Sending Offers

[thriftabulous]

Can someone provide some insight as to why I send offers every single day and 95% do not buy? Any suggestions? Or input as to why not? I think my offers are low but maybe not low enough.  Thanks

[reallynicestamps]

The Offers are going to Viewers and Watchers who looked at your listing and decided not to buy it.

While they are slightly more likely to remain interested on the second pass, you have to keep in mind that they did not want it originally and may have bought elsewhere.

[lux.ra_14]

Don't be predictable by sending so many offers.

There are sellers I follow who send offers on every item I put on a watch list. Why would I ever pay full price?

[stainlessenginecovers]

What was the original price vs. the 'newly offered' price? (give a couple examples)

Are the items used or new? 

[soh.maryl]

Or they were watching because they have a similar item to sell and want to see if yours sells and how much it sells for.  

Also, I have watched items that I find odd/interesting and just wonder about their value.  

[slippinjimmy]

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@thriftabulous wrote:

Can someone provide some insight as to why I send offers every single day and 95% do not buy? Any suggestions? Or input as to why not? I think my offers are low but maybe not low enough.  Thanks

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Pretty simple, just because a buyer looks at your listing or watches your listing doesn't mean they are ready to buy your listing.

When I'm browsing eBay for a particular item I might add some of the ones I find to my watch list but at most I'll buy ONE of them and most of the time I don't buy any of them. I have no idea how many items I have on my watchlist (plural since I have multiple id's) each watchlist can have 500 listings, I can't remember the last time I deleted anything from my watchlist.

For me an offer of a 5 or 10 or 15% discount isn't usually enough to motivate me to click the buy button.

A 5% response rate is not really that bad.

[lakefor94]

I send offers everyday and achieve about a 10% success rate. I use to say 15% but these days it is closer to 10% or less.

[dbfolks166mt]

     For the most part I quit playing in the best offer arena a long time ago, for one thing it can chew up a lot of time. Like slippinjimmy there are a lot of reasons I may look at an item or watch it. The ones I find to be the funniest are when I am trying to help a poster on this forum with an issue and look at one of their items to do some analysis and poof then next thing you know I have an offer. 😂

     I seldom send offers simply because I do not shop on eBay all that much anymore. I can generally find the items cheaper elsewhere. There are occasions when the item is unique and I can't find it elsewhere I actually submitted an offer on an item about a week ago, it didn't work out but seller still has the item so I may try again. I think that's the first offer I have sent in over a year. 

[iart]

We send out over 100 a week. Sometimes closer to 200. It takes quite a bit of effort to figure out how much to charge for each one. We also usually allow counters. We get maybe 1 or 2 sales from this.

I think a lot of buyers don't even look at them. They don't understand how it works and how good a deal they might get.

[sin-n-dex]

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@iart wrote:

We send out over 100 a week. Sometimes closer to 200. It takes quite a bit of effort to figure out how much to charge for each one. We also usually allow counters. We get maybe 1 or 2 sales from this.

I think a lot of buyers don't even look at them. They don't understand how it works and how good a deal they might get.

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I had similar experience, although I think I can send 300-400 in a week if I let them accumulate (there's over 400 now and I haven't sent them for about a week). I find it's an all evening activity, and like you, I like to calculate how much for each item and not blindly offer an x discount across the board. The offers get better the more times I send them out for the same stuff. But I don't allow counters, but if messaged back by someone who declined the offer, I can sometimes be persuaded to send a new offer for a better price (if it's not too far off from my original offer).

C.

[kensgiftshop]

Maybe they are not interested in buying, just checking to see if yours sells and at what price.

Maybe they get so many offers they just stop checking them.

I look at a lot of listings and have no intention of buying then I started receiving a lot of offers for just looking at a listing.

I just ignored them for awhile and it got so bad, I just opted out of receiving offers.

A good way to tick buyers off, send a bunch of offers just for looking at an item,

[ckimodog]

@thriftabulous 

My take on watchers is they are just basically window shopping so to speak.  They may just change their minds or get it cheaper from someone else.  Again, just my opinion. 

Happy Selling

[simba6]

Not all watchers intend to purchase the item.  They may have one like it to sell and want to see if and for how much it sells.     They can also use the watch list when looking for the best deal and have purchased from another listing.  Keeping the other ones on their list in case the deal falls through or the item is lost in shipping.

If you going to make an offer it needs to be a fair amount off.  5-30%  just won't do.

[redmodelt]

I open and read a lot of listings that I have no interest in actually buying, just want to take a look at the item and what it is. 🙂

[sin-n-dex]

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@simba6 wrote:

Not all watchers intend to purchase the item.  They may have one like it to sell and want to see if and for how much it sells.     They can also use the watch list when looking for the best deal and have purchased from another listing.  Keeping the other ones on their list in case the deal falls through or the item is lost in shipping.

If you going to make an offer it needs to be a fair amount off.  5-30%  just won't do.

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30% is kind of a lot... I try to do 20-25% on most items. Depends on the cost and margins.

C.