Antique Technology - What?

So I spent a great deal of my early working career in the technology space. I helped write "baby" systems in the late 80's, massive systems in the 90's and atrophied into a management suit in the 00's.  From the 70's and on, I always bought and sold antiques but my main source of income was building systems and teams to build systems. Now that revenue model has been reversed, what income I do have comes primarily from buying and selling antiques. 

While there are no real parallels between the antiques business and the technology business, there is no business that I can think of that has not be changed in some way by technology. I think that I could successfully argue that the antiques business has been radically and forever changed by technology. More specifically, the impacts that technology has had on the people that might buy antiques has driven major changes to the antiques business.

I am not going to spend a lot of words talking about who or what technology changed the antique business. I will say that the net impact that technology has had on the retail antiques business has been the destruction of the local markets that once thrived. It has become increasingly difficult to make a living by having a local antique shop alone - one must expand digitally. The ability that individuals and businesses have (through technology) to expose once regionally available treasures to national and international buyers has forever changed the way we market and sell antiques.

Next - items once thought to be limited in supply became abundant through the increase in who was selling these products as well as the ease in which the products could be sold on-line. The quality of what was being sold became increasingly important as everyone seemed to have plenty of mediocre antiques to sell. Buyers were able to become more discriminating and demanding about what they would spend their dollars on. Of course the recession has not helped the market either. 

Technology has opened the nations attic (the northeast) and pockets of accumulation

throughout the US to the world. At some point in time, simply putting a sign on a shop and running a few ads in the antiques trade magazines was no longer enough to excel. Shops and individual sellers now need a way to connect to existing customers and locate new through the intelligent use of technology. Making buying antiques natural and convenient for the new plugged in consumer. I am not saying that the old-school buyers have completely vanished but they are getting on in years and there are probably not enough to make everyone successful in this business.

It is also not enough to just slap together a Facebook site. While it is a step in the right direction one must really pay attention to their on-line business persona. The following list should provide a starting point on how to create a steady on-line presence. In future posts I will give some more detailed advice on how to develop each item more deeply. Some of this may sound basic but I am always surprised at how many shops out there do not spend any time or effort in promoting themselves well on-line.

Get a website up an running. There are many places that for a very small investment or even free in some cases where one can launch a website for their business. The company website will become the hub of your internet presence and a tool to electronically brand your business. It will be a place where existing customers can go to find rich content about your shop, actually conduct business with you through e-commerce or via direct links to your eBay account. A well designed website and current content will drive repeated traffic. It will also be a place that new customers will be able to find you through search engines like Google or Bing. Plan to spend from $200.00 to $300.00 a year in hosting and up to $1,000.00 to put together a nice little website. If you are good with technology you can use a template based site builder to create your site for free and only pay the annual hosting fees.

Start a Facebook page for your business. Facebook is a great way to gain followers organically. If you have a shop post signage to promote "likes". Keep your posting fresh by setting up a regular schedule for postings to be completed. Jot down ideas for postings in a pad when they come to you and make time in your schedule to actually post. Keeping your branding and naming conventions consistent with your website will provide added ways for new customers to find you via search engines. Always provide a link back to your website from Facebook.  Facebook link

Get a twitter account. Twitter accounts are free and can be set up in about 20 minutes. Spend a little time personalizing your Twitter site to convey your business brand. Follow other Twitter accounts that have common business threads or that you believe will have complimentary followers that you can leverage to build your audience. Make certain that your website and Facebook has twitter links embedded.  Twitter Link

Consider a blog if you can find the time to write about your business knowledge. Blogger by google or Wordpress can provide a free platform to write and post blogs. The blog must be well written and again, content must be kept fresh and relevant. You can tweet your blog posts using your twitter account and you can encourage followers to sign up for automatic feeds with tools like Feedburner or and RSS feed. Blogger Link  Wordpress Link

Set up an email contact database. Using a free tool like Mail Chimp or a paid tool like Constant Contact you can keep an intimate dialog with your opt in customers (those that sign up for emails). Email is probably the least expensive way to have direct communications with customers that exists today. Products like Mail Chimp will even allow you to use templates to make your email communications very professional and attractive. Sending sale notifications can be as easy as pressing a few keys on your keyboard and letting the emails fly.  Mail Chimp link  Constant Contact

These are just a few foundation tools that will allow your shop to enter the on-line mode of business. It will also get the word out about who you are and what your shop or antiques business has to offer. Yes it will take a time investment to get most of these tools up and running and it will take a good deal of discipline to keep the on-line machine current, fresh and appealing. For some the most difficult part of the transition will be to recognize that you will need to break old patterns of behavior and make time to learn new tools.