'Tis the Season

I've been buying and selling on eBay since 1998. It's high eBay season right now, and I am officially at the point where I have sold or am currently selling everything that is not nailed down (actually, I tried that too, but buyers complained about the nail holes). If you have anything you were planning on selling, do it now. For sellers, your personal eBay calendar and a couple of tips from me.

When to list. Today, Nov. 24, is a good day to list using 7-day listing. Don't begin or end auctions from Thanksgiving through the following Sunday the 30th. People are away for the holiday, traveling, and in the (gasp) brick and mortar stores, not on eBay. Then in December, go for it, all day, every day. There are lots of bits of advice about good days to begin and end auctions, but I say for December, any day is good, any time of day. I have experimented with ending at crazy times like 3 in the morning because I find people use a sniping service since they won't be up, and tend to put in a high proxy because they don't want to wake up to a loss.

Using Buy It Now. Definitely put Buy It Now on your high season auctions, it only costs a nickel and this time of year people don't want to wait around to find out if they've won an auction. I look for the highest completed auction price for the same or similar item and put a BIN a buck higher. Don't put a counter on BIN auctions (or put a hidden counter). If people see that 50 people have looked at your auction and no one has purchased, they won't purchase either. You want them to think they are the first person to stumble upon your auction at such a super deal.

Consider using an auction host. I highly recommend using an auction hosting site. I use Sparedollar (not a referral link), and though it is quirky as all hell, for $5 a month you can post as many photos as you want for no extra fee, schedule listings to launch at whatever time you choose for no extra fee, check all your counters, bids and prices on one screen, and you get some nice looking, simple templates too. The best feature is a photo gallery of all your current auctions right on every auction page. I get tons of hits that way.

Take it (somewhat) seriously. The best way to avoid problems is to be somewhat professional about selling. Ship quickly, pack safely, stay in touch with the buyers. Consider putting Delivery Confirmation on all your packages, even if you pay for it yourself, you are the one protected by it. I got some free business cards from vistaprint.com with my eBay seller information on it and I put one in every package.

Tomorrow: Tips for Buying on eBay.