EBAY No Longer Worth It.
Been a member since 1997. In recent years, have used EBAY very infrequently and now I understand even better why. It was a great platform 25 years ago. Recently I posted 7 or 8 listings which I haven't done in a long time. Now I see I'm lucky if I get 1 or 2 "views". Years ago I would receive dozens of views within the first day and often times items would sell within 1 day or even less of my listing. Clearly these people have changed things in a big way so that "views" are now few and far between unless "of course" you pay up additional $$ by "promoting" your listing. It's not enough that these people hose you by charging fees in the range of 10%+. I ask myself, if my listing is way down the bottom of the "views" potential then why the "F" am I even paying these people anything? Thankfully I never "need" the $$. So if my item doesn't sell then so be it. I can find other platforms. The brand has really gone downhill over the years. That's also reflected in the lousy performance of Ebay stock price and the miserable return they have delivered to investors. What a Pity.
az93
·1 year agoHer name is leeann tweeden. Look at the cover.
ed8108
·1 year agoPlace a hourly dollar value on your time
12345jamesstamps
·2 years agoIt's worth it to me.
I know what I am doing.
movieman630
·2 years agoYeah, Welcome back. We now give ebay up to 25% of our sales just to have sales. It's a dirty trick. It would be one thing if they removed the throttling they put on you and actually allowed you to make MORE money but to keep you at a yearly, monthly, weekly, daily "ceiling" and ask for more in advertising is just terrible. If my Promoted listings actually added up to a major increase in revenue I might think it was worth it. But to keep all the old "governors" in place at the same time just isn't fair. Where's the incentive? Where's the excitement?
gurlcat
·2 years agoYall this thread is from February.
inhawaii
·2 years agoSo ... the op is long gone, making big bucks on some other platform? 😉
dbfolks166mt
·2 years agoSo ... the op is long gone, making big bucks on some other platform?
Actually OP still has 8 active listings and has in fact sold two items since they made the post in February.
lawnmowerpartsstore2
·2 years agoYall this thread is from February.
And your point is ???
gurlcat
·2 years agoThe thread is from February. That's 5 months ago. Also the OP is no longer participating in the thread. Also the OP was obviously bluffing about eBay not being "worth it" to them, as they are still selling here. Also at least one (if not many) posts just like this start up in the feed every single day, so what was your post in asking what mine was? Is there something about this thread you find particularly worthy of keeping active?
az93
·2 years agoPromotions are optional. What you need is a good title and an item someone wants to buy. If you check solds and no one wants it, do not bother to list it.
sakic92710
·2 years agoThe view count changed, as others have told you because, they removed the existence of 'bot' views. This was no benefit to eBay because it showed sellers the reality of how few "buyers" actually visit the site.
Unavailable member
·2 years ago@sinbad1989 Years ago the majority of the views your items received were from internet bots not humans. eBay removed bot views a couple years ago, so now items receive true views from humans.
Plus years ago, there wasn't as much competition as there is now.
Best wishes where ever you land.
sakic92710
·2 years agoI posted this item on Marketplace & it was sold within 3 hours. I wonder how many MONTHS it would have sat on eBay with about 5 views? lol
movieman630
·2 years agoWell it's all in price. That's a Korean War UN medal. Obviously period original by the patina. If your price was low it sold. If your price was high it wouldn't have. Not on FB, not on Ebay, not at a flea market. I don't know what FB charges you but on ebay you'd have to inflate the price up to 40% just to make what you could in cash.
sumsum70
·2 years agoI don't know what FB charges you but on ebay you'd have to inflate the price up to 40% just to make what you could in cash.
This is why I have more sales on FB than eBay. Buyers can find what they want without paying eBay's overhead.
In the grand scheme of things, sellers don't pay eBay fees and shipping, buyers do. These days, buyers don't need to.
movieman630
·2 years agoWell I'm looking forward to the day FB gets smart and starts charging fees on marketplace. I refuse to open a FB account ever again.
chapeau-noir
·2 years agoFrom what I've been reading in the trade press, that day is not long in coming, though there's a lot of speculating.
dbfolks166mt
·1 year agoFrom what I've been reading in the trade press, that day is not long in coming, though there's a lot of speculating.
They are probably trying to figure out all the costs associated with doing so and what they want their bottom line to look like. Charging and collecting fees would also mean collecting and remitting sales tax, collecting personal information to track and remit 1099-K's or paying a third party financial processor to do so, ensuring legal compliance..................... META Platforms owns Facebook and it would be a HUGE initial investment for them and they would need to realize a decent ROI to appease their shareholders.
sakic92710
·2 years agoZero fees on FBM. You keep every penny. I got my asking price of $35 Cdn. No doubt I would not have gotten that much on eBay & would have had to subtract fees.
inhawaii
·2 years agoI'm starting to wonder if you work for FBM? 😉
sakic92710
·1 year agoI wouldn't advise it. My pay so far this week is $7.00. Put your job application in somewhere else! lol
gurlcat
·2 years agoSo eBay charges too much in fees and throttles you, you won't have another FB account, so ..... I take it you have a great flea market booth???
inhawaii
·2 years agoYears ago views included bot views.
Now views exclude bot views and only show real human views.
That's why your views (appear to have) gone way down.
You're like a lot of sellers who blame ebay because nobody wants to buy their stuff.
What a pity.
Good luck to you!
thebenlyshop
·2 years agoI agree entirely. I sell primarily vintage cars, motorcycles, bicycles and guitars. There are simply more effective platforms now. ebay owned this business for years but got complacent, greedy and controlling. The consequences are real and evident.
annadryl
·2 years agoLots of "quotation marks", is there some "code" I am missing?
ten_o_nine
·2 years agoIn 1997, there were a few sites you can sell and buy. Yahoo was the first place I started, then moved on to eBay because of all the ads they featured at that time, yahoo auctions died then and 95% were using eBay.
But now, we have thousands of sites all over the internet, and eBay leadership missed the boat and became followers instead of leaders in the online marketplace, for some time, their focus on short time profit and how to keep investors happy, with no vision for seller and buyer retention.
frankenhobbit
·2 years ago25 years ago, the competition (meaning other sellers, not other platforms) just wasn't there. Now everyone fancies themselves a 'flipper', many cannot do basic math so pay the promotional fee, don't realize that overall, they are selling at a loss or at least making below minimum wage. Hard to compete against that without a solid business plan.
Need to sell items that very few others do to beat the promoted listings game.
I, fortunately, like you don't NEED to sell stuff, I'm usually just getting rid of it. Have had two selling 'sprees' of about 35-40 items each. Nearly all items sold pretty quickly. But it's usually stuff where there are not a ton of them listed and so my items show up near the top. I tried promoted for a couple of items, just out of curiosity. Made no difference. Apparently no-one wanted a rear sight for an Arisaka Type 99 at that time, at least not my one!
hartungcards
·2 years agoUh.....you said yourself you have less than 10 listings, and they're your first ones "in a long time." And you have 2 followers. Maybe your followers forgot about you over the last 25 years.
ckimodog
·2 years ago@sinbad1989
Sometimes we have to make choices. I wish you well with future opportunities. It's been a hard ride in the last few years to say the least.
All the best.
onlinecentral
·2 years agoMarketers love the age 25-54 age group.
Your buyers from 1997 are now 52-81.
A whole new crop of buyers has come along.
Best wishes selling on other platforms.
martin2001
·2 years agoDon't get discouraged. I doubt that you will find a better venue to sell than ebay. I started on ebay in 1998. The sales were much higher, but you have many factors that affect the sales. More competition, I sell old prints, younger generation is not interested in this stuff, with currently high prices of the essentials, people are cutting back on non-essentials. Unless you sell a hot product, you have to have many more items listed to get some views. You also need to consider using marketing tools like discounts, coupons, promotions. I have 10,000 items in the store and get in average 350 clicks/day
gurlcat
·2 years agoHappy trails and good luck, wherever you wind up selling instead.