Our eBay store
My seller's profile at eBay (with all customer feedback)
Transcript of the live chat session that took place Thursday, May 13, 1999. These sessions are normally scheduled for 12 noon-1 PM Eastern Time every Thursday. Please note that the US is now on Daylight Savings Time. So in international terms, we are on at GMT -4.
For Guide to eBay for sellers: practical advice from one seller to another, see www.samizdat.com/ebay.html
Since the chat itself happens at a rapid pace, it's often difficult to note interesting facts in particular URLs as they appear on-line. Here's a place to take a more leisurely look. I've rearranged some of the pieces to try to capture the various threads of discussion (which sometimes get lost in the rush of live chat).
Please send email with your follow-on questions and comments, and suggestions for topics we should focus on in future sessions. So long as the volume of email responses is manageable, I'll post the most pertinent ones here for all to see.
These sessions are hosted by Richard Seltzer. If you would like to receive email reminders of our chat sessions, simply send a blank email message to businessonthewebchats-subscribe@yahoogroups.com or go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/businessonthewebchats and sign up there.
For transcripts of previous sessions and a list of future topics, www.samizdat.com/chat.html.
For an article on how to make "business chat" work (based on this experience), www.samizdat.com/events.html.
For articles about online auctions, see www.samizdat.com/auc.html
Our online store at Yahoo
Our eBay
store
My seller's
profile at eBay (with all customer feedback)
Richard Seltzer -- All -- we've started. As you connect, please introduce yourselves, then let us know your interests, let us know about your auction-related experiences and learnings.
Richard Seltzer -- Welcome, Bob and Armin. Bob -- what kinds of things have you been trying out at Ebay?
Bob Zwick -- Hello everyone. Bob, independent consultant from Dallas, Tx here. I was aware of eBay before we started discussing it here and since have been captured by the opportunities it presents.
Tracy5 -- Hello all. Tracy Marks, Internet and Photoshop trainer, Boston area. Have been very active on Ebay the past six weeks - started a whole new profession.
Tim Dolan -- Hello, Tim Dolan saying hello. Newie to the chat but a low-level EBayer.
Richard Seltzer -- Welcome, Tim, what kinds of things do you buy or sell at Ebay?
Tim Dolan -- Hello Richard, I have been doing "old" computer tech books . kinda techno-campy. some slide rule stuff. I only do it as a hobby - I am too much of a bottom feeder to make any real money.
Ron Rothenberg -- I have lots of old computer books from graduate school 20 years ago -- The Classics - maybe it's time for them to find a new home?
Richard Seltzer -- Welcome, Awarepress. Please introduce yourself and let us know your interests.
Richard Seltzer -- Bob -- yes, they have a few unexpected features at Ebay that help both buyers and bidders. If you really want an item, you appreciate a note that someone bid higher than you. And if you're the one selling it, you just love that kind of incentive for buyers to get into a bidding war. Also, there's a feature that you can post the highest amount that you want to pay, and the software automaticallly increments your bid, a little bit at a time, when others outbid you. If several people operate that way on the same item, the price can escalate quite rapidly.
Tracy5 -- I just put up an old autographed copy of Atlas Shrugged for $19. Within a few days it was up to $149. During the last 10 minutes, a bidding war started and it sold for $881! I just shipped it, using an escrow account. What a thrill!
Tracy5 -- Bob, I've been following up with emails to the 2nd highest bidders and selling them the same item in many cases. You can click on the user name and get the email addresses .....but ebay doesn't automatically provide it until you do so.
Ron Rothenberg -- Bob - yes and yes -- according to the community rules, you're not supposed to use that for advertising, though. and that's what offering the same item to #2 really is.
Richard Seltzer -- Bob -- when you click on the "bid history" for any given item, you get a list of the "handles" of everyone who bid on that item. Click on the handle, identify yourself with username and password, and you can get a person's email address. You may have something similar that you want to sell and may not want to do it through Ebay -- you could find interested parties that way.
Ron Rothenberg -- Richard, if someone did that to me I would consider it SPAM.
Tracy5 -- Ron, are you saying that it's not really legitimate to offer the same item to number #2 after the auction ends? (Just want to make sure this is ok. It doesn't appear forbidden in the rules)
Ron Rothenberg -- ebay considers that fee avoidance and a misuse of the bidder information. Check their bylaws though - it's always changing and i'm not always right. i understand why ebay would object to it.
Bob Zwick -- Ron - I understand that rule and agree wholeheartedly wit it, but thought that some form of communication even with the loosers would be a good business practice. One that I also do in my consulting business.
Ron Rothenberg -- Yes, and generally it is well received. But where does it step over the line from being a welcome offering to annyoing unsolicited email? if i were to start receiving solicitations from 20 or 30 different merchants who had me on their "lists" i would be annoyed.
Richard Seltzer -- Bob -- Building a distribution list from Ebay bidders and sending spam to them would probably be against community rules and not a very good thing to do. But I don't see anything wrong with personal email, addressing the specific interests of an individual. E.g., if I had an Ayn Rand-related collector's item, I would definitely want to contact that person who paid so much for Tracy's book.
Ron Rothenberg -- mostly I'm a seller, but some buyers have put me on their mailing lists. I am not really interested in Tae-Bo classes in Atlanta Georgia, so I merrily hit the delete key.
Richard Seltzer -- Ron -- When I conduct business at Ebay, I build relationships with bidders and buyers. People email me with questions while an auction is going on; they ask me if I have a certain related item and would be willing to sell it to them off-line. And when someone buys or repeatedly bids on something of mine, I feel no qualms about contacting them to let them know about other related items that they clearly would be interested in. The auction takes place within the community. But what I do in other ways with folks that I met there is really my own business.
Tracy5 -- Based on what Richard just said, I think we need to distinguish between one-time buyers and repeat buyers. If you have repeated buyers, you may develop a friendly relationship with them in which off-Ebay communication is frequent........One would then operate differently with them than a buyer with whom you are making first-time contact.
Richard Seltzer -- Ron -- the key word for off-line contacts is "list." The bigger the list, the more messages are impersonal, the closer the practice gets to spam. But I see no problem with one-to-one contact.
Ron Rothenberg -- i am not talking about repeat buyers, my problem is with writing to people who have just made a bid in your auction, not developed a relationship. I know, when I bid in an auction, I frequently get email from OTHER vendors offering the same item at lower prices. This really is SPAM and annoys me.
Richard Seltzer -- Ron -- ah ha -- I'm now seeing better where you are coming from. You are selling brand name, mass manufactured merchandise. I am selling one-of-a-kind collectibles (even bottle caps are a bit "one-of-a-kind" because their value depends largely on their condition -- shown in photos -- which varies considerably. No other vendor is going to suddenly offer the same merchandise as me at a lower price; but that could easily happen to you. So the definition of "spam" and the notion of proper community behavior depends in large part on the kind of merchandise for sale.
Tim Dolan -- (whisper) I've contacted the second place bidder and have sold. I do feel guilty but such is life.
Richard Seltzer -- Tim -- You shouldn't feel guilty about selling to the second place bidder. For the kind of merchandise you deal in -- old computer books -- that makes perfectly good sense and would probably be welcomed by the person you contact. Just put yourself in the other person's shoes and see how you'd feel about it. (I wouldn't be doctrinaire about this -- there are too many variables, too many cases where a second place bidder might be delighted that something similar is still available.)
Richard Seltzer -- Tracy's case -- selling prints of photos that she took herself -- is a bit different from both Ron and my experience. She can make many prints of the same photo; but no one else can sell prints of that photo (she is the only one with the negatives). Tracy would probably also have many more repeat customers and build longer relationships. I will soon run out of old comic books. But she focuses on photos of ice skaters; and someone who loves that kind of thing will come back again and again and again for prints of new photos.
Tim Dolan -- Oh but Richard - the 2nd place bidder is happy. My guilt is more toward papa-ebay. I am preventing him from collecting the massive 25 cents plus 5percent of $10.00. I don't lose sleep but I understand what I am doing.
Ron Rothenberg -- ebay does accept voluntary fee payments on those, Tim.
Ron Rothenberg -- Frequently bidders contact me and ask for an off-auction price. Some people find the idea of auctions just awful and don't have the patience. Others think it's the greatest thing since online shopping itself.
Richard Seltzer -- Ron -- I love auctions for selling. But for buying, it somehow doesn't suit me. For instance, when I wanted a digital camera, I could have gone to Ebay, bid on yours or others there; but then it would have been days before I knew whether I had "won". It was good being able to call you up, get your advice, learn from you, find out what you had in stock, and just make the deal. Going another route, I could probably have gotten a better price, but I don't think I could have been any better satisfied. I got just what I wanted and when I wanted it.
Tracy5 -- Tim - I'm doing the same thing you're doing, and would certainly be willing to pay Ebay the 25 cents and 5 percent if they had a systematized means of doing this. But the policy doesn't seem clear in this regard. For me, the impetus is primarily to save time by not having to list an auction again and track it again.......And the 2nd bidder is almost always thrilled and wants the item. I just have to make sure that my repeat buyers don't always expect that I'll contact the 2nd bidder and therefore slow down on their bidding because they don't think they need to be first to win.....
Tim Dolan -- good idea Tracy.
Richard Seltzer -- Tim -- I certainly wouldn't lose sleep over it. Keep in mind that Ebay has a beautiful business model. They don't use transaction software. They just link buyers and sellers, who then do all the work of completing the deal manually, off-line. That interaction between buyers and sellers enables them to build relationships and naturally leads to them making other deals without the need of the Ebay bidding mechanism. That's the way it's set up. That's the way it should work. That's one of the reasons that I'm so addicted to Ebay as a seller -- not just for the items sold directly by auction, but for the business that comes through the relationships built there.
Tim Dolan -- Richard - you talk good words but Papa-ebay would disagree with your suggested view of their minimized role. Each auction is a transaction and I think they want a piece of the however small pie.
Richard Seltzer -- Tim -- Ebay is more than welcome to their tiny slice of the pie when an auction takes place. But what happens out of the auction arena -- between consenting parties -- is really none of their business. Ebay would only get involved if one auction user were annoying someone met in the Ebay space.
Tim Dolan -- Anyone using auction
Universe? I tried it back in jan 1999 but there just was not enough people.
Sellers were afraid of too-low price so they set starting price at
cost+plus. I see comments about Amazon maybe I will try it.
Tracy5 -- I posted ten of my photo sets on Amazon.com's auction site a week ago just to check it out. NOT ONE SINGLE BID! There just aren't enough people there yet, or those who are there are only checking out particular categories.
Ron Rothenberg -- i have tried auction universe, firstbid and others. The only one that makes a dent is Amazon. Yes, categories are important on amazon -- scanners sell much better than on ebay, but can't sell software there. some categories yield higher prices than ebay, some lower. It takes some experimentation.
Richard Seltzer -- Ron -- I've taken a look at Amazon a few times and there seems to be very, very little merchandise for sale. and the items for sale typically have unrealistic prices and no bidder. It was humorous on the news when Ebay was down for a few hours and the reporter plugged Amazon saying they had "half a dozen auctions of Star Wars collectibles". That in fact was all they had -- just half a dozen -- nearly all priced ridiculously, with no bidders. And Ebay has over 2 million items total and thousands of Star-Wars related auctions. For collectibles, I see no reason to deal with Amazon at this point. (It's totally different for branded new merchandise).
Richard Seltzer -- Tracy -- re: Amazon. That's my impression as well -- not enough customers to make it interesting when you are selling collectible items. And very little merchandise for sale.
Ron Rothenberg -- Yes, amazon has a problem with its charter merchants. I can't seem to win anything there - too-high reserves.
Ron Rothenberg -- amazon advertises auctions on the book pages -- if you get on good pages, you get good traffic.
Richard Seltzer -- Ron -- Amazon is running those ads on book pages primarily because they have so little traffic to the auction site and so little for sale there. If they had anywhere near the 2 million items that Ebay has now, it would be a long long time before you'd randomly get visibility from a book page.
Tim Dolan -- Good Question Tracy5, I have a couple slow customers that I am considering doing a "negative" feedback. I'm almost afraid.
Ron Rothenberg -- Tracy, factual negative feedback is ok in the case of REAL problems -- i don't believe that just failing to email me is a real problem - I just got my first three negative feedbacks this week. all were from people who didn't really understand how their mail systems worked, and were sending me emails, but the emails were still sitting in their out boxes. before you leave neg. feedback, get the person;'s phone number and call. you have two months to leave negative feedback, but you can never retract it-- therefore you should wait until you are VERY VERY sure of the facts.
Ron Rothenberg -- it may be that buyers expectations are low. They are surprised to get the item within a month.
Richard Seltzer -- I would only give negative feedback if I were actually hurt by the actions or inaction of someone at Ebay. For instance, if the high bidder on that collector's book of yours backed off, it's unlikely that you'd be able to get a price nearly that high putting the same item up for sale again. And the person who came in second, isn't likely to want to pay his/her highest bid. a person making high bids with no ability or intention to buy screws up the whole auction system. Fortunately, such people seem to be very very rare. But that would be a good use of negative feedback.
Tim Dolan -- Speaking of feedback - I'm concerned that most fdbk is over-done. eg. a++++, Excellent.... . Way too much. I just to a simple. "good emailer, sent money, I would do business again"
Ron Rothenberg -- Tim, that's there way of saying thanks. it's like grade inflation. adequate = an asset to ebay!!! the best merchant ever!!! great = surpasses superman in speed - able to leap tall UPS trucks in a single bound!
Ron Rothenberg -- yes, i still have a few orphaned checks sitting around.
Ron Rothenberg -- i tried
"mister lister." it really stinks. They claim to be working on something
better.
Amazon has a better method using spreadsheets, but it's not a lot better.
Still clunky. one-click relisting and auction cloning would be better.
Richard Seltzer -- Tim -- I'd second the vote for deferred auction start and explict end time. Those would certainly help me.
Ron Rothenberg -- they claim to be working on it -- also, 3,4_ day auctions (instead of 3,5 and 7 would allow you to set up a whole week's worth of auctions in one night, instead of 3.
Ron Rothenberg -- Tim, they are becoming more responsive to feedback (sometimes) -- I have a sales rep at ebay - she listens, I don't know if she always understands. but they are responsive and amazon is VERY responsive, and if Amazon implements something, generally ebay will follow very soon.
Tim Dolan -- the comment about the "sales Rep" reminds me.... I must have a mental block around the user interface of Ebay. I can never figure where to find answer, where to submit a email on features or billing issues.
Ron Rothenberg -- i think it's all under news/chat
Bob Zwick -- Ron- I Work in a remote area and that postoffice thing sounds like it could save me a lot of trips to town. Do you just patse the printed stamp on a package ?
Ron Rothenberg -- No, Bob - you need special Priority mail labels - you print out the combo postage, mailing label, bar codes, etc., on your laser printer, then paste to the box. Right now, it's only open to the first 5000 users as a test.
Ron Rothenberg -- I have also seen laser printed stamps on plain-old first-class mail - but I think that is not an internet venture, but rather a collaboration of USPS and some of the postage meter makers.
Ron Rothenberg -- almost all wholesalers will drop-ship. there is someone on ebay who sells a diskette of all wholesalers, drop-shippers, auction houses, liquidators, etc. it is modestly useful. ingram micro and merisel will drop-ship computer products.
Ron Rothenberg -- i would love a database record-keeping program.
Tracy5 -- Ron - let's stay in touch about database programs for managing Ebay. I used Act two years ago and really like it, and got 4.0 at Ebay for only $39, so I'm inclined to go with that, especially since it's so customizable. But moving transactions in process is a real bother........the setup takes a lot of time.......Don't know enough about the current auction software, though I did purchase one and used it some to set up nicely designed listings.
Ron Rothenberg -- Tracy, i am trying to set something up using quickbooks pro.
Tracy5 -- Let me know what you think
of quickbooks pro, Ron.
Tim Dolan -- Last week someone mentioned doing test marketing of a product by using different styles of ads(words, photos, gaudy...) Any Ideas? I agree that "good" ads are good but I view Ebay as a pond of fish that we are trying to capture their attention cycles (and cash)
Ron Rothenberg -- Yes, I have -- one or two photos make a big difference. I wish i could say clarity sells, but that's not the case. I use a lot of bulleted lists to specify features, etc. Doesn't help it sell any better, but it's less work for me -- fewer unnecessary questions from bidders.
Ron Rothenberg -- i agree with richard -i start 99% of my auctions at $.99 - no reserve. Reserves are auction-killers, especially if there's a wide spread between min. price and reserve. I don't know why sellers don't notice that.
Tracy5 -- I agree about starting low if you have no overhead, Richard. You don't have to pay for your comic books; you already have them.... But I don't start too low on 8x10 photos because of the cost of making them. You've got to be willing to sell at your starting price without loss...
Tracy5 -- Ron - you really take a risk starting at 99 cents. Have you as a result had to sell a number of items at a loss to you? Or perhaps based on experience you know that the price always gets driven upwards.
Richard Seltzer -- Tracy -- Yes, your situation is different.
Ron Rothenberg -- yes, but you might find that if you start lower, you get more interest and more bids and a higher price.
Tracy5 -- Ron - I agree that reserves are killers, but they are a means to test the market and see if there's any interest and how high the bids will go with a reserve. You can usually count on there being more and bids going higher when you relist the item without a reserve or with a lower reserve.
Tracy5 -- Most of what I've been selling are my ice skating photos ....have sold several hundred already. This week I am putting them up for sale before I've duplicated them or enlarged them.....just to see if the market's big enough for me to take the time to hunt up each negative and have multiple copies made. It's great to be able to test the market that way. I also did that with a rare book, setting a fairly high reserve, just to see what the interest was. But I don't think you can really tell with a reserve; many people avoid reserve auctions.
Ron Rothenberg -- Snipers are just last-minute bidders - it is a derogatory term by disappointed bidders.
Tim Dolan -- (snippers hurt Sellers)
Ron Rothenberg -- why do snipers hurt sellers?
Tim Dolan -- snipers don't bid early and keep the ending price down.
Bob Zwick -- Seems like a waste of time to bid on something 3,5 or 7 days before it sells. When I window shop, I only look at auctions ending that day.
Richard Seltzer -- Tim and Ron -- Yes, snipers hurt sellers.
Especially, if they operate in a particular category. Buyers in that category
get discouraged that this guy is going to swoop in out of nowhere at the
last minute; and stop bidding the way they normally would.
Ron Rothenberg -- 12 noon or midnight?
Ron Rothenberg -- 12 midnight would be 6am in most of europe?
Ron Rothenberg -- I get highest prices on computer stuff between 8pm and 11pm EDT. after 11:30pm or so, it's kind of dead.
Tim Dolan -- Ron - I can't argue with your success(which you have been) but 08:00 is good for Europe and Boston but not Los Angeles.
Tim Dolan -- oops Ron, I didn't see that you said PM. I assumed you said AM. The logic still holds but just inverse it.
Ron Rothenberg -- Tim-different hours for different items. Some people (like Richard) have great success on weekends -- my auctions die on weekends.
Richard Seltzer -- All, we've almost reached the end of the hour. I'd like to continue this topic again next week. What do the rest of you feel?
Tim Dolan -- I would love to continue.
Tracy5 -- Would love to continue. Especially to discuss more about what makes for an effective listing....
Richard Seltzer -- All -- before you sign off, please post your email address and URL so we can keep in touch. Don't count on the software to have captured that.
Tracy5 -- Tracy Marks, tmar@tiac.net
Ebay auctions under user name torreyphilemon
http://cgi3.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewListedItems&userid=torreyphilemon
Ron Rothenberg -- Ron Rothenberg - Homebase@world.std.com ebay site: http://members.ebay.com/aboutme/ronrsr/
Richard Seltzer -- All -- please join us again next Thursday. As usual, I'll post the edited transcript, hopefully within a few days. Check www.samizdat.com/#chat Please send followup comments for inclusion with the transcript to seltzer@samizdat.com
Richard Seltzer -- All -- thanks again. great discussion. please come again next Thursday, and please spread the word.
Date: Fri, 14 May 1999 09:08:19 -0400
read your recent transcript on ebay and e-commerce. i am the director of auction research here at Gomez Advisors. If you are looking for insight into the marketplace and my schedule permits, let me know.
reply --
We'd love to have you join us. We'll be revisiting the topic next Thursday, (May 20), noon to 1 PM
Hope you can make it. (And please let me know if you plan to.)
reply to reply --
that sounds fine.
Date: Tue, 18 May 1999 00:53:55 -0400
Just received and am passing it on......
Tracy Marks
Windweaver Web and W95 Resources http://www.windweaver.com/
From: mthomas86@hotmail.com
Date: Mon, 17 May 1999 13:20:23 -0700
Hi! I have recently put together a rating page for the various online auction sites available today. This might be of interest to anyone who trades online. I would like to get some feedback concerning these sites and my ratings.
Come visit my site at http://members.spree.com/business/jauctions/
You will find a wealth of information and links to many auction sites.
M. Thomas
Other auction articles by Richard Seltzer
Previous transcripts and schedule of upcoming chats -- www.samizdat.com/chat.html
To connect to the chat room, go to www.samizdat.com/chat-intro.html
The full text of Richard Seltzer's books The Social Web,
Take
Charge of Your Web Site, Shop Online the Lazy Way, and
The
Way of the Web, plus more than a hundred related articles are available
on CD ROM My
Internet: a Personal View of Internet Business Opportunities.
Web
Business Boot Camp: Hands-on Internet lessons for manager, entrepreneurs,
and professionals by Richard Seltzer (Wiley, 2002).
No-nonsense guide targets activities that anyone can perform to achieve
online business
success.
Reviews.
a
library for the price of a book.
This site is Published by B&R Samizdat Express, 33 Gould St., West
Roxbury, MA 02132. (617) 469-2269. seltzer@samizdat.com
Return to B&R Samizdat Express
| Internet Business Showcase: | ||
|
|
|