posted on May 19, 2001 07:56:46 AM new
Everyone by now should know that I enjoy playing around with available numbers to make rough estimations of just what's going on at various auction sites.
So this morning, I took a look at ePier and Bidville.
ePier provides a sales history table that shows the following for the most recent seven days listed there:
May 11 - 171
May 12 - 123
May 13 - 152
May 14 - 171
May 15 - 172
May 16 - 158
May 17 - 207
Now Bidville does not provide a sales history, but you can click any category and find "closed auctions." Bidville's definition of a "closed auction", however, differs from what you or I might consider a "closed auction."
Bidville's "closed auctions" are those auctions that have successfully closed with a bid or those for which the seller has decided to stop relisting the item. Those relisted are not considered closed.
Okay, with me so far?
Let's assume for now that Bidville has a sell-through rate that is comparable with ePier.
Their homepage shows 600,000 listings so what would they have in the way of really, and I mean REALLY, closed auctions each week?
I should be able to click on any of Bidville's 2,000-plus categories and find dozens of closed auctions. But every category I click only has, at most, one or two closed auctions for the past month.
That leads me to conclude that although Bidville has more listings, ePier is far more successful in terms of sell-through.
ePier has a sell-through rate of 1.4%; my guesstimate is that Bidville has a sell-through rate of perhaps 0.1% to 0.2%.
Any comments?
--
[PROPOSAL] alt.marketing.online.bidbay has been posted to alt.configuration.
posted on May 19, 2001 08:38:46 AM new
You could be right. I have over 1000 listings on Bidville, and have sold about 35 items. On Epier, I only have about 40 auctions and have had 5 closed. The last 4 have not been paid for, so could be deadbeats! Maybe I should list more on Epier, I was just listing my duplicates. I still need to edit about 400 auctions. I just do not have the energy to put into all of this when there are not enough buyers. On the other hand, I have been reading where Ebay sellers are unhappy about the slow down as well.
posted on May 19, 2001 11:21:58 AM new
You could very well be correct in your numbers--I'm not sure. But it doesn't look to me like the auctions on BidVille get very much action. Of course, the ones on ePier don't look a whole lot more promising, LOL.
During the past couple of weeks I've sold two items on BidVille and 0 items on ePier, and 5 on eBay. Compared with what I've done in the past (at least on ePier and eBay) that's pretty sad, LOL.
posted on May 20, 2001 09:25:28 AM new
I have 200 items listed on bidville and about 20 on epier. I sold 7 items on bidville 5 were non payers. I closed 4 auctions on epier and 2 of of them were non payers. I hope this helps. I REALLY need to move this stuff and am seriously thinking of going back to Yahoo-boo boo but looking at their sell through ratings on the types of things I sell are about the same as bidville and epier. NOTE: I do not feature my items on bidville or on epier. I do NOT use any of their features that they charge for. Maybe I need to do that??+++++
Does anyone have any feedback about listing on there two sites and have improved sales by using their features. I SURE would like to know! and would truly appreciate any feedback on this!
edited for clarity
[ edited by paloma91 on May 20, 2001 09:27 AM ]
posted on May 20, 2001 09:57:59 AM new
Bidville does not give feedback summaries, but ePier does. Of a total of 952 feedbacks for the past seven days, 28, or 2.9% were negatives.
Since you're getting so many deadbeats it looks like alot of sellers are not posting appropriate feedback on their transactions.
I've only made a single sale on ePier and it was an excellent transactions; no sales on Bidville.
posted on May 20, 2001 10:22:16 AM new
This is the problem with free sites. You generally get what you pay for. In the case of bidville and epier it's less if you value your listing time.
Join us for our live chat tonight on Auctionpie 8:00PM EST
posted on May 20, 2001 11:14:37 AM new
canvid13 >
This is the problem with free sites. You generally get what you pay for. In the case of bidville and epier it's less if you value your listing time.
I don't see that as a "getting what you pay for" situation. Its a problem for all auction sites, both fee and free.
posted on May 20, 2001 12:44:42 PM new
Hi dimview, I've been looking at all your stats for awhile now and I was wondering how a new site like Bargain and Haggle.com measures up to ePier or bidville Or what your opinion of it is? I have had some luck on the site, but an outside opinion would help!
If you don't have the time I can understand. Thanks. collectstocks2
[ edited by collectstocks2 on May 20, 2001 12:47 PM ]
posted on May 20, 2001 05:33:40 PM new
Hi again dimview,
I want to thank you for takeing a look at Bargain and Haggle! The only numbers I have seen are when you click onto: View all listings and you see the number of listings in each category. I've never seen how many sellers, or buyers or completed sales mentioned.
"Duh! What's retro-moderation?" I don't
know eather?? (lol) Thanks again
posted on May 20, 2001 05:46:07 PM new
collectstocks2,
Thanks for the info. When I get some time I'll take a closer look at the information you can get from their categories and listings and maybe come up with something useful.
posted on May 20, 2001 08:08:22 PM new
I hate to admit this but out of frustration with the "free" sites I went back to Yahoo! I posted nine items and sold four. (The four I did sell were "featured" so they were more costly too list-but successful)
posted on May 21, 2001 10:09:51 PM new
well i can't answer about your comparison, but i can say i have sold ZERO on bidville and have SEVEN PAGES of sold auctions with epier!! IMO epier is far superior!! i've been listed with both sites for the same length of time if you care. in all this time i have had TWO NPB's and that's pretty dang good in my book!!
posted on May 22, 2001 01:56:33 PM new
I can't speak for all of Bidville... but MY sell through rate is pretty good. I list most of my auctions for 7 days and MOST of them end with a take it price before those 7 days are up. The reason I list it for 7 days is that I list in the gallery as a primier member (meaning it cost me about .01 per listing rather than the "normal" .25) and it stays in the gallery longer for that .01. I put a take it price on most things since I LOVE combining shipping (less paperwork and pkging on my part) so that we don't have to wait forever for an auction to end to combine it. Another reason I use take it is that I noticed that when people bid on something that ends in 7 days they completely forget about it and you end up with more dead beat bidders (most unitentional). For things marked down a LOT I don't put a take it or put the take it closer to actual cost.
SOOO... you won't see a lot of bids on my auctions but I AM getting them you can see from my feedback.
