It's not that you ought to cut down the cost to magnetize shopper but playing with the psychology of people can work miracle. In spite of setting the auction's initial offer, if you offer the same product with some bugs added to its proposed auction bid & with a message displayed 'Buy it now' then some fraction of people, who had been longing for the item would take it to be an opportunity to avail the product undoubtedly without taking chance in bidding & losing. They actually don't mind paying extra to get what they long for.
The 'One Dollar Less' Strategy
This is easy, but needs an eagle eye on your competitor. As soon as they launch a 'Buy it Now' auction for the product you have, launch your auction for the same product with price tag 1 dollar less than theirs. Any search for the product would bring both the results together & you'll stand higher probability for your '1 dollar less' price tag.
The 'Free Shipping' Strategy
Buyers really hate paying for shipping. You can easily include the 'free shipping' title after adding the transportation cost into the main price. You would be shocked to know how shoppers prefer to pay the final price (including shipping) for the 'free-shipping' title, instead of having shipping cost extra. Again the psychological factor, they pay the same final cost at the end, but feel good that they did not pay an unnecessary extra cost for Internet shopping as transportation charges.
