posted on January 10, 2003 06:57:03 AM new
I don't know if AW will let this post stay on the board but they should, because in the final analysis, I found that AW is worth the extra $25/mo and FVF I pay for the Variable Power Sales Manager Program....
Enticed by a posting here, I decided to give Spare Dollar a try...it offers services comparable to AW for one flat $ 4.95 fee...it sounded too good be true but it was true..no strings attached.
However, there were a few "glitches" that ended up taking up too much of my time and energy and made the AW Service win my vote:
1)Limited Image Hosting Capacity - I like to scan my images at 150% and leave images on at least until the relist period of 30 days is over so I don't have to do anything to relist but adjust the price and launch. I try to consistently run between 200-300 auctions at a time so it doesnt take a rocket scientist to figure that in a 45 day period I would use up my allotted 50MB image storage. SD suggested I use Acrobat picure editor to compress my images but I dont want to do any more messing around with them than the initial scan.
2)While the templates are saved there is no way to save basic auction information so I ended up doing lots of copying and pasting for each auction. (I guess I could design my own templates and save them but I am not a web designer and again, I dont want to mess around with it.)
3)One of the most irritating things was that a simple thing like saving the Payment Options and s/h information was not provided so to get "payPal" in payment options one had to revise each auction or just let the "other" designation ride!
4)The Post Sale program was not nearly as nice or as sophisticated as AW...didn't let you save feedback comments for one thing...again copying and pasting takes times!
5)Post Sale program did not include "unsold" items for relisting purposes
6)The counters were wonderful in SD - charts and even the IP of the "hits" were listed..this is one improvement AW could make...but the counters had to be updated manually..deleting auctions that had ended takes time! ditto to the gallery ..and the post sale management had to be updated manually as well...
7)On the plus side for SD...counters far exceeded the ones provided by AW, member support was amazing...Tomas at SD was wonderful and if he truly is one guy doing all the work it's no wonder that SD is a little behind AW in technology..once those time consuming "glitches" are worked out (and revisions are in the works) SD might truly give AW a run for their money..but for now...
....my time is worth something and if I consider that I could use that time to list more items the extra AW fees are well worth it! AW wins hands down!
posted on January 10, 2003 07:06:32 AM new
You do realize that SD is only approx 1 year old??
They also subscribe to eBay's API & I have never had an auction launch less than in 5 sec's -- no "processing,processing"
For $4.95/month, it is very impressive! Is it perfect yet? No, of course not! But the site is constantly improving every month
FYI: if your images are > than approx. 40kb, you are losing dial-up viewers, as it takes forever to load big pics, plus it makes NO SENSE to do so! A 200kb pic don't look a whole lot better than the same pic crunched to 40kb, when viewed on the web! Printing pics is a different story, but irrelvant to auction posting!
I try to keep my pics < 400X400pixels + < 40kb.
If you want a good + FREE & easy proggie to do this, visit...
posted on January 10, 2003 07:13:02 AM new
I sell postcards and while in many venues the image is not as important as the description, in post card sales it is everything. The view buyers see with the auction on AW is compressed and does not take as long to upload as the SD (even the SD thumbnails)..they can then elect to view the clickable version.
I do realize that SD is less than a year old and I am amazed and how much they offer for such a low fee..it just isn't right for me right now...I can't take the time to accomodate the extra work during this "hottest" of auctions seasons..I found I was launching fewer auctions and staying up all hours to do so..
posted on January 10, 2003 07:20:48 AM new
Whether ye be selling post-cards or diamonds, if ye donna CRUNCH, yer gonna lose viewers!
I'm on very fast cable & when I view monster pics, I just BACK OUT!
Most folks are on DIAL-UP and will remain so, as AO-SMELL has resisted broadband as their stock sinks!
A PROPERLY CRUNCHED pic looks essentially just as good ON THE WEB as a MONSTER PIC! I crunch as a courtesy to the MAJORITY of viewers who are on dial-up!
If you believe in monster pics, you should view 200kb & 400kb pics on a friend's PC with dial-up -- it's not a pretty sight
posted on January 10, 2003 07:32:24 AM new
I agree but I have elected to show condensed versions on my AW auctions items..you are welcome to view two of my auctions for comparison:
AW auction: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=20214&item=2153611525&rd=1
and a SD auction: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=20204&item=2153346173&rd=1
Sorry I don't know how to make clickable links...and image hosting was not the whole issue..I realize I can get around that..it's the TIME accomodating the copying and pasting and updating that is the problem..TIME is money
posted on January 10, 2003 08:39:01 AM new
I'm with Tom on this one. It doesn't matter if you are selling the Mona Lisa, if it takes more than a few seconds for a dial-up user to download the image, you ARE ging to lose potential bidders.
And he's also right about properly comressed jpgs being indistinguishable from much larger size images.
posted on January 10, 2003 09:31:07 AM new
tomwiii is absolutely correct on the ease to use this program...one of the best bits of advice I ever got here.
it only takes a second to resize the picture and it loads so quickly!!
posted on January 10, 2003 09:37:32 AM new
I have been using AW for the past 3 yrs. & wouldn't think of changing. I have 3 formats that I use as the basis for my auctions. I keep one of each stored in pending auctions. When I get ready to list, I just copy one of them & put in the description & picture. The boiler plate message is already there. As to pictures, I try to keep under 60KB. From my own experience on dial-up, anything over 10 seconds is too long.
posted on January 10, 2003 10:10:16 AM new
I do use the post sale management system faithfully (but skip the rigamarole in the silly WBN process) - i combine notification of payment received with shipping notification but go down and check the boxes to update that payment has been received, item shipped, and then i send out the shipment notification which autmatically updates that box...i leave feedback at the same time. What I get is an accurate record of items awaiting payment (AW is very good in keeping track of dates for sending payment reminders (again you have to manually update that one has been sent) and filing for FVF...so basically all you have to do is go to "post Sale" and do a search by last 4 digits of your item #..then click on the update boxes and go down the line checking box 3 - pyment received,,box 5,,,item shipped,,generate the shipment notification (box 6) and one click on "submit feedback" (box 7) or you can scamble them up to leave a variety of feedbacks (i usually don't bother) and you are done..I love it!
[ edited by neglus on Jan 10, 2003 10:11 AM ]
[ edited by neglus on Jan 10, 2003 10:17 AM ]
posted on January 10, 2003 10:14:05 AM new
I agree that buyers would be put off by huge images when looking at an item...but the AW image is small in the intitial description but large enough to give viewers the general idea..they click on the image to see a larger version only if they want to...I will check out that image editing site however..sounds good..thanks!
posted on January 12, 2003 10:54:59 AM new
No question about it now..SD is down and ON A SUNDAY!!!! It could cost me WAY more than $25!
[ edited by neglus on Jan 12, 2003 10:55 AM ]
posted on January 12, 2003 01:30:37 PM new
I originally found AW almost by accident; I was previously using an MS Access database to track my auctions, but it was making me crazy. Did some Yahoo searches and found my way here.
I only once went looking at AW's competitors. They are nearly entirely unsuitable. Most have a monthly fee, regardless of volume; I go through months where I launch a couple hundred auctions and then months where I do nothing. I'd rather pay per auction, as I do here. Also, most have database capabilities that are inferior. I LOVE the checklist system here, and for the most part I use it. (I even keep track of the return feedbacks, just for fun.)
