Placeholder Bids 202: Be Not Afraid
In the previous 3 installments of the Placeholder Bids series, I discussed what closed auctions on Swoopo were, how a Placeholder bid can get you into these exclusive auctions and why placeholder bids skew Swoopo Analytics statistics.
In this final installment, I’d like to discuss why those scary auctions smattered with “pinkies” aren’t as scary as they seem.
What Are “Pinkies”
In the Swoopo Strategy Forum, someone lovingly dubbed Swoopo Pros “Pinkies” – named after the color we use in Swoopo Analytics to mark bidders who’ve won several previous auctions. These bidders are the dangerous “Swoopo Pros” and knowing how to avoid them (or be them) is what the Swoopo Manual + Swoopo Analytics is all about.
So Why Shouldn’t I Be Scared?
Sometimes I’ll log into an auction and see that dozens of bidders are participating who are “Pinkies.” But upon further inspection, I realize that many are simply using Placeholder Bids to mark their spot in the auction. So what on the surface seems like a scary auction I should avoid…might actually be a good auction to start bidding in.
Now that you know all there is to know about Placeholder Bids, you’ll be armed to conquer closed Swoopo auctions. If you haven’t yet purchased the Swoopo Manual and started using Swoopo Analytics – get on it!
Placeholder Bids 201: Skewed Win Statistics
In my previous two posts, I discussed what a closed auction is on Swoopo and how Placeholder Bids can help you get access to these exclusive auctions.
Today, I’m going to explain how the strategy of Placeholder Bids has an interesting effect on our Swoopo Analytics statistics…
Let’s Talk Win Percentages
With Swoopo Analytics, we track every single bidder and every single auction. We also know a bidder’s won/lost history and can therefore calculate a winning percentage over the history of their account.
A typical bidder (let’s call her Susan) may have 15 wins and 100 auctions participated in, meaning she has a win percentage of 15%.
This statistic alone isn’t helpful, however, because there are many other factors to consider. I won’t get into detail here, but I do want to explain what this has to do with Placeholder Bids.
The best bidders often use Placeholder Bids with regularity. So Susan has participated in 100 auctions, but let’s say in 40 of those auctions she simply placed a Placeholder Bid and then never returned to participate in the auction. (Maybe the auction remained too competitive, or she were bidding on another auction and didn’t want to be distracted or perhaps she simply had other things to do).
If Susan has 40 auctions in her history that were single bid auctions, then her win percentage would be more accurately described as 15 wins in 60 auctions. Or a win percentage of 25%.
So when considering win percentages, both for yourself and others, don’t forget to factor in Placeholder Bids. In the final post of my Placeholder Bids series, I’ll explain why you shouldn’t run from all those “pinkies” you see in Swoopo auctions.
New Data on Swoopo Changes
There have been a few changes at Swoopo over the past few weeks. These were controversial changes for our members in the forum, who were torn about whether or not the changes were good for users.
I waited to make up my mind until I had data firmly in hand about what effect it would have. And thankfully, my data mastermind Jason was able to get me stats quickly.
Here is the average savings on Swoopo over the first 10 weeks of 2010.
So it would appear that the changes are good for users on Swoopo. Now, the techniques of the Swoopo pro will definitely change because they can no longer heavily rely on Swoop It Now to save them from a big loss. It’s also made it easier for new bidders to jump in and start winning auctions.
With the shift from Swoopo Pros to every bidder on the site, hopefully Swoopo can continue to improve their customer satisfaction and keep bidders coming back again and again.
There have also been concerned voiced that Swoopo’s traffic is down. Here’s a glimpse at the number of closed auctions by week:
It should be noted, however, that their current traffic levels are similar to those about 5-6 months ago. They’re not growing at this point, but it’s not unprecedented for them to have this many finished auctions per week.
It’ll be interesting to see what they tweak in the model going forward and how it affects everyone in the forums and at home who’re bidding and winning on Swoopo.
Updated Swoopo Manual
Today I released an updated version of the Swoopo Manual. This is now version 1.7.
Included in this update is an all-new data set of over 30,000 analyzed auctions. And more importantly, we slice and dice that data to reveal interesting trends about how the best Swoopo bidders bid…and how they win.
Also included in this update is an item by item savings breakdown. In the previous versions I grouped items together into categories (such as TVs or Cameras). But readers of Swoopers dot org requested item breakdowns instead…and I listened!
Finally, the biggest change:
We took our huge data set and created an hour-by-hour matrix for the entire week. This shows the best hours to bid for every single day of the week. We included this in an all-new Excel download which you can grab on the “Stats” page.
Thanks as always for reading…and keep kickin’ tail on Swoopo!
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Swoopo Auction Data: Old News?
If you’re relying on reems of Excel data as the sole source of your Swoopo auction data, you’re making a big mistake. There are more important things than stale historical data from 30 days ago or 3 months ago. Yesterday I explained why Swoopo skills are better than Swoopo stats. Today I’d like to share why without real-time data…you’re still bidding blind.
Real Time is Real Important
Swoopo Excel sheets have a purpose: They let you see which auctions are usually better for bidding. They reveal, for example, that bids for bids are usually a losers game. This is helpful for new Swoopo bidders because you can stay away from bids for bids.
But oddly enough, I recommend you participate in bids for bids if you’d like to start small and “trade your way” up to a laptop or digital camera. That’s confusing, huh?
The reason I can confidently recommend this strategy is because I see it work for pros time and time again. The difference, of course, is that they aren’t relying on Excel sheets. They are also using advanced bidding techniques from the Swoopo Manual. They are also using…
Swoopo Analytics is Real-Time
There’s only been one other person in the “Swoopo industry” who’ve I’ve worked with on a regular basis. His name is Jason and he developed Swoopo Analytics. And what it does is provide real-time analysis on every Swoopo auction right on the same page. You’d hardly even notice you were using it if you weren’t winning all the time 
Swoopo Analytics is much more powerful than Excel sheets because it reveals deep data about the most important Swoopo auction: the one you’re bidding on!
Swoopo Analytics gives you access to:
- Who’s bidding in an auction
- How many times every single bidder has won before
- The win/loss history of every bidder on Swoopo
- The average sales prices for that item in the past
- Much, much more
I joined forces with Jason and Swoopo Analytics a couple months back and the program is now offered only to buyers of the Swoopo Manual. If you want to learn more, you can get access here: