Continue reading »]]> Whoa, it’s been over a year since I last updated my site. I’d like to say that I’ve been off on wild adventures. But, truth be told, I’ve been consumed with life. Between working over 90 auctions in 2010, running (and losing by six votes) for director of the National Auctioneers Association, and serving as Past President of the Minnesota State Auctioneers Association, life has been crazy. Ohh yeah, and don’t forget to mix in serving on two high-profile national committees.

Maybe, just maybe, life is starting to slow down… or I’ve figured out how to better prioritize life. Yet, it again seems I’ve got a lot on plate for the year.

As for service to the auction industry, I’m again going to take a run at being elected to the National Auctioneers Association Board of Directors. With missing by only six votes, it’s hard to pass on running again. Given a larger margin of defeat, I probably would have taken my ball and gone home. This year, I’m working on a bit more of a structured campaign strategy thanks to some friends with experience. Vote early, vote often comes to mind… but just won’t work – although the elections are in Florida this year. Ha!

Career wise, our company is often recognized as leaders in our industry, and we’re going to take a bold step this year in continuing that leadership. We’re in the process of refocusing the asset classes our auction company serves, and increasing the online presence of our auctions. In fact, this year all our auctions have had an online part, and many online only. We’re also committed to taking our customer service levels to the next level by engaging our customers for honest anonymous feedback after every transaction with our company. We’re already seeing fantastic results from this engagement. Maybe I’ll talk more about that in the future.

Finally, personally, life is looking good. I’ve already been on one vacation this year. It was a two-part vacation. The first part was a cruise from Miami to Key West to Cozumel and back. It was a great time of doing nothing, and just what the doctor ordered. The second part was a trip out to Phoenix to see a friend run his first marathon. It was a huge motivator, and has led me to the gym and gearing up for a 5k in April, June and probably August.

In the meantime, I’m back. If you’re a past reader, you’ll know that I can be quite prolific in my writing, and quiet at other times. I hope to be more consistent, and to give you a mix of life, work, and fun. I’m sure I won’t always strike the correct balance. But, I’m hopeful that I’ll get back into the swing of writing – which I very much enjoy!

Continue reading »]]> It’s becoming increasingly common for auction companies to offer online bidding at their auctions. There are a multitude of types of auctions with online bidding. However, I’d like to focus on live auctions that have an online bidding component (i.e. pre-bidding, live bidding, or a combination thereof). In particular, I’d like to examine the registration requirements of two fictitious bidders at an auction with live online bidding. Let’s call the bidders Online Guy, and Onsite Gal. The auction can be of any asset class you’d like, for arguments sake it doesn’t matter.

Online Guy and Onsite Gal both come across an auction that they’d like to attend. They both notice it has online bidding. Onsite Gal has an entire day to spend at the auction. Online Guy on the other hand is taking care of his two toddlers, and finds it more convenient to stay at home than go to the auction with the two toddlers. Online Guy still wants to participate so he decides he’ll bid live online from his home.

Let’s examine the registration process for each bidder.

Onsite Gal
Onsite Gal shows up about twenty minutes before the auction is to begin. She heads over to the clerking trailer and asks for a bidding number. In most cases, the cashier asks for a picture ID. In exchange for the information on the ID, and verification that Onsite Gal is really who she says she is, Onsite Gal is given a bidding number. When Onsite Gal makes a purchase and is ready to leave she is asked to stop and make payment with the cashier. Payment can be in the form of cash, check, or credit card, and once payment is made, she can take her purchases home. However, there is nothing stopping Onsite Gal from leaving the auction with her purchases and not paying.

Online Guy
Online Guy registers a few days before the auction is to begin. He logs in online, and is asked for his address, multiple phone numbers, credit card information, and in some instances is required to provide a bank letter of credit. In exchange for this information, the auction company issues a bidding number. When Online Guy makes a purchase, he is emailed an invoice, and his credit card is typically processed for the purchase (in some instances alternative arrangements are made). Only once payment has been secured and verified as in the account of the auctioneer is Online Guy allowed his purchases. In addition, every transaction that Online Guy makes is tallied and tracked. His complete purchasing history and payment history is logged in a database.

Something Doesn’t Add Up
Somewhere along the line, because we can look a buyer in the face, we’ll give them a credit card (i.e. bidder’s number) with no credit limit, allow them to take their purchase home prior to verification that the funds are good (i.e. bounced check). However, in instances where we can not look a buyer in the face, we require additional safeguards, and in actuality have more historical data about the online buyer (i.e. purchase and payment history) than the onsite buyer. Somehow that just doesn’t add up, and in fact seems backwards.

Auction companies need to apply the same set of registration terms to both online and onsite bidders. In fact, approving an online bidder to participate in your auction that has a history of purchasing and paying for items is safer than handing bidding numbers out to anyone that produces a valid photo ID in person. By overly restricting online buyers, auctioneers are dampening the impact online buyers will have on the bottom line of an auction, and are not serving the seller’s best interest.

Continue reading »]]> It used to be that an auction was an all day event attended by many who spent the entire day at the auction. It was a social event. Times have certainly changed. In our current world, buyers rarely attend an auction from opening item to the last item. In fact, I’d be surprised if the average auction goer spends more than a three or four hours at an auction, and many are choosing to not go at all because of other more important time commitments.

First, why is this? We all have a finite amount of time. However, in the past several years the demands on our time have increased significantly. We rush from one commitment to another. Gone are the days of a leisurely day spent at an auction. Certainly there are auctions which are the exception to this rule, but those auctions are quite few and far between.

We’ve increasingly been aware aware of this, and are becoming more sensitive to the buyer’s needs. It’s simple without ample buyers, the demand end of the supply and demand equation is severely hampered and prices drop as a result. The longer an auction takes, the more likely the crowd is to dwindle in size. I’ve often thought about conducting a simple count every half hour of number of attendees at our auctions. I’ve seen this technique used in bars and restaurants numerous times to analyze crowd sizes and optimal staffing. Application of the technique to crowd size of an auction would result in an interesting look at the trends of auction crowds, and could possibly result in fitting a crude equation to crowd size.

A seller, in contrast to a buyer, often believes having two rings results in substantially reduced prices. While I agree, it may lead to lesser prices on a few select pieces, over the course of the entire auction it leads to higher prices. Each item, on average, will have more potential buyers in a two ring auction than in a single ring auction that is over three or four hours in length. Of course, convincing a seller of this is quite difficult. In fact, I’ve yet to find more than a few sellers that are able to understand this phenomena. Sellers of course want the entire crowd to focus on each of their possessions one at a time. However, they often fail to realize that this comes at the cost of a dwindling crowd, and has severe consequences after three or four hours.

Results are almost always better when we’re able to sell in two rings for significant portions of an auction. Sadly, as auctioneers we are in the middle of the dichotomy of a seller wanting the entire crowd to see each item they have, and a buyer wanting to purchase the items they are interested in as quick as possible and without impacting their time committed lives! Simply put, auctions of over three or four hours are almost always best conducted with auctioneers selling in two rings.