As the mornings turn crisp and the days get shorter, it's time to begin thinking about the upcoming holiday season. While you may not be ready to start your gift shopping, it's not too early to consider how you are going to express holiday greetings to friends and family, business associates, and customers and clients.

Why Buy Greeting Cards Online?

Christmas cards and holiday cards serve purposes ranging from giving you the opportunity to update family members and friends about life events to marketing your business to customers and potential customers. But whether you send personal greeting cards, business holiday cards, or both, buying them online has several distinct advantages.

The first such advantage is selection. Whether you're looking for business Christmas cards, Thanksgiving cards, or other holiday cards, you'll find many more choices online than you will at a local card store. The second advantage is the ability to save money. Because online greeting card stores don't have the overhead expenses of brick-and-mortar stores, they're able to pass along the savings to their customers. Third, online stores typically offer personalization, both in the form of printing your family's name or the name of your business on the cards, and in printing your return address on the envelope. Fourth, you can usually get steep discounts if you order your Christmas cards early (by mid-October), before the holiday season is in full swing.

What to Look For When Buying Greeting Cards Online

While there are many online businesses that sell holiday cards, you need to choose the right one. You don't want to take the risk that your business Christmas cards will arrive at the end of December, or that the personalization is incorrect. Here are some services to look for when selecting an online source for holiday cards:

1. Longevity and Satisfied Customers. Look for a company that has been in business for at least three years and that can point to a loyal following of individuals and businesses that are happy with their products and services.

2. Quality and Pricing. If you're ordering in quantity, the company should offer bulk discounts. They should also offer an "early bird" discount if you place your order early. The company should be willing to send you sample cards so you can verify the quality of the card. They should also offer high-quality, coordinating envelopes, such as foil-lined envelopes.

3. Personalization. Look for a company that offers several forms of personalization. You should, for example, be able to select from among several different verses for the inside of your cards. They should also include up to four lines of imprinted text on your holiday cards at no extra cost, and allow you to choose from among at least four colors of ink.

4. Customer Service. The company you choose should make it easy for you to order. This means giving you the ability to order online, as well as the option of printing out an order form. They should also have live customer service representatives who can help you place your order and answer any questions you may have.

It's never too early to start thinking about Christmas cards and holiday greeting cards. Once you find the right online source for your needs, you'll never look back!

Everybody would love to make lots of money quickly, working from home, and only doing a few hours of work per week. I've spent the past two years trying to find a great way of doing this. Only over the course of the past few months have I found any "get rich quick" programs worth buying. I've been trying to make money online for a long time. I had a few small websites, but they never made much more than a few hundred per month. It was easy money and didn't require much work on my part, but I knew there were people out there doing better than I was and I knew I could do as well as them.

Now, I've seen a lot of "get rich quick" programs. Most of these people make claims about earning $2000/day with Google or something similarly insane. Almost all of these people are complete liars. Even if they were making $2000/day with Google AdSense, it'd be because they had high - traffic websites with a lot of quality content. I'd know, because in one whole month, I never even made half of what they promised I'd make daily with their programs. Maybe you've already been scammed by one of these fraudsters. Anyway, I finally got sick of what was being offered.

I decided I'd look through the all of the "get rich quick" programs I could find and see if there were any that were actually legitimate. I found that there were owners selling their programs for well over $100, but the information in them could be found almost anywhere online for free. Additionally, they all contained out-of-date information, had no e-mail support, no money back guarantees, and broken links in the downloads section.

In conclusion, almost all of the programs I found were completely useless. The owners knew it, but they couldn't care less about their customers since they didn't offer refund policies! Amazingly, while looking through all of the programs, I actually did find a few legitimate programs. They were run by ordinary people like you and me, and they had found some great methods of making money from their home by doing very little work.

I spent some time working with those programs, and my income is now ten times what it used to be. These programs provided a large amount of great information on how to make extra money on your computer doing very little work. Numerous customers had provided great feedback and reviews for their products. Many of them have started to make money just days after buying!

When you invest in sports memorabilia, you often don't realize how much the value can climb by the time you choose to sell. Likewise, it could decrease in value as well.

Appraisal is a must for the serious sports collector. People have been sorely disappointed because they didn't get their items appraised for value and then sold them for a fraction of their worth.

Some places to check for appraisals for sports memorabilia include:

1.) All Authentic Sports Memorabilia-professionals who can provide references and offer instant appraisals

2.) Vintage Sports Memorabilia Appraisals-has a sports artifacts library for thousands of vintage sports items, prefers email requests limited to two items, nothing newer than 1980.

3.) Krause Standard Catalog of Sports Memorabilia Price Guide

4.) Robert Connelly-He does clinics on appraisals. He's a member of the American Society of Appraisers and was honored by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors.

5.) American Legends-Provides paid appraisals, founded in 1992.

6.) Sports Memorabilia Appraisal Expert Witness-Provides an 800 #, volunteers background information to help give reference to its value as an appraisal business.

Besides the importance of appraisals for resale value, you may want to seriously consider having your valuable insured. Insurance companies also may not recognize the value unless you've had an appraisal done. Make sure you have documented proof.

There is a Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice which is recognized in courts and acceptable to banks, insurance companies, auction houses, and the IRS.

Don't just depend on a local sports shop or whatever available appraisal you come across. Also, consider that paying for more than one opinion is worthwhile if a lot of money is involved and if it gives you peace of mind.

Prices will change, so you'll want an updated value before decided to sell. Retired players hold their value better because their status won't change.

Make sure you sell to the right person or business. Just because an item is listed as one amount doesn't mean the dealer will agree to pay that amount.

Sweat stains don't necessarily make a jersey authentic. Anyone can wear a jersey long enough to sweat in it and try to pass it off as the real thing. Watch for smudged autographs, dog-eared pages in books, worn edges on cards. An appraiser should be trained to notice small details that would decrease the value of your collector's item.

There is a system with trading cards called grading. A graded card has a more reasonable guarantee of authenticity. Graded cards are sealed to discourage card switching, a low tactic of some sellers. The appraiser should know to recognize graded cards and their value.

When my daughter was involved in card collecting and bought a box of cards that seemed like a great deal to her, she was soon sorely disappointed. The only authentic card was the one in the display on the front of the box. All the rest were fakes, worthless. It was a waste of her hard-earned and long saved allowance. So beware of this type of scam when you buy a group of items. The appraisal value will be zero!

Millions of people around the world have had the dream of finding the perfect home based business and being able to fire their boss.  One thing that people just don't realize when they decide to take their home based internet marketing business online is that there's a lot more to it than meets the eye.  Most people who have searched for a suitable home based Internet Business opportunity complain about a common illness: They are sick and tired of websites that promote best home based Internet Business opportunities… sick and tired of the false promises, the over-hyped sales pitches, and the downright SCAMS that lurk behind most Internet Business opportunities.

Once you’ve decided what you are going to sell on the internet and how, you venture online to search for profitable home based business opportunities that appeal to you.  If you have finally decided to start your Internet home based business and have done all your home work, the key to making your home office conducive, as a working environment is organization.  Also, start a business that you enjoy, you have to be motivated to wake up in the morning ready to start the day with your home based business, you are your own boss. After you've done your research on how to start your own home based business, you should be ready to be a home based business owner.

An internet home based business can either offer a service that another person may need (like web design or programming) or can offer a service that brings the “have’s” and the “have not’s” together.  After you decide which direction you want to focus your internet home based business the next best step is to start learning how others are making a profit.

The holidays are a great time to be a retailer—60% of all retail sales are made during the holiday season. Millions of new online shoppers make their first internet purchases during this season, and their experience there can either erase their hesitancies about online shopping, or reinforce them. This gives you, as an eBiz owner, an opportunity to create loyal customers and generate repeat business.

That’s why you need to be ready when the holidays roll around—don’t get taken by surprise. Most people think the shopping season starts right after Thanksgiving. But Lisa Suttora of http://WhatDoISell.com says, “Holiday shoppers actually come online right about mid-August, when back-to-school-shopping tapers off, and they stay online until the end of January [when] they’ve spent all the extra holiday money.” The best way for you to cash in on the holiday buying season is to be prepared well in advance.

How to Prepare for the Holiday Season:

1. Get your inventory listed early. You don’t want to spend the holidays playing catch-up, so have your goods ready to go.

• Take stock of your inventory. Get it organized, and determine what needs to be listed.

• Systematize your operation. Don’t try to go through the entire listing process with each individual item. First, photograph all your items. Then upload and edit all your photos. Then write all your listings, and compile all your descriptions. By streamlining your processes this way, you’ll save a great deal of time.

2. Have a shipping game plan. The number one concern of holiday buyers is whether their purchases will make it on time, so timely shipping is crucial.

• Stock up on shipping materials prior to the holiday selling season. You can even order your shipping supplies online at http://USPS.com.

• Prepackage your products, whenever possible. This way you can just print a label off and be ready to go.

• You can, in most cases, arrange to have the post office pick up your packages at no charge, rather than standing in line for hours.

3.Customize according to your buyers’ needs.

• Offer gift wrapping and gift-recipient delivery. Customers value their time, especially around the holidays, and they’ll pay extra for the service and convenience.

• Provide them with multiple shipping options. By offering overnight and express delivery, you can make sales all the way to December 24 that your competitors who only offer priority mail will miss.

• Create unique gift packages. For example, put a Curious George stuffed toy with a Curious George book and movie and wrap them together in Curious George paper. Says Suttora, “What you’re doing is… pre-shopping for your customers.”

Customer Service is King

If your customers have a good holiday experience with you, they’ll most likely come again. Be in constant communication with them—you’re letting them know you’re on top of things. Always let them know their tracking numbers and order status. Respond immediately to their emails—not 24 hours later. When the sale is over, send them a thank you note—you’re reminding them you’re there and giving yourself a chance to promote your new products. Follow up on your sales—by building consumer confidence, you’ll produce repeat business throughout the rest of the year.