How to post auction lots on Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp

Which network for which buyers

Do not try to be everywhere. Pick the networks where your buyers already are, and post properly there.

• Facebook is still where local buyers and most buyers over forty are, and its groups are sorted by exactly the subjects auctions are sorted by: a make of tractor, a region's antiques, a breed, a kind of collectable. A post can carry a link, so the path from seeing to bidding is one tap. A business Page is the base; groups are where new buyers come from, provided the group allows sale posts.
• Instagram rewards lots that photograph well and buyers who browse by eye. Captions carry no clickable link, so the link to the sale goes in your profile and every caption says "link in profile". Stories, which vanish after 24 hours, are the natural tool for "closes tomorrow".
• WhatsApp is not a broadcast medium; it is where your regular buyers hear from you personally. A broadcast list reaches people who have saved your number, one message each, with no group chatter. A group is for a circle that wants to talk among themselves. Either way, two messages per sale is the limit before it reads as spam.

LinkedIn, X and the rest have their trades (equipment, vehicles, business liquidation on LinkedIn; collectables on X) and the same rules apply: the right shape, the closing time, the link.

Image shapes, and why your photo gets cut

Every network crops to its own frame. A lot photo is usually taken in landscape or 4:3, because that is what a camera gives you; the feed wants a square and a story wants a tall portrait. Upload the camera photo as it is and the network crops it for you, which is how a chandelier loses its top and a car loses its wheels.

The fix is to place the photo on a canvas of the right shape instead of cropping it: the whole object, with the title, the closing time and your address in the space the canvas leaves. Keep text out of the top and bottom 250 pixels of a story, where the network draws its own name bar and reply box.

One rule above all: no current price on the image. A post is seen for days; the price changes with every bid. A picture that says "€120" is wrong by evening and stays wrong in everyone's feed, and a wrong price is a complaint you have to answer. The closing time is the number that stays true.

Lot post or sale post

You will make two kinds of post and they do different jobs.

A sale post says a sale exists: a few lead lots in one image or a short carousel, the number of lots, when bidding closes, where. One at the announcement, one at the 48-hour reminder, one on the closing day. It is the post people share.

A lot post is one object, filling the frame, with its own closing time. It is the post people bid from. In the final week, one lot a day: the ones with a story, a recognisable name or a low start and no reserve. Building one is the same five steps every time.

1. Choose the lot and the one photo

   The best single photo of the object, on a plain background if you have one. Not the detail shot, not the label: the whole thing, the way a buyer first sees it.

2. Place it on the right canvas

   Square for the feed, tall for a story, the photo whole, with the lot's title, "bidding closes" and the day, time and time zone, and your site's address. Your colour, every time, so the posts are recognisably yours.

3. Write the caption

   First line: what it is, with the name people search for. Second: one sentence of story or condition. Third: closing time and how to bid. Fourth: the link, or "link in profile". One or two hashtags that a collector would actually follow, not twenty.

4. Post when your buyers are awake

   Early evening local time for consumers, mid-morning for trade buyers. If your bidders are in several countries, the closing time in the caption matters more than the posting hour.

5. Answer the comments

   A question under a lot post is a bid waiting for an answer. Reply in public, because the next person has the same question, then take the specifics to a message.

The caption, line by line

People read the first line and decide. A caption that works on every network:

1962 Vespa 150 VBB, one owner since 1974, running.
Bidding closes Sunday 5 October, 20:00 CEST.
Register once, bid on any lot: link below / in profile.
#vespa #scooter

Four lines, no more. The name in the first words, because that is what is searched for and what a group's members scan for. The closing time with its time zone, because a sale across borders has bidders an hour out. One line on how bidding works, because the first-time bidder's question is always "do I need an account". Then the link.

What to leave out: the lot number (meaningless outside your catalogue), the estimate (a reason not to bid), "don't miss out" (everyone says it), and anything that will change, which is the price and the bid count.

Stories, status and timing

A story lasts 24 hours, which makes it useless for an announcement and perfect for the end. Use stories for the last two days: "closes tomorrow 20:00" with one lot per story, three or four stories in a row, and on the closing day "closes tonight" in the morning and "two hours left" in the evening. Instagram's countdown sticker, set to the closing time, lets people ask to be reminded; use it on the last-day story.

WhatsApp status is the same idea for the people who have your number, and costs them nothing to ignore, unlike a message.

For feed posts, the rhythm from the promotion timeline holds: the announcement four weeks out, the catalogue a week later, one lot a day in the final week, two or three posts on the closing day, the results the morning after. Outside the final week, once or twice a week is plenty.

Posting lots before bidding opens

A lot that is listed but not yet open for bidding is still news: it has a title, a photo and an opening time. "Coming up: bidding opens Tuesday 10:00" posts fill the quiet middle of the run, give collectors time to arrange money or a viewing, and cost nothing you would not make anyway. The rule about prices applies with more force here, because the starting price is the one number certain to change the moment bidding opens.

When the lot opens, do not repost the same picture; post a story that says it is open, and keep the feed post for the final week.

Groups, Marketplace and the rules to check

Three things get sale posts removed, and none of them is about auctions as such.

• Marketplace listings want a fixed price. Facebook Marketplace is a classified ads board; a listing is one item at one price, and "auction, see link" listings are routinely taken down. An auction belongs in a Page post or a group post, not a Marketplace listing.
• Groups have their own sale rules. Many allow sales only on a set day, only from members of some standing, or not at all. Read the group's rules before the first post; a removed post is also a lost membership.
• Some goods are restricted. Alcohol, weapons, animals, tobacco and some medical items are limited or banned in the networks' commerce policies, whatever the local law says. A wine auction can be announced; a listing-style post of a bottle may be removed.

The policies change and differ by country. Treat the above as what to check, not as a rule we state for you: each network publishes its commerce policy, and the current version is the one that applies to your post.

WhatsApp, done properly

A broadcast list delivers your message to each person separately; they only receive it if they have saved your number, which is why asking buyers to save it at collection time pays off for years. A group delivers to everyone and lets them talk, which suits a circle of regulars and does not suit a hundred strangers.

Two messages per sale: the announcement with the sale image and the link, and the 48-hour reminder with the closing time first. Send the square image, not the story; WhatsApp compresses whatever you send, so text on the image should be large. Put the link on its own line so the preview card renders. Do not add people to a group who did not ask; in most countries that is a consent question as well as a courtesy one, and the rule to follow is the one where you sell.

Questions