No reserve auctions, low starting price - ARE THE TICKET!

[Modee]

Almost all of my auctions are no reserve, starting price a penny. SELLING LIKE GANGBUSTERS and the end price is almost always more than if I had tried any kind of buy it now.

[John14789]

I tried $0.99 auctions and they give me the same results as BUY IT NOW auctions so why waste the time with lengthy seven day auctions. Although I will try one cent auctions on a couple of my products.

[Modee]

Right, my experience has been that when the item is listed with a reserve at say, $1000. dollars, no one might bid and the auction ends with no winner.

And then you take the same item, list it at no reserve starting price a penny, and it ends at over a K! Go figure.

In any case - the formula works for most (not all) items, as long as your cost into the item is sufficiently low.

[John14789]

Very true about the reserve auctions as they don't derive as much intrest. With my products I've always found it better if I place them in a BUY IT NOW auction. If I don't then I'll get about $20-30 less for it which doesn't make sense to loose.

[NO ID]

Auctions really do bring in more money from my experience and its does make a difference with the fees on ebay.

[SevnSins]

I have never use reserve, unless it was to test the waters for a new product. Although; I think I might try the $0.01 auctions to see how they turn out.

I sure would like to know what it is that you can list for $0.01, and still get $1000 for an ending price. You really do have a golden goose in your hands.

[NO ID]

I list $0.99 and end up with a max of $125, average $105

If its hottt, it will get up there.

[SevnSins]

I had several things last year that I could list for $0.99, and get $50-$75/each consistantly. Due to the VERO man, I just quit trying to sell them. Looks like I need to research better, because you guys have some good products. I'm sometimes scared of listing things low, for the risk of losing money up front.

[Modee]

As a desperation tactic you can cancel all bids at the last minute (not allowed to cancel the auction as you get close to the end - but you can always cancel bids).

This is very hard to do though and you might end up with a winner anyway. You just have to hope that the winner is reasonable and doesn't try to get you to perform for a penny!

[SevnSins]

I'm going to give it a try, and see what happens. Can't hurt to test the waters again. If I end up giving it away for $0.99, then I'll know it's the wrong product. I'll test it on one of my cheaper items, so the loss won't be so great.

[NO ID]

A test is good but its better to look at your competition on the same item and see those that list low and how much they end up getting it for at closing.

[cjw7]

from what I understand, a seller can only cancel bids if the listing has more than 12 hours left. If fewer than 12 hours, a seller can only sell to the highest bidder.

[SevnSins]

I ran a test on about a dozen items, and most paid off. I do believe I lost money on 2 of them, but made enough back on the other 10 to balance out. This method definitely gets more traffic to my listings. I posted the dozen $.01 items on a Sunday, and listed 20-30 of my regular priced items on Monday. My closing prices on my normal listings were an average of 20-25% higher than normal.

In closing; the method works for me.

Thanks,
Sevn

[John14789]

Will this method still work if you have zero feedback?
On my accounts which have zero feedback I just put the final price I want for it and if someone wants it they just bid at the last moments of the auction. Whenever I do this I always put a couple dollars less than other seller's buy it nows.

[Modee]

It'll work. As I've mentioned, I have had my no reserve auctions sometimes end just as high on accounts with zero feedback as five hundred.

But, of course, it depends on WHAT item. If it is a high risk, expensive item, the buyers might just think it is some scam. But if questioned by potential bidders you must emphasize in response - it's the CLOSING price that matters, not the opening.