Critical Mistakes People Make When It Comes To Bidding In Auctions
Since joining DealDash back in August 2013, I’ve made more than my fair share of mistakes. Hopefully I can help you avoid making some of the same mistakes I’ve made. Why, you may be asking, would I be interested in helping you avoid making mistakes. Great question! Most of the mistakes we make result in something nobody wants – HIGHER PRICES!
If we were to talk about all the mistakes I’ve made, we’d be here for a long time, and I know you’re anxious to get bidding so let’s just look at the three most critical mistakes.
One of the most critical mistakes is having unrealistic expectations. This one mistake is responsible for just about every other mistake we can make. We see someone snag an iPad Air for $37.35 and decide we’re going to do the same. Could we be so fortunate to get a deal like this? Absolutely. Unfortunately, we could also end up spending lots of bids and ending up with nothing. Many people might be surprised to learn that most bidders average less than a 5% win ratio. This means that most bidders lose more than 95 out of 100 auctions they participate in. If we’re talking about an item like an iPad Air, our chances are even lower. I’m not trying to discourage anyone here. I just want to make sure you take off your rose colored glasses before you start bidding.
As I mentioned, having unrealistic expectations ultimately leads to other mistakes. The primary mistake we’re likely to make when we begin bidding and our expectations are too high is to become emotionally involved.
Let’s just say we set our sights on that iPad Air, and say we’re looking to get it for less than $50.00. Seems reasonable. After all, we saw someone on a TV commercial who got one for less than $50.00 and we just personally witnessed one go for $37.35. So, we decide to go for the next iPad Air we see. Guess we should probably buy some bids, but how many should we buy? We’re feeling lucky so we get 200, and start bidding.
Fast forward several hours….
Our iPad Air is currently at $53.50, we’ve exhausted our original 200 bids, bought another 200 and those are running low. The good news is we’re down to only 2 regular bidders besides us, so surely the other 2 will drop out soon. Maybe we miscalculated a little bit, but we’re not too worried yet. After all, even $75.00 would still be a great price for a brand new iPad Air. And, let’s face it, we’re having some fun!!
A little while later…
What the heck is wrong with these people? Don’t they know this is my iPad? One of the other bidders finally dropped out, but then some other jerk jumped in out of nowhere and started bidding. That’s just wrong, we think (actually we shout it out loud), don’t they know how long I’ve been bidding here? Guess what? We’ve become emotionally involved!
I’m going to spare you the details of how our pretend auction ended up, but let’s just say it got pretty ugly.
I promised to talk about three critical mistakes, so here’s number three. As they say, I’ve saved the worst for last. While the first two mistakes are very easy to make and can be very difficult to break, there is no reason for anyone to make the final critical mistake. So, what is it?
People begin bidding without doing their homework. I don’t know if you’ve seen the TV commercial where the man tells the woman about DealDash for the first time and seconds later she tells him she’s got to go start bidding. She’d be much better off is she said she was going to go visit DealDash Reviewed, of maybe go watch a few dozen auctions instead. The fact that you are here reading this blog puts you ahead of a majority of your competition, but don’t stop there. For every auction you participate in, sit out 10 or 15 and just observe what happens. While you’re watching all those auctions, you won’t be winning any of the great items available on DealDash, but you also will not be losing even a single penny, and you will learn a lot. I can just about guarantee you will be much more successful in the auctions you do take part in.
Had our pretend bidder done their homework there’s no guarantee they would have won that new iPad Air, but they could have saved a lot of money and unnecessary frustration.
I challenge everyone reading this article to go find the average selling price of an iPad Air with Wi-Fi and 16GB in Space Gray, come back and post a comment .
