Swoopo – Too Good To Be True? My Experience with Swoopo Last Weekend!
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Swoopo was my weekend project last week. I read quite a bit about the site and decided to put it couple 100 dollars to test if the service really works or it’s one of the smart online scams.
Swoopo is an online bidding portal which offers popular electronic items for cheap. How cheap? That depends on your “luck”.
Here is how it works. If you are trying to get a listed item on Swoopo then you are supposed to bid for that product until the auction time runs out and you have the last bit. There are several types of auctions, Time based auctions, Penny based auctions, location based auctions, etc.. each designed to get more money out of you 
Most important part! Each bid you place on an item will cost you 60 cents. So if you place about 10 bids you end up paying $6, that’s the math. Users have to buy a BidPack before you start bidding. BidPacks range between 40 – 1000 bids for $24 to $600.
Let me show you an example of why Swoopo attracts so many bidders from across the world.
Click on enlarge
The screenshot I took of one of the ended auction shows that the PS3 was sold for $199.80 which (according to swoopo) was worth $359. Now let’s do a little bit of math. This is a regular bid so everytime someone bids the item price goes up by 12 cents so the fact that the item was sold for $199.80 means that 1665 (Auction Price – $199.80/Bid Incremental price 12 cents) bids were placed during this auction.
And knowing that each bid cost 60 cents, Swoopo made $999 on something which is worth $359. Keeping these numbers in mind I don’t see why a company should have an issue in keeping things legit by sending the product to the winner and that’s one of the only reasons which drive me to believe that the sites business model is legitimate.
I decided to put my belief to test and registered with the site on Friday night. I started with the smallest BidPack to get to know the service. After a sleepless Saturday night and a couple hundred dollars later I realized it was too tough to talk yourself into believing that the service is legit.
Here is what raises questions for me! During the time I spent on the site I saw at least one person who was on the site bidding endlessly for more than 20-24 hours. Suspicious right? Check this out! I Googled one of the names of the bidders who was frantically bidding on an auction and what I saw in the results suggested that it was most likely a bot.
My learning’s at the end of the weekend? Mathematically I think Swoopo should not have a problem keeping the business legit by sending stuff to the users but the activities I’ve noticed on the site argue otherwise which leaves me nowhere!
I would be glad to talk to someone from Swoopo and find out more about the service. It would be even better to see the action behind the scene from my own eyes. So, if anyone from Swoopo is reading this, Invite me ill be happy to report from behind the scene.
Resource Credits: Shaila AzizTags: Online Auction, Swoopo, Swoopo Review, Swoopo Scam?
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Comments
I started tracking some "auctions" today to see whether or not this site is legitimate. I tracked two auctions specifically, and watched a few users battle it out. The clock would run down to 5, 4, 3, 2-- up! A mass of automated bids and the clock goes back up.
Even with this I was still optimistic that once they spent a certain amount they'd give up and I could jump in at the last second to get the deal with a 60 cent bid + the auction price. So I signed up to bid on that item.
Only AFTER I registered and bought credits did the site say that bidding on that item was CLOSED TO THE LAST 6 USERS WHO BID. There is NOTHING about this mentioned until after you register, and they don't tell you how long ago you have to have bid in order to be in the final closed bidding (which actually continues to go on several hours after the clock gets under 10s).
I'll use up my credits as strategically as I can (ha!) but this is nothing more than a gambling site. I've just bought $20 in powerball tickets-- except if I win, I get a lousy laptop or iphone, not 35 million dollars.
Strange to read about sth like that on an english blog - cause I still think most of the users coming from germany. So, actually there are bots for swoopo outside (I'm using one) - but they don't to all the work for you. It's just like a BidButler, with some more features.
There is lots of stuff that most ppl don't know about swoopo, like i.e. most of the time, ppl from different countries are bidding on the same auction, but on different products. Strange stuff!
But to be fair, swoopo is still the fairest "entertainment shopping" site available. all those new ones are pretty pretty bad. i.e., they mostly got 1-2 cent/penny auctions which is pretty bad too.
if you want to get more information about swoopo, just contact me. i'll not get you any neat details about the bot, but i can give you some hints.
What was the username that you noticed looked suspicious? I track every Swoopo auction and haven't noticed weird behavior like you saw.
Also, did you note whether or not it was a BidButler? Swoopo has an automated bidding tool they allow users to turn on called BidButler and if someone is using that, they won't need to be by the computer to continue to bid. There are pros and cons to the BidButler, of course.
Thanks for sharing your experience!