Early & crazy bidders on the drop. Why?

[Skinny]

First off this is not a rant because I lost a domain name auction.

I bid fairly up the point I budgeted and lost the auction fair and square.
Not blaming anyone for a fair auction.

However, it seems to me that some people (not sure if these are newbies) tend to bid so poorly strategically that I'm just trying to grasp the reason why they would bid they way they do.

I was watching a name that was on pending delete. The name in question was a reasonable value and even though pending delete would have been found by a drop tool, etc.

It finally was on the drop and with about 2.5 days left Bidder A places a standard bid.

Why? Is he/she not aware that this will bring attention to the name?
From their perspective why would you want to do this? What strategic advantage is gained?

Then with over a day left Bidder B places an $xxx big placing the name on Namejet's front page attracting even further attention by 50+ domainers.

Again why would you place a high bid so early in the auction?
What is the advantage of having more people coming into the auction?

In the end neither Bidder A or B won the auction.
So I don't understand why they would bid the way they did.
It certainly hurt their chances. If they had won this whole thing would be moot.

This seems to happen often on Namejet or Snapnames,
but I'm just curious what the thought process is because it really doesn't make any sense to me at all?

When I started to bid on the drop, early on I wanted to find out bidding strategies and how to bid as stealthily (as possible).

Anyway curious to hear your thoughts. On to the next name ...

 

[Theo]

Not everyone has the time to bid the last minute using reminders etc. In the end, good names will always be given attention, and will always have higher bids than not so good domains.

 

[Gerry]

Not everyone has the time to bid the last minute using reminders etc.

Bingo! As much as I like sniping, I had to bite the bullet and enter a bid this morning on a name that was closing this afternoon. I knew that I had some errands to run and would not be able to get to a computer to place a bid...and doing it via my phone seems to be more of a hassle than a convenience (let alone trying to drive and enter a bid - NOT!)

Well, as Acro pointed out...good names will attract the bidders no matter what. Good news is my proxy bid (the name already had at least 2 other bidders) was enough for me to come away victorious against a total of 4 other bidders. I have to say that I consider myself very lucky as I had the same situation yesterday and won that auction as well.

There is no science to the methods of bidding. Just be thankful that not everyone thinks the same or bids the same...or else these would be perpetual auctions that would never end.

 

[Skinny]

Thanks for your posts guys. You both make great points.

I agree that good names will cost more than crappy ones and will have attention and higher bids. That's fine. Nothing wrong with that.

Proxy bidding also makes sense in real life as you've indicated and that way you can still win an auction while doing other (sometimes more important) things.

I've had to do this once as well and ended up winning (though I usually prefer bidding while at my PC or phone).

It is interesting to see the variation of bidding and how the final 5 minutes can sometimes turn into hours of bidding and on other occasions end rather quickly.
I like all of that, it's fun and exciting and you never know what can happen.

I just don't get in the scenario listed in my OP why some bidders do what they do, when it seems so strategically terrible from their point of view.
Like shooting yourself in the proverbial foot.

I guess I'm more of a sniper type bidder, but it to doesn't work every time (especially when you get out sniped).

 

[Gerry]

You also are missing an incredible scenario of = TIME ZONES!

People have to sleep. I am presently in a location that is 7 hours behind Italy, etc. Seems most of the auctions are posted in Eastern Standard Time. Gotta be tough on those international bidders.

 

[Skinny]

Gerry I've thought of that too & yes it must be insane to bid on auctions that you aren't always present for.

Likely means you sometimes have to overbid just to win a name!

Even so I would assume those bids would come less than 24 hours prior to the deadline accounting for various timezones.

Putting in a bid 2.5 days early just doesn't seem smart. Oh well, everyone bids differently I guess.

 

[amplify]

Sniping is fun in Japan :smilewinkgrin:

I'm sure there's a lot out there that are like :upset: when they wake up and see that they lost their domain (unless they put the highest possible bid they wanted to pay for it).