How do I hide Sponsored Listings?

[callixto]

I HATE, I repeat HATE Sponsored Listings. They are ruining my eBay experience, and you can best believe that I will NEVER purchase a Sponsored item.

I want a way to turn them OFF. I do not want to see the same overpriced item at the top, middle, and bottom of every page of results, especially when I have specific sort criteria. What is the point of 'newly listed' or 'price low to high' if the first results are the Sponsored Listing? I guarantee you that seeing these same listings over and over is not going to weaken my resolve and make me want to purchase these random items. Au contraire, mon frère. Any seller that makes frequent use of Sponsored Listings is going to go on my blacklist. You people are the worst.

[reda3615]

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@jeannicho22 wrote:

Seems like a lot of negative mojo.  YMMV

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Your company is looking for the right person to fill a job opening.

OK @jeannicho22 I''l give it a go:

Your company posts a job ad for a programmer with at least 3 years of Python experience.

Sponsored: John Cleese shows up

[nc-daydreamer]

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@callixto wrote:

By the way, I think I may have found a workaround that doesn't require ad blocking extensions. I am creating a blacklist of sellers who use Sponsored Listings, and using the Advanced Search option to exclude them from my search results. So far it seems to be working, but if this starts to proliferate to the point where there are too many spammers to keep track of, I will have to resort to ad blocking software.

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While I understand the frustration, you might not be aware that eBay encourages sellers to do this because they promise to get your listings to be seen higher in search results and they charge sellers a hefty fee for this.  Sometimes, sellers' items are hidden from searches if they are not promoted/sponsored.  that is why some things seem overpriced as the seller sometimes passes this fee along to the buyer.

Not every seller promotes or sponsors all their items - normally only a few because  of the extra expense. So it is not fair to the seller to block all their listings, just as you might be doing yourself an injustice by missing out on some great items that are not being promoted from that seller.

Just something to keep in mind @callixto  - 🙂

[callixto]

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@nc-daydreamer wrote:

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@callixto wrote:

By the way, I think I may have found a workaround that doesn't require ad blocking extensions. I am creating a blacklist of sellers who use Sponsored Listings, and using the Advanced Search option to exclude them from my search results. So far it seems to be working, but if this starts to proliferate to the point where there are too many spammers to keep track of, I will have to resort to ad blocking software.

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While I understand the frustration, you might not be aware that eBay encourages sellers to do this because they promise to get your listings to be seen higher in search results and they charge sellers a hefty fee for this.  Sometimes, sellers' items are hidden from searches if they are not promoted/sponsored.  that is why some things seem overpriced as the seller sometimes passes this fee along to the buyer.

Not every seller promotes or sponsors all their items - normally only a few because  of the extra expense. So it is not fair to the seller to block all their listings, just as you might be doing yourself an injustice by missing out on some great items that are not being promoted from that seller.

Just something to keep in mind @callixto  - 🙂

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"Not fair"? Too bad. You want to play eBay's game, you go right ahead, I'm done.

[toddkelley0]

I don’t mind that sponsored item appear at the top of the search results, but the same items over and over? That is wrong. I’ve seen their item! I don’t want to see it again and again! This is fixable by eBay. Please do it soon!

[toddkelley0]

Oh that comment re: the iOS app and save searches. Just in case anyone at eBay reads these replies

[beez5720]

"You people are the worst"

Really? Wow. People are just trying to make a living and using the tools ebay gives them, and yes, sellers ARE people.

[ifyouloveit]

Sadly, eBay has made it near impossible for a seller to be seen unless said seller jumps through all the eBay money grabs to get their item seen by a buyer.

It stinks, I am a seller and buyer and I hate it from both sides. Sellers have to pay to play now, eBay is shoving promoted listings down sellers throats, promote or not be seen at all it seems.

Not the sellers fault, it's another money grab by eBay, make small sellers pony up yet more money to 'maybe' make a sale here anymore.

I hope it ends as the search results get even more messed up.

[dontelmywife]

Thank-you for posting this.  I, too, am fed up.  I use sort options constantly and no matter what sort I select, up pop the sponsored items first. Even when sorting by "SOLD" items, the sponsored listing pop up first even though they were NOT sold! I understand the "pay to play" world and I know eBay is making money off this so if they want these overpriced "sponsored" items to pop-up on a basic item search so be it.  But once I select a specific sort option, I would expect to see the results I asked for and not these darn sponsored items over and over again.  Once again, greedy eBay is hard at work making my experience less and less satisfying. Hurry, hurry competition!

[revenue-collector]

Count me in on the frustration as a buyer. When I sort by newest, ending soonest, highest, or lowest, that's what I want to see, not **bleep** listings that eBay wants to push at me outside of that sorting order.

I've bought and sold on eBay since 1998, with a roughly 50-50 mix as buyer and seller, and I absolutely despise what eBay has become with its obfuscation and manipulation of search results, thinking they know better than buyers as to what they want, and that they know better than sellers as to the nature of what they are selling and how to sell it.

Just get the [CENSORED] out of my way, eBay and let me buy or sell. Just stop it.

Every time I try to do something on eBay anymore, eBay itself gets in the way. There's a reason that both buyers and sellers here are frustrated and eBay is circling the bowl. Five years from now, the only sellers that will be left will be bulk wholesalers from Asia, and the only buyers will be those looking for consumer widgets (but only *AFTER* they shop at Amazon, AliExpress, and Wal-Mart *FIRST* since that's where you go for those items).

[lovefindingtreasures2]

It is eBay, not the sellers. Smaller sellers like me are doing almost no business now unless we promote listings. eBay made a big error with this move, as it is currently a cluster $#&% trying to find anything (I buy tons of items here).

I hear you, eBay has become VERY difficult to use with it's non stop glitches and games. This is their latest game, make all sellers cough up more money to get seen by buyers.

I did the promotions for a couple weeks on my 2 stores here to see if it made a difference. Maybe, but I personally HATE the wall of promoted (Sponsored is what eBay calls them) ruining my search results, experience, and wasting my time as a buyer so I stopped doing them. I'm not going to keep paying more and more to get a sale on eBay.

I don't know what is going to happen with eBay, they don't seem to know what they want to do with their site anymore, other that annoy both buyers and sellers alike.

Maybe eBay will MAKE a HIDE promoted listings button for those that detest it 🙂

[eburtonlab]

@lovefindingtreasures2 

I personally HATE the wall of promoted (Sponsored is what eBay calls them) ruining my search results, experience, and wasting my time as a buyer [...]

Maybe eBay will MAKE a HIDE promoted listings button for those that detest it 🙂

Why wait for someone else to do something when you can do it yourself?

Install Ad Block Plus in your browser, go to the settings and uncheck "Allow Acceptable Ads" and the current crop of sponsored listings will no longer appear at the top and bottom of your search results.

[lovefindingtreasures2]

2 thumbs up @eburtinlab, thank you!

eBay needs to listen a bit more to their buyers and sellers.

[sneakerhistorycollection]

Im seeing sponsored ad’s that are irrelevant to me while browsing.   If i wear a size 10 shoe and search for size 10’s my sponsored ads show all sizes which i have no interest in, now how does that help the seller?   Ebay has made shopping incredibly more frustrating then it already was.  

[serling99]

I'm a little confused. Why is everyone talking about "ad blocking software"? Did I get transported back to the late 1990s? I haven't used a computer to view my saved searches in more years that I can remember. I assumed all humans in the year 2019 used the mobile app for their eBay activities, not a browser.

Can ad blocking work with the mobile app? I've never bothered to look into it but if that's possible that would be nice.

[lovefindingtreasures2]

Most sellers I know (and I know a ton of them) still use computers and lap tops and not cell phones to do their listings, browsing and buying.

Maybe we can take a poll and see how everyone here browses, although I think the bulk of people on the boards are older and that may explain that 🙂