Strategies for Using Second Chance Offer
by Jerry
eBay Staff Member

The Second Chance Offer service could be the best deal going on eBay. Unfortunately, it is may also be the most underutilized and misunderstood service. Second Chance Offer is an invaluable tool for reducing your eBay business's costs and improving your bottom line. It is nimble, effective, efficient, discreet, and best of all it's FREE!

Nimble: A seller can use Second Chance Offer to handle three different types of situations: 1.) the winning bidder failed to complete the sale; 2) the seller has duplicate items; and 3) the reserve price was not met in an eBay Motors listing.

Effective: On average, for every 10 offers made, more than three bidders will accept. This is an amazing conversion rate when compared to other optional enhancements and their associated costs. Given that every bidder has made the effort to place a bid, sellers can assume that they're dealing with an interested audience.

Efficient: The time required to process a Second Chance Offer is small because the entire process is handled through online forms. The system takes care of all of the administrative tasks for you. A Second Chance Offer can be sent with just four clicks of the mouse, and without having to send an email message or type anything.

The system performs the following tasks: 1.) it carries over the full item description and pictures from the original listing; 2.) it determines the new Buy It Now price based on the under-bidder's high bid; 3.) it creates a new item number; 4.) it includes a feedback link, and 5.) it includes link to the original item.

Discrete: Details of the offer are only visible to the seller and the Second Chance Offer recipient. They cannot be viewed by the highest bidder, or found on any search results or category listing pages.

Free (Cost Effectiveness): Sellers can only improve their bottom line by using this feature. There are no listing fees whatsoever. If a bidder accepts a Second Chance Offer, the seller pays the regular Final Value Fee. If the bidder declines the offer, the seller pays nothing. Consider also the savings in a seller's time. While a small amount of time is needed to send a Second Chance Offer, time is saved from having to relist an item, and waiting for the new listing to end.

Strategy

The Second Chance Offer system can be viewed as a utility to help a seller recover emotionally and financially from a Non Paying Bidder situation. Or, it can be used if a reserve price was not met in an eBay Motors listing.

Before, a Non Paying Bidder could waste a seller's precious time and force the seller to absorb the listing fees. Now, if payment is not received within a certain number of days, the seller has the opportunity to complete an eBay transaction with the next highest bidder.

The Second Chance Offer system can also be viewed as a specialized tool in a seller's bag of tricks to sell two items for the price of one. Whenever you have a duplicate item, or offer a choice in custom-made items or services, anticipate that you will receive multiple bids. One item will go to the highest bidder, and the second item will be earmarked for one of the under-bidders. Use this strategy to leverage the excitement generated by an auction-style listing in order to get the most for a pair of items, and reduce insertion fee costs.

The best time to send a Second Chance Offer is immediately after a listing ends. This is when an under-bidder is the most receptive to an offer. In the aftermath of a last-minute bidding war, imagine the delightful feeling if you were able to snatch up a duplicate item. If a seller waits too long to send the offer, the under-bidder may choose to move on to another listing, and the opportunity could be lost. PowerSellers who use this technique regularly have reported acceptance rates in excess of 50%!

The seller can also limit the duration of a Second Chance Offer. If the next highest bidder declines, or does not respond within the allowable period of time, the seller can cancel the original offer and send another to a different bidder.

Savvy sellers recognize the inherent value in the Second Chance Offer system, and make it an integral part of their overall selling strategy.

To learn more about the nuts and bolts of the Second Chance Offer system, please click here.