posted on January 15, 2001 01:21:11 PM new
In case you haven't read it elsewhere, the most important thing you can learn about internet selling whether on YaFool, ePay, or anywhere else, is that the idea of auctioning most items is a fad and a probable deal killer. If a looker can get it NOW he may well be a buyer, but in a few days he may well have forgotten or lost interest.
Yahoo was THE place to sell low priced items this way but now to list a $25 item and set the minimum bid = to the buy price = classified ad, costs .75 for 10 days and many items will take 10 relists or more so be careful.
eBay understands this. Evidence: they bought Half.com. They also started BUY IT NOW with an evil twist: Try to save on listing fees and start the auction at $9.99 for your $25 BUY IT NOW price, and the first bidder who wants it cheaper nullifies the BUY IT NOW option. This is so silly a concept that one must look for ulterior motives and that can only be, they want to force the seller who really wants a classified ad to set the minimum bid = to the BUY IT NOW price which for a $25 item is $1.00 listing fee on ePay.
posted on January 15, 2001 05:17:38 PM new
"hunted humans" movie category? *snicker* only one comes to mind off the top of my head- and it was a really bad Jeane-Claude Van Damme movie. Am I missing something? will take a look to see what's listed in there sometime when I'm bored & in need of entertainment.
motive- I don't know if this is true across the board, but things I consider "yahoo-able" are things that I can expect to get as much for on Yahoo as I would get on Ebay. NOT things that I couldn't sell on Ebay so I moved them to Yahoo. I can honestly say that I've sold things on Yahoo that didn't sell the first time on Ebay though. Before the fees were implemented, Yahoo was the perfect place for those items that just needed the right buyer to come along and see it. Those days are over, so my advice is, don't buy anything that you don't know full well you can make turn over quickly at a profit.
haoleboy makes good points as well. Selling Chanel? Mary Kay? forget about Ebay, Yahoo is really where you wanna be. No VERO hassles.
Haoleboy, I'm not completely disagreeing that Yahoo buyers may be naiive- maybe they are, maybe they aren't. However, my opinion is that they are more IMPATIENT than Ebay buyers. In a lot of cases I think you are making the sale on Yahoo because they have the opportunity to buy that widget RIGHT THAT MINUTE and not have to wait for an auction to end on Ebay. See, Motive, that's one more example of why to use a buy price!! I tell you, I was about to give up on Yahoo altogether before some of the girls here let me in on the buy price secret. After that my sales turned right around as if by magic!! Ebay does have "BIN" now but it's still not set up the same as the buy price on Yahoo, so Yahoo still has that edge in my opinion.
posted on January 15, 2001 08:52:32 PM new
motive8
IMHO
eBay could have gotten you over $230 and 80 bids for just 20 of the the stuff you list on Yahoo. That's compared to the $27 and 11 bids you are getting on Yahoo presently for the same stuff.
You should cancel the Yahoo auctions and move them to eBay. I'm desperately tempted to snipe some of your better pieces and sell them myself on eBay, but I like canadians.
posted on January 15, 2001 10:16:54 PM new
All of you have brought up some more very good points. You people are right, the buy price would probably work much better. I was going to list all my items on Yahoo that way, but due to a bad expereice on eBay with BIN when an out of control newbie shopper with a fake registration bought 19 items (with BIN) and within hours left negative feedback for all sellers, I decided not to.
I suppose that was a rare incident, it looks like many sellers are using it, so I'll let these listings run out, and relist the other items with buy prices.
AnnonymousCoward, you can snipe those if you like, I still make money even at the opening bid price. I have been quite successful selling those items on eBay since the summer. I always start the opening bid at $4.95 and often it goes up to $39, with some some fierce sniping.
My average high bid is around $15 on eBay. You weren't far off on your estimate either. Last week I had over 2200 hits and made over $240 selling many of the same items (I didn't list as many as were on Yahoo). Some names sell much better than others, and for most of them, I have determied when (in terms of how often and at what time) to list them for maximum profit.
I was thinking I would run a few auctions without the buy price to see what Yahoo bidders would pay, but it looks like I'll just list them a buy price, perhaps based on average eBay high bids. Now, I just have to figure out the duration and ideal day to launch them. Due to time constraints, I;ll probably be forced to list most on the weekend.
Hopefully the buy price still remains popular on Yahoo. I would really like to see how my items sell with a buy price. Selling on eBay, I could always be sure a few items would sell for 5 times what the opening bid was, which helped even out the items that received only one bid. Now, I hope my buy price will be neither too high or too low, that's what I was worried about.
posted on January 15, 2001 10:33:07 PM new
Motive8: Do you use the same ID on Yahoo?
If so please explain this feedback you recently gave a buyer:
Seller gives Bad Buyer rating.
Comment:after a month and reminders I still have not received payment from bidder. (Dec 11 12:22 PST)
Seller gives Excellent Buyer rating.
Comment:I was just recently contacted by my old roommate who said I received a letter in the mail from USPS it contained in it a letter of apology and a letter that was in pieces also mentioning that a check was missing that was supposed to be enclosed. I will b (Jan 14 23:05 PST)
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It seems to me the seller is saying an old roommate who had opened his mail, recently told him that there was one of those baggie packages which contained the remains of a damaged letter from the buyer and an apology from the USPS. What I'd like to know is: 1) why is an old roommate volunteering this information now, how did he remember so many details, and 2) how could the post offfice apologize for a check missing from the package...I mean if it was missing, how would they know it was supposed to be there?
posted on January 15, 2001 10:41:46 PM new
zzyzx000, no I do not use the same ID on either Yahoo or eBay.
I just registered with Yahoo last week before the fees came into effect, so that's definatly not me. On Yahoo, I have no feedback yet, good, bad or neutral.
