Choose the best auction style for your fundraiser.
MemberHub offers two auction types, each with its own bidding process so that you can choose the best option for your fundraiser and donor base.
English Style
English-style auctions operate similarly to many in-person auctions:
- Each item’s starting price and bid increment are set before bidding starts.
- Participants must meet the bid increment requirement or go beyond it to outbid someone else. (E.g., if the bid increment is $5, the participant must bid at least $5 over the previous bid.)
- Participants must manually re-bid if they are outbid, and they can bid as many times as they like.
- The item is sold to the highest bidder when the auction ends.
English-style auctions encourage real-time bidder engagement and competition, driving up the item’s price and helping your organization raise more funds.
Example: If a current bid is $15 and the bid increment is $5, the next bid must be at least $20, but a participant might choose to bid $25 or more. When the auction ends, your organization receives the highest bid amount that a participant is willing to pay.
Proxy Bidding
Proxy bidding auctions are similar to English style auctions, but participants only log in once and then a proxy system will continue bidding for them as needed:
- Participants submit their first bid manually and set a maximum bid limit (other participants can’t see this limit).
- A proxy then monitors the auction on their behalf. If the participant is outbid, the proxy will raise their bid to put them back in the top position.
- The proxy will only bid the minimum amount necessary to keep the participant in the top position.
- The proxy will keep bidding until the participant’s maximum bid limit is reached. The participant will then be notified that they’ve been outbid past their limit, and they can manually raise their limit to keep bidding.
- The item is sold to the highest bidder when the auction ends.
Proxy bidding auctions make the bidding process easier and less time-consuming for donors, so it’s a good choice if your audience wants to participate but can’t be as engaged to bid often. However, a proxy will only bid the minimum amount necessary to keep the participant in the lead.
Example: If a current bid is $15 and the bid increment is $5, the proxy will only bid $20. If the auction ended at that moment, your organization would only receive $20 for that item, even if the participant’s maximum bid limit was more than $20.