How to be an ebay sniper...

[The Baron]

2 minute mark? The idea is to leave no time to be outbid.

I've not lost an auction in years.

[Sundance]

well, i'm often doing something else online and don't like to forget. sometimes i do it at 5m, some times at 2m, 1m or 30 seconds... depends what else i'm doing.

[gung-hoeddie]

But you only need one hand to snipe,

[ODB]

I appear to be firing blanks with my snipes recently, I'm going in at 5 seconds but most of my bids appear to be well wide of the mark, for example I was bidding on a Star Wars Trilogo MOC and I was well adrift of the final price of £350.

[gung-hoeddie]

£350 was that one of Dave's? He'd charge you that for a broken loose figure.

[ODB]

No it wasn't, you're just arsed because he wouldn't let you have that Red Laser cheap.

[gung-hoeddie]

He wouldn't let me have anything cheap!

[humby248]

I usually leave till the 20 second mark. Although sniped in on a couple of good buy it nows recently!

[Monkfish]

Sniping is an optimal strategy even when you don't win.

Provided you submit the very most you'd be prepared to pay when you snipe, and provided you snipe within the last few seconds (and why wouldn't you do both?) there's no harm or shame in losing an auction.

If someone else wins then it's because they submitted a higher maximum bid independent of your bid and not because of it. All that's really happened is that they've paid a bit more for it than they might have done had you not bid as well.

You can therefore think of what it went for as the equivalent of a "Buy it Now" price that was just above your acceptable maximum.

[Sundance]

well, i bid on a complete Kraken and won despite bidding at the 2min 20 mark.

some came along at about 5 seconds, but he hit my helmet, cuz he bid £10 and i'd max bid a tenner, so i won!

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!