Seller Information

Home About Buyers Contacts Feedback Forums Links Listings My Eggschange Search Sellers Site Map Help

Seller Information

Selling an item (or items) online in an auction format can be very effective. We encourage you to post as many items as you like and watch as your product is sold to the highest bidder. Here is some information which will help get you started.

	User Agreement


	Please read our User Agreement which outlines the site policies and terms of use.

	What You Should Know First


	Before placing your items for sale, you must first become a registered user. By becoming a registered user you will have the ability to sell items on this site. Payment of our fees may either be via cheque or Nochex credit card transfer. Our fees are described on our Fee Schedule page. See below for our policy on fee payment and late payment fees.

	How do I list something for sale?


	There are a couple of ways to get to the "List an item for sale here" page: you can click on the "Listings" link at the top of every page, which takes you to the listings categories. After each category name there is a "Sell here!" link, which will take you to a page where you can list an item for sale. There is also a "Sell your item" link on each category listing page. Or, you can just click here.

	What if I have multiple "kinds" of a certain type of item? How should I list it?


	If you have multiple kinds or varieties of a certain type of item, you would be best served listing each variety in a separate listing. There are a few reasons for this: If you list all varieties in a single listing, it precludes you from being able to receive the best price for each variety. It may turn out that a certain variety has a higher demand than another, and by listing them together, buyers have no way to distinguish one from another. It's confusing for potential buyers, and may actually discourage potential bidders. If the overall auction's price level is being driven by the variety that is in the most demand, a buyer who would be willing to bid on one of the lesser-in-demand varieties will be discouraged from doing so, or else think that the items are very overpriced. Separating each variety in a different listing will let each variety find its own bidding audience, making it clearer for them, and more effective for you. A single listing will only allow you to sell a single variety of your item (unless you're using a dutch auction). The high bid will only result in a single sale. Unless this is what you are trying to achieve, multiple listings will allow more varieties to be sold. More listings produce an impression that you're more "active". Just like everyone wants to dance with the girl who's out on the dance floor often, you'll appear more interesting to potential bidders if you're seen as an active participant in the auctions. For example, if you had five pairs of wellies to sell, all the same size but each pair in a different colour, you'd be best served by creating a listing for each different colour rather than creating a listing for all five pairs.

	What if my item doesn't sell?


	Unless you opted to use some of our optional listing features, there will be no charge for your listing in the case the item didn't sell. If so, you may want to consider re-listing your item, as doing so will still be free unless the item sells (again, excluding any optional listing features). You can easily re-list items by visiting your My Eggschange Personal Page, where you can select an option to see all of your auctions that haven't resulted in a sale, and re-list the item for another go. When re-listing, you may want to consider if the original opening bid was too high, or if perhaps your reserve amount was too high to generate a sale. There are also seasonal aspects to some items, and some things may not be much in demand during certain parts of the year. Unless you're more interested in selling such an item than getting the maximum possible for it, you may want to consider waiting for a more favourable time of year to re-list.

	How can I tell what people are interested in buying?


	Since listing an item for sale at Eggschange is free, there's no cost to a potential seller to just try out listing a few items on the site and see what sort of interest is generated. Bear in mind that while listing is free, optional listing service fees always apply, whether an item sells or not (refer to the Fee Schedule page for information on these charges). If you'd like to see what people are looking for at the moment, Eggschange provides a way for you to get an anonymous look at member's "wanted lists". The FutureWatch Summary page provides a digest of all the words on our member's FutureWatch keyword lists. Our FutureWatch system gives members a way to be alerted when a new item is listed that contains particular words in the listing that would indicate that the member may be interested in the item. Sellers can use this summary to see what items are of current interest. Note: Sellers should bear in mind that the FutureWatch summary is only as good as our members' maintenance of the entries on it. It shouldn't be taken as the final word on current demand. The best indicator of interest will always be demonstrated by how many members bid on a listed item.

	Shipping Rates and Estimates


	The Royal Mail has a postal rate calculator online at www.royalmail.com. You can only use the Royal Mail for non-living items. We are not aware of whether or not this applies to hatching eggs. Graham Francis conducts countrywide deliveries of live birds. He may contacted for a delivery quote at 01691 860459. If you conduct deliveries of birds, eggs or other items and would like to have your information posted here (it's free), please notifiy us at Customer Service.

	Including Photographs in Your Listing


	Images or photographs are a good way to enhance your auction listings. Typically, an auction that has a picture of the actual item(s) for sale will get more bids than one that does not. If you want to include a photo, you have several options as to how to put it on the auction: you can post the picture on your own web space and link it to the auction, or you can utilise any number of web services that provide image "hosting" capabilities. Some image hosting is free, but other sites are now charging for these services. Several of the larger images hosting sites that you may want to investigate are: Auctiva MyItem.com Additionally, you can put your images up on any number of web home page services like Tripod or Homestead. While not specifically designed for auction image hosting, you can still use the site to contain your images and provide a target for a URL to your image. Please keep your images under 600 pixels wide. If you include any images that are wider than 600 pixels, we will scale them down so that they are 600 pixels wide. The scaling process isn't always flattering to the image, so it's better if you manage scaling them down yourself. To include an image in your listing, simply enter the URL of the image in the field labelled "Picture URL" on the Sell Item page. If you use HTML in your description (see the next section for details), you can also use <img> tags in your description to include additional images if need be. You should keep in mind that large images with lots of colors can result in very large files that may be slow for a potential bidder to download. If it takes too long, a potential bidder may simply give up rather than wait for for the image to download. The best way to avoid this is to use the JPEG image format with the lowest quality setting that doesn't significantly impact the visual details of your item. Alternatively, if the level of detail required for your image is high, try reducing the physical dimensions of the image. Another method that can be effective is to create two different images, one small "thumbnail" version and a larger full color version. Use the smaller version in your listing, and place a link to the larger version in the description of your item. This way, interested parties can follow the link, with the understanding up front that the image they are loading is large and may take some time to load. Since Eggschange places no restrictions on the size of your images (except for the width), you should try to exercise good judgement as to what is an appropriate size for you image. We're sorry, but at this time, Eggschange cannot provide image storage space. We will reconsider this feature depending on demand and auction volume.

	Including HTML in Your Item Description


	Eggschange allows you to optionally use HTML instead of plain text in your auction item descriptions. Although not necessary, some sellers like to use HTML in order to have more control over the presentation of their item, or if they wish to include more than one image in their listing. If you choose to utilise HTML in your listings, you have several choices to do so. You may simply edit the HTML by hand using a text editor such as Notepad, you may use one of the commercial HTML design packages such as FrontPage or Dreamweaver, or else you may choose to use one of the free web-based HTML tools generally available for setting up home pages on the web, such as Tripod or Homestead. If you use one of these tools, you'll need to copy and paste the HTML source from the tool into the description field of the Sell Item page. When you copy the HTML code, DO NOT copy the entire source; copy only the HTML between the <body> and </body> tags (not the <body> tags themselves). If you copy the entire HTML source, you may specify incompatible settings for the page, or otherwise make the page difficult or impossible for bidders to view. If you find you have created an auction and the page is severely damaged or unviewable, contact Eggschange technical support for assistance. However, Eggschange will not provide assistance in making arbitrary stylistic changes to your listing. Please note: In order to help ensure a safe browsing experience for all our users, and also to preserve the formatting of our pages, Eggschange automatically removes certain HTML tags from listings when they are submitted. The listing you see in the preview page will already have these tags removed, so you'll be able to see the impact of this removal on your listing before you do the final "commit". We remove all applets and embedded objects, the "html" and "body" tags, all frame tags, script tags, and all tags having to do with creating and formatting tables. If these restrictions create undue hardship in creating your listing, contact us at Tech Support and we can discuss possible accomodations.

	Payment Schedule and Late Fee Payment Policy


	You can find our payment schedule and late fee payment policy here.

	Selling Items


	In order to sell your items in this auction you must be a registered user After you have registered just follow these simple steps: Click on the category of your choice Click on the Sell your item in this category link. Fill out the form completely and click Add Item to finish.

	My eggschange Personal Information


	You can check your Personal Page which allows you to do the following: View and edit your personal info. View your selling history. View your buying history. See your user feedback. Use the Future Watch feature. Relist your expired auctions. Edit your current Auction Items.