posted on June 10, 2001 08:02:53 AM new
I am not directing this guestion at anyone just asking. I have seen on alot of chat boards people talking about the big auction sites have no competition. So is bigger better? I have found the bigger sites seem to have lost touch with the real world. They start believing that the sellers will have to just take what ever they dish out because to sell anything on the net it must go through them, is this true? Some complain that the large sites have taken to much controll over the sellers and in some cases are trying to push the little sellers out, what do you think?
As for me I have lost respect for the big sites because they have no respect for me as a seller they raise there rates start charging for things like pictures even try to controll my email so I have four choices one pay them and make less profit (When I dont make much now), Two raise my price to off set the charges then my sales drop. Three find another site and start over again. Four stop selling online. I have desided to do Three.
So is bigger better? Thank you for your reply's. Have a nice buying/selling day.
posted on June 10, 2001 11:03:13 AM new
That's a very good question. I think what's best for you is what works. There are many sellers that couldn't make it on Ebay before they raised prices and clamped down on emails, and there are many sellers that are doing well on Ebay now.
I think it depends on what you sell and how you sell it? If you an average seller I don't think you're any better off on a smaller site. I think you'll pay less fees to get less sales.
If you factor in a value for the time you spend prepping and listing I think you'll find out that the small sites end up costing more for the results.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm not defending the Ebay's of the world but am being practical.
From what I've seen most of the smaller sites concentrate most of their time and resources on everything but bringing in the traffic flow of strong bidders.
Easier said than done but MARKETING is what makes a site work and you don't need big bucks for that. You need a really good product.
I am not a fan of Bidville but I see here on AW that a few sellers and Bidville are trying to do a promotion. It's better than nothing but not terribly good.
Ebay became Ebay because they were pretty much the only kid on the block for awhile and the word of mouth was tremendous.
It's something for all site designers to think about?
posted on June 10, 2001 11:47:17 AM new
Bigger is defin. Better!! More objects for sale means buyers come back more often. That is what's important!! I don't even bother checking Yahoo!, Bidbay, and Epier if I'm looking for a specific item. I know that 99.9% of the time they will not have it.
eBay is the best because they always have something I'm looking for...
posted on June 10, 2001 11:55:30 AM new
The Thing is no matter big site or Little site Ask yourself this Are they really trying to control more and more or are they really honestly listening to what there users are say ???
here is an exsample:
Ebay last year started useing banner advertizeing to incress there income helping there bottom line with out haveing to incress there fees as much.
Sellers on Ebay how ever seen these banner advertizeing some times like Items to what they were selling as unfair to the sellers they started MAM million auction march screamed for ebay to stop running banner for Like Item from other sites, links out side was competeing against the sellers who were paying them fees to list.
This year Ebay Incressed listing fees and made a new policy on links to your websites which in many cases sellers were useing to lead buyer from Ebay to other like Items.
Ebay says they built this policy based on what they were hearing from there comunity of users yet sellers are complaining about this move being to have more control over sellers.
Fact is last year all seller did tell ebay links out side ebay were unfair you cant have it both ways.
IF banner advertizeing and links are unfair for ebay to use and make more income from how can it be any more fair for seller to do the same things in there listings.
The answer to the Question is bigger Really Better NO bigger isnt better as far as the amount of Item listed.
The higher the listing count gets on Ebay the more avalable Item become The lower the sell through for all sellers.
one catagory might have 50,000 lists from many sellers for one same widget but Only has may 100 to 150 Buyers for this Widget.
The selling price on each sale and the bids on each of these Drop and the chance of ending with a buyer is also less.
This means if your widget sells at all on ebay you may need to list it 2X or maybe even 6X before you get a buyer some will never find a buyer at any price for what ever factor and costing more over all to list to make $$$ for every seller.
Yahoo and other smaller sites Have the right Idea but the mass avalablity on Ebay must change before something smaller can make much head way.
You might only have 5 of the same widget on yahoo but there is still near 50,000 on ebay going unsold.
Now if you were walmarts and want to sell more you build another store in another town but if your a online Auction site your already world wide to any user with a computer How or where do you exspand to get more buyer inless you move outside the Internet or Just send free computers and online access to people who still dont have them Or pay to find life other then on earth.
Economies Rise and Economy fall for one reason Spending slows down when this happens Production slows people lose jobs.
How long can the Economy rise before the market has near all the new durable goods and houseing it can use for a while and slow the markets down.
You here people talk about ressesion proof markets and there are a few Like Food, Drugs and energy thing every person buys and uses every day.
How many times a year do you need a new car, House stove or computer Antiques.
There comes a point when you have more to sell then your market can sell The internet market grew Super fast sales went from near $0 in 93 to 94 To to Billions from 96 through 99 .
In that 3 year this Market has Flood the people who have computers with every thing from empty soda can to Information More then likely more then it really needed.
We are to the point right now where everyone and there great grand mother has heard this internet thing is easy money people marketing and selling out weight the people buying 85 or more to 1.
anytime you get to the point where buyers have been buying stead more then they ever need there has to come a slow down and weeding out period, sellers who didnt save for the rainy day will fall off soon the people who came in for easy money makeing less then thought will drop out and the cycle will start over.
This is not just an American thing it happens all over the world but in this country for some reason people use this logic more then other.
If one pill works this well what if I take two or even three at the same time twice a day I will get well two or three times faster they know it not true but when they open that pill bottle they use the same logic.
People talk about how the small auction site fail do to a lack of marketing and advertizeing and so on but the fact is that the marketing and avertizeing it is useing worked so well its Rise was very fast So fast that it could take quiet a while to shake out the sad thing is once it does shake out every one will more then likely make the same mistake again.
History is very usefull when its used to really learn from the faults or mistakes made.
but as long as people keep makeing the mistake that more and bigger is the only way to go andpooring million time and time again into the same errors these cycles will continue.
posted on June 10, 2001 12:23:34 PM new
Diversity is better - twenty items in 2500 catagories, rather than 50,000 items in one catagory would be better I think.
To that end just the sheer number of listings has nothing to do with anything.
Seems to me that darn near half of the listings at, for example Bidville, are sports stuff...noting against sports stuff, but this lopsided catagory saturation just does not create a site with lots of diversity. I never buy sports stuff myself, so the fact that BV has 304313 sports items, means that I can rule out roughly half the site. So "bigness" just for the sake of being big, means nothing.(IMHO)
You got it I dont think That these site are doing this out of mean ness so to speak as much as Bidville was an up and commer at the time yahoo Decided to charge a fee and clean its house.
Much of the Items they cleaned out were Sports cards which I found right off werent a big profit maker.
Also DVDs Re recorded videos and a few other things.
Epier Now looks like a war memorabila site they still allowed these Item when Ebay & yahoo set there new policys on this.
SEll Your Item will in its time come to look like a auctionsellers searchengine where you go and see in every auction link to sellers stores and websites.
There are sites out there that are small but doing very well for then selves that seem to be uneffected by sellers mass Item movement from one large site to a free small site places like Edeal small but more then promiseing selling going on .
bargan & haggle from post we see is doing well Ewanted as well.
But the bidville Sports and book catogories flooding is a good exsample of how much is to much befor there is more Items then buyers causeing a catagory to have a slow down or total disinterest in it from all.
posted on June 10, 2001 01:43:41 PM new
dman3 - I think your correct about bidville NOT doing this out of meenness, heck, I'm sure that any new site would be happy to get whatever listings they could get!
Sellers I think should take a look around the house and see if they cant find some other "out-of-catagory" items to sell. Perhaps those sports sellers could find some interesting old LP's, or perhaps some pottery or old tools or car parts or whatever.
As a seller, I always thought I was well served by having the widest variety of items I could find. Everything from dinnerware to hubcaps to Railroad stuff can generally be found on my auctions. This policy also forces me to become more knowledgable on a wider selection of collectibles - I try to fill as many catagories as I can.
This is not so importand when listing on mega-site ebay, but I think is critical when listing on a small or new site.
If sellers want more trafic, they need to take the responsibility to list items NOT found at Wal-Mart. Diversifacation, not high listing numbers is the key, I think we have seen it work in the past for ebay and I believe it can work for any site (well except those "nitch" sites like AuctionArms and others).
The question may be, What can a site do to insure diversifacation?
Can managment do anything at all to prevent a site from becomming topheavy with one catagory?
Do we really want managment controling the listings in that manner?
Could massive numbers of all type items overcome any of that "top heavy" effect?
posted on June 10, 2001 07:34:08 PM new
Definately a good Question for sure I do try a little varity as well on most sights on Ebay im mainly in one or two ares and do well but for the most part I like to mix it up.
If your going to be a niche seller You really need a Niche auction site how to insure There is a good mix on other site well good Question may the free sights could charge fees for more then X amount of listing in one catagory or some thing there has to be an answer. http://www.Dman-N-Company.com
posted on June 10, 2001 09:06:54 PM new
Bigger may be better for some things but it is not a guarantee of a happy trading experience for buyer or seller. I made a long post about this in eBay Outlook but don't worry, I won't repeat it here. While bigger may mean a greater selection of items, it also means more junk, more rip-off artists and usually poorer customer support. I think that a site's reputation is far more important. For example, if a site takes more concern with buyers' safety (by requiring ID verify for sellers) then generally the buyers' experience will be more positive than say at eBay.
That is not to say that smaller is better though. Aside from having fewer buyers, most sellers don't want to invest the time and energy in transporting their auctions to yet another site that advertises as "always free" but then the fees kick in as soon as the site picks up steam (like Yahoo and several others). In this case, I think most sellers would rather stick with the known evil (eBay) than try to establish another site.
