Why do people actomatically bid for things and how do you do it.

[Stormness_1]

I personally use a free snipe service for overseas auctions that end at weird times, or when I can't be around, but if I'm home I bid manually. I still like to get in with a late bid, mostly to keep prices realistic. I like the idea of silent auction styled listings, it prevents bidding wars, which make inflated prices seem the norm.

[Cswift]

Advice?  Either bid your max or use a sniping service! 

A sniping service won't win an auction if someone else has a higher max bid.

This is true but it really helps with the emotional aspect of bidding.  You decide your max. you program it in.  You go do something besides hover over your auction.  If you won, yay go you. If you didn't, then you know the other person HAD to pay more than you wanted to! 

Seconding this. I honestly really like sniping services since they help keep average prices down, and they've saved me from emotional overbidding more than once. I understand people thinking that they're unfair or unsportsmanlike, but...eh. I'll readily admit there's an art to bidding, but that clearly doesn't seem to be eBay's focus.

[Khayman81]

Sniping is a strategy to keep the price lower until as near the end as possible, increasing your odds of winning for a more affordable price. You can manually snipe by being online when the auction ends and bidding at the last few seconds but many people use automatic software to bid on their behalf. Since sniping is so close to the auction end, you won't usually have a chance with time left to enter an alternate bid if someone bids higher than you.

EBay's proxy bidding system lets you - directly through eBay, no third party software involved - enter either one bid for a certain price or do a proxy bid. A proxy bid is you enter your maximum bid and eBay will automatically bid for you until it reaches the max as other users place bids. You can do this any time during the auction. No matter when a bid is placed, the highest bid will always win.

The theory is that sniping can sometimes outsmart proxy bidding because instead of the price going higher over the course of several days you enter at the last moment.

Like this:

Day 1:
Seller: lists item at $0.99 for a 5 day auction

Day 1: bidder 1 places one manual bid for $1.05

The auction price increases to $1.05

Bidder 1 is the high bidder.

Day 1: bidder 2 places a proxy bid for a maximum of $10

eBay increases the price incrementally and places 1 bid on bidder 2's behalf. The auction price is now $1.30. Bidder 1 has been outbid. Since Bidder 1 entered one manual bid, they would need to come back with a second bid or proxy bid to try and win the auction.

Bidder 2 is the high bidder. The auction price is $1.30.

Day 2:
Bidder 3 sees the auction price of $1.30. They enter a proxy bid of $5. They do not know that Bidder 2 has entered a max bid of $10.

Bidder 3 is automatically outbid by Bidder 2's proxy bid. Bidder 3 must now come back to place a new bid, otherwise is out of competition to win the auction.

The auction price is now $5.25. Bidder 2 is the high bidder

Day 3:
Bidder 1 comes back to check the auction and sees that she has been outbid and is no longer in competition to win the auction. She decides to place another bid. She enters a proxy bid this time. She enters a max of $12

Bidder 2's bids are entered and automatically countered by Bidder 1's bids. Bidder 2 is outbid. eBay increases the price by the minimum amount required so the auction price is now $10.50 and Bidder 1 is the high bidder.

Day 4:
No bids are placed. The auction price is still $10.50

Day 5:
Bidder 1 thinks sweet, she can get a great deal. But just in case, she decides to increase her proxy bid max to $18. The auction price doesn't change until a few other bidders wander in and place manual bids, but the price remains below Bidder 1's max.

The auction price is now $16.75 and Bidder 1 is the high bidder

Bidder 2 decides she really really wants the pony. She enters a max price of $50.

There is one hour left in the auction. The price increases to just above Bidder 1's max and the auction price is $18.50.

Bidder 2 is the high bidder. Bidder 1 decides she doesn't want to spend more than that and drops out.

A few more bids trickle in, some manual, some proxy. The proxy bids increase the price quickly because eBay automatically outbids the second highest with the first highest.

The price is now $27.25 and Bidder 2 is the high bidder.

Five seconds to go.

Bidder 2 panics and enters a max bid of $200 (never do this!) because she really really wants the pony. It's her grail!

Bidder 9 snipes the auction at 2.5 seconds left using third party software. Bidder 9 probably isn't even online right now. He trusts the software to do its job.

Bidder 10 enters a manual last minute bid of $52 with 2 seconds left but is immediately outbid by Bidders 9 and 2 and doesn't have time to enter a new bid.

The auction price jumps to $100.75 after Bidder 9's snipe.

The auction ends at $100.75 and Bidder 2 is the winner.

Why is Bidder 2 the winner? Bidder 9 bid closer to the end of the auction.

Bidder 9's max snipe price was $100
Bidder 2, although the bid was placed earlier than Bidder 9, still wins the auction because eBay's system makes sure  the highest bid wins and $200 is higher than $100.

So usually a last minute bid will win the day but not always.
Bidder 2 probably way overpaid for the pony but she got emotionally invested in the auction.

Bidder 1 goes and BINs the same pony for $8 from a different seller.

(It was Peachy)

I love how you explained it, so Accurate. Actually this last days l like watching bids on ebay, for Mimics or ponies l can't afford, and know they are going to end up sold for a small fortune, but yes, the bids grow slowly and then the last day they just go crazy.


And yes, l have used to max bid for my last purchase and l won the bidding cause l went high the first, but never above a limit (it was 15€ for Sundance and got her for 11,5) if the other bidder had gone above 15 l would have lost but ok cause it was my max bid.

[dragonfly]

I don't have anything against using software and have in the past, but I'm usually afraid it will fail or not connect, so for my most-wanted items I'm usually going to manually snipe and I'll watch from a couple different devices. My cell service is more reliable than my wifi but the connection is slower. But if I know I won't be online I prefer to use a sniper vs enter a manual bid because I don't want to show my hand and get outbid prematurely. I also remember the furor around snipers when they first made an appearance.