BidPage.app

rom pinned posts and expert calls to domains and abandoned side projects—almost anything scarce and deliverable online can become an auction.

The internet has created countless things that are valuable but surprisingly difficult to price.

What is a pinned post worth?

How much should someone pay for seven days on a website’s homepage?

What is the right price for a 15-minute call with an expert, an unused domain or a promising side project that its developer no longer has time to finish?

Most of these opportunities are currently sold in one of three ways:

The seller guesses a fixed price.

Buyers negotiate through direct messages.

Someone writes “DM me your best offer” and tries to manage the process manually.

None of these approaches tells the seller what the opportunity is actually worth to interested buyers.

That made me wonder: why not auction it?

I built BidPage to test that idea

BidPage lets anyone create an auction for a digital item or service, choose how the bidding works and share one link with potential buyers.

There is no marketplace to join and no audience to build inside BidPage. Sellers bring their own audience from X, Instagram, LinkedIn, a newsletter, a community or an existing website.

The page handles the competition.

Bidders save a payment card before their bids count. When the auction closes, the winner is charged automatically and the seller receives the payment through Stripe.

The seller then delivers what was promised.

The basic idea is simple:

Create an auction. Share one link. Let buyers decide the price.

But what can actually be auctioned?

The more I thought about it, the more possibilities appeared. Most of them fall into four categories: attention, access, expertise and ownership.

1. Attention

Online attention is valuable because the best positions are naturally scarce.

An Instagram profile has only one bio link. An X account can pin only one post. A newsletter has limited sponsorship space. A website can feature only a few products prominently.

Creators could auction:

A sponsored Instagram Story or Reel

A pinned X, Threads or LinkedIn post

A profile link for one week

A newsletter sponsorship

A podcast mention

A YouTube product demonstration

Website and community owners could auction:

A homepage banner

The first position in a product directory

A featured tool of the week

A sponsored leaderboard position

A community announcement

A launch-day homepage takeover

This does not require millions of followers.

A developer with a small but highly focused technical audience may be valuable to companies selling developer tools. A niche pet account could be valuable to an independent pet brand. A local newsletter may have exactly the audience a nearby business wants to reach.

Relevance can matter more than raw reach.

I’m testing this idea myself by auctioning a seven-day banner placement on [PawWars.lol](https://pawwars.lol), another project I recently launched.

Instead of inventing an advertising price, I can describe the placement, set a minimum and let interested buyers decide what it is worth.

2. Access

Time is another naturally scarce resource.

Many people receive requests to “pick their brain,” review an idea or provide advice. A short, clearly defined session can be much easier to understand—and more interesting—when offered as an auction.

Someone could auction:

A 15-minute Zoom, Teams or Google Meet call

A private question-and-answer session

A one-hour consultation

A mentoring session

A portfolio or résumé review

A collaborative brainstorming call

The important part is to define the outcome.

“A call with me” is vague.

“A 30-minute call in which I review your landing page and suggest five practical improvements” is a clear offer that someone can value.

Access can also mean participation rather than conversation. A creator could let the winner choose the next video topic. A developer could let a sponsor name an upcoming feature. A podcast host could auction the opportunity to suggest a future guest or question.

The auction itself can become part of the experience.

3. Expertise

People do not always want someone’s time—they want a specific result.

Developers, designers, marketers and other specialists could auction:

A code review

A landing-page teardown

A UX audit

An SEO review

A pair-programming session

A startup pitch review

A custom illustration

A short video edit

A logo or brand concept

A technical consultation

This could be particularly useful when someone has one unexpected opening in their schedule.

Instead of advertising an ongoing freelance service, they can auction one clearly bounded slot:

“I’ll review your SaaS onboarding flow this Friday and send you a recorded 20-minute teardown.”

The seller knows exactly what must be delivered. Buyers know exactly what they are competing for.

4. Ownership

Developers and founders accumulate digital assets.

There are domains purchased for ideas that never launched, repositories that became weekend experiments, browser extensions that still work and small products that deserve more attention than their creators can give them.

Potential auctions include:

A domain name

A source-code repository

A starter kit or boilerplate

A browser extension

A mobile app

A plugin or theme

A Figma design system

An unfinished prototype

A small SaaS product

An abandoned side project

A developer might have built something useful but not know whether it is worth $100, $1,000 or considerably more to the right person.

A fixed price forces the seller to guess. An auction allows several interested buyers to answer that question.

This could also include legally owned white-label products or starter applications inspired by familiar categories. It must never include stolen repositories, copied branding or somebody else’s intellectual property.

The seller should own what is being offered and be legally able to transfer it.

Creative professionals have similar opportunities. They could auction an unused logo concept, an original music track, a 3D model, a game-asset collection or an exclusive commercial licence.

The listing simply needs to explain whether the winner receives full ownership, an exclusive licence or limited usage rights.

Not every auction should work the same way

BidPage currently supports three auction formats.

Open bidding

Everyone can see the current leading bid and compete publicly.

This is the familiar auction experience. It works particularly well for creator promotions, sponsorships and homepage placements where visible competition can make the auction more engaging.

Private bidding

Each buyer submits a confidential offer. The highest bidder wins and pays the amount they offered.

This can be useful for domains, codebases and higher-value services where buyers may not want competitors to see their budgets.

Fair Price bidding

Offers remain private. The highest bidder wins but pays the second-highest qualifying bid—or the seller’s reserve price if that is higher.

For example:

Highest bid: $120

Second-highest bid: $85

Winner pays: $85

This format encourages people to bid their genuine maximum because winning does not necessarily mean paying the full amount they entered.

Sellers can also add a Buy Now price when there is an amount they would happily accept immediately.

The listing matters more than the idea

A good digital auction makes the promise concrete.

Before bidding, a buyer should understand:

Exactly what the winner receives

When and how it will be delivered

How long a promotion or placement will remain active

Which submissions or buyers are not permitted

Whether intellectual-property rights are included

What happens if the winner’s submission is unsuitable

For a homepage banner, specify its position and duration.

For a consultation, explain the call length and subject.

For a repository, describe the technology, documentation, included assets and transfer rights.

For a sponsored post, explain the approval process and whether advertising disclosure is required.

An unusual offer can work perfectly well if its boundaries are clear.

Some things should not be auctioned

A flexible platform still needs sensible limits.

Sellers should only offer assets, services and placements they control. Auctions must respect intellectual-property rights, advertising-disclosure requirements and the rules of the platforms involved.

Personal or customer data should never be sold. Neither should fabricated reviews, deceptive endorsements or account transfers prohibited by another service.

“Digital” does not mean consequence-free.

The goal is to create a straightforward way to sell legitimate opportunities—not a way around other platforms’ rules.

The most interesting use case probably hasn’t been discovered yet

I built BidPage around digital products and services, but I suspect its most interesting uses will come from its users.

Perhaps it will be a creator auctioning a Reel.

Perhaps it will be a developer selling an unfinished app.

Perhaps it will be a founder offering the first lifetime account for a new product, a community auctioning its next sponsorship or an open-source maintainer letting someone sponsor the next release.

The underlying principle remains the same:

If something is scarce, clearly describable and deliverable online, it may not need an arbitrary fixed price.

It can have its own BidPage.

BidPage is now live at https://bidpage.app.

It is still early, and I’m especially interested in the possibilities I haven’t considered yet.

What would you auction?