HOW ONLINE AUCTIONS ARE CHANGING HOW WE BUY THINGS IN THE UNITED STATES
We often shop online, just go through products lists on e-commerce websites, view and purchase them in an instant. You can find almost anything online today. People sell everything from electronics to foodstuff, old things, new ones, things you want to get rid of, and almost anything else. You may have even bought at an online auction without knowing it. You do not even have to go to the store as the companies deliver your purchased product to you.
With a growing number of e-commerce stores, the list of products grows every day. Some of the most well-known stores include E-bay, Yahoo, uBid, Listia, AuctionZip, and bidtopia. These have auctions for different products. What we might not know is how much influence the websites have on the decisions we make on the purchasing.
Why Are They So Popular?
First, online auctions have eased the work of the American buyer. All you need is a computer and access to the internet, and you can be able to get anything with a click of a button. It is a one-stop shop where you will get furniture, cosmetics, car spare parts, clothes, utensils, and anything else you might think of. Most people thus do not need to go to the store anymore for your purchasing needs. Some people prefer to bid for the products they are interested in, as opposed to paying for it immediately at a full retail price.
Bidding Trends
In online auctions, the bidding is usually concentrated at the last minutes of the given deadline (the end of the sale). The bidders place their bids, some waiting for others to start and try to find the right moment for them to set their bids when they are most likely to get the product. Others put in max bids and online bots execute bids as other bids come into the auction. Hundreds of bids can happen in the last few moments of a sale.
Marketing Effects
Advertising plays an important role as well in making purchases at online auctions. Marketing for online products is different from that done for physical stores. E-commerce stores have tapped into the opportunity that comes with online marketing to sway the masses to opt for their product over all other similar products on offer. Pushing the ability to get a “deal” is a natural sway point for many buyers.
Availability
Auctions also mean that there is a 24-hour market for potential clients. You may be watching something on YouTube, and a popup advertisement lures you to the site it links to, having you buy a product with no previous plans made. The e-commerce stores make use of this possibility by having such marketing campaigns to get to the people, and convince them they need something they may not have previously planned for. The intensely competitive prices then bring one to bidding for the specific product, and possibly more than one.
Online auctioning has indeed brought many changes to the world today, from eliminating geographical and timing constraints to making work relatively more manageable for the client. It is a great way to sell products to any interested person. All one would need is to do some research on the marketing strategies that would work and get the supplier and the buyer of products.