Making people wait 60 seconds before accessing account

[largeformatphotographer]

I have been using the free version of Gixen for years but I have been seriously considering upgrading to the paying service the last couple of months as I have become a much more serious collector over the last year and I try and avoid bidding at all as I have seen prices go insanely high on items simply becuce a couple of people got into a bidding war. Its best to just enter the amount you are willing to pay in Gixen and leave it at that, but forcing people to wait 60 seconds for no reason at all has ade me consider using a different bidding service altgether. Its even more annoying than video sites making you watch advertisements. I just cant support a site that uses such methids to try and get people to become paying customers.

So at least in this case, your 60 second timer has had the exact opposite effect. Instead of getting me to become a aying member, its made me decide not to become a paying member. My advice would be to axe that whole idea asap.

[mario]

I responded already to a few emails about this, and I don't mind discussing it in the forum. So here is the reasoning behind it.

Gixen was free since beginning, which was more than 10 years ago, since August 2006. I made it running for free by having a day job. Mirror generated some income, but it has always been low. To give you an idea - I recently met at a conference one of the owners of competing, paid, service, and he has staff of 5, including himself, and supports that with 1/3 of the traffic Gixen has. Meanwhile I cannot afford to quit my job and support just myself. Mind you - I am not bitter about it, I chose my business model myself - but I have every right to modify it if it makes sense.

I finally realized that not only that it's difficult for myself, it's not even good for Gixen users. I cannot find time to make major improvements to the service - e.g. I have no time nor resources to develop mobile apps. I cannot take a vacation without constantly checking my cell phone, as I cannot afford to hire help. So I realized I have to increase revenue.

There were two ways to do this: one - to hike fees for Gixen Mirror users. I did not want to do this, as I actually owe a big deal of gratitude to mirror subscribers. And I mean it - I may not say that often enough.

As for free users, I owe them far less, in all honesty. And if there was not for mirror subscribers, occasional or repeated, the service wouldn't have survived at all.

I still want to keep the service free (with annoyances or not), as I understand that some users may not use the service frequently enough, or may not be able to subscribe for other reasons. But I have to make it worthwhile for users to subscribe. In the past 10 years I have been trying to do that by improving mirror service. Now, unfortunately, I have to do that by slightly degrading user experience of the free service.

I understand, to a point, your annoyance with this change, but if you re-think it you will realize that you really have no argument for it. You are annoyed because you are used to Gixen being free and without annoyances.

Gixen is still a very good deal, with counters or not. I would like to keep you as a user, but I am aware that I may not be able to keep everyone.

I hope this explains it.

[outstandin001]

Ads are OK for me. I´ll change my sniper if waiting times stays.

[Cupid]

I think what Mario is saying is that he is prepared to lose a few, in order to try and make the service more sustainable for the rest by increasing the proportion that support the service.

A few observations:

a> If you end up moving to a less reliable service, it might not decrease your overall frustration at having to wait 60 seconds every time you want to use this one, for free, as much as you might have hoped.

b> If you end up paying more than $6 for a similar service you will have actually lost out by leaving.

c> If your first recourse, after being asked to contribute something ($6 per year) after perhaps some years of using the service without doing so, when the opportunity has been there and the rest of community have thus supported you... is to threaten that service... then can you genuinely hold you head up high as an truly honourable Gixen user ?
_________________
Mark

[Gixen]

[BIFANOC]

I had paid for the mirror service but seems it expired. Where can I see the history/dates for when I had it?

[Mrmopar]

Sadly, this seems to be a typical attitude of too many people in current times. Not sure if most of these folks complaining are Millennials or if they are older, but that would fit the typical stereotype to a T. "I am annoyed by something that is absolutely free AND USEFUL to me. Make it stop or I will leave, you owe me that much."

To that, I say LEAVE THEN!

I can't say I have contributed enough to Gixen in comparison to the usage I have enjoyed, but I did subscribe for 1 year a while back after having problems multiple times with free snipes. I was fairly pissed off at the fact that the issues seemed to pop up at the most inopportune times. I really could only blame myself though, because I chose a free service over a pay service, not that a fee service can offer a perfect guarantee, free from troubles either. However, after that first year, I let the subscription lapse and have not renewed since.

The recent changes have had me thinking much more seriously about subscribing once again. Since the Mirror subscription, I have had a few more glitches that resulted in snipe failures. Perhaps for $6 for a year, these would go away completely. I think Gixen is a bargain and hope that it can remain free or low cost, but would rather see it go to a few service before folding all together.

Thank you for offering the service to begin with. I can't begin to tell you the time and money it has saved me over the years. I owe it to Gixen to give a small portion of that back! In fact, I am going to subscribe as soon as this posts.

[Rickajho]

[rplay]

Wasted quite a lot on other snipe sites. Given up hope then found this site. I have saved money using GIXEN. So will be upgrading soon $6 a year. Saved more than that already.

[mrmopar]

At the very bottom of the main page after you log in, it tells you when your subscription started (or ends possibly). There is also a link to renew right there as well.

[Dakid]

I don't like the timer either but its a small price to pay for a free service. Personally, I want to contribute but my financial situation at the present time does not allow me to. I do plan to contribute as soon as I am able. I am presently trying to return back to school so I can get a job that pays enough so I can pay for worthwhile things such as this service. If it wasn't for this service I would not be able to afford items that I need and would have to do without. We are lucky to have this service and I definitely plan to contribute as soon as I have the funds to do it. I hope this service stays online. My guess is that many poor people depend on it. I consider this service a community service and I thank you for keeping it online. I also thank you for putting up this forum so I can express my feelings.

[juangrande]

Thank you for your considerate comment. It is Mario's intent to keep the free version of Gixen available to serve people in your situation. Putting in the delay as an annoyance is a way to remind users of the free service that for a remarkably low price they can remove the annoyance and enjoy the the best sniping service out there.
_________________
John

If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
--- Yogi Berra

[lpope22]

I have used the Gixen free service for 4 years and I'm super grateful that someone spent their own personal time to create it and let me use it for FREE! Amazing! It has helped me scoop up great items on ebay and not have to get into bidding wars with other bidders. I really appreciate that. If I have to wait 60 seconds, big deal. You could ask me to wait 5 minutes, I don't care. I'll launch it and then go put on a cup of tea. It's worth it! If I had an idea for an app, you'd be the first person I would contact to code it for me. Gixen has been so reliable and worked perfectly all these years. Let the crybabies go to other snipers. You do not need the ingratitude. I foresee that ebay will figure out how great it is and buy Gixen from you so that you will be able to retire nicely, like they did with kjiji. Keep up the fantastic work!

[muchtobuy123]

I understand the reason behind the wait period , but the problem is I paid for a subscription and then began receiving notifications to join the service and then have to deal with the countdown ticker . I understand trying to make it hard for the non payers, but i paid and being treated like I am a non payer. Not very good customer service.

[Cupid]

muchtobuy123,

This is highlighting to you that the Mirror service that you paid for is not active on your account, please email Mario direct at the support address given on the Contact tab above.

Please include the details you can find, or recall, about when you paid your Mirror subscription, and also include your Gixen id, both these things will help Mario track down what has happened and why your Mirror subscription was not activated properly.
_________________
Mark

[play]

Amazed that somebody had the nerve to complain about the free service !

So it annoyed them, so what? thats the point! the annoyance can be removed by PAYING

Threatening that they should have the timer removed or else they will leave? well i would just ban them from the service. immediatly.

The ONLY good thing is it has highlighted the cost of the sevice, so i will be subscribing in the new year and not because i need the mirror service

[Just a user]

Couldn't agree more. I'm seriously p****d off by the entitlement generation. My youngest is the same; comes home from school with all sorts of "my rights" statements... guess how far that gets him!

Apologies for all those I've insulted, I know it's a stereotype, but I'm in the grumpy old man stereotype, so I reserve my right to live down to it

I've been using Gixen on and off since the start. Originally I got the mirror service by hosting a link on my own site, but I write and sell software too and totally get where Mario's coming from.

So I've subscribed.

[007macadder]

Mario,

I have been a paid up mirror subscriber for a number of years now (as far as I am aware) and I have saved a fortune using your software, however within the last 12 months, as mentioned to you in an previous email sometime ago eBay have software which tells other users that they are the higher or lower bidder, this encourages bidders to bid and undermines this software. The way I get around this is to still use Gixen but put my bid in within the last 60 seconds, if I did not do this then Gixen would not be as effective as it was previously. In the past, I had a 98% win rate, as eBay use this new software I can't guarantee this success.

Regards

Justin

[Juneyjoo]

I have just paid for Gixen Mirror and am happy to do so. I was paying a lot more before and having tried this service for a couple of months now I'm more than happy with it. I'm not sure why people expect to get something for free and this is an incredibly small price to pay.

[Cupid]

007macadder/Justin,

The amount of your snipe bid is not passed by Gixen to Ebay until the scheduled time... just as it always has been. It is thus not possible for Ebay to know what bid is coming, and instruct other bidders accordingly as you suggest, any more than it could over the many years that Gixen has been providing this service.

So, I don't know why you think the Gixen service has been degraded by the closer integration between Gixen and Ebay to perform that task.
_________________
Mark

[Lahiri]

Someone has to put in their time and efforts in building and maintaining a product like this, so I'm happy to chip in $6 a year.

It's a reasonable price to pay, but I do understand there may be people who wouldn't want to go down that path. I suppose the only option they have is to move to another free provider, if one exists.

[Cupid]

... or be prepared to wait 60 seconds to get in to continue using this one, for free ...
_________________
Mark

[Luckypz]

I have been using Gixen for a long time. I do'nt use it a lot as I don't do a lot of bidding if I did $6 is not a lot for a Service that saves you time waiting online and bidding manually on eBay

[play]

[harry]

I just cant support a site that uses such methids to try and get people to become paying customers.

[mario]

[HappyGixenUser]

[BellasGoose]

You must be joking. It's literally 60 seconds guys and the site admin has a very legit reason for implementing it. At the end of the day you use Gixen because it's the best free sniper - timer or not! But you're willing to waste your time trying to find some other crappy snipe site for the sake of saving 60 seconds of your day...? Go ahead. No one would lose out except you.

[underscore001]

why waste 60 seconds for this guy to prove his point, when there are so many other free services out there?

[mario]

[bikerjohn57]

I have been using the Gixen free service for 3 years and am quite happy to continue doing so, a 60 second wait is a small price to pay for such a useful and reliable app. If I were able to afford the Mirror service I would gladly pay for it but my current financial circumstances mean I have to use the free service, and grateful for it I am.

[f1losof]

A little bit of feedback:
I don't use the service much (3-6 times a year), neither do i need the advanced options, but I use the sniper from time to time. Two years ago around xmas i thought: I've been a user for 5 years or so, gixen was always good to me, why not donate as a 'thank you'. While I used my mirror-enabled account gixen did fail on me (sniped two items of a group not because there was too little time between snipe executions but because of a gixen bug) and I had some stress because I relied on a feature which worked for me fine before, but, hey, shit happens. Needless to say Murphy striked when I was bidding for used notebooks in the 500€ range, which is a lot of money for me. A friend of mine said 'oh i can use a notebook' but then backed down, so i had to talk the original seller into taking back the computer. In the end, thanks to a friendly seller, i did only lose the price for the postage and packaging (~10$). However, a 'sorry' would have been nice when we wrote about the incident, because I had all this real-world-troubles with communicating and waiting in line at the post office and stuff. I mean, I don't blame you for them, but you could sympathize, even though I didn't bring it up you could have known that it was trouble for me. Like it always is when deals go wrong. I wouldn't have minded that much if that error happened while i was a non-paying customer, but I was in that time, and thus I had slightly different expectations about reliability and the service. Now a year later we have this silly countdown. The 20 second countdown is way more endurable than the 60 second one, but I sure don't feel like "i want to say thank you because gixen was always good to me" anymore.

Have a nice day and a happy festivus

PS Posting to the forum doesn't work in Firefox 58.0b11 for me, but it does in Chrome 63.0.3239.84. Weird.

[G Singh]

[mario]

f1losof,

Can you please email me? Even though this was two years ago I would like to go back and refresh my memory about what happened. In situations like that one, where Gixen bug is responsible, I do my best to at least cover the expense (or more) users endure because of it. If I haven't already - I do apologize for it.

[areasonableguy]

Hello, children. Please consider your entitlement.

- It's one thing to be too cheap to pay $5 for something you use a lot.

- It's entirely another to complain about waiting 60 seconds to use it - especially when this literally saves you tons of time and money.

If don't donate because you rarely come here, you won't have to wait very long, will you? If you use it all the time, you really should be subscribing. And if you leave because you won't pay for something even when it is useful, why should Mario care? You are the worst kind of consumer (wants everything, pays nothing).

Thank you, Mario, for all of your hard work. For loving your product enough to support it despite earning very little revenue. The rest of us really appreciate all of your hard work.

[choohooo]

This is absolutely appalling. Am I wrong, or are you complaining about paying $0.50/month to use a sniping service that dramatically increasing your eBay using experience. "....my financial situation at the present time does not allow me to." Whoa! Mind blown. The guy is asking for a gallon and a half of gas a year. Every snipe you make you probably save $10-30. $6 is the difference between 1st Class and Standard USPS shipping! I'm not a guzzilionaire, I understand that times can be rough, but $6/year! That won't even buy Mario a Chipotle burrito to stay up late and answer your email. If you can't afford $6, you should probably reconsider the very internet/mobile service you are using to post on this site. If you seriously can't spend less than 2 pennies per day for this service, 60 seconds of wait time is the least of your problems.

Honestly, think about what you are arguing. Sure it's annoying as hell, but imagine the crap this poor guy puts up with every day on your behalf.

[Mike]

I never write comments on the net- I don't care. But Gixen and Mario are and I have to say that Gixen IS the best and always was the best,timer,paid or not.
The support is/was always stellar, the product is and was simply amazing. Guys, there are NO options to Gixen, none. Gixen worked and works for me and I cannot say enough times THANK YOU, Mario/GIXEN!!! Mike

[an1uk]

I'll just switch tab and browse ebay while I wait for the timer to go down. Unfortunately we live in a Neoliberal world where everybody wants to take (high cost of living), but nobody wants to give (low wages).

If we had a high wage low living cost society, businesses and small enterprises like Gixen would really take off as people would be happy to spend their spare money. This is something businesses all too often forget when they pay their employees poor wages to please shareholders. Even Henry Ford realised he needed to pay his employees a decent enough wage to be able to buy the cars they were building.

[GreenHornet]

Gixen is fantastic. Gixen with a 60 second wait is..................fantastic. I would love to see the owner be able to quite his day job and be sustained by Gixen revenue, but I don't think that is going to happen without dropping an Ad or two on the page. I don't know if I use the service enough to warrant paying for mirror, but have you considered levels of service? Perhaps snipe bundles? A 10 snipe pack for $1, 30 snipes for $2. I'm pretty cheap, but I'll pay a dollar for almost anything. Heck, I even gave a dollar to Wikipedia the other day.

[timihoscar]

[datasage]

Hmmmm.... how to use the 15 seconds productively.

One could use something akin to a captcha, that delives a message.

Users think nothing of answering a captcha, that has pictures, text, or asks a question.

Are "free" gixen users any different?

Another alternative revenue enhancer could simply be a SUPPORT button on gixen.

Many people simply "pass the hat" and request "donations". Another possibility is an amazon search for like items, and get the referral fees. A find simliar for "did not win" items might be nice.

The 15 second delay, could be used to display a "video" about some "paid" gixen feature, like groups. Of course, the time could simply display an ad of some time. I have personally used several "pay" sites, that I happy recommend because of quality of service/product - many pay for referrals.

These are not mutually exclusive and all be used. What's more they can actually improve the functionality of the site.

[bob]

i totally dont get it, people NOT subscribing.
i did it, even without the counter just to support this.
you dont seem to understand, if you successfully snipe,
youre sure to have saved WAY more than 1 year(!) fee of just 6$.
seriously, wtf.
how greedy can the people be??
thanks for the service, using it for 4 years now.

[mfenwy]

The 60 second counter is a bit of a pain - but i accept that you have to generate some income to keep the service going.

As an infrequent bidder it would not be worthwhile for me to pay for the higher service and I would not favour a limit on number of 'free' bids as I may bid on 10 items in one month and none for the next 6 months.

I would suggest however that as you have a lot of free page room - it would be beneficial to you if you showed changing adverts while the viewer is waiting for the counter to end.

This would generate better income for yourself as well as give the viewer something to hold their attention during the wait.

[mario]

[Battey]

60 seconds was a great idea. I am about to pay up. Service has worked flawless for me. Except you pissed off some whiners who are not paying customers anyway. They can call a waaam-bulance.

[ozzyzak]

Bunch of cry babies in here. This service kicks ass and he's asking for what...50 cents a month? If ya'll don't have that, ebay is probably the last place you should be.

[FoxBlue]

[mario]

[obydd]

I only login this time to say Mario "thanks for your time". I appreciate your effort to give us a free snipper alternative. I hope you could compensate with my thanks, at least one of the people that think your time is owned by them.

[jonesthephones]

GIXEN has won me very many eBay auctions and saved my having to sit by my computer for hours, to wait for end of auctions and then place a bid at the last moment manually.

So thanks, Mario, for coming up with Gixen in the first place and allowing free use over the years.

I would suggest that you simply dump the 60sec delay and make GIXEN a paying service for all, which will enable you to keep your annual charge as low as possible.

That way, my guess is you'll keep the vast majority of existing GIXEN users and then those miserly individuals who want it completely for free forever, can go and look for another snipe service.

This way, you'll have the income necessary to continue to support those of us who are grateful for the service and willing to pay a miniscule annual fee for the privilege.

I fully understand that you want to encourage users to pay for mirror service, but the 60 sec delay is probably seen as annoying to some existing users.

You're simply being too kind, in allowing continuing free use. Your mirror annual charge is tiny, so don't beat about the bush, just switch to asking for a small fee from everyone....

IDEA: You might want to build in the facility for new users to have say 10 free snipes, so they see how great GIXEN is, before splashing out and spending their hard-earned $6

Thanks again, your work is really appreciated. Regards, Alun

[depruett]

Gixen has been my go-to auction sniper for years. I don't use it often, but when I do, it has never failed me. It's undoubtedly saved me a lot of money.

People complaining about a freaking 60 second wait for a free service (a very useful one, at that) are unbelievable. Switch tabs, check your email, look at Facebook - we're talking about a minute! And good lord, grow up!

If you don't want to wait, quit expecting people to hand stuff to you - pay the 6 bucks for a year subscription! You can easily save that much in one auction.

[Trixen]

Lol, part of me can't believe people are complaining about a short counter to use this amazing free service. I've seen far longer counters for hosting sites just to use their crappy slow free download services.

The other part of me knows this is expected. Entitled and ungrateful people everywhere.

[droshodi]

[d13]

Totally ludicrous to be at arms with a free service over a few seconds wait. This isn't about being a "millenial" or whatever as everyone is completely different; it's about being grateful or being ungrateful.

I buy the Mirror service when I can afford to buy things, a lot of the time money is extremely tight and I have to shop accordingly.
I'm not whingeing that the free service is not good enough though - I would be embarrassed at my self if I did

[Goodgrief]

I've been using Gixen for a few months, and on adding a bid today, I noticed the timer. "Ohh", thinks I, "that's odd, what's happened?". So I read the text, totally understand the reasoning and now I want, like others, to thank Mario for a great product, but especially for giving-up all his time for FREE, spent developing and running Gixen.... and having to endure moaning and winging freeloading gits. [/b]

[f1losof]

Mario, my memory was failing me. You explicitly said "My sincere apology for this." and later "sorry for the trouble again." in the last mail, which i both probably missed because I was so upset.

However, my counter is now back at 60 from 20 seconds and I still have some issues using the forum.

[ebuyer0]

Pure Genius!!

You have set up something that values peoples time, in that they can use Gixen and allocate their time to doing something else.

if you save time are you not allowed to charge a fee for doing that...

ignore the something for nothing crew and take this to the next level. the support is already behind you.

[mario]

f1losof, please email me and include your eBay and Gixen usernames.

[racceber]

Thank you for the free service. It's appreciated.

[y0sti]

I have been a mirror subscriber for 4-5 years or something.
I use it weekly to buy items from China that I sell in my store. It must have saved me hundreds if not thousands of dollars already. And I would probably have lost like 90% of those auctions if I had to bid myself (they always end middle of the night...).
6$ in a year is a steal!

I actually would be interested to know how many auctions I have won with gixen and how much money that cost me. Would be fun and scary probably
Is there any way to see those kind of stats?

[Cupid]

y0sti,

All there is at present is what you get when you press the 'History' button.

That appears to go back to about August 2014.

You'd need to do a fair bit of processing on it to extract the information you are talking about though.
_________________
Mark

[Strathlad]

Apologies Mario, I have used Gixen for free for a good few years never checking out the community or any of the other tabs. I just clicked on through to get to the goodies. I just presumed that since it was FREE it made revenue from the hits it got. I did look at the mirror service once but when I saw they were West coast US servers I just didnt think they would improve my service here in the UK any so didnt bother paying up. I am now left feeling rather guilty that you set this up yourself and that your hard work has gone unrewarded all these years.

I have recommended Gixen to all my friends and now after subscribing myself I promise to chase them all up to subscribe also. Many thanks for all the auctions you won me. GREAT SERVICE would never dream of using any other sniper service.

[mario]

Strathlad, all eBay servers are hosted in US, including ebay.co.uk. ebay.de, etc. UK domain doesn't mean the physical server is in UK. It isn't - as far as I know eBay has no servers outside of US, except that they use Akamai for hosting of static content.

[lr2112]

I use Gixen occasionally as a free user and I do not mind the timer, but I think it would be more logical to combine the timer with ads on the login page. The idea obviously being that users - like me - can enjoy the free service but have to watch some ads in return. Of course the ads might be blocked (depending on the way they are hosted), but even so it would be more logical.

[OrangeCrush]

I have to admit, reading through some of these posts was actually really amusing. I love how people just immediately jump to the whole "entitled generation" BS. The last thing I am is entitled. I'm an architectural photographer that dropped out of college in my senior year of environmental engineering so as to pursue my dream of being a photographer. I then spent another 6 years in college, got my B.F.A. & M.F.A. in fine arts and then proceeded to start my own architectural photography business. I had to work 30-35 hours a week during my entire time through college. And for roughly 6 years after I graduated, I was DEAD BROKE as I had to turn around and invest any money made right back intoe equipment as large format photography is expensive and architectural photographers have to have entire lighting kits as well. By the time I actually started to make money I could actually keep, I had spent well over $100,000 in equipment while building up my customer base. I know people have seen the Ramen Noodle joke many times over, but in my case it is not a joke. There were literally hundreds of nights where all I ate was Ramen Noodles as I just couldn't afford to buy regular food.

It wasn't until the roughly my 5th year with my business that I actually started to make money. And during this entire time, including the years I was in college, I had to help take care of my mother, who had multiple sclerosis. My father passed away when I was just 11 from a heart attack and I am an only child. I guarantee people who haven't helped take care of a family member with a disease like MS or Alzheimer's has absolutely ZERO clue how demanding and terrible it can be at times. Thankfully she wound up passing away a few years later and I say thankfully because she was miserable and suffering terribly. Entitled, lol. I guarantee most people in here have NO CLUE what truly struggling really means or what its like to try and start up a business with very little money all while having to take care of a sick parent. There were times I actually lost clients because I had to pack up and leave in the middle of a job due to a medical emergency with my mother. To even attempt to throw the entitled generation BS in my direction is like trying to convince people Warren Buffet is poor. Its nothing short of laughable. Again, I guarantee most people in here have no clue what TRULY struggling really means.

And yes, I have been using Gixen for years, but during those years I only bid on MAYBE 4-5 items a year. So its hardly like I was being cheap and trying to get away with heavily using a site for free. It made no sense to become a paying member as I only used it once every couple months. All in all, up to this point, I have maybe bid on 35-40 items over the last 6-7 years I have used Gixen. So its hardly like I was being a cheapskate and heavily using Gixen for free. The reason I didn't become a paying member was simply because I didn't use eBay enough for it to make sense. As I stated in my initial post, I have become much more serious of a collector in recent years so I have been using eBay a lot more and I was seriously considering upgrading to the paying service because I was planning on using it a lot more in the future, NOT because I have been using it a lot more.

IMO, the only thing more annoying than all of the BS advertising on the internet is people on the internet who presume to know someone based on a single post thay make online. Honesty, those people are just as bad as fanboys and trolls. The sheer level of hubris that this entails is honestly nothing short of mind blowing. And I honestly couldn't give a rats a*s what other people in here think. I stand 100% behind my initial comment. To offer a free service and then punish or ridicule people for using that free service...well, that in itself is absolutely mind blowing. If you don't want people using your service for free, THEN GET RID of the FREE side of Gixen. Its that simple. Making people stare at their screen for 60 seconds as a way to remind them or convince them to start paying is the single worst idea I have seen to date in regards to getting people to pay for a site. I would much rather this site just went to advertising so I could actually watch something for 60 seconds as opposed to staring at a counter for 60 seconds and I hate online advertising.

Oh well, to each thier own. Again, your counter had the exact opposite effect for me. I was all ready to become a paying member, but refuse to do so now with such an awful system in place punishing those for using a system that pride's itself on being free.

[OrangeCrush]

By the way, this is LargeFormatPhotographer, the person who made the initial post in this thread. I accidentally used the name OrangeCrush and not LargeFormatPhotographer as my username on most sites is OrangeCrush.

[mario]

LargeFormatPhotographer,

I will have to delete that previous post, not because I am censoring the forum, but because now you started telling us your own life story which is frankly only remotely related to this, and it's a long reading.

I got your point from the first post, and I never said you were cheap. I didn't even think you were - I understand that occasional users may not see value in subscribing. That's OK, I have nothing against it. If I used the site a few times a year for items easy to find again, I probably wouldn't subscribe either.

But you have to also understand that to my and the site's bottom line it makes little difference if this had an opposite effect on you, and if instead of never subscribing you will now never never subscribe.

I had to do what I did, I accepted the risk, and still do.

[Guest]

I'm willing to pay 1% fee on my winning bids to bypass timer. I don't use gixen enough to subscribe, but I understand the value that it provides.

[Cupid]

If you are bidding less than a total of $600 a year, you can only be using the service once every few months ?

If your expenditure is that low any payment you did make to Gixen would be swallowed up by Paypal fees on the Gixen side, so I think it probably wouldn't make commercial sense.
_________________
Mark

[tio200]

I understand your point and agree with the holding tank feature, but its the real world, everybody has their hand out for something and its just part of something we must all endure. the world is a hustle, get used to it, every opportunity to make a buck, get used to it or get left behind

[Rickajho]

I want to know there is "a different bidding service" the OP is threatening to use that costs no more than $0.00 and less than $6.00 per year. Go price them out - good luck with that. Oh - and that works, at the very least, as good as gixen. Just sayin'...

I rarely bid on eBay stuff but I have been paying for the mirror service since long before this timer issue came up. Didn't even know it was an issue until I tripped across a whiny post about it. If you don't care for the $0.00 option I can guarantee you will not find any service out there that only costs as little as Mario is asking for the mirror service. $6.00 a year a problem? Move over to one of the other sites charging $6.00 a snipe. Really people - how much are you paying for your cell or cable service a month?

Mario many of us do appreciate you and your service. If you ask me it's worth a lot more than $6.00 a year.

Rick

[johnn7591]

Subscribed.
Not had the opportunity to use Gixen yet, however; the ethos of the owner sounds spot on to me and for a measly 4.54 Sterling per annum what's not to like or object to?

J[/i]

[johnn7591]

[johnn7591]

-should be HMRC now of course!

Also, to my way of thinking it's either Sub to Gixen OR % charge on purchases - not both. But as I mentioned a further 'tax' would be tough to chew and a deal breaker for me, we get taxed to death here in the U.K. - directly and indirectly

My two pence worth.....

J

[ferranti]

[discountpcsales]

I cant believe people are complaining, this is the best service for sniping Ive ever used and its amazing that the owner is happy to let people use it for free. It takes time, money and dedication to run a service like this and why people think others should just keep giving giving giving with little or no reward is beyond me. The cost is minimal and if you're that bothered about the timer just get your wallet out and stop with the entitlement mentality. Youve probably saved more than the fee with just a few snipes ya stingey bunch of freeloaders

[Rickajho]

If we want to ramp up the absurdity level even higher, in USD an annual mirror subscription costs 0.016438 cents per day. But if that pains you could always wait for a leap year and get a special deal at 0.016393 cents per day.

[tonyd5747]

I subscribed and yet still have to wait 18 seconds plus?

[Guest]

[johnn7591]

[mario]

[kbab123]

[a]

Leaving the service due to this stupid counter change.

[alanambrose007]

I sympathise with Gixen's need/right to earn revenue but I think the incentive / pricing model could be more advantageous to everyone.

I think a lot of people are conditioned to avoid subscription services as they'll think they're likely to forget about the service and continue paying the subscription. I've done that with Experian (at ÂGBP 15 a month and I didn't use it for years at a time) and myUS (at ~$250 per year). It's just human nature that for one reason or another at some time you may stop using the service and as you don't use the service you will forget to disconnect your credit card. There's also the problem of letting yet another service (that could get hacked) have your credit card or paypal details. Lastly, most subscription services don't have a way of handling low volume users to everyone's advantage. The user who uses the service a lot on a fixed subscription gets great value, the occasional user gets low value.

That means a lot of people are very resistant of signing up for subscriptions especially for stuff they don't use every day.

So: a cost per snipe (as % or $) or even a cost per successful snipe; a cost per month when if service is used; a commitment to stop charging a card after a period of non-use etc. Any of those systems may double or triple the amount of actual subscribers. I would be very happy to pay 2-3 dollars per successful snipe.

Alan

[mario]

[mytwocents]

Mario this is your site so obviously you have the right to do whatever you want and desire and I respect that.... but don't you think that you'd make more money by putting up some really basic ads? Even something super basic like a constantly auto-generated eBay EPN ad with really basic daily deals and stuff like that would get a ton of traffic and likely generate more $$ for you, for this service, than charging membership fees.

You certainly deserve to be compensated for this beyond donations, but you have a site with a ton of traffic geared towards people who are already inclined to use eBay. Just my .02. Thanks for the service.

FWIW - I'm a big fan of the site and it's saved me a lot of money but at the end of the day this same service is available other places for free. If someone offers me a brand new car for free, or the same brand new car for $4000, the 4 grand is still a really good deal but no rational person passes up the free option. You can say that "yeah well how much have you saved with ____ over the years! don't be cheap!" True -- but my heat bill was 150 bucks this month. Every 6 bucks counts.

Thanks again

[mario]

mytwocents, I wouldn't say that exactly the same service is available for free, not when it comes to features nor reliability. But I won't argue about it.

However, I will comment on ads - Gixen cannot use eBay EPN, and Google adsense, that it does use, does not make much, contrary to the popular belief. I would probably have to use something really annoying when it comes to ads in order to generate more income from it. Since I have seen sites that do this, and it becomes even unsafe for users (especially on mobile devices) as they don't apply the same scrutiny on content, I would rather stick with adsense.

Since the recent changes, there have been some complaints, but I don't see any decline in traffic or exodus of users, quite the opposite. I think most users understand why I made the changes in the way I did, and I sure appreciate they do.

[mikaolavi]

Normally I do not participate discussions all too much but on occasion I feel the need to encourage good work. I have used Gixen ever since I first time saw is over a decade a go and almost each year reneved my subsription to the mirror site. I've never had any problems using the system and the savings I've made using Gixen have manyfold exceeded the investment and is definitely worth every 600 cents a year. What, its like less than 2 cents a day, as a non-smoker I probably have saved enough during my life to afford Gixen until I'm 180. The 60 seconds waiting time is understandable and fully agree on it and if this bugs someone just spend the $6 for support and get over it. But if someone wants to leave because of this... well...I rest my case.

Thanks for the good work, Mario!

[Fretwise Harper]

First of all I would like to thank Mario. I have been using Gixen for over a decade, but I only bid on auctions occasionally, so it has never been worth my investment to subscribe. Mario has provided a means for me to be able to afford a few simple luxuries for my single-income family. If you are a free user, he owes you nothing. We owe him.

That said, I would prefer advertisements over a 60 minute wait. I would visit Gixen even when not making a purchase, just to generate a little revenue for Mario. He deserves it!

Thank you, Mario. Cheers to you and yours!

[vorrinz]

Hahah, vabbe' Mario, your anecdote about meeting your competitor at a conference and discussing numbers, is pretty excellent, fair enough, even though I don't really use gixen often enough to justify a paid account, I see your reasoning, and I liked your explanation, so I'm now un-pissed-off at the counter!

Best of lucks with turning this into something you can live off!

[User01]

I think a big problem is that you advertise $1 for 10 days. That's a shit deal.

However, after reading this thread I've realised it's $6 for a WHOLE YEAR. I'm going to sign up now because that's a great deal.

Lucky you linked to this thread or I would have just skipped over it. I suggest you point out the full year deal in the 60 seconds instead!

Also, it's very hard to find the sign up for this paid service. I suggest you make it a lot more prominent. Put an extra tab at the top saying "Sign up for premium!" in red or something. It took me about 5 minutes to find it eventually on my overview page on a small link at the bottom saying something like "mirror service".

Put this link and the associated price in loads more places.

[knight301wk]

I have been using this site for years and there has only been one unexplained hiccup (ie., don't know if it was me or Gixen's error). Mario has every right has the creator and manager of this site to do what he thinks best. Keep up the good work!!!

[hadrahana]

Hi, It's good to hear some of the backstory about how and why Gixen is running, a one man job? Thank you! I only use it about twice a year, but it has definitely saved me money. It's so cheap and has saved me a lot more than it costs so I'm buying even though I don't need it.

[FALKLANDFOX]

I am astonished that someone should complain about anything they do not pay toward. I moved over from Auction Sniper some time ago and have made hundreds of snipes with Gixen and saved a fortune. If anyone is not paying and not happy, move on to a pay site you'll soon be back. And if you stay, consider dipping into your pocket and pay toward this excellent service. I think Gixen should move on to a subscription for all which would be fair and acceptable.

[Hutchinsfairy]

[Kaori]

HI,I just registered free account here.
Until a week before,I don't know what is sniping-(I live in Japan and popular auction extends time when someone bids last minutes)

I began use here a few days before because so frustrated waking up at 4AM(JST),to bid some earrings.When I bid earlier,someone bids (of course)50cents more than my max bid.I looked up google,found out it's called sniping,and led to here.

And so grateful what you do free of charge.I will consider subscription when I use ebay more than now.and I even don't understand someone complaining for 60 seconds timer.Keeping server alive is huge task.Most of people know much more than me,but this Japanese old lady wanted to say Thank you.

[Hotblack]

I have a confession to make, I must have been using the Gixen sniping tool for the last ten years and because the free service worked, I didn't see the need to pay for it. In recent years I probably only used it once a year and have only just encountered the 60 second timer. It didn't bother mke that I had to wait a minute, I was more concerned that it wouldn't bid for me if I hadn't paid my $1.
I had a problem today where Gixen wouldn't place a bid for me because it picked up on the "Uk only" for postage and knows I am in Spain (which I've mentioned in a new thread) and it was bexcause of this that I first hit the contact button and then saw there was a forum. I have't read the whole thread but it's quite ridiculouis for anyoen to complain about a small delay in using a free service that is saving them money. I've now decided that my contribution to this site is long overdue but after hunting around the home page where it mentions the $6, I can't find any means of actually paying it.

[Hotblack]

Found it!

Went for the 2 year $11, must have saved 10 times that over the years so many thanks for the service.

One man's moan leads to another man's guilt. I feel slightly cleaner now having put my hand into my pocket

[bunbun]

annoyance is fine and all... but its screwing up the security token and I can't use the service.

That's unacceptable.

Error: Please login again now. Your security token has expired.
Error: Please login again now. Your security token has expired.
Could not add this item (xxxxxxxxxx)(1, -1).

[juangrande]

I don't think the 60-second delay has anything to do with your security token expiring. Have a look at this thread.
_________________
John

If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
--- Yogi Berra

[mario]

I'll repeat it here as well - you can renew the authorization / expired token from the Gixen settings page.

[Guest]

If someone is not paying and they threaten to leave where is the downside to the owner. User numbers only matter if you trying to sell ads which Mario clearly said he is not. Threatening to leave a free service has to be the most stupid thing I've heard in years. Also, if you cannot afford $6 for an entire year then what are you doing spending money on eBay anyway. Ingrates just piss me off.

[herrhepcat]

I love this service, and got my first mirror account back when you could get that for posting a banner on your own site.

I've paid for the mirror a couple of times (I thought there was a lifetime one once... was that something different?)

Anyhow, I know the value of the service, and am happy to pay for it on occasion.

Anyway, I'm a business guy, and while I personally don't really care about the counter, from a business perspective, it's a terrible idea. Your paying customers come from your set of free customers, and you should ensure any encumbrance they have to your service is at least a way of paying you... that would be understood. If you start the conversation with your free customer: "I get paid if you watch this video, otherwise, you can give me money.", they are likely to be more understanding. "I like your service, and I can chose how to compensate you, but I need to compensate you."

This path however reads a little like: "I have added a delay to my free customers. You are a nuisance to me, so I'll be a nuisance to you. Start paying, or deal with the nuisance."

It'll be a lot harder to get a sale with that message. The comments above are some evidence of that. And remember, while I know the value of the service, and sometimes pay for it... a new (free) customer does not yet know the value of the service, and you've added an obstacle for them to find out.

If you'd like, I'm happy to chat about some ways you can increase revenue without simply charging more for annual mirror service.

[mario]

herrhepcat,

There was never such a thing as a "lifetime" Gixen Mirror membership.

As for the other suggestions how terrible an idea the counter is, here are some actual facts that contradict your assumptions:

1. Of all users who typically use Gixen on a daily basis, around 40% are mirror subscribers. Only 4% have been mirror subscribers some time in the past, but not renewed their subscription.

2. Of users who subscribe to Gixen Mirror, 75% do it in the first year. 82% do it within 2 years, and 87.5% subscribe within 3 years of signing up. To turn this around, and combine with 1., if user hasn't subscribed to Gixen Mirror within first 3 years, there is around 5% chance he will do it in the future. Or at least this was the case before the counters.

In other words, there was little to lose by introducing a counter. I believe I am still reasonable about it - users who haven't used the service longer than 3 years, or who have subscribed at any point in the past, will have a 20-second counter. This was not an arbitrary decision, it was a result of the analysis above. The rest are displayed a 60-second timer.

Note that I still provide email support to all users regardless, and that I have nothing against users who do not subscribe. It's OK - if I used eBay twice a year for small-value items I wouldn't subscribe either, but then I wouldn't mind the counter either.

As for the comments above, I did consider them, but by large the reaction was very positive - and very few users complained. The bottom line also tells a different story - not only that income has significantly increased, which I expected, but number of active Gixen users has increased as well, and this I did not expect. I can only speculate why, but I assume that once users subscribe they tend to stick with the service longer and use it more often.

So, maybe now, as a business guy, you learned something new. I have, for sure.

[Cupid]

herrhepcat,

I personally would still be interested in your ideas of how to increase revenue without increasing the Mirror subscription fee, I believe that could be a positive conversation to be had, from both perspectives.

However, also on a personal note, one of the Gixen accounts that I have set up is unpaid, and I've had it for years so it now has a 60 second timer on it... I use it primarily in order to offer support to those users here that have such accounts, with things that are specific to that level of Gixen service, so ironically (in a British sense) my paying to upgrade it would, in this very specific case, actually do a disservice to the level of support I am able to provide here, so I'm unlikely ever to do it, for that account. Anyway, I digress, the point I wish to make is that actually I prefer the 60 second wait, before I can get on with trying to help people, as opposed to watching advertising, which, in general, really does tend to wind me up and put me in a worse mood... but maybe that's just me ?
_________________
Mark

[danghahn]

I came to Gixen because it was free, and i don't bid that often. I'm happy with everything about gixen, and don't mind waiting the 60 seconds. But i don't blame you, you deserve to make a few bucks off of the service you provide.

I will continue to donate the $1 each time i use it. I've paid for the mirror service a few times, just to contribute to a site that is very useful. I would suggest having a "Donate" link so i can throw in $10-$20 every once in a while for as i use the site.

[Tupac's Cousin Dave]

I don't mind the timer at all. It's a free service. I'm just happy that it's offered. It's comes across as pretty entitled to complain about something like the timer on a completely free service. You can always upgrade to the paid service. It's only $0.50 a month.

[herrhepcat]

Yeah I learned something.

Keep criticisms to your self. Few listen with an open mind.

[Cupid]

[justaguy]

I'm just a casual user and want to say thanks Mario.

You are helping many people, you are a kind soul, and the universe will reward you for your generosity. You do not need to justify your choices, and I'm sure there are thousands of us who feel the same way.

I'd say don't let a few bad apples change your clearly great attitude/s, but I think you are already wise and great enough to be above this.

I would be happy to wait 5 minutes if I had to, and if I had more disposable income I would happily subscribe too.

All the best for the future.

[paxamica]

Hi, I recently paid for the mirror service again but am still given the 60 second wait. Is that a mistake? I haven't actually used your service since I signed up for the mirror service this time,
By the way, I'm very glad you are protecting yourself. You deserve to get something for your efforts.
Thank you,
paxamica

[Cupid]

paxamica,

You should not be seeing the timer if you have a paid up Mirror subscription.

Please email Mario direct at the support address given on the Contact tab above and include all the relevant details you have to hand, like your Gixen id, your Ebay id, the date you paid your subscription, etc.
_________________
Mark

[Matt]

Infrequent user of a great service, now subscribed

[GnosticGnome]

I recently found Gixen.
Used the service free once, and then subscribed.
The best way to compliment any business or service, or programmer, for that matter, is to fund them if you find their work exceptional.
Since Gixen is a free service with a paid upgrade, anyone can use the service to gauge it's worth. Upgrading is akin to applause.

The system works perfectly, is effective, is cleanly and neatly put together, and is exceptionally easy to use. even if I rarely use it, it is a worthy addition to the toolbox. I applauded.

It takes a completely self important and egotistical individual to complain about a minor inconvenience using a service that they are getting pro bono.

Don't be a Richard Cranium. Contribute or deal with it.

[herrhepcat]

Cupid,

I did notice your interest, but I'm not certain of your relationship with the site?

It seemed to me I was rather dismissed by the site owner.

[mario]

herrhepcat,

Cupid is one of the oldest Gixen users who helps on the forum pretty much on a volunteer-like basis. I am very grateful for this.

And you were not dismissed. You gave your perspective, I gave mine. I have more data on my disposal than you do, and I shared some of it, which few businesses do. It was far from dismissal.

[Beaniecheese]

Occasionally, I might click a button to watch a 30 second advert that I have no intention of watching. Why? Because I get a free spin to win a random prize, or better still, a boost to help me achieve a task. Whatever its is, I'm being rewarded. Would I ever click the button if I was not being rewarded? No. Would I feel rewarded if the advert was forced on me. No. You want users to feel rewarded. So in that aspect I have to agree with what Herrhepcat has touched on. Maybe the 30 second advert or wait, could be rewarder with extra bids, and the free version has a limit to how many bids per week?

Please see below an abbreviated version of some things you might want to consider to considerably help you with your pricing and marketing.


Comparative Pricing

Not a good idea. You may not go for the cheapest. You may choose a different brand because you perceive it as the less risky choice. Or you may not buy anything at all.


Selling Time Over Money

A person’s experience with a product tends to foster feelings of personal connection with it, referring to time typically leads to more favorable attitudes—and to more purchases. I.e. How much time have you spent on eBay auctions – we can help you save time and hopefully some money too? Referring to time over money can help to potentially double sales.


Effect of “Useless� Price Points

A web-only subscription for $59
A print-only subscription for $125
A web + print subscription for $125

The price in the middle, while seemingly “useless� in that it does not provide any value (since the print + web is the same price) is actually useful in that it helps get costumers to turn from “bargain hunters� to “value seekers�. However, without the middle option, we can see that the price points has too much contrast: when the middle option is taken away, people look at the two prices and try to convince themselves that they don’t need the “upgrade�.


The Power of Number 9

We’ve all heard of the reasons why it’s used (to make the price look lower), but does it really work? Are people really going to be effected by a $99 price point versus paying $100? As it turns out, this tactic does indeed work, and has been dubbed the use of “charm prices.� William Poundstone dissects 8 different studies on the use of charm prices, and found that, on average, they increased sales by 24% versus their nearby, ’rounded’ price points. In fact, in an experiment tested by MIT and the University of Chicago, a standard women’s clothing item was tested at the prices of $34, $39, and $44. To the researchers surprise, the item sold best at $39, even more than the cheaper $34 price.


The Price Perception

A jeweler managed to sell out of turquoise jewelry because it was accidentally priced at double its initial price, instead of half (which is the price she had intended). The inflated price now made the jewelry irresistible to buyers, who had before ignored the color over all others (which was the initial reason for the intended price cut). Now that the price had been raised, the context of turquoise jewelry had a “high value� in the buyer’s minds, even without an explanation!

When it comes to price, priming is also heavily influential: a $60 dinner doesn’t sound so bad when anchored next to a $300 dinner. Similarly, the best way to sell a $3,000 suite is to put it next to a $10,000 suite!

[voskulenbart]

Hi Mario,

Just a quick thank you for keeping the free service. Over a number of years I have used your free service quite irregularly, but successfully. If I would have had to pay for it it would probably not have been worth it, but if you were to ask for donations that might be a useful alternative. In the meantime, I have no problem at all with the delay counter. Thanks once again for a great service.

[Guest]

[Missy]

When I first found Gixen around a decade ago. I had tried some other sites and they didn't work. I was sooooooo mad. When I found Gixen and tried it, it worked the first time. Getting something or a service for free, you can't and shouldn't complain. Be thankful. They don't have to offer it for free. Take it or leave it. That I've learned since I was a kid. If you didn't like what mom cooked for dinner, you ate it or you went to bed hungry. Be appreciative of everything you get. I haven't used Gixen in a little while since I haven't been able to shop much lately. I do buy here and there. Today I needed something and wanted to make sure I got it. I've learned if you place your snipe too close to the ending of the listing it may not work although nearly all of mine have. I think I've lost maybe 1 or 2 that way. Sometimes you just have to take a chance on it and hope for the best. But I haven't had any trouble. I think in 10 years, I've had maybe 2 regular failed snipes? I have used Gixen for almost the time it's been here for free.

I was watching the listing I wanted today and it only had about 1 min left on the listing. I didn't think I could sign in fast enough to catch it, but tried anyhow. I signed into my acct and saw the 60 second counter. With this being new to me, I thought for a split second 'Oh crap now I gotta wait. I won't be able to place the snipe before it ends.' Then I thought, I'll just have to raise my max manually and hope for the best. Snipe or not, it's all about how much you are willing to pay and who much the other bidders are willing to pay. It's not pretty, but I don't mind the 60 second counter because this service is free and it works for me. Thank you Gixen I hope you stay free even if we have to wait 60 seconds to be able to place our snipe. It's a trade off for getting something free. The creator can change whatever they want when they want or stop whole show altogether. It's up to them, not us. Sign in and let it count. Go read an email or grab something to drink. Life changes daily. We have to learn to change with it.

[kbab123]

[NilsonHerr]

Why do people complain about free services? When something is free they act like they paid for it or take it for granted. Happens all the time in life.
Bad mannered, shame! Gratitude is what you lack!

Make it 300 seconds! Haters gonna hate... and trust me, haters gonna wait

I have been using this for years and when I used to be a school boy I only would have used/recognized it because there was a free service. So that is nice.

Mario I have been reading about chunks, how does that work? It sounds great! I would rather buy those chunks than subscribe for a year. I do not see any option to acitvate that.

[Grahambeetle]

Personally I thought the wait was a tiny bit irritating ...
But they I realised that for $6 I could avoid that wait...
So if the wait irritates you, make the payment.
Frankly if the wait doesn't irritate you, make the payment anyway.
Look at it this way - if this site can't continue, it stops operating. They you either have to go back to "pre-snipe" eBay, or have to pay to use someone elses' site. Make the little payment and help out.

[peachy]

Just dropping by to say thanks to Mario.

With the advent of local p2p buy/sell apps and forum marketplaces, I now rarely use eBay, much less for "classic" style auctions since most product listings are fixed-price nowadays. The last time I used Gixen was years ago, and frankly I've even forgotten what it was called and had to look it up on google.

I'm not among the league of paying customers but am grateful to those who do and to the developer who has maintained this service for so long. A short wait for me is perfectly acceptable if it means more people who use it often (or at least often enough to not tolerate 60-second wait) pay for it.

[make7]

Mario, What are you thinking over there?

Ok, I love Gixen, I initially switched from a competitor. I did have a mirror subscription way back when I used Gixen all the time (my counter still is 60 not 20, not a big deal just saying).

Nowadays most everything is buy it now as we need it now, so I don't use it much if at all. I just had cause to come use it today and found I had to sign up, and now there's a counter, and a 60 second counter.

I clicked the "why a counter" just because I was waiting anyway, and I read these posts. Again, because I was waiting anyway. As I started to read them they made me laugh, so I read some more. After reading most all this, and being a fellow business owner, and someone who loathes to work, and not get paid for it I completely empathize with your predicament.

However, I'd like to point something out to you. My guess is (and correct me if I'm wrong) the counter serves to try and monetize your time by getting people to sign up for mirror at $6 a year (very reasonable I always thought). I have no way to know if that is working or not. If it is that's great, mission accomplished. If it's not working, and people aren't signing up you might look at alternative paths to monetize the traffic. For me I have no need for mirror at the moment, but I'd have gladly used my 20-60 seconds watching a stupid ad or clicking a stupid link, or doing any number of things that might have made you something, anything at all for the use of the Gixen service. Far better imho than waiting and doing nothing and you still didn't get any $$ and I wasted time for nothing.

You mentioned alternative "service plans", I'd pay you $6 for a year of "used mirror". Like I said I haven't been here often, but when I come you could track me and charge me for 365 days of "use". ie., I enter my snipe and the listing goes 6 days that's 6 days "use" or 1 snipe = x days, or whatever. Hell I'd even pay $6 for 6 months "use". Maybe even your $6 "use" expires after 2 years, or after 6 months of no use. $1 for a 30 day window? I don't know just tossing out my thoughts to try and help.

My simple point is, the counter isn't just an annoyance, if it doesn't make you $$$ it isn't helping, and it's just being annoying. I'd like to see you make $$$ because I don't want to come here and find that like so many other devs they stopped devving because they couldn't afford to. I'd just like to suggest that if I have to wait because I'm not using it often enough to pay for it annually, you figure out a way to get some payment for my wait. Then at least you could tell all the complainers that while they waited you earned something for your time and effort to keep the site up and running and keep doing a great job. And hey if they don't like that then they can always sign up for $6. The same premise that cell phone apps have ad free versions (paid) and ad versions (another way they get paid). Because as one business owner to another, at the end of the day, the goal is to get paid.

To everyone who's complaining, just keep in mind, many things are and have been free until the day you come and find out that there's now a fee. Here you have found it's still free but you must wait a minute. Tomorrow you may find there's a fee just to come and use it. Then you'll really have something to complain about!

The moral for Mario though- "If you're gonna annoy use please find a way to profit from it" lol.

All the best!

[silverdean]

Small time ebay'r here. 60 seconds gives me time to appreciate your free service. I'll kick in for the mirror eventually after my guilt quotient bites me in the ass!

[gsm9999]

I find it amusing people are complaining about $1 when there is a free alternative (GIXEN with the time delay) that takes a WHOLE minute of waiting.

Heck, that's more than enough time to write your own program and $1 is a tiny fraction of what it takes to pay for hosting. The outrage that so much is being asked! What are you waiting for?

When I see a signature that says <Everything I do, I work for free> maybe I'll take the crying seriously. This is a simple business decision. It is either worth it to you or not. If 60 sec is too big a price to pay the crushing burden of $1, don't let that screen door hit you on the way out.

I also have to reflect on how many of the complaints posted above took more than 60 sec to compose.

[blazer003]

Honestly, if you're not paying for Mirror service, and you leave, you're doing him a favor. You're not sucking resources without providing any form of payment. I haven't been ebaying much over the last year, so let my Mirror subscription expire, but I find myself looking again for camera equipment, so I'll GLADLY re-up again.

[bmp02]

First, I have a strong aversion against people who think everything must always be free. Parasites.

Second, I find Gixen to be a great service, and probably wouldn't even have thought about upgrading (because well, it already works fine now) if it hadn't been for that nasty counter. Yeah, it's nasty, but I get it.

Anyway, anyone dedicated enough to making a service like Gixen that actually works great, and then offering it to the public, just deserves to earn those 6 bucks. Having used it just a few times, I have saved so much more than that. It saved me much time as well, not having to bid again and again on the same Japanese auctions that always close in the middle of the night. Plus, the group option is just perfect!

I'll be upgrading in a sec. Thank you!

[UserOfGixen9999]

I have actually didnt mind waiting the 60 seconds, because well Gixen is the best.

But thanks to this annoying OP I have gladly upgraded my account. BTW it tool less than 60 seconds.

[Guest]

Can't believe people threaten someone who has been providing a free service. wtf

[casperfiona]

Yes, I second the motion!!! "If you're unhappy w/the service just leave quietly since you were never coerced nor invited to subscribe here in the first place.
Gixen NEVER sends anybody NAG-ADVERTISING/SOLICITATIONS to join.
There are many services out there that may equal or out perform Gixen,
so either live with it, or walk away!!!

It was perhaps your incompetence & helplessness that got you here in the first place.Bidding doesn't come in a silver platter! You either win some or lose some,don't expect others to carry your own weight, nor others becoming a sacrificial lamb for your sake.Be appreciative rather than be a parasite bleeding on Mario.

Sustaining one's own life never comes free!
Ergo getting Mario's gixen service for free is a privilege and not a right!
Hence, don't demand nor expect too much in return.The least you can do
is to contribute or express your gratitude to it's creator/programmer.
It is better to take your greed & attitude elsewhere.If you want a totally free
life with all it's perks... There's the internet cyberspace for you �
Needless to say, only lazy people who can't take care of themselves have
the gut to complain this way!

Re:waiting time on the free service " IS NOT AN ISSUE"
Hence, whether you pay or get the service for free...vis-a-vis
you have to merely accept & undertake the consequent risk for depending/relying on a bot-machine to look afer you... sillly 😆
Or might as well get a 'Nanny' to look after you & sponge your hang-ups.

To the rest of those sensible folks out there 😀😃😊�
Say "Thank you to Mario for keeping us entertained 😇"

Amazed that somebody had the nerve to complain about the free service !

So it annoyed them, so what? thats the point! the annoyance can be removed by PAYING

Threatening that they should have the timer removed or else they will leave? well i would just ban them from the service. immediatly.

[collect987]

I am new to GIXEN, I have always used Goofbid in the past. Now I have discovered GIXEn I will transfer over to it. It has a mirror facility and is cheaper than goofbid. I cannot believe that people are complaining that they have to wait a few seconds before they can use it for free. After reading your reply Mario, it has convinced me that I will become a subscriber. Maybe there is somewhere you can show that to every non paying user that logs in so they realise why it is important to contribute a little to further enhance the product. It worked with me! All the best.

[fragment7bus]

I got this delay before I paid for my use of Gixen. Now that I've paid for it, why do I still have to wait to get to my account?

[juangrande]

Please contact Mario directly at his Gixen support address, using the directions on the Contact page. Be sure to provide him with your Gixen username so he can look up your account.
_________________
John

If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
--- Yogi Berra

[UCF Knight]

First, thanks Mario for what you've done with this site. I discovered Gixen only a few months ago, and have only started using it this month. I am a Mechanical Engineering/Robotics student, and appreciate how much time and effort it takes to create and run a website with this kind of functionality. I tried other sniping services, and they all cost much more than this one, with fewer features.

I saw this thread and that prompted me to buy a subscription out of gratitude. I'm using it to get some engineering exam books, and if that's the ONLY item I got in 2018-2019, it's worth the price. Ignore every single whiner for what they are - entitled brats. Like a pot full of 'em! I'll address the three main ones in the next three blocks...

-For the person who says they "can't afford" $6 for the yearly service, yet has the discretionary funds to be shopping on eBay - STOP LYING. You're really cheap, because if $6 is a lot of money, you can't even afford to pay attention, much less shop on eBay.

-For the person who "doesn't use this enough" to justify paying for the service, you'll make that back within one or two auctions. Period.

-For the person who is hot and bothered about having to wait a paltry 60 seconds to log in...go on eBay and buy one of those fidgeting spinners. You obviously don't have enough to do in your life, and seem to be unfamiliar with tabbed browsing. The truth is that you want your cake and to eat it too. I get it, princess...everyone's hard efforts revolve around your personal benefit and comfort. We're here to serve you. I scarcely noticed the 60 second wait, much less was bothered by it. Fine; leave, and don't let the door hit you where the good Lord split you, snowflake.

[Innomen]

I'm sure the timer will be profitable.

You'll always find people willing to tell you everything you do to make money is ok. If nothing else because so many people are asked to do unethical things in order to live and are eager to absolve themselves via absolving others.

"Just doing my job" is the modern version of the Nuremberg defense.

I agree you deserve a living, indeed I believe all other humans owe it to you on the grounds that we all deeply profit from culture in ways we can't even detect.

Put simply I believe culture should pay up front because it is immortal so long as humans live and it has all the money by default. It should invest in us first, not the other way around, and certainly not contingent on an investment return.

However, that argument should be made at society, not at your customers. Yes you have the absolute right as a businessman to do whatever you can get away with for profit and at whim, but customers are equally right to in turn use other services.

Survivor fallacy means you won't see the people that leave or fail to join. But it likely won't matter. You probably will indeed make more money this way. And everyone will tell you it's ok. Because we worship profit.

I rarely use your service. I paid for a year in the past as thanks for a number of good deals you helped me get. When your service saves me money I share the savings by buying subscription time.

This timer makes me less eager to do that. It makes the whole effort feel like I'm dealing with yet another greedy suit. Regardless of your self image or even the reality of your context.

Do with this information what you will. /shrugs

The whole reason kindness is laudable is because it's not always profitable.

[Cupid]

Thank you for your kind post, Innomen.

It's an interesting divergence to advocate starting a campaign to get social funding... I can't see that bearing many fruit but I do wish you luck with your efforts on that front.

Though personally I have more than a slight socialist tendency, I recognise that markets do have a place and are not always such a force for evil as is perhaps implied. After all sniping isn't for the social good, it's for individual profit, and that's certainly something marketeers understand well.

No one is held to ransom here, indeed anyone can continue not to contribute at all if they so wish, and still have access to the standard features. They might have to spend a few seconds doing something else while they wait for access, that's hardly the worst any of us has to put up with on any given day, is it ? It is acknowledged that other similar services exist and that there is a competitive market, it's open to anyone to play that field and if they do find a deal that is better for them there really are no hard feelings.

Asking those people that find a service of use to them (as evidenced by their ending up on this thread) to contribute a little, is hardly akin to the massacre of millions of humans, really, is it ? I would find it hard to believe anyone thinks there are Nazis running this site.

Personally I don't worship profit, but unfortunately in the society I live in, I do need some in order to avoid destitution. I don't think I've ever seen Mario wear a suit, though I'm sure he does own one. I doubt he would ever have bought one from the profits made on this site though. Fortunately for him he also has saleable skills that have enabled him to maintain this site in his spare time, on occasion funded out of his own pocket from selling those skills elsewhere. For many years that has benefited the whole community here, and I hope that will continue to be the case for many years to come but we really shoudn't take it for granted, should we ?
_________________
Mark

[Rickajho]

Just pointing out the obvious (again):

Why is it some people who weren't paying for the service to begin with are feeling compelled to share that since the timer came into play they... will continue to not pay for the service? Why they are practically being forced to not pay for it now! (Sheesh...)

There is value in the sniping service.
There is value in my own time, not having to sit and bid manually on eBay,
There is value in the high reliability rate of the mirror service.

Considering all that, I cannot fathom which aspect of the service grinds people's gears into claiming $6.00 per year is somehow an outrageous cost for what you get out of gixen. I am not a high volume bidder on eBay. Never have been, probably never will be. But even before this whole timer thing came up I paid the six bucks for the mirror service after I placed about 3 snipes via gixen. I get what that added reliability means. I also get that none of this happens for free. Mario's only fault in this situation may have been being far too generous for too long because the end result seems to be complaints of "How dare you expect me to pay 50 cents a month for something you were giving me for free!"

Some times I'm truly embarrassed by the human condition. Sigh...

Rick

[Xaunloc]

[tigting]

Mario, you rock! I truly appreciate what you have done for the Gixen community.

You have committed to creating, improving, and supporting a sniping platform that all the posters in this thread have come to value. And it is my belief that Gixen is absolutely the best platform for sniping eBay auctions and also the best value in the auction sniping world.

I have seen you adapt to API changes by eBay time after time – and quickly. I know and have deeply felt your level of commitment, dedication, and sacrifice. I also know that few of us have the wherewithal to perform such magic in programming nor are willing to devote a fraction of the time and energy you have given to the effort.

Many times I have seen you dig into the data in support of every last Gixen user who has ever had a problem with their snipes or the Gixen interface, be they free user or mirror subscriber.

I, for one, applaud your ethics, integrity, and dedication in pursuit of your dream of providing this service for all. Actually, I feel that you have performed an extraordinary service for each of us.

Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU!!!

P.S. I am gladdened to hear that your service is becoming more viable as a result of implementing the timer. And I, especially, appreciate you sharing the Gixen data and your take on that data. I appreciate, also, the solid thinking you shared in the three or four posts you made in this thread.

I know it is against your principles, but you really should find a way for individuals to support your work by implementing a "click to donate" option.

... just one man's opinion ...

[Marioferu]

I Just want to say that I have been a mirror user and I am planning to become one again for $6 monthly. Thank you Gixen.

[mas]

[djoptix]

Long time Gixen user here, I haven't read the whole thread but I've picked up the gist. $6 is unbelievable value. In fact, don't take me as representative of the whole customer base, but if you put it up to $10 a year I would still very happily pay it, and probably even at $20. Thank you for an elegant and super-useful product. I've done a some software development myself, so although I'm not a coder, I know how much work must go into maintaining what looks to the end user like a simple product. Thanks again from a happy user.

[Rickajho]

[Cupid]

[ebay123]

I'm trying to find my payment too. I searched my email for “Gixen� and PayPal. Could you let us know all the ways you received payments and what the requirements were (email for paypal, name written to by check, etc.?)

I love Gixen and have probably used it for the whole 10 years, not on every auction, but boy was I delighted when I won, my items, at such a bargain price. You have been good at keeping up with eBay's terms and when they changed their requirements.

I say to the people who want it free, "Wow what a blessing having it free for 10 years!" Can you feel the gift that was presented to us?

Another idea is what if we had to be the one who designed this great sniping tool? We have yet another gift; being able to enjoy the gifts that were created off of the sweat and tears of another soul who put the effort and time into it and freely shared it. Thank you for your skills talents, time, and everything else about it I don't clearly see.

Sure there are other sniping tools, but I would guess if you aren't grateful for this one and are compelled to say thank you for all your hard work and dedication bringing this to me, (us) well you probably aren't really grateful for the other people's work either.

I believe if that is the case you might be a type of person that makes a mess rummaging through something good, take what you want and leave not only the rest you consider of no value to you, but quite a mess behind too, without thought or consideration of others.

Maybe you consider yourself so important that people want or at least should want to freely spend their time, energy, and/or resources catering to your needs (wants). That might be something to take a closer look at.

I really am not trying to be mean here. I use to be the same way without considering how I was coming across or even where my heart was in the pursuit of my goals or towards the other person.
Either way I want to take this time to say thank you Mario for thinking of our needs and trying to bring a good product to society.
I didn't think of you as an individual but as a company, I never considered you were doing it in the pockets of your time, and I certainly don't know how long it takes to create and maintain Gixen. Somehow thinking of Gixen as a company leaves me to consider it ok to continue not to pay for the services, but then there goes my flawed thinking again. I am working on that too. Please forgive me if I offended anybody it is hard for me to communicate this in a better manner. (I’m a work in progress)

Sincerely,
Deborah Leffingwell

P.S. I know a much more lucrative way to spend the pockets of your time. You could use the time saved on your hobbies, relationships, or anything else you like. It has helped me change my character, realize how I am coming across to others, and is helping me to become very valuable for society too, all while getting paid excellent money. I would love to share it with everyone, especially you Mario. Keep up the good work and thanks again.

[Rickajho]

[Cupid]

Deborah (ebay123),

Are you saying that you think you paid for the Mirror service but that it is still asking you to subscribe and not providing you with that service once you have logged in ?

If so, is ebay123 your Gixen id? Mario can probably look into it behind the scenes if you can supply your Gixen id... it might also be helpful to provide your Ebay id, just in case you have set up more than one Gixen account for that Ebay id... if that is the case you will need to transfer your Mirror subscription from the account you were using when you paid to the one that you are using now.
_________________
Mark

[ebay123]

yes

[ebay123]

my ebay account is *power_sellers
I did pay and I'm having problems accessing your services.
Thanks so much for helping me.

[juangrande]

In order to resolve this quickly, please contact Mario directly via his Gixen support address using the directions found on the Contact page. Be sure to provide your Gixen username (as well as your eBay account name) so that Mario can look it up.
_________________
John

If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
--- Yogi Berra

[Sourpuss]

[gixen_user111]

On modern displays, the login waiting/click-through page looks like having too few content and too much whitespace.

A suggestion for improvement:
the waiting/click-through page could have a much bigger (BIG) ad banner

[colinswatches]

I just cannot believe what I just read!! People whining because they have to wait 60 seconds when using the free version. The answer is simple, use the paid service. It costs only $6 usd per year AND you possibly save this on your very first snipe.,
I have been using the paid / mirror service of Gixen for years. Over that time, it has saved me far, far more than the cost of subscriptions.

[gadgets]

Hello,

I paid for a couple years and then when I decided to go with a free version because of money difficulties.
always made donations for free software and apps when possible, I'm not sure but I think I've made a couple donations to Gixen, Only now I don't see that option.

Instead of the 60 sec wait why not make an annoying popup donation request, let them know why you need donations and if they donate the price of a membership give it to them in that way, of course, let them know the popup will cease if a donation is made at or above the members fee,
along with along with receiving all the perks of becoming a member, I think people will feel better about the fee if it feels more like a donation, and the perks will feel like a reward for doing a good thing,

To me, the 60 sec waiting period feels more like a punishment for not being able to afford it.,
Also in my case, I still would have donated or this year if it were possible, I wonder how much more money you are now receiving due to the 60 sec wait time, Maybe you could add a high pitch squeal and a naked photo of a 400lb old lady, I wish I could see the difference in profit gains compared to the previous method of earnings.

That 60 sec could be going to better use, Instead of it being a negative experience it could be a bit more positive and also a way to send your clients' important info and make money at the same time,

I wonder if you were to set up a donation page popup
asking those that have the means to please give a small amount $$ if possible and reasons why.

I can believe 80 or 90% of people would donate, but what harm would there be of posting 1 add at the very top of the gixin shooting gallery,

letting people know if the pay the members fee the donate page goes away and same with the add,
I am sure you would then make enough to hire and develop
and not have to worry about having to work during a vacation,.ji,
and perhaps pay for them as well,

I know of people who have done similar and they have enough for good employees who develop and look after the apps while the owner is on permanent vacation, But (unlike you) he still pretends to be underfunded,, Although I don't like that particular method of obtaining sympathy and increasing funds., Still it does just that,,

I think its great that you are keeping the option of a free Gixen,

Thank you so much Gexin [/b]

[gisforgirard]

this might not be the greatest thing ever for the business model

but its not the end of the world

ebaydts.com/eBayKBDetails?KBid=5102

[lolzmaa]

I don't mind the timer. But why it log us out when we click on following buttons?

Home
Why snipe?
Compare
FAQ
Community
Terms
Contact

[mario]

lolzmaa, you are not really logged out, only session is not saved. You can right-click and open other links in a different tab.

[kres]

Hi, I just subscribed.

Why do we have to wait after login? I mean those few seconds with the message "If not redirected to your account in 5 seconds, click here.", not the 20/60 sec timer.

Thanks!

[Foggy]

Why would someone complain about the low charge to be able to use this worthwhile service?
Its a WANT WANT WANT society and they want it all for nothing.

GROW UP! Give the guy his payment and sit back and enjoy the service.

[Cupid]

[Cupid]

[kres]

Thank you Cupid! It makes sense

[bigray]

i didnt get through all the comments but wanted to message and say thanks! my subscription ended not long ago and i havent renewed yet. but im happy to pay and support you.

its true, the other sniper sites are F***ing 10x the price of this. they are big rip offs. also some arent as easy to setup as gixen is.

i dont think anyone can justify complaining about your subscription setup. its the cheapest and you also offer it completely free (with a timer haha)

please show me a quality sniper service that offers better than this?

[Nubiwan]

eBay is not what it was 5-10 years ago, so I don't find myself bidding on multiple items as I once did. Particularly around Christmas. With the advent of the extortionate global shipping "service", many ebay items are no longer good deals, and it's only when I really want something, that I look on eBay these days. So my issue is how much use this service will be to me.

As for free services. I recall once using a site which allowed me to quickly review only the negative feedback for a particular user. A great tool. No need to use it now, as eBay has incorporated this feature. Not saying they will incorporate sniping, but at least speaks to sustainability of free services.

Another option would be to perhaps pay $1 or something for every successful winning bid. As a part time user, I don't think I'd have an issue with that. Not sure it can be built in to the process. Anythings possible, I guess.

Until then, guess I am waiting a timed minute on the few occasions I now use this service. Fee for successful bids might be the way to go for part time users. Mega users can pay a flat fee.

Just my 2 bits.

In the end, I Honestly look at aliexpress more than eBay theses days.

[Madhwyn]

This must be the worst marketing ploy ever. Need to find another sniping program.

[rb1]

I think the original intent of the poster has been misunderstood. At no point did he say "you shouldn't be making money", he said that having a 60-second wait on login is annoying and may stop him using the service. Other people on this thread have said the same, that you have put a solution in place that has the opposite effect that you are intending. Just because you have a solution doesn't mean it's the only solution, or the best solution. It is merely one solution.

If you're trying to solve the problem of "how do I get more premium sign-ups?", there are lots of solutions to this.

No-one is saying the service isn't worth it, or that the pricing is wrong. The point of this thread is that the 60-second wait on login does not support a strategy of getting as many premium users signed up as possible, in fact it often has the opposite effect.

No-one here will argue that you shouldn't be making money. The "it costs money to run and it's a service people will pay for" statements are completely true, but none of those address the OP's problem.

Having a 60-second wait does not in of itself make you more money. It's not like on YoutTube where the longer someone watches a video, the more money the creator makes because more ads are displayed. Having a 60-second wait does not make money by itself.

There are much, much better ways to get people to sign up to the premium service. Look at any other service that offers free and premium versions, and see how they do it. None of the other ones I have seen do things that will deliberately antagonize people. Any internet marketeer will tell you that antagonizing people is a surefire way to stop them becoming paying customers. Have ads on there, have multiple tasty-looking levels of membership in fancy graphics with one pre-selected as being "the most popular option" with a boring plain text link "No thanks" at the bottom. There are hundreds of ways in which you can inform the customer that a premium service is available - and there's lots of suggestions from people on this thread saying what *would* be more effective, they are literally telling you what approach would turn them into paying customers - without putting in a solution that makes potential customers go find another similar service because they're trying to service a need and you're putting a big barrier in front of them that they can't get past until a "significant" (in terms of the internet) amount of time has passed.

All the OP is saying is that you should change your strategy to entice people to sign up to the premium service. If you change it to be something less antagonistic I *guarantee* you will get increased sign-ups as a result, and you can measure this yourself.

Having a time-barrier is one way of informing users of the premium service. There are other, much more effective, solutions that you can use, that will get you measurably more paying customers and who will be supportive of the service.

Having more paying customers is good for you, because you can make more profit and improve the service, and it is good for them because they are successfully having their needs met in a way that benefits them. It's a win-win situation. Selling them that win-win outcome by making it easy and enticing for them to sign up instead of aggravating them at the first step will ultimately solve your problem in a much more effective way, because instead of turning people away, you're welcoming them in. Everyone wins.

[mario]

rb1, do you have an actual experience what works and what doesn't, or are these just your assumptions?

[unessential]

I found it odd that the timer was there without at least an ad. I love gixen but don't use it enough to subscribe (actually I was under the impression it was $6 a month until I read through this thread... it's $6 a YEAR? ... wow!) -- Still I only use the service a couple of times a year at most...

-- Most ebay postings are buy it now, and the only time i snipe is when I buy something rare and there's only one listing, and it's auction only.

Like mentioned before the 60 second timer in itself doesn't provide any revenue. Ads *might*. -- And targeted ads - especially if they relate to keywords or subjects that have shown up in the auction history, may actually even be helpful

I don't really mind the 60 second timer, but if i'm going to wait, I might as well be generating some sort of revenue for a great service that I *do* recommend to nearly everyone.

[Cupid]

As you may have noticed, Gixen does host advertising, has done for many years.

Unfortunately, it doesn't generate a great deal of revenue, so it's not the solution many seem to think it should be.

Fancy graphics are also all well and good, I've actually tried them in a commercial environment, they do have a minor effect, but are sometimes very costly to implement and maintain. It's function that really makes the difference and Gixen already provides that.
_________________
Mark

[rb1]

When I say "fancy graphics", I'm talking about these:

They're not difficult or costly to maintain, they're just static images but present options in a friendly way to your customer so they can see the benefits of donating or subscribing. You still have your boring text link of "No thanks, just take me to the service" at the bottom. The end result is that you've shown people that there are advantages to buying a tier, but you're not actively stopping them from progressing through the process if they don't want to donate right now. Instead of the boring link, some websites have the free tier alongside the paid ones, showing that you get the basic service but not the extra features. The implementation of the free tier is however you want to do it, but the point is you're still making people aware of the advantages of paying whilst not aggravating them by making them sit there completely helpless and unable to go use your service which was their point for coming to your website.

To be honest I find this thread very bizarre. People on here are *actively helping you* to improve this part of your website and you seem oddly resistant and that makes no sense to me. If a customer is telling you what would work for them, listen to them. Maybe even try it out and measure it before and after to see what effect it had. People on here are spending their time telling you what from their experience would work a lot better. I don't need to provide evidence because you can make your own. You already know how much money comes in through this method per month or per year. Try implementing a more positive system without the 60s delay and try it for a month. If it doesn't work, you can post in here and present the evidence and tell everyone to sit down and shut up because your 60 s delay method brings in more money. If it does work, great, you just found a way of getting more money every month and all you had to do was change this one page.

The ideas I've mentioned aren't mine. It's basic psychology. You can read a bazillion books and websites and Youtube videos about it. "How do I convert customers into paying customers?" This is an easy subject with easy answers and has been written about since at least the 1930's. "How to win friends and influence people" is literally a salesman's handbook and has many examples of how positive experiences turn people into paying customers. If you give people a positive experience, they will remember you and will recommend you, you are able to build a positive relationship with them and they will throw money at you. If you antagonise people, they will just go elsewhere. Gixen is not the only auction sniping service out there. In the time it takes for the 60s countdown to complete, I can Google for another site, sign up and place my bid, and not have them actively stopping me from doing so. And, I'll likely go straight to their site instead of yours from now on. Aggravating people does not make them conducive to supporting you or wanting to become a customer if there are other identical services which are freely available and easy to find.

At the end of the day it clearly makes no difference to me whether or not you take any notice of what I've talked about. I make no more and no less money today by making these suggestions. My motivation is to help you get more subscribers because that will ultimately help the service, and if you can help someone, then why wouldn't you? At the very least, just try some of the suggestions for a short time, that way you can prove once and for all without much risk which is the better method.

[rb1]

edit for the above: the forum wouldn't let me post links to images, so I couldn't show you some good examples.

Instead we will do a treasure hunt to get to the 3 examples I found:

Google for "u6499921" and look at the Norton image

Google for "site:convertmyfiles.com subs.png" but without the quotes

Google for "avast your license expires in x days" but without the quotes and look at the image

Doing the above worked for me, let me know if it doesn't work for you.

[mario]

rb1, I am not resisting, in fact I am carefully listening, but what you are proposing "try removing timer" was a previous state of things. That was tried with different variations, splash screens, appeals, explaining the benefits, etc. for years.

This is why I asked you a simple question that you haven't answered - do you have an actual experience in this? You have certain assumptions, likely at least partially based on what would work for you as a user - but unlike you, I have an experience what the bottom line looks like based on tens of thousands of users, for many years.

And my conclusion is - what works the best is a combination of explaining benefits, and at the same time making a difference more pronounced between free and paid tiers.

I want the service to remain available for free (even with timer hindrance), but I need to make the paid service more desirable to users who can afford to subscribe.

[Rickajho]

World sure has changed a lot since the 1930's and selling vacuum cleaners door to door.

If someone can click on a "no thanks" button in a split second and dismiss any motivation to pay for the mirror service in the process... guess what they are going to do? Human nature being what it is.

Appealing to a logical reason to pay for the service has very little traction in this age. Some of us did see it and do pay, recognizing the service in general is well worth 6 bucks a year, let alone in addition to the added reliability of the mirror service. But if a majority of users saw things this way we wouldn't be having a thread like this at all, would we?

6 bucks is what? 2 coffees at Starbucks? A Whopper meal at Burger king? But paying for an entire year of gixen mirrored service is a total outrage? Reality check please.

.02¢

Rick

[Cupid]

[manusapucahy]

New suggestion on how to increase revenue and sort of prove some people wrong.

Build a mobile app for gixen. You can find developers that would do it for 50 bucks.
On the apps, show those timed (30s) paid adds. Those adds are present in most free games (here is where your point is proven).
Enjoy your new revenue stream!

[mario]

[san_gr]

Hi Mario,

I'm a long time user of your service (I think almost 10 years now), but I really don't use it more than once a year just because I don't need to.

I think it's a great service and personally I don't mind waiting those 60 seconds since as I said I don't use it often.

I have a suggestion that just poped in my head without having any experience myself or having done any research whatsoever.

Maybe you can have 3 types of users. The 2 you already have (mirror subscribers and free) and a third one which would be the cheap supporters (of course a more appealing name would work better ).
This group will agree to contribute 0.5% of the winning price for every successful snipe. Personally I would easily agree to 1% but I believe more people will feel comfortable with the 0.5%

I'll make some assumptions here since I don't have any data. Let's assume you have about 50.000 successful snipes a day and the average amount of each snipe is 40usd. If 1/5 of those snipes are subscribed to the 0.5%, that amounts to 2.000usd a day.

These users will not have access to the mirror servers and will still have ads but there will be no timer when logging in and it also comes with the pleasure of knowing you are supporting an awesome service.

Just a thought

[mario]

san_gr,

You already have this, check the settings page, it's called pay-per-use. You also have mirror chunks as an option. Frankly, there are all options you can imagine - annual / bi-annual subscription, mirror chunks, pay-per-use.

[Tgau]

To be honest, if someone uses eBay on a frequent basis then Gixen is a great deal. I’ve subscribed multiple times with multiple accounts. It basically pays for itself, and only $6/month, you can’t beat that at all. So Mario, thank you and keep up the good work for a lot of people out there.

[mario]

[Gixen User]

For people who only bid occasionally, maybe it would be a good idea to introduce a small fee/bid, like 30 cents or something like that?
I know there is an option of $1 for 10 days, but it is not always present I thinK? By the way, does the Gixen account update immediately after payment if someone pays the dollar for 10 days?
Thanks.

[mario]

[kriscathy]

[Blagbox]

A NEW users perspective.....

I'm just giving GIXEN a 2 week trial to see if it delivers on its promises. After just 3 days it seems to be a YES. I've already saved a little more than the $6 ANNUAL subscription.

Back in the day I used to use JBidWatcher on my iMac for sniping. It was free and did everything I wanted, including Grouped bids. GIXEN seems to be very similar in function, and has a very similar 'basic' look. Unfortunately JBid was not regularly maintained and stopped working properly after an update from eBay or Apple. I forget which. My sniping days were put on hold.

A few years ago I again needed to use a sniper, and after a few trials, settled on GOOFBID. Again it did what I wanted - and was a much nicer interface than JBid (or GIXEN!).

GOOFBID was good for as long as I needed it, then life moved on and it was no longer required....until recently, when I discovered it was now Subscription only - just under ÂGBP 24 a year. Still not a huge amount given the expected savings it would make, but having recently had to give up work because of Multiple Sclerosis, every penny counts.

So the search was on for a new FREE sniping tool. Most of the ones I've come across are only FREE for very limited function or use. Just half a dozen free snipes per month seems to be common, or a small % commission on winning bids. GIXEN is the only one I've found that has near full functionality, and unlimited snipes for free. But it is ugly

"Oh but you have to wait 60 seconds every time you log in...." the whingers shout. Jeez!!!

How long did the OP take to write his post? And the later one giving us his completely irrelevant life story!! As has already been pointed out, it's only 60 seconds for misers that have been free-loading for YEARS. For newer users like myself it's around 20 seconds. Is your life so precious that you can't spare that? It takes longer to enter a CAPTCHA on many massive sites like eBay or Amazon if you want to post or send a query.

$6 a YEAR is much less than most similar tools seem to be asking for PER MONTH, and if you were to use one of the commission sites you might be looking at $6 PER SNIPE!

As I said, I'm just trialling at the moment but can see no reason why I won't put up with the minor inconvenience of a 20 second wait at login.
Heck I'll probably pay the $6 just to get the Snipe Box up to the top of the page instead of the bottom as on the free version. THAT is far more inconvenient than a 20 second wait. Lol

In fact $6 a year seems small change for the service provided. How about making it $10 a year & pay someone to give it a nice fancy 'GOOFBID' style UI?

As for the OP and other free-loaders 'threatening to leave' if you don't remove the 'long wait', you must be A) heart-broken or B) relieved or C) ROFL.
You may pick any 2.

[Blagbox]

[Cupid]

[Blagbox]

That's better!!!

Thanks for such a swift response

[daedaluscan]

You did however promise that it would always be free. Maybe a rash promise, but you made it.

[daedaluscan]

and 30c a snipe would suit me fine, I bid maybe twice a year on ebay, not enough for a subscripiton

[Cupid]

[Anonymous_m]

My opinion: charge per snipe and charge based on the total bid. I use this app since a long time ago just every now and then, I wound't mind to pay on the go a tiny fraction.

I've always said it, not pricing correcntly (or not charging at all) is a deadly mistake.

You help us save a few bucks per product, you make a little money from there. It's the perfect revenue model, when you help to save the cost doesn't hurt.

Here I am, waitigin for my snipe to get triggered

[Cupid]

[Disraligears]

Seriously?? I simply cannot understand anyone thinking they are entitled, let alone actually moaning that they have a short wait to place a snipe. You have a simple choice - either pay a tiny fee or sod off elsewhere. Sheesh...

[tellicomark]

Hi - just a quick Thank You! for this site. I do not eBay much but wanted an item and was watching/bidding closely and lost it at the last second because I got sniped. I remembered using your FREE SERVICE years ago, found you again and am back on board. If I start eBaying much at all I will gladly pay $6. Thanks for the free option for now.

[BlueSaint64]

[unessential]

[Unessential]

Yeah, so I just logged in again, there's only "10 days for $1" which definitely isn't appealing for those who do one snipe a year or less, -- I don't remember what I said previously since it was a while ago, but I only snipe when there's no buy it now, and my purchases are usually very cheap.

I do some streaming, and I can get pretty nice graphics done for $100 or less. It's a good investment. It doesn't even need to be graphics, just a table, / grid / proper html elements will go a long way.

When I went to my settings page, I wouldn't have noticed the pay per use option if you hadn't mentioned it. There's no spacing, no grid,

Whitespace makes things a lot readable, and Having a price first rather than "click here --- click here" helps readability. The price is probably the main consideration for most people but it's hidden in the MIDDLE of those sentences.

Again just sticking that in a table in the format (which others have given an example earlier) will go a LONG way. but you can get even fancier with html formatting / graphics.

[Albert Dinger]

Hi
I paid for the service so why do I have to wait 60 seconds?
Regards
Ray

[mario]

[TheSeeker]

[Cupid]

[BradChesney79]

I value your service-- it saves me money on ebay auctions. You have already save me hundreds. ...Please add a dynamic option where we may purchase 3+ years of premium service.

I bought two years (recurring) today. I would have bought 5 years if I could have.

[mario]

[Jeninwi]

I get why you have the counter there for free use members. But I’ve been a paying member for several years and I still get the counter, trying to get me to pay for something I’m already paying for. It’s frustrating and has me questioning the advantages of being a paying member.

[Cupid]

Jeninwi,

That should not be happening and indicates that your subscription has not been credited to the Gixen account that you are using.

Is it possible that you have registered here more than once ? That is the usual cause.

In any case, if you can't easily figure out where your subscription has been credited and transfer it to where you want to actually use it, please email Mario direct at the support address given on the Contact tab and please include your Gixen id, and your Ebay id might also be useful in tracking down what has happened.
_________________
Mark

[mario]

Jeninwi, as Mark said - please email me - you should absolutely not be seeing the nag screen or ads of any kind as a paying member.

[vortexrob]

I have a suggestion for you:
On the initial login page, instead of just the "countdown timer" you should put two 30-second video ads/commercials there, and "force" the users to watch them. I don't know much about ad serving, but I would imagine that these types of ads have a MUCH higher payout than ad banners with very low click-thru rates. This would be an easy way for you to generate WAY more ad revenue for your site. I only use site very infrequently, so can't justify paying for a subscription, so I don't mind the short wait on the rare occasion that I use it: but I would much rather watch something slightly more interesting than just a boring countdown timer while I am sitting there waiting for 60s. Just an idea...

[mario]

Any suggestion where to find these ads / videos?

[mab3803]

I've been using another snipe service for years, with an annoying annual renewal difficulty. They now fail to respond to messages altogether. I knew there were other sniping services, and found that the internet seems to like Gixen. I tried the free service for one snipe, which went off without a hitch, and am now signing up for Mirror. A fraction of the cost to me, more savings through sniping, and mario makes some excellent points. Thank you for your efforts, and glad to join the Gixen group.

[rumeyj]

[rx7driver]

i can't understand why waiting a few moments to get in the site is annoying at all ! I suspect you were right thinking millennials. maybe not,, but it is a rather typical attitude for the ones that are in my family. imagine the emotional crisis they'd have if there were no phone answering services or caller id etc. if you were not home,, you had no idea if anyone called ! and no cell or even wireless phones,, and,,, oh my gawd tv's didn't have remotes and you had to get up to go change channel between the 4 channels that were available !
there was no way to call someone unless they were home. imagine the freak out if when they called no one answered and they couldn't leave a message ! you had to call back later ! get over it people. its not annoying.

[troubled]

I'm a subscriber of the mirror service. $11/2 years is the equivalent of 2 coffees, nothing to whinge about. If it helps I don't mind ads either, if it helps your revenue stream, turn it on I say, at least you're welcome to turn my on!

[Genesis]

Hey there just a quick note that because of this thread I have just subscribed for a year. I don’t even use it that much at all but I really appreciate how you hold yourself and look out for the user experience and quality of service. And you’re providing a great one and I want you to be able to live a good life so I’m supporting that.

Anyone complaining just remember it’s their own thing and everyone has to move through the spaces in their own way and time.

Thanks for everything,
-G

[torquemad]

Thanks for all the hard work on the platform.

[Nick]

Mario,
Would it be possible to charge users less - $4 recurring or $5 non-recurring annually - and make the entire site paid-only without restrictions? Surely you would vastly increase your revenue and people wouldn't mind paying such a low fee?
Regards,
Nick

[Guest]

[mario]

It's inexpensive enough in my opinion, very much so, and I still want users to have a chance to test Gixen at no charge, or use it occasionally for free. For most users, $5 compared to $6 / year (!) makes no difference, and those who don't want to pay won't pay at any price.

[Juan]

[Temp_just_for_this]

I was going to buy a subscription once I reached the point of 5 uses of the service. But the 60 seconds thing means I have changed my mind.

I've been using the internet since its early days, and not being a USA citizen (you guys are programmed to pay for everything from cradle to grave) I do not have strong opinions on how wonderful a free service is. Where I live, many things are free.

You can be more creative to generate more income, or, you can take the lazy way and bully people into becoming customers.
In my experience the latter have lower morals than the former, which raises one essential point. Do I now trust this service with my payment information and personal data? Whether $1 or $50 is not the argument.

If you're twisting my arm a little just to use it, how far will you go in the future? Sorry but I just don't trust tactics that manipulate users, no matter how small and no matter how it's compensated by other moral views. It's a small evil and no-one will ever convince me the end justifies the means.

Use the carrot, not the stick.

[Cupid]

The creativity has been demonstrated in the many years of Mario keeping this service performing at such a high level of success, along with adding extra features to it over the years.

The carrot has also been there for most of those years, in the even greater reliability of a subscription and the availability of even more extra useful features.

With that strategy for about the first 15 years it built up a good core base of loyal customers but only ever just about managed to break even on all the work and investment that Mario put in over those years. Hosting a service like this on the internet can't be done for free, hiring servers and bandwidth costs, it always has.

Since introducing this little nudge ('stick' if you like) it has ensured the support it always needed and the future of the service for all those loyal customers that no longer have to be so concerned that it could stop being supported at any time as many other similar services have been over the years.
_________________
Mark

[Blagbox]

Well said Mark.
I can’t believe there are STILL people moaning about the limitations or minor inconveniences of the Free Service. The Subscription cost, whether you go for the one off or repeating service is a PITTANCE for Gods Sake, the cost of a couple of cups of coffee or a Big Mac. I don’t believe there’s a single person who cant afford it. And I don’t believe there’s a single person who couldn’t save the cost of subscription in a half dozen snipes a year - most could save the cost in ONE SNIPE. I know I do several times a WEEK!

I’m sure some people would moan if it were $1 a year!
Never mind offering carrots, some people should be beaten with the stick! Lol

Keep up the great work Mario & Mark. The best M & M’s there are

[ANewUser]

Read this forum and somewhat surprised by the freebie-junkies attitudes displayed. To give some context...

I've been a loyal user of Esnipe for, well, seems like forever. Always been pretty good for me and I don't think they've lost anything I'd otherwise have won (of course, I lose loads through my own efforts). But my partner uses Gixen despite my recommending Esnipe.

Today I'm placing a bid and chatting to my partner about her placing a bid on something else, and I realise I'm about to run out of bidpoints (Esnipe currency). Not often I do that on account of only being charged for a win and my success rate not being stunning. So, I'm about to sign over $15 for 1500 points which will see me through another 15 wins. I never really thought about it before, but that's $1/win. Hmmm, lemme look at this free Gixen thing...

So here I am and it looks pretty damn good to me in not doing the 'bend over while we extract all your contacts info' thing. The desktop tool doesn't install but keeps everything where it's unpacked. Good signs, but things take money to run and either the place is making it off Ebay in some way or the users must be coughing, whether they know it or not.

Cutting to the chase I've been here half an hour and already paid for the mirror service. I expect to have made that back through sniping pretty quick, but even if I didn't it's $6! (OK, $8 for me because I don't do auto-recurring. Yet.) That's 6 wins on Esnipe and I bet other places aren't that much cheaper.

I can understand that having used this service for years a 60 sec timer on entry feels like a kick in the balls, but it's easily saved you $6 worth of time and effort during the free time you've been using it. And cost the developer a LOT more than you've saved. So to thank him for all that work, for him to effectively be paying for you to get easy sniping, you whine about him needing just $6/yr to keep going, despite still being able to snipe if you want to be a skinflint.

What you should be banging on about is what happens if he gets run over by a bus? Who keeps the service going then? From the looks of things here, y'all will either shrug and move on to some other place without a backward glance, or complain that the poor bloke didn't rope in his brother or someone to make sure it kept running. You couldn't really blame him for sussing that attitude and saying, "well, to hell with you lot, why do I even bother".

[JoeC]

The timer is client side. It wouldn't be hard to make a Chrome extension that would bypass this at all.

[mario]

[dayheim]

is there any way to pay without paypal? I dont want to pay the exchange rate fees.

[mario]

These fees should be a few percent only, is this really a problem?

[dayheim]

a few percentage adds up over a life time!!!
i will just wait till i get paid by an american company next month

[Guest]

[howardthecoach]

I've just joined Gixen having been let down by a rival service to which I have subscribed for the past 6 years. Having had just one failure in that time, I have been faced with 6 failures in 5 weeks. That's bad for a paid service so I cancelled my subscription with them and have now joined Gixen. I have not yet put a snipe in via Gixen but having missed out on $400 worth of vinyl which went for less than half of that I was done with that service.

I have a question regarding the mirror service. I can, as a trial, buy a 10 day pass for $1. My other service used to cost €2.99 a month so it seems the 2 services are of a similar price. Which I find totally acceptable. The point being that I live in Europe and will get charged more than twice that because there will be Paypal charges each month roughly equal to the monthly Gixen charge. Is here a way round that?

[howardthecoach]

Query answered. Just got a welcome mail from Gixen and paid the annual fee. Job sorted..... too late for the ones I've missed.

Looking forward to sniping.

[fraim]

People complaining about a free service and threatening to jump ship because of it. Awesome lol.

I know this is an old thread, but wanted to tell you how much I've appreciated using the free version of Gixen over the years.

I haven't used eBay much for quite some time, but recently started back up and signed up for two years of Mirror to support the project.

Have you considered putting a donate link anywhere on the site? I imagine there are a fair number who think it's worth more than $6/year and would like to contribute.

[Gixen User]

Stop complaining

Just pay up and Stop complaining, what do people expect for nothing.

[JacquesHaugh247]

Seriously if this website hasn't saved you at least $10 or whatever the fee is these days, you really need to try harder. I have no problem spending some of the money Gixen has saved me back into the system.

To not do that is borderline unethical. Some people need to grow up.

[justsavedabit]

[Gish]

Please allow me to necro this thread to say
Thank you so much Mario!!! For all your generosity and flexibility all these years.

I don't live in North America or Europe so I've not had that many occasions to use eBay and Gixen through the years. But now that a friend has moved to the USA and will kindly receive packages for me... you bet I rushed to buy a Mirror subscription.

I very much appreciate the option of buying 6 chunks of 15 days for Mirror. I don't think this is available in other services and for some of us it's a god-send. I'll maybe place 3-10 snipes in a short period and then nothing until 6 months later. Then rinse and repeat.

Thanks so much for giving us so much value and options!

[mario]

[Guest]

My eBay usage dropped off dramatically over convid scam, but prior to that I used Gixen on occasion, I absolutely don't mind the 60sec countdown, you should even put the song by Europe "final countdown' as a theme song lol!

I am slowly starting to use eBay more as amazon has gotten stupid expensive and it's a no brainer to subscribe to Gixen, the price is less than a fast-food burger so do yourself a favour...

Don't buy a burger buy Gixen and save money.

Another reason I like Gixen is you are buying into Mario and I have to say he's a very likeable guy, very genuine and sincerely cares about his patriots.

[creepingout2]

Hi.
I just read the complainant's letter and tbh they just sound impatient and entitled. I'm unable to buy nearly as much as I'd like. The financial climate is awful.
I only use gixen a dozen times or so per year.
I don't mind waiting the 60 seconds.
You ,Mario, have done an amazing thing-thankyou and if I could,I would pay for mirror and keep the 60 second wait too.
Life is too fast as it is,what's a tiny minute?
Love,
CJ.

[Guest]

I think the reason many people dislike the counter is because there is no reason for it. It doesn't save Gixen any money / time nor does it give Gixen any profit. Its only to "punish" free users.

Just for comparison: Nobody will complaint when business class passengers get Champagne. They pay more so they get more.
However if you put a counter to the toilet that lets passengers wait for 60sec before they can enter the toilet...this will annoy a lot people.

And I think this feeling is natural and makes sense.

How about this: Remove the counter the way it is implemented now and instead put an advertisment video before. There are services available for this where people choose an ad out of three, watch it for 10-20sec and get forwarded afterwards.

I bet less people will be angry about this than they are about the counter as they will see a reason for it.

[hobbyist]

I've used the service sporadically since 2014. Today I actually clicked the link to read why there's a timer. I read this thread, and the explanation makes sense to me. I know I've gotten value from the service in the past and so I signed up for the 2 years. I didn't need to, I haven't always been in a position to throw money at a service when I didn't have to.

Thanks is all.

[Guest]

[Guest]

[Cupid]

Please don't try to goad, or escalate arguments.

Constructive criticism is fine, and also suggestions in the relevant area.

Insulting other users is not encouraged here.
_________________
Mark

[123]

Just bought the 6*15 day package to support because auction sniping is great thanks for providing a free service too Mario.

[raretechseller]

I have been using Gixen for many years (since 2014), with some long delays between.

In the beginning, there was no timer as I remember, but there was an ad for a paid mirror service (which I bought and used). Then we have got a timer for free users, which I think is OK, waiting to be able to use such a service is worth it.

I usually have a low budget for eBay auctions/purchases, but try to buy Gixen paid service from time to time at least, because I like the service and would like to see it doing well in the future. I recommend you all do the same. If you use it heavily and bid/win at many auctions, it would be fair to buy a long-term subscription.

Good services should be protected and kept going by the user community.

Quote from Mario's message from 2017:
Gixen Mirror is a lifeline for Gixen, not an enrichment tool - it pays for the servers Gixen runs on, domain names, software licenses and other expenses. It keeps Gixen running, and is very low cost. And equally important - it protects your bids from outages and network timeouts.

[jaared]

So, going on 8 years later, how has this change panned out? Are there more Gixen Mirror subscribers? Have free users given up and left?

My suggestion - prohibit free users from sniping an item that a Mirror user has a snipe on.

[xyike]

[Cupid]