It's official, Facebook MarketPlace is rubbish for selling

[mikkh]

I've spoken at length about trying to navigate the minefield of buying computers on MarketPlace, but now I've had a go at trying to sell something myself.

First item was an old motherboard complete with CPU, RAM and a suitable graphics card for that era of technology.
A steal at £10 and the clicks on listing count was looking promising with 50+ the first day, rising to 100+ by the second day.
By the third day I'd halved the price to a fiver just to get rid of it, but still not a single reply/enquiry and I deleted it in disgust before going to bed that night.

Second item isn't computer related and probably is a bit niche with a fairly limited market, but it gained a whole two clicks in two days.

The obvious thing was to try eBay instead, it is after all a site dedicated to buying/selling with serious buyers.

I put the listing on for the more obscure item a few hours ago and it's already had over 10 views and a couple of watchers registered.

The difference is night and day and when I get round to listing the motherboard, it will go almost instantly if I put a buy now price on it.

I suppose the main difference is the Facebook audience is a much younger demographic, basically the crowd flicking through their phones on public transport with no real intentions of actually buying anything, whereas the eBay people are generally older and actively looking to buy.

So there you have it, eBay rules and Facebook basically sucks - you heard it here first

[elvis]

H! Mikkh.

I have never tried MarketPlace, and I never will from what I have heard. As for eBay, I did try it once or twice but never again

[mikkh]

Just to prove my theory, I had another go at selling something on Marketplace.

This time a whole computer, well the main part at least but with an offer to supply the missing parts (monitor, keyboard, mouse etc)

For the princely sum of £10 with a modern wi-fi adaptor worth that amount alone, I watched as the clicks on the listing grew.

It's an old computer but with the help of a lightweight version of Linux (wattOS) It's a perfectly good general surfing and office machine.
I even installed a whole bunch of retro games to make it dual purpose.

Actual replies? NONE

I only gave it two days before deleting it and I realise the word Linux would put a lot of people off, but I also assumed it might attract anybody who was Linux curious for a bargain price.

Apparently not!

Looks like another one for eBay then.