eBay

cristian3_6 · ‎04-10-2024

hello
I received a message from ebay, I don't know if it came to me alone or to everyone.

Does that mean that you can't add more promoted lists by paying a few dollars like I do now?

the message says this

Soon you’ll be able to use Promoted Listings Standard for your auction and fixed price items

Starting April 15, 2024, Promoted Listings Express will no longer be available. Instead, you’ll be able to promote auction and fixed price listings using one of our other products, Promoted Listings Standard. This high-performing advertising solution has many great features that will help you create more impactful campaigns.

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Only pay for sales. Instead of paying up front, you’ll only pay when you make a sale on an auction or fixed price item.

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Simple setup. Get started in just a few clicks.

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Reach more buyers. Stand out from the crowd with listings in prominent ad placements.

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Powerful results. Use reports to monitor your performance and optimize your listings.

gurlcat · ‎04-17-2024

Ooo! Here's something I'll be very curious to see -whether the % rate is editable after the first bid is placed. I understand why so many other listing features are locked at that point, but changing how visible the listing is wouldn't change anything that factored into already-bid'ers' decisions to bid or how much.

Well, POOP, but then I guess the algorithm would have to be programmed to charge the seller according to the rate applied when the winning bidder ....BLARRR! I DON'T KNOW! I JUST HATE THIS SO MUCH!! 🤣

my-cottage-books-and-antiques · ‎04-17-2024

@gurlcat Well, we won't know for certain until this launches, but I don't think the auction duration will be a factor. You select whatever % you are comfortable with, same as with fixed price items now.

As to what percentage to choose, that's up to you.

I might be mistaken, but don't you mostly use auctions for jewelry lots? Maybe go back though and figure out an average sales figure---do your lots usually sell for $50, $100, $500...whatever.

If you paid $1.99 for most of your auctions (PL Express up front fee), what PLS percentage would come closest to approximating that amount? (Keeping in mind that the PLS is calculated on total price, so if shipping or sales tax is high, that can skew things).

If the PLS minimum of 2% is closest, then I would probably start by using that. (But of course, 2% might or might not get you the type of visibility you want, so you might need to go up from there) I would, of course, ignore ebay's "suggested rate".

And of course, right now, with no PLE and no PLS, you can get a pretty good idea whether your lots might sell without any PL.

valueaddedresource · ‎04-17-2024

@gurlcat wrote:
Ooo! Here's something I'll be very curious to see -whether the % rate is editable after the first bid is placed. I understand why so many other listing features are locked at that point, but changing how visible the listing is wouldn't change anything that factored into already-bid'ers' decisions to bid or how much.

Well, POOP, but then I guess the algorithm would have to be programmed to charge the seller according to the rate applied when the winning bidder ....BLARRR! I DON'T KNOW! I JUST HATE THIS SO MUCH!! 🤣

@gurlcat just from what was said in the eBay Ads blog, it sounds like the plan is for the most part it's going to work very much like it does for Fixed Price BIN as far as attribution, which would make sense since you'll be able to include both auction and fixed price in the same campaign if you use the Simple option so they would have to keep that relatively consistent.

So, to keep it simple, for your auctions in PL Standard, if you change the rate while the auction is running, it should be based on last click attribution just like for fixed price.

https://www.ebay.com/sellercenter/growth/promoted-listings/promoted-listings-standard

For Direct sales, we measure the 30-day sales attribution window from the click closest to the sale and charge the ad rate in effect at the time of that last click.

For Halo Item sales, you will only be charged an ad fee if the purchased item is in an active Promoted Listings Standard campaign at the time of the sale, and you will be charged the ad rate of the sold item.

The ad fee for Halo Item sales will be calculated based on the ad rate in effect for the sold item at the time of the sale.

Direct sale example 1: A buyer clicks your item before you revise the ad rate and purchases it after your revision.

When a buyer clicks on your promoted listing before you revise the ad rate but purchases the item after you revise the ad rate, you will be charged the ad rate before you revised it.

Direct sale example 2: A buyer clicks and purchases your item after you revise the ad rate.

When a buyer clicks on your promoted listing after you revise your ad rate and purchases the item, you will be charged the updated ad rate that is active at the time of the sale.

gurlcat · ‎04-17-2024

@valueaddedresource wrote:

Wish I had suggestions for you on a strategy for how to best use PL Standard for auctions but I don't....if nothing else, don't feel bad because it's not entirely obvious to me either. 😂

Thank you, that actually means a lot to me.

Unfortunately, it's probably just going to require testing and tweaking once the option is available.

Well you know I'm always down for testing stuff!

my-cottage-books-and-antiques · ‎04-17-2024

@gurlcat Excellent question!

devon@ebay On a fixed price listing in PLS, I can change the rate at any time (or even end the campaign). How will that work with auctions? and will there be a difference between an auction without any bids, and an auction with a bid?

my-cottage-books-and-antiques · ‎04-17-2024

@valueaddedresource I agree that the attribution will likely work that way, and agree with @gurlcat that changing the PLS rate after a bid has been secured really should not be prohibited, but I think it would be good to get that confirmed if we can.

valueaddedresource · ‎04-17-2024

@gurlcat wrote:
@valueaddedresource wrote:

Wish I had suggestions for you on a strategy for how to best use PL Standard for auctions but I don't....if nothing else, don't feel bad because it's not entirely obvious to me either. 😂

Thank you, that actually means a lot to me.

Unfortunately, it's probably just going to require testing and tweaking once the option is available.

Well you know I'm always down for testing stuff!

@gurlcat you're welcome!

My first thought was going to be along the lines of what @my-cottage-books-and-antiques suggested of looking back at what you were paying for Express and approximating a percent from that to start with, but I'm not really sure how that will work since Express was such a different animal with visibility and what you "got" for that amount being so different that I don't know if any of the data you may have gleaned from your experience with those ads would actually be remotely helpful in trying to figure out what to do for auctions in PLS.

Given how much that blog post is pointing to the idea that these ads will work for auctions almost exactly the same way they do for fixed price (and assuming auctions will now be competing against fixed price for the same placements using same/similar ranking criteria), it might be a better strategy to take what you know has been working for your BIN listings and use that as a starting point for auctions too?

Though if your BIN listings tend to be single items and auctions tend to be lots, that could make some difference too.

Honestly, my suggestion would be to take a deep breath, don't stress about it and just see where things are on the 29th but I know that's much easier said than done.

valueaddedresource · ‎04-17-2024

@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:
@valueaddedresource I agree that the attribution will likely work that way, and agree with @gurlcat that changing the PLS rate after a bid has been secured really should not be prohibited, but I think it would be good to get that confirmed if we can.

@my-cottage-books-and-antiques for sure confirmation would be great! Hopefully Devon or someone at adsteam@ebay will be able to provide some additional info to help those who use auctions prepare for this change.

my-cottage-books-and-antiques · ‎04-17-2024

@valueaddedresource That's another good way of lookin at it. Whether @gurlcat starts with a rate similar to the old PLE fee or the rate she's been using for FP listings, it will still be a matter of testing. I know when PLE was originally launched, the placements were limited, although I seem to recall at some point ebay did expand them? Since I rarely used PLE, I didn't keep up with that.

It is definitely a change, both in how effective PLS will be when compared to PLE, and in the likely cost for the seller. I gather @gurlcat has something of a following for her auctions, and she clearly knows her stuff, so I think she'll continue to benefit from auction format. I agree, no need to stress over this. Just wait till it's here, and then deal with it.

gurlcat · ‎04-17-2024

Thanks but there's no way to do a calculation like what you suggested because the winning bids on these lots are SO unpredictable. If it were as easy as calculating the average of a bunch of them, then theoretically I would just list them as BIN's for that amount. In fact, that's often how I decide the BIN price for a single item, if there are enough Sold listings of it to figure an average (taking condition into account of course). But with mixed lots, there are just so many wild card factors.

Even with as many of these as I've done, the results surprise me all the time.
I figured this one would fetch at least $150.

And I thought this one might go as high as $300. LOL.

So, I rightly predicted which would do better than the other, but by how much ..... not even close.
But I can tell you this much for sure: $1.49 or $1.99 was negligible compared to what I'd have to pay for promotion if I used the 7-9% rate that I apply to most BIN's, regardless of winning bid, because I don't ever list a lot that couldn't fetch (at baaare minimum) 50 bucks.
What I have to figure out is whether I'll NEED to apply that much. But even 4 or 5% would be an increase in my costs, that's for sure.

valueaddedresource · ‎04-17-2024

@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:
@valueaddedresource That's another good way of lookin at it. Whether @gurlcat starts with a rate similar to the old PLE fee or the rate she's been using for FP listings, it will still be a matter of testing. I know when PLE was originally launched, the placements were limited, although I seem to recall at some point ebay did expand them? Since I rarely used PLE, I didn't keep up with that.

@my-cottage-books-and-antiques as far as I know, PLE were only ever eligible to be shown on the view item page of similar listings.

Presumably in PLS they will be eligible to be shown in search results now too and other places across the eBay network where PLS may be shown (watch lists, post sale pop ups if they're still doing that, marketing emails...not sure about external placements but I would assume so since that blog post seems to indicate placements will be the same as existing PLS ads for FP)

We know the majority of impressions and clicks for PLS on FP come from the view item page, so not sure how much of a difference this will really make to add auctions in too.

I do think it will increase competition for PLS placement in search, which has already been ratcheted up from the fact that Promoted Advanced went from Top 4 placement to, Top 4 place 3 "premium" slots, to now being eligible to appear anywhere in search as well but we'll see how that goes.

my-cottage-books-and-antiques · ‎04-17-2024

@gurlcat

Yeah, I figured coming up with an average would be just a very rough sort of thing, because prices are bound to vary. I agree that using PLS , especially at , say, 7%, will cut into your margins compared to the cost of PLE.

A couple thoughts (you may already do this stuff, or maybe it wouldn't work for what you do...just throwing this out there.

1. Launch your lot auctions on the same day, say, Sunday night every week.

2. Send a weekly ebay newsletter reminding subscribers about the auctions. Maybe include a discount coupon for repeat buyers?

3. Use social media to promote the auctions as well.

I think the more consistency there is the more you can build up a repeat customer base, and hopefully will not need to rely so much on promotions.

Like I say, just some random thoughts....

my-cottage-books-and-antiques · ‎04-17-2024

@valueaddedresource Well, I'm guessing that, yes, this will increase visibility (at least in theory, in that more positions will be available), but whether that will really translate into more bids and better sales is anyone's guess. And the cost, especially for higher dollar auctions, is certainly going to exceed the $1.99 or whatever that seems to have been pretty common for PLE.

Only time will tell.