eBay tips

[Caduceus]

Okay, this seems like a better forum to post this than open; this is about individual sales.

I am looking to unload the WoTC Star Wars Revised Core Book and was looking for some advice on posting it on eBay. I have never attemtped to sell a book of any kind on eBay (indeed the only things I have tried to sell are items that almost sold themselves) and was looking for some general advice on posting RPG books because I have some others I want to unload.

First things I noticed were that the Revised Core was not going for a very highe price there; most people set the initial bid for about 20.00 and have recieved no bids. What is a good rule of thumb for choosing a good starting price for an item like this?

I have pretty good feedback (+11, 100%) and was wondering if a reserve price was worth anything at all. I don't like them when I'm bidding but this is different; what is a good rule of thumb for using them?

Would accepting only money order or cashier's checks make my item very undesirable? Do I have to take PayPal to get anywhere?

If anyone has advice on this matter I would appreciate it. Thanks!

[DougSun]

Some advice, in no particular order:

1. Category selection is important. Remember that RPG books are not books, but games. Sell them in Toys&Games/Games/Roleplaying Games/Science Fiction.

2. Pump the item title full of keywords that bidders looking for your item are likely to use, like "Star Wars Revised d20."

3. Since the Star Wars Revised core book is still in print, $20 may be kind of high as a starting bid. You should consider starting at $9.99. Any higher than that, and you'll have to pay 60 cents as your listing fee instead of 35 cents.

4. A reserve price will do you no good at all in this case. If the demand for this item is as lax as you say, you'll probably have to take whatever the market will bear for it.

5. I don't know that refusing to take personal checks will cost you many bidders. It does reduce the chance that you'll be burned by a bad check to zero. Accepting PayPal is helpful. There's a good reason why it's such a popular service.

Hope this helps. Good luck!

[Eric J. Boyd]

Speaking as a frequent purchaser and sometimes seller, here's some thoughts:

-Starting prices: There are several concerns I weigh when selling stuff--the listing price charged by eBay and the prices that the same item has been able to draw in the past.

You've already seen that the $20 starting bid is not working, but looking at completed auctions for the same product shows that you can get around $20 for it with starting bids anywhere from $1 to $9.95 (a refined search looking for completed auctions got me this info). Low starting bids seem to encourage more bids overall in my experience and can result in better final prices. So where you want to start depends on how many other copies are out there at the same time and whether you're willing to risk getting very little if no one competes with the first bidder.

-Reserve prices: I don't like them either as a bidder and I've never used one when selling. Reserve prices only make sense if you've got a true collectible that you don't want to virtually give away because the target audience hasn't seen your auction. The spread between getting $10 and $20 for an in print RPG doesn't seem to warrant a reserve price in my opinion. YMMV.

-Paypal: It's a bother to get a money order or cashier's check, so as a bidder that factors into what I bid on. Paypal lets you accept payments from other people's balances and bank accounts for free the last time I checked (anyone else know if this has changed?), so simply limit Paypal payments to those forms (i.e., no credit card payments) and it hasn't made anything more difficult for you.

What I quickly realized in buying and selling RPGs on eBay was that people are looking for rare items, which they'll pay top dollar for, and bargains on other items. If you're looking to get most of your value out of the books you have, you may be better off trying to trade them through rpg.net first.

[rumble]

Smithy's correct in his brief summary: People are looking for two things on ebay: collectibles and deals.

If your item for sale is still on the shelves and easily available, you're only going to sell it if you price it as a good deal. If your item is out of print, but is easily available because it sucks, expect to sell it as a deal. :)

A good deal is usually 60% of retail or less. Other deals to sweeten the pot include free shipping, combined shipping for multiple auction wins, and the like. I've pulled all kinds of stunts, including listing multiple auctions, and subtracting a dollar off for every auction won after the first -- so if you win 5 auctions, I add up the bid totals and subtract four. That one worked well.

I usually don't like reserve prices, but I've come to realize that from a seller's point of view, and under the right circumstances, they ROCK. Here's why:
With reserve prices:
Ebay charges you a fee AS IF YOU SOLD THE ITEM AT THAT PRICE.
AND
Every bidder's bid is binding, even if the reserve price isn't met.
AND
The seller doesn't have to sell if the reserve isn't met, BUT HE CAN IF HE WANTS TO, AND THE BUYER MUST PAY THE BID AND OTHER AUCTION COSTS (shipping, etc.).

If the item sells at higher than the reserve price, Ebay refunds the reserve, and then charges you a final cost based on the actual winning bid.

If it's worth more to you to risk the seller's fee for a reserve price than to sell at less than that price, you can't beat the concept of the reserve price. In my case, I was willing to sacrifice $xx.xx to put a multi-hundred dollar reserve on my Ravenloft collection, which was ultimately purchased in under 24 hours with the Buy It Now option for $900. I would rather have lost a few dozen dollars than sold it for far less than it was worth.

Speaking of which, BUY IT NOW is an excellent option. If you don't have a reserve price, Buy It Now only sticks around until a bid is made, and then it vanishes. However, if you have a reserve price, Buy It Now sticks around until the reserve price is met -- that's also an excellent choice for the seller. I haven't been dumb enough to try setting the BIN price lower than the reserve price.

Whenever I have a Buy It Now option on my auctions, I try to offer free shipping. It's a perfectly reasonable incentive. Hypothetically, you could charge $20 shipping, have a one cent opening bid, and then offer a buy it now at $20 with free shipping. I read auctions carefully for this sort of scam, but you might trap an unwary schmuck ONCE. But balance it out a bit, and you'll be fine.
9.99 opening bid, $5 shipping, $20 Buy It now with Free shipping, and some people might jump at the chance to bypass the $5 uncertainty.

[Caduceus]

Wow, thanks for the insights! I had actually forgotten I was elligible for Buy it Now now.

Another question: does auction length seem to make a difference?

[bubbalin]

Originally posted by Stephen Henderson-Grady
Wow, thanks for the insights! I had actually forgotten I was elligible for Buy it Now now.

Another question: does auction length seem to make a difference?

This is my subjective experience. But I find that most people tend to bid on the last day. You might want to give it a few days to let people see it and think about it, but most bidding happens at the very end.
I would say that there is little different between 5 days and 10 days. Less and potential buyers may not see it, more and it doesn't matter anyway. People are always waiting to see if others show their hand first.

edit: Unless it's collectable, then you want as much time as possible so people have time to see it.

[deadboydex]

Set the buy-it-now at whatever price you *want* it to sell at, but set the initial bid at $0.99, no reserve. I have set several items at 99 cents and seen them go up *far* beyond what I'd set the BIN at. Examples: the Rolemaster GM screen that sold for $30, the Tobin's Spirit Guide that sold for $50, the Paranoia modules that sold for $20 each, the WEG Indiana Jones Artifacts book that sold for $40, and so forth. Ebay users are cheap fucks, myself included, and will beat the living bejesuscrap out of each other over a perceived deal.