Shill bidding on a private auction site.

[Kuffy]

I'm using an auction script to list domain names for sale, and I'm trying to replicate the usual negotiating practices that go on before a price is agreed. The site is not open for general sales submissions, but of course it will be open for buyers. I think I'll be lucky to get more than a dozen visitors a month, so the usual auction practice is not viable as there will be no competition for names. I'm thinking of creating a user called "House bids" to increase the offer price until it reaches a level at which I'm prepared to sell. If I explain this in the signup page, would you guys be comfortable with this approach? Buy it now is another option, but it does not allow much room for negotiation.

 

[loredan]

No offence but that's just silly and might put off a lot of potential bidders/buyers.

Why on earth would you create your own "super user" to shill bid on your own auction site? Just start each auction at the price you're happy to sell (or close to) and stay clean of shady practices.

Would you bid your own money on a site that says "Dear user, we have an account called "HouseBids" which will outbid you up to the price we're prepared to sell. Please disregard the starting prices. Lots of love, your fair auction house!"

 

[Pierre Barnard]

No @Kuffy, I wouldnt go that route. When people realises/knows there is a bot-bidder you are making lots of problems for yourself as people will keep questioning auction outcomes and could easily blame everything on you or you bot or your process. It will be a mess.

 

[deez007]

Yeah I agree with @loredan & @Pierre Barnard - you would be creating problems for yourself.

 

[Kuffy]

I take your points, and I can see the problem in perception. Logically, I can't see the difference between a house bid in an email negotiation. The ideal would be a buy-it-now price with the possibility of offers, but this script doesn't seem to support that.

I guess I need to see if I can add that to the routine.

Thanks for the replies.

 

[anantj]

You should look at a reserve price route as well. That is a known and accepted model and fully suitable for an auction style sale

 

[Kuffy]

I think that is probably the best short term solution.

I think my problem is that I'm trying to use auction software to create a sales listing site. Most of my names I look on as investments, but would sell if I received the right offer. Putting them into an auction with only one or two bidders would be a disaster. The other problem is that the maximum length of an auction is one month, and I wanted at least one year.

I'm really grateful for the feedback, and it looks as if I've got some work to do over the next few days.

 

[Pierre Barnard]

Good luck @Kuffy, please keep us updated, would be interested to see your site in action soon...

 

[Kuffy]

OK - I've worked out how to create auctions with a one year duration. This means that I could enter flips as a standard type of auction, and put names that I'm using to test the market up for a one year auction. People won't want to wait that long, but they can always make an offer to close the auction early.

Also it looks as if pictures make a difference to the viewing figures, so I might add more images for each auction.

I'm starting to get spam as well. It's in the Google analytics as well as the normal places. I need to work out how to filter that. The other thing I need to work out is how to split buyers and sellers. I don't want to create a general auction site, but just list my own names.