Over the years, eBay has introduced all sorts of different auction types, in an effort to give all the people more options when they buy and sell their things on eBay.

For every seller who doesnt like the idea that their merchandise might sell for a far lower price than they intend, theres another who wants to shift hundreds of the identical merchandise quickly. eBay tries to cater to all tastes. This e-mail gives you an overview of the different kinds of auctions and their advantages for you.

Normal Auctions.

These are the bread-and-butter of eBay, the auctions every one knows: buyers bid, others outbid them, they bid again, and the winner gets the merchandise . Simple.

Reserve Auctions.

Reserve auctions are for sellers who do not want their items to sell for less than a certain price a concept you will know about if youre familiar with real auctions. They work just like normal auctions on eBay, except that the buyer will be told if their bid does not meet the reserve price you set, and theyll positive need to bid again if they want the merchandise . If no-one is willing to meet your price, then the auction is cancelled, and you keep the merchandise .

Fixed Price (Buy it Now) Auctions.

Buy it Now auctions may work in one of two ways. You might add a Buy it Now button to a normal auction, meaning that buyers can choose either to bid normally or to simply pay the asking price and avoid the whole bidding process. Some sellers, though, now cut out the auction process altogether and simply list all their items at fixed price. This lets you avoid all the complications of the auction format and simply list your items for how much you want them to sell for.

Recently, eBay added a twist to fixed price auctions: the best offer. This means that buyers may contact you to negotiate a price, which could be a dazzling way to get sell some extra stock at a small discount. The only downside to reserve and fixed price auctions is that you pay a small extra fee to make use of these formats. In general, it is more worth using reserve auctions for higher-priced items and fixed price auctions for lower-priced ones but remember that you might combine the two formats.

Multiple Item (Dutch) Auctions.

These are auctions where you can sell more than one of a certain product. Dutch auctions may be done by bidding. Buyers bid a price and say how many items they want, and then every one pays the lowest price that was bid by one of the winning bidders. If you have trouble taking your head around that, then do not worry everyone else does too! These auctions are very rare.

What is more common is when a seller has a lot of one merchandise , and lists it using a combination of two auction types: a multiple-product fixed price auction. This just means that you might just say how many of the merchandise you they have, and offer them at a fixed price per unit. Buyers might enter how many they want and then just click Buy it Now to get them.

Now that you understand about the different types of auctions, you should make sure that the items you plan to sell do not violate eBays listing policies. The next electronic mail will let you understand whats allowed and what is a big no-no.