Looking for some ebay research info.

[cyberdan]

Is there a location on feeBay or an independent website where someone can see which auctions get the most bids. Does not need to be the highest sales price. My theory is if an item gets a lot of bids then there is demand for that item. It does not need to be a high priced item to be in demand. I may adjust my buying to look more for items in demand.

 

[GibH]

Ebay refers you to Terapeak. It's a pay deal, but they do have a 7 day free trial.
Make money on eBay | Research Tools & Market Data directly from eBay | Terapeak| Item Pricing, Online Sales Reports | eBay Research Tools & Market Data

 

[GibH]

I suspect Terapeak is probably owned by Ebay, another way for them to squeeze more money out of you.

 

[Iron Patch]

That could be true, but more for a reason you didn't say directly.... which is those items get more bids because the sellers start them low, and they start them low because they have the confidence they'll get fair market value. I can say that is the case for coins, but not sure what else.

 

[northwoods]

eBay used to have a site called eBay Pulse that showed the most popular items in each category, but not sure if it is still active. I do less and less on eBay and more on Amazon. I hate Paypal and making listings is too time consuming. When I do research, I usually just search eBay Completed listings. I think it's more important to know the amount of items that ended with a bid in a certain price range than the amount of bids each individual item gets.

 

[Iron Patch]

eBay used to have a site called eBay Pulse that showed the most popular items in each category, but not sure if it is still active. I do less and less on eBay and more on Amazon. I hate Paypal and making listings is too time consuming. When I do research, I usually just search eBay Completed listings. I think it's more important to know the amount of items that ended with a bid in a certain price range than the amount of bids each individual item gets.

Everything is way too random to ever make strategical choices based on bids, price, views, or anything else. Plus if say Roman statues are a hot item it's not like knowing that is going to help me in any way if it wasn't something I had ever sold before. Being creative and thinking out side the box can definitely help one get ahead, but I think you use those tools for what you know, and not let numbers direct you into something you have no idea about. As I said coins very consistently get bids, but even now that I just said this it's not really much help to anyone because there's WAY more to it.

 

[vpnavy]

I agree with ya northwoods (I do less and less on eBay and more on Amazon). Over the past few years it seems like shipping delivery now takes twice as long as before on EBay. I have found that Amazon ships a bunch faster and will go with them if both have the same item wanted. As far as PayPal - I love PayPal!

 

[djarvis9]

Not sure of type of items you are selling but try collectors weekly. They give a lot of info (on ebay) including number of bids and number of watchers on a variety of items. They show this on ongoing, most watched and completed.
There is no charge.

 

[randazzo1]

I actually do this now. I agree that bidding activity is a good measure. I usually go the antiques and then to each period and sort by auctions only and then number of bids most first. When I first started buying things for resale - I learned about all sorts of things this way like danish wood toys, jadeite, dorothy thorpe items, franciscan china, and dozens of others. These are things that most antique dealers seem to know well, but for someone like me, from a completely different world, it was and continues to be extremely helpful. I also perform the same search in "Vintage Retro". Never knew about fake xmas trees or pyrex bowls or dansk peppermills or vietnam zippos before doing that. You should try it.

 

[spankster13]

Dan , I don't know of any site myself. I sell items on ebay and always checkout the bidders of my items as to what they have purchased in the past. It has helped while at yard sales as to items I would usually pass up . I also take my 14 yr old son to help on videos games and hot clothing. High school kids are always upgrading and starting the new trends. Its a niche market but helps with sales.