Section 6.3. Auction Tips and Tricks

6.3. Auction Tips and Tricks

There's a lot of conflicting advice out there about what works on eBay and what doesn't. While it would be nice if there were a sure-fire plan that could take you from newbie to PowerSeller (Section 7.6) in a couple of months, the best way to learn what works for you is by starting with the tips in this sectionand then adapting them as you discover which work best.

6.3.1. Best Category, Best Price

Try listing the same items in different categories to see where they perform bestgetting the most bids and highest prices. Some categories are straightforward. If you're selling a Dell Inspiron laptop, you're going to list it under Computers & Networking Laptops Dell. But what if you make and sell one-of-a-kind teddy bears? Do you list them under Collectibles Animals Bear, or Dolls & Bears Bears Other Bears, or both? Does depression glass sell better when you list it under Antiques, or under Pottery & Glass? How do you know where buyers are most likely to look? The following two strategies can help.

• Compare completed auctions . Look at completed auctions for similar items and note which auctions had the most bids. To do so, from the eBay home page, click Advanced Search and search for similar items, being sure to turn on the "Completed listings only" checkbox before you click Search. Sort the results by "Price: highest first," and look for items that generated lots of bids and sold for a good price. Then check the auction listings to see which categories the hot sellers were listed inthe info is right above the title and item number on the auction page. Knowing where buyers are likely to look for your items helps you list them in the categories most likely to generate bids and get a great price.

  Tip: When you list similar items in different categories to see where they perform better, use a hit counter , which keeps track of how many people look at your auction, to see which categories get the most hits . You can add a hit counter in step 3 of the Sell Your Item form (Enter Pictures & Details).

• Check out the hot list . Another way to find hot categories is to research eBay's hot list . Each month, eBay puts together a report, called the Hot Categories Report, that tracks bidding activity by category. Take a look at the latest hot list by heading to the navigation bar and clicking Sell; look on the right-hand side of the page and then click The Hot List. You can find out where demand exceeds supply and which categories' items tend to attract lots of bids. Figure 6-9 shows a sample page of the hot list.

WORD TO THE WISE
Avoid Auction-Page Gimmicks

Some eBay sellers try to make their auction listings stand out by using gimmicks, like music that plays when a shopper opens the auction page; animated pictures; or text that blinks, shakes, or scrolls across the page.

Ever try to read a Web page while an ad flashes at you or sings that you're the 10,000th visitor? Unexpected noise and jittery graphics are highly annoying. These gimmicks can also increase the time it takes for your auction page to appear on a buyer's computer screen. Most eBay shoppers aren't patient, spending just a few seconds on an item page before deciding whether to bid or move on. If your auction is slow to load or if it contains gimmicks that a shopper finds more irritating than charming, that shopper will quickly hit the Back button and keep on looking.

Instead of gimmicks, rely on good pictures and a clear, exciting description to psych up your bidders.

Note: eBay considers categories "hot" when the Level 4 category (see Figure 6-9) attracts at least 100 bids per week, when the bid growth from one month to the next is 1 percent or better, and when bid growth exceeds listing growth by at least 1.5 times.

Figure 6-9. There are three levels of "hot," and all of them indicate how much faster bids are growing than listings: "super hot" means a month-to-month percentage-point spread of 35 or better between listing growth and bid growth; for "very hot" that spread is between 15 and 35; and "hot" means a spread of up to 15. For example, in the "super hot" subcategory of sheets and pillowcases, bids might be up 60 percent over the previous month while listings have increased only 20 percent during that time (there's a 40-point spread between them). In the "very hot" silver urns and vases subcategory, bids might have grown 40 percent while listings only grew 23 percent (a 17- point spread). The "hot" quilts subcategory might have seen bids up by 88 percent while listings increased by 80 percent (an 8- point spread).

6.3.2. Meet or Exceed Buyers' Expectations

A buyer's satisfaction with your auction depends only partly on whether you packed the item well and shipped it right away. Most of how a buyer feels about the transaction comes from whether or not the whole experiencefrom the moment she first glimpsed that photo of a vintage umbrella stand to the moment she stepped back to admire it all loaded up with her family's umbrellaslived up to her expectations. Meet the buyer's expectations, and you've got a satisfied customer. Exceed those expectations and you've got a very happy customer. But fail to meet themwatch out. Unhappy buyers can make your life miserable, from emailing you incessantly to leaving negative feedback to filing complaints.

"But that's not fair," you might be thinking. "How am I supposed to know what some buyer in Wichita or Des Moines or Anchorage expects?" And, technically, you'd be right: you can't read minds. What you can do is set up your auctions in a way that keeps expectations reasonable. That way, most buyers will be satisfied or happy.

Here are some tips to help buyers keep their expectations down-to-Earth:

• Keep it real . When you sell, you want to get buyers excited enough to click the Bid Now button. But don't exaggerate to make the item sound better than it really is. If the item is used, say so. Don't call it "like new" unless you really couldn't tell the difference between your item and one fresh out of the box.

• Include measurements . It can be hard to tell from a 3 x 4" photograph how big an item is in real life. Your buyer might be disappointed to find that the pendant was much smaller or the vase much larger than she thought. You can show an object's size by placing it next to another object in the photo; if the pendant is next to a quarter or a ruler, it's easy to get a sense of the pendant 's size. Or grab a tape measure and take measurements up, down, across, and aroundit's nearly impossible to have too manyand state these measurements in your item description.

  Tip: Clothing sizes are notoriously inconsistent: one designer's size 6 is another's size 10. Don't rely on the size tag in clothes sales. Measure the item (sleeves, bust, waist, length, inseam, and so on) and make those measurements part of the item description.

• Little things mean a lot . Nonsmokers care whether or not an item has resided in a smoke-free environment, and people with allergies might be glad to know your home is pet-free. Other things that might mean little to you but everything to some buyers include intact tags or extra buttons in clothing, original box or other original packaging, manuals, price tags, manufacturer's marksanything you can think of that comes with the item itself.

• Display more than one picture . Including several photos taken from several different angles lets buyers scrutinize the item more closely. Then they won't be surprised that the jacket is a little longer in the back or the teddy bear doesn't have a tail. To create a picture display using thumbnail images that the viewer can click to make full-size , see Section 6.2.4.3.

  Tip: If you're selling clothing, press the item before you photograph ita big mass of wrinkles isn't going to excite potential buyers. After the auction, do your best to make sure that the item arrives looking as much like the photo as possible. Use tissue paper between folds and don't cram the piece of clothing into a too-small envelope. A buyer who bid on a sharp-looking outfit won't be happy to pull a limp, wrinkled mess out of the package.

• Contact the buyer at auction's end . Many buyers, especially newbies, expect some kind of contact with the seller after the auction. It can be a bit nerve -wracking to win and pay for an auction and then hear nothing back. The best way to satisfy this expectation and keep the buyer calm is to contact the buyer as soon as possible after the auction ends. You can send a personal email, or you can use auction-management software (Chapter 9) to automate the process for you.

• Explain your feedback policy up front (and follow through) . Some buyers feel that once they've paid, they've completed their side of the bargain and deserve positive feedback right away. If a buyer emails you and asks for positive feedback before the transaction is completethat is, before the buyer has received the item and let you know all's wellsimply explain that your policy is to leave feedback once you're sure that the buyer is happy and there are no problems with the item. This sounds like good customer service to the buyerand it protects you from giving premature feedback to a buyer who pays promptly but morphs into a monster later in the transaction (insisting on a refund against your return policy, making spurious claims that the item arrived damaged or didn't arrive , and so on).

6.3.3. The More Auctions, the Merrier

Even when you're just testing the waters as a seller, avoid listing only one item at a time. If one auction you're running looks good enough to bid on, many buyers will click the "View seller's other items" link to see what else you're offering.

You can also take advantage of cross-promotions , using one auction to advertise other auctions, when you list more than one item. eBay sets things up so that the checkout page of one auction includes links to your other auctions. You don't have to do a thing to take advantage of this featurejust make sure you're selling several items at once. You can opt out of cross-promotions (through My eBay Preferences), but why would you want to? A buyer whos decided to buy one item from you is a buyer ripe to buy another.

eBay's Checkout page, where buyers begin the payment process after an auction, displays cross-promotions with the total checkout amount. However, if you didn't include all your payment details in step 4 of the Sell Your Item form (Payment & Shipping) when you created the listing (Section 5.4.6)for example, if you didn't specify shipping coststhe Checkout page won't show cross-promoted auctions. So make full payment details a part of each listing.

Tip: To make cross-promotions more effective, offer a shipping discount on multiple purchases (Section 6.3.5). It can be just the enticement a buyer needs to buy something else from you.

6.3.4. Donate Some of Your Profits

Charity is good for the soul. And, believe it or not, it can be good for your wallet, too: you can actually make more money by giving some away. eBay makes it easy by offering Giving Works auctions (Section 8.5), auctions whose proceeds (or some percentage thereof; the minimum donation is $10) go to a nonprofit organization. Supporting a nonprofit feels good. And it can feel even better when you realize that donating part of the selling price to charity can give your auctions a big boost.

eBayers love shopping for a cause. The company boasts that Giving Works auctions average 40 percent higher selling prices and 50 percent better sell-through rates than regular auctions. High-profile celebrity auctions for charity skew those numbers a bit, but the fact remains that shoppers are willing to spend a little more when they know their money supports a good cause.

Buyers can restrict their searches to Giving Works auctions only, and these auctions prominently identify both the cause and the percentage of the sale that goes to support it. So not only can you close more sales for better prices, running some Giving Works auctions can actually increase your visibility and build your customer list. That's smart marketing.

6.3.5. Offer Incentives

You can make your auctions stand out by offering a deal that's just a little better than everyone else's. For example:

• Shipping discount for multiple items . eBay buyers complain about inflated shipping costs, but they love sellers who offer a shipping discount on the purchase of two or more items. Not only does this kind of shipping discount save you the hassle (and cost) of having to pack and ship items separately, it gives buyers a real incentive to buy several items from you at once.

  To offer a shipping discount to buyers who buy more than one item from you: from the eBay home page, select My eBay eBay Preferences. Under Seller Preferences, find "Offer combined payment discounts ," click Change, and then specify your discount policy. Be sure to feature your combined shipping discount in your item descriptions.

• Free shipping with Buy It Now . If you take shipping costs into account when you set your BIN price, you won't lose any money this wayand the allure of a BIN price with no post-sale shipping tacked on will attract buyers.

• Price discount for multiple purchases . Another kind of discount to consider is a price discount. Some sellers offer a five or 10 percent discount on the second (or third or fourth) item purchased within a certain time frame. (Just remember that eBay will charge you Final Value Fees, FVFs, on the final sale price, whether or not you knock a little off your invoice for multiple purchases.)

• Throw in a bonus . If you're selling a damask tablecloth, include a set of matching napkins as a bonus. If you're selling a camera, offer to tuck a carrying case in the box, gratis. Be sure to feature the words WITH BONUS (or something similar) in your auction's title to attract attention. A buyer who thinks she'll get something extra is a buyer who's likely to bid.

6.3.6. Offer Anything Points

Anything Points (Section 3.4.2) are a kind of eBay-only currency that buyers can use to pay for things they buy on the site. As a seller, you can offer Anything Points to buyers who win your auctions. Offering Anything Points just might be the incentive that makes a shopper bid on your Bavarian beer stein, and not on someone else's.

Anything Points are worth a penny eachand guess who pays that penny. Yup, the seller who offers them. So if you offer five Anything Points per dollar and a buyer wins your beer stein for $45, you pay $2.25 for the Anything Points the buyer receives. Charges for Anything Points appear monthly on your eBay Account Summary in the My Account view of My eBay.

To offer Anything Points with your auctions, first list some items. Then go to the Anything Points Offer Manager (http://anythingpoints.ebay.com/offer.html) and log in. Tell the Offer Manager how many points you want to offer (between one and ten) for each dollar a buyer spends.

6.3.7. Sell in Lots

If you have an item that doesn't sell after a couple of auctions have run their course, try grouping it with other items in a lot. For example, a skirt that didn't sell on its own might be more attractive when paired with a top, and maybe a piece of costume jewelry . Or a light meter that hasn't attracted any bidders on its own might work better with a camera, tripod, and carrying case as part of a complete photographer's kit. The trick here is to think creatively to make the wholethe outfit, the photographer's kit, or whateverappear more than the sum of its parts .

Note: If you group items together to sell in one auction, make sure there's a reason for them to be together. An auction for a Winnie the Pooh cookie jar plus a light meter, or a copper birdbath and a pair of mittens, is going to strike buyers the same way it strikes you: just plain odd.

6.3.8. How to Get More Feedback

It can be frustrating to spend a lot of time creating exciting auctions with good prices, packing items carefully , and shipping them fast, only to find your buyers don't bother to leave you positive feedback. No matter how hard you work to provide great customer service, it takes a while to build the feedback that's so critical to your reputation (and to your bottom line as a seller). Feedback is optional, and not all buyers will leave it.

To increase your chances of getting positive feedback, give the best customer service you can and keep the lines of communication wide open . Pack a note with the item saying, "Thank you for your purchaseI hope you'll enjoy it. Please let me know that it arrived safely." This encourages the buyer to touch base with youand many buyers will do that by leaving you positive feedback. (And if there's a problem, good communication encourages the buyer to contact you to work things out, rather than heading straight to the Feedback Forum to leave a negative.) It's also acceptable to send a quick email asking whether the buyer has received the item and is happy with it. However, don't pester your buyers for feedback. Sending email after email begging for feedback can easily backfire. More than one eBayer who's done so has ended up with a negative that says, "Here's the feedback you kept bugging me for, you pest!"

Tip: Don't leave feedback for a buyer until the entire transaction is over and done with. A transaction isn't over when the buyer pays, it's over when you know the buyer has the item and is happy with it. If you leave positive feedback too early and a problem ariseslike the buyer turns into a screaming harpy who insists that you refund her $4.99 even though she won't return the rhinestone-studded sunglasses she bought from youyou'll regret you left that feedback prematurely.