Auction-related observations

I've been in a daze these last few days... what's with coming out the other end of the auction tunnel much better off than I imagined I'd be... I honestly didn't think anyone would bid, but some did, and the winning bid ended up being a nice $1,029 from

@Aor Thitaram

of By 50 Journey.

Now that I'm finally thinking straight again...

Here are 7 of my preliminary observations:

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1️⃣ Auctions are, by their nature... quite fun!

I noticed it first when John Bejakovic ran his auction in his group (to a whopping $31k winning bid from Nick Bandy). And I saw a similar energy reflected in my auction as well. Some people do not engage at all, and that's fine, but those who do end up enjoying themselves... the winner, and even the non-winners ;) My community is usually pretty dead (that's on me), but even so, the 2-hour auction thread has 250 comments!

💡Lesson: Nothing makes your community come alive quite like an auction!

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2️⃣ Auctions are stressful for the person running them.

You almost always end up needing some type of support. My auction wouldn't have gone as well as it did had it not been for quite a few active and passive supporters.

John was pretty much the backbone and without him I would have fallen flat on my face. He told me exactly what to do, when, and how.

Chris Dyson chimed in over DMs several times with his auction wisdom.

Both of them helped the chat going while I was away for lunch. And some others kept the bidding moving along when things felt a bit dead. I felt supported the whole way!

💡 Lesson: Your network matters, so so much!

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3️⃣ It's probably best if you have a plan in place 😅

I had zero. I literally wasn't thinking straight when I decided to run the auction, and aside from what was up for the auction, I had no idea what else to offer as bonuses, special perks, etc. Another reason I'm extra thankful to both John and Chris for their help with those.

💡 Lesson: Don't do what I did... maybe. Spend a bit of time (or a lot) planning how you'd run the auction.

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4️⃣ Your best buyers are those who already bought from you once

@Aor Thitaram

is a buyer of the course she now has resale rights to. She's also a lifetime Vault member.

And now she's even my first auction winner!!!!!

💡 Lesson: I really should get to know my existing buyers better 😅

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5️⃣ I had zero ideas for follow-up.

Apparently, the real money to be made through these auctions is AFTER the auction, when you reach out to high bidders and offer them something adjacent to what they were bidding for...

I knew this, theoretically, but again, I had zero plans. So even after John suggested it, I was like... naah...

So I probably missed out on some after-auction deals I could have made.

💡 Lesson: Just have a plan 😅

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6️⃣ Auctions bring out people from the trenches.

I had a few people bidding who I had never communicated with before. But they were part of my larger community (in the email list), who joined the Anthill Club when I announced my auction, and even came out to bid!

💡 Lesson: I should run more auctions??? 😂

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7️⃣ Too many emails lost me many subscribers on the day of

But that's the cost of running a business. I already anticipated this would happen. Most of them weren't buyers, and at 9k subscribers, I'm privileged enough to say... I really don;t care if I lose 50 subs for doing something that: