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Feature Rich, Easy to Use
"From the clean, easily
customizable face to the intuitive and pleasantly
comprehensive Admin features, this product is fantastic. Add
to that the exhaustive feature list this product carries and
it's clear that as far as auction software goes, there ARE
no competitors."
Written by Kerry from
Canton, OH |
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With its
ease of use, TWD-Auction may look deceptively simple at first
glance. However, closer examination will reveal that it is a
powerful auction system just loaded with features. In order to
make TWD-Auction the best value auction application available,
we have spent countless hours testing, developing and refining
various layouts and features. We actively listen to feedback
from our clients and use that to add new options and refine
TWD-Auction to do more than just make it the best auction
solution available. The end result is a product that has
tremendous functionality behind the cover of an interface that
is as user-friendly as possible.
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How your web site operates will leave a lasting impression
on your site's users. The user interface side of TWD-Auction has
been developed so that new users can easily navigate through
the process of posting or buying auctions. However, we've also
kept the experienced user in mind by providing built in tools
and features that make it easier to manage many auctions at
once. Users of all levels will find that it is smooth and easy
to conduct transactions through TWD-Auction.
Multiple Auction Types
TWD-Auction supports several
different types of auctions: Standard, Reverse,
Multiple, Blind, Barter, RFQ,
Linked, Fixed Price and Turbo. TWD-Auction gives you the
option to decide which of these types you want to offer to
your site users. You might want to have a site that only has
Reverse auctions. Or maybe you only need Standard, Multiple
and Blind auctions. With TWD-Auction, the choice is
yours.
| Standard Auction |
This
is the most popular type of auction where the auctioneer
sets starting bid amount and the bidders drive the price
up. The highest bidder at the close of the auction is
the winner of the auction. |
| Reverse Auction |
This
is just the opposite of the Standard auction. The
auctioneer sets the starting bid and the bidders drive
the price down. The lowest bidder at the close of the
auction is the winner. This type of auction is perfectly
suited for auctioning of jobs, services, or items
wanted. |
| Multiple Item Auction |
The
Multiple item auction (also known as a Dutch auction) is
extremely common on business related sites. It is used
when your auctioneer wants to offer multiple items but
does not want them to be grouped together as a single
lot. The bidder then has the choice to bid on as few as
one item or as many as the total number offered. The
bidding process works similarly to a Standard auction in
that the bidders will drive the price up. The winning
bidders will be the highest bidders in the list that can
be fulfilled with the quantity of items being auctioned.
For example, if a Dutch Auction has 16 items up for bid
and at least six bidders want three items each, only the
five highest bidders will get all three of the items
they wanted. The sixth bidder will only be able to get
one item. Any subsequent bidders will not receive
any. |
Fixed Price Auction |
Fixed
Price auctions allow the auctioneer to sell an item at a
predetermined price to the first bidder.
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| Turbo Auction |
A
Turbo Auction, which can also be known as a "$1-No
Reserve Auction" in it's default configuration, allows
the auctioneer to auction low priced items and possibly
garner quick and enthusiastic bidding on highly desired
items. This is done by forcing the Turbo Auction to
always start at a low fixed amount (i.e. $1 - determine
site wide by the administrator), and does not allow for
a Reserve price option. Otherwise the Turbo Auction is
just like a standard auction in that the highest bidder
at the close of the auction is the winner of the
auction. |
| Blind Auction |
Blind
auctions are like standard auctions in that the highest
bidder at the close of the auction is the winner of the
auction. However, the difference is that the bidders do
not know their rank until after a blind auction has
closed; at that time, the high bidder is revealed.
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| Barter Auction |
Barter auctions allow bidders to offer anything
they want in exchange for an auction item. This can
include other items they want to trade, cash, or any
combination of the 2. At the close of the auction, the
auctioneer can pick which offer to accept. |
| RFQ Auction |
A
RFQ, or Request For Quotation, Auction would typically
be issued by an individual or organization looking for a
product or service that they will describe in the RFQ's
detail information. Then any people or organizations
interested in providing the product or service to the
auctioneer can submit their bid for the products or
services outlined in the RFQ. Their bid may typically
include additional descriptions or features of their
products and services in regards to the RFQ, as well as
any other limiting terms of their bid submission. At the
close of the auction, the auctioneer can choose which
bid he wants to accept. |
| Linked Auction |
Linked auctions can be used to link to items that
are actually on another site. The auctioneer can enter
the URL for the item, and then the bidder will be taken
to that URL upon attempting to place a bid.
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Auction Watch
The auction watch feature allows
users to register an interest for items they want. When items
meeting their criteria are listed, they will be notified via
Email. Additionally, users have the option to make their
auction watch public. This is a way your users can influence
the type of items offered for auction; Auctioneers can use
public auction watches to decide to list a matching item.
Memorized Auctions
Users can click on a button when
viewing any auction in order to add this to their custom list
of Memorized Auctions. This allows users to have one central
place to keep track of all the items in which they are
interested.
Bulk Uploader
The Bulk Uploader feature is a
powerful tool that allows advanced users to list a large
amount of auctions at one time. All you need to do is to
create a CSV file (typically in Microsoft Excel) with a row
with the properties for each auction. Based on your own
configuration options, TWD-Auction will generate a sample file
that users can download. This file will contain the necessary
headings and samples of what kind of data should be in each
cell. Users can take their time creating a CSV file when they
are offline, and just come to the site to upload all of their
auctions at once without having to go through the step-by-step
process each time.
AutoRelist
The autorelist feature allows
user auctions to be automatically relisted for a certain
number of times if they close unsuccessfully.
Bulk Relist
The bulk relisting feature
allows users to manually relist a large number of auctions
with one click of a button.
Multiple Currencies
Users can select a default
currency so that all prices will be displayed both in the site
currency as well as an approximate value in the user's
selected currency. This allows international users to have a
better idea of prices without having to go to another site to
do the currency conversion.
Auctioneer Marketplace
The Marketplace is an area where
power listers can be featured with a short profile and a link
to their current auctions. This allows new bidders to see some
of the most trustworthy listers on your site.
Price Drop Option
An auctioneer can select the
Price Drop auction in order for the starting bid to decrease
at intervals if no bids are placed. The auctioneer can decide
the minimum threshold, and the starting bid will never go
beneath that point. This can be useful if the auctioneer isn't
entirely sure of the market value of their item.
Highlight Option
Highlighting is one of several
options users can choose to make their listings stand out.
Users can even choose a color they want to use for
highlighting, from amongst a list defined on your site.
Withdraw Option
If for some reason an item is no
longer available to be sold, it is easy to withdraw the
auction. At the click of a button, the auction will be closed
and the current high bidder will automatically receive an
Email notifying them that the auction has been withdrawn.
Flash Buy
Auctioneers can decide to set a price
which they are willing to accept for an item if a bidder
decides he must have that item immediately. The Flash Buy
feature allows the bidder to pay a special price to end the
auction early and to avoid competition from other bidders.
Flash Buys can be used for both Standard and Multiple Item
auctions.
Reserve Prices
Not to be confused with a
Reverse Auction, a Reserve Price is an optional
feature of Standard Auctions. The Reserve Price allows an
auctioneer to specify a minimum price the auction needs to
meet to close successfully. Although the Reserve Price is not
shown to bidders while an auction is in progress, they are
aware that a reserve price is in effect. The reserve price
will be revealed at the successful close of the auction.
Proxy Bidding
TWD-Auction automatically supports
Proxy bidding on behalf of the auction bidders. Proxy bidding
allows a user to specify the maximum (in the case of a
Standard auction), or the minimum (in the case of a Reverse
auction) amount they are willing to bid. When a proxy bid has
been placed, the current bid will be posted at the best bid
price possible while the actual proxy amount will be hidden
from other bidders. When another bidder attempts to place a
bid, the previous bidder's proxy will go into effect in an
attempt to foil the new bidder. Whichever of these 2 bidders
has the higher proxy bid will end up as the current high
bidder. Proxy bidding encourages more activity by bidders and
typically drives up auction closing prices. The site
administrator can also disable the proxy bidding feature.
User Ratings and Feedback
An auction site is most
successful when it can generate some feeling of community. To
encourage users to feel more secure about who they might be
dealing with, users can rate and leave feedback on each other.
This public comment system encourages honesty and fair deals
since problem users are quickly pointed out. To avoid
artifically inflated ratings, users can leave a rating and
comments only on other users with whom they have conducted a
transaction.
Automatic Activity Email
TWD-Auction is designed to
help you keep your site users informed of auction activity in
items they have either posted or bid on. TWD-Auction can
automatically send out email notices to auction participants
when an auction ends and when a bidder has been outbid on an
item. TWD-Auction can also send out status emails to keep
auction participants reminded of what they have active on your
site. TWD-Auction works to help keep people coming back to your
site by keeping them engaged!
Special Views
TWD-Auction provides a number
of views, or ways your site users can look through all the
items that have been posted. By having a variety of views,
even the busiest sites can make it easy for site visitors to
find items of interest to them.
| New |
This view shows
the items that have been posted recently. The site
administrator can define the time period that is
considered recent. |
| Closing Soon |
The Closing Soon
view allows the site users to find out about items they
might have otherwise missed out on. Since on very active
auction sites a lot of activity might not occur until
the very end of the auction, it gives users a way to
locate and participate in the most active
auctions. |
| Hot |
The Hot view
allows the site users to quickly find the most exciting
auctions with the greatest amount of activity. Auctions
can be defined as Hot either by virtue of the number of
bids placed or the number of times they have been
viewed. |
Gallery View
The Gallery view allows users to
find only auctions that have images associated with them. The
administrator can choose to set a premium price for allowing
an auction to appear in the gallery.
Multiple Views Within Categories
Within a
category, users can choose to filter the results displayed
according to any of the following options: New,
Current, Closing Today, Last Chance,
Closed, Featured and Premiere. This is
another way TWD-Auction makes it easy for a user to find the
auctions that most interest him or her.
Searching the Auction Database
Since many people
do not have time to sit and browse through lists, TWD-Auction
Pro provides comprehensive search functionality. Searching in
version 3.x of TWD-Auction is more powerful than ever. Users can
search with multiple keywords either within a category that
interests them or else within the entire auction database.
Users can search for items by many fields and they can specify
as many or as few of these fields as they want. Searches can
include all the active auctions posted by a particular user.
This is a great feature for auctions, as some auctioneers will
create a following of loyal bidders. TWD-Auction makes it easy
for your site's visitors to find the items that will be of
interest to them.
Special and Additional Icons
Icons displayed with
auction items can make these items stand out to your site's
users. There is a HOT icon for auctions that have a lot of
bidding activity. There is a PICTURE icon for auctions that
have an image attached to them. Additionally, the auction site
administrator can define other icons to allow users to bring
extra attention to their items in lists. Administrator defined
icons are especially useful on niche sites since you can
configure them to have any meaning you wish.
Ease of Use
Since you need to encourage activity
in an auction site to make it successful, the ease of use in
posting an auction is extremely important. TWD-Auction really
shines in the way it guides users through the process of
posting an item. Even completely inexperienced users find it
simple to post an auction and upload images using TWD-Auction.
Comprehensive Help
We've strived to make
TWD-Auction as intuitively easy as possible to use. However,
since certain options or terminology might not be clear to new
users, pop-up help windows are used extensively throughout
TWD-Auction's user interface for added guidance. By clicking on
one help links conveniently located next to a user option, the
user will see a pop up window with an explanation. These help
files are simple HTML files that you can customize to suit
your site. A Buyer's Guide and a Seller's Guide are also
provided to help your site users familiarize themselves with
how your online auctions work. Since these are provided as
simple HTML files, you can easily customize the text to suit
your audience. Having separate help files in this manner is
also beneficial to the experienced user as it streamlines the
content of the pages used for posting and bidding.
User Account Management
TWD-Auction users
can manage their own account details. As the site
administrator, you do not need to personally handle change
like new phone numbers, email addresses, etc. Your site users
can keep this information up to date themselves. For sites
that use TWD-Auction's billing features, users can also update
and change their billing information (new card expiration
dates, change accounts, etc). The user account management
system that is built into TWD-Auction, is called XUD. This is a
shared user management system that will allow TWD-Auction to
integrate with certain other XCENT applications to allow for a
common membership database. XUD also allows you to protect
other pages on your web site and only allow access by
registered users.
Optional Image Uploading
If users want to include
an image in their auctions, many online auction sites require
that they find their own place to store and host these image
files. With TWD-Auction, you can allow users to upload images
for their auction directly to your server. This option is
seamlessly integrated into the auction posting interface. To
use this optional feature, it requires an image upload
component from another vendor to be installed on your web
server. TWD-Auction supports a number of different upload
components. TWD-Auction makes it easier to include
images with auctions than many of the high-end sites.
Optional Thumbnail Creation
When users upload
images, thumbnails can automatically be generated to make them
stand out in different listing views. To use this optional
feature, it requires an imaging component from another vendor
to be installed on your web server. TWD-Auction supports a
number of different imaging components.
Auto Extend Closings
TWD-Auction also sports an
Auto Extend feature which allows the auction closing to be
delayed if there is any last minute activity. The Auto Extend
feature can really enhance the last minute auction frenzy that
often occurs in auctions that have had little activity prior
to closing. The Auto Extend feature can be enabled/disabled by
the site administrator and also has an adjustable timeout
window. It can be used to help prevent users from "sniping" an
auction by attempting to make a successful bid at the very
last moment.
And More!
Of course, just reading through a list
of features and functionality cannot compare to the experience
of actually seeing how they work within TWD-Auction. So be sure
to visit the working online demo of TWD-Auction. The online demo
lets you play with a real functioning installation of
TWD-Auction.
Now
on to the Administrator's point of view....
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