David was interviewed by quite a few journalists this week, including CNET radio and NewsBytes, for reporting what seemed to surprise the rest of the world, but was only a confirmation of what people who sell on auction sites already know:
The Average Selling Price (ASP) of consumer collectibles on eBay has fallen from a year ago. While the ASP was down an average of 25%, there were more auction listings for most of the items we studied. The decreased ASP in collectibles doesn't hurt eBay if they have a greater volume of completed auctions. So we wondered why eBay was so quick to refute our findings. (Note that they did not publish any figures that contradicted our study.) Here's the full release: http://www.auctionbytes.com/pr5301/pr5301.html.
We did not release our findings to show how eBay was doing; we wanted to know how eBay SELLERS were doing. When you factor in the many cost increases this year, the conclusion we draw is that sellers are working harder for less money.
So what can we do? Figure out how to work SMARTER! Figure out how to save time, how to get inventory that sells well, how to make our auction listings stand out from the competition and how to lower our costs. And AuctionBytes is here to help! For example, check out the "This and That" section below - there's a new online payment service that does not charge sellers fees!
We also have two "case studies" on how to list online auctions. Louis Rouse uses AuctionWatch.com's AMPRO software (a fee-based service) to save time when listing auctions on any of the major auction sites. And Mike Marino tells us how he uses HTML and Mister Lister (a free service) to list his auctions on eBay.
Ina Steiner is co-founder and Editor of EcommerceBytes and AuctionBytes.com and has been reporting on ecommerce since 1999. She's a widely cited authority on marketplace selling and is author of "Turn eBay Data Into Dollars" (McGraw-Hill 2006). Her blog was featured in the book, "Blogging Heroes" (Wiley 2008). Follow her on Twitter at @auctionbytes and send news tips to ina@ecommercebytes.com.
You may quote up to 50
words of any article on the condition that you attribute the article to
EcommerceBytes.com and either link to the original article or to
www.EcommerceBytes.com. All other use is prohibited.
You can read past newsletters going back to 1999 - click on a year and you'll be taken to all 24 issues from that year, which you can read in full-text!
Have a question about buying or selling online? Want to get marketing or technical advice? AuctionBytes Discussion Forums are the place to come to get answers to your questions and get advice! Great tips - a refreshing change!
