Promoted Listings - More Fees as of March 30th

[wastingtime101]

https://www.ebayads.com/2023/02/15/seller-announcement-promoted-listings-standard-fees-are-changing/

What’s changing?

• As we continue working to help make your ads more engaging and helpful for buyers, we will be expanding our definition of a click for Standard and Advanced ads to include interactions with new features and functionality of your ads. In addition to when a buyer clicks through to your listing page, we will now include when a buyer clicks on the heart icon to add an item to their watchlist from a Promoted Listing.
• We will be expanding what we qualify and report as an Attributed Sale for Promoted Listings Standard to include when a buyer clicks on one of your Standard ads and then purchases any of your Promoted Listings Standard items within 30 days.
• In anticipation of upcoming product launches, we have clarified that certain account optimization features (e.g., dynamic bidding) may be managed through your account settings. Please stay tuned for announcements on when these will be available to you.

[the-hook-and-the-loop]

I really see this backfiring on eBay as every seller who promotes will be lowering their rates or ending PL's all together. Enough is enough of this childish game.

[seconhandrosie]

Funny how the lemmings bend over for Feebay and ask, "please, may I have another fee increase!" lol

[wastingtime101]

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@the-hook-and-the-loop wrote:

I really see this backfiring on eBay as every seller who promotes will be lowering their rates or ending PL's all together. Enough is enough of this childish game.

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That's what people said when eBay raised the min from 1% to 2%.

That's what people said when eBay started charging the ad rate on shipping and sales tax.

Time will tell.

As of right now it's still a pay to play system in many categories.

[nuclearomen]

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@sapphire_studio wrote:

For those that promote everything in their store at a somewhat low percentage (like less than 6%) this will really hurt. I used to do that (just select 100% of my items to promote at 5.3%). My reasoning was that sure it may not be high enough to actually make me win the promoted spot, but then I will be found organicially instead and not have to pay the fee. If I do happen to win that promoted spot with that low of percentage then great, I am keeping my fees relatively low.

Later I slowly started changing my method to analyzing each listing individually, taking promoted completely off items that I was one of only a few people selling it, and raising my percentage up to closer to 10% (0.1%-0.2% above the recommended rate) on items that I had a lot of competition on (to guarentee the top spot). I am really glad I started going through most of my listings one by one to do this. It's going to be nice that so many of my items aren't promoted at all now.

It's really easy to do a blanket lower percentage and I think a lot of people do it because it's not very much work. They may not realize how often they're just selling those items organically now (with no promoted fee) because the percentage isn't really competitive. But now it's pretty much going to be a guarantee that whatever percentage they choose they're going to end up paying that as a fee. So I would suggest people start doing what I do and look for any items that you don't have a lot of competition on and just take the promoted fee completely off of those.

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the reverse effect is what your doing, now paying too much to promote items that would likely sell on a lesser percentage election. Being "the top" spot in search is meaningless as no one really buys like they google, meaning the top slots get the sale and by now, even buyers know the top slots aren't usually the best deal without toggling "price + shipping: lowest first" in the results....and then where are you in slots? Not the top! Also doesn't mean that items you have no or few competition with don't need PL election, ebay can at any given time, just not show that item in search results at all... which they already do ("not all results are shown"). The philosophy of simply not promoting due to no or low competition will more typically result to no sale, especially in categories highly over saturated with same item and gazillion sellers competition. Just as raising the election rate of such items doesn't ensure top slots on search with those categories either... 80,000 sellers in a category, 40K of those have the same item, search returns 60 items per page as default... so how many sellers will be getting the top slots? the first page? the second page? - enter PLA and now your into a whole different universe.  

[ittybitnot]

@zamo-zuan 

In your graph on message #29, it appears you reduced/dropped your PL  rate (either altogether or shifted to a lower %)  for a rather short period of time.  Did you give it just a week?  Have you done any testing on what happens, if you wait it out, give it a month or more?   Or is your resuming the vig a response triggered by that graph short term information.

We have been aware for many months that the income eBay gets from PLs in general is used to counter their lack of sales (source of traditional income for ebay) on the platform.  They even boast about it.   

For some reason, I am thinking due to your sales record, your lack of view when adjusting your PL rate lower, or even discontinuing it altogether might "even out" when you are out of the panic mode of feeling you have to start it up again.  

Just thinking, mind you, but something to consider.  Do you have your own website yet? 

[aqeeqsouq]

@zamo-zuan 

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@zamo-zuan wrote:

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@2010byandsel100 wrote:

Easy solution - stop using PL! 

I did after they went up to 2% 

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If we stop using PL, our traffic decreases by approximately 90%.

Our ORGANIC traffic takes a nosedive if we stop using PL.

We're basically forced to use it. Because the way it functions is contradictory to the very definition of Organic.

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..............................................................................................

I have read all of it, they don't even mention "Organic traffic" term.

it's sounds they will terminate organic clicks on 30th Mar.

R.I.P organic clicks, we gonna miss you so much.

[my-cottage-books-and-antiques]

ebay encourages us to use social media.

If I send a buyer to my storefront via Instagram, for example, even if all my items are part of a PLS campaign, he will be clicking on them as organic (within the store). So, for now, if that happens, and he buys, say, three items---- no PLS fee. Yes, they were part of the PLS campaign, but since they were shown as organic, no fee.

Once this change goes into effect, if the buyer looked at one of my PLS items in the 30 day period before clicking on my Instagram link, I WILL be charged the PLS fee for the items he looked at---and bought--- in my store, even though they were shown to him as organic, and even though he actually got there because of my social media efforts, not the PLS item he clicked on with the last 30 days. The "Halo" effect will ensure I have to pay ebay the PLS fee.

Obviously, I will be making further adjustments to my ebay marketing efforts. 

[ittybitnot]

he will be clicking on them as organic (within the store). 

@my-cottage-books-and-antiques 

Are you sure they will be counted as "organic"?   Are items in your store list considered PLs or organic for sure? 

If you have an "ebay store" you can engage Google Analytics which will give you some interesting insight.  There is an extra step involved since you cannot claim an eBay URL, but there is a way to do that.   Since I use social media (non-paid) to promote most of my listings I am no longer sure of the exact steps anymore since I have my own URL, but I know it is possible.  This will also allow you (if you are in the US) to send your items on your own to Google shopping for no charge.

[seconhandrosie]

Your graph appears to show Feebay fraud. lol

[my-cottage-books-and-antiques]

@ittybitnot  My understanding is, if the buyer looks at it and it doesn't say "sponsored" its organic. And that is true whether the item is part of a PLS campaign or not. I think----not 100% sure---that ebay had glitched one time and shown items on the store page as Sponsored, but I believe that was a glitch. It is one place where I think ebay doesn't show sponsored listings (my own or anyone else's). 

[movieman630]

Well I will say this. They're a lot more lax on holding sellers to a standard then they used to be.  I bought something off a guy who said it was an original old 11x7 promo photo from 1972.  When I got it it was in fact a current 5x7 copy print on regular non glossy printer photo paper.  They are in Australia.  When I went back and looked at their feedback they got well over 100 negatives in one month!  IN ONE MONTH!!  Most people complaining about the same thing.  Which is in fact illegal because what they were doing is copying copyrighted photos belonging to MGM. 

Yet they remain, selling as usual with no repercussions from ebay.  That is a bad buying experience and a seller that should be banned. 

[movieman630]

You have a point there.  When I search on google I rarely pay attention to top results for anything as I know they're mostly just ads.  I look for the first REAL search result and start there.

[movieman630]

Essentially forced to pay twice for the same service you're promised with a regular "membership".   If you don't agree to the 2nd fee you'll never get any traffic or visibility.  The 2nd fee is basically the fee that allows your stuff to be "seen".  So what's the first set of fees for?

[tagalag78]

MEGA Make Ebay Great Again

Stick to auctions

[stainlessenginecovers]

I have always done the minimum for all items and just figure my cost is 14% (rounded with a store and 2% promos) for every item sold. Some items go PL, some not. Not much would change, but I get the concept that 'if a customer clicks/saves your item, and then buys more items- all due to a PL, then the PL will be charged' Makes sense if that's how it's going to work going forward.