eBay

rhsoutlet · ‎01-30-2020

Greetings fellow Ebay sellers

JANUARY 2020 SALES ARE DEAD and returns are up. (As of January 29th, 2020). I have tried percent off sales, best offers, and refresh after refresh (calling in and requesting refresh and bulk edit). I have all my items promoted at 1% as a rule. I have sent countless reasonable offers to 'interested' buyers. I only do GTC BUY IT NOW. The auctions I see for items are selling for a fraction of what the previously did. Is this a time to hunker down and wait or sell for a fraction of reasonable value? I called Ebay & was told there are others calling in like me who are experiencing dead sales too. I don't think this is a search issue. It seems as though buyers are fed up with Ebay and have made a new years resolution to shop elsewhere.

67bird67 · ‎01-30-2020

I’m retired now after 40 years in “real world” sales/management. One thing I had to learn fast was, patience.

Selling is selling regardless the format. You will experience fluctuations for any number of reasons and EBay selling is no different.

If you panic sell now you will regret it later. As you asked, should you hunker down...depending on your specific set of circumstances....hunker down.

As for me, I’m using this time to buy heavy at the bargain prices from the panic sellers. Their loss now will be my gain later.

This has worked for me over my long career in the real world, in my investment purchases....cyber space selling is no different.

fern*wood · ‎01-30-2020

I feel ebay has way more competition now and that has affected sales negatively. Personally, my sales fluctuate greatly depending on the stuff I have for sale. This month has been my best January in a few years, but in no way does it compare to sales ten years ago.

dhbookds · ‎01-30-2020

@rhsoutlet wrote:
Greetings fellow Ebay sellers

JANUARY 2020 SALES ARE DEAD and returns are up. (As of January 29th, 2020). I have tried percent off sales, best offers, and refresh after refresh (calling in and requesting refresh and bulk edit). I have all my items promoted at 1% as a rule. I have sent countless reasonable offers to 'interested' buyers. I only do GTC BUY IT NOW. The auctions I see for items are selling for a fraction of what the previously did. Is this a time to hunker down and wait or sell for a fraction of reasonable value? I called Ebay & was told there are others calling in like me who are experiencing dead sales too. I don't think this is a search issue. It seems as though buyers are fed up with Ebay and have made a new years resolution to shop elsewhere.

looks like you've had quite a few sales (to me) in Jan. How many were you expecting?

byrd69er · ‎01-30-2020

eBay sales may be like the stock market. You have no control over its performance....only how you participate. It goes up up down up down down down nowhere up.... like the market, you rides the waves. Adjust your strategy as needed, trial, error, fix, flat, rise, fall... Give it time.

jewelbiz · ‎01-30-2020

“Hope springs eternal in the human breast.”

Hey!

January has 2 more selling days left!

m60driver · ‎01-30-2020

I have been selling here for many, many years and for the first time I too have seen a significant drop in sales and volume. I always follow my 60-day numbers of number of sales and dollar amount shown on the My Ebay page. I stopped selling for just over two months before the holidays as I was off on vacation. And since my return it appears, unless there is a major change, that I will be down between 30% and 40% from my previous selling period that ended in early October, numbers that had remained fairly steady over 2019. I am hoping that it is partially a reflection of stale inventory as I source mostly at estate and garage sales and those have been fewer and further between during the winter months. We shall see as we head in to the spring and sourcing picks up, but my decades of being involved in retail hints at something other than just my sourcing as corporate Ebay continues to follow their pipe dream of becoming another Amazon. Ebay is just another US corporation run by money junkies, and we all know you can't trust a junkie. Just ask the folks over at Boeing where the the former and now disgraced head of commercial aviation chased Wall Street profits over safety.

rosszonebricks · ‎01-30-2020

I'm up 9% over last year in January, and that was up over 30% from the year previous. My success: At the moment, I'm selling something people want, at prices they are willing to pay.

I will say that most often when I see these threads, those complaining the loudest are selling in categories that there just no market for, or far far less than in times past and they just don't want to accept that. BIG example: Collectibles or Antiques/Vintage. It's just not what people buy these days, or if they do they will not be willing to pay premium prices. Others, it is reselling old clothes or 'garage sale' items. Amazon and Walmart can beat most prices I've seen for used items on NEW versions of whatever it is, and Prime shipping, too.

It's easy to blame eBay for all our woes, but business is business. Simply put: If you are not selling what the market wants, or are asking more than the market is willing to pay, then it stands to reason that you will not be making sales.

byrd69er · ‎01-31-2020

snip: At the moment, I'm selling something people want, at prices they are willing to pay.

Right on!

Successful sales has always been a matter of selling product people want, or need, at the proper price. When markets change for the worse, especially long term....then it's time to consider a different product. It seems people can't accept this and make the needed change(s).

product + price = sale

animal-house-8 · ‎01-31-2020

Having sell Antique and Collectibles you are correct in some ways, there is a huge market in that field but you do have to sell what people want and a lot of times I find you just have to let it sit until the right buyer comes around. Now the other problem in the A&C field is that items are not must haves and disposable income is generally used to purchase such items and in the last couple of years the type of income is shrinking big time. Such mismanagement and turmoil in the country does not help either. Now I did have a great December but so far January i've had just over a 50% drop in sales compared to last year with more items offered. Antique and collectibles really is not a great field if your trying to make a main living on it for me it was just a hobby but when I retired I needed some extra income to feed and take care of rescued animals and this filled that gap as I live now on social security only. Now I have tried some sales on Facebook which have worked well but even that seemed to slow in the last few weeks.