How do you run a design adopt auction

Posted 1 year, 8 days ago by circlejourney

I have wanted to run a character design auction for AGES, but I have no idea how it's generally done, seeing as I've never participated in one. How long do you keep it open, is it usually until N hours after the last bid? How do you decide the starting bid and autobuy? How do you publicise it. Help

Comments

Tenshilove

When I run adopt auctions i usually start by announcing that it will be streamed live (i usually stream my adopts) and sometimes i will ask for feedback about how complex people want it to be or what theme to use by starting a poll. Then i go live and allow bids in stream via PMs so i notice them. I set the starting bid at a price that i feel comfortable selling them at but not too high, and set minimum increase to 1 USD to prevent people from adding like a cent onto someone else's bid. At the end of the stream i will set the most recent stream bid as the first bid on the adopt and set usually a 48 hour time limit with a 1 hour snipe guard. Snipe guard is basically an added timer on the most recent bids, so if the 48 hours are up and there are currently people going back and forth the bidding wont end until one of them gives up, so the other person doesnt lose the adopt because of the timer. they will have to stop bidding for 1 hour in order for the bidding to end. I like to set 2 Autobuy options, one that i feel like is reasonably high, usually twice the starting bid amount that will give them just the adopt as it's presented. Then i offer a 2nd higher autobuy option that includes a selection of artwork for the adopt that i will make afterwards. I find people like to have some art, outfits, maybe a pet for the character when they start off so they can get a jump start on their character profiles. sometimes i even offer to write a small blurb about the characters' backstory, interests, etc so they have some ideas to start off with. they really like that. i usually get one or two super autobuys in a small batch of auctions.

Theres a bunch of ways to go about doing auctions, this is just how ive found works best for me. hope that helps! : )

artwizardabbey

I've never held an auction myself, but I've seen a lot of people end the auction 24 hours after the last bid

Waltz

Like Yocto said, if you aren't sure about pricing you could try an OTA at first! And people can offer whatever they feel comfortable with without the hassle of normal bidding constraints. I would either set the AB much higher than you expect (to encourage more offers), or set no AB at all, and just close the offers after a certain number of hours.

(In general though Yocto has some awesome advice here! And I'd love to see what you'd have to sell for designs!)

circlejourney

Thank you, I think I'll be trying an OTA! Do people normally get to revise their offers after seeing others' in an OTA?

Waltz

Typically! Usually if there's multiple people offering cash there'll be an informal bidding chain anyone can offer more on top of until it closes/the seller chooses an offer

YoctoCrunch

I typically see people keep their adopt auctions open for 24 hours, 48 hours, or 72 hours. Due to everyone living in a different time zone, it's recommended you go by hours and not days.
You can do it for XX hours after a bid! I personally have it open for 48 hours after the starting bid. If your adopts are in high demand you could also just have it close in a set amount of time from the moment you've posted the adopt. When I get the SB, I check the time stamp and set a reminder in my personal calendar to close the auction. Some creators like to reply to the SB comment with a timer so that the bidder knows exactly when the auction ends. If this is too much to manage, I would consider trying out ych.commishes, as they have a built-in timer for adopts.
I started off with set price adoptables then moved to auctions to get a gauge of how in demand my designs are. I would look at other adopts of your same quality and see how they price their adopts. I personally start off between $30-$35 because that's the mimimum I would take for a design. The autobuy should be at least 3 times as much as the starting bid. If the autobuy is too close to the starting bid amount then what's the point of bidding imo
Not super sure what you mean by "publicizing" it 😅 Are you asking how to advertise it?

circlejourney

Yeah advertising is what I meant for the last point!

Also thanks for the tips 0: the hours thing makes sense! I think maybe I'm thinking of things back to front - I don't know how much people would pay for my designs and I haven't bought many so an auction was how I was thinking of finding out how much people would pay 😂 but doing just a flat adopt is probably a good idea. I've only sold super cheap ones (same base, chibi art style), but they were on my other account and I didn't really advertise them, haha.

YoctoCrunch

Considering how many subscribers you have, I would say a lot of people like your work! I'm sure a lot of your followers would love to get an adoptable from you. If you're really unsure of how much people are willing to pay you could always try an OTA (Offer to Adopt). People will give you random offers and you pick what is most acceptable. A lot of people do OTAs but I personally avoid those people many viewers are intimated about offering a price that's too low.

If you want more tips about adoptables, you can read this post I made a while back giving advice. And if you're curious about anything related to adopts, I would recommend reading this guide.

I advertise my designs by posting them in the Toyhouse Design Marketplace and submitting them to Deviantart adopt groups. If you're looking for a list of groups to submit to, here's a comment I made showcasing a lot of them.

Let me know if you have any more questions! I'm happy to help :>

circlejourney

This is so helpful, thank you 😭 I'm curious about OTAs, this whole time I thought they were for people to offer money but the journal you linked says you should always accept other kinds of payment e.g. points or trades - is that the norm? Also would people usually keep them open until they get an offer they like, or close it after a fixed time and pick the best offer? Oh and, would they then notify everyone who offered that they picked someone else?

YoctoCrunch

Yup, most OTAs I see accept money and art. Some will also take character trades or robux lol. You don't always have to accept other types of payment, but if you're only looking for money offers, might as well make it a bid. It's obvious more money is worth more than less money so it's a bit pointless to make it an OTA. However, with art, every art offer has a different value and it's up to you to decide which one is the best.

People typically keep it open until they get an offer they like. For me, I kept my OTAs open for around 2 days to see all the offers before picking one. Some people like to respond to every offer with an acceptance or rejection comment but I just leave most of them in the dark 😅 If someone really wants to know if their offer was accepted, they'll just check back on the character to see who got it.