Everyone knows that you can save a load of cash by shopping on eBay. Personally, I've saved hundreds. The problem is - in order to get the best deal, you have to be stalking auctions that are about to end. In my shopping for an XBOX 360, I've seen variances of $100 for systems with identical components.
eBay has a way of keeping you up to date on your auctions when you're doing other things than staring at your computer like a mindless drone. All you need is a cell phone and eBay will happily provide this service for you for a quarter. 25 cents per auction. Ouch. Considering that I'm actively watching 13 different items at the moment - $3.25 doesn't seem too fair when they can email me for free.
If you visit the preferences section of eBay, you can get notification emails for free, and you can be notified of nearly everything imaginable:
Buying Notifications
- Watched item ending reminder
- Watched item daily list
- Watched item emails for relisted items
- Bid confirmation
- Outbid
- Winning buyer
- Non-winning bidder
- Second Chance Offer
- Personalized New Item Updates
- Daily buying status
- Want It Now reminder
Selling Notifications
- Saved draft reminder (Sell Your Item form)
- Listing confirmation
- Sold item
- Unsold item
- Buyer checkout
- Selling account invoices
- Daily selling status
MAKING IT WORK
You'll be using a couple free services to make this happen. First - Gmail - a free web based email program built by Google, and teleflip to help forward your email notifications to your wireless device.
So, make a Gmail account if you don't already have one - you don't have to change your life around or anything. You can keep whatever other email you use. From your Gmail inbox, look to the upper right hand corner of your browser and find “Settings.”
From there, choose “Filters.”
At the bottom of the Filters Tab, choose “Create a New Filter.”
What you'll be doing is forwarding all emails from eBay to your wireless device. When eBay sends you an email - “eBay” is in the “From:” field. Therefore, you will type eBay in the “From:” field. Then click on “Next Step”
Now that you have told Gmail what to look for, you have to tell it what to do with it. You want it to forward to your wireless device. Teleflip helps here by automatically determining what your wireless device “email” address is.
On the page that follows, Choose the check box for “Forward it to:” and type in your 10 digit wireless number @teleflip.com. Once you click “Create Filter” you're done! Wireless phone emails count as text messages and are billed by your wireless provider accordingly. Most plans have a provision for text messages.
After your filter is created you can modify it accordingly - here are some examples:
- In the “Forward it to:” field, put any other email address you would like to receive the update separated with commas
- Create several filters to further customize your notifications
- Keep your eBay stuff organized and separated by automatically applying labels
