Switch to 99 Cent Auctions

[randazzo1]

Hi all - we are going to switch one of our ebay garage sale finds accounts over to 99 cents auctions. I have ton of jewelry that is either non PM or worth more than scrap. I'll let you all know how it works out the first week. Going to push everything from antique gold to 1980's Monet and see how it shakes out. I've noticed other sellers have success with this approach, but only if you have enough volume to keep things interesting and build excitement. Going to launch the new model with 100 listings.

Anyone else been through this before?

Thanks.

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

A Handbook of Civil War Bullets and Cartridges - Grab it through Amazon!

[jerseyben]

Seems like this is the current "trend" of ebay selling.

Makes me want to give it a try myself.

 

[randazzo1]

Seems like this is the current "trend" of ebay selling.

Makes me want to give it a try myself.

It does seem like a trend. I recall reading about the popularity of 99 cent auctions several years ago before I was selling regularly. By the time I really got into selling, the thinking seemed to be that if you used 99 cent auctions for anything but super items (e.g. bullion, graded coins, hard to find collectibles) you would get beat. Now the 99 cent auction appears to be coming around again. It kind of makes sense too. If you list 100 items (in which you have a low basis) you could sell enough of them at a high enough price to make up for the ones that go for .99 cents. It'll be an interesting experiment regardless. I plan to do the listing this weekend with auctions going live on Sunday. If this actually happens, I'll have a lot more to say about it next Sunday.

Rudy

 

[Iron Patch]

There's too many factors involved to suggest whether 0.99 cent starts are good or bad. Unless you're selling extremely low end stuff only worth a buck the real question here is the final total. If you start the 100 items at 0.99 and in the end all sales added up to, say, $700, would you have got $1,000 had you started them higher, even if you had to relist a few times to get them all sold? Most of this has to do with what type of demand there is, and everything is different. I do list a lot starting at 0.99 because the stuff does have the interest and generally gets close to market value. I would consider doing all fixed price but the problem is I'd spend massive amounts of money buying and not selling at a high enough rate, so I need the balance of auctions. A lot of sellers probably look at it the wrong way, that they should only list the real cheap stuff for 0.99 so they won't get burnt, when in fact the smart thing to do is list those higher to protect them, and start all the better stuff at 0.99 because you know they will get bids. In doing this you get a lot of traffic because of the low start best stuff, and because of that it will help you get bids on the junky stuff. The key is to knowing what you sell and having the confidence to list it and not worry about it. There's never really much risk because anything you feel you might lose your shirt on shouldn't be going to an auction of any type, that's what fixed price is for.

 

[apush]

I had put on ebay a J. Crew women's blouse for $19.97 a few weeks back. No takers. I purchased the blouse for $1.00. I took a chance and listed it for $0.99. It is now at $21.71. 78 views, 11 bids, 4 watchers.

This is the first time I opted for a $0.99 listing. I may give it awhirl again soon.
apush

 

[Coppercrazy]

What is the shipping you will put on these items? Does it depend? Generally I would just think $2-$3. I have a whole bunch of little things to sell I bought from garage sales, I want to sell that I could get a dollar here and a couple here from.

 

[Citiboy289]

IMO .99 is a great start point I have used it several times with low end stuff, Always successful , I bidder will usually put his 99 cent bid in at like 3.00 max. The next guy gets caught up in the auction fever and the race is on

 

[TreasureHunters]

I did real well with .97 start and free shipping, if you run it for a week (so it goes through a weekend) then you get the maximum views and highest profit, I think I only got burned about 5% of auctions listed this way...

 

[apush]

My shirt I listed I have $3.75 shipping with the $0.99 starting price. The shipping will actually cost me a tad under $3.00 as it is so light weight. A win-win on this particular item.

Today I found 4 Ralph Laurens men's "Black Label" Shirts. Paid $2.00 each. 2 were new with tags @ $129.00 each. Not sure if I am going to start these at the $0.99?

apush

 

[jerseyben]

I just listed my first 99 cent auction in about 10 years. It is a unique, one of a kind coin (in its grade) that should generate a lot of interest. Let's see how this goes...

 

[Iron Patch]

Today I found 4 Ralph Laurens men's "Black Label" Shirts. Paid $2.00 each. 2 were new with tags @ $129.00 each. Not sure if I am going to start these at the $0.99?

apush

I wouldn't, you can sell them as new. I'd start them at $120 and take offers, and add a note that all offers are welcome and will be considered. You can always drop the price if need be.

Here's your tip for the day.... Never be insulted from a low ball offer, and actually be happy you get them. Other bidders do not see the amount you declined, just see there is some interest in the item. You can even have a friend make you several offers and decline them to make things look good. I personally don't bother doing that because I usually have a lot going on and one item doesn't really mean much, but if you only sell a few things the extra effort might make it worth while. Not sure how ethical tricks like this are, but you can be sure I'm not the only one who has thought of it.

 

[Iron Patch]

I just listed my first 99 cent auction in about 10 years. It is a unique, one of a kind coin (in its grade) that should generate a lot of interest. Let's see how this goes...

Depends on what it is. I sold a British evasion halfpenny that fit the same criteria and got a bit over $300, and also a French Colonial which ended at $984. Some coins would have been MUCH more, others, quite a but less. If you do have something there's a good market for you'll no doubt have a pretty good week.

 

[randazzo1]

Auctions listed at .99 cents. We went with 60 ---- total time to photograph and list was over 5 hours. Items range in value from about $10-$400.00. We'll see what happens. One unintended consequence is that we're getting a lot more traffic to our high end buy it now items - Getting offers on items that have been up for almost a month with no action.

 

[diggummup]

What is the shipping you will put on these items? Does it depend? Generally I would just think $2-$3. I have a whole bunch of little things to sell I bought from garage sales, I want to sell that I could get a dollar here and a couple here from.

Be very careful. One of the biggest mistakes new or inexperienced sellers make is not charging enough for shipping. It varies by distance as well as weight. And ebay also gets 9% of your shipping charge also so you have to figure that in too. I would recommend a "Weighmax" brand digital postal scale. They are inexpensive and work well. Remember, it costs money to make money.

 

[randazzo1]

Be very careful. One of the biggest mistakes new or inexperienced sellers make is not charging enough for shipping. It varies by distance as well as weight. And ebay also gets 9% of your shipping charge also so you have to figure that in too. I would recommend a "Weighmax" brand digital postal scale. They are inexpensive and work well. Remember, it costs money to make money.

Agreed. Been there and done that on both sides of the equation. Having never sold anything in my life that wasn't brokered by a third party, I screwed up my entire first set of listings. I presumed that people would want Express Mail so I listed all the items with only express mail as an option. Things that should have sold for $50.00 brought only $25.00 and I received two negative feedbacks for "Insane Shipping Fees". Round 2 - I switched to $3.00 flat rate shipping. Well you can't ship anything over 13 oz for $3.00 no matter how small it is!

I now use either free shipping ( on higher priced or known market items) and calculated shipping on everything else. I estimate all jewelry items at 5 oz so I can use listing templates.

On the same note -- Watch out for ebay's "Global Shipping Program". I opted into it last month and its been nothing but headaches. The third party vendor jacks the shipping fees up by close to 30% and only ships priority international. That stinks. I could ship international with tracking for the same cost -- where is the benefit? AND They don't ship to Japan (most months Japanese buyers make up 10-30% of our sales).

 

[Iron Patch]

Auctions listed at .99 cents. We went with 60 ---- total time to photograph and list was over 5 hours. Items range in value from about $10-$400.00. We'll see what happens. One unintended consequence is that we're getting a lot more traffic to our high end buy it now items - Getting offers on items that have been up for almost a month with no action.

I can tell you without question, especially if a lot of items are similar, traffic does definitely make a difference. Not just to your fixed price stuff, but always gets you more bids and higher prices on your auction items. I've been using that to my advantage for many years now, the only problem being Sunday seems the best day to really load up my page, but to get it all on tends to be quite a work load. So the balance I've found best is to try and get quite a bit on Sunday, just not an insane amount, and then do higher starts and fixed price through the week.

 

[Iron Patch]

Agreed. Been there and done that on both sides of the equation. Having never sold anything in my life that wasn't brokered by a third party, I screwed up my entire first set of listings. I presumed that people would want Express Mail so I listed all the items with only express mail as an option. Things that should have sold for $50.00 brought only $25.00 and I received two negative feedbacks for "Insane Shipping Fees". Round 2 - I switched to $3.00 flat rate shipping. Well you can't ship anything over 13 oz for $3.00 no matter how small it is!

I now use either free shipping ( on higher priced or known market items) and calculated shipping on everything else. I estimate all jewelry items at 5 oz so I can use listing templates.

On the same note -- Watch out for ebay's "Global Shipping Program". I opted into it last month and its been nothing but headaches. The third party vendor jacks the shipping fees up by close to 30% and only ships priority international. That stinks. I could ship international with tracking for the same cost -- where is the benefit? AND They don't ship to Japan (most months Japanese buyers make up 10-30% of our sales).

yep, a seller should know he is the one who is paying the shipping in the end, not the buyer. So when it's out of your pocket anyway you might as well do what goes over best with the buyers.

No way I would ever participate in that program as a seller based on a couple of my purchases made from sellers using it. One transaction I had cancelled because the added cost was so ridiculous in comparison to the cost of the item. It basically doubled it.

 

[TreasureHunters]

results people?

 

[Iron Patch]

results people?

My result is... Always good!

 

[diggummup]

results people?

Next Sunday for the OP.