Doll Categories Missing

[mauitinkerbel]

What has happened to all of the doll categories?   I was checking some of my listings and noticed that ebay had changed the category from Vogue Ginny to something else.  So I tried to relist the item and all of the categories except for a very few are missing.  It is no wonder I am not getting any watchers.

[dhbookds]

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Selling/Updates-are-happening-to-some-item-specifics-and-category/td-p...

This was announced in the Fall updates.............

[shisa_dolls]

Maybe this explains why I can't seem to list my dolls today by clicking on "sell similar".  its been confusing me all morning. 😞

[mauitinkerbel]

they have really made a mess of things.  I hope they get it fixed soon because you can't list in the proper categories now.  Buyers will have a hard time finding things and sales will really drop off.

[magic*moonbeams]

Yeah, and in typical eBay's do everything completely backwards fashion, they launch this new garbage with technical errors that aren't allowing me to list an item in the doll category.  I'm trying to list Monster High clothes and accessories lot, I put it in the doll, clothing and accessories category... took all my time taking the pictures, typing up the description and everything and when I hit "list item" I get some dumb-A error message that says it looks like I'm trying to list something in the American Girl doll category

"

It looks like you might be listing a non-American Girl item in the American Girl category. If your item was made to fit an American Girl doll, but is not American Girl brand please go back and find another category such as Dolls & Bears > Dolls > Clothes & Accessories > Modern > Other Modern Doll Clothing. 

If your item is American Girl, please go back and make sure American Girl is in both your title and Item Specifics for Brand."

Um, no stupids, I have it listed in YOUR new categories, and have the franchise selected as Monster High.

I'm telling you, whoever does the programming for this site are complete morons.  They don't test things before they launch, they leave little glitches, that no matter how many times you report a technical issue, nothing is done about it... isn't ANYONE bothering to make sure all the I's are dotted and T's are crossed beforehand?

Really this site gets more and more pathetic every single day.   If this is the best they can do for hiring programmers, I'd hate to see who they turned down. *eyeroll*

[mauitinkerbel]

Yes I tried to relist a doll with all of the item specifics they suggested and it still is in the Doll playsets category.  I hope they fix this real soon because it is a mess.

[nechris85]

I listed a bunch of doll items today, both contemporary and vintage Barbies, and it seems like they are dumping them all in one category.  When I try to search for them I can't find them.  My items did list successfully, but I have had hardly any views and even fewer watchers.  I have really good prices on these dolls so I expected at list something would sell right away, but no, not even one item.

[magic*moonbeams]

To heck with it, I'm not going to keep waiting for these incompetents to do their jobs right, I took my Monster High clothing lot out of the doll category and just put it in "every thing else" and then, "every other thing".

Anyone who looks for MH stuff will just do a keyword search anyway *eyeroll*

But if anyone is having doll category trouble and you want to get your stuff out there now, that works (since nothing else around here does).  Just a note though, you can't promote items in that category, but who cares, why give these idiots another dime of your money anyway.

[thaisanne]

Not that eBay really listens to any of us but...grrrrrr.  Nine times out of ten when I am trying to search I end up on a blank page. I too have noticed very few 'views' of my new listings so it is definitely impacting my selling activity. Sellers have always come second to buyers but now it seems that they don't care about buyers either. The changes have basically ended my buying activity. I used to search the whole Vintage Barbie category every morning to see what was ending and if I might be interested. Now, I can only find items if I know EXACTLY what I'm looking for. Good bye impulse buying! Is this the new normal or are they working on it?

[velocitizer1]

WELL! This change is NOT conducive to people FINDING my listings!  If someone wants a Barbie Family doll or item, now I have to type the WORD "BARIBE"  into every Skipper, Ken outfit, or Tutti accessory item.  This means I will have to use up more of my title space in order for people to find things.  Also, now searching for what I actually want to look at will be much harder and have WAY more items be where I am VERY unlikely to ever find them.  AND!!!! I don't have hours and hours to read every single UPDATE that is sent out in deep detail.  What would have been GREAT, and CONSIDERATE, is if eBay would have sent a message to all members with listings that were going to be MESSED UP telling us that our items were being changed without our input.  THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN REALLY NICE! AND, it could have easily been a computer-generated message.

[bullsbridge]

Ebay recently implemented disastrous category revisions.  MANY categories are affected, including "Dolls" -- most pertinent subcategories have been eliminated.  Once they see that their revenue is falling, perhaps they'll rethink this.  In the meantime, I know many former Ebay sellers who will be exploring other selling platforms -- Ebay no longer corners the online selling market.  

[eburtonlab]

If someone wants a Barbie Family doll or item, now I have to type the WORD "BARIBE" into every Skipper, Ken outfit, or Tutti accessory item. This means I will have to use up more of my title space in order for people to find things.

That is not necessary. As long as Barbie appears somewhere in the item-specifics of your item, it should be turned up using a search with Barbie as a keyword.

[maaland]

Try to find and browse the "vintage pre-1967" listings for vintage Barbie, now that pertinent subcategories have been eliminated.  No one interested in vintage Barbies wants to wade through listings that includes thousands of modern dolls.  Eliminating subcategories (in "dolls" any many other categories) is the worst decision that Ebay has made in the past 20+ years.

[eburtonlab]

Try to find and browse the "vintage pre-1967" listings for vintage Barbie, now that pertinent subcategories have been eliminated. No one interested in vintage Barbies wants to wade through listings that includes thousands of modern dolls.

If sellers include the year of manufacture in the item-specifics, the following search might be a starting point to use:

https://www.ebay.com/sch/262346/i.html?_oaa=1&_dcat=262346&_fsrp=1&rt=nc&_from=R40&Character=Barbie&...

Some years are not represented there; those are the years of the current listings I found. If additional items are listed for other years at some point, you may want to add them to the search and bookmark the new search results link for future use.

I do not believe there is an individual "pre-1967" item-specific at the moment, but if sellers include that in the title or item-specifics, it will be searchable. A general search for barbie pre-1967 only returns one result right now, indicating that that is not a common term used by sellers when listing.

A search for barbie pre- -pre-owned turns up a handful of results with various years or decades, to give you an idea of what terms various sellers are using to designate their vintage items:

https://www.ebay.com/sch/238/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=barbie+pre-+-pre-owned&LH_TitleDesc=0

There is a "vintage" item-specific, but I do not know what years that would include, or if sellers use the term consistently or not. But it might be a good way to weed out many contemporary Barbie listings:

https://www.ebay.com/sch/262346/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=barbie&rt=nc&Vintage=Yes&_dcat=262346

Note I am not saying that such searches are as easy to use or as intuitive as the old missing categories were or that these searches will find everything you are looking for, what I am saying is that there are alternatives to simply wading through the entire doll category if you only want to see some specific listings. There are many possible ways to filter and sort your search results other than simply by category. Most likely sellers will find new ways to differentiate their items to make things easier for buyers to find the right listings as time goes on and users adapt to the new category system.

If someone who knows nothing about dolls can find these alternative searches in a couple of minutes, chances are good that a buyer who knows a bit about dolls and is truly motivated can find additional ways to search and find good results while avoiding results that are not of interest.

[yesterfun]

I got the same "American Girl category" error message that Magic Moonbeams did, when I was listing a vintage Barbie something a couple of weeks back.  ("It looks like you might be listing a non-American Girl item in the American Girl category....etc.)  When I saw this glitch, I was actually hopeful that it could mean someone at Ebay was working behind the scenes to get the doll subcategories restored!

Here is one thing that really annoys me -- "Barbie" is NOT a BRAND.  Mattel is the brand.  Barbie is the most popular character in the brand,  but that's not the brand.  If you put in "Barbie" as the brand in the item specifics, that's technically wrong.  Yet, when I do my listings, it automatically suggests "Barbie" as a brand, probably because so many people are doing that.  It just irritates me!