eBay to force non-store sellers to use auctions instead of fixed-price listings.

[the blob]

While I am very annoyed with ebay we are, after all, talking about free listings here, so what is to complain about?

 

What I found really outrageous is that when I was paying for a frigging store I was not eligible to receive these free auction listings? What kind of B.S. is that?

[slym2none]

I agree.... if the seller actually relied on selling comics for a living and really wanted to sell it. Many don't and only use ebay's free offerings only in order to list as just a hobby. That way nothing is lost if items never sell. Everything to gain. Nothing to lose.

 

Exactly... This is why ebay comic listings suck. It's not a showcase for comics you don't want to sell. That mess pisses me off! Listing an SA comic worth $100 for $400 because it's a 9.8. Naturally, it never sells but you have to keep skipping it over and over as it is continually re-listed. I only want to see mess people want to sell and a reasonable prices. Ebay is not a personal showcase for mess you obviously want to keep.

 

Having it auctions only won't change that...just start the auction price at $399.99

 

Yep, and when everyone starts doing this it will probably drive away buyers like me who turn the auction only filter on because we don't want to see all the fixed (over)priced auctions.

 

Not all fixed-price listings are over-priced.

 

 

 

 

-slym

[the blob]

I noticed on my "My eBay" today that, at least for this month, I still have my 50 free auction or fixed-price listings, but I also have a "Pay no insertion fees on up to 6,000 fixed price listings" promotion going on. Those kinds of promotions come up about once a month for me (and I am not by any means a Power Seller, been on eBay since 2002, 619 FB rating) and if those continue after this new policy change, I will hold out my fixed-price listings until they pop up, and then list them for 30 days.

 

But, it will be a shame to not have those in my 50 free auctions anymore. As someone else said though, we used to have to pay for these before, so I take it as "it was fun while it lasted."

-slym

 

The problem I see is investing all this time into listings based on the assumption they will be free or cost 3 cents or whatever and then ebay changes the rules around. i can't imagine investing the time into 500 fixed price listings with the intention of them only being used for 30 days as, unless they are really cheap, you'd be lucky to sell 50 of them.

[the blob]

Also, do the free listings apply to re-lists? I had a store for so long I was never able to take advantage of free listings as I wanted to keep my buying account separate from my selling account.

[the blob]

I agree.... if the seller actually relied on selling comics for a living and really wanted to sell it. Many don't and only use ebay's free offerings only in order to list as just a hobby. That way nothing is lost if items never sell. Everything to gain. Nothing to lose.

 

Exactly... This is why ebay comic listings suck. It's not a showcase for comics you don't want to sell. That mess pisses me off! Listing an SA comic worth $100 for $400 because it's a 9.8. Naturally, it never sells but you have to keep skipping it over and over as it is continually re-listed. I only want to see mess people want to sell and a reasonable prices. Ebay is not a personal showcase for mess you obviously want to keep.

 

Having it auctions only won't change that...just start the auction price at $399.99

 

Yep, and when everyone starts doing this it will probably drive away buyers like me who turn the auction only filter on because we don't want to see all the fixed (over)priced auctions.

 

Not all fixed-price listings are over-priced.

 

 

-slym

 

Not to mention, that's what the "best offer" feature is for (for a smart seller at least, even if they price on the high side to start with).

 

If I have something that's relatively hard to find why not price it a little on the high side if you're in no rush to sell? If someone makes an offer you can live with, then so be it.

 

I had some Kirby and Starlin BA art I was in no hurry to unload. While I did not price it outrageously, I had it in line with heritage auction results and thus had no problem taking an offer 10-15% below my asking price. It took a while, sure, but it was better than tossing it out there and hoping that everyone potentially interested happened to see it over the course of a 7 day auction in a crowded market.

 

Auctions are fine for "hot stuff" or high end stuff, but if you have some nice VF copy of some non-key Silver Age book that guides for $80 and you want to get a reasonable % of guide, a 7 day auction isn't likely to do it, having it in your store with a best offer option will eventually get it sold at a decent price.

[thunsicker]

I also turn off fixed price listings when I do look at EBay. Though I doubt many things will go from fixed price listings to $.99 auctions. I don't see how this is necessarily a win for me. And if it pushes those fixed price auctions to high reserve or high starting point listings I may stop using EBay altogether.

[NewWorldOrder]

I complain about eBay the same as most but I am fine with this actually.

 

eBay still is the #1 place to buy and sell Copper Age to current.

 

For books such as WD #1 CGC 9.8, eBay is still the best place to sell it hands down.

[Boba]

No matter how you slice it, eBay is not the same company that it was when it started out, and now all it does is make silly rules and bust chops. I have very little use for it to be honest, except maybe to get rid of junk I have lying around. It's pretty sad what they did to it.

 

I don't love selling on eBay, but I've sold stuff there for double the price of what I asked for it here on the boards without any hint of interest.

 

I will agree with you, certain items that just sit on other venues seem to get attention on eBay, maybe because of the sheer number of folks on it. These special items I usually put a price I am willing to part with it at, and if I get a little more (or better yet 2 bidders who have to have it) I can do fairly well.

But if I don't have a lot of books listed, and I list a few decent ones up at $9.99 starting prince, it's hit-and-miss that I'm going to even make back my original investment.

If you're Sparkle City with a ton of people looking and bidding, you're probably going to be fine.

But, if like me you are the lone wolf seller putting a few nice under copies up for auction, be prepared to sell these books for a steal.

[ItsJustRyan]

via Imgflip Meme Maker

 

OR

 

via Imgflip Meme Maker

[Chaseman210]

No matter how you slice it, eBay is not the same company that it was when it started out, and now all it does is make silly rules and bust chops. I have very little use for it to be honest, except maybe to get rid of junk I have lying around. It's pretty sad what they did to it.

 

I don't love selling on eBay, but I've sold stuff there for double the price of what I asked for it here on the boards without any hint of interest.

 

I will agree with you, certain items that just sit on other venues seem to get attention on eBay, maybe because of the sheer number of folks on it. These special items I usually put a price I am willing to part with it at, and if I get a little more (or better yet 2 bidders who have to have it) I can do fairly well.

But if I don't have a lot of books listed, and I list a few decent ones up at $9.99 starting prince, it's hit-and-miss that I'm going to even make back my original investment.

If you're Sparkle City with a ton of people looking and bidding, you're probably going to be fine.

But, if like me you are the lone wolf seller putting a few nice under copies up for auction, be prepared to sell these books for a steal.

 

Exactly. I sell maybe two books every month.

 

Another thing I don't understand is this: let's say you have a BIN of $400 and accept a best offer of $350. Ebay gets about $35. Now if you list an auction with a starting bid of $400 or 350, nobody is going to place it. Then again, if you start low to get bids, it could sell for $150 or less. Then eBay only gets $15. Aren't they losing money on this too?

[ItsJustRyan]

No matter how you slice it, eBay is not the same company that it was when it started out, and now all it does is make silly rules and bust chops. I have very little use for it to be honest, except maybe to get rid of junk I have lying around. It's pretty sad what they did to it.

 

I don't love selling on eBay, but I've sold stuff there for double the price of what I asked for it here on the boards without any hint of interest.

 

I will agree with you, certain items that just sit on other venues seem to get attention on eBay, maybe because of the sheer number of folks on it. These special items I usually put a price I am willing to part with it at, and if I get a little more (or better yet 2 bidders who have to have it) I can do fairly well.

But if I don't have a lot of books listed, and I list a few decent ones up at $9.99 starting prince, it's hit-and-miss that I'm going to even make back my original investment.

If you're Sparkle City with a ton of people looking and bidding, you're probably going to be fine.

But, if like me you are the lone wolf seller putting a few nice under copies up for auction, be prepared to sell these books for a steal.

 

Exactly. I sell maybe two books every month.

 

Another thing I don't understand is this: let's say you have a BIN of $400 and accept a best offer of $350. Ebay gets about $35. Now if you list an auction with a starting bid of $400 or 350, nobody is going to place it. Then again, if you start low to get bids, it could sell for $150 or less. Then eBay only gets $15. Aren't they losing money on this too?

 

eBay is privy to data we are not.

 

Some number cruncher looked at the reports and probably saw a huge up swing in items listed for free that did not correlate to a proportional upswing in actual sales, which in turn leads to eBay making money. This way, eBay gets money every way unless sellers just step away all together. eBay knows the sellers aren't going anywhere so they can continue to change the rules and sellers have to take it.

[techtre2003]

I agree.... if the seller actually relied on selling comics for a living and really wanted to sell it. Many don't and only use ebay's free offerings only in order to list as just a hobby. That way nothing is lost if items never sell. Everything to gain. Nothing to lose.

 

Exactly... This is why ebay comic listings suck. It's not a showcase for comics you don't want to sell. That mess pisses me off! Listing an SA comic worth $100 for $400 because it's a 9.8. Naturally, it never sells but you have to keep skipping it over and over as it is continually re-listed. I only want to see mess people want to sell and a reasonable prices. Ebay is not a personal showcase for mess you obviously want to keep.

 

Having it auctions only won't change that...just start the auction price at $399.99

 

Yep, and when everyone starts doing this it will probably drive away buyers like me who turn the auction only filter on because we don't want to see all the fixed (over)priced auctions.

 

Not all fixed-price listings are over-priced.

 

 

-slym

 

Not to mention, that's what the "best offer" feature is for (for a smart seller at least, even if they price on the high side to start with).

 

If I have something that's relatively hard to find why not price it a little on the high side if you're in no rush to sell? If someone makes an offer you can live with, then so be it.

 

I had some Kirby and Starlin BA art I was in no hurry to unload. While I did not price it outrageously, I had it in line with heritage auction results and thus had no problem taking an offer 10-15% below my asking price. It took a while, sure, but it was better than tossing it out there and hoping that everyone potentially interested happened to see it over the course of a 7 day auction in a crowded market.

 

Auctions are fine for "hot stuff" or high end stuff, but if you have some nice VF copy of some non-key Silver Age book that guides for $80 and you want to get a reasonable % of guide, a 7 day auction isn't likely to do it, having it in your store with a best offer option will eventually get it sold at a decent price.

 

I agree with you guys, there are good fixed priced listing out there if you really dig. However, a vast majority of them, to me anyway, weren't worth looking at. And when fixed price listings outnumber auction style listings 10-1 it just became too much junk to wade through. Plus the submit best offer unfortunately hardly ever seemed to be attached to the listings I would actually be interested in. Sure I've probably missed a few good deals that way, but I may only be on ebay 20 minutes a week so I'd just rather spend my time looking at the auctions.

[darkstar]

Yep, and when everyone starts doing this it will probably drive away buyers like me who turn the auction only filter on because we don't want to see all the fixed (over)priced auctions.

 

I would like to think that most buyers have the intelligence not to ignore fixed price listings for a book they are looking for simply because sometimes the book is listed at a price higher than they would be willing to pay.

 

Also I think you would be amazed with how often sellers are willing to let books go at lower prices than they have them listed for, even when best offers accepted are not listed as an option in the listing.

[Jeffro.]

via Imgflip Meme Maker

 

Same thing applies to those who complain about moderns and still keep buying them or complain about CGC and still keep submitting, or etc etc

[Boba]

This may be true to some degree, but I can tell you that I sell significantly less on eBay then other venues, so I have to believe that I am not the only one who has abandoned using them for the majority of sales.

 

[loadstone]

 

eBay is privy to data we are not.

 

Some number cruncher looked at the reports and probably saw a huge up swing in items listed for free that did not correlate to a proportional upswing in actual sales, which in turn leads to eBay making money. This way, eBay gets money every way unless sellers just step away all together. eBay knows the sellers aren't going anywhere so they can continue to change the rules and sellers have to take it.

 

This.

 

They probably found that they were making more when people were willing to accept the .30 for BIN and had a moderate amount of BIN postings and lower but more frequent final sale auction prices. However once they offered BIN for free to get those higher final sale's commission percentages it probably opened the floodgates and in poured gigabytes if not terabytes of postings that were free to list and sat at unsellable prices for longer than auctions. Images of BIN items stored online take up storage space requiring more storage capacity and power requirements. They may have seen their datacenter costs spike as a flood of new postings lingered longer. It was like free rent. Well the free ride is over but now that we all got used to free BIN, it's going to be hard for any of us to want to go back to the old system and actually pay the .30 rent fee for the BIN listing.

 

I'll probably do the high auction start price at or above my best offer price but below my BIN price if they allow that. The other thing that made BIN easy is you could auto relist and once you posted it you never had to look at the listing again unless it became a hot book. Not sure if the auction listings allow for auto relist 3 day auctions or running 30 day auctions. I'd just hate to have to micro manage my listings.

 

I understand I could sell them faster via auction but my target demographic is not the bargain hunter, not the shrewd investor, not the comic dealer looking for a steal, nor the auction sniper. My target buyer is the collector that must have it right away at that grade and not wait for auctions to end, the dealer that promised to find a copy for an important a customer and now has the option to BIN at the above market convenience price which will no doubt be factored into their sale price, the frenzied speculator who is willing to buy up copies before the hype hits the streets, the buyer who is willing to risk paying a higher price or market best offer price rather than enter a needless bidding war, or the buyer that doesn't want to buy in bulk such that he has to turn around and resell the unwanted issues in order to get that one or 2 non-keys that no one else seems to be selling individually. Basically the buyer that doesn't want to waste any time and wants to "Buy It NOW" at my price. Now, however, I'll have to run shorter term auctions to provide customers that convenience.

 

Alternatively, maybe I could do the Amazon thing and list the auction for .99 and put a flat shipping fee for whatever the BIN price would have been (i.e. 399.00) minus the .99.

[1Cool]

Your BIN must be 30% larger then your starting auction price. I use to start my auctions at the price I wanted and then a BIN at 10% more but that got shut down last year. Now its all about fair priced BINs.

[slym2none]

 

eBay is privy to data we are not.

 

Some number cruncher looked at the reports and probably saw a huge up swing in items listed for free that did not correlate to a proportional upswing in actual sales, which in turn leads to eBay making money. This way, eBay gets money every way unless sellers just step away all together. eBay knows the sellers aren't going anywhere so they can continue to change the rules and sellers have to take it.

 

This.

 

They probably found that they were making more when people were willing to accept the .30 for BIN and had a moderate amount of BIN postings and lower but more frequent final sale auction prices. However once they offered BIN for free to get those higher final sale's commission percentages it probably opened the floodgates and in poured gigabytes if not terabytes of postings that were free to list and sat at unsellable prices for longer than auctions. Images of BIN items stored online take up storage space requiring more storage capacity and power requirements. They may have seen their datacenter costs spike as a flood of new postings lingered longer. It was like free rent. Well the free ride is over but now that we all got used to free BIN, it's going to be hard for any of us to want to go back to the old system and actually pay the .30 rent fee for the BIN listing.

 

I wonder, why doesn't eBay make 7-day fixed price listngs free, and charge more for the longer durations, just like they do for auctions?

 

 

 

-slym

[Supa-Bad-Mofo]

I agree.... if the seller actually relied on selling comics for a living and really wanted to sell it. Many don't and only use ebay's free offerings only in order to list as just a hobby. That way nothing is lost if items never sell. Everything to gain. Nothing to lose.

 

Exactly... This is why ebay comic listings suck. It's not a showcase for comics you don't want to sell. That mess pisses me off! Listing an SA comic worth $100 for $400 because it's a 9.8. Naturally, it never sells but you have to keep skipping it over and over as it is continually re-listed. I only want to see mess people want to sell and a reasonable prices. Ebay is not a personal showcase for mess you obviously want to keep.

 

Having it auctions only won't change that...just start the auction price at $399.99

 

Right. That will undoubtedly happen. But, again, is $399 a reasonable price for a book that GPA's at $150. No. I

 

Oh look!! Guess what I found on ebay tonight!!! Pay special attention to the red text!!! Copied directly from the listing and I quote:

 

 

"Welcome to my new ebay store where I am listing some of my CGC slabbed comic book inventory. I have been collecting high grade Marvels since 1994 and have been an ebay member since 1999. These books are listed with very high multiples of the overstreet price guide with good reason.....I may not be ready to sell them just yet. While I am not a national dealer you can find me at local comic shows in the midwest and especially at the Chicago Comic Con-Wizard Show in the summer. Happy Hunting!!!"

 

 

This is what I'm talking about!! This drives me crazy!!!! Don't list the book then!!!! Quit cluttering ebay with listings!!!

 

Click here if you want to see it for yourself on ebay!!!

[Kevin76]

I agree.... if the seller actually relied on selling comics for a living and really wanted to sell it. Many don't and only use ebay's free offerings only in order to list as just a hobby. That way nothing is lost if items never sell. Everything to gain. Nothing to lose.

 

Exactly... This is why ebay comic listings suck. It's not a showcase for comics you don't want to sell. That mess pisses me off! Listing an SA comic worth $100 for $400 because it's a 9.8. Naturally, it never sells but you have to keep skipping it over and over as it is continually re-listed. I only want to see mess people want to sell and a reasonable prices. Ebay is not a personal showcase for mess you obviously want to keep.

 

Having it auctions only won't change that...just start the auction price at $399.99

 

Right. That will undoubtedly happen. But, again, is $399 a reasonable price for a book that GPA's at $150. No. I

 

Oh look!! Guess what I found on ebay tonight!!! Pay special attention to the red text!!! Copied directly from the listing and I quote:

 

 

"Welcome to my new ebay store where I am listing some of my CGC slabbed comic book inventory. I have been collecting high grade Marvels since 1994 and have been an ebay member since 1999. These books are listed with very high multiples of the overstreet price guide with good reason.....I may not be ready to sell them just yet. While I am not a national dealer you can find me at local comic shows in the midwest and especially at the Chicago Comic Con-Wizard Show in the summer. Happy Hunting!!!"

 

 

This is what I'm talking about!! This drives me crazy!!!! Don't list the book then!!!! Quit cluttering ebay with listings!!!

 

Click here if you want to see it for yourself on ebay!!!

 

 

I've seen this done with sportscards, people are just showcasing, looking for insane offers, trades ect...