One thing I've noticed since I started reselling is majority of buyers are other resellers. So by pricing full or close to full market value you get rid of majority of your customers. My average time to sell is about 3 days I sell at about 60-70% of market value. Items sitting on shelves aren't making money. I turn and burn and use that money to ramp up more. Like that mask, if I bought that for $1 I probably would have sold it for 100 to 150 and sold it same day. There will always be more items to flip. I see too many reseller friends sitting on items for months. I sold a backwards compatible ps3 to a reseller for 250 in 2 days of buying it for 80. He still has it listed at 400 3 months later. I used that 250 to make a lot more than 400. Food for thought. Love the vids.
@@bennystratton7734 I’ve always thought this with things like houses too. Some people would rather wait ten years to get $1M rather than getting $900K in a few months
it was very well-paced for an informative video! i felt the need to check that i didn't have playback set to 1.5x or something 😂 i know Justin is pretty good for that in general but this one has exceptional momentum 😎 so refreshing.
Reasons to use Best Offers in your store: 1. Give a buyer a happy feeling they won (not kidding - it is important!), 2. Attract more buyers, 3. Getting rid of old inventory, 4. And you can always say no! 😉
Great way to look at it! Someone else said they’d have never known they could just be a few $ apart so made a deal. I noticed eBay said on one item that I only have 2 more offers available. I upped my minimum
I agree on #1 especially. Same as brick and mortar stores putting items on clearance. It may only be $1 lower, but the psychology of it is exactly what you said. I also think it lowers the risk of a return. Again, the psychology of getting a "deal".
Sometimes it's better to have stock turning over rather than sitting on it for a long time. I've made some huge profits on some of my items and some things that I bought cheaply that has sat around too long I just donate it back to the charity shops to make room for new items.
I put a best offer on about 25% of my 400 or so items. Sometimes people pay full price. Sometimes people offer reasonably well above the minimum. And some people make a series of ascending offers from a lowball price point till they hit the minimum or a little above. I price my minimums at a price I will accept, and always make the sale when I accept a buyer's offer. Only once did I counter, on one of my early listings where I'd priced the shipping too low and someone on the opposite end of the country wanted it. They accepted and item sold; everyone happy! One thing I learned from over 20 years running a small business (before Covid ruined it and I pivoted to Ebay): You make your profit when you BUY the item, not when you SELL it. Procurement takes experience, discipline, and sometimes hard lessons along the way, but if you procure at a good enough (predicted) markup, you can still do well even selling for a bit less than full asking price. I'm wary of the phenomenon of "Customers getting trained that the sale price is the REAL price," but on Ebay I'm pretty satisfied with the number of people who go ahead and buy at (or near) full asking price with offers turned on.
Ebay open the last 2 days announced they are making the buyer give purchase info and they now have to agree to be charged if they send a best offer and you accept. Good news with 4th quarter coming!❤😊😊😊
We always have best offer turned on, but we put a minimum on at 60% of list. We price to make a profit at 60%. People will buy at a "sale" price, even if they aren't actually saving money. In fact, some stores and restaurants adverise the regular price as if it were a sale price because it's been shown to increase sales. Best practice from a seller's POV is to price a little high, and make buyers believe they're getting a deal.
I love love love best offer! I use it on every item that isn't on sale, BUT I do have a strict rule in which I do not go lower than 20% off. I occasionally have non-paying buyers but it's pretty rare. Also, and this has been key for me, I've learned to say no and mean it. If I get a potential buyer who wants to go back and forth I just say "thank you for your interest, my previous offer is as low as I can go" and move on. Lastly, I have started blocking extreme and/or rude low ballers. I know they're going to be a pain in the ass no matter what I do, so I just add them to the list. I know it's all a bit of a game but I think buyers like feeling like they have some control/say over things. Congrats on joining the world of hagglers, and good on you for taking the plunge!
@@sammonicuslux Same here! As sellers, it's one of the few ways we can protect ourselves. Allowing offers gives us a way to prescreen potential problem buyers by seeing how they behave before we put ourselves in a vulnerable position.
Love this video, Justin. Thanks for providing content that is out of the box. Next time you choose to do this, could you give your viewers a heads up? Lol
I have best offer for everything and am really surprised at how many sales are full price. I feel people just want to get the item without all the back and forth.
@@positivepsycho2932 Same to this as well. I'm constantly sending offers when I get watchers, sending good offers too, and I too usually do not get a response. When I do make a sale 95% of the time it is full asking price. So who knows!?
@@positivepsycho2932 I am the same, I really hate the back and forth and worst wait and no pay. I am sticking to me sending offers to likers and no counteroffer option. It's not like I am insisting the listed price, it's the hassle and wait I hate.
Even tho I sell on ebay, when I'm buying I never remember to even check for best offer. I find what I'm looking for, price what I'm about expecting to pay, I get it.
You should keep it on for all items. I never counter offer lowball offers I just decline them right away. If someone sends something thats close to a price I want I will counter. Also not sure if you're aware but ebay rewards engagement. SOOO many times THAT item that had the best offer engagement ends up selling within a couple hours to someone else at full price. I dont think it's a coincidence. I can't prove it but if you look around a lot of people have brought this up as well. traffic items get pushed more. engagement creates traffic.
At the beginning of the year, I turned best offer off and run a 30% off sale all the time. My 90 day total has more than doubled and I’m finally making more than I did at my full time job reselling 15 hours a week. This strategy was a game changer for me.
@@emmagreenland-broadsmith6841 slightly, but definitely not a full 30% markup. I also don’t mark down items that I have just listed that month, to give them a chance to sell at full price. I run my sale 30 days at a time then reevaluate which newer items I’ll mark down after that month :)
The number of people I've had buying at the buy it now price after making an offer and me responding by letting the offer expire or declining it is crazy.
This was so fun to watch - love that you’re experimenting with new content for your channel and reminding us to try new things in our business. Thank you!
I do best offer on 21k items in my store but definitely don't do free shipping. So I generally accept any offer as long as it's not ridiculous. That's just me.
I use best offers on almost all items. I've been very happy with the results but I source items with a high profit margin. I've found that buyers are happier with the items when they feel like they get a good deal on them. It's a nice side effect to have fewer returns and more positive feedback.
If you use best offer you can also set the auto accept at the lowest you'll take for it, but that is at the time of listing. That way if it comes in lower you can bid them back up a bit, but you have to justify why it is worth more than their offer. Sometimes their offer is not to far off that if its still has a decent profit, its not worth the effort to counter. But they'll message an offer even though it's buy it now asking for an offer as discussed. It all depends on the eBay market, if there's a lot of sales not interested in taking offers, but if the weekly sales are slow that is the time to move your inventory. Keeping the revenue stream moving.
I hear someone say if you accept an offer you are getting your original investment money back so you can buy something better to sell. The goal is to become better at sourcing. The better you source the more profitable you will become. I used to buy anything that I think would sell. Now I only buy things with a mid to high sell through rate.
What an interesting experiment. I think the only times you lost out was items that had free shipping. I personally have best offers on for everything. The negotiation part really doesn’t take much time.
Yes it’s interesting how few people make an offer. Also, remember that now eBay keeps your item for sale until a successful offerer PAYS. 👍🏼 Also, for the few items I don’t have listed as Best Offer, people still message with (usually lowball) offers that can be annoying anyway. I turn in minimum offer and usually make it a little less than I’m willing to take. If somebody gets that low I’ll make a reasonable counteroffer which is often accepted. It’s kind of fun. I don’t have the guts to bargain in person but this way for the people who get a kick out of the back and forth, they get to do that, and I get money. 💰 in hand means I can buy and sell more stuff. (I also send offers out to watchers and have noticed that when I do that I seem to get full price sales right after that. Maybe coincidence…)
I like best offer, it allows me to price closer to the top of the market while still being able to accept offers closer to the middle of the market. I always put in an auto reject number that is about 10% to 20% less than full price. I think the auto reject is very helpful since it gives the buyer immediate feedback that they need to raise their offer if they want it to be considered and it also makes it less personal, since they kind of know that it was an auto reject and they don't really get mad at you the seller for not considering their offer. However, I don't use it on stuff that's really low price already or stuff that is really rare, where I just need to wait for the right buyer to come along and pay the full value.
A couple of times....I've gotten an offer (reasonable) on a very new listing that has people viewing/watching. I decided to "sit" on it for a few hours...and suddenly, someone else bought it at full price. Don't know if it was coincidence or if it somehow triggered more visibility.
Do yall wait a while after listing before turning best offer on to see if it will sell at full price, or do you have best offer on already when you list it?
i needed the "how high can you go" answer on that "how low can you offer" question just hours earlier. got a low ball offer and should've answered just as cheeky as this fellow ebayer opened the conversation.
Finally selling that vest was a major win. I hate seeing inventory that sits. I've recently started posting daily and I think what my strategy will be after a certain time period has passed for an item, I'll enable best offers (6mo. and older) depending on the item like if it's seasonal or very niche etc.
Interesting that people can make a best offer and then not pay on eBay. As a buyer on Poshmark, you have to enter payment info/commit to the purchase in order to submit a best offer. Then if the seller accepts, the sale is automatically completed and payment is processed right then. I wonder if more sellers would use it if that were the case on eBay..
I used to be against best offer but after talking with other ebay sellers I put it on for all listings. At first I had a minimum threshold but then I took that off because apparently declining offers is bad for your store. However, whenever I got an offer that I didn't like I ALWAYS countered....even if it was just £1 under. Apparently it helps give a boost as store activity....funnily enough some of the items I countered on sold for full price to a different buyer. Also another useful thing with best offer is that it alerts me if I overpriced my items initially. I would review the market for the listing that got an offer and see if solds are actually around the offer price or closer to mine. Just like with selling on Amazon, prices fluctuate based on supply, demand and seasonality etc so it's worth reviewing the market. Anyway, interesting experiment but yea....it's not good to just accept any offer whatsoever
Awesome change-of-pace video. Maybe in your next weekly sales vid you can mention how your sales during this experiment compared to your weekly averages? Total items sold, ROI, etc.
I could be going crazy, but it happened to me again! I accepted an offer from a customer. They must not have agreed to pay immediately when sending the offer to me since this put the accepted offer into a new "pending" category. The item is not showing in any category listed on the seller dashboard (ie Sold, Awaiting Payment). So, I am guessing that someone else can buy it right under the customer who's offer I accepted. I guess this is good for me if someone else buys it at full price; however, it could be a customer issue if the first person goes to pay and it is showing sold. FCFS in play here? I couldn't even find where you send an invoice. Thanks for the great vids to help us become better sellers! Blessings, Michelle
Phenomenonal episode and experiment! Thank you for trying and sharing the results. I'm curious if, sold price aside, you think having offers on drove more traffic your way? Did it appear that the eBay algorithm treated your listings more positively with offers on?
Hello Justin, What is 1 business day when you have your shipping time set to 1 business day? Do weekends count, just Saturdays? If I get an order on Monday if I ship it on Tuesday at 11:59pm is that the next business day?
I struggle with best offers because the eBay fee is calculated off the asking price not the accepted price. So if you list something for $50 take a best offer of $35, your 13%-15%+ seller fee is still based off $50.
Hey Justin I found the concept of this video fascinating. I'm also fascinated that you've decided to massively increase your workload I changing the format of your videos so dramatically and also allowing best offers. I am taking a different Direction. My online content is very low effort but I believe maximum value and in addition I am turning off best offers on my store. I am sick to death of lowball offers and the time it takes has eBay expects me to negotiate. I know exactly how much time and effort it has taken to source research list and item and store it and I list my items at a fair price. I wish to be in control of how much I sell it for with minimum effort therefore I send Out offers with a note saying this will be my only offer. I look forward to seeing how this goes for you. Being experimental is an excellent strategy and I loved seeing you talking to the camera in your storage section as this was very very relatable. ❤
I go off time. 2 weeks 10% off gets sent out to clicks with main staying the same. 4 weeks 20% off. 5 weeks price drops by 20%. Then I drop the price by 5-10% after tgat on a weekly basis. Having flat shipping lets you do offers and still know your rough profits. You can(I have) get burnt with free shipping with offers if your not careful.
Great video. I have best offer on 90% or more of our listings. I use the minimum so I don't get a ton of notifications and set that amount to what I would be willing to accept. Then there is no back and forth. I ran the numbers and it looks like 37% of sales have been best offer. So far, only one no payment in close to 200 best offer sales.
I have best offer on for about 95% of my listings. The 5% that are strictly buy it now are priced at the lowest price I would consider as at or below market value. I counter, when appropriate and decline low ball offers. I have never had a failure to pay. If a buyer declines my counter offer, that’s okay. I only buy and list quality items that have a record of selling.
Ha! Love this experiment. Good on ya! I'm looking to do a similar go but for auctions. I'll be a bit more discretionary than putting EVERYTHING on auction, but def considering putting items I'd never consider auctioning and starting them at 99 cents and see what happens. I'll post on my channel when I do. Good stuff Justin!
Hey Justin, thanks for all you do! Question for you - I am selling stuff that I have owned for decades, and using the proceeds to buy new, collectible items that I don't intend to sell anytime in the near future. I'm using Flipwise and I have not found a great way to record procurement info for either of these cases. For the old inventory, Flipwise really, really wants me to put the price I paid and where I got it, and I don't have any of that info anymore. For the new inventory, I don't see anywhere to record that info unless I list the item. What do you do for these situations? Thanks!
Only 5 sales for me started selling last month. I received a slightly less offer on something and didn’t respond bc at work. Same person decided to buy at full price before I got home. I had the only S&P cat set used like it and it’s been listed less than 12 hours with many views . Free lesson for me there and I learned a new bolo Amy Lacombe whimsically. I only knew they were cute . Btw thanks for the shake test tip on packing orders. I wasn’t excited for my 1st and 2nd sales to be glass 😅
I have best offer on everything except low dollar items with free freight. I must be a beta tester because when I accept an offer the item goes to pending and stays visible on eBay it doesn’t go into sold until they pay which I like. Because you still can accept other offers which has happened and the item ended up selling for more
I admire your integrity because you certainly could have changed your mind and declined or countered any offer, but you didn't. I have offers turned on and always set a minimum offer amount so that I know what the least is that I'm willing to take on that item (based on my cost and my research on comps.) Since the value and demand for items can fluctuate, and my income fluctuates, I am willing to consider offers when I am more interested in making a sale and getting inventory out my door, than I am in making the top dollar---five months from now. Sometimes I'd rather make a nickel now than a dime later. Especially when I picked something up out of a free box at a yard sale.
As long as you remember to set the minimum offer limit so eBay auto rejects anything more than ~25% off, I think best offers work great. I'm usually sending discounts of 10-15% off out to buyers anyway.
I am a new reseller and use best offers on most of my items but I set a minimum of about 20% off and require immediate payment. Not sure how I set that up actually. So far it has worked well for me. Thanks for sharing this experiment!
I have best offers turned on for most things, some people want to haggle they may start super low, but i don't mind a couple of back and forth rounds for a sale. But my margin is super low so I have a lot of wiggle room. I get quite a few sales from getting and sending offers.
I have best offers turned on for my whole store. I'll set the BIN price at what makes sense based on current active listings and recent solds, and I'll put in a minimum offer price of the very lowest I'm willing to sell an item for. I'm going to estimate about 75% of my buyers just hit the buy now button.
Pretty much my whole store has offers on. Certain items I have a auto-decline set on them but most items I want to see what people are offering. It's usually pretty bad. lol. I used to do counter offers and I'd say my success rate on counter offers was about 25% so I just stopped doing it and now I just straight up decline. Sometimes they'll continue offering amounts in small increments and I'm happy to decline them all day long. BUT, I do get legit offers where I can tell that the buyer put thought into the offer and I'll accept it. Basically I have no formula for accepting or declining. I just like to see what the offers are because it's a metric of what the market is attempting to lower the price too. It's data, I guess.
I have had best offer turned on since I began selling back in 2012, I am now slowly going through and turning it off on many items because I don't put some arbitrary " least amount accepted ", yet each time I check, Ebay puts an amount in at roughly half the amount I list an item. I listened to you guys and hunt for fair resale value, calculated the best shipping etc etc and to have Ebay do that is infuriating. If I leave it blank, it should stay that way.
Hey Justin, I thought you always listed the link to join you in a video? Am I missing it or did you not put it on this video? Thx I usually have BO on most of my listing, however I will usually negotiate IF they low ball me. Also, I don't always accept them, some I flat out decline if it's way too low. I look forward to you weekly posts, BTW thx for answering 1 of my questions a few shows ago. Cheers!
At first I hated this but I’ve since deleted my comment, and I liked this video after all. The production feels a bit odd but I learned something from the experiment
Great video - I have best offers on for almost everything. I can always decline or counter and I send out offers quite often anyway. Interesting experiment!
Since I'm not rebuying I'm trying to get rid of my comic collection. As long as I can get the cover price I paid for (not counting major and some minor keys) I take most Best Offers within reason.
This was good! Interesting..I would have been wondering if someone gave a really low offer and it was accepted then they decide to go back in your store and get more great deals..haha
I look at it just like the jewelry stores in a mall. Mark up the price and then run a big sale! Lol! I comp my item and then always price a little higher than I expect to get. I work with the offers coming in by responding as quickly as possible. People love a discount / bargain or sale. And surprisingly many times people will pay full price so I do a little better than I expected!
I have done best offer since I started. I find most times people just are watchers not much action after that. I get a low ball offer that is way low I counter offer or decline all together.
Hey Justin, I’m betting you’re the type of seller that never stresses out or gets any sort of anxiety when it comes to outgoing shipments that are valued between say 500, and $1000? I just sold a fur coat for $900, the buyer paid $142 for shipping, it was supposed to be there last Saturday, never had a package go out to California that took seven days showing still in transit! Would you stress over this type of thing? Just curious… BTW, great channel, keep up the great info.🥳👍🏽
What if 90% of the items you sell are from your own personal stuff. I am selling collectables, tools, and just stuff around the house. I don't have any of those receipts or remember where I bought most of them. I am keeping receipts from the few items I purchased for the store to add on.
Very interesting experiment! I have been trying to get a certain profit margin on new listings and maybe I’m being too rigid when I receive an offer. Sometimes though, the offers are just ridiculous!
One thing I think rarely gets talked about enough (probably because many influencers are too afraid of legal liability) is the problem of fake items. It's not just high end sneakers and handbags being faked these days, there's a LOT of fakes out there on all kinds of goods and it's getting harder and harder to spot them without a lot of very specific expertise. How do we as resellers protect ourselves from counterfeit items and what do we do if we find ourselves in the situation where we end up purchasing a fake item that can't be returned despite our best efforts? Are third party authentication apps and services worth it? Can their judgements be trusted? Do you simply avoid items that tend to have a lot of fakes? What's your strategy?
I had someone send me an offer on something I was shooting high on to start, it was reasonable so I accepted it and waited, the guy didn't pay so I lowered the price to $20 over his offer and someone else snatched it. I thought when someone sends an offer it and it's accepted they are committed. Lucky for me I was able to get the extra $20
So I just watched your video, I have a pretty relevant question? Don't you think that if you accept offers on everything that you will build a customer base that saves you as a favorite seller based solely on the fact that you will accept offers on anything they want to buy?
One thing I've noticed since I started reselling is majority of buyers are other resellers. So by pricing full or close to full market value you get rid of majority of your customers. My average time to sell is about 3 days I sell at about 60-70% of market value. Items sitting on shelves aren't making money. I turn and burn and use that money to ramp up more. Like that mask, if I bought that for $1 I probably would have sold it for 100 to 150 and sold it same day. There will always be more items to flip. I see too many reseller friends sitting on items for months. I sold a backwards compatible ps3 to a reseller for 250 in 2 days of buying it for 80. He still has it listed at 400 3 months later. I used that 250 to make a lot more than 400. Food for thought. Love the vids.
@@bennystratton7734 yeah, usually its pretty obvious if you look at their store and history and stuff but yeah always be cautious!
@@bennystratton7734unfortunately shows the amount of dishonesty in todays ebay world
@@bennystratton7734 I’ve always thought this with things like houses too. Some people would rather wait ten years to get $1M rather than getting $900K in a few months
Items move faster with best offer on. We don’t always take the best offer sent but when we don’t, we counter.
I do the same. And sometimes they don't like my counter offer and don't buy. That's fine with me. Someone else will buy it eventually.
Really like the format of this video (the music in the background, the little clip inserts, and the topic itself)
it was very well-paced for an informative video! i felt the need to check that i didn't have playback set to 1.5x or something 😂 i know Justin is pretty good for that in general but this one has exceptional momentum 😎 so refreshing.
Reasons to use Best Offers in your store: 1. Give a buyer a happy feeling they won (not kidding - it is important!), 2. Attract more buyers, 3. Getting rid of old inventory, 4. And you can always say no! 😉
Great way to look at it! Someone else said they’d have never known they could just be a few $ apart so made a deal.
I noticed eBay said on one item that I only have 2 more offers available. I upped my minimum
I agree on #1 especially. Same as brick and mortar stores putting items on clearance. It may only be $1 lower, but the psychology of it is exactly what you said. I also think it lowers the risk of a return. Again, the psychology of getting a "deal".
Sometimes it's better to have stock turning over rather than sitting on it for a long time. I've made some huge profits on some of my items and some things that I bought cheaply that has sat around too long I just donate it back to the charity shops to make room for new items.
I put a best offer on about 25% of my 400 or so items. Sometimes people pay full price. Sometimes people offer reasonably well above the minimum. And some people make a series of ascending offers from a lowball price point till they hit the minimum or a little above.
I price my minimums at a price I will accept, and always make the sale when I accept a buyer's offer. Only once did I counter, on one of my early listings where I'd priced the shipping too low and someone on the opposite end of the country wanted it. They accepted and item sold; everyone happy!
One thing I learned from over 20 years running a small business (before Covid ruined it and I pivoted to Ebay): You make your profit when you BUY the item, not when you SELL it. Procurement takes experience, discipline, and sometimes hard lessons along the way, but if you procure at a good enough (predicted) markup, you can still do well even selling for a bit less than full asking price.
I'm wary of the phenomenon of "Customers getting trained that the sale price is the REAL price," but on Ebay I'm pretty satisfied with the number of people who go ahead and buy at (or near) full asking price with offers turned on.
Ebay open the last 2 days announced they are making the buyer give purchase info and they now have to agree to be charged if they send a best offer and you accept.
Good news with 4th quarter coming!❤😊😊😊
This is what Mercari does and it makes it so much easier, one less thing to worry about
There is no adventure without risk. And life is an adventure! Good on you Justin ❤👏👏👏👏👏😊 and you running while taping...HILARIOUS 😂😂😂😂
We always have best offer turned on, but we put a minimum on at 60% of list. We price to make a profit at 60%.
People will buy at a "sale" price, even if they aren't actually saving money. In fact, some stores and restaurants adverise the regular price as if it were a sale price because it's been shown to increase sales.
Best practice from a seller's POV is to price a little high, and make buyers believe they're getting a deal.
I love love love best offer! I use it on every item that isn't on sale, BUT I do have a strict rule in which I do not go lower than 20% off. I occasionally have non-paying buyers but it's pretty rare. Also, and this has been key for me, I've learned to say no and mean it. If I get a potential buyer who wants to go back and forth I just say "thank you for your interest, my previous offer is as low as I can go" and move on. Lastly, I have started blocking extreme and/or rude low ballers. I know they're going to be a pain in the ass no matter what I do, so I just add them to the list. I know it's all a bit of a game but I think buyers like feeling like they have some control/say over things.
Congrats on joining the world of hagglers, and good on you for taking the plunge!
I LOVE the block feature!!!!!!! I also check "feedback left for others" whenever I get a low LOW ball offer.
@@sammonicuslux Same here! As sellers, it's one of the few ways we can protect ourselves. Allowing offers gives us a way to prescreen potential problem buyers by seeing how they behave before we put ourselves in a vulnerable position.
Love this video, Justin. Thanks for providing content that is out of the box. Next time you choose to do this, could you give your viewers a heads up? Lol
Ok Justin, your subtle comedy you add to this video is total spice in entertainment.
Wondering if there will be an update on the broken Pamper Chef.
i'll give an update in the video tomorrow (monday)
Great video! I love the premise of the experiment. Thanks for taking the risk for our enjoyment and entertainment.
I have best offer for everything and am really surprised at how many sales are full price. I feel people just want to get the item without all the back and forth.
Same.
@@positivepsycho2932 Same to this as well. I'm constantly sending offers when I get watchers, sending good offers too, and I too usually do not get a response. When I do make a sale 95% of the time it is full asking price. So who knows!?
Agree
@@positivepsycho2932 I am the same, I really hate the back and forth and worst wait and no pay. I am sticking to me sending offers to likers and no counteroffer option. It's not like I am insisting the listed price, it's the hassle and wait I hate.
Even tho I sell on ebay, when I'm buying I never remember to even check for best offer. I find what I'm looking for, price what I'm about expecting to pay, I get it.
You should keep it on for all items. I never counter offer lowball offers I just decline them right away. If someone sends something thats close to a price I want I will counter. Also not sure if you're aware but ebay rewards engagement. SOOO many times THAT item that had the best offer engagement ends up selling within a couple hours to someone else at full price. I dont think it's a coincidence. I can't prove it but if you look around a lot of people have brought this up as well. traffic items get pushed more. engagement creates traffic.
At the beginning of the year, I turned best offer off and run a 30% off sale all the time. My 90 day total has more than doubled and I’m finally making more than I did at my full time job reselling 15 hours a week. This strategy was a game changer for me.
Do you price higher though to account for the 30% loss? (Are you just trying to convince customers they’re getting a good deal?)
@@emmagreenland-broadsmith6841 slightly, but definitely not a full 30% markup. I also don’t mark down items that I have just listed that month, to give them a chance to sell at full price. I run my sale 30 days at a time then reevaluate which newer items I’ll mark down after that month :)
The number of people I've had buying at the buy it now price after making an offer and me responding by letting the offer expire or declining it is crazy.
This, but usually only on unique items for me.
I have best offers on, and most people still pay full price, I negotiate with lowball offers and usually go 10-20 percent less if the item is old.
This was so fun to watch - love that you’re experimenting with new content for your channel and reminding us to try new things in our business. Thank you!
New format... pretty cool! I love experiments lol!
I do best offer on 21k items in my store but definitely don't do free shipping. So I generally accept any offer as long as it's not ridiculous. That's just me.
Not just you. I don't do free shipping either.
I use best offers on almost all items. I've been very happy with the results but I source items with a high profit margin. I've found that buyers are happier with the items when they feel like they get a good deal on them. It's a nice side effect to have fewer returns and more positive feedback.
If you use best offer you can also set the auto accept at the lowest you'll take for it, but that is at the time of listing. That way if it comes in lower you can bid them back up a bit, but you have to justify why it is worth more than their offer. Sometimes their offer is not to far off that if its still has a decent profit, its not worth the effort to counter. But they'll message an offer even though it's buy it now asking for an offer as discussed. It all depends on the eBay market, if there's a lot of sales not interested in taking offers, but if the weekly sales are slow that is the time to move your inventory. Keeping the revenue stream moving.
I hear someone say if you accept an offer you are getting your original investment money back so you can buy something better to sell. The goal is to become better at sourcing. The better you source the more profitable you will become. I used to buy anything that I think would sell. Now I only buy things with a mid to high sell through rate.
What an interesting experiment. I think the only times you lost out was items that had free shipping.
I personally have best offers on for everything. The negotiation part really doesn’t take much time.
Yes it’s interesting how few people make an offer. Also, remember that now eBay keeps your item for sale until a successful offerer PAYS. 👍🏼 Also, for the few items I don’t have listed as Best Offer, people still message with (usually lowball) offers that can be annoying anyway. I turn in minimum offer and usually make it a little less than I’m willing to take. If somebody gets that low I’ll make a reasonable counteroffer which is often accepted. It’s kind of fun. I don’t have the guts to bargain in person but this way for the people who get a kick out of the back and forth, they get to do that, and I get money. 💰 in hand means I can buy and sell more stuff.
(I also send offers out to watchers and have noticed that when I do that I seem to get full price sales right after that. Maybe coincidence…)
I always have best offer on.. but I do set minimums, I don’t have time to address low ballers. Without minimums, the offers are straight up insulting.
Is the experiment going for another week so I can go to your store 🙈 😂
😂😂😂
Bahahaha! I was thinking the same thing! LOL!
🤝agreed 😂😂😂
😂😂😂
I like best offer, it allows me to price closer to the top of the market while still being able to accept offers closer to the middle of the market. I always put in an auto reject number that is about 10% to 20% less than full price. I think the auto reject is very helpful since it gives the buyer immediate feedback that they need to raise their offer if they want it to be considered and it also makes it less personal, since they kind of know that it was an auto reject and they don't really get mad at you the seller for not considering their offer. However, I don't use it on stuff that's really low price already or stuff that is really rare, where I just need to wait for the right buyer to come along and pay the full value.
This was so much fun to watch! What an interesting experiment.
A couple of times....I've gotten an offer (reasonable) on a very new listing that has people viewing/watching. I decided to "sit" on it for a few hours...and suddenly, someone else bought it at full price. Don't know if it was coincidence or if it somehow triggered more visibility.
This was a great video Justin! The content was great, and in addition, I really like the pace and style of it! 😎
Do yall wait a while after listing before turning best offer on to see if it will sell at full price, or do you have best offer on already when you list it?
i needed the "how high can you go" answer on that "how low can you offer" question just hours earlier. got a low ball offer and should've answered just as cheeky as this fellow ebayer opened the conversation.
Finally selling that vest was a major win. I hate seeing inventory that sits. I've recently started posting daily and I think what my strategy will be after a certain time period has passed for an item, I'll enable best offers (6mo. and older) depending on the item like if it's seasonal or very niche etc.
Interesting that people can make a best offer and then not pay on eBay. As a buyer on Poshmark, you have to enter payment info/commit to the purchase in order to submit a best offer. Then if the seller accepts, the sale is automatically completed and payment is processed right then. I wonder if more sellers would use it if that were the case on eBay..
I used to be against best offer but after talking with other ebay sellers I put it on for all listings.
At first I had a minimum threshold but then I took that off because apparently declining offers is bad for your store. However, whenever I got an offer that I didn't like I ALWAYS countered....even if it was just £1 under. Apparently it helps give a boost as store activity....funnily enough some of the items I countered on sold for full price to a different buyer.
Also another useful thing with best offer is that it alerts me if I overpriced my items initially. I would review the market for the listing that got an offer and see if solds are actually around the offer price or closer to mine. Just like with selling on Amazon, prices fluctuate based on supply, demand and seasonality etc so it's worth reviewing the market.
Anyway, interesting experiment but yea....it's not good to just accept any offer whatsoever
Love this video! Really made me think about my own store. Thank you!
Awesome change-of-pace video. Maybe in your next weekly sales vid you can mention how your sales during this experiment compared to your weekly averages? Total items sold, ROI, etc.
is there a way to consolidate a bunch of listings within ebay if you want to make non-selling items a lot?
I could be going crazy, but it happened to me again! I accepted an offer from a customer. They must not have agreed to pay immediately when sending the offer to me since this put the accepted offer into a new "pending" category. The item is not showing in any category listed on the seller dashboard (ie Sold, Awaiting Payment). So, I am guessing that someone else can buy it right under the customer who's offer I accepted. I guess this is good for me if someone else buys it at full price; however, it could be a customer issue if the first person goes to pay and it is showing sold. FCFS in play here? I couldn't even find where you send an invoice. Thanks for the great vids to help us become better sellers! Blessings, Michelle
Phenomenonal episode and experiment! Thank you for trying and sharing the results. I'm curious if, sold price aside, you think having offers on drove more traffic your way? Did it appear that the eBay algorithm treated your listings more positively with offers on?
Hello Justin, What is 1 business day when you have your shipping time set to 1 business day? Do weekends count, just Saturdays? If I get an order on Monday if I ship it on Tuesday at 11:59pm is that the next business day?
I struggle with best offers because the eBay fee is calculated off the asking price not the accepted price. So if you list something for $50 take a best offer of $35, your 13%-15%+ seller fee is still based off $50.
That is not true. Your FVF is calculated on the final sale price.
Hey Justin I found the concept of this video fascinating. I'm also fascinated that you've decided to massively increase your workload I changing the format of your videos so dramatically and also allowing best offers. I am taking a different Direction. My online content is very low effort but I believe maximum value and in addition I am turning off best offers on my store. I am sick to death of lowball offers and the time it takes has eBay expects me to negotiate. I know exactly how much time and effort it has taken to source research list and item and store it and I list my items at a fair price. I wish to be in control of how much I sell it for with minimum effort therefore I send Out offers with a note saying this will be my only offer. I look forward to seeing how this goes for you. Being experimental is an excellent strategy and I loved seeing you talking to the camera in your storage section as this was very very relatable. ❤
Really interesting experiment- thanks! Good way to do a big store clear out if you’re buying cheap enough.
I go off time. 2 weeks 10% off gets sent out to clicks with main staying the same. 4 weeks 20% off. 5 weeks price drops by 20%. Then I drop the price by 5-10% after tgat on a weekly basis. Having flat shipping lets you do offers and still know your rough profits. You can(I have) get burnt with free shipping with offers if your not careful.
Great video. I have best offer on 90% or more of our listings. I use the minimum so I don't get a ton of notifications and set that amount to what I would be willing to accept. Then there is no back and forth. I ran the numbers and it looks like 37% of sales have been best offer. So far, only one no payment in close to 200 best offer sales.
I have best offer on for about 95% of my listings. The 5% that are strictly buy it now are priced at the lowest price I would consider as at or below market value. I counter, when appropriate and decline low ball offers. I have never had a failure to pay. If a buyer declines my counter offer, that’s okay. I only buy and list quality items that have a record of selling.
Hi. What do write to buyers as feedback (if any) after I sell an item of clothing?
I put best offers on all my listings but I Price it to accept offers and put in my SKU what the minimum I'm willing to take.
Ha! Love this experiment. Good on ya! I'm looking to do a similar go but for auctions. I'll be a bit more discretionary than putting EVERYTHING on auction, but def considering putting items I'd never consider auctioning and starting them at 99 cents and see what happens. I'll post on my channel when I do. Good stuff Justin!
Hey Justin, thanks for all you do! Question for you - I am selling stuff that I have owned for decades, and using the proceeds to buy new, collectible items that I don't intend to sell anytime in the near future. I'm using Flipwise and I have not found a great way to record procurement info for either of these cases. For the old inventory, Flipwise really, really wants me to put the price I paid and where I got it, and I don't have any of that info anymore. For the new inventory, I don't see anywhere to record that info unless I list the item. What do you do for these situations?
Thanks!
Only 5 sales for me started selling last month. I received a slightly less offer on something and didn’t respond bc at work.
Same person decided to buy at full price before I got home.
I had the only S&P cat set used like it and it’s been listed less than 12 hours with many views .
Free lesson for me there and I learned a new bolo Amy Lacombe whimsically. I only knew they were cute .
Btw thanks for the shake test tip on packing orders. I wasn’t excited for my 1st and 2nd sales to be glass 😅
Go watch Avante Ave for great packing tips. She is great
I have best offer on everything except low dollar items with free freight. I must be a beta tester because when I accept an offer the item goes to pending and stays visible on eBay it doesn’t go into sold until they pay which I like. Because you still can accept other offers which has happened and the item ended up selling for more
Your record keeping is stellar
I admire your integrity because you certainly could have changed your mind and declined or countered any offer, but you didn't. I have offers turned on and always set a minimum offer amount so that I know what the least is that I'm willing to take on that item (based on my cost and my research on comps.) Since the value and demand for items can fluctuate, and my income fluctuates, I am willing to consider offers when I am more interested in making a sale and getting inventory out my door, than I am in making the top dollar---five months from now.
Sometimes I'd rather make a nickel now than a dime later. Especially when I picked something up out of a free box at a yard sale.
As long as you remember to set the minimum offer limit so eBay auto rejects anything more than ~25% off, I think best offers work great. I'm usually sending discounts of 10-15% off out to buyers anyway.
I am a new reseller and use best offers on most of my items but I set a minimum of about 20% off and require immediate payment. Not sure how I set that up actually. So far it has worked well for me. Thanks for sharing this experiment!
I live here in Europe, any chance that you will have a version for us and the platforms we use here? thank you for the great content
I have best offers turned on for most things, some people want to haggle they may start super low, but i don't mind a couple of back and forth rounds for a sale. But my margin is super low so I have a lot of wiggle room. I get quite a few sales from getting and sending offers.
That was pretty bold! Thanks for doing the experiment.
Great video, thank you for trying out this experiment. Very educational.
I just discovered your channel, and subscribe, I am learning a lot and enjoying ..thank you...😊
We also have to factor opportunity cost. The longer an item sits the less of an annualized return we make.
I have best offers turned on for my whole store. I'll set the BIN price at what makes sense based on current active listings and recent solds, and I'll put in a minimum offer price of the very lowest I'm willing to sell an item for. I'm going to estimate about 75% of my buyers just hit the buy now button.
Be nice if you could have best offers automatically after the item has been up for 3-5 months
Great content as always Sir!
We also have to factor opportunity cost. The longer an item sits the less of an annualized return we make.
You didn’t counter any of these offers?
Pretty much my whole store has offers on. Certain items I have a auto-decline set on them but most items I want to see what people are offering. It's usually pretty bad. lol. I used to do counter offers and I'd say my success rate on counter offers was about 25% so I just stopped doing it and now I just straight up decline. Sometimes they'll continue offering amounts in small increments and I'm happy to decline them all day long.
BUT, I do get legit offers where I can tell that the buyer put thought into the offer and I'll accept it.
Basically I have no formula for accepting or declining. I just like to see what the offers are because it's a metric of what the market is attempting to lower the price too. It's data, I guess.
I have had best offer turned on since I began selling back in 2012, I am now slowly going through and turning it off on many items because I don't put some arbitrary " least amount accepted ", yet each time I check, Ebay puts an amount in at roughly half the amount I list an item. I listened to you guys and hunt for fair resale value, calculated the best shipping etc etc and to have Ebay do that is infuriating. If I leave it blank, it should stay that way.
Hey Justin, I thought you always listed the link to join you in a video? Am I missing it or did you not put it on this video? Thx I usually have BO on most of my listing, however I will usually negotiate IF they low ball me. Also, I don't always accept them, some I flat out decline if it's way too low. I look forward to you weekly posts, BTW thx for answering 1 of my questions a few shows ago. Cheers!
Love these bonus videos! 🙏🏼😄
Good experiment. Best offer is awesome & I consider essential as a full time ebayer. 😊
At first I hated this but I’ve since deleted my comment, and I liked this video after all. The production feels a bit odd but I learned something from the experiment
Great stuff! I also sold some Halloween Nikes recently too!
Great video - I have best offers on for almost everything. I can always decline or counter and I send out offers quite often anyway. Interesting experiment!
Thanks for experimenting. Really useful info!
Entertaining perspective on best offer utilization. 🖖
Since I'm not rebuying I'm trying to get rid of my comic collection. As long as I can get the cover price I paid for (not counting major and some minor keys) I take most Best Offers within reason.
I love the style of this vid!!!
This was good! Interesting..I would have been wondering if someone gave a really low offer and it was accepted then they decide to go back in your store and get more great deals..haha
I look at it just like the jewelry stores in a mall. Mark up the price and then run a big sale! Lol! I comp my item and then always price a little higher than I expect to get. I work with the offers coming in by responding as quickly as possible. People love a discount / bargain or sale. And surprisingly many times people will pay full price so I do a little better than I expected!
I have done best offer since I started. I find most times people just are watchers not much action after that. I get a low ball offer that is way low I counter offer or decline all together.
Experiment videos are so informative.
Hey Justin, I’m betting you’re the type of seller that never stresses out or gets any sort of anxiety when it comes to outgoing shipments that are valued between say 500, and $1000? I just sold a fur coat for $900, the buyer paid $142 for shipping, it was supposed to be there last Saturday, never had a package go out to California that took seven days showing still in transit! Would you stress over this type of thing? Just curious… BTW, great channel, keep up the great info.🥳👍🏽
What if 90% of the items you sell are from your own personal stuff. I am selling collectables, tools, and just stuff around the house. I don't have any of those receipts or remember where I bought most of them. I am keeping receipts from the few items I purchased for the store to add on.
I turn on best offers on items that has defects, the like new ones or new sealed no
Very interesting experiment! I have been trying to get a certain profit margin on new listings and maybe I’m being too rigid when I receive an offer. Sometimes though, the offers are just ridiculous!
I don't think there's a standard in how strict it just depends on your situation and how soon you want to get paid
@@Sammzor I was referring to profit per item goals that I set for myself.
That was a fun video. Go Justin!!! 🏃♂️
How much is flip wise monthly?
flipwise.app/pricing
One thing I think rarely gets talked about enough (probably because many influencers are too afraid of legal liability) is the problem of fake items. It's not just high end sneakers and handbags being faked these days, there's a LOT of fakes out there on all kinds of goods and it's getting harder and harder to spot them without a lot of very specific expertise.
How do we as resellers protect ourselves from counterfeit items and what do we do if we find ourselves in the situation where we end up purchasing a fake item that can't be returned despite our best efforts? Are third party authentication apps and services worth it? Can their judgements be trusted? Do you simply avoid items that tend to have a lot of fakes?
What's your strategy?
Awesome idea and video edits! The only bad part is you ruined the sold COMPS for us doing research! 😅
You did beyond good.
I had someone send me an offer on something I was shooting high on to start, it was reasonable so I accepted it and waited, the guy didn't pay so I lowered the price to $20 over his offer and someone else snatched it. I thought when someone sends an offer it and it's accepted they are committed. Lucky for me I was able to get the extra $20
Lol at the segway at the end. This means big brother is coming for every dollar. Remember the government can spend your money better than you can.
I have best offers on turned on. I get great offers everyday.
Thanks for doing this experiment and sharing.
Thanks for the video. Great experiment! I have some flipwise questions but I don’t have the discord yet. What is the best way for me to ask questions?
support@flipwise.app
So I just watched your video, I have a pretty relevant question? Don't you think that if you accept offers on everything that you will build a customer base that saves you as a favorite seller based solely on the fact that you will accept offers on anything they want to buy?
not really. this was for 17 items only
I'd say about half of my sales come from offers so I think you are losing out on much more money if you don't have best offers on 👌