03-08-2018 05:52 AM
Recently I was sent a message from eBay that buyers had an item of mine in their "shopping cart". Did not even realize ebay had shopping carts but whatever. Anyway the email suggested a price reduction that I should consider and they would message the buyer and let them know. Can anyone explain why this is even a thing when my listing is fixed price with a buy it now offer. Any buyer is welcome to present an offer to me on the item so ebay should message the buyer and tell them to put an offer in. I believe what they are calling a shopping cart is really just items on a useers' watch list.
Does ebay realize that if a buyer really wanted an item they would either bid or offer.
Someone please enlighten me on this.
03-08-2018 12:31 PM
I moved my whole watch list over. We'll see.
03-08-2018 12:34 PM
I noticed pretty strong sales on Friday morning (payday for many) and the 1st and 4th of the month. (Paydays and government checks)
I'm pretty sure those items were from a shopping cart filled up earlier in the week / month.
03-08-2018 12:39 PM
@flukeman43wrote:Recently I was sent a message from eBay that buyers had an item of mine in their "shopping cart". Did not even realize ebay had shopping carts but whatever. Anyway the email suggested a price reduction that I should consider and they would message the buyer and let them know. Can anyone explain why this is even a thing when my listing is fixed price with a buy it now offer. Any buyer is welcome to present an offer to me on the item so ebay should message the buyer and tell them to put an offer in. I believe what they are calling a shopping cart is really just items on a useers' watch list.
Does ebay realize that if a buyer really wanted an item they would either bid or offer.
Someone please enlighten me on this.
eBay has always had shopping carts as far back as I can recall. Not sure why you would think otherwise. When you look at your fixed price listings you see a button called Add to Cart, which allows buyers to add this item to their personal cart and continue shopping or come back later to pay for it.
Just a quick note - Fixed priced items are always available on eBay until someone pays for them, so any fixed price item sitting in someones cart does not remove it and any other buyer can come along and buy that item.
The promotion you are speaking about is just a suggestion as a way to entice the buyer who put it in there cart and maybe forgot about it, getting approval from family or friends, maybe checking sizes before they pay, whatever the reason is the promotion is just a simply reminder to the buyer and a small discount might make the difference in them going ahead and paying or not.
Since it is just a suggestion you do not have to do anything if you do not want to. It is something eBay can do and I think it is good idea and one that all parties can benefit from.
Good Luck Selling!
03-08-2018 12:42 PM
The message I received a few days ago listed six items that were in carts. Since then, two of them have sold at full price.
I'm in no hurry to reduce the price of the other four.
03-08-2018 12:46 PM
I just got my first email. Nice to know someone wants it but once word gets out people will just load up their carts, hoping for a price reduction.
03-08-2018 12:47 PM
@flukeman43wrote:When I put stuff in a shopping cart on other websites but do not complete the sale right away those companies do not offer a price reduction at all, they just keep it in a cart for a day or so then delete. When I put things in my cart at the grocery store then get to the register and change my mind on one or two, they do not offer a price reduction so I will still buy them. What a useless concept here on eBay.
I've seen a few websites I buy from send me an offer for something I have in the shopping cart. this isn't a new thing, nor is it an ebay thing.
03-08-2018 12:49 PM
Got the message on 3 IDs here ... on one they had an item listed that was sold 4 days ago ...
Swell.
Poor ideas implemented poorly.
Is that a Mission Statement?
03-08-2018 12:52 PM
@ozarkjoewrote:I just got my first email. Nice to know someone wants it but once word gets out people will just load up their carts, hoping for a price reduction.
That was my complaint on the last topic about this... once buyers figure this out, it will actually cause people to NOT buy hoping for a discount if they wait and don't buy now...
03-08-2018 12:53 PM
My only suggestion would be "don't open that can of worms". I would rather take my chances with getting a sale at the prices I set on my listings than having eBay do it for me. If this is the new program for them, why to we bother to price our items at all? Just send a long list to eBay and let them handle the details.
03-08-2018 12:57 PM
At least they're letting the seller make the call on this (unlike adding Make Offer to listings)... for now...
03-08-2018 12:57 PM
If you let eBay offer discounts of 5% on your items at their discretion, what makes you think the buyer would not hold out for an even larger discount? Who would approve that, you or eBay????
03-08-2018 01:02 PM
I'm thinking that next time I get one of those, I will up the price a tad on the item being targetted in the message.
03-08-2018 01:14 PM
It seems like a version of markdown manger which is available on all stores. Since someone confirmed to me it was sent to them and they had no store, now everyone can take advantage of this tactic.
03-08-2018 03:40 PM
Ebay has not had the shopping cart all that long, they introduced it in 2011. So for the most of the time, this feature was not available. It has proven to be problematic and some don't/won't use it for this reason. There actually is no reason to use it, unless you are buying multiple items from one seller. Every listings has it's own option to bid or buy.
It is different from the Watch List, but some buyers don't realize that and use the Cart as their Watch List, sometimes with dire consequences.