| |
Five Ways To Detect Shill Bidders On eBay So That You Don't Pay Absurd Prices
By Sydney Johnston
There is as a lot of buzz about shill bidders on the eBay
forums. But in actuality, shrill bidding isn't that common and
is rather easily detected.
A buyer will sometimes attempt to use shill building to raise
the price of merchandise he is selling. The idea is that the
shiller will bid increasingly high prices, in the hope that
legitimate buyers like you will top the artificially high prices
in an effort to win the goodies for sale.
Here are five ways you can recognize a shill bidder:
1. Few shill bidders will have any feedback. This is because
they never follow through with transactions and therefore
don't have anyone to leave feedback. If the shiller does
have legitimate transactions on ebay, he is usually smart
enough to use a separate ID, because he does not want to
get caught shilling and lose all buying and selling privileges.
{It is important to note, however, that just because a
bidder has no feedback that does not mean that he is
necessarily a shrill bidder. This may simply be a new
account that has not had time to build a feedback
reputation.}
2. Generally, a shiller only bids on the auctions of a
particular seller. When in doubt, you can check the current
and completed options of a seller and see if this shiller has
bid on other auctions by the same seller.
3. Shill bidders are most often newbies. You can check the
feedback, and the date that the eBay account was created,
for any ebay member. If the bidder's account was created
two days ago and he is bidding on several auctions of the
same seller, you can be pretty certain about what is going
on.
4. eBay has ways of the tracking shillers. Of course we
don't know everything they do (and if I did know I wouldn't
tell!) but some clues all are dead giveaways. For example,
if the seller and the bidder have the same IP address, eBay
knows to take a closer look.
5. Shill bidders retract many more bids than normal buyers.
eBay does allow any buyer to retract a bid, although this is
only supposed to occur for specific reasons. But in actuality,
a retraction is rarely challenged and ultimately what can
eBay do? It cannot force a person to pay for a particular
item.
It is wise not to use this option on a frequent basis.
Remember that your eBay behavior deal is constantly
tracked. A retraction is considered to be a "black mark" on
your reputation so don't do it very often. Shillers, on the
other hand, don't care because they're unconcerned about
their reputation. If caught, they simply open a new
account.
Sometimes a shiller is the high bidder at the end of an
auction. In that that case, the seller and buyer can agree
to cancel the bid, rather than retract it. However, all this
takes a lot of work, planning and effort. In the end, shill
bidding is rarely worth the trouble and time. Instead, smart
sellers spend their time finding products and writing listings
- the two basic moneymaking activities of an ebay business
- instead of plotting how to raise profits on individual
listings. Success in business is about efficiency.
About the Author
Learn how to sell on eBay with 16 hours of online instruction taught by a 10 year eBay veteran. Own an eBay business instead of an eBay hobby.
http://www.auction-genius-course.com
Article Source: http://www.simplysearch4it.com/article/5988.html
| If you wish to add the above article to your website or newsletters then please include the "Article Source: http://www.simplysearch4it.com/article/5988.html" as shown above and make it hyperlinked. |
| Some other articles by Sydney Johnston | |
| |
|
|
|
