posted on January 4, 2001 10:01:19 AM
There are still free auction sites out there. I found one last night called "snaprat"(www.snaprat.com) it is out of Sacremento. Bills itself as the "free eBay". It is new; and not very many listing as of yet. As I agree with what you all say about Yahoo I find it just awful as everyone try to get a piece of the internet auction. I found out last evening there is to be a rate hike soon at UPS. I imagine soon the buyers will be going back to the malls since the shipping charges will soon put us all out of business.
posted on January 5, 2001 08:54:52 AM
i started moveing my yahoo auctions to snaprat last night.its a very user freindly site.yea its a brand new site less then 6 months old but i like getting in while its new.like all sites word of mouth will make them or break them.no site that is young will ever grow if people visit a site and say (oh look this one is slow)and then not even give it a chance.its up to each person to spread the word and try them out.i like the ease of this site and will be listing at snaprat and give it some time to grow.i also put in my conformation letters from other sites that i sell on .i say DONT FORGET to check out or other auctions on SNAPRAT.word of mouth is the best advertiseing a company can get.if you never try you will never know.yahoo hardly gets any lookers so moveing our auctions was an easy choice and yahoo has been around a couple years.good luck to everyone wherever you end up.......aka arealmess
posted on January 5, 2001 09:19:20 AM
I took a look at SNAPRAT to see if it was a venue for me and ended up bidding on a auction! So I've done my part.
I still can't get into PayDirect and can't get a response from them. I deleted all my closed auctions that were waiting for relist. Finished sending all my negs to NPBs. I'll be darned if I'll pay to list to losers who have nothing else to do. My blacklist was getting too long anyway.
posted on January 5, 2001 10:01:00 AM
Is Snaprat a web portal? How about Bidbay? Was Golds a web portal? It won't happen. These sites are isolated islands. Ask anyone in a chatroom if they've heard of MSN, Lycos, or Excite. Then ask them if they've heard of Snaprat. No harm in looking around, but the Fair Market Sites will be the next destination for the bulk of items now listed on Yahoo. I know I sound like a know it all, and it's really academic to me where any individual lists his/her items, but this one is a no brainer.
posted on January 5, 2001 11:05:29 AM
Spreland____i dissagree with the no brainer statement.i heard about fairmarket when it first started last year and never went there.i do think an auction site can work without it being a portal.look at ebay its not an internet portal.but thats just my opnion i will continue at snaprat and try to draw coustmers to that site. but i feel fairmarket is to big .the main problem is buyers do not like changes ,they are lazy and only want the easiest venue to buy from.but if you can find a way to sell stuff inexpensive that gives someone a deal they will brag about the deal and it will snowball from there.
posted on January 5, 2001 11:17:59 AM
The snowball effect is the way most business is done. I sell craft items. One lady comes along and buys something; she shows all her friends and here they come. They buy and then they tell their friends across the country. More buyers. I have listed items on eBay every once in awhile for that reason. Most of them had no clue Yahoo had an auction site. I included my sites in every email, etc. More customers. And they didn't just stop at my auctions. They shopped the rest of the auctions also. And then they told their friends. I am in the process of posting protest auctions right now and I am listing potential sites where the buyers should be watching for the sellers.
posted on January 5, 2001 12:40:12 PM
jumpup;....If I'm wrong I'll join you on Snaprat, but from my personal experience I've never sold a single item listing with a start up site that wasn't a web portal. I sold items on Lycos within days of being listed. I don't understand your comment about Fair Market being too big. Bidders do not have to visit each auction site to see all the listings, or even realize that Fair Market is a network. The listings are identical regardless of which site the bidder is visiting. If Snaprat joined the Fair Market network all of their listings would appear on Lycos and vice versa. I apologize if I'm stating the obvious, but there seems do be a lot of misunderstanding about the Fair Market Network.
