ebay tactics?

bluechair84

Been having this argument today; is there any point to bidding in the last few seconds? Surely the highest bid is the highest bid no matter when it's put in and entering it in the final few seconds is only a fools notion that you can get it cheaper this way...

Me n the misses have wildly differing views. I don't bother revisiting an auction until it's finished to stop me from thinking it's worth more than it is, she insists on watching it like a hawk, entering in the dying seconds. Who's right on this?

Kaise

i just set what i think i will pay and then walk away!

The Northern Monkey

you only ever bid what you can afford to pay so it doesn't really matter?

sheepsteeth

i tend to wait until the last 20 seconds to put in my full bid in. i have saved loads of moneys in the past doing it this way as unfortunately, loads of people do it.

if you pu tin you max ammount, people at the last minute may out bid it by an arbitrary ammount.

if you are smart and put in lower ammounts than your maximum (because you know everyone else is also doing this) you can find that your opposing bidder may not have time to put in their max bid and you can get it a bit cheaper.

has worked for me.

main reason i do it is although i have in mind what i want to pay for something, i hate that feling i get when i lose an item by 2 quid or some other cheap amount when in reality, i would rather have paid an extra fiver and still have saved money over a retail price

bluechair84

@ Northern Mnkey;
That's my impression. She thinks that Snipe bidding is the best way to get a deal, I think her assumption is that everyone else only bids a little at a time above the current auction price. By bidding at the very end she doesn't allow people the opportunity to add one bid at a time gradually increasing the valuation. At least, that's the only way I can see the idea of snipe bidding working...

[edited]

bluechair84

sheepsteeth wrote:

if you are smart and put in lower ammounts than your maximum (because you know everyone else is also doing this) you can find that your opposing bidder may not have time to put in their max bid and you can get it a bit cheaper.

Doesn't this assume that people aren't relying on autobid? If people genuinely are just addling a little at a time than I can see a snipe bid working, but not if anyone in the auction at all has put in a realistic final bid early on.

supersonic

I just set my highest amount and leave. If I lose by 50p, I don't mind, because my highest bid is just that.

sheepsteeth

bluechair84 wrote:

sheepsteeth wrote:

if you are smart and put in lower ammounts than your maximum (because you know everyone else is also doing this) you can find that your opposing bidder may not have time to put in their max bid and you can get it a bit cheaper.

Doesn't this assume that people aren't relying on autobid? If people genuinely are just addling a little at a time than I can see a snipe bid working, but not if anyone in the auction at all has put in a realistic final bid early on.

i have been sniped a couple of times and i can live with that, i rarely bid higher than i intended to in the first place and these days nore often than not will use buy it now

ollie_lucas1985

I agree with sheepsteeth - bidding small amounts (testing the water) then last minute bidding is the key.. sometimes I don't even put in small bids because then my competition knows that someone else is interested which keeps there attention on the auction!!

Always set a maximum price in your head tho and never go over it!..

Anonymous

supersonic wrote:

I just set my highest amount and leave. If I lose by 50p, I don't mind, because my highest bid is just that.

+POWTAYTO

The only annoyance when someone snipes you is when you think you've got a bit of a bargain, then suddenly in the last few femtoseconds, somebody grabs it for a million billion pounds.
Nobody except a tw@ is going to bid more than they're willing to pay for something anyway, so why bother leaving it till the last minute?

The Northern Monkey

Yeah if you do your research, your max bid should only be as high as the max price elsewhere.

If you bid higher then you're paying more!

If you're max bid isn't reached then you've got a discount.

I don't really see ebay as only buying stuff because its cheap... more to try and get it maybe a few quid cheaper.

Anonymous

Photography stuff is frequently insane on Ebay. I'll be bidding on a Zeiss lens, for example, and look to be getting a nice second hand lens for about £200-300 less than retail, GREAT!!
Then in the blink of an eye, some mongs have bidded on it and won it for about 3 times the cost of a new one :roll:

sheepsteeth

if i am buying brand new, i tend to buy from shops as most of the things i have intended to buy have been cheaper from a proper shop, ebay isnt the bargainsville it once was now with the increased seller fees and final value fees. those costs have been passed straight on to the buyer.

if i am buying second hand i weigh up the cost compared to a new object which comes with no flaws and is warrantied and jusge my price accordingly.

agin, id rater pay a couple of quid more than my original intention to win an auction to get wat i am after and i find by keping an eye on an auction at the end, i can manage this.

either way, after a certain point, id rather go without and buy new.

The Northern Monkey

exactly... was watching something (can't remember what now) and there was a buy it now for £20 posted.

Put a bid of £20 on a different normal auction for the same thing.... 5 mins to go and I was winning with £18.... by the end of the auction went for £35.

I bought the buy it now one.

Some people really get "into the moment".

sheepsteeth

The Northern Monkey wrote:

exactly... was watching something (can't remember what now) and there was a buy it now for £20 posted.

Put a bid of £20 on a different normal auction for the same thing.... 5 mins to go and I was winning with £18.... by the end of the auction went for £35.

I bought the buy it now one.

Some people really get "into the moment".

i always look for all of the other items which match what i am buying to make sure i cant get it cheaper on ebay at a later date.

ive seen loads of times when the price rises higher than the other exact same items which are also available.

the other reason why checking the rest of the listings is to gauge the value of summat.

tom_howard

The Northern Monkey wrote:

you only ever bid what you can afford to pay so it doesn't really matter?

Yes, but if the item is going really cheap and you bid at the last second, it stops other bidders from getting all excited and upping their bids as there isnt enough time. happened to me a couple of times and there is nothing more frustrating than losing by 10p,

supersonic

But some don't get frustrated!

Anonymous

I really don't think that most people understand how ebay bidding works.

bluechair84

I think people place too much emphasis on tactical bidding thinking that it will ultimatley stop the auction from reaching as high-a-price as it would if everyone put in an autobid.

I think we came to a conclusion last night; Sniping can only work to get something cheap in the absence of autobids, and under the assumption that everyone else interested is just bidding incrementally. And I doubt that there are many auctions where these circumstances apply so I just wouldn't bother - Em however is sticking by her guns :roll:

Kaise

yeehaamcgee wrote:

Photography stuff is frequently insane on Ebay.

+potato

i had to replace the lens for my EPL-1 and all the kit leens were selling for a rediculous price but i still to this day dont understand how but i got a Lumix Micro 4/3's lens for under £100, brand new, in a box, from a well known camera shop through its ebay store.

I do think people use a 2nd account to up their items selling rpice, i havent done it but i have heard of people that have, really annoying if they do as basically they are making you pay more for an item that isnt worth it!

nozzac

I think sniping works in getting a better deal. If you just plonk say a £100 on the item you find people will take repeated bids and push the price up over a few days and then give up. You get a few people doing this and you end up paying the max price anyone was going to pay. If you don't do this and nobody else does either then at the last minute people just put in one bid that they think is a bargain and if you win you end up paying less.

Also even though you think you only wanted to spend £100, it normally turns out that you would have been happy to pay £105. So when someone snipes you with £102 it's very annoying.

ddraver

I think Sniping works but it's not really playing by the rules. In the long long ago when ebay was new it was considered to be bad karma and very unsporting and computer geeks would whinge about it on myspace or windows messenger.

Now it seems it's so common it's no longer the travesty it once was. I admit that I tend to do it too. That said I don't bid much on ebay any more, I tend to find that the shop pages are just as good value and have some backup associated if the product breaks, or more commonly that the classifieds or CRC have the same prices anyway. Camera lenses are about the only exception now but that's rare for me.

Anonymous

I wonder if anybody's done a scientific analysis into ebay sniping? It seems that both sides, for and against sniping, believe it is logical for it TO or TO NOT work.

Daz555

Sniping works because loads of people on ebay are "I'll just have one more go" types.

They bid £10 for something but then 5 mins before the end when they realise they are not top bidder, they chuck some more money into the bid. Sniping stops your average Joe having time to respond to the higher bid.

I always bid by sniping - snipe software is the way to go. I set the max I'm prepared to pay and then leave it. Having said that I can't remember the last time I bought anything on ebay in a genuine auction. All my purchases lately have been buy-it-now.

Anonymous

Daz555 wrote:

They bid £10 for something but then 5 mins before the end when they realise they are not top bidder, they chuck some more money into the bid. Sniping stops your average Joe having time to respond to the higher bid.

That doesn't make any sense. If the "average Joe" only bid what he was happy to pay, then it changes nothing. He wouldn't increase his bid anyway.

cat_with_no_tail

yeehaamcgee wrote:

Daz555 wrote:

They bid £10 for something but then 5 mins before the end when they realise they are not top bidder, they chuck some more money into the bid. Sniping stops your average Joe having time to respond to the higher bid.

That doesn't make any sense. If the "average Joe" only bid what he was happy to pay, then it changes nothing. He wouldn't increase his bid anyway.

No I see what he's saying there.

For example you'll have someone who bids a five on an item saying "that's what it's worth". Then you come along and stick in your bid of £6, they then decide "oh what the hell, it's only another £2" and whack on a slicktly higher bid.

By sniping, you're removing the "temptation bid" factor.

People bid what they think is a bargain first, then when they get outbid, they might increase their bid to what it's actually worth.

Disclaimer: I am not an ebay sniper. Never tried it, can't say I have any wish to do so either.

Anonymous

But that is two people trying to out snipe each other, surely?
This is what I mean, logically, both sides claim that it makes sense.

cat_with_no_tail

yeehaamcgee wrote:

But that is two people trying to out snipe each other, surely?

Kind of.

However assume that person A puts their bid in with 3 days remaining.
Person B raises their bid, still with 2 days remaining.
Person A then decides they are going to up their bid with 1 day remaining.

OR

Person A puts their bid in with 3 days remaining
Person B snipes with 1sec remaining.
Person A has no time to react and think "oh, actually, I don't mind paying an extra X amount, I''ll stick another bid on."
Person B wins.


Obviously, it dosent quite work like that because so many people are sniping these days, they are ALL "person B".

Anonymous

The way I see it, Person A decides that they'd happily pay £10 for something, but no more, so they bid £10. Highest bid goes up to £6 (for example).

3 days go by and the highest bid is still at £6.
Last few seconds of the auction, and Person A is thinking, hey, neat, I got a bargain there, then WHACK, the snipist comes in and bids up to £15.

Person A hasn't lost anything, they're just peeved at having something seemingly taken away from them at the last second. They weouldn't have paid more than £10 anyway.
For a few days, it genuinely looked like they were the only interested party.

If you're decided that £10 is what you're willing to spend to get something, But then thinking later, "ah, sod it, I'll just put a bit more on", then you're only fooling yourself.

ewizzy1977

kaiser83 wrote:

I do think people use a 2nd account to up their items selling rpice, i havent done it but i have heard of people that have, really annoying if they do as basically they are making you pay more for an item that isnt worth it!

Surely that would only happen if you (hypothetically) are so stupid that you put a bid in that A). You havent got the money to pay for it. or : Bid too much for the item you are looking for :?:


Yes, or No?

cat_with_no_tail

Oh don't get me wrong, I completely agree with what you're saying. Was just playing devils advocate for a sec.

I've done it before myself. Bid X amount on an item, then been outbid and suddenly had the impulse to bid a bit more.

Same thing happens in "real" auctions all the time (although I do appreciate it's a little different). People get drawn into bidding wars and exceed that limit they said they'd stick to.