Community Chat Hour - Tue. July 3rd @ 1 pm PDT - General Topics

[alan@ebay]

Join The Community Team here at 1 pm Pacific on Tuesday, July 3rd for our chat hour. We're moving the chat hour forward this week due to the July 4th holiday 🇺🇸

Chat with you then! 

[abfabvintage]

@my-cottage-books-and-antiques

I, too, questioned this term "differing." I had to look it up in the dictionary. So that means we have to research other competitors in order to figure out how to set the sale? Or am I just dumb here?

[nc-daydreamer]

Just thought of a second question.... When will the shipping supply coupons actually be worth something again? The selection of items have gotten worse and worse over the last few months.

Thanks 🙂

[Anonymous]

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@dhbookds wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

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@dhbookds wrote:

Hi Alan  Happy almost 4th, hope it's cooler where you are ........

There continues to be questions about listing promotions banner showing up at the top or bottom of a listing.

Bob K said in the q/a ( as I understood it), that the bannner would show if the promo was a "good one".......at the top.  Lesser ones would show on the bottom or only when a buyer went to check out.......

I can find nothing to expand on this..........I understand that $1 off 3 items, each valued at $500 is not a good one, but can you give us what WILL make a banner show up on top? 

There is a discussion on the Tech board......

https://www.ebay.com/itm/202273580621                30% off doesn't show up at top

https://www.ebay.com/itm/141916397741                     25% off Does show at top

https://www.ebay.com/itm/252342590681                 20% off Does show up at top

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Hi @dhbookds - Thanks for joining us today! There are quite a few factors we look at when it comes to promotions banners and their placements. Similar to Best Match, there isn't a singular way to guarantee your banner will display at the top of your listing. We would just encourage you to look at differing sellers and what they're offering to make sure your promotions are competitive to theirs. 

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Thanks Heidi......just an observation that this is going to create a real "favoritism" charge........why is his 20% off better than my 30% off?  I would also point out that these promotional programs are touted  as a benefit to all store "ownership"...  While new rules have been promulgated for MM sales, as far as I know, no qualifications or even suggestions to % off offers have been published.  It seems unfair that one shows to a better advantage than another.

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@dhbookds - Multiple variables will play a role in the banner placements but I'll send this example on to see what we can learn. I'll keep you posted as soon as I have an update and/or additional insight I can provide. Thanks!

[my-cottage-books-and-antiques]

abfavintage,

Ask heidi, not me. I don't know, since apparently some sellers get the banner with , say, 20% and others don't. So, what exactly are we supposed to compare? I have no idea. And so far, heidi hasn't even hinted at what factors we should be looking at as we spend time hunting for other sellers markdowns....

[tyler@ebay]

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@the_fancy_fox wrote:

On a different thread it was stated that the new seller metrics for the 4% fee increase would only apply if a seller had over 10 SNAD returns or 1%. (Which seems to conflict with being judged against your peers)

So if a seller has sold 20 items in a particular catagory in the last year and ends up with one SNAD return, will their fees increase 4%?

Is there a minimum amount of sales before these metrics kick in?

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Hi @the_fancy_fox - short answer: yes. 

Longer answer: Not sales, but returns. A member would need to have at least 10 return requests with 3 unique buyers, and that would need to be a minimum of 1% or greater of the peer average for the category.

[Anonymous]

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@beauty_at_your_tips2013 wrote:
Does this mean that I need to abandon my 30 day listings for good until cancelled listings? Because I now have old items that I can't put on sale because they have been relisted.

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Hi @beauty_at_your_tips2013- Not at all! You can still list Good Till Cancelled listings and use Markdown Manager for sales events. The items just need to be at the same price point for 14-days before the first sale or another sale can be placed on that same item.

[funfactorychannel]

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@Anonymous wrote:

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 Hi @dhbookds - Thanks for joining us today! There are quite a few factors we look at when it comes to promotions banners and their placements. Similar to Best Match, there isn't a singular way to guarantee your banner will display at the top of your listing. We would just encourage you to look at differing sellers and what they're offering to make sure your promotions are competitive to theirs. 

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I wanted to clarify here.

If we do look at other sellers and what they are doing? How we know they are doing it right also? with less info we are all just blind leading the blind no? Imagine a few sellers doing it wrong and we all follow then we are all doign it wrong but then blame something else not working since everyone was following everyone elses advice. I can imagine competitor platform comes in and price it all super low and we all race to the bottom and sink.

So are their plans to just do away with Store plans? seems to me with these type of changes we want contractors and not store partners.

[my-cottage-books-and-antiques]

Tyler,
Wait, what?

"Not sales, but returns. A member would need to have at least 10 return requests with 3 unique buyers, and that would need to be a minimum of 1% or greater of the peer average for the category."

10 Return requests? Or ten INAD return requests? Which is it?

[beauty_at_your_tips2013]

eBay has seemed very glitchy and disorganized lately.  If I ran my store the way your managers ran eBay, then I would have been shut down and banned for life a long time ago. 

Someone over at eBay sould invest some of that money from the huge corporate tax cut that you guys got from Congrss earlier this year. Use it to hire some folks from that other selling platform that doesn't breakdown frequently.  It will be well worth your investment.

[alan@ebay]

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@nc-daydreamer wrote:

I'll second the problems already noted.  So no need to say more about them as there are some fine writer's in the Community.

So I will ask what I hope to be a very refreshing, easy question for you of an important matter, but not actually business related.... 

In April an announcement was made about a contest for a pair of all expense paid tickets to the Open.  Who won? And by what margin did they win? As I recall the metrics were based on acceptance of the number of solutions one received.  I have not seen an announcement on this, but am curious.  It would be an encouragement to all I think to know that there really are winners to these occasional contests, rather than have it appear that such things really don't  happen.

Thanks for a response...

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Hi @nc-daydreamer, 

Here's the post announcing the winners [link]

The contest was decided by the number of votes (helpful) each entry received. 

We're looking forward to seeing the winners in-person in 3 weeks time! 🙌

Thanks! 

[tyler@ebay]

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@dhbookds wrote:

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tyler@ebay wrote:

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@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:

Hi Alan,

I think I can understand the rationale behind the new 14 day rule for Markdown Manager.

However, for a seller to keep track of which items are eligible to participate in a sale and which are not is obviously not very practical. Yet, when I launch a sale, eBay obviously can instantly determine which items are eligible and which aren't. So, wouldn't it be a good idea for ebay to provide us with a new tool that enables us to find the eligibility date for each listing IN ADVANCE of creating a Markdown Manager Sale?

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Hi @my-cottage-books-and-antiques - you're right that we can determine what items do and don't qualify at the time they're added to the sale. To help with that, the promotions manager has been adjusted to regularly check an item's eligibility and to mark the item down when it qualifies to do so. 

There's not currently a tool that will do that outside of a Markdown sale event though, thanks! 

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I can see adding an item to the sale when the sale only has 3 days left to run would NOT please many........since that kills the ability to offer it again on sale for 14 days...............  is there a way to turn OFF that feature????

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Hi @dhbookds - not at this point in time, no. This is good feedback and I'll make sure it gets shared. 

[brian@ebay]

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@lecroy3 wrote:

Hi Alan. Thanks for hosting today. Quick questions about returns. 1) If a seller is deemed to have a high rate of returns, will an Ebay representative review a seller's status before the 4% additional FVF is imposed? And 2) Will the peer percentage be posted somewhere on the Performance chart so sellers can gauge their performance with that of their peers? Thank you.

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Hi @lecroy3, while I don't have specifics on how this will be reviewed, I do know that sellers can contact customer service to have the situation looked over in depth if they believe an error may have been made. The peer metrics will be available in the new Service Metrics area of the Seller Hub, which will be available soon, so keep an eye on the Seller Hub Performance section!

[coffeebean832]

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@Anonymous wrote:

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@dhbookds wrote:

Hi Alan  Happy almost 4th, hope it's cooler where you are ........

There continues to be questions about listing promotions banner showing up at the top or bottom of a listing.

Bob K said in the q/a ( as I understood it), that the bannner would show if the promo was a "good one".......at the top.  Lesser ones would show on the bottom or only when a buyer went to check out.......

I can find nothing to expand on this..........I understand that $1 off 3 items, each valued at $500 is not a good one, but can you give us what WILL make a banner show up on top?

---

Hi @dhbookds - Thanks for joining us today! There are quite a few factors we look at when it comes to promotions banners and their placements. Similar to Best Match, there isn't a singular way to guarantee your banner will display at the top of your listing. We would just encourage you to look at differing sellers and what they're offering to make sure your promotions are competitive to theirs. 

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I called CS and they said banners are not guaranteed to show up on a listing at all, top or bottom, no matter how great the offer. They could not provide more information than that.

I asked them to look at some specific promotions that I thought were good & competitive because Bob Kupbens said we should escalate for review and I was brushed off until I insisted that I wanted to understand. Then CS said they would send those promos to the team in charge and get back to me after they were reviewed. I'm not counting on that.

It's disappointing because promotions are one of the reasons we pay so much in store fees and they were supposed to give us more space on the listing page that was being used to promote other sellers' listings.

I have promotions that show up on some listings and not others - within the same promo. It doesn't make any sense.

[tyler@ebay]

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@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:
Tyler,
Wait, what?

"Not sales, but returns. A member would need to have at least 10 return requests with 3 unique buyers, and that would need to be a minimum of 1% or greater of the peer average for the category."

10 Return requests? Or ten INAD return requests? Which is it?

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Sorry for leaving that out @my-cottage-books-and-antiques - it's 10 not as described return requests. 

[my-cottage-books-and-antiques]

Thanks Tyler, that's what I thought, but one never knows....