The Art of the E-Deal
How buyers and sellers can score in the online marketplace.
By Jane Bennett Clark, Senior Associate Editor
From Kiplinger's Personal Finance magazine, June 2007
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You're desperate to find a baseball card featuring Oscar Dugey, who played for the Boston Braves in 1914. Your son is equally eager to get rid of last year's 5-pound chemistry textbook. And you wouldn't mind unloading your sagging Barcalounger if you could replace it with a nice leather sectional.
Time to get clicking, e-traders, and don't just stop at eBay, the online-auction behemoth. Other online shopping marts not only get you in on the auction action, but they also offer alternative ways to buy and sell your stuff. You can engage in a bidding war, trade at a fixed price, find and post deals through online classifieds, or use megasites such as Amazon.com to set up your own shop.
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You can even compete with the paddle-wavers at on-site auctions. About 15% of auction professionals -- including auction house Skinner, in Boston -- use online venues to attract extra bidders to sales, says Bill Sheridan, of the National Auctioneers Association. "Technology has enhanced the auction industry, not hurt it," he says.
How to begin the bazaar? You'd be silly to start anywhere but eBay, the Web site that took the flea-market mentality global 12 years ago. With 6.6 million new listings a day, eBay offers buyers a chance to grab everything plus the kitchen sink (2,155 entries at last count) and gives even casual sellers the opportunity to peddle their wares worldwide. "It's very difficult to ignore eBay on either side of the equation," says Heather Dougherty, of Nielsen/NetRatings.
From there, branch out to sites that specialize. For instance, www.etsy.com is a meeting place for buyers and sellers of handmade goods -- "a much smaller population than eBay," says Debra Schepp, who wrote eBay PowerSeller Million Dollar Ideas (McGraw-Hill, $25) with her husband, Brad Schepp. AbeBooks.com showcases rare and out-of-print editions along with new and used books. "People who are looking for antiquarian books are likely to look there," says Brad.
With all the choices, regular sellers often set up shop at more than one location -- say, at eBay, a specialty site and their own Web store -- and troll other sites to pick up inventory. That same tchotchke churning applies to buyers. A ceramic vase might start out at a yard sale, be traded at an online auction, find its way to a classified-ad site, such as Craigslist, and end up in somebody's attic -- to start all over in the next treasure hunt.
The four forums described here will give you a feel for the online marketplace. Quoted fees, including listing and closing costs, are paid by the seller. Also, check out our tip sheets to learn how to sell with success and buy with confidence.
EBAY
Listing fees: From 20 cents on starting bids up to 99 cents to $4.80 on bids of $500 and up
Closing fees: From 5.25% on values up to $25, to $33 plus 1.50% on values of more than $1,000
Total fee on a $40 sale: $3
Buyer protection: Up to $2,000 on items purchased through PayPal from sellers with at least 98% positive feedback
Once mostly a way station for Beanie Babies, eBay now conducts auctions on everything from carats to cars to castles. The site's easy-to-use format encourages newbies on both sides of the deal. Although sellers complain about high listing fees, few can afford to bypass a venue where $1,800 in goods changes hands every second. "EBay offers what no other site does -- sheer volume," says Debra Schepp.
If you don't want to dicker, you can opt for the "Buy It Now" feature. Fixed-price transactions constitute 40% of the gross value of items sold on eBay, says Catherine England, a company spokeswoman. EBay Express lets you search just the "Buy It Now" items, and Half.com, part of the eBay empire, offers books and other media items at fixed, discounted prices.
Such features make for convenience but hardly evoke eBay's auction excitement. England says eBay hopes to redirect people to its auctions. "Ten years ago, what made eBay fun was the thrill of winning an item," she says.