Trading tips

Hi, I'd like to help people out with trading. Here are some of my tips. Hopefully this helps people realize what options they have in order to get some good offers or deals! This may be a bit too detailed and actually insignificant in the grand scheme of things ha ha. My other blog about reselling also covered some of the other details I have not discussed.
Feel free to comment below if you have something to add or critique on!

When selling consider:

People are more likely to offer when you are offline because they are not sure if you will accept or not if you aren't.
People love to do stuff with their mp or like seeing a lot of it on their profile. They will get antsy if you don't respond immediately. What I try to do to counter this is say in the caption that you are online daily or will be back immediately.

Know when to back off or stand your ground when someone under offers on your item!

Negotiation is extremely important, and some people will inevitably try to offer for a little less just to see if they can test you. Whether or not you accept their offer depends on the item. If it is retired and popular like an enchanted raulf plushie for example, it is generally better to hold off on under-offers because a fairer offer may come your way soon. On the other hand, if it is something hard to sell like an enchanted non-le plushies, it may be best to accept slight under-offers because not many people buy those kinds of items except certain collectors and sometimes missions. Use your best judgment!

If you can't get rid of an item no matter what, just stick it in auctions or in your shop and advertise your item in forums with words like UB(unbuyable)or quicksale

Sometimes an item just won't sell no matter how much you advertise. If that happens, those are the only other options you can use. Just don't expect to get a high price if you do use auctions or your shop.

Huge vs individual trade lots
There are pros and cons to selling items in these ways.

Huge lots

Pros:
Less annoying to create a trade lot for each individual item, so it is good for people selling a lot of items at once.
Cons:
People will be less likely to offer because they may want only a single item in your trade and will feel too lazy to mm you to separate.

Individual lots

Pros:
More offers generally because people will have the mp to offer fairly though you do get some bad offers occasionally.
Cons:
Extremely frustrating to create a trade lot for each item. Not recommended for people selling a large amount of items.

The trade lot caption

This is actually rather important to getting offers that you want. Will cover each option pros and cons in detail.

Blank caption or ambiguous mm offer caption

Pros:
Occasionally you will get over-offers in items or currency, but generally I don't particularly recommend doing it for this reason. My least favorite option.
Cons:
You also get the most bad offers by doing this. It's harder to get the price you want by just leaving a blank caption.
Prevents price gouging too as does blogs. More below.
Priced caption aka something like
"1.5 mil or 1 au(account upgrade credit and 500k"

Pros:
Generally recommended for people who know exactly how much they want for an item.
Cons:
Other traders who see your price will try either to match it or lower their price. A keen example would be the Rejected trading card. Before where there were only a few the lowest trade lot was priced at 4 mil, but as more people put their items in trades it is now closer to 1 mil. Price gouging doesn't happen often, but it can definitely hurt!

Check my blog caption
Pros:
A surprisingly effective way to sell multiple items at once. It allows you to sell items in bulk, and making a blog means you don't have to remember prices for each individual item! Highly recommended for people selling a large amount of items.
Cons:
People may be too lazy to check your blog or won't be able to find it. Make sure it is easy to find or you may deter a potential customer.
END FOR CAPTION SEGMENT. sorry for being really long, lol

People will typically not offer on an item if they see a large supply of it
if there is a large supply of an item, people will be skeptical about dipping into their pockets because a high supply often means that the value will drop because demand will be satisfied easier. Be careful about displaying a large amount of the same item at once. It is generally good to sell one at a time unless you are looking to sell something like crystals or chocolates at a bulk discount.

Communication is key. You'd be surprised at how much negotiation can take you
You can ask for items from someone's gallery as payment if they don't have any currency or ask for a discount if you're feeling lucky. It's really that simple. All it takes is a couple of maramails.

Refresh your trades once in a while
This is important because sometimes another seller will try to go a little cheap on another item that you're both saying, so it's very important for you to match that price!
Also, sometimes trades is flooded with swap or blog trade lots which are really massive and can bury your trade lot out of view from a potential seller. Re-posting your trade lots is an annoying task but necessary if you want to sell your items quickly by exposing them to more users.

Advertise in forums
Like I said before, sometimes your trade might be hidden from a potential buyer due to how fast trade lots can add up. Therefore, it is important to advertise in forums, so that buyers who lurk there more may be interested in your item. Collectors generally will pay more than some random user in trades. Remember that!



When buying:

Quicksale
Don't be fooled if someone says quicksale. Make sure to determine the popularity or usual price of the item before buying. People will often say quicksale to catch a buyer's attention, but it might not actually be too far from the actual price. Inflation and newly released items are the biggest culprits of being more expensive than they actually are. A good way to determine if an item is actually valuable is to check rarity instead of (ss)shop search price. The item could also be (hts)hard to sell. You generally want to avoid hts sell items as a reseller.


Under-offering directly is generally not recommended
Instead of under-offering directly and getting rejected. You should talk to the user politely through maratalk or maramail for a discount. If you do this, they be more likely to listen depending on the item and their mood.

When an item is priced too cheaply, it is usually too good to be true
If someone is selling a enchanted yellow chibs plushie for 4 mil, wouldn't you think that's a suspiciously great bargain? Normally, you would offer the price asked for, but I don't recommend this because smarter users will try to offer a bit more to convince the seller to accept their offer instead. Think about what is the best price you are willing to pay for the item in these situations. It is better to pay a little more than to lose out on the deal entirely.

Ask a buddy. Is the item really worth buying at that price?
I can't tell you how much mp I saved by talking to someone before purchasing an item that I wasn't sure about. Sometimes you may not be thinking correctly at the moment. By asking for another person's opinion through forums or maramail, you can avoid potentially over-offering on a trade that you may regret in the future.

Check their wishlist or ask if they accept items
Sometimes people will trade items for what is on there wishlist. You can get some real bargains this way if you find an item on their wishlist that is a lower price than the item you're trading! Make sure not to just pass off "swap" trade lots as rip-offs. Some of them can be really profitable.

All of this is was what I learned in my career as a reseller. I have another blog that covers the topic of reselling in a bit more detail. I hope you found my blog interesting!