Claire's Random Thoughts

This post was inspired by Tony H’s “Everything I Know About Business I Learned From Poker” article.

When I first started using the internet regularly, my favorite site was neopets. According to the records I just looked up, I first started playing on September 24, 2000, when I was not even 12 years old. Little did I know, “business” in the Neopian world was actually very similar to online business, and my “wasted” hours on neopets may have actually inspired me to start my online business I have been conducting since I turned 18 and was legally allowed to sell on the internet. My online business is quite simple, I simply sell things (profitably of course) on ebay, amazon, half.com, or in some cases, craigslist

By the way, my username on neopets was the least creative possible: claire_chiang

When I first signed up for neopets, I just explored the site and their neopian world. After a certain point, I became so obsessed that I often dreamt about it as if it were real. I think my interest in becoming rich in neopoints, the currency in neopets, sparked my continual interest in the game. The main reason I wanted to play was because getting rich in neopoints, even though that meant nothing in real life, gave me the upmost satisfaction a kid could feel.

What I learned:

1. Buy things on sale, sell them in your shop for more
Simple, isn’t it? I constantly looked for items in the shops that the neopets site put items in, and I bought merchandise cheaply and sold it in my small personal shop for more.
Now, I look for big discounts online that I find on forums specifically designated for users to post good deals, and I buy stuff, receive it, and sell it for more on ebay/amazon/half.com

2. Discount cards (or coupons) are your friends
Neopets used to have a system with discount cards, but I think it was discontinued a few years ago. They would simply give the user a certain flat percentage off all merchandise bought at in site-generated shops. The less I pay for merchandise, the more of a profit I make selling it, right?
Now I use online coupon codes heavily to make good deals even slicker.

3. Sometimes it’s appropriate and in your best interest to haggle
In the neopets shops, you were allowed to haggle to get better prices, which again meant higher profits (or just simply lower prices if I actually wanted the items I was purchasing)
Of course I wouldn’t do this at a major retailer, but haggling is a must with street vendors or in some cases, small privately owned stores. Ok, maybe this isn’t really that relevant to my online buying/selling business, but it’s still a good example in how to save money applied from neopets.

4. When selling things in the marketplace, price your goods to be slightly cheaper than the next lowest price so that your items sell right away
In neopets, I learned that items in my shop would sell almost instantly if I priced everything 1 neopoint cheaper than the next cheapest in the shop wizard. The shop wizard is basically a search function to search all the user-operated shops to compare prices and list them in ascending order. Making everything 1NP cheaper is a great strategy, unless the next lowest price is significantly lower than all the other prices. If that’s the case, then buy the significantly lower priced one and sell both of them for 1NP lower than the next price.
In real online business on Amazon or Half.com, I basically do the same thing, except I list everything for 1 cent cheaper instead of 1 NP. That way my inventory typically turns over at a very high speed, and I don’t have to worry about running out of space to keep my stock, nor do I have to worry about items that depreciate over time.

5. Don’t just make money from operating, also invest your money properly or find a high interest liquid bank account.
In neopets, there was a stock market as well as different types of bank accounts. I always made sure to open the bank account with the best interest possible and to collect my interest every day. I also did a little day trading or short term stock investing, but that’s optional for the risk averse.
When I run my online business with high cash flow, I make sure to never let money sit in a low or zero yield checking account. Instead, I signed up for the paypal money market fund to earn interest while money is in my paypal account, and I always have my sales deposited into high yield money market checking accounts or higher rate savings accounts. I might do another post on my banking structure later, so if you are interested, keep posted.
In our current economic state, investing is probably optional. However, it will be an option I will definitely go for in the future if and when the economy stabilizes.

6. When you get ahold of a limited edition or rare item, hold onto it. It will probably appreciate more than cash at its current value will.
Some items in neopets were issued at one point and never given out or sold again, so they naturally appreciated in value over time. When these items were issued and I held onto them for several months, they typically became very valuable. Examples include paintbrushes and job coupons.

7. You can sell stuff that you got for free
That’s right. There were a few daily opportunities to get free stuff just by visiting a place and clicking, such as omelettes, jelly, and the tombola. If I was lucky, I sometimes got valuable items from the daily freebies that I was then able to turn around and sell for a good amount of neopoints.
Opportunities like this may be harder to find in real life, but when one presents itself, I never refuse. Some argue that it’s unethical to sell things that one obtains for free, but I respectfully disagree. If a transaction can be agreed upon, it means both parties involved are satisfied and feel as if they will have more to gain from completing the transaction than not completing it. So, as long as there is somebody willing to buy the item you are selling, it doesn’t matter how much you paid for it.

So there I have it. Neopets was not a complete waste of my life during my middle school and early high school years. Although it was a highly addictive and arguably unhealthy hobby, it was a good model of the real online business world that inspired me to start trying to make a profit online.