anyone tried ebid?

littleme1969

RFW wrote: »

It's certainly a well balanced and factually accurate argument, except for the errors and the inability to use the name Ebay. Ebay's sales, users and profits are all up, there seems to have been consistent foretelling of Ebay's demise on here for the last few years, doesn't seem to have materialised yet.
I still don't understand why Amazon doesn't come in for the same vitriol from you, as they charge more than Ebay for what could be considered a lesser service. I'm fairly certain that if ever Ebid managed to get to a quarter of the trade of Ebay they would without doubt hike their prices. It is only by being and remaining small that they can be competitive on fees, they have considerable fewer overheads.
Ebay's PR with regards price increases and the whole private v business sellers has been appalling. The changes from around the time of abolishing sellers' negative feedback have all been to increase buyer satisfaction and the little pull down menu on the Ebid site comparing Ebid v Ebay actually proves that they have done just that.

I refuse to give them any type of publicity which is why I wont use their name.. Petty i know but hey .. they made me that way..lol and as for all profiles etc are on the UP.. i get the impression from both using the site and generally keeping a close eye on whats going on over there that is not the case.. They have had a huge rise in free listing weekends this past few months, andthings that used to get alot of interest and bids are now not doing well at all. Its great for buyers but not so good for the sellers.
I joined Feepay pretty much when it hit the UK about 9 years ago and have seen it rise and grow beyond all expectations, but what is happening now smacks of desperation. They keep trying new things only to dump them . Such as the Plus Points scheme thats just been cancelled after only approx 12months.
One positive thing I feel that has come from feepays greed is the success of buy sell pages on such as facebook and also things like Gumtree. People are finding their own way of selling their unwanted items without paying the fees. Feepays issues are having a knock on effect with many.. just look at the post office.. it was clearly benefiting in a huge way with the increased volume of sales done over the net, and now ... well the news tells it all Its all very sad. Feepay despite all its so called positive spin is seriously feeling the pinch, maybe they will pull it back from the brink but at the end of the day people will eventually vote with their feet.
There are quite a few options out there for people trying to either sell via small business or just sell their unwanted items and I feel keeping your options open at this point can only be a good thing. At the end of the day im far happier selling something and paying Ebid 2% than I am paying between 10 - 20% on Feepay and that is what this site is all about... TRYING TO SAVE PEOPLE MONEY :P It works for me.. but I understand the turn over is not sufficient at present there to make it worth while for alot of people, but you never know till you put the effort in and give it a try and thats all we ask. A fair try before people rip us to shreds before they have given it a good go.:T

scotchebidder

"One positive thing I feel that has come from feepays greed is the success of buy sell pages on such as facebook and also things like Gumtree. People are finding their own way of selling their unwanted items without paying the fees. Feepays issues are having a knock on effect with many.. just look at the post office.. "

this is just another example of what i have been saying in how e-commerce is changing feebay users are in denial or simpley do not see how things are changing it does seem a ability to adapt while the going is so called good is lacking a bit like the british motor industry

littleme1969

RFW wrote: »

This thread was started to ask if anyone thought selling on Ebid was a good idea, it seems like you think it is, yet haven't made a coherent argument to support that view.

No but I have.. Ive given my Ebid ID on my original post and my sales for what is actually a very unusual product speak for themselves.
The opportunity is there you just have to be prepared to work for it.
Ive been a member of feepay for 9 years and Ebid 5. Not keeping all your eggs in one basket at the moment could only be a good thing its tough out there to be selling anything. If Ebay works for you thats is great :P but for me im far happier paying 2% FVF than I am between 10 - 20% that I was On Feepay. All we are trying to say is there are options out there! The days of Feepay talking the lions share numbered :P

savingscruncher

Hi!

This is a very interesting thread. I use both ebid and ebay; each site has it's strengths and weaknesses. Ebay has the obvious traffic, sales, buyers. The fees though are increasingly "crunching" out my "savings" (profits)! Call it the tripple wammy - fees to list/ship + sell + receive dosh + mail out item. That is alot of fees for a natural bargain hunter. Like the variety of stuff as a buyer.

Ebid has no to low seller fees, and a supportive community forum. I buy and sell there. Traffic and sales could be brisker. Membership is definately picking up and sales are increasing.

For me it is a matter of diversification. Blending the strengths of the two sites helps to lessen the impact of their weak points. This is only my opinion. For those who can tolerate only one or the other, this will most assuredly not be a workable model. That's ok! Do whatever rocks your boat!

Shezz

To the OP :rotfl: dont let all this put you off, imo Ebid is great for some and not others, why dont you list a few items just to see how it goes


Good luck with what you decide to do

lovinituk

littleme1969 wrote: »

No but I have.. Ive given my Ebid ID on my original post and my sales for what is actually a very unusual product speak for themselves.
The opportunity is there you just have to be prepared to work for it.
Ive been a member of feepay for 9 years and Ebid 5. Not keeping all your eggs in one basket at the moment could only be a good thing its tough out there to be selling anything. If Ebay works for you thats is great :P but for me im far happier paying 2% FVF than I am between 10 - 20% that I was On Feepay. All we are trying to say is there are options out there! The days of Feepay talking the lions share numbered :P

I had a look and think you have some great stuff. I used to make latex moulds for a specific reason so I found your items really interesting. You seem to have found a successful niche and its great you are making regular sales.

I appreciate ebids fees are lower but I would rather pay 10% of lets say £2000 than 2% of £50 - I get more in the end for less work. As you say, with ebid you have to be prepared to work for it. I am happy to pay ebay more in fees so I don't have to work as hard for it - I put up the listing and then sit back and watch the sales come in.

I don't believe ebid is right for me personally just now as it would be more work for less return. As a professional seller I need less work and more return! I'm definitely keeping my eye on it though and if more buyers flock there (which is what it desperately needs to attract professional sellers) I might give it a shot in the future.

Thanks for your balanced input, I appreciate it and good luck with your continued sales.

mrsk

Right, I can't stand the idea that you all think scotchebidder is representative in any way of those who use ebid, so I'll try again.

I have twice built up regular sales of new products on eBay. Each time they moved the goal posts and my sales collapsed. I would not rent a shop in a mall where the managers could decide that my shop window would not be lit (the first time.. shop items disappeared from searches) or that people from some towns would not be allowed into my shop (the restriction of UK items' appearance in international searches), so relying on eBay as a sole source of revenue is unwise. Who knows what they will do next?

I also dislike monopoly (for obvious reasons.. see first paragraph), so I started to list on eBid. Originally membership was free, then, as sales increased, charges were introduced. Unlike eBay, each time existing members were given a chance to upgrade for free. This is a totally different attitude from eBay.

eBay could move those goal posts again any time so relying on them alone for a living is a mistake. I'm not earning a living so I just stopped doing the new stuff in any sort of growing way (I'm selling off the stock now). However, if you still have substantial sales of new goods on eBay, I think diversifying onto other sites is wise.

eBid is not the place to sell items which will go out of fashion or in other way stop being desirable. It is not the place to run auctions - you need to know the price for your item. But it is a good place to list slow moving items with a long "shelf-life". It is a way of selling items without paying any listing fees.

There are several mistakes which even big sellers from other sites often make - one is Run till sold. Only one-off collectables that people may search for should be listed that way. Another is to "dump and run" - eBid buyers are wise to this and even if you do intend to return to the site if you sell something you are unlikely to get any sales if you appear to be absent.

Like other minor sites, eBid engenders almost ridiculous loyalty in some members but that is nothing to do with the site or the way it operates. "Tazzies" were the same - many of them remaining pathetically loyal after the management introduced new charges in a most underhand way.

For the record, I have sold on eBay in almost every category except property. I am a charity seller on there as well. I sell on Amazon (the horrific charges are worth it to save listing fees while I wait for a buyer for obscure books) & Specialist auctions. I tried CQout, Huntforit and Tazbar. The last two have, as you know disappeared but I bought and sold on all three.

lovinituk

mrsk wrote: »

Right, I can't stand the idea that you all think scotchebidder is representative in any way of those who use ebid, so I'll try again.

I have twice built up regular sales of new products on eBay. Each time they moved the goal posts and my sales collapsed. I would not rent a shop in a mall where the managers could decide that my shop window would not be lit (the first time.. shop items disappeared from searches) or that people from some towns would not be allowed into my shop (the restriction of UK items' appearance in international searches), so relying on eBay as a sole source of revenue is unwise. Who knows what they will do next?

I also dislike monopoly (for obvious reasons.. see first paragraph), so I started to list on eBid. Originally membership was free, then, as sales increased, charges were introduced. Unlike eBay, each time existing members were given a chance to upgrade for free. This is a totally different attitude from eBay.

eBay could move those goal posts again any time so relying on them alone for a living is a mistake. I'm not earning a living so I just stopped doing the new stuff in any sort of growing way (I'm selling off the stock now). However, if you still have substantial sales of new goods on eBay, I think diversifying onto other sites is wise.

eBid is not the place to sell items which will go out of fashion or in other way stop being desirable. It is not the place to run auctions - you need to know the price for your item. But it is a good place to list slow moving items with a long "shelf-life". It is a way of selling items without paying any listing fees.

There are several mistakes which even big sellers from other sites often make - one is Run till sold. Only one-off collectables that people may search for should be listed that way. Another is to "dump and run" - eBid buyers are wise to this and even if you do intend to return to the site if you sell something you are unlikely to get any sales if you appear to be absent.

Like other minor sites, eBid engenders almost ridiculous loyalty in some members but that is nothing to do with the site or the way it operates. "Tazzies" were the same - many of them remaining pathetically loyal after the management introduced new charges in a most underhand way.

For the record, I have sold on eBay in almost every category except property. I am a charity seller on there as well. I sell on Amazon (the horrific charges are worth it to save listing fees while I wait for a buyer for obscure books) & Specialist auctions. I tried CQout, Huntforit and Tazbar. The last two have, as you know disappeared but I bought and sold on all three.

Some good points made there, thanks.

I think what you said about ebid being a good place to list slow moving items with a long "shelf-life" is why a lot of larger sellers are not using it at the moment. There are obviously buyers, as evidenced by yourself and littleme1969, I just think it needs a lot more buyers to really attract the serious sellers and unfortunately, at the moment, the vast majority of those buyers are at ebay.

I would love there to be a serious competitor to ebay, as would most sellers, but at the moment it is where the really high numbers of buyers are and one of the only real, ready-made places (as well as Amazon) to make a living from online sales.

Good post though and thanks for your input.

Crowqueen

I have twice built up regular sales of new products on eBay. Each time they moved the goal posts and my sales collapsed. I would not rent a shop in a mall where the managers could decide that my shop window would not be lit (the first time.. shop items disappeared from searches) or that people from some towns would not be allowed into my shop (the restriction of UK items' appearance in international searches), so relying on eBay as a sole source of revenue is unwise. Who knows what they will do next?

All businesses change and adapt to the marketplace and staying still is not often an option. eBid haven't changed an awful lot, they don't seem to do a lot as regards customers' rights (which have changed over the period that ecommerce has become popular, sometimes from year to year), and if you admit that it's not the place to sell fast-moving goods then you see there is a problem with the way the site is presented - in contrast, eBay at least makes the sell-through rate viable for fast-moving products.

That an auction site is not a good place to list auctions is also worrying. I tried to list some things there in late 2008 at BIN prices, but I didn't have the money to invest in a membership fee. So I couldn't use the BIN facility and went back to eBay to list my stuff. If all I can do as a casual seller is auctions, and if those auctions aren't viable because no-one bids, then I'm sorry, I can't be bothered to give it my custom, even though I'm paying 10% on eBay. The trade-off is that I've got a reasonably good chance that my items will sell on eBay, and if I keep my end up (fulfilling my legal and moral responsibilities to my buyers) then my items will be seen. Because I am conscientious when I sell, and don't abuse my buyers, I have no trouble keeping up with eBay's demands and no objection to being judged by their standards.

Shop listings are now visible in the main search, so you have nothing to worry about on that score. That changed as long ago as late 2008, IIRC, after some experimentation in the format.

eBay is not a monopoly in the strict sense of the word. Even among large ecommerce sites, it is one of three big corporate retail sites that allow third-party sales. Granted, it is in a virtual monopoly where it comes to general sales, but that is because they have grown the business themselves, focussed on the buying public, and had the sense to charge enough fees to make it worthwhile for sellers to list there while

As I said, I'm not fussy, I buy there. But it needs to address the problems rather than ranting about how it's better than eBay and bla bla bla. What a lot of people are saying here is that they would use it - if it changed to meet their needs. If more stuff was listed, then it might be a viable option for more kinds of goods, which would attract sellers, which would in turn attract revenue and make it easier for people to sell there.

I don't doubt you have had some success on there, but I think eBid do still need to answer some criticisms and act on them. As you point out, several sites have gone under even though they were free or cheap to list - so it's obviously not a good idea to try and compete on low fees for sellers alone.

People here are interested - but eBid has to go some way to making themselves attractive to people without the "magic item" that seems to sell there.

redmerlin777

soolin wrote: »

The ebid market though is not picking up any of the slack at all, in fact the forums now are much more negative than they were when I first joined. Then everyone was positive and saw ebid as a bright new thing. Now the forums are full of doom and gloom, some of the bigger UK sellers that used to be there to offer encouragement have given up and some sellers I have bought from in the past have just crept back to ebay.

If there has been any growth in ebid then it is overseas, just go look at the forums, the posters now are rarely in the UK. I think th eebid market is overseas and in places where ebay does not have such a hold.

In response to this post.......

Well I might not be one of the bigger sellers but I am still to be found on eBid. My posts in the forums are far from doom and gloom. I have more than covered my £ 49.99 cost of lifelong membership. As a result I can and have listed as many items as I like, AND have them automatically relisted 10 times for free ad infinitum.
I can sell my very low cost items and still make a decent profit. Ebay will be charging 10% Final value fee that plus listing charges will soon eat away any profit from a 99p listing. This will make you a very unhappy seller.
eBid charges 2% final value fee .
I have usually about 500+ items. Not all low cost either. I have just sold a rocking horse for £300 with no problem.
I have given up with eBay even for the larger more expensive niche items. My customers have found me. yes! I do have to market myself but surely Alan Sugar would encourage this no matter where your place of sale is if you want to maximise your potential.

Yes! eBid is VERY international. My customers find me from Norway, Australia, India , all over Europe, South Africa and of course Canada and the USA. I believe eBay is still strong in the USA. Well eBid has happy sellers there too. They have been found posting alongside the Brits in the forums. Yup! eBid is DIFFERENT ! It is not eBay. It IS like how eBay was way back, when auction sites were fun and full of "Moms and Pops" type sellers.



Now talking of doom and gloom...... which post here sounds more dynamic and positive?
Who would you be more inclined to buy from?