How Quibids Locked Auctions Changed Everything!
2013
Quibids rolled out the “locked auction” feature back in 2013. At the time, power bidders won most Quibids penny auctions while new players were mostly shutout. To average bidders a fighting chance, the Oklahoma based penny auction giant introduced Locked Auctions and explains its reasoning in “Winning Just Got Easier.”
The post explains how the locking mechanism prevents players from “jumping an auction” after a certain point. Meaning, players who wait until very late in the auction to place their first bid, risk getting locked out. To avoid this, bidders are forced to place one or more bids before an auction locks.
Bid-Ninja to the Rescue
Bid-Ninja quickly understood the code behind Quibids Locked Auctions and provided its customers an automated solution. A simple checkbox was added to BidBuddy (Bid-Ninja’s auto-bidding tool) giving users a “prevent lockout” option. Choosing this option tells BidBuddy to automatically place the necessary number of bids to avoid a player being locked out. An additional feature was also added to Bid-Ninja Analytics that indicates locked out players in every auction.
Firstly, the prevent lockout feature removes the worry of manually placing enough bids in each and every auction to avoid lockout. Additionally, the locked out player identification feature allows users to see how many eligible bidders remain (after lockout occurs) and re-evaluate whether to remain or leave the auction. Together, the two new features should definitely improve winning rates for Bid-Ninja users.
Improved Penny Auction Experiences
Quibids’ decision to implement locked auctions a few years ago improved customer experiences for most of its customers. The decision also prompted other auction sites to make similar moves (read “No More Bidders” to see Dealdash.com changes). The bottom line is Quibids Locked Auctions forced bidders to modify auction strategies. And by so doing, created better players, increased auction competition, and gave all users a chance to win!
