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Best Practices for Auction!-Bidding for Good Linkage

Auction Systems and Bidding for Good (formerly cMarket) have developed powerful tools for updating auction items and donors, bids and bidder information from either system to the other. Each company’s product has strengths in their specific market, and a tremendous amount of effort has been put into making the products work well together. The client also has an important role in assuring smooth results as they bring their online & gala auction events together.

 

This document is designed to share Best Practices for using Auction-Link™ successfully. As always, please contact Auction Systems Technical Support or Bidding for Good Client Services with questions. We’re glad to help, and your feedback helps us continue to improve our products.

 

Each tool has key steps for Auction-Link™, in addition to routine item entry and maintenance:

Auction! Bidding for Good
cMarket menu, Export to cmarket Client Services, upload items
cMarket menu, Import to Auction! Reports, Export to event management software
cMarket menu, Merge with existing database  

 

For each guideline, the implications or rationale for this point is provided. For a quick review, simply follow the bolded guidelines.

 

  • Use item numbers of no more than four numeric characters. Both systems work together smoothly when the fewest items need to be renumbered going either direction. Both systems are compatible with item numbers of four or fewer digits; alternate numbering will make Auction-Link™ very difficult.
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  • Make a decision about entering items primarily online via Bidding for Good tools OR on a PC via Auction!, and stick to it as much as possible. Each system has advantages; you and your team are likely to “stomp” on each other’s data when you enter many items in each of two different systems.
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    • Special Case: Bidding for Good Instant items. These items must be selected online. Their item numbers are alpha numeric,  usually three letters followed by three digits.
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    • Note: Auction! does not use alpha characters or dashes in item numbers. When entering these items, think about the number range you will select to replace the Bidding for Good numbers for items imported to your software. It should be “conspicuous” to you and your team, to remind you that the numbers have been changed.
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    • For instance, if your Bidding for Good items range from CMP-101 to CMP-125, we suggest a starting number for renumbered items such as “4101.” The last three digits will match the online numbers, and the 4000 range will make the items stand out as Bidding for Good Instant items when reviewing information.
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    • Special Case: Baskets/grouped items from multiple donors: for best results, create baskets in Auction! for upload to Bidding for Good, rather than using the multiple donor feature in Bidding for Good. Auction!’s basket feature is very powerful for retaining individual item donation for each donor and grouping two or more (no limit) items together into a single saleable item.
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  • When entering items in Bidding for Good that will be sold/closed at the gala, be sure to mark them “YES” for “Live” event. These items will then be set up appropriately for bid sheets and winning bid data entry at the gala event.
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  • Item behavior when “Live” event = NO. Items imported to Auction! that were flagged “NO” for Live/Gala event will be flagged as “online close.” You can enter a replacement winning bid at your gala for these items if you change your plan. You will receive a reminder prompt for each one of these items asking “This item was planned for online closing. Are you sure you wish to replace its bid?”
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  • Create Category Names with 21 or fewer characters in Auction! for Silent Items, 16 or fewer characters for categorized Live Items. cMarket online auctions will truncate lengthier category names.
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  • When you revise item descriptions inside Auction! for items already online, be sure to upload the revised data to your Bidding for Good online event as well. This ensures both copies of the item information are consistent and accurate, preventing bidder disappointment or misunderstanding.
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    • Special Case: Bidding for Good Instant items are not exported for re-upload from Auction! to Bidding for Good Instant Items. The Bidding for Good Instant item descriptions and costs are “frozen” by the consigning vendor. Updates from the Auction! software are not appropriate for Bidding for Good Instant items, so they are not exported for re-upload.
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  • Plan ahead on bid numbers to use for your online bidders. Your reservations team may have printed “paddles” for the gala, and plan to use a specific bid number range. When information is brought in, the online bidders are assigned bid numbers. When you merge this with existing reservations, duplicate bid numbers are not allowed. If your reservations team is using bid numbers beginning, say at 101, we suggest you use an entirely different range for your online bidders, such as 2000s.
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  • When merging online data and gala event reservations, it will generally work best when you OPEN the gala dataset, and merge the online data INTO it, rather than the other way around.
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    • Special Case: Auctionpay clients, post-event data merge. Guests who have swiped credit cards in the Auctionpay event payment system or Spire Payment Solutions have their bid numbers tied to their credit cards. It is critical to retain this link, and give priority to these bid numbers. When merging Bidding for Good online results with these dataset, you must open the GALA dataset FIRST, and merge the Bidding for Good data into it.
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  • Name Resolution. When online bidders and gala attendee/bidders appear to be the same name, Auction! will merge these into one record. See the Auction! user guide for more details on merge algorithms for names. Your reservations team may have imported a school dataset for names with “formal” names, e.g. Robert & Rebecca Jones. If Rebecca also bids online, and enters her name as “Becca Jones,” this will be a new name record, and she will have a different bid number.
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  • AFTER completing the merge, you may, if desired, revise the winning bidder number for Becca’s items to be the bid number for Robert & Rebecca Jones. This will then show BOTH online auction items purchased and gala/live items purchased on the SAME invoice on event night. If you do not have time for this step, the Jones’ gala purchases will appear on one invoice, and online purchases on a separate invoice for Becca.
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  • Bid Sheets. When online bids exist for an item, the highest online bid will be automatically recorded as the winning bid until you revise it on event night. This bid will ALSO be shown as the first bid on bid sheets. We recommend you turn “preprinted bid increments” ON so the next bid levels are immediately apparent to event guests.
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  • Bid Sheets and “Buy Now.” When an item has been sold online, you can print the bid sheet if you like to let guests know this. It will indicate that the item is already sold.
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  • Absentee Bids. Some online auctions will use absentee bidding. When absentee bids exist, the Auction! bid sheet will indicate “Absentee Bids Exist.” We recommend you highlight this phrase so your guests are aware that they need to bid to win. You can assign volunteers to proxy-bid during the event on behalf of the highest absentee bidder, or simply check for a higher bid at closing. Be sure your guests understand the strategy you plan to use.