Episode 316: The 3 Auction Settings That Can Double Your Revenue: How to Optimize Bids, Momentum, and Closing for Maximum Impact

📚 Grab your copy of Tom Kelly's book, The Million Dollar Nonprofit: https://ip.charityauctions.com/free-book-podcast Most nonprofits think auctions succeed because of great items.They’re wrong.In this episode of The Million Dollar Nonprofit, Tom Kelly reveals the real drivers behind high-performing auctions — the invisible settings that control how people bid, how they feel, and how much they ultimately give.Because auctions don’t fail due to lack of value. They fail due to lack of momentum.Tom breaks down the three critical levers that can dramatically increase your auction results: Starting Bids. Bid Increments. Closing Rules.First, Starting Bids. Set them too high, and people hesitate. Set them too low, and you lose value. The sweet spot? Around 30–40% of the item’s value — low enough to encourage early participation, high enough to protect revenue. Early bids create momentum, and momentum fuels competition.Next, Bid Increments. This is where many auctions quietly lose money. Small increments slow everything down. Large increments scare bidders away. The key is dynamic scaling — smaller increments for lower-priced items, larger ones as prices increase. This keeps bidding active without losing participants.Finally, the most powerful lever: Closing Rules. Fixed closing times kill competition. Last-second “sniping” cuts off bidding and leaves money on the table. Instead, use a rolling or soft close — where the timer resets when a bid is placed in the final moments. This keeps energy high and pushes prices upward.Platforms like CharityAuctionsToday make it easy to implement these settings, and this one change alone can significantly increase total revenue.But it doesn’t stop there. Auctions are emotional experiences — and your communication should match that energy. Outbid alerts, countdown reminders, and last-chance messages keep bidders engaged and competitive. Tools like DonorBooks help you track behavior and trigger these moments automatically.The result? An auction that feels alive — not static.Because people don’t just bid on items. They respond to energy, urgency, and competition.If your auctions have ever felt slow, quiet, or underwhelming, this episode gives you a simple but powerful system to fix it — and unlock significantly higher results.