My Thoughts/Observations After Conducting my Own Online Auction

[REO]

I too had wondered why people are not using that auction. I never thought about it being it's name. Tons of people don't know it's named after Mona's farm Last Chance Miniatures and may "assume" the auction is a last chance thing. I know Lois kept the name in Mona's honor.

Lois, maybe you can put something at the top? This Last Chance auction is named for Last Chance Miniature Horse Farm, in honor of Mona Stone.

??? Would that help? Just an idea.

The auction is awesome and I hate that more people don't take advantage of it!

 

[StarRidgeAcres]

Personally, I have a problem with the name but also my perception of the lack of traffic. I don't see it advertised anywhere else but here (maybe it is and I've just not seen it), but my personal website gets TONS of traffic and I think more people know about my site from other advertising and cross posting of links that I do with other farms then the LC Auction. Again, maybe it's all perception and maybe we can all help to change that. I considered, briefly, using the LC site, but decided against it due to the traffic issue and name.

 

[Songcatcher]

I thought about something while walking out to the barn -- we HAVE a great on-line auction site that doesn't seem to get used much. In fact there wasn't any horses on it at all the last time I looked. Why? I'm talking about the LC Auction. It's all set up, it's all ready to go, why aren't more people using it?

Well, since someone else brought it up, the last time I used the LB Auction, I was VERY disappointed. I had a buyer post a question to the seller asking for more specific pictures. I replied that I would be happy to send her more pictures through email, but I didn't have her address. I gave my email address so she could email me directly for pictures. My reply was up for about a day, then removed, along with the question.

In my opinion, this gives the impression that there is something wrong, when a question and answer are removed. Interest in an item generates more interest and when the question is removed, it removes interest. I espressed my dissatisfaction to LB LC Auction and the reply was simply, "Sorry you are dissatisfied."

I now feel it is pretty much a waste of time to list anything there. JUST MY OPINION. Everybody has one. BTW, I never received an email from the interested buyer.

 

[Becky]

Well, since someone else brought it up, the last time I used the LB Auction, I was VERY disappointed. I had a buyer post a question to the seller asking for more specific pictures. I replied that I would be happy to send her more pictures through email, but I didn't have her address. I gave my email address so she could email me directly for pictures. My reply was up for about a day, then removed, along with the question.
In my opinion, this gives the impression that there is something wrong, when a question and answer are removed. Interest in an item generates more interest and when the question is removed, it removes interest. I espressed my dissatisfaction to LB LC Auction and the reply was simply, "Sorry you are dissatisfied."

I now feel it is pretty much a waste of time to list anything there. JUST MY OPINION. Everybody has one. BTW, I never received an email from the interested buyer.

I agree with that. This particular auction is limiting contact between buyer and seller which generally doesn't result in a sale if the two parties involved can't communicate with each other.

 

[Charley]

What great suggestions. I will look into what it takes to change the domain name and get everything moved and then make a decision on it. I would love to improve the traffic to the site also. I think I am going to have to get some expert advice there but I will work on it.

I have had to make some hard decisions about the contact information. It was about the same time that Mary Lou had to have everyone take the sale info out of everyone’s signature. It is not fair to our paid advertisers or the auction. And while it would be nice for the sellers of horses to have the info readily available, I do have to take into account that I also have vendors on our site. So the contact information was prohibited from the listings and put into our Listing Policy. I suggested that people use our About "Me" page to have that information available and the information about this was also added to our About "Me" Guidelines.

The questions do not get deleted but they are removed, only if there is contact info, from public display on the listing. The answer is still there for the asker of the question to read just not displayed on the listing. And I do try to keep up with it but sometimes it takes me a day to see it and remove it. The question and answer is still in the system. That part is manual but the emails about the questions and answers are automated. When a question is asked the site software sends out the required messages. The seller gets an email with a link to the question. They answer it, and the site software sends the buyer an email with a link to the answer.

I do allow 6 photos to be posted on each listing. Would it help if I raised the number? How about 10 or 12?

I do apologize for my failure to communicate this better.

 

[StarRidgeAcres]

I have had to make some hard decisions about the contact information. It was about the same time that Mary Lou had to have everyone take the sale info out of everyone’s signature. It is not fair to our paid advertisers or the auction. And while it would be nice for the sellers of horses to have the info readily available, I do have to take into account that I also have vendors on our site. So the contact information was prohibited from the listings and put into our Listing Policy. I suggested that people use our About "Me" page to have that information available and the information about this was also added to our listing policy.

Thanks for responding! I sure don't think anyone has been offended, just puzzled in some cases. I would like to suggest that you consider looking at those that place items on auction as "vendors" in that they are paying you a fee to advertise something for sale. If you want more of them to use your site to advertise their wares, you should give strong consideration to what they are saying about the contact info/process.

I do think a new name may help a great deal. And as a short-term solution, getting new domain and then just re-directing to the existing one (using a mask) may be an easy way to make the transition.

Best of luck to you. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could have an auction site as busy as the traditional saleboard site????!!!!!