expensive.
Stephen: [03:20] And again you’re saving 30 percent on it. It’s really a smart deal and grasshopper try grasshopper dot com slash momentum. It’s the professional way to present your company. You don’t have to carry a second phone. It’s an app that goes on your phone but it allows your calls to get routed effectively and for real. I mean I always say you can have them go. Press one for customer service but that could go to your customer service team if you use one right. That can go to that person or I’m surprised nobody’s offering that services to us to be the customer service department for a lot of us whereas desk in effect somebody should offer those services. But that’s what’s cool is you know by using grasshopper they press two to get to that department and then they can come in and you know effectively represent you.
Stephen: [04:05] I just think it’s so cool so try grasshopper dot com slash momentum. It’s going to save you 50 bucks and you’re going to be able to all of a sudden become that professional organization you want to become. And I just appreciate my sponsors. I hope you do too.
Cool voice guy: [04:20] We’ll get to the e-commerce momentum. Yes. Well we’ll focus on the people the products and the process of Commerce selling today. Your host Stephen Peters welcome back to the e-commerce momentum podcast. This
Stephen: [04:36] is episode 245. Karen Locher is Karen’s back and this is an on location interview where again I love sitting across from someone because I get to see their reaction and they get to see my reaction and I think it adds something to the conversation because you know it’s real. I mean of course you know it’s real but but it’s just different when you’re looking in the eye you know. And so we spent quite a bit of time talking about an inventory management system is that the answer. Right. Right now is that the place where you want to take and put your Amazon level photos right. Let’s assume they’re the best they set the standard of course. So you do your photo at their level your descriptions at their level and all the rest of those things and then map it out from there and put it on all the markets and the new markets yet to come.
Stephen: [05:27] There will be a new market. I don’t know what it is. We don’t know how strong but it will be a new market at some point. And so is that possible. Well yes. Is it cheap easy. No. And so we spent some time talking about that. I think that just so smart let’s get into the podcast. All
Stephen: [05:45] right welcome back. Our guest again is different because on one occasion he lied to me interview which I enjoyed because I get to look the person in the eye. It’s a very different conversation. It’s easy when you have a microphone. But now we get to see my reaction to. And I assume they will attest that I do use my hands when I talk because I really do believe that that is the truth. Karen locker Welcome. Hi Stephen how are you. I’m really well and this is our second or third time we’ve talked Karen’s background information right if you want to know your story how she’s gotten to where she is where she was and started doing an interview. Number 52. So that was quite a long time ago because we’re several hundred. Has this crazy.
Karen: [06:31] It is it’s crazy how many interviews you’ve got out there.
Stephen: [06:35] It is crazy. But you know Kyra it is I should qualify as a sponsor of guess. I never heard of it. You always hear me talk about solutions for the cameras because she’s also my account manager and it’s a teaser every time I see her I pay the same price as everyone else I should get a discount. She will not give you this it’s fair to actually pay. And you know what I’m going to pay for on that. Was it yesterday I think it was I was carrying a request for 65 variations to be added to three or four different listings. And what’s wonderful for me and it’s wonderful for you I think if you think about it is that both of us are here and that work is getting done. It is. Course it is. It wasn’t easy. It’s not been easy getting to this place.
Stephen: [07:21] You know it’s funny. I get asked a lot of hey I want to start a podcast and I might do it. I mean it’s a great opportunity if you like to talk but it’s hard it is to get to 200 has not been easy and I know some that are great sometimes. You know when that stings and I try to get better. But getting people that can do you know how long does it take you to train somebody to bring them to the standard that I expect. Right. Me as a customer I have certain expectations. How long does it take you to train.
Karen: [07:49] It can take to just get that they’ve got the understanding you know we’re talking a month or two to really get them understand it. And then there’s still probably another month two months after that that you’ve got that level checking and even I mean some of my people that do my lessons have been with me two years but there’s still two or three levels of oversight to make sure that you not only does a person get train but then you have to pay somebody above them and above them they so valuable what they’re doing look at it more global.
Stephen: [08:25] But at a higher level that’s not easy. And you know so you should be embarrassed for me. You know I’ve just never have thought of that is still happening. But it is true and I think that that’s very cool though that we’re here. And I’m so excited because I don’t know if you get a chance to look at those pictures my son took those pictures of cool. And he’s been studying photography at college and he is now at that place doing product photography. I mean it’s stunning. Some would say look you know what. OK I’m impressed. Now I’m impressed. Saying OK when I create that I create a monster here.
Karen: [09:02] If you can and I have not personally had a chance to look at them because they didn’t discover as I was traveling but I’ve seen some of the other stuff that you were you know showing me about and you know getting good product photography is tough. It’s very because there’s lighting and shadows and just taking the background.
Stephen: [09:21] You know it’s tough because you know it almost I mean you look at it and you see those things when you look at some of the listings there’s an artwork in there. I mean it really is or you know there’s a there’s a reason a piece photograph on the wall sometimes can grab that person’s perspective it can capture something so you can sit there and say look if I can see you know you can just take a picture or you can really take a picture. And I don’t think he has to be very very pleased. And it’s very cool. And so I think you can see something in the future from us on that service a lot. We’ll see. I mean I want to be happy to enjoy it. You know I love this. Not everybody loves what we do know.
Speaker 8: [10:03] And a lot of people think that they know that what we do is easy. Right. And that they can just go do this and it’ll be because it’s a simple thing to do and it’s like there’s a lot more to it than what you see and you know you and I are sitting here having this conversation.
Karen: [10:22] But there’s still other stuff that’s going on it has to be worked on and checked and you know you have to love it.
Stephen: [10:30] I love the details. And so you know it’s funny because you had no great news under$200. This is one of the best to get you to some speakers they have here and they track this speaker and for$200 this is a great venue really is getting a couple hundred people. But in my talk tomorrow like some of what I’m talking about is how easy some of you guys make it look. Yeah. You know my talk was about the crucible moment. I mean what is it true though is that you had to go through a bunch of junk. Right. And I’m talking about the crucible. And you knew you had to go through and deal with and jump and then you get to that level of foundation because but it’s a foundation and then you build from there. But it didn’t just happen right.
Stephen: [11:23] It’s been overturned. And I guess people have to understand you know is it a little bit to tomorrow or people that were doing something in this business now we’re only doing a piece of it because they want to see. That is really not so anymore still coaching. But he’s retired from teaching and now he’s the president because that’s a piece of it. Yes. He doesn’t want to deal with the other side of it. Does that make you feel hurt. No. Because guess what he’s getting the piece.
Karen: [11:52] He says that they call and. Yeah and I totally agree because I very rarely said. I used to do FBA that’s what started me on a lot of this Mickey-Mouse journey that I’ve been on some days. I hate sourcing. You’ll never see me talk about how to source how do I know that. So there’s plenty of people. But if you want me to but tracking to that rabbit hole in the back of Amazon to find out what’s broken and how it’s there. I love doing that. I heard you say something today and it just kind of you know.
Speaker 11: [12:26] I guess I take it for granted because of our relationship but this fascinates me how much you know you forget more than we all know because you were talking about example somebody was having a problem in one one if you do Asians or what was once one of us when I first get on FM I can never say that one ever and skill and two aces while assigned to it. Yeah
Speaker 12: [12:50] .
Speaker 11: [12:50] And into. And he figured no and most people couldn’t figure it out but it took how long for you back or just counting time. And when you find problem there’s layers to it just start pulling them one little. Right you work your way backwards Yeah to isolate it by finding out what it is what it is and what it is an intervention you figure out what it is.
Stephen: [13:11] Most people can’t work at that level. That’s a skill set. That’s.
Karen: [13:15] Your interest. Yeah.
Speaker 11: [13:17] And it took me less than 15 minutes just to get most people including the seller was willing to do.
Karen: [13:23] He just knew he couldn’t ship it. He had a product. It was on his own inventory but he could show he didn’t know why. And so you know because I’ve dealt with all of this stuff for so long I knew to look on this page and look on this page and then I’m like show this. OK those are different. That’s the problem. So we just have to open a case and the method by have people that write.
Stephen: [13:45] Because you’ve been doing for so long. And so is the last time you seen. Right.
Karen: [13:52] A year ago when I had a budget goes you know there’s a point.
Speaker 13: [13:54] You know you learn this you will see it for another year exactly expect you to retain. Not that this is true. It is.
Stephen: [14:02] If you sit back and you think about these things you know what I’m excited about is that each person has found their place. Each one of those people that you find Certainly Christians and other Christians working on something you might do you just blow my mind because he’s working you know so different than we are. Yeah. It’s all he’s trying to think of the next. And he just wants to say interest. And that.
Karen: [14:28] Of course is if you want to be interested in what you do exactly you want to be interested you want it you want something that challenges you. When something becomes by rote you lose interest and that’s why as much as you know Amazon can be annoying. That’s the challenge for me and that’s why I enjoy the rabbit holes.
Speaker 14: [14:51] You definitely love the craziness of it...