Ultimately, I think ebay is best for factory-made items or bulk buy (ie. things you can make a huge profit margin on). The issue is when you get to custom-made and handmade stuff, which have a smaller profit of margin. Ebay buyers are looking at the price, more than they look at quality, and are looking for bargains or, as you've found out, easy bidding.

The site is also rife with problems, from bid rigging, to false bidding (ie. payment avoidance), and fraudulent items.

This is why I prefer Etsy, there's much more focus on handmade quality rather than scouring for bargains. It's more about getting a cool item than getting the item for the lowest price possible. Which means people are more willing to shell out for what the item is actually worth. I won't say there aren't issues of payment avoidance and so on, but it seems less obvious to me.

I think what you've done in terms of marketing the listing could easily be transferred to other sites; why limit yourself to only selling on Ebay? As the next step of your experiment, you could see which does better - Ebay, another site, or test a number at once.

Hey,
I agree. I think ebay is a good platform to get your name out there.

Cheers,
Daniel