EBay for Dummies (28 page)

For simplicity’s sake, go over to my Web site and print my quick and easy eBay time-conversion chart. It’s located at

www.coolebaytools.com/usa_time_zones.html

Using a laid-back strategy

Sometimes the best strategy at the beginning of an auction is to do nothing at all. That’s right; relax, take off your shoes, and loaf. Go ahead. You may want to make a
token bid
(the very lowest you are allowed) or mark the page to watch in your My eBay area. I generally take this attitude through the first six days of a week-long auction I want to bid on, and it works pretty well. Of course, I check in every day just to keep tabs on the items I’m watching on my My eBay page, and revise my strategy as time goes by.

The seller has the right to up his minimum bid — if his auction has received no bids — up to 12 hours before the auction ends. If the seller has set a ridiculously low minimum bid and then sees that the auction is getting no action, the seller may choose to up the minimum bid to protect his investment in the item that’s up for sale. By placing the minimum token bid when you first see the auction, you can foil a Buy It Now from another bidder (because Buy It Now is disabled after a bid has been placed unless there is a Reserve on the listing) or prevent the seller from upping the minimum. If it’s important enough, you can see whether the seller has done this in the past, by searching the Seller’s completed auctions (see “Get to Know the Other Bidders” previously in this chapter to find out how to do this search). All preclosing changes are available for public view; just click View All Revisions just above the words Seller’s Description
on the item page. See Figure 7-5 for a sample.

If you see an item that you
absolutely must
have, mark it to watch on your My eBay page (or make that token bid) and plan and revise your maximum bid as the auction goes on. I can’t stress enough how important this is.

As you check back each day, take a look at the other bids and the high bidder. Is someone starting a bidding war? Look at the time that the competition is bidding and note patterns. Maybe at noon Eastern Time? During lunch? If you know what time your major competition is bidding, when the time is right you can safely bid after he or she does (preferably when your foe is stuck in rush-hour traffic).

If you play the waiting game, you can decide if you really want to increase your bid or wait around for the item to show up again sometime. You may decide you really don’t want this particular item after all. Or you may feel no rush because many sellers who offer multiple items put them up one at a time.

Using the beat-the-clock strategy

You should rev up your bidding strategy during the final 24 hours of an auction and decide, once and for all, whether you really
have
to have the item you’ve been eyeing. Maybe you put in a maximum bid of $45.02 earlier in the week. Now’s the time to decide whether you’re willing to go as high as $50.02. Maybe $56.03?

No one wants to spend the day in front of the computer (ask almost anyone who does). You can camp out by the refrigerator or at your desk or wherever you want to be. Just place a sticky note where you’re likely to see it, reminding you of the exact time the auction ends. If you’re not going to be near a computer when the auction closes, you can also use an automatic bidding site to bid for you; see Chapter 20 for details.

In the last half hour

With a half hour left before the auction becomes ancient history, head for the computer and dig in for the last battle of the bidding war. I recommend that you log on to eBay about 5 to 10 minutes before the auction ends. The last thing you want to have happen is to get caught in Internet gridlock and not get access to the Web site. Go to the item you’re watching and click the auction title.

With 15 minutes to go, if your auction has a lot of action, eBay reloads the bidding action every second so you can get the most current info on what people are bidding.

Sniping to the finish: The final minutes

The rapid-fire, final flurry of bidding is called sniping.
Sniping
is the fine art of waiting until the very last seconds of an eBay auction and then outbidding the current high bidder just in time. Of course, you have to expect that the current high bidder is probably sniping back.

With a hot item, open a second window on your browser (in Internet Explorer or Firefox, you do that by pressing the Ctrl key and the N key together); keep one open for bidding and the other open to watch eBay’s constant reloading during the final few minutes. With the countdown at 60 seconds or less, make your final bid at the absolute highest amount you will pay for the item. The longer you can hold off — I’m talking down to around 15 seconds — the better. It all depends on the speed of your Internet connection (and how strong your stomach is), so practice on some small auctions so you know how much time to allow when you’re bidding on your prize item. Keep watching the time tick to the end of the auction, as in Figure 7-6.

If you want to be truly fancy, you can open a third window for bidding and have a back-up high bid in case you catch another sniper swooping in on your item immediately after your first snipe. (I recently received an e-mail from one of my readers who used my somewhat paranoid method — which she learned from a previous edition of this book — and by using the second snipe, she won her item!) You can avoid the third-window routine if you’ve bid your highest bid with the first snipe. Then, if you’re outbid, you know the item went for more than you were willing to pay. (I know; it’s some consolation, but not much.)

Some eBay members consider the practice of sniping highly unseemly and uncivilized — it’s like when dozens of parents used to mob the department store clerks to get to the handful of Beanie Babies that were just delivered. (Come to think of it, whatever happened to
those
collectibles?) Of course, sometimes a little uncivilized behavior can be a hoot.

I say that sniping is an addictive, fun part of life on eBay auctions. And it’s a blast. So my recommendation is that you try sniping. You’re likely to benefit from the results and enjoy your eBay experience even more — especially if you’re an adrenaline junkie.

Here’s a list of things to keep in mind when you get ready to place your last bid:

Know how high you’re willing to go. If you know you’re facing a lot of competition, figure out your highest bid to the penny. You should have already researched the item and know its value at this point. Raise your bid only to the level where you’re sure you’re getting a good return on your investment; don’t go overboard. Certainly, if the item has some emotional value to you and you just have to have it, bid as high as you want (and can afford — but you knew that). But remember, you’ll have to pay the piper later. You win it, you own it!