Auction eZine - Issue 5

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AuctionInsights Newsletter
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January 6, 2005 

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Hi,

Doug Feiring here from AuctionInsights

With the new year comes new resolutions to
succeed in our auction business.  I've recently
come across a tool that will definitely help my
eBay sales during the peak auction season
ahead of us.   

Happy New Year,
Doug

http://www.auctioninsights.info
http://AuctionLink.to

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MAKE A PROFIT YOUR FIRST WEEK - Get INSIDER
SECRETS for MAKING QUICK CASH with online
auctions. We'll even give you items to sell! Get
the details today! 

Click:
http://refer.auctionriches.com/click.cgi?id=fearlessdf

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o FEATURED ARTICLE...

Learning What I Don't Know about eBay
A Review of Terapeak.com

By Doug Feiring

As the owner of AuctionInsights., I frequently
receive requests from businesses to review their
latest eBay tool or service.  Such was the e-mail I
recently received from Chris Smith of
Terapeak.com. After a month of procrastinating,
last week I finally made time to give Terapeak a
test-spin.  I only wish I has access to this useful
tool a few months ago when I was selling off
my collection of Star Wars comics.

Terapeak is a data-mining service for eBay
sellers.  The toolset is the only service currently
authorized by eBay to perform statistical analysis
of the auction site's closed auctions and
categories.  Terapeak helps eBay users sell more
effectively by providing them the information
they need to effectively understand and predict
the performance of their auction listings by
highlighting market trends.

Using Terapeak, I compared success (and failures)
of a month's worth of closed auctions with the term
"Star Wars comic" in the listing title.  I was
interested in learning the average selling price,
average number of bids, the most successful
closing day of the week and time, and average
opening bid of the most successful auctions.  I
was also interested in knowing if features like
bold, highlighting, or "Buy It Now" made an
appreciable difference for the comic book sellers
that employed them.

The results were startling.  I learned for the month
of November 2004, the average selling price of a
Star Wars comic listed in the category in which I
used (Collectables, Comics, Bronze Age (1970-
1979) Horror & Sci Fi) was less than half the price
($5.40) of the average selling price of a Star
Wars comic across all of eBay's categories
($13.00).  The Terapeak results page prominently
displays all the major categories in which your
item of interest was listed during the period
researched, so I was able to quickly drill down and
discover which categories were outperforming the
one I normally use.

Interestingly, the Action Figures category (Toys &
Hobbies, Action Figures, Star Wars, Prequels) had
an average selling price of $16.37 (three times
that of my category) and over twice (76.47%) the
successful auction close rate of my normal
category (36.96%). I also learned that three day
listings for Star Wars Comics were much more
successful in closing with a bid than the seven
day listing periods I used.  Additionally, I was
surprised to see that sellers who employed the
"Buy It Now" feature enjoyed a whopping 100%
success rate.  Amazing information...and I was
only just scratching the surface of what I could
glean from this service.

Terapeak offers two versions of its toolset:  Terapeak
Lite, which limits price searches to one day of closed

auctions at a
time for $9.95
USD per month
and Terapeak
Research
Complete, which
enables users to
search and
aggregate up to
30 days of eBay
data at time for
$16.95 USD per
month.


As my Granddad always said, "You don't know
what you don't know."  Terapeak helped me to
quickly learn what I didn't know when I was selling
off my Star Wars comic collection.  With
Terapeak's help, I won't be making the same
mistakes when I sell off my X-Men comics later
this month.  

An AuctionInsights.com recommended eBay tool.

Terapeak.com 

Next AuctionInsights newsletter... Selling books on
Half.com

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=--=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
MAKE A PROFIT YOUR FIRST WEEK - Get INSIDER
SECRETS for MAKING QUICK CASH with online
auctions. We'll even give you items to sell! Get
the details today! 

Click:
http://refer.auctionriches.com/click.cgi?id=fearlessdf

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