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How eBay can save itself in 1 day

bradleyspencer.com

1–10 of 25 posts

Re: How eBay can save itself in 1 day

#2
How about you bid your "reservation price" and have no regrets? Simply bid the most you are willing to pay and then last minute bidders won't matter. That is the beauty of a second price auction.

Re: How eBay can save itself in 1 day

#3
post #2

How about you bid your "reservation price" and have no regrets? Simply bid the most you are willing to pay and then last minute bidders won't matter. That is the beauty of a second price auction.

That's one way, but it doesn't approximate real world "bidding".

I definitely think eBay would be better off with this feature implemented

Re: How eBay can save itself in 1 day

#6

eBay has heard this proposal at least a bajillion times before, including at least 3 for me. I don't know what their reason is for not doing it that way but it's been heavily considered and rejected.

Yeah, i figure that they actually won't change anything. it's just striking how different ebay is from an actual auction. i had never been able to pinpoint what part of it was out of whack though.

Re: How eBay can save itself in 1 day

#7
post #3
post #2

How about you bid your "reservation price" and have no regrets? Simply bid the most you are willing to pay and then last minute bidders won't matter. That is the beauty of a second price auction.

That's one way, but it doesn't approximate real world "bidding". I definitely think eBay would be better off with this feature implemented

Ebay does this bidding for you. Anytime you enter an auction, the price you are willing to pay should be independent of how everyone else in the room values the object. If your willingness to pay is a function of the last bid, then you probably should stick to fixed price sales.

Re: How eBay can save itself in 1 day

#8
post #7
post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's one way, but it doesn't approximate real world "bidding". I definitely think eBay would be better off with this feature implemented

Ebay does this bidding for you. Anytime you enter an auction, the price you are willing to pay should be independent of how everyone else in the room values the object. If your willingness to pay is a function of the last bid, then you probably should stick to fixed price sales.

I don't disagree. The best approach is to always put your maximum bid in. But human nature plays a big part in auctions, and I think ebay should note this.

It seems that most people, given 3 hours to think about and consider the regret they would feel if they didn't get what they are bidding on, would usually convince themselves to skip a coffee and add another five dollars to their bid.

you are totally right, but humans are far from rational.

Re: How eBay can save itself in 1 day

#9
New Zealand's eBay clone - trademe.co.nz - has auto-extend for auctions where a bid was just received.. The auto-extend is only 5 minutes though.

This doesn't eliminate last minute bidders though - rather it just extends the period of the 'last minute bidding war' till someone gives up.

So. Its good idea, but you don't want a 3 hour auto-extend - 3 minutes would be better. 3 hours, as suggested, would probably mean many auctions would not end for weeks and weeks and would likely frustrate the heck out of bidders and sellers alike.

Re: How eBay can save itself in 1 day

#10
post #9

New Zealand's eBay clone - trademe.co.nz - has auto-extend for auctions where a bid was just received.. The auto-extend is only 5 minutes though. This doesn't eliminate last minute bidders though - rather it just extends the period of the 'last minute bidding war' till someone gives up. So. Its good idea, but you don't want a 3 hour auto-extend - 3 minutes would be better. 3 hours, as suggested, would probably mean m…

Shit. Thats cool. Ok, five minutes is more than fine.
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