What is the best suggestion for Bid Offset times?

[njdunkin1]

I am concerned about a few high dollar items that I want to make sure I get bids on. They end in about four days. Here is my question--do the mirror/regular service bid offset times matter? What combo works best?
Thanks,
NJ

[Cupid]

It is optional what you set these offset times to precisely because there is no universal agreement as to what works 'best'.

This is the case at any price point, what makes a difference to the effectiveness is the pattern of bidding (amounts and timing) that other buyers have on the listing.

Personally, I believe that larger offsets than the default six seconds work best for me... but I take an interest in auctions where there are often many other snipers.
_________________
Mark

[Rickajho]

What Mark said.

It's been said here that the reason there is a wide range of options - mind you only in the context of a matter of a range of... seconds - is because people asked for the option. Personally I can't see getting into a nail biter as to whether a 3 second snipe is going to be "better" than a 7 second snipe. Ultimately - highest bid always wins.

You have to know what you are bidding on, it's market value, and what it's worth to you - and those two figures may not necessarily be the same. Reasonable market value gets thrown right out the window in some auctions so your snipe offset is irrelevant if you were prepared to snipe, say, $200.00 and the bidding shot way past double your snipe amount.

Sniping gives you the advantage of not revealing your hand until the last few seconds. As Mark said you might have a "bidding rules" advantage with a bigger offset if you end up in a sniping war and you happen to have a bid amount equal to or higher than everyone else bidding.. (But you can't know if that would be true either so...)

For my auctions I haven't seen any advantage to a particular offset. If I'm getting outbid I'm getting outbid by a lot more than I was prepared to pay. So I almost always just stick with 6 seconds.

Oh! If you were asking if there is any advantage to have different offsets for the main and mirror server: I don't believe there is. The mirror is your insurance that one bid gets placed should there be an error using only a single server. Both servers try - but the bottom line is only one bid gets placed for one bid amount. Personally, I set the main and mirror server for the same offset.