When is the best time&day to end an auction?

Swattie

I am in the middle of my first ebay auction as a seller and it's going fine. But I was wondering what the best day and time is to end an auction.

Is it in the evening ? and are there any days of the week that are better than others.

Is it better to have a 3, 5 or 7 day listing? as the item I'm selling has only had bidders in the last 18 hours & ends in 1 hour, but I did a 5 day listing.

I'd appreciate any advice.

Many thanks

stavros_2

I think someone said that ebay gets the most hits on a Sunday evening, and I end all my auctions between 8pm and 10pm on a Sunday. As for auction length obviously BIN's should be listed to go on as long as possible, as for auctions it depends on the item you're selling. If you feel the item won't be seen by many people I would suggest leaving it on longer so to gain more interest in it. If the item has to be used by or is needed for a specific date then make sure the auction doesn't end after that date (and leave time for postage)! One day auction's are great for things you just want rid of or items that you know will generate alot of bids. Some bidders are pretty stupid and will see a cheap item with less than a day left and a bidding war might start on it (whilst they forget there are 20 other items all ending today but started a bit more expensive). I've only ever used one day auctions on mobile phones but found that they went for alot more than the other phones on ebay this way.

HTH

Tojo_Ralph

Some opinions on the subject here.....................
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=38299&highlight=sunday

Swattie

Thanks for the advice.

Much appreciated.

Wish me luck.

biblejohn

Ive sold loads of stuff on ebay and in my experience it doesnt matter when they end. Ive had stuff selling on each evening of the week and its gone for the same amount. Even having stuff end mid-afternoon went for the same price, if not more. I guess there must be a lot of bored people surfing the net at work who bid for stuff.

Regardless of when you have the items ending, you`ll usually find that noone will bid until the last day of the auction. And with BIN items, thats just the same. Most buyers are lazy and wont bother scrolling past the first few pages, so your item wont be viewable to them until the last day of the auction. Therefore, i very often these days have 3 day auctions.

Hintza

In general i reckon between 7-10pm. Sunday is good and so is Tuesday for some reason.


However I reckon that you should figure out who your target market is and what time of day they are liable to be active on EBay.


EG Mums at home with toddlers might have an hour or so mid afternoon when the wee one has a sleep. You get my drift.


To be honest though I tend to avoid early mornings and 2-4pm. They seem dead times to me. I need to do more research myself on this.


I have a lot of items on at anyone time and just wish I could download my sales into a spreadsheet to analyse the optimum times when prices peak.

fiendishly

I disagree with the Sunday evening answer. I have sold over 1000 items on ebay, (mainly clothing) and I think Saturday 9pm is best!

beachbeth

fiendishly wrote:

I disagree with the Sunday evening answer. I have sold over 1000 items on ebay, (mainly clothing) and I think Saturday 9pm is best!

I usually time my auctions to end Friday or Saturday night between 8-9pm as Im hoping people will be sitting at their computer perhaps with a beer in their hands which may encourage them to bid more! Don't know if this works. Will have to try the Sunday evening theory.

Ms-Money-Penny

Mine seem to do well on Thursdays, have sold a lot of stuff recently that have all been bought on auction or BIN wither between 1 - 2pm and between 8-10pm. A lot of people get paid on Thursdays.

danmanchester

I've always gone for sunday evenings too...perhaps the timing of the end of auction is more important - I've seen some people with auction listings timed to finish at 4am GMT on a weekday morning! However if their item is selling "worldwide" and aimed at the USA market..then this would be OK I suppose.

Sofa_Sogood

Hi

I tried to test the theories, and as a buyer, I'd agree with those that think Sunday evening's the best time to sell.

My brother collects a certain thing, so I put in more than reasonable bids, and was outbid on all but two (out of about ten )

Now it seems to be winding down

But I'm still a novice, so I could be wrong. But one thing's for certain ...

....... I won't try Sunday evenings again