Auctions - a dinosaurus of the past!

[melinachristina]

We decided to ‘give a little bit back’ with our final listings for 2018 and put a handful up with no reserve. Part of the decision though, was a little experiment, and we played it safe with less expensive items.

The results thus far clearly indicate for us and our items at least, along with many other opinions here, that the day of the auction on eBay is truly done and dusted. Oh, you might get the odd item that attracts a small bid war, but small is the operative word, and it’s rare enough to almost be unique. No reserve listings these days, will I think generally return no profit, and may even bring the colour to your cheeks with a loss. We certainly wouldn’t last very long.

Cover thy bum, or it will be exfoliated most painfully ... lol.

Interestingly though for us, is that if we list as BIN there’s very little interest, as opposed to still listing in the auction format and creating a reserve with the starting price, which goes then hops along okay. This has intrigued me since our return to eBay, and so far I cannot understand any tangible reason for it. Ah! The convoluted, intricate and evasive psychology of the eBay buyer. I’d so love to know what makes this tick the way it does.

It seems to me these days that in many cases you need to match an item up with a buyer and in some instances be very patient. Using two or three platforms now seems to be almost requisite as well. Online selling has changed so much. These days it’s so much more important to realise your profit when you buy, rather than trying to make it when you sell. The world of shopping has become so small and accessible for buyers.

Melina.

[the4masters2013]

I listed an item last month as an auction. I got the price i was looking for but after ten days it was listed for, many views but only the one bid.
It was the first auction I had put up in about 3 or 4 years .
The items I list are really not auction material.
I also find that buyers want things quickly and are not prepared to wait for delivery.
It's not really easy doing both auctions and BINs

[imastawka]

4masters, why do you have a store, but no listings?

Seems a waste of money.

[padi*0409]

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@imastawka wrote:

4masters, why do you have a store, but no listings?

Seems a waste of money.

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I see 186 listings Stawks....................

[davewil1964]

186, same as padi.

[digital*ghost]

I think auctions tend to only work these days if you are offering an opportunity to potential buyers that outweighs the benefit of buying the same or similar item with no delay or competition (JMHO, anyway). Auctions = a wait of up to 10 days to know if you'll be able to purchase the item, plus a variety of other unknown factors which can translate into a hassle, if not risk (shilling, seller not following through etc). 

For common items, that means the opportunity for a price that's significantly lower enough than regular price, and for uncommon items it's usually about the item itself rather than price, but even then many buyers now know that if they miss this one, another one will come along sooner or later, so it's mostly one-shot items or ridiculously low-priced (but popular) items that will really get good bidding activity.

I think the novelty of auctions carried their success for a while, but eventually, on regular type items anyway, people realised that "winning" is just paying more than others are willing to, so BIN became a great equaliser, with the added benefit of not having to wait. 

The last time I tried to run auctions, it was on items that were still at regular BIN prices in my store. No one bid on them, but people kept buying the item through BIN. That might have been partly a visibility issue with the auction, but it was fairly consistent across multiple tests with auctions, and indicated that at least with my items, buyers were prepared to pay more for the simplest shopping experience possible. 

[imastawka]

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@padi*0409 wrote:

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@imastawka wrote:

4masters, why do you have a store, but no listings?

Seems a waste of money.

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I see 186 listings Stawks....................

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Well, I dunno what happened.

I clicked on both the red door and 'view listings' - even completed listings, and saw zero

at every turn.

I see 186 now though.

[the4masters2013]

Must be a glitch... I have around 180 listings.

People seem to have found them as there are a couple of new watchers.

Thanks... if it keeps up , I'll put my detective hat on and see what is happening.

[springyzone]

I think you're so right on a number of fronts.

I've noticed a change in my own buying habits, to some extent, exactly as you have outlined.

A lot of it (on common items) is all about the wait.

Ebay used to be the home of a lot of one -off, second hand items but not now. It is mostly new.

Just looking over some of the things I have bought lately, there probably hasn't been a lot of wiggle room for the price to go up much anyway. For instance, if I'm buying cinnamon, I just want to buy it right now and get it in a few days.

The auction format means waiting around, checking in to see if you've won etc. It is worth while (from my perspective as a buyer) for bigger items, second hand items, more unusual items or things not every second seller carries. But for most new items, people just want to shop around, compare prices and buy.

The part of your post that made me smile was where you said that with an auction, winning is just paying more than others are willing to. I can identify with that.

For sellers who have quite a bit of the same stock-which describes quite a few sellers on ebay these days- I think an auction format can backfire. I've seen (in the past) sellers who have put one item up for auction, then after it sells, the next one etc

But when they do that, I have sometimes looked at completed listings and thought, well, they sold one at $30 and one at $42 and the next at eg $35, that middle person paid too much. No one likes to feel they have been caught out.

I would think with individual items like pipes, that would not be such an issue as they are not all the same.

But for a lot of other everyday things that can be bought elsewhere, people don't want to hang around for 7-10 days when they might miss out anyway.

[collect247]

Sorry to hear your experiment never went to plan and you're lucky you only listed cheaper items.

I on the other hand beg to differ because it all depends on what you sell.

I only have auctions and I do start them at 99c yes silly me for doing that but because I sell what alot of buyers want I end up receiving 500-800% of the value of the item so for me an auction is not a problem at all.

So if I start an auction at 99c for an item that sells for $100 I make a profit of $80 as to me it was only worth $20.

I have never sold anything at auction for a loss.

I see other sellers that sell same things as I do that have BIN listings and they're doing ok as well selling that way,I suppose I could sell at BIN also but I'm not in a hurry to sell so the 10 day auctions are fine with me.