Pricing Items on the Market Board

[Slycer]

A bit of context first, but my question is in the last paragraph. Recently I've gotten most of my crafting classes to 60 and have been trying to put them to good use by making some profit.

I noticed that there were several people and a couple in particular who would place new items or re-list existing ones under the ones I was selling by anywhere from 1 to 1000 gil. Because I have a job and things to do, I don't have all day to camp the market board but I do want my items to sell. So, because of the significant profit margin, I would cut my price by anywhere from 10,000 to 15,000. Many times within a few minutes I would see the competing item disappear and then reappear a few hundred gil below my new price. With the profit margin still very high I would repeat the process, in some cases taking the price down by over 70,000 gil (still with a significant profit margin, illustrating just how ridiculous the profit was earlier). Once the price got to a point where the profit was about as low as I would reasonably accept, which would often happen very quickly, I would stop reducing my price. I have been successful with this and I've managed to turn a fairly handsome profit over the past week or so.

This morning I received a tell from someone who first undercut nearly every item I was selling by 500 gil asking what business I had making such significant price cuts. I explained my philosophy and was then linked to the Wikipedia article on supply and demand. Clearly supply and demand really does not apply in such a monopolistic seller driven market like this, but that's besides the point.

My basic question here is what is everyone's philosophy on pricing their items when they put a new listing on the market board? Do you price just below the lowest listed price and engage in back-and-forth undercutting? Do you make a significant cut to try to avoid being undercut? Do you (heaven forbid) match the current lowest price? Some other strategy? I'm not implying that there's any right or wrong here, in fact I'm trying to dispel the notion that any particular way is wrong. I am really curious to hear what other people's thoughts are on this though, and if you think it's wrong to take such big cuts I'd like to hear why as well.

[3.141592]

I put up items that ppl need in gigantic quantities. Most of the time it doesn't matter if someone starts undercutting, there is never enough of the stuff and ppl can never put enough of it up, so it sales pretty well. Good example are pterodactyls during the first weeks of Relic (and even now still) and furymint, because right now everyone and their mother are getting ready for progression and crafting insane amounts of draco pots. I made millions on that stuff without having to adjust prices even once. Just put it in for the current price and wait a day or two, ppl will buy it eventually. Either because they either are desparate or don't give a shit.
Ofc it depends on the server. I'd say that Gilgamesh has a very healthy economy when it comes to endgame related stuff, so food and medicine mats are in high demand and might probably even go up in the next couple of weeks.

[BerenTebogo]

When I still played, if I noticed that someone was hawking the board and undercutting by a few hundred gil every time I listed or re-listed something just to get theirs to sell first and quickly I would immediately drop the price huge amounts in a gigantic fuck you. If it continued I would flood + drop price more and kill the entire market for the item. I wasn't one to spend every waking second watching the market board and I also wasn't about to lose to people who wanted to do that.

I think the only reasonable way to characterize different mentalities is by examining the relative value of gil. If I was slowly selling off the NQs of something (say food or pots back in the olden days) that I had hundreds of, I wouldn't tolerate any level of bullshit. I always listed initially matching the lowest price. If I found that the person whose price I matched had relisted and undercut, it was fucking on. As long as I was still selling for more than the NPCs would give me, it was worth it for me to give a tremendous fuck you to anyone who wanted to constantly undercut by 1-10g. Even for expensive stuff. If you're already loaded and essentially just listing stuff to get it out of your inventory and to get > 0 gil return on something, you don't care if you get 80% of your invested gil back or 40%. But if you're poor as shit you want every gil to matter, so it makes the most sense to let the people who will undercut sell their stuff of and gtfo your market and let it stabilize so you have a continuous revenue stream. That fails when you have people who are poor AND stupid AND impatient, which is unfortunately 90%+ of the population.

tl;dr Never had any qualms about punishing impatient people. If you price match, and are then undercut, fucking glass 'em.

[Slycer]

Good example are pterodactyls during the first weeks of Relic (and even now still) and furymint, because right now everyone and their mother are getting ready for progression and crafting insane amounts of draco pots.

That's a good example of where supply and demand definitely do apply (gathered items or crafted consumables where the sell-through rate is fast). I probably should have been clearer too, the market I was talking about is for armor/accessories where most people will only ever buy one unless the price drops to the point where they are worth converting into materia, which will probably never happen. So there's a much higher profit per item but a much lower sell rate. For these items in particular, I'm pretty sure if I listed it at some higher price it would never sell as the same two or three people would just keep listing new items 500 gil below whatever the lowest price is.

When I still played, if I noticed that someone was hawking the board and undercutting by a few hundred gil every time I listed or re-listed something just to get theirs to sell first and quickly I would immediately drop the price huge amounts in a gigantic fuck you.

Yeah, maybe that's part of it for me too. But even leaving emotions out of it and looking at it logically (which is admittedly hard to do when the people undercutting you start sending tells questioning your pricing), as long as I'm turning a profit that I feel is reasonable I don't see any reason not to take major cuts in the price to get the shit to sell.

[Kaisha]

It's a free market. Do what works for you, fuck the haters if they don't spread their crafting markets out and try to rely on 1-2 things for all of their income.

If someone undercuts heavily I'll usually just maintain the history price and wait for them to rid of their stock because I'm in no rush with my current capital.

[Rocl]

If someone undercuts you, undercut them by using this formula:

(theirprice)/5

[Luthia]

I personally think its dumb to undercut by such a large amount, regardless of margin. If the shit is gonna sell, its gonna sell regardless of the price on it, by undercutting by the 100ks you're mostly hurting yourself, even if you're still turning a profit.

I guess thats why I mostly stay away from undercuttin wars, most people get retarded about it and then it just gets annoying. I'll leave my overprices shit listed on the mb for months, eventually, it will sell. Its not like Im hurting for gil anyways.

[Slycer]

I personally think its dumb to undercut by such a large amount, regardless of margin. If the shit is gonna sell, its gonna sell regardless of the price on it, by undercutting by the 100ks you're mostly hurting yourself, even if you're still turning a profit.

I thought that at first, and I wish that were true, but some of these people seem to be on nearly 24/7 and when something they have listed sells, they just replace it with another at whatever the current lowest price is minus 500 gil. So unless you get lucky and a couple people buy items in a short amount of time, the second lowest priced item will never sell. I tried a couple nights to leave my items at second or third lowest price and my overnight profit on those nights was significantly lower.

[Taint]

I just keep under cutting. If it gets too cheap I buy up the market and repost. I mostly deal with high quantity items though so I have to keep my supply in motion.

You will also see low prices from people stumbling upon the item and just posting it cheap. I buy those ASAP.

[Obsidian]

I usually match first, then start undercutting aggressively if someone I matched start dropping their price for no reason. If they come down far enough with me sometimes I'll even buy their crap and re-list it for a profit.

[The Stig]

I'm not a crafter but I occasionally round up lots of junk I want to move on the market.

First up, like many others I don't value gil as much in this game, and I also don't have a house/room as I see it as quite a waste.

On things that don't sell everyday or uncommonly sold: I aggressively undercut to ensure a sale and at the same time make people think about price matching/undercutting me. If they also don't value gil they will match my price/undercut me, otherwise leave me alone

On things that do sell common: depending on how much is up I will price match

[Cassalot]

It depends what I'm selling. A particular item I sell a lot (and have been selling for a loooong time) I am pretty aggressive with undercutting. Aggressive not in the way that I undercut them by 10k+ or anything large. I'm home a lot and am able to keep an eye on the market board constantly. Sometimes I undercut by 1 gil or sometimes I undercut by 1k. It depends how lazy I'm feeling. With the item I sell often I will make a point to push people out the market--its my market bitch get out.

Some items I will match the price on. It really depends how much of a demand it is.

So for me it depends what item it is, who's selling said item and how I am feeling. If I dont have time to have an undercut war with someone I will undercut them more than usual just to shut them out. BUT typically its only by ~1k.

Shits situational.

I'll add I'm very familiar with how the market board works. Making gil is VERY fun to me. I love it lol It is my content.

I also find that the market board is very slow in the morning. I make most of my profits in the afternoon - evening.

[BaneTheBrawler]

I usually overprice by a bit and just wait for the market to swing back up. 8 retainers has its perks.

[Obsidian]

Sometimes I undercut by 1 gil

Just saying, this can work against you. I personally make it a point never to buy from someone undercutting by 1 gil. It's asinine, and it starts undercutting wars for no reason. If you match prices you still show up first in the list because it sorts by most recent listings.

[Alistaire]

I personally think its dumb to undercut by such a large amount, regardless of margin. If the shit is gonna sell, its gonna sell regardless of the price on it, by undercutting by the 100ks you're mostly hurting yourself, even if you're still turning a profit.

I guess thats why I mostly stay away from undercuttin wars, most people get retarded about it and then it just gets annoying. I'll leave my overprices shit listed on the mb for months, eventually, it will sell. Its not like Im hurting for gil anyways.

Was gonna post this almost exactly word for word.

[Lujei]

I usually overprice by a bit and just wait for the market to swing back up.

This is exactly what I do.

Of course, it's also probably part of the reason why I have no space.

[haroldsaxon]

Volume profit > Single item profit for items that can easily be mass produced

Selling 100 items in 1 day with 1000 gil profit each is FAR better than selling one at 20,000 profit.

I'll quite often pick an item, undercut and sell at cost to get rid of any competition to the market, and then jack the price back up and sell with no competition later.

[Genmai]

I always put my items with 1 gil lower than the next one on the list, I do this just to make the market doesn't screw up with too much undercut. And somehow it works, when the other starting to the same like me, with 1 gil lower each time.

If someone cut too much like over 2000 gil, i will stop selling that item and dig into another. Long time before, I saw a guy that camp the whole GSM market, like he plays the game 24/7. I put a ring with 16,999 gil, lower than the other 1 gil, and then 3-5 seconds later, this guy cut ALL of the same items that he put on his retainers (his retainer hold 10 items/retainer, and he has 3 retainers for 1 item) like 3000-5000 gil lower than me. I was like wtf are doing? And then after a few minutes of cutting war, the ring drops from 17,000 gil to 3,000 gil.

[Fondue]

Just saying, this can work against you. I personally make it a point never to buy from someone undercutting by 1 gil. It's asinine, and it starts undercutting wars for no reason. If you match prices you still show up first in the list because it sorts by most recent listings.

You are the only person I have ever heard say that lol so keep sticking it to the man

[BaneTheBrawler]

Volume profit > Single item profit for items that can easily be mass produced

Selling 100 items in 1 day with 1000 gil profit each is FAR better than selling one at 20,000 profit.

I'll quite often pick an item, undercut and sell at cost to get rid of any competition to the market, and then jack the price back up and sell with no competition later.

nah, i dont overprice by that much. i'll look at history and pick something on the higher end of the range thats actually been selling. if an item has a bunch of 1k listings currently but sold a bunch for 1500 yesterday, i'll list at 1500.