Is Selling USed on Amazon Rigged?

Almost everytim I list a book there are no other sellers, then
suddently there are six or seven all $1 lower. And when I lower my
price, those six or seven all lower it again to $1 under me. I
appreciate the need for competition in the free market place, but I
wonder is there a bot or something that large booksellers (maybe even
publishers) use that automatically places bids lower than books they
may or may not have just to discourage, thwart, etc? It's just too
automatic ...

callmekilo wrote:

Almost everytim I list a book there are no other sellers, then
suddently there are six or seven all $1 lower. And when I lower my
price, those six or seven all lower it again to $1 under me. I
appreciate the need for competition in the free market place, but I
wonder is there a bot or something that large booksellers (maybe even
publishers) use that automatically places bids lower than books they
may or may not have just to discourage, thwart, etc? It's just too
automatic ...

What happens if you list a book for $1?

Is it always the same 6 or 7 who list lower
than you?

And, what happens if you list a book that
is already listed by another dealer?

-m.

On 2005-02-03, callmekilo wrote:
Almost everytim I list a book there are no other sellers, then
suddently there are six or seven all $1 lower. And when I lower my
price, those six or seven all lower it again to $1 under me. I
appreciate the need for competition in the free market place, but I
wonder is there a bot or something that large booksellers (maybe even
publishers) use that automatically places bids lower than books they
may or may not have just to discourage, thwart, etc? It's just too
automatic ...

A number of dealers use software that will check the prices of
all their books at Amazon and reset their prices to the lowest.
For example Sellerengine
http://www.sellerengine.com

And if two dealers with the same book are using such software
you can get to a low price of a $.01 very fast.


--
Jonathan Grobe Books
Browse our inventory of thousands of used books at:
http://www.grobebooks.com

On Thu, 3 Feb 2005 15:00:10 +0000 (UTC), Jonathan Grobe
wrote:

On 2005-02-03, callmekilo wrote:
Almost everytim I list a book there are no other sellers, then
suddently there are six or seven all $1 lower. And when I lower my
price, those six or seven all lower it again to $1 under me. I
appreciate the need for competition in the free market place, but I
wonder is there a bot or something that large booksellers (maybe even
publishers) use that automatically places bids lower than books they
may or may not have just to discourage, thwart, etc? It's just too
automatic ...

A number of dealers use software that will check the prices of
all their books at Amazon and reset their prices to the lowest.
For example Sellerengine
http://www.sellerengine.com

And if two dealers with the same book are using such software
you can get to a low price of a $.01 very fast.

So if you had a moderately priced book (say $40) and see that a
competitor is using one of these programs, wouldn't the thing to do be
to drop your price to say $5, wait for his bot to match, buy his, and
then put yours back up where it belongs?

Ah, this explains it: sellerengine. Maybe I'll have some fun and
lowball a book I want as a seller, then let the seller engine bring the
price down for me. Any reason why this wouldn't work? Cheers,

Jonathan Grobe wrote:
On 2005-02-03, callmekilo wrote:
Almost everytim I list a book there are no other sellers, then
suddently there are six or seven all $1 lower. And when I lower my
price, those six or seven all lower it again to $1 under me. I
appreciate the need for competition in the free market place, but I
wonder is there a bot or something that large booksellers (maybe
even
publishers) use that automatically places bids lower than books
they
may or may not have just to discourage, thwart, etc? It's just too
automatic ...

A number of dealers use software that will check the prices of
all their books at Amazon and reset their prices to the lowest.
For example Sellerengine
http://www.sellerengine.com

And if two dealers with the same book are using such software
you can get to a low price of a $.01 very fast.


--
Jonathan Grobe Books
Browse our inventory of thousands of used books at:
http://www.grobebooks.com

And if someone then tries to buy it from you at that price?

In article .com,
callmekilo wrote:
Ah, this explains it: sellerengine. Maybe I'll have some fun and
lowball a book I want as a seller, then let the seller engine bring the
price down for me. Any reason why this wouldn't work? Cheers,

Jonathan Grobe wrote:
A number of dealers use software that will check the prices of
all their books at Amazon and reset their prices to the lowest.
For example Sellerengine
http://www.sellerengine.com

And if two dealers with the same book are using such software
you can get to a low price of a $.01 very fast.

On 2005-02-03, callmekilo wrote:
Almost everytim I list a book there are no other sellers, then
suddently there are six or seven all $1 lower. And when I lower my
price, those six or seven all lower it again to $1 under me. I
appreciate the need for competition in the free market place, but I
wonder is there a bot or something that large booksellers (maybe even
publishers) use that automatically places bids lower than books they
may or may not have just to discourage, thwart, etc? It's just too
automatic ...
--
= Eric Bustad, Norwegian bachelor programmer

On 3 Feb 2005 21:26:36 GMT, (Eric Kenneth
Bustad) wrote:

And if someone then tries to buy it from you at that price?


Easy, just refund their money and say it's not available. Since about
75% if not more of the listings on Amazon Marketplace are for items
the "seller" does not have in his possession, it should come as no
surprise to the potential buyer.

R. Totale wrote:
On 3 Feb 2005 21:26:36 GMT, (Eric Kenneth
Bustad) wrote:

And if someone then tries to buy it from you at that price?


Easy, just refund their money and say it's not available. Since about
75% if not more of the listings on Amazon Marketplace are for items
the "seller" does not have in his possession, it should come as no
surprise to the potential buyer.


I have done this. I once wanted a book that was only available for $100
from a used book dealer. I thought that a tad high. I offered to sell
my own copy for $29.95. The next day, I checked and lo and behold the
dealer had dropped their price to $29.95. Guess, what I did? I bought
the book from the dealer for $29.95 and cancelled by order.

Ah, this explains it: sellerengine. Maybe I'll have some fun and
lowball a book I want as a seller, then let the seller engine bring the
price down for me. Any reason why this wouldn't work? Cheers,

That's a great idea. I'm going to go pick up a slew of books I wanted for a
lot cheaper now....ha ha

"callmekilo" wrote:
R. Totale wrote:
On 3 Feb 2005 21:26:36 GMT, (Eric Kenneth
Bustad) wrote:

And if someone then tries to buy it from you at that price?


Easy, just refund their money and say it's not available. Since about
75% if not more of the listings on Amazon Marketplace are for items
the "seller" does not have in his possession, it should come as no
surprise to the potential buyer.


I have done this. I once wanted a book that was only available for $100
from a used book dealer. I thought that a tad high. I offered to sell
my own copy for $29.95. The next day, I checked and lo and behold the
dealer had dropped their price to $29.95. Guess, what I did? I bought
the book from the dealer for $29.95 and cancelled by order.

Don't you find the ethics of this sort of thing to be rather
questionable? Perhaps I'm too honest to be a real book collector.

-David