Ebay auction ending times

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Posted By: JudgeDred2

There's been discussion about the best time and day of the week to end auctions. This questions is along the same lines.

If I had 20 x E107s for sale should I end all of the auctions at the same time or should I end them about 4 minutes apart?

If I ended them all at the same time then it would force E107 collectors to put forth their best bids sooner because all auctions ended simultaneously. But then again there are snipe services. Also, it would take a long time for all of the aucitons to end.

If I ended them about 4 minutes apart it would be cheap entertainment for those that like to watch the ending of these auctions and it would give people time to "reload" and bid more on later cards if they don't win the early auctions.

Any ideas on the best time to end these auctions?

By the way, NO I don't have 20 x E107s for sale. This is only a hypothetical question.

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Posted By: Hal Lewis

I have given this a lot of thought as well.

With snipe services being used as much as they are these days, I don't think ending an auction at 4:00 in the morning is going to really hurt at all... as long as the auction has been running for 7-10 days and everyone has had time to set their snipers.

In fact, I think it would ATTRACT more snipers because they would think that they might get a bargain at that time of night with some people sleeping.

BUT... I think the major auction houses are PROOF that you should NEVER have all of your items ending at the same time.

If you had 20 E107's for sale... I might LOSE OUT on the first 10 and then would have MORE MONEY to spend at the very end of the last 10 auctions.

There is NO WAY that I could set 20 "high limit" snipes... for fear that I might win them all and be forced to come up with a ton of cash.

Thus, I think a 10-minute window in between ending times on the cards is sufficient to give people time to see that their snipe did NOT win the first auction...

so they can ADJUST and INCREASE their snipes for the remaining items.

This is why Mastro stays open when only ONE item is still getting bids. They want the LOSER of the $210,000 Babe Ruth card to still be able to spend his $200,000 on OTHER things in the auction!!!

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Posted By: T206Collector

...were in auctions that all ended at the same time. There was just less competition and ability to manually snipe. Why anyone would end their auctions all at the same time and foreclose people from moving money from an auction loss to another auction is beyond me.

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Posted By: jay behrens

People end their auctions at the same time becuase Turbo Lister does it that way. If you want to stagger the end times, you have upload the auctions one at a time by yourself, or pay a fee for TL/eBay to stagger it.

Jay

My place is full of valuable, worthless junk.

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Posted By: T206Collector

I used Turbo lister once or twice, but I was really annoyed by the timing feature. I just spend the extra time plugging them all in separately on-line. I find it doesn't even take that much longer, and the time it takes me to list each one staggers the auctions a few minutes apart -- an ideal time, in my opinion.

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Posted By: Julie

(er..does anyone?)--anyway, a LOT of fairly high demand cards of the same set, it would be a good idea to really stagger them, like, weeks apart, rather than minutes apart?

You wouldn't want bidders to get the idea that these high demand cards are really not so high demand, or, worse, that you're making your own.

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Posted By: davidcycleback

As has been touched on, staggering is probably the best. Many collectors want to win items but can't afford to win everything. If they see they've been outbid on one item, perhaps their first choice, they will move onto the next. So they bid on a long line of items, perhaps all, trying to win some. For these bidders, this is not possible if the items end at the same time. In fact, if the items end at the same time, they may restrict their bidding out of fear they might win too many items. With staggered bidding, they have a running tally, saying "Okay, I won this and this and lost those five. I have enough money to bid bid on the last one."

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Posted By: JudgeDred2

I guess common sense would indicate that staggered times would be best. The main reason (and this is very sound) is that ending the auctions at the same time may not allow the bidders to put there best bid forward on all lots because of economic reasons (possibly winning all of the lots and not having the resources to pay for all of the lots).

A staggered ending would allow bidders to concentrate on the remaining cards if they happen to "not win" the "earlier" lots. In some cases it might even turn into a better bidding scenario for the seller for the last few items.

Thanks for the input!

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Posted By: barrysloate

Ebay allows you to set the time you want your lot to end at 15 minute intervals. I use this service (ten cents extra) and list two items per 15 minutes. It does give collectors enough time to regroup when they lose something and can move on. I try to end auctions at night so that people are in a relaxed mode, but they end a bit early for the west coast people. Just don't list similar items to end all at the same time.