eBay Patent Reveals Search Ranking Secrets

[wendybac]

http://www.ecommercebytes.com/C/blog/blog.pl?/pl/2017/9/1506019578.html

[the_fancy_fox]

No surprises there. The only thing that surprises me is ebay believes their programming is sound.

just like their recommendations, I have an item they say is 100% not going to sell so lower the price to $9.99.  When I look at other listings for that item they are not taking the free shipping into account. Sure I can lower it, and charge for shipping. My item is MIB from a non smoking home, the cheaper one for sale the box is beat up.  Bots can't see that so my ranking on that item gets lowered? LOL. 

In time the only people that will sell anything is those that sell things at a loss or near to it. A race to the bottom with eBay's favored cheap Chinese junk sellers leading he way. 

[retrose1]

And feedback counts against a seller, when it comes to getting your items seen.

As I read through it, ebay makes it clear that they can tell the program to exclude everyone that are not favored by ebay in search results.  And since the UA says that ebay never has to show your listing in search results....sellers can look forward to even lower sales than they have now.

[margarenisa_0]

...“In SOME cases, when the business rules are transparent and therefore known to both the sellers and buyers, promotions and demotions might be used to encourage certain behavior.”...

Yup.

[d-k_treasures]

Yeah - this works well -

 Relevance score, representing a measure of the relevance of an item listing with respect to search terms provided in the search request; 

How much more relevant can you get if you enter in most of the words in the title, and it either doesn't show up at all, or picks listings that only have a couple of the words in it?

[d-k_treasures]

And how well does THIS work with unique or OOAK if none were sold on ebay for a year or two?

- Listing quality score, representing a measure of the likelihood that an item listing will result in a transaction based at least in part on historical data associated with similar item listings; 

[d-k_treasures]

For example, it stated that "with some types of items, such as antiques and/or jewelry, the seller trust factor may be more important, as there may be more fraud prevalent in the trade of such items."

Gee - yet china gets top spots for fakes ..................

[the_fancy_fox]

Seems so obvious they want us small sellers gone.

another example.

i have a semi rare book up. eBay says 100% won't sell. Last one (one of two) sold for half of what I am asking by the Goodwill. Their listing declared their copy as acceptable condition. Mine is mint. The second copy that sold actually sold for a little more than I am asking. I even have Amazons sellers prices beat! (Before I list I check ALL sites).

Yet mine won't sell. Well yeah eBay, it won't sell if you won't show it. eBays algorithm won't even give me a suggested price.

So exactly what are you trying to tell me EBay? That you only want items that turn over quickly so you make a fast buck? Or you only want mass produced items that dozens of sellers are in competition to sell so eBay can manipulate the fees paid for exposure of such items?

It would be funny if it wasn't so irritating. I have spent a lot of time over the last week developing a five month exit strategy so I feel a whole lot better and am starting to laugh at the absurdity of it all. Because absurd it is.

[the_fancy_fox]

 I also have patterns for sale. Patterns were the numbers have been reused as we all know. So I list the ones that are rare and sell for decent prices. EBays algorithm picks up the ones that have flooded the market that have the same pattern number as mine and then tells me 100% percent chance mine won't sell drop the price to a buck.

now you know why the catalog and matching items to like items are so important.