Any eBay alternatives?

[SpeedyCycles]

I am getting soooo frustrated with eBay. I have two accounts and I have been a member for 8 years or so, and this last few months has been the worst as a seller. I have had more non-paying bidders now that ever. In addition, I just sold an item for $469, and after all fees, etc. I only net $415. I think I paid $26 in JUST final value fee.

Soooo, outside of Craigslist, is there any other monster/giant auction service or place to sell things? I love Craigs, but the exposure is so limited.

I am open to any/all suggestions!

[SpeedyCycles]

ebid.net is the best alternative I have found in the last couple of hours of research.

F

[JOS51700]

I think the issue is that there are so many smaller, less-known choices, the buyers are too spread out, and that dilutes the competition that makes ebay so profitable.

I swore I wouldn't list anymore on eBay 'till they got their feedback act together, but I listed something sunday. We'll see how it goes. I'm thinking that your experience is not unique, and eBay might pull their heads out of their aces when sellers stop selling.

[JOS51700]

Too bad it's such a pain to leave any kind of feedback with ebay, to tell them about it.

[Firemann]

Is Ubid and Yahoo auctions still around?

[SpeedyCycles]

I know Yahoo auctions have been gone for a few years. I think Ubid is a lot like Overstock.com

I think I am going to try:

www.motoyard.com and http://us.ebid.net/indexmain.php

motoyard is all motorcycle stuff and ebid is as close as it gets to eBay IMO. I am still looking. I -wish- Google would confirm or deny their rumored auction site.

F

[Unregistered Mac User]

I think I am going to try:

www.motoyard.com and http://us.ebid.net/indexmain.php

motoyard is all motorcycle stuff and ebid is as close as it gets to eBay IMO.

MotoYard has 336 items listed. Welcome to the 800 lb gorilla that is eBay. :(

eBid looks promising, though...

[JOS51700]

590 eBid auctions for "Harley-Davidson"-related materials.
66,069 on eBay.

Not promising enough.

[SpeedyCycles]

Yeah, it sucks. But if dissatisfied individuals like me don't ever leave, it will never change. I think I am going with the new one that is FREE ;)

Is there anything else out there that I am missing?

F

[Firemann]

Is ebid free?

Might be the place to go, I've pretty much stopped selling stuff on ebay because of that exact thing, EVERYBODY thinks the can quit thier jobs and sell stuff on eBay. You have to keep lowereing your prices to sell anything, eventually your making like .02 an hour for your time.......

[SpeedyCycles]

If I understand it correct, eBid is free to list and is about 1/2 the final value fee. I read about a LOT of these alternatives, and I think this is the one that has a "happy hour" which is a very cool idea. I will try to find the link explaining it again, but in short, it is a 1 hour listing!

F

[silver_s13]

Why not just start a simple web site that allows you to sell your stuff at no fee other than your domain fee? Then you can advertise here and tulsasportbikeriders.com and slowly let the traffic build. You could use paypal for secure transactions and then your non-payong bidder problem will disappear. The down side is that you'll probably won't have the bidding just Buy it Now type pricing. You could make it look something like www.drumhillcycle.com

[SpeedyCycles]

I am planning on doing that also with a PayPal link, however it does not get the exposure that eBay, etc get. Also, there are certain items I just want gone in 7 days, and bidding works well for that rather than waiting around. Thanks for the input, good idea.

F

[SpeedyCycles]

I thought this thread may be worth reviving. Anyone have any new ideas out there? Any new developments of discussion?

[Firemann]

How's the alternate sites working?

[SpeedyCycles]

I have not sold anything thru eBid or Ebay lately. Anyone else?

[JOS51700]

I pretty much gave up on it. I had several auctions that didn't even net any watchers, let alone bids, and it was stuff that people would've fought over two years ago.

I think the Mandatory Paypal drove alot of the bidders away. Lots of people I dealt with didn't have bank accounts, didn't have the money (so they say) for bank accounts, and didn't want credit cards. If Ebay goes to Mandatory Ebay Packaging and forced shipping through USPS, that will piss off even more people.

For me, I hate the fact that they are always changing things trying to keep everyone happy. Every time I'd go to sell something, it was a different listing procedure,different shipping procedure, etc, and they never worked any of the bugs out. The skewed feedback ruined it, now you never who you're really dealing with.

[SpeedyCycles]

Hence the reason I was looking for an alternative.

[JOS51700]

Unfortunately, it was ebay's sheer size that made it so popular. There's simply too many alternatives, none with a clear advantage, and that makes it impossible for any one of them to be as good as ebay was (note past tense). I'm guessing that the first person to come up with some sort of unity of sites that auction specialties (Gunbroker.com, for example) will be the next biggun.

If it's rare, or super-valuable, I'll probably ebay it in the future, but until something else comes along, I'm Craig's stepson.

[SpeedyCycles]

+1 on Craigs. I have had tremendous luck on Craigs... if I price it correctly. It is weird, I had and item priced at about an eBay price, maybe 10% above, and very little response. I literally dropped the price $15 and it was like I was giving it away. "Can I meet you TODAY?? Will you hold it for me?" :truestory

[DaiSan76]

I didnt see anyone post this, I got rid of 2 parrots on this site.

http://springfieldmo.kijiji.com/

[bimmerjo]

I got rid of 2 parrots on this site.

what kind?

[DaiSan76]

what kind?

A Quaker Parakeet and an Umbrella Cockatoo. Still got a Green Wing Macaw..however you spell it. I hate birds. :p

[SpeedyCycles]

Hey, that is awesome! I have never been on that site. Thanks for posting it up.

[bimmerjo]

A Quaker Parakeet and an Umbrella Cockatoo. Still got a Green Wing Macaw..however you spell it. I hate birds. :p

My family used to have two, blue and gold macaws, I think Macaws are beautiful birds

[DaiSan76]

My family used to have two, blue and gold macaws, I think Macaws are beautiful birds

I like to fantasize about it's death. :)

[bimmerjo]

lol

[SpeedyCycles]

So I was feeling eBay is the only real way to market an online auction etc. I have had as of today, I have had a total of FIVE non-paying bidders in a row. That is amazing to me. I also have my parameters set to block (0) feedback buyers, however I noticed one made it in this last time. I checked again, and it is still set the same. Man, I wish we could leave them negative feedback.

Also, it is no easy to leave a "non-payment" strike against someone. You have to wait 4 days, but not more than 29, you have to revisit ebay and check up on the status, and if you don't manually close the dispute within a certain time frame, eBay closes it for you, but does not leave the strike against them. Man I wish there was another good alternative.

[Unregistered Mac User]

So I was feeling eBay is the only real way to market an online auction etc. I have had as of today, I have had a total of FIVE non-paying bidders in a row. That is amazing to me. I also have my parameters set to block (0) feedback buyers, however I noticed one made it in this last time. I checked again, and it is still set the same. Man, I wish we could leave them negative feedback.

Also, it is no easy to leave a "non-payment" strike against someone. You have to wait 4 days, but not more than 29, you have to revisit ebay and check up on the status, and if you don't manually close the dispute within a certain time frame, eBay closes it for you, but does not leave the strike against them. Man I wish there was another good alternative.


I'm spooling up to list some stuff on eBay as well. Do I understand correctly that there is now no way for a seller to leave negative feedback for a buyer? But the buyer can leave negative for a seller?

[JOS51700]

Do I understand correctly that there is now no way for a seller to leave negative feedback for a buyer? But the buyer can leave negative for a seller?

Bingo was his name-o.

[bimmerjo]

b-i-ngo... b-i-ngo... b-i-ngo and crap, thanks dude... i'll be singing that all day.

[Gixxer Jon]

How much sense does that make? I can trash-talk a seller and rate them low, but they don't even have the ability to let the other sellers on eGay know that I'll rip them off? Logic, please.

[JOS51700]

How much sense does that make? I can trash-talk a seller and rate them low, but they don't even have the ability to let the other sellers on eGay know that I'll rip them off? Logic, please.

Get in line, mister.

[Jerzey]

b-i-ngo... b-i-ngo... b-i-ngo and crap, thanks dude... i'll be singing that all day.

And now...it's stuck in my head too! FML :rant

[Neanderthal]

I participated in an on-line EbaY town hall meeting this summer. One of the driving forces behind them cracking down on the seller was all the extortion going on, ie.... sellers would hold off giving a rating until it was impossible for the buyer to complain. Still see a lot of it going on now, I thought that was supposed to stop but I guess the system is too big to police. Here's the gripe in a nut-shell:

Buyer bids on widget. Buyer wins bid and immediately pays via Pay-Pal. As far as the buyer is concerned, he/she did their part (they bid, they won, they paid) and the seller should see money in Pay-Pal account and send out the item. It should be a done deal as far as the seller is concerned if the item was honestly described in the ad. Many power-sellers in a quest to reach a lofty status started to be jerks and refused to give the buyer a rating (which should have been positive) until the buyer rated them positive first - that's blackmail and destroyed the accountability system.
Now this mainly pertained to Pay-Pal related transactions. There are other problems that go both ways as far as the buyer not paying, but those mainly involve other forms of payment.
The rating system falters when there is no rating recourse. Once you leave a rating, good or bad, it is essentially in concrete.
I've only done one non Pay-Pal transaction, and I got burned. I sent a cashier's check and the jerkwad did not send the item, lol. Every other sell/purchase has gone great.

[banana]

These days, not many people are interested in auctions when prices are so low as it is on the regular market -- especially at places like craigslist.

[Neanderthal]

I've had much better luck getting the prices I want when selling on EbaY than through Craigslist. Craigslist buyers are typically pretty bad about low-balling.

[JOS51700]

The whole feedback hostage thing could've been prevented, and feedback credibility saved, by one simple action.

Seller has to leave feedback first.

As you said, once it's won and paid for, the buyer is essentially done, unless they can't read the ad, and if the seller waits two weeks and hears no gripes, then.....

(I probably would make any feedback not intentionally left, and automatic positive if no disputes were filed).

I'll go back to ebay if they pull a system restore a la' 2002.

[SpeedyCycles]

I bought something recently that was described as "New in box". It wasn't, and the seller refunded $10 (without me asking, just the mention of it). They refused to leave feedback for me until I left it for them first, ie "Feedback Hostage".

I think the worst part is how many people are just bidding something up, winning, and then NO correspondence. On our motorcycle books, very little problems. On the iPhones, every one has been a problem recently. I can honestly say I didn't have these problems when we could leave a dead beat bidder neg feedback.

[Neanderthal]

Speedy,
I might be way off here, but it is my guess with the Ipod stuff you might be dealing with a lot of kids - just a guess. It is ironic that the one and only problem I had was with an electronics item as well, lol. At least EbaY refunded me 75% of my loss, so for me it was a lesson learned (Pay-Pal only, no exceptions).
The seller holding the buyer hostage until they received positive feedback was supposed to be stopped, but I still see a lot of sellers blatantly stating in their ads that they expect positive feedback or else, lol.

[Unregistered Mac User]

I've had much better luck getting the prices I want when selling on EbaY than through Craigslist. Craigslist buyers are typically pretty bad about low-balling.

This has been my experience. I use Craigslist to sell large items, which I do not want to ship. Also for low value items, again where shipping isn't worth it. eBay usually gets the best selling price, though. If nothing else, I chalk this up to a much larger buyer pool.

Garage sale < craigslist < eBay, IMO

[SpeedyCycles]

Yep, that is pretty much where I am on it. I have not sold a vehicle on eBay in years if ever, and I have had pretty good luck on Craigs. I try almost everything on Craigs first, but like someone mentioned earlier, you almost have to price most things at garage sale prices or they don't typically sell.

[Unregistered Mac User]

Yep, that is pretty much where I am on it. I have not sold a vehicle on eBay in years if ever, and I have had pretty good luck on Craigs. I try almost everything on Craigs first, but like someone mentioned earlier, you almost have to price most things at garage sale prices or they don't typically sell.

In the last few days I've sold a dining room set and a concrete mixer for my full asking price, to the first person who showed up / inquired about them. I had priced these items high (IMO) to allow some negotiation room. I was surprised to find buyers eager to purchase without negotiating.

I've got several more items on Craigslist, I'll see how they go.

[JOS51700]

**** Ebay, the guy that bought my EX500 off of craigslist dropped cash and didn't ask a question.

This was after I filtered out all the "Will you go from $1000 to $300, if it's just like new?" questions, which I did also get on Ebay the last time I used it.

[SpeedyCycles]

Putting an unpaid strike against a member is just this quick and simple as you can see drawn out in this diagram:

http://www.swmosportbikes.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=29506&stc=1&d=1258295076

Here is your options for leaving feedback for a buyer:

http://www.swmosportbikes.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=29505&stc=1&d=1258295076

I have not found anywhere any specific rule that states WHAT you can say in positive feedback. I wonder if you can put "DEADBEAT BIDDER! See item# 12345678, Still unpaid 89 days later" ?

[EDuck]

if you are selling vintage items or handmade items, etsy.com is great

Pm'd ya Frank.

[BRAD]

beezid.com

[SpeedyCycles]

Can you sell on beezid.com ?

[SpeedyCycles]

Bump. Anyone have any new info?

FleBay keeps getting worse for sellers.