Best time to use Best Offer? AND Other Features?

[kevin_psx]

Listed 3 Star Trek DVDs at $90 per season, fixed price. Also included "make a best offer" in case someone thought $90 was too high. Is this the right situation to use the Best Offer option? In what cases is it best to use it?


AND do you use other ebay "features" to attract attention to your auction?

Tried most. Found the Gallery photo works best to make my auction stand out in Search results. And only cost 35 cents more.

[jajaja]

"make best offer" doesnt cost anything extra so if you list at a fixed price i dont see the harm of including this option. Set the BIN price alittle higher and the maybe someone will give you an offer on what you was going to set the BIN price to in the first place.

[Darth Sensei]

The "Best Offer" seems to be the "In" way to avoid final value fees. People make you their best offer and you sell off ebay.

[kevin_psx]

Set the BIN price alittle higher and the maybe someone will give you an offer on what you

So I should set BIN to $95-- hoping someone will offer $90?

[jajaja]

Set the BIN price alittle higher and the maybe someone will give you an offer on what you

So I should set BIN to $95-- hoping someone will offer $90?

Ye, for example. This way (if you get an offer) the seller gets a discount. Then it feels like hes getting something free if you know what i mean :)

[FABombjoy]

I just sold a bunch of Star Trek DVDs recently... and also used the Best Offer on a few of them.

Within 24 hours, I had a handful of idiotic offers and removed the Best Offer feature to prevent getting any more.

"Hey, I know you got this up there for $55, but I just got one for $30 so the most I'd be willing to pay is like $35"

"HI WUD YOU TKAE $25? LMK, KTHX"

I mean, don't people realize they don't have that kind of bargaining power 2 hours in to a 7 day listing?

[kevin_psx]

I have no offer and only 4 days left. Guess people think $90 is too high & just don't bother.

But I paid $105 for these things-- don't want to give them away for cheap. Would rather keep them.

[rpepper9]

The "Best Offer" seems to be the "In" way to avoid final value fees. People make you their best offer and you sell off ebay.

That is not at all how "Best Offer" works. Best offer is still sold through eBay, if you choose to accept a best offer the auction ends and you complete the transaction through eBay. Ebay gets their fees and offers the same security and everything else you would get selling any other way on eBay. Do you really think eBay would give you a way to avoid their fees? LOL

[FABombjoy]

But I paid $105 for these things-- don't want to give them away for cheap. Would rather keep them.

Paramount just lowered the price on quite a few of them, so you may have no alternative. I just saw a bunch of TNG and DS9 at Sam's for $48/each new.

With the exception of a few that I set BIN prices on, I started the rest at .99 and got way more than I paid for them. But, I bought them all used from Gamestop so that helped the ole profit margin.

[XianXi]

The "Best Offer" seems to be the "In" way to avoid final value fees. People make you their best offer and you sell off ebay.

Sorry that is wrong dude. When you make an offer using the option it is the same as bidding. The seller either accepts or declines the offer. If it is accepted the listing ends and you are sent an invoice through ebay. You still pay fees on it.

[Kitsune Sniper]

I added Best Offer to items that have little chance of selling normally. For example, I have a seven PC game lot going on. The BIN is $12.50, but in reality, I'm looking for $9-10. If a guy offers that amount, I'll sell it to him. :) Likewise with an old PC game with strategy guide. It can go for up to $20, so I put a 19.99 BIN or best offer and hope to get $13-15.

[kevin_psx]

Paramount just lowered the price on quite a few of them,

Yeah seasons 1/2/3 of tng and ds9 were dropped from 140 to 70-- half price.

Maybe I should copy other sellers
- sell for $50
- charge $30 to ship
- trick buyers to bid

:roll:

[Kitsune Sniper]

Well, was the price lowered because they removed the extras?

I mean, The X-Files season sets were recently slashed in price, but at a cost - they have little to no extras anymore. This happens a lot with anime boxsets as well.

If these are the original releases and they are different than the cheaper sets, you -might- want to let people know that upfront.

[kevin_psx]

Great idea!

But no. It's the same 7-disc set w/ extras. The price was dropped from $140 'cause these are old sets that've been out for 3-4 years.

50% reduction to $70 attracts more thrifty customers who formerly thought '140??? Nuts. Forget that.'



$70 is also in line with other season sets at 50-70 like xfiles, babylon 5

(shrug) I'll keep 'em & watch 'em 'til they wear out.

[ryborg]

To answer your original Q, I *always* use gallery, unless I'm selling something so unbelievably common, there's no need (single NES cart, a book/dvd/cd, etc...). I use subtitle frequently too, as I like having another line to describe my item to people on the search page. In some cases, I will use bold too, but this is only for rare items that may not normally get the page hits necessary.

Yeah, these cost extra, but if you do it right, you will get a nice return. For uncommon items, getting 20% higher than the usual price can happen. If you're really cheap, you can just add the cost of the upgrades to the S&H fee.
________
BODY SCIENCE (http://bodyscience.ws/)

[kevin_psx]

To answer your original Q, I *always* use gallery, unless I'm selling something so unbelievably common, there's no need (single NES cart, a book/dvd/cd, etc...).


Huh. I think the opposite would be true? Rare items don't need a gallery pic.

Common items need a gallery picture to make them stand out among the hundreds of other items.

?

[Kitsune Sniper]

To answer your original Q, I *always* use gallery, unless I'm selling something so unbelievably common, there's no need (single NES cart, a book/dvd/cd, etc...).


Huh. I think the opposite would be true? Rare items don't need a gallery pic.

Common items need a gallery picture to make them stand out among the hundreds of other items.

?

... Rare items need a gallery to show any sort of damage and the condition of the item overall.

I don't use gallery, I use imageshack. :P Why pay fifty cents for something I can add for free?

[ryborg]

Common items need a gallery picture to make them stand out among the hundreds of other items.

I disagree. When people are searching for something common (50-100+ available at any given time), all that matters is current price and time left, assuming your title has good searchability. Believe me, I've sold thousands of NES carts and similar items. There is no evidence to suggest that the price goes up because there is a gallery pic of SMB2 or whatever.


I don't use gallery, I use imageshack. Nyah Why pay fifty cents for something I can add for free?

It doesn't matter who hosts the images. If you want the gallery feature turned on so your images show up on the search page, you pay $.35. I use a free photohost too, but there's no getting around the $.35 gallery fee. Image host and gallery feature are two different things.
________
Iolite moisture condenser (http://vaporizers.net)

[kevin_psx]

Huh. I think the opposite would be true? Rare items don't need a gallery pic. ----- Common items need a gallery picture to make them stand out among the hundreds of other items.

... Rare items need a gallery to show any sort of damage and the condition of the item overall.

We are talking about differetn things. As defined by Ebay:

"photo" = the large image on the auction page
"Gallery" = the tiny thumbnail on the search results page.

Now. Re-read my previous post quoted above. See my point about common items need "gallery" to stand out among hundreds of other items?

And rare items not needing "gallery" since they are rare.

[Felixthegamer]

I used best offer for something yesterday for the first time. I got 15$ knocked off the price as my offer was accepted. It felt good, but I am sure the seller had moved the price up a little to make somebody feel better when they make a realistic offer. I can see a down side to having it though as somebody mentioned stupid offers that were made. I guess it cannot do any harm to have it though as you never know what might come up