Offer Acceptance Guidelines

[Debbi]

I am trying to develop some guidelines for myself about accepting offers. I would appreciate any advice y'all have to give. Do you have any rules about this practice? Every time I get an offer I go through a paroxysm of indecision.

I was thinking of something like:

Refuse offers for less than full price before the article has been for sale for at least two weeks (a month, six months, etc.?)

Refuse offers if they are less than 3/4 of the original asking price.

etc.....

Any ideas?

(Not that I'm being deluged with offers constantly, but I hate to let an unsold article go for $10 or less)

Debbi

[Celeste Stewart]

Here's my system: I don't use the best offer system

But yeah, it's nice to have a set of guidelines that you can apply so that you know you're not shortchanging yourself. A time period and percentage that you're comfortable with are good ideas. Then, if the offer passes your test, you can accept it without remorse. If it doesn't, you can decline it knowing that it doesn't meet your requirements.

[Debbi]

I've been wondering about the Best Offer option. Do you think it repels certain buyers? Maybe they think writers who offer the Best Offer option are desparate or don't have confidence in their work? Maybe they think the more you pay for something, the better it is? and does it attract buyers who just want to get everything as cheap as they possibly can and don't care about the quality? I certainly don't fault anyone for wanting the biggest bang for their buck but some offers are so low, they're insulting.

I think I'm afriad that if I don't provide this option, the majority of buyers will just pass over my work without even looking at it. Maybe I DO lack confidence in my work! Aaargh.....

Debbi

[Phil]

Since I only have two articles up and neither has received an offer I get to give the rookie perspective.

I will offer a best offer option for now but will only consider offers that are 3/4 of the asking price. I've found on other sites that it takes time for articles to "mature" and I am looking to see if that applies here at CC.

I need to look and see if you can toggle the best offer option on/off. If you can, then I will toggle it off for the first couple of months. Then after it has marinated awhile without selling, turn the option back on.

Just a thought. I'm new and so can risk looking silly without any real harm being done. Take Care

-Phil

[Lysis]

I've stopped using best offer too. Most offers are $5 for a 500 word piece!

[Antonia]

When I first started a few months ago, I used Best Offer on ALL my work (what? what desperation? there was no desperation!:))

Now, I use it on some pieces. My thinking is like this:

If I know I don't want to go lower than a certain price then I will not bother with the Best Offer. If someone is really serious about buying it but it's out of their price range, they can always email me.
If I wrote something quickly and easily, but feel that it is worth much more in terms of the value to the customer, I will price it based on the value. But then I check Best Offer because if someone offers less, but it's still a good price per hour, then I'll likely take it.

I keep track of how long it took me to write every piece so when I get an offer that I am not sure of, I just refer back to my spreadsheet. If it's a decent hourly wage I usually accept the offer.

I am still playing around with Best Offer and I am sure my use of this feature will change in the next few months. Celeste's practice of not using the option at all sounds very liberating.

[canywriter]

I also use best offer once in a while, usually when i found the article didn't take much time to write, and when I am not sure of its value to a potential customer. I was agonizing aloud recently a about one such offer - I had priced the article at $25 and the offer was for $15. My husband, who was around, said, "if it makes you feel good at the end of the transaction, do it. Otherwise, don't." My son piped in " guess it depends on how long you took to write it?". I tossed for it, decided I needed to earn some money that week, and accepted. Bonus - the same client bought another of my articles, priced at $20, along with it! So that one was a happy experience.

But the two perspectives I got from my family helped.

[Celeste Stewart]

"if it makes you feel good at the end of the transaction, do it. Otherwise, don't."

Words of wisdom there! Recently struggled with an assignment, and declined it, because of a philosophy like this. You really have to trust yourself to know what's right. A spreadsheet can help, but we all have that "gut feeling" that more often than not is worth following.

[Debbi]

After I saw everyone's posts, I decided to take Best Offer off all my articles (except two that I wrote in 5 minutes and haven't received many hits). I even raised my prices on some of the articles. One was an aritcle I sold usage rights in a public request. I raised its price and voila! today someone bought that article for the higher price I don't know if that was just a coincidence, but I'm sure glad I did it.

I was thinking before about Best Offers. I wished it didn't include that in parantheses after the title. I don't mind the little *Make Offer* button, but something about having that (Best Offer) statement after the title made me feel uncomfortale. LIke my article was the "blue light special". I think a lot of buyers just want to make a quick purchase and not bother with making offers and waiting around for the author to respond. Sort of like the impulse buys of candy bars at the checkout counter.

Thanks everyone for all your comments!

Debbi

[canywriter]

I noticed that second sale, Debbie - wasn't it the one about grandma and the in-law suite? Congrats!

[Debbi]

Yep! That's an example of writing for a public request on a topic I knew nothing about and for a relatively low price.

What kind of buyer do you think goes for usage rights? Not ones that want to build their search engine ratnkings probably. Maybe they're putting these articles in newsletters or something?

Debbi