ebay - How do you bid?

[theboyfold]

If there is an item on ebay that you like the look of how do you bid?

Do you:
a) Bid up to the amount you are happy to pay and wait to see if you get outbid and leave it at that
b) Wait until the end to see what the price is and if you are happy with the price, bid at the last moment
c) Another method.

I would normally go with b, but a mate swears by method a.

It'll be interesting to hear what everybody else thinks.

[LukeBird]

Normally A, but if it's a bit of a rare item or something I really want I will sometimes watch it.

[PaulHogan]

a. every time. I bid for CD's quite a bit and am often outbid but often my bids are cheeky. I did eventually get a copy of Fat of the Land by The Prodigy for under £2.50 but I must have bid on 50+ before winning. These are a bit of fun and I don't mind if I lose. If there is something that I really want then I work out how much I'd be prepared to pay and bid accordingly. I win over 90% of these auctions and am happy with my success rate. I never bid a higher amount and I almost never* respond to second chance offers especially when I'm sure that the item has been bid up by a duplicate account/friend of the vendor to see how much my bid is.

• Unless I reasonably believe the vendor does have more than one of the items for sale.

[soad]

I bid as high as I can afford to pay for it. Always bid early too.

[Chris_w666]

A, always A mainly because I am lazy and never really really want stuff anyway, in fact I am more inclined to use buy it now as 90% of all my ebay purchases are impulse ones. I sell quite a bit on there and am amazed at how often an item gets to within 6 seconds of ending and then shoots up in price massively.

[Bri957]

Auction sniper.

Has secured some right bargains in the past.

[Don]

Bri957 said:

Auction sniper.

Has secured some right bargains in the past.

Manually snipe. If you want something badly enough you'll do it - and get the best price.

[theboyfold]

Interesting split so far, at the moment I'm watching an item that's really badly listed.

Thinking of putting in a big bid to scare the others off as the main listing does it no justice what so ever.

It's just a LOT of money to spend on something I might not really need!

[ratbane]

Always contact the buyer for a bargain price for early cash. If no go, I wait till the end.

[BERGS2]

PaulHogan said:

a. every time. I bid for CD's quite a bit and am often outbid but often my bids are cheeky. I did eventually get a copy of Fat of the Land by The Prodigy for under £2.50 but I must have bid on 50+ before winning.

that must have been satisfying

[king arthur]

I work on the basis that the more bids an item has, the more bids it attracts, therefore always go in right in the last few seconds.

[andy-xr]

Tend to just throw in what its worth to me. If its worth more to someone else they're welcome to it

[Mr E Driver]

I research the 'right' sort of price and bid 10 seconds from the end. I put a reminder on my phone so I don't forget.
If I really want something that is rare I put a big bid in, I recently bid £165 for something that only cost me £43.

[TooLateForAName]

theboyfold said:

Thinking of putting in a big bid to scare the others off as the main listing does it no justice what so ever.

But nobody knows that it's a big bid until the bidding goes up?

[theboyfold]

TooLateForAName said:

theboyfold said:

Thinking of putting in a big bid to scare the others off as the main listing does it no justice what so ever.

But nobody knows that it's a big bid until the bidding goes up?

The bid that I would put in would put it above a reasonable amount for the item as it's listed

So if people look at only the search result listing it would seem very expensive.

[Dr.Doofenshmirtz]

I have a second account which I use to bid on items and find out the reserve price and find the highest bid ammount etc. I then retract the bid once I have the info I need.
I'll then use eSnipe with my proper account if I want to place a bid. I never bid directly.

People don't like this method one bit...but there ain't a lot you can do about it, so nerrr.

Edited by Dr.Doofenshmirtz on Thursday 4th February 16:27

[Justayellowbadge]

theboyfold said:

TooLateForAName said:

theboyfold said:

Thinking of putting in a big bid to scare the others off as the main listing does it no justice what so ever.

But nobody knows that it's a big bid until the bidding goes up?

The bid that I would put in would put it above a reasonable amount for the item as it's listed

So if people look at only the search result listing it would seem very expensive.

But your bid would not show in it's entirety untill someone other was bidding against you. It would only initially register as the minimum increment above the current highest bid.

[Justayellowbadge]

Dr.Doofenshmirtz said:

People don't like this method one bit...

Can't think why..

[theboyfold]

Justayellowbadge said:

theboyfold said:

TooLateForAName said:

theboyfold said:

Thinking of putting in a big bid to scare the others off as the main listing does it no justice what so ever.

But nobody knows that it's a big bid until the bidding goes up?

The bid that I would put in would put it above a reasonable amount for the item as it's listed

So if people look at only the search result listing it would seem very expensive.

But your bid would not show in it's entirety untill someone other was bidding against you. It would only initially register as the minimum increment above the current highest bid.

At the moment it's at about the max for the item as listed. So if the other person has only put in a smaller bid it will push it over the edge.
Hopefully this will mean other people who are browsing will ignore it and not click on the link for more details.

[theboyfold]

Ended up bidding early and got snipped right at the last minute, went for more than I wanted to pay so no great loss really.