eBay Stores vs. eBay Auctions

Is it just me, or is that a freakishly long thumb?

Anonymous said: "I would also love to hear your thoughts on when it is good to have an ebay store rather than just listing auction items."

I'll give you the short answer, and then I'll give you the long answer.

The short answer: Don't do auctions.

The long answer: In general, I am very anti-auction. I started out selling on eBay with auctions only. I suspect that's how most people start out. I didn't even know there was such a thing as eBay stores back then. That was during the day that store listings were separated out from auction listings in search results, so I wouldn't have wanted to do that anyway. Once I started to sell more, and once eBay integrated store listings back into search results, I decided to make the leap. I was half-sick about that $15 a month (or whatever the basic store level is), because how would I afford that??

It became obvious in a very short period of time that I made the right decision, and I've never looked back. My store fees were only 5 cents per month (back then - they have since changed it to 20 cents per month for basic stores). That $15 paid for itself very quickly. I was able to list my items higher and get what I wanted for them, rather than listing them at auction and hoping for the best.

Several months later, I did the math and realized that I would save even MORE money by upgrading to the mid-level Premium store. If I thought I was sick about paying $15 a month, imagine how I felt at the thought of paying $50 a month! But again, what I was saving on listing fees quickly added up to pay for the store subscription. I don't think there's a boost in search results by having a premium store, so I don't think making that upgrade really increases your sales, but there is a point where mathematically, it makes sense to upgrade. Let's take a look at that before I talk about why else I don't do auctions.

Basic Store: $15.95/month; listings 20 cents each

Premium Store: $49.95/month; listings 5 cents each

If you have a basic store, and you list 230 items per month, you are paying $15.95 for the store subscription, and you are paying 20 cents per listing, which is $46.00. Your total monthly fees (excluding final value fees) are $61.95.

If you have a premium store with the same 230 items per month, you are paying $49.95 for the store subscription, and you are paying 5 cents per listing, which is $11.50. Your total monthly fees (excluding final value fees) are $61.40.

So yes, your premium store subscription looks like a lot of money, but you are actually SAVING money by upgrading. You pay more up front, but your listing fees are lower.

***********

Ok, so now that I've gotten that off my chest (something that had nothing to do with the original question) ... let's go back to the original question.  When is it better to run auctions? And I think I said something like, "Never."  Let me explain my reasons for saying that:

Instant Gratification. We live in a Gimme-It-Now society. Auctions are a thing of the past. More often than not, people don't want to bother waiting for an auction to end. They want their item, and they want it now. I speak from experience here. I just bought something the other day that was an auction listing with a BIN option. I didn't want to wait until the end of the week. I wanted it sooner. The difference was just a few dollars, so I just bought it now. I was not the least bit interested in waiting until the auction ended. People don't like to wait.

Over-saturation. eBay has been running all these ridiculous 1,000 free listings promotions. Everybody and their mother is listing their stuff at auction right now. If you search for something like "Clarks Black Shoes Size 8," you will probably be overwhelmed by all the search results. Because everyone is listing, there are way too many listings to choose from. A bargain buyer will sort those gazillion search results by lowest price. You have 2 options: underprice and be the lowest price so yours sells, or price fairly and let the lower-priced auction get the sale. Neither of those is appealing, so you need to price your item where you want it and wait for a Gimme-It-Now buyer.

Ordinary inventory. I sell shoes. They aren't exactly collectible. There are a lot of shoes out there in the world. Let's say a buyer searches for "Clarks Black Shoes Size 8" and finds a pair that she likes at auction. She bids, but is outbid. She has a gazillion other Clarks Black Shoes Size 8 listings to choose from, so she'll just move on to the next one. On the other hand, let's say a buyer searches for "Curse You Red Baron Fire King mug." There is currently ONE of those listed at auction. This is a rare item (one that I actually managed to find and sell last summer!) If there are 8 people looking for this mug, those 8 people are going to get into a bidding war over that ONE mug that is listed. They HAVE to win it. There is no other option. They can't just move on to the next mug listing. That is an auction item for sure. You need to know what's ordinary, and what's extraordinary. Put the ordinary stuff in your store. Auction the extraordinary stuff. And it needs to be truly extraordinary. I have had great success (meaning $100+) with only 3 auction items in my history of selling on eBay. All three of those items were hard to find and were one of very very few that were listed at the time.

Time investment. I'm busy. I'm pretty sure most of you are busy too. During several of eBay's recent free auction listing promotions, I decided to go ahead and move some of my older inventory to auction, as a form of clearance. I spent over an hour switching those listings over to auctions, only to have just 3 or 4 of them sell. I then had to spend over an hour a week later switching those listings back to store inventory. Maybe it didn't cost me money to switch them to auction, but it did cost me money to switch them back to store inventory. It also cost me a great deal of time, time that I could have spent listing NEW items.

So to summarize:  only use auctions if you have a super-special, extraordinary item that is rare, with only 1 or 2 other active listings (or better yet - zero!). Price your auction wisely. Start your item at a price that you would be content with. But generally speaking, if you are planning on sticking with eBay for awhile, you NEED to open a store. I guarantee you your sales will increase. Not necessarily in units, but definitely in dollar amounts. You can price your items how you want them, and you can relax, knowing that that price is the price you will get. Eventually.  Store listings are less exciting than auction listings, but they are definitely more reliable.

Let's hear some opinions in the comments. Who has a store? Who just does auctions? Why? If you have a store, have you ever looked back? If you only do auctions, are you considering opening a store?

My Top eBay Moments This Week

I had another great week this week, until the last 2 days anyway. I had 42 sales this past week. Only 12 of them were shoes. I've really been selling a lot of Meltonian shoe cream lately, and this week was no exception.  I had a difficult week in terms of getting people to pay. Since I've removed Best Offer from most of my listings, the number of unpaid item cases I've had to open has really decreased. But I took advantage of eBay's free auction listing promotion last week, and several of my winning bidders were actually losers. I have 2 auctions that I'm still waiting to receive payment for. I also had to open a case against a woman who bought 2 pairs of shoes from me, but she paid the next day. I was especially annoyed about that, because she had bought 2 pairs from me a month ago, but then contacted me to let me know she was having trouble with her Paypal account. Honest to goodness, it's amazing the number of buyers that "have trouble with their Paypal accounts," isn't it? But anyway, I was nice. Since she was actually communicating with me, I offered to cancel the transaction and she could re-purchase the shoes later, once her troubles were fixed. She was very grateful. And then I didn't hear another word from her until a month later. Well, one of the pairs she had originally wanted sold in the meantime. But she found another pair she wanted. She ordered them both (I had turned off Immediate Payment so I could combine the shipping on her invoice) and assured me she'd pay immediately. I don't know about your Webster's dictionary, but mine does NOT define "immediately" as "4 1/2 days later." But she eventually paid, so it's all good.

Enough about all of that. Here are my highlights from the week:

I found this in the back of my son's closet. The tractor that it hooks to is LONG gone, so I tossed it in the box of yard sale stuff, figuring I could get 50 cents out of it. But something made me think to check eBay (I dunno ... maybe the fact that it's in my blood now?)  There weren't any of this particular plow listed, but I was pleased with how the other attachments were selling. I went high and priced it for $19.99 or best offer, hoping for $10. Imagine my surprise when I got an offer for $15 about a week later! My boy was delighted, because he gets the money for that (except fees, of course).

I regretted this purchase as soon as I got it back to the car. What in the world was I thinking? Who was going to buy a Tamagotchi board game, even if it WAS new in the shrink wrap. I'm thinking there was a good reason the original owner never bothered to play it!  But again ... it never ceases to amaze me what people will buy. I bought this at a dirty dingy thrift store in July for $1 and sold it for my full asking price of $19.99!

This is a giant frog puppet. He's about 24" tall. I'm telling you ... huge. And really solid. Well made. He was given to me to sell back in July. I listed him for $24.99 or best offer, hoping for $20. But again ... full price sale. Didn't even make me an offer.

I love ALF! This is the third one I've sold. He's about 18" tall. Always grab him up. There are talking versions too. I've never found one of them, but hopefully someday I will. I bought this guy 2 weeks ago for $1. I decided to put him up for auction during eBay's free auction listing promotion. He only sold for my starting bid, but it was one I knew I'd be happy with. I sold the other 2 for $34.99 each, but this one sold for $29.99. Still good enough for me!

This was a gut-instinct buy. Dragon Strike, the game. I've never heard of it, but it had TONS of pieces and cool graphics. I think there's a niche market for this type of thing, so I took a chance on it. I bought it at a yard sale for $3 a couple weeks ago. I also put it up for auction. It also sold for my starting price, but I was happy with that $29.99 too.

I always buy Scrabble games when I find them. I try not to pay more than $2 for them, but obviously I prefer Goodwill's game price of 50 cents! This was 5 sets split up into 3 lots. I sold 6 boards a couple weeks ago for $24.99. I still have the letter racks listed (16 for $14.99). This lot of 500 tiles sold quickly for $50 (free shipping - but they fit into a padded flat rate mailer for $4.90).

I am deliriously happy that these finally sold! I bought 25 games and the console/gun/controllers/cords the end of July for $15. I sold 3 Mario games for $23. I have had the rest of the games at auction three times now. Each time, I had over 10 watchers, but no bids. The third time really IS a charm. They sold this week for $51!

It was a good week. Here's hoping for another!  What were your favorite sales this week?

Fantastic Finds Friday

We want to hear all about your Fantastic Finds! This features isn't about your exciting sales. It's about your exciting finds! There are so many places to find inventory: your closet, your garage, a yard sale, thrift stores, a consignment item you're selling for someone else. What did you find this week that you are excited about? It can be something you're excited to get listed OR something you're excited to keep! You can even post to your listing, if you'd like. Free advertising!

==========

~Lesley

==========

I went to an auction last Friday night. Haven't been to one of them in a year and a half. There wasn't much there that I was interested in, but it was a benefit auction for a dear family friend, so I enjoyed being there with family and good friends. I did spot a hard bonnet salon-style hair dryer, but I figured it would go for more than I was willing to pay for it, especially considering I didn't have a chance to research it. Finally toward the end of the (6 hour) auction, it came up. The auctioneer chuckled and said, "ok, here we have a hair dryer" and would you believe no one wanted it??? So I got it for a DOLLAR! I haven't tested it yet, but it's complete and in its original box. I'll need to clean it up and take pictures, but it's the same as the one in this listing (mine is pink). That one is new, so of course I don't expect to get that amount out of it, but for a dollar, I should be able to turn a decent profit on it.

Oh - I also got a crockpot that I'm pretty sure was never used. We go through crockpots like some families go through paper towels, so I was pretty excited to get a back-up one for $2.25!

 ~Jessica

===========

What did you find this week? Anything exciting?

CHA CHING!

I love the sound of a cash register making a sale or the end of an eBay auction where you truly are floored by the results! Well my last post was about an antique sugar & creamer set that I scored for just 50 cents at a yard sale. I waited until now to type this post, just to make sure the customer who bid and won this auction would actually ante up and pay for it!

I ran the auction for 7 days and started it at .99 cents. I figured already I had doubled my money so the rest is just a bonus! Seven days and 10 bids later this set went for a whopping $72.00. It’s times like these that motivate you to do more scavenging, sometimes it’s a risk, but no risk…no reward!

Last weekend I found some vintage Fisher Price toys and my childhood started replaying in my mind. I bought the whole lot because I remember researching this angle before and seeing a market for it on eBay. I also snagged a large lot of Build-a-Bear clothes and accessories. Dolls and bears are not my thing but I know there is a market for that as well.

Now to just find the time to get my lots listed!

Happy eBay hunting!

Lesley for Lil*bo*tique