Ebid and sites other than ebay...

Charlton_King

... anything to be said for them?

StaffsSW

you get what you pay for...?

Many are free for a very good reason..

greedbay

My thoughts.

Ebid is crap.

After joining for 'free', noticed they charged me a credit card checking fee.

Haven't sold a sausage despite having lots of listings, items that do sell never get payment. Same items listed on ebay at a higher price have sold.

sequence

Yeah I found eBid to be useless. I had 0 visits on my items after 90 days.. I wish they were better but they aren't!

soolin

I listed on ebid for 5 years without a single sale but there is an ebid thread on here where some users have reported that they have made sales so I might have just been unlucky. However, I still vists the ebid forums and even there you see that posters have dwindled away to a small handful.

The other one that did seem to have a loyal following was Tazbar, but that closed for good in June.

cyril82

if you have some items that you can flog at a tenner and make a good profit and more importantly that people will buy for a tenner then you may do alright on ebid using their "happy hour" auctions. These are scheduled auctions that start at 6pm every day and end at 10pm.

They also get the best front page exposure on the site, they start at a £10 bid by default so you can get more than a tenner if the item is worth it you will get bids but just don't put a £100 item on expecting to get big money as it likely won't happen.

I used this format to sell of surplus stock and as an extra revenue stream for some of my lower priced items and i did ok, not great, just ok but anything else i listed that wasn't a happy hour auction got next to no views and no sales.

Ebid is growing quite considerably the problem is that far more sellers either unfairly booted off ebay or just plain sick of the constant changes and increases in fees are finding it than buyers are.

If you have an ebay and an ebid account try helping ebid attract buyers by placing a "thank you" slip in with your items sold on ebay encouraging them to come back again and just mentioning where else they can find your stock i.e Amazon, Ebid your website, just give whichever one offers you the best profit after fees the most promotion.

I'm sure someone will come along to say "that’s against ebay rules" and there probably is something in their endless T&C's that say's you can't do it but you are just promoting your business, i doubt Argos or Dell have any plans to pull their T.V and media advertising because they sell on ebay, just do what makes you the most money, without buyers ebid and other competitors (what’s left of them) will not attract buyers and will not be any use to sellers, word of mouth is the most powerful promotional tool so if you want to make money on ebaid, help spread the word.

soolin

There is nothing at all in the ebay rules that prevent sellers adding a flyer to their parcels, I even used to have my ebid details in my signature that I sent to my buyers on ebay (not the ones through the ebay system though).

My current signature advertises my Amazon shop, but I have no idea if it drives any traffic as my sales are fairly steady, in fact some weeks I sell more books on ebay than I do on Amazon.

peter_the_piper

Watch that the normal safety net offered by Paypal to Ebay users does not apply to Ebid, if it goes wrong and the seller clears his account, tough, claim closed.

soolin

peter_the_piper wrote: »

Watch that the normal safety net offered by Paypal to Ebay users does not apply to Ebid, if it goes wrong and the seller clears his account, tough, claim closed.

I think this is a problem that ebid need to address but they seem reluctant to actually deal with any concerns and just want to trundle along. The other main problem they have is being seen as the place where sellers banned on ebay go, I hardly think that casts them in a glowing light, 'come to ebid, meet all the scamming seller who ebay don't want'. They really need to address that issue and be proactive in pointing out that they also have harsh penalties for sellers that repeat offend.

Lastly the one thing that really really puts me off ebid, the stupid little names they gibe ebay. It doesn't't make the users look clever, it just paints them as sad little ebay wannabee sellers who can't compete in a real market.

Ebid have potential, they could make a go of this but they seem very reluctant to do so. If they can't make any impact after 10 years (is it 10 now) then they never will.

cyril82

soolin wrote: »

I think this is a problem that ebid need to address but they seem reluctant to actually deal with any concerns and just want to trundle along. The other main problem they have is being seen as the place where sellers banned on ebay go, I hardly think that casts them in a glowing light, 'come to ebid, meet all the scamming seller who ebay don't want'. They really need to address that issue and be proactive in pointing out that they also have harsh penalties for sellers that repeat offend.

Lastly the one thing that really really puts me off ebid, the stupid little names they gibe ebay. It doesn't't make the users look clever, it just paints them as sad little ebay wannabee sellers who can't compete in a real market.

Ebid have potential, they could make a go of this but they seem very reluctant to do so. If they can't make any impact after 10 years (is it 10 now) then they never will.

Soolin i think you are quite harsh on Ebid in this post.

Peter_the_piper is right there is less recourse through paypal if you buy on ebid but that is more down to paypal's "if you didn't buy it on ebay we don't care" attitude and is something paypal need to address more than ebid who have no more influence on paypal than you or i.

In ebids favour is the fact that they offer their own alternative to paypal in the form of pppay.com, a uk company who, unlike paypal are full members and therefore fully regulated by the F.S.A and unlike paypal again, your money never leaves the sunny shores of blighty and are kept in a uk bank not a Luxembourg bank, and again, unlike paypal they do not routinely freeze your money under non existent EU legislation or because you reached the dizzy heights of £1,700 in payments in a year. pppay offer their own protection to buyers and i would advise people buying on ebid to use this service, i have used them on my own website and never had any of the problems we hear over and over again on here from paypal users.

Also i don't agree that ebid is where "ebay scammers" go after they get banned, i have bought quite a bit on ebid as due to lack of buyers it can be a buyers market with bargains to be had, often that can be resold for more on ebay, and i have never received bad service or been scammed.

And i don't agree either that after ten years they can't compete with ebay, ebid are growing, slowly, but growing all the same and if they can now start attracting buyers as well as sellers then ebay may for the first time have a serious competitor in their mists, i think ebid will continue to grow for another couple of years then sell out to someone who can take the business further.