Do books sell on ebid?

[Spot50]

Yes and No .

Like most of what I say, this is general advice that I would say applies for the majority of sellers. It is just a case of recognizing who your audience is and making it easy for them to purchase - your gaps with the bid/buy price will stop a lot of that. Fine if they are already a member of eBid and would be more prepared to use the bid price, not so good for those who haven't got an account and both the bid and buy price works against each other. You can get away with big bid/buy gaps on extremely rare items, but in general it won't work.

The reason I am prepared to list that many items on eBid is because I can build a solid base here for my long term gain. The bay can provide a short term gain but it is like building on sand waiting for the tide to come in. I do sell a lot on eBid, although I would make it clear that I don't class myself as a success - but I am extremely happy with the direction I am going in, it is actually far ahead of schedule. I have 1,000's of listings which are effectively inactive at the moment, deliberately so.

If you look at my feedback here (and less than 50% of sales have received feedback) you see that a lot of the recent buyers are indeed new to Ebid, this initially made me think the site had finally taken off but alas things have slowed right down again.

I don't really have any knowledge of the post card collecting market but I would imagine a seller like yourself would build a group of regular buyers who give repeat business and, obviously. it's more of a collectors product than the type/range of books that I offer. I genuinely believe your comments about Bid/Buy prices is very pertinent to your product but really is less so with mine. if I specialized in rare or vintage books I'm sure your premise would equally apply but my listings are so varied and in most cases readily available that I really don't think it does.

[deanosaur1972]

If you look at my feedback here (and less than 50% of sales have received feedback) you see that a lot of the recent buyers are indeed new to Ebid, this initially made me think the site had finally taken off but alas things have slowed right down again.

That is good that you have had new to eBid buyers, my question would be - how many other new to eBid buyers have you potentially missed out on because of the bid/buy price gap where the buy price can become inactive? It is all very well getting, for example, 20 sales from newbie's when you may be missing out on a 100. Those original sales would not have been lost by a closer bid/buy gap but plenty of others would potentially be lost.

The bid/buy price gap scenario is relevant to the majority of sellers. Exceptions would be the be rarer 'must have' items.

[Spot50]

That is good that you have had new to eBid buyers, my question would be - how many other new to eBid buyers have you potentially missed out on because of the bid/buy price gap where the buy price can become inactive? It is all very well getting, for example, 20 sales from newbie's when you may be missing out on a 100. Those original sales would not have been lost by a closer bid/buy gap but plenty of others would potentially be lost.

The bid/buy price gap scenario is relevant to the majority of sellers. Exceptions would be the be rarer 'must have' items.

deanasaur1972, I fear we're just going to have to agree to disagree on this point! I'm sure others could say if I dropped the auction running time to 3 days some buyers may be more inclined to place a bid, others might say free P & P will encourage bidders. I really feel there has to be a differential between the prices to make the concept viable otherwise you might just as well offer B.I.N. prices only.

[JanetB]

I don't offer returns on either site. we will have to wait and see if recent changes over 'there' makes any difference. I would point out that from what I read on the boards over there, whatever policy is offered by a seller becomes irrelevant as they make the policy and as a seller you HAVE to accept it if you want to use their platform. If that's the case a sellers stated policy becomes redundant and therefore it's a complete waste of the sellers time in typing it onto their listings.

Selling the product I do I really don't think many buyers are seeking a returns policy to inform their purchasing position, but can understand why someone selling the product that you do would need to have a policy in place..

TOS are becoming ridiculous forcing sellers to do things they don't really want to do, seems like sellers are becoming slaves to them, and i don't blame you for coming over here and making a go of things. At least eBid more or less leave it up to you how you conduct business here. Good luck with your sales!

[deanosaur1972]

deanasaur1972, I fear we're just going to have to agree to disagree on this point! I'm sure others could say if I dropped the auction running time to 3 days some buyers may be more inclined to place a bid, others might say free P & P will encourage bidders. I really feel there has to be a differential between the prices to make the concept viable otherwise you might just as well offer B.I.N. prices only.

Yes there has to be a differential between the bid/buy price. But the two need to work together, if the bid price rules out the buy price because of the gap then it will cost you sales.

Ultimately anywhere outside of the bay the buy price rules - that is where the vast majority of sales will come from.

On that example earlier - buy £4.99 and bid at £1.99, that gap will potentially lose sales because for many (and certainly those who would need to join up to purchase) the buy price is made inactive by the bid price. If it was either buy £4.99 and bid £4.49 or buy at £2.35 and bid at £1.99, then the bid price is not making the buy price inactive. On any standard items the bid/buy price has to work for each other.

[peterpunto08]

Hi Spot

One of my pet hates is the gaps between the bid and buy it now price and something I am increasingly seeing on eBid.

Just let me give you an example:

Monty Python and now for something completely different.

The bid price is £1.99 and the buy price is £4.99.

Most sales come through the buy price. But with that gap, for a lot of people, you have an inactive buy price. You have made it almost impossible to use the Buy it Now because I know that you would sell the item for £1.99 and therefore I am not going to pay an extra £3.00.

So we are left with the bid price of £1.99. Now for a customer who has just arrived on eBid and doesn't have an account - are they going to join up to place a bid and then wait 10 days to see if they win the item? As the item would be posted 2nd class by the time they receive the item it could be a total of 2 weeks since they placed the bid. In most cases the answer would be a no, they wouldn't join up to place a bid on an item. So in many cases you have created an item that someone couldn't bring themselves to buy and also couldn't bid on.

Be extremely careful with the gaps between the bid/buy these are not rare items and the bid/buy price has to work for each other - the bid price (if you really need to use one) should be at a level that doesn't make the buy price almost impossible to use.

Keep it simple.

Most items I like to sell by auction, some on a best offer (usually having failed to get off the ground at the auction starting price)
On eBid though I've been tempted into doing auction with BIN cos it then supposedly gets onto Google shopping

I follow your logic deanosaur......do you think for example a 10% difference is ok between auction start price and BIN price....or would you go higher/lower than that??

[peterpunto08]

As we all know, and read about time and time again, there are a lot of 'questionable' buyers on Ebay trying to scam sellers (and also there are questionable sellers on there as well). It seems a buyer can buy just about anything on Ebay then make claim the item was not as described, or they didn't receive the item and start proceedings to get their money back and a lot of the time they get to keep the item as well.

So far, that sort of behavior is a rarity here on eBid.
Any buyer is able to return anything back to the seller, if they deem the item as not described and would want their money back and if they paid via Paypal then it is almost 100% certain they would win even if it's buyer's remorse (and you can bet they will find some excuse) (especially if a seller has no returns policy).

Having a returns policy spelling out your terms and expectations of buyers, protects both seller and buyer.

All I am saying is (and I mean this sincerely in your favor) that a UK buyer may be put off with your No Returns policy, not bother to ask you a question, and just move on to another seller instead making you lose a sale/customer.

Would have a quick look at my profile when you have a moment to spare please jewels and give opinion (especially re returns)?
(The fact that I'm asking probably proves I'm not 100% happy with it)

[JanetB]

Yes there has to be a differential between the bid/buy price. But the two need to work together, if the bid price rules out the buy price because of the gap then it will cost you sales.

Ultimately anywhere outside of the bay the buy price rules - that is where the vast majority of sales will come from.

On that example earlier - buy £4.99 and bid at £1.99, that gap will potentially lose sales because for many (and certainly those who would need to join up to purchase) the buy price is made inactive by the bid price. If it was either buy £4.99 and bid £4.49 or buy at £2.35 and bid at £1.99, then the bid price is not making the buy price inactive. On any standard items the bid/buy price has to work for each other.

Can I also add that sellers need a Buy Now price for Google Shopping to accept listings on their search list.

[JanetB]

Most items I like to sell by auction, some on a best offer (usually having failed to get off the ground at the auction starting price)
On eBid though I've been tempted into doing auction with BIN cos it then supposedly gets onto Google shopping

I follow your logic deanosaur......do you think for example a 10% difference is ok between auction start price and BIN price....or would you go higher/lower than that??

That's a very interesting question and one I would like to know as well (I'm always learning something new and trying out suggested plans, on these forums)

[JanetB]

Would have a quick look at my profile when you have a moment to spare please jewels and give opinion (especially re returns)?
(The fact that I'm asking probably proves I'm not 100% happy with it)

Take a look at my returns policy, if you like it and want to use it, feel free to copy http://us.ebid.net/users/jeweleffects

Hope it helps