topic Re: Buy It Now in Selling

Buy It Now

pats_treasures — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 05:45:49 GMT

Is there a best time of day to list "Buy it Now" items? I sometimes list straightaway which could be mid morning or late afternoon.I know in theory that buyers can buy at anytime,but is evening the best time to start a listing? This is only for "Buy it Now" items. What do other sellers think ?

Thank you in advance,Patricia.

Re: Buy It Now

countessalmirena — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 05:50:41 GMT

pats_treasures, I can at least tell you when not to list an item, and that is ... on a Friday.

Fridays may as well be renamed Glitchday for eBay Australia members.

Speaking as a buyer rather than as a seller, Sunday seems for many to be a good day as people tend to relax on a Sunday without having to work or dash off somewhere. It's a good day for eBay browsing, to see if anything new catches one's eye.

Re: Buy It Now

lyndal1838 — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 05:51:33 GMT

I'm a buyer only but I could not care less when an item is listed.

I check every day, sometimes twice a day, for new listings of items I am looking for so if an item is listed after my first search then I find it on the second search.

Re: Buy It Now

Anonymous — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 06:01:56 GMT

I can only echo what has been said

Never on a Friday

Re: Buy It Now

kopenhagen5 — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 06:11:39 GMT

Doesn't matter when you start a BIN especially if you have it listed for 30 days.

No one waits until the end on a 30 day BIN listing.

It's auctions you dont want ending at peculiar times or Fridays.

And always a good idea to have at least one weekend in auctions.

Re: Buy It Now

brerrabbit585 — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 09:40:11 GMT

A while ago I went through my email folder with all my sold emails in it and had a look at the time of day things sold. On one ID over half the items sold between about 8 and 11pm, with quite a few selling late morning. A lot would depend on your products and the target market, but in my case (not this ID) I decided to have things ending round about the times that people mostly bought.

Re: Buy It Now

davewil1964 — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 11:21:23 GMT

I list BIN exclusively. They usually end between 6 and 11pm, because that's when I'm home to do listings.

My sale times range from 12am until 11.59pm. The few between midnight and 6am are at the early points of that range and mainly WA. But BINs aren't really time sensitive, so list them when it is convenient for you.

Re: Buy It Now

joztamps — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 20:40:49 GMT

A free subscription to Sales Reports would have saved you all that yakka, and broken all your sales up into both listing ending times and days of the week as well.

Unfortunately, as far as I can see, it doesn't allow for any bias you have in your listing or ending times and days, ie it doesn't show what percentage of listings listed or ending at a particular time or on a particular day actually result in sales; nor, as a consequence, does it compare the strike rates between those variables.

Re: Buy It Now

collect247 — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 22:18:02 GMT

My buying time frame is between 6-11.30pm so is my drinking and whinging so sometimes I end up buying an item that I don't remember buying then I start whinging and then I have another drink to calm down.

This is my daily process so I could end up buying something from everyone that sells between these hours lol.

Re: Buy It Now

brerrabbit585 — Tue, 01 May 2018 00:33:51 GMT

@joztamps wrote:
A free subscription to Sales Reports would have saved you all that yakka, and broken all your sales up into both listing ending times and days of the week as well.

Unfortunately, as far as I can see, it doesn't allow for any bias you have in your listing or ending times and days, ie it doesn't show what percentage of listings listed or ending at a particular time or on a particular day actually result in sales; nor, as a consequence, does it compare the strike rates between those variables.

I don't use Seller Hub or whatever gives me sales reports and it only took 5 minutes to sort my emails alphabetically so all the sold ones were together and I could see the times of day.

For most of my sales I usually open the listing so I can check/update the amount available so it's easy for me to see when the listing started in relation to when it sold. On the other account they often sold mid cycle (30 days) but I figured if people were buying at night it was a good idea to have my listings starting/ending at night because they might see something of mine about to end (or just started) and check out my other items. I was selling in a category where one seller had ten duplicate listings for each item and if I listed just before them my listings got buried.

For some items, listing at the time people are most likely to buy (if there is such a time) can mean more views as some people regularly check what's been newly listed, so BINs are time sensitive to a certain extent. The real bargains get snapped up soon after they're listed so there's at least a few people who regularly check newly listed in some categories.

On this ID I tend to get more sales from items that are about to end than those that are newly listed, but I know others who sell more at the start of the cycle than the end.

Re: Buy It Now

davidc4430 — Tue, 01 May 2018 00:40:16 GMT

for BIN i really doesnt matter when i list or when they end.

for AUCTIONS i would usually want them ending on a weekend, saturday night or sunday night.

but i dont bother with auctions anymore.

the days of bidding wars seem to be long gone.

Re: Buy It Now

brerrabbit585 — Tue, 01 May 2018 00:56:57 GMT

@lyndal1838 wrote:
I'm a buyer only but I could not care less when an item is listed.

I check every day, sometimes twice a day, for new listings of items I am looking for so if an item is listed after my first search then I find it on the second search.

This is where listing times can matter. If it's a really busy category a lot of people who check newly listed regularly may not check back far enough to see your items, so listing at the time of the day when more people look could get more sales. That's why I went through my emails to see if there was a pattern in the timing of my sales.

In one category I occasionally sell in, there's a seller who floods the category at a particular time of day and I try and avoid that time of day to list.

Re: Buy It Now

countessalmirena — Tue, 01 May 2018 00:57:54 GMT

Sadly so.

I have fond memories of my first ever bid on eBay. The bidding wars were exciting, and bewildering - and then I learned all about placing a snipe bid for that last minute edge.

Re: Buy It Now

countessalmirena — Tue, 01 May 2018 01:01:11 GMT

@brerrabbit585 wrote:

In one category I occasionally sell in, there's a seller who floods the category at a particular time of day and I try and avoid that time of day to list.

A good point.

There are certain items for which it is very frustrating to search on eBay at any time, because of search terms being improperly used. I can well envisage the additional frustration if a category / item type abrupty inundates the banks of a particular search.

Re: Buy It Now

digital*ghost — Tue, 01 May 2018 01:37:43 GMT

Theoretically, evenings and weekends might be marginally better, if just for the fact that newly created listings get a little boost in best match so they could catch the eye of a few more people, and they will also end at the same time (even if a good 'til cancelled listing, since when they get to the end of their cycle, they will appear higher in "ending soonest" search results).

I suspect the effect is relatively minor in the grand scheme of things, though, because I think new BIN listings are more likely to be watched than purchased, unless someone has been specifically looking for an item, in which case they'd probably buy it no matter when it was listed.

Re: Buy It Now

joztamps — Tue, 01 May 2018 01:57:33 GMT

I will tell you one odd thing I have noticed in selling stamps is that I consistently get a few hits ("Views") each weekday between 7-9am and 4-6pm.

Which leads me to suspect that, after 150 years, stamp collectors have finally found a way to indulge their hobby while commuting on the train/tram/bus.

Re: Buy It Now

brerrabbit585 — Tue, 01 May 2018 02:09:06 GMT

@digital*ghost wrote:
Theoretically, evenings and weekends might be marginally better, if just for the fact that newly created listings get a little boost in best match so they could catch the eye of a few more people, and they will also end at the same time (even if a good 'til cancelled listing, since when they get to the end of their cycle, they will appear higher in "ending soonest" search results).

I suspect the effect is relatively minor in the grand scheme of things, though, because I think new BIN listings are more likely to be watched than purchased, unless someone has been specifically looking for an item, in which case they'd probably buy it no matter when it was listed.

My points were all trying to explain that to buy it they have to see it, and for some products they're more likely to get seen if you list at certain times of the day. For collectables like pats_treasures sells, a lot of people might check newly listed items regularly but not do a search for specific items so the timing could be important.

Re: Buy It Now

davidc4430 — Tue, 01 May 2018 02:16:49 GMT

@joztamps wrote:
I will tell you one odd thing I have noticed in selling stamps is that I consistently get a few hits ("Views") each weekday between 7-9am and 4-6pm.

Which leads me to suspect that, after 150 years, stamp collectors have finally found a way to indulge their hobby while commuting on the train/tram/bus.

just wondering, how has the modern 'peel n stick' stamp been handled by collectors?

i can remember as a kid soaking stamps off letters then using little lick and stick things to hold the stamp in my collection book.

Re: Buy It Now

joztamps — Tue, 01 May 2018 08:09:00 GMT

P&S stamps can also be, and usually are, soaked off the paper too, but it's much harder and takes longer than with sheet stamps, and you are more likely to damage them by tearing or by "thinning" parts of the rear paper texture of the stamp. Some issues are worse than others, depending upon the combo of the stamp paper and the degree of impermeability of the adhesive layer.

Some US (and other) collectors do leave them on the paper, which is not surprising to anyone who's tried to soak US stamps off paper, they are mongrels to try and get off. The same with some other countries, they're all different.

Mint P&S stamps are collected and left on their backing papers.

Stamp hinges are still used, but only on used stamps.

The standard for post-1970 stamps is "MNH", ie Mint Never Hinged, and even for 1950-1970 stamps lightly hinged stamps sell for less than MNH.

Nowadays they are stored and displayed in hingeless albums, or stockbooks, where you slide them into clear non-adhesive strips or pockets attached to the page. You can see these display sheets on almost any scan on the Stamps listings.

Now you know the lot Dave, time to get out your childhood collection and rejoin the world's 60 million philatelists.