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eBay Staff (Alumni)

Welcome to Selling on eBay! Our theme this week is Your Seller Holiday Checklist. On the Main Story we have Mr. eBay Australia, Tim Davies, with Holiday Selling Insights from a veteran seller. Jen Deal returns for our Inside eBay segment and this week’s topic is Holiday Do’s and Don'ts, Liz Austin is back with What’s Hot, Alan Aisbitt presents Trending Topics, and we've got your calls! Don't forget, to have your questions answered on Selling on eBay, call us at 888 723-4630 or email us at sellingonebay@ebay.com.

 

Selling On eBay - Episode 15 - Holiday Selling Insights, Holiday Do’s and Don'ts, What's Hot, Trending Topics and Your Calls!

Welcome to Selling on eBay! Our theme this week is Your Seller Holiday Checklist. On the Main Story we have Mr. eBay Australia, Tim Davies, with Holiday Selling Insights from a veteran seller. Jen Deal returns for our Inside eBay segment and this week’s topic is Holiday Do’s and Don'ts, Liz Austin is back with What’s Hot, Alan Aisbitt presents Trending Topics, and we've got your calls! Don't forget, to have your questions answered on Selling on eBay, call us at 888 723-4630 or email us at sellingonebay@ebay.com.

Links:

ebay.com/sellingonebay

ebay.com/meetups

ebay.com/community

ebay.com/holidayplaybook

explore.ebay.com

Hosts:

Griff, Audrey Tracy, Liz Austin, Alan Aisbitt

Guests:

Tim Davies (eBay Seller), Jen Deal (eBay Staff)

Transcript

I'm Audrey Tracy

And I'm Griff and this is Selling On eBay. Your weekly source for the information and inspiration you need to start, run and grow a business on the world's most powerful marketplace. Well, Audrey, what do we have this week on Selling On eBay?

What a show we have for you. First on the main story, we have Mr. eBay Australia, Tim Davies. His entire life and career right now is about helping sellers start and build a business on and off eBay.

I had the pleasure of meeting Tim on several trips to Australia and in Las Vegas for the Global Retail Conference a few years ago. He's one of the best eBay coaches I've ever met. It's going to be a great segment. What else?

Our esteemed colleague Jen Deal returns for our Inside eBay segment and this week's topic is Holiday Do's and Don'ts.

Ooh. I love a good do! I can't wait to hear it.

What do you have for us this week Griff?

Well, Audrey, I'll join Liz Austin on our What's Hot Segment to talk about well, What's Hot on eBay based on buyer searches. Apparently, it's all about Post Malone.

Who?

Post Malone.

Who?

Post Malone.

Who?

I don't know. You have to listen and figure it out. Oh, and Crocs by the way.

Crocs always hot.

Yes.

And of course, Alan joins us for trending topics or what we may end up calling “The Buzz”.

Yeah. You know, we were considering a new name for that segment and I liked The Buzz. Do you?

Hmm. Why not.

That's not very confident. Well, shall we just make the decision right here and now to relabel it as such. Let's call it The Buzz.

Why not?

Okay. It's The Buzz.

The Buzz it is. I hate to ask this, but...

But what, what, what, what? Just ask it.

Do we get any you know, calls?

Well, as a matter of fact, we did. And so, we'll take that call later in the broadcast. Remember our hotline number Audrey?

I sure do. 888-723-4630 and if you can't call in but you want your question considered for the podcast, you can always email us at sellingonebay@eBay.com. sellingonebay@eBay.com. 888-723-4630 who could ask for anything more? All of this is great. Now, without further ado...

Coming up next. Trending Topics.

Now it's time for everyone's favorite segment, Trending Topics. Welcome back, Alan. How's it going?

Hey, Audrey.  It's going good. I'm doing fantastic. Thanks for asking. It's good to see you again. And by the way, wasn't it someone's birthday this week?

Oh Boy.

Can we sing? Griff's on board.

I'm on board!

Let's go. (singing) Happy Birthday Dear Audrey, Happy Birthday to you!

Aww. That was very touching. Thank you, boys. I'm wiping away a tear.

Shall we jump on in?

Let's go for it. The first thing on my list today is a follow-up to a topic we chatted about last week and it's that eBay now guarantees listings that are identified as Fast 'N Free.

That's right. Remind us what we announced about Fast 'N Free.

So, if your listings are identified as Fast 'N Free, they will be covered by seller protection. If a delivery is late, we promise to make it right for customers.

So, what's going on with Fast 'N Free? What are people talking about?

Well, it seems that some sellers were concerned that the Fast 'N Free Guarantee will create poor experiences for buyers due to delays during the holidays. And if eBay's announcement regarding Fast 'N Free shipments reflected a change in protections or shipping expectations.

What's the overall sentiment around Fast 'N Free Guarantee?

Well, there was some confusion about what qualifies a listing for Fast 'N Free status leading some sellers to extend their handling time in an attempt to remove the Fast 'N Free logo and eliminate any potential inaccuracies being presented to their customers. So as a reminder, Fast 'N Free listings are characterized by four day or less delivery, free shipping, shipping within the 48 contiguous US states, no local pickup or freight as default shipping option and isn't listed in the classified ad format.

We should clarify that the announcement does not remove existing protections and it only adds protections for sellers who ship on time. And I also do want to take this opportunity to encourage sellers to ship their items as quickly as possible this holiday season. And we know that sellers who ship their items quickly are more likely to snag that sale when a buyer is in decision mode. So definitely extending handling times out of fear isn't a good idea. You're only going to shoot yourself in the foot as you'll turn buyers away from you and they will purchase from other sellers.

That's right. I know we've all gotten used to receiving online purchases in a few days and that's especially the case over the holidays. When you're purchasing decorations for your home or that cute little dress you want to wear to the holiday party or gifts for your loved ones.

That's right.

So, what else do you have for us, Alan?

Well, I've got some good news regarding the Volume Pricing Discount Tool.

Ooh. Do Tell.

So, the good news is sellers are discovering the Volume Pricing Discount Tool and they're beginning to use it. And we're getting really good feedback on it. Sellers are reporting increased sales. Some of the sellers on our community boards have questions or needed help setting it up correctly.

What are we doing to help sellers with Volume Discount questions?

In our Weekly Community Chat that we held on October 31st, we have positive engagement with sellers eager to learn, ask questions and share suggestions for enhancements to the tool. You can find that conversation at eBay.com/communitychat and scroll down to the October 31st discussion.

That's great. Now remind listeners when the Community Chat hour is held.

Yeah, so it's held every Wednesday from one to two PM Pacific at eBay.com/communitychat. So, the way we do it, is some weeks we host an ask me anything style Q and A and then other weeks we'll have eBay subject matter experts there on hand to answer questions and share expertise on specific topics.

So, I want to encourage our listeners to check out eBay.com/communitychat each week to see the topic that we're chatting about now.

That's Great. Now going back to Volume Pricing Discounts, what are next steps around helping sellers understand that tool?

Yeah, well we're actually working on a tutorial video right now and that should be live soon. I'll be sure to stop by again and let you know when that's available.

Yep. We have plans to put that on our YouTube channel, so be sure to check out Selling On eBay to catch that video. Anything else this week?

Yes. I have one more topic and then I promise I'll be on my way. Last week we announced our Q3 results and sellers on our forums picked up on one aspect in particular. It was the results so far of Managed Payments. I want to give a quick update on the scale of the transactions we've managed so far, so keep in mind we're about five weeks into managing payments on our platform.

As of October 28th, we saved sellers a total of $335,000. Now isn't that an incredible amount of savings that we've passed on to our sellers so far?

Wow. That's a ton of money.

Absolutely, and something I love is that we launched with Apple Pay as a payment option for buyers too. And so far, we've seen that 12 percent of payments made on iOS devices have gone through Apple Pay and I'm not surprised. It's so quick, easy and fun to use Apple Pay as a buyer. So, to summarize, we're saving sellers a ton of money in fees and we're making it easier for buyers to shop on eBay. Sounds like a win win situation.

Yes. I can't wait to hear more about how Manage Payments evolves. Will you come back and share more updates when you have them?

You Bet. I'd love to. So that covers all my updates for this week. Thank you again for having me.

Thanks Alan, appreciate all that. Coming up next. The main story. We'll chat with Tim Davies an eCommerce and eBay expert based in Australia.

I'm Audrey from eBay and with me now is Tim Davies known as Mr. eBay in Australia. Now he used to work for eBay as a Manager of Seller Education and Engagement and now he runs his own business consulting with online sellers. He's also the president of PESA Australia, the Professional eBay Sellers Alliance. Lots of great bonafides there Tim, and it's an honor to have you on the show. Welcome.

Thanks Audrey. It's a delight to be here.

You're here to share some holiday selling tips, but before we get into that, tell us what eBay is like in Australia. How does it differ from the US?

It surprised me greatly. The first time I spoke with Americans about eBay, that the perception of what eBay was, was very different to what it is here in Australia. To give you an idea, in Australia, 80 percent of the top 100 retailers all have eBay stores and that's obviously something that eBay is very proud of Down Under. That means that buyers tend to come to eBay first and then if they don't find what they want, then they check elsewhere on Google, for example. Also, around about 70 percent of all online shoppers in Australia visit eBay every month, so it's Australia's largest marketplace by a long shot. In Australia, eBay is well and truly shaken the old image of eBay as an Auction and Collectibles site and it's now perceived as the number one mainstream online shopping destination. So that's really quite an achievement for Australia. But as we know, eBay is still eBay the world over. It's the same marketplace and functions the same. In the US, eBay has got around 10 times the number of monthly visitors compared to Australia, so it's a massive opportunity to tap into.

Now what are the holidays like in Australia? Do you have some interesting traditions that differ from American customs?

Yes, definitely. We don't always just throw shrimps on the Barbie as they say. I can think back a couple of decades in Melbourne where I live, we just had a public holiday for a horse race. For example, at the Melbourne Cup as it's called, is known as the "race that stops a nation" and everybody gathers around their TV screens and has office parties and dresses up in their finest. Christmas is obviously probably the big one for most Australians. Christmas is obviously all about family and being thankful the same as it is anywhere in the world, but for us it's summertime, so while you guys are all shivering indoors or freezing your hands off, making snowballs were out lying on the beach, getting a Suntan.

I'm so jealous. Maybe they'll come to Australia for Christmas.

Sounds like a great idea.

I would love to do that. Okay. Let's jump into your selling tips. Now. These tips are great for holiday, but they're actually kind of apply year-round and you've got three sets of tips. Number one is be real. Number two is have fun, and number three is be good because Santa is watching. Let's start with be real. What does that mean?

Yeah, being real really means thinking about the fact that the buyers on the other end are also human beings. Being real means that we're not just chasing the dollar. We're not just grabbing the sale. We're not just trying to do it as quick as we can and move onto the next one, but we're actually realizing that we've got a real person on the other end of the transaction. So, a couple of things that I'd say under being real. Firstly, let buyers know in advance what your support hours are. When you'll be available if they have questions and they need to ask whether it's before the transaction or after. Make sure that you tell the buyers how they can actually contact you. We all know that eBay has a messaging system. Not all buyers know that. Not all buyers know where to find that link, so why not put a link to eBay messages in your description so they can actually just click it straight away and come and ask you a question nice and easily.

The easier you make it for the buyers, the more likely they are to like you and hopefully buy. I think it's also good to manage expectations around how quickly you're going to respond to any messages that you received as well. So, tell them the hours that you're available, but also, we respond within one to two hours or I'm available anytime of the day. It's entirely up to you how you run your eBay store. Make sure you let buyers know if you're going to be closed anytime, especially over the holiday period. If you're going to be closing down for the Christmas period for a week or a few days, and also when you re open just to manage expectations. Also let buyers know about any shipping delays which are likely to happen as a result of increased traffic of parcels around again, the holiday season. And sometimes you may hear of particular events happening in different parts of the country which could affect delivery time, so it's good, good idea to let them know as best you can.

All this can be recorded in your listing, in every listing that you have. Also, especially for Christmas and in fact for any holiday period when people tend to have a bit of a buying frenzy at the last minute, it's really good to make sure that you tell them what your ordering cutoff date is. Right? If you're doing eBay guaranteed delivery, you might be able to go a little closer to the Christmas or the holiday period than others, so a week out, make sure you tell them. Last order is by Friday before, otherwise we can't guarantee it'll get to you.

Thanks Tim. That's great advice. Now, what are your have fun tips?

Well, exactly that. Have Fun. Okay. We will love to have fun. Again, it goes to the idea of us all being people, right? A lot of people tend to think in terms of, I've got the money, let's get on with the next transaction.

No, we're not dealing with machines and bits and bytes on a computer here. They're real people on the other end, so you know, have some fun. If it's holiday period, think about adding a few extra products to your range which might fall in the spirit of the holidays. Show a little of the holiday spirit by adding some keywords to your titles, which might make sense or people might go searching for, only the relevant of course. And also remember no keyword spamming if it's not relevant to the product that you're listing. Maybe think about some discounts or some sales events that you can run in the lead up to a holiday season. Particularly at this time of the year, people tend to spend a little more. They're buying gifts for family and friends. Provide an opportunity for them to save a little more on the expectation of hopefully selling a little more. And also, if you can, provide a direct link to the sale from within your listings.

Remember that when a customer lands on any of your products, any of your listings on eBay, unless you provide them with pathways that they can continue on within your eBay space, they're just going to hit the back button and go back out to search if it's not what they want. So, providing that opportunity to say, hey, you know, we've got things on sale. You can save up to 20 percent click here, Bang. They're now in your store front and they can actually have a look around with what you've got. Another great thing that I think is really good is putting a nice little holiday greeting card or a low value seemed gift that's around the theme of the holidays. You know, in all the parcels that you sent out to your customers. It's a welcome surprise for your buyer. It's going to make them feel warm and fuzzy and hopefully remember you and maybe come back and buy some more.

Also, I think loyalty discounts are worth thinking about at this time of the year as well for people that come back and buy from you again or maybe refer friends. And there's a few ways of doing this. eBay's got a system built in with the code less coupon, which you can actually then send out through the messages or an email during the transaction time or after the transaction to say, thanks for buying from us. Here's a special discount for you and when they click on that link, they can go and see the discounts that you've got available for them and maybe share it with friends. So, I think there's some great fun ideas.

You're right Tim, buyers love a little gift or a little card in the package this time of year. Okay. Lastly, what are your be good tips?

Well, Santa is coming as the song says, so you better watch out and you better be good. Look, the reality is when we are not good, it comes back to bite us. The reality is, again, we're dealing with real people on the other end, so we should be nice to them, treat them the way that we would like to be treated if we were on the buying end. Including information in your listing and I think even in all the parcels that you send out to the customers about your returns process. Whether you offer a change of mind returns process or whether it's only for things that are broken or damaged or don't work, make it easy for the buyer to actually know what to do in that circumstance. It will actually provide reassurance to the buyers if they can see that information in the listing before they make their buying decision, but certainly when they received the parcel from the delivery courier or postal system to actually have that document there or a piece of paper saying, look, if you have a problem, you can send it back. There's a returns process on eBay. Giving that information up front is really useful.

If we think about when customers complain, or leave us negative feedback, it always hurts, but the reality is it's going to happen. It's just part of being in business. We really need to be kind to other people and resist the temptation to react badly because that's very automatic. The reality is that will win people over by being positive and kind more than we will by being defensive. We all know that in principle, it's very hard to sometimes do. Put yourself in the buyer's shoes, you know, consider their feelings of disappointment even though it might not have been your fault or something within your control or let's say that the parcel arrived damaged and it was the courier that damage it. You didn't do it, but there's no point defending and say, Oh, you know, we only send out good products. You're not helping the buyer. The reality is they gave you the money. They need you to make it right. I think being good is really all about understanding that things can go wrong and really making sure that the buyer is looked after.

So true. Tim, you've been selling on and teaching about eBay for how many years now?

I used to sell photography studio equipment on eBay for about six years. I had a business prior to that that went bust, didn't have much money left and while I was looking for a job I couldn't think of anything else to do but find something to sell on eBay. That was my perception of eBay at the time and it was a real lifesaver. So, I did that for about six years and then in the last couple of years of that I actually started working for eBay in Australia, which was a great experience. And my job at that stage really made it impossible for me to stay competitive with other people that were in the same category, particularly on handling time because eBay was really starting to respond to buyers wanting things dispatched quickly. Back in the day, you could sort of get the sale and then decide that you'd send it out five days later, but not now. So, I actually stopped selling. I was doing a lot of travel at that time, so it was very difficult for me to get things out quickly. From the time I started working at eBay in about 2010, initially I was working as a Business Development Manager, helping sellers to grow their business and then moved into the Seller Education role for a couple of years after that. I've been working with sellers ever since, so all up, it's probably about nine years now and counting.

And in all that time, what's the one thing you see common across all successful eBay sellers?

In a nutshell, I think it's a can-do attitude. eBay's a one size fits all marketplace. Okay. With many different sellers out there, eBay's way of doing things won't always fit perfectly with how you want to deal with your buyers and that's the reality, especially if you're actually running a business across multiple channels.

I learned early on when I was selling on eBay myself that complaining about things that I didn't like was a misdirection of my energy. I needed to find creative ways of making eBay work for me even if it didn't fit perfectly. The sellers that I've observed that have been successful, always figure out how to do what needs to be done, even if the standard approach doesn't work for them. They find another way around it. They're creative. Even today, I regularly consult with eBay sellers and often all they want to do is complain about what they don't like about eBay or how eBay forces them to do things a certain way and automatically accepts returns that they don't want to accept, and you know, effectively blaming eBay for holding back their sales. But I find in most instances when I do an audit of their eBay store and listings, they suddenly discover that there are simple but important things that they've not actually paid attention to.

And in most cases, they're actually the ones holding themselves back. So, the sellers that are successful are listing to a eBay, watching for the upcoming changes and then adapting and evolving just as eBay does.

And what's the one thing you advise eBay sellers not to do?

Don't cheat. It's not worth it. The problem is if we're trying to cheat and deceive and trick people into things, it carries through in the experience that you as a seller give to buyers. If you're transparent and you're credible all the way you know you're going to build trust. And that trust of course can not only get you the sale but can also lead to repeat purchases and referrals to family and friends, which is great. One of my sayings is that the customer is more important than the transaction. Yeah. So many sellers think that getting the money is the objective, which is why they then get so upset when they have to do a return, but that's not the objective.

The real objective should be making somebody's day. How are you going to make somebody smile or make them feel really good about dealing with you If you're looking for all the angles to try and exploit them? Remember you're dealing with a real person on the other end, so treat them as you'd like to be treated. Be Honest and kind. So yeah, don't cheat.

Great Advice. You have this interesting background of being both an entrepreneur and an advisor to entrepreneurs, so what makes you guys so special? I think one of my former colleagues that left eBay about the same time as me said it very well, like they said, once you work at eBay, eBay is in our DNA. So, I'm still doing now what I did when I was working at eBay, getting to understand seller’s businesses and helping them to grow through education and understanding really. But now actually having a team of integration and data specialists myself in my own business, that means we can actually help relieve their stress by doing some of that work for them.

It's all very nice, sitting down with the customer and giving them some guidance, advice, consulting, but it's all theory until actually gets done. And I find a lot of the sellers that I talk to are very, very time poor. It's a very common experience in business. The two main areas that we focus on at zealous in my business are customer experience and data. So, if I can break down what each of those is, so customer experience really starts before a buyer buys from you. It's in the details about the product, the photos, the descriptions, and especially the promises that you make about what that experience is going to be like dealing with you. How accessible and responsive you are to their questions and their needs. Right? So, it starts at the beginning, but then it goes all the way through to when they receive their order. How that makes them feel. Whether they feel satisfied enough from that entire experience to come back for more or to refer you to family and friends.

We work with a lot of sellers who are multichannel. It's a multichannel world now. It means that they're selling in other marketplaces and perhaps on their own website too. So, making sure that they deliver a consistent and engaging customer experience across all channels is really important for building their brand long term, so that's one side of what we do. The second side is data. Now all of that customer experience is powered by data. You won't be found on eBay or evening google if you haven't set up your product data in the way that those systems work, so as you can just do it the way that you think is right. You've got to understand how eBay search works. It's important to understand that you're able to be found the way that eBay search works, or Google if you've got a website. So, it goes well beyond having good keywords in your titles.

It includes your item specifics. You know how you do your categories. For the automotive parts and accessories category, how you do your vehicle compatibility and fitment. We often come across sellers who have thousands of products available, but they're really struggling to find time to prepare the data, so they can list them on eBay and that's obviously holding them back. I've got an amazing team of data specialists based over in Cebu, Philippines, which is where eBay's customer support is also run. Some of these in my team are actually former eBay customer support staff as well. They really understand what works on eBay. We turn out probably around 3000 new products for our clients each week at this stage, so they can start selling on eBay. So, for someone just starting a business on eBay or not, what's the most valuable lesson you've learned as an entrepreneur?

I would say persistence. Well, persistence and patience really. Starting a new business or that sounds like fun until suddenly you find yourself sitting at a desk wondering when the sales are going to start coming in. My wife Charlene recently started an eBay store selling a beautiful range of fashion ear rings. The store looks really good. We made sure of that, that's what we do. All the data is set up right, but you know the sales are very slow to start with, so it really tests your patience. I think to be an entrepreneur, you need to self-talk, to have the determination to see it out and you know, not just give up when you hit the first roadblock or maybe the second or third but keep pressing on. The unglamorous reality of eCommerce is that it can actually be quite lonely, especially if you're a solo seller working from home and I'll think of there's a lot of people listening to this that can probably relate to that.

I think it's also important to really be objective and to try to keep the emotions out of it. That is how you grow your business and what you're doing. The fact that somebody's passionate about something doesn't mean that they're going to succeed. We need to pay attention to the changes and trends happening on eBay and outside eBay as well. Business is not just set and forget. You don't just set it once, get it right, and then think it's going to last for the next 10 years because the reality is the world moves on. You need to reevaluate and adjust your business over and over again, and then just when you get it right, everything changes again. eBay's got some new policies, new features, so we need to be willing to change and be willing to seek information and help you know, when we're not sure about something.

Thank you, Tim. Really appreciate your time and insights.

My absolute pleasure, Audrey. It's been wonderful to talk to you guys. I will say, in the whole time I was working at eBay, I actually never got to visit any of the eBay officers in America, so it's something I'm looking forward to doing in the very near future.

We'll see you soon!

We've been speaking with Tim Davies, Mr. eBay in Australia and President of the Professional eBay Sellers Alliance. Coming up next, we'll welcome Jennifer Deal, Marketing Strategist here at eBay. She'll give us a list of do's and don'ts for holiday selling and beyond.

I'm Audrey Tracy and with me now is Jennifer Deal, l Marketing Strategist on the Seller Marketing Team at eBay. She's also an active eBay seller. Welcome, Jen.

Hi Audrey. Thanks for having me today.

Sure. What do you have for us today?

Well, we're in mid-November now and if that caught you off guard, no worries. There's still plenty to do to move the needle on sales before the end of the year. So today I've got a list of important do's and don'ts for selling during the holidays. But before we get to that, I want to mention that eBay has published some advice for holiday selling in the form of a checklist.

eBay.com/holidayplaybook. All one word. And I encourage everyone to review the checklist if you haven't already. In this segment, we'll share a few of the reminders on that list, almost a play by play of what sellers should and should not be doing this holiday season.

And I should mention that these tips are good for year-round too. We're focusing on them for holiday, but really they're good all year round. So, you have a list of holiday Do's and Don'ts. Where do you want to start? Well, since it's mid-November, I'm assuming that sellers listening now have already listed most or all of their holiday inventory. If you still have items to list, do that right now. That's a Do. That's a first Do. When you're doing that, add multiple items specifics so that you can match your listings to the buyer searches. We expanded thousands of these attributes on Item Specific, so that's important to include as many that are relevant.

That's right. What's your next do?

My next Do, is to have a shipping strategy. Fast 'N Free are both important to buyers, especially during the holiday season. Actually, there's a willingness from buyers to pay for expedited shipping as a specific event date nears like December 24th. But in most cases, there's less willingness to pay for shipping if delivery is beyond three days. That makes sense. So, have shipping supplies on hand also is important for the holiday season because you want enough to carry you through the season. You don't want to run out midway, so think about your thank you cards if you use those various sizes and styles of packaging, bubble wrap, poly bags, label refills, tape, etc. And by the way, you can buy all these on eBay.

Cheap plug alert.

And then finally on your shipping strategy, when you think of where to ship, do consider international sales, which includes Canada, actually also Hawaii, Alaska, and Puerto Rico.

So, when you're listing in your selections you can add up to five different international shipping options, where you would like to offer for a specific reason. Regions, excuse me, countries. Um, if you intend to ship to buyers directly or you can use our global shipping program.

Now, what about a "Do" for Customer Service?

In general, it's a good rule of thumb to Do, be honest, professional and friendly when communicating with buyers. We live in an online space and selling online sometimes is not a, it doesn't bring top of mind the communication with buyers and how you stay in touch with them or how you offer customer service. But there are multiple ways that you can have touch points with your buyers and to help their buying go easier. And that is by including frequently asked questions in your listings by offering multiple images with angles, especially ones that competitors are not showing so they can really see the product because people online or shopping with their eyes first. So that's important. You can also create a reason to reach your buyers now that you can offer your watchers an exclusive price. So, look for that feature also, if you've got watchers and you want to pull in the sale, offer them a different price. And then finally you can include your telephone number in your account for complex questions, pre or post transaction. Now the way that you do that is that you want to make sure that you include your telephone number in your account under Manage Communications with buyers. You want to check the box that says that you do want to share your telephone number. And then you'll have to decide and check the boxes for whether you'll take calls only after the transaction or both before and after the transaction. But it's important that you have that number listed so we can help through that.

So, Jen, how should sellers be thinking about Cyber Weekend?

Well, here's a tip for some competitive success. Do consider a Small Business Saturday strategy instead of a Black Friday strategy. November is going to seem to fly by because we're going to see actually we're already seeing Black Friday sale is starting and going and they'll continue to go on and that is a highly competitive space. It's very much who can get to the bottom price the fastest. But not everybody can compete on price and you want to play up the fact that you're a small to medium business and you have as much to offer as everybody else or more. So, compete on your differentiators. Setup your promotions that make sense and help build up your business in a positive way that will actually carry you throughout the season and beyond.

And a lot of folks do want to support small businesses and they might be willing to pay an extra buck or two to know that they're supporting a small business, particularly on Small Business Saturday.

That's right.

Now what about deals for holiday? Well, you definitely want to, do set up discounts for the deal hunters. It is still Cyber Weekend and people are still looking for discounts during that weekend, so you can use some of the tools that we offer, like the new Volume Pricing tool where the treatment actually shows buyers that they're going to get a discount if they buy more than one item. And this is awesome because it really moves the needle for sellers who have multiples of any skews. Do not overlook this feature as part of your pricing strategy.

Now, what about timing?

Well, it's important to keep in mind the calendar, so do keep in mind the fact that we have a longer season. There are 32 days between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Also, remember Hanukkah is a gifting period and that's December 2nd through the 10th. Think about cutoffs from when buyers may be want to ship packages across the country or around the world. Keep in mind that calendar. And finally, do be as consistent as possible across multiple channels. If you are selling your inventory on several different platforms, be consistent in pricing because it's harder to track. First of all, if I were you, that's one thing to keep in mind. It's definitely hard to track, but it's also going to give one of your marketplaces a disadvantage, right? And so, you want to take accountability for that and you want the best experience for the buyer and show them that you can meet their needs wherever they are and that you have the best pricing.

What a good list of do's, but how about some don'ts. I love a good "don't". Particularly when it comes to fashion or eBay selling tips.

Well, don't forget about selling throughout the entire season. You want to maximize sales all the way through the end of December and add express shipping methods to capture those last-minute sales. Also, don't refuse returns. They happen. Figure out how to manage those and as I pointed out a minute ago, be polite. You know, be friendly. People shop with good intention for the most be part and are buying gifts and they just want to get it right. It's not necessarily that you did something wrong, it's just maybe they didn't quite get it right. Even if you have a fierce person on the other side, don't react.

As I tell my 10-year-old, don't take the bait.

Don't take the bait.

Continue to be professional. Thank you, Jen. Lots of great "do's" and only a few "don'ts". Appreciate you being here and happy holiday selling to you.

Thank you. Happy holidays.

We've been speaking with Jennifer Deal, Marketing Strategist here at eBay about holiday "do's and don'ts" for selling.

Coming up. What's Hot with Liz Austin. Don't go away.

Joining us now. It's Liz Austin with What's Hot on eBay. Welcome back, Liz.

Hello Griff.

There's so much going on the site right now from the buyer perspective and that's what we do in this segment is to try to give you some insight into what buyers are searching for based on the buzz we hear and also based on the data on eBay.

Absolutely. To drive as much velocity on the site as possible.

So what do you got for us first?

So, we are putting out an SOS or a Red Alert, a 911. We need more mobile phones.

Mobile phone?

Yeah. Every time Apple does their release, then we get a big search for Apple phones and mobile fines, but not just the latest ones, the old ones as well.

Going back how far?

For three years. But so, we can search on phones for three years ago. So, if you've got any pre-owned, gently used cell phones, pop them on the site.

I do.

Go home and get them.

Well I can't. We're recording right now.

We'll after the, after the record.

I have a Samsung note five. I wonder if that's worth anything? I didn't think about that day.

I mean they're selling. Even the ones that are three years old will sell between 10 to 16, at least.

Ten?

$10 to $16.

Well that's better than zero dollars.

That's right. No one knows that their phones have actually got some value on eBay.

And you're keeping them out of the landfill and in the recycle. People are using them.

ReCommerce makes the world a better place.

So, it's not so much a brand play then it's just a good smartphone. It could be any brand or any uh, operating system?

Yes.

Because I always think Apple is the hottest. But my new Samsung phone cost a pretty penny, so I'm sure Samsung's are popular as well.

And then also cell phone accessories. So peak season is now and there's also particularly massive buying periods starting Cyber Week and it goes right through until December 18. And on average, did you know that 91 cell phone accessory items are sold every minute?

Every minute?

Every minute. It's huge.

That's a lot of accessories. A lot of accessories.

You could fill a lot of drawers and a lot of closets with all those accessories, which is where most of them end up for us. Right.

Probably, but they are huge for gifting as well. So that's what I wanted to talk about. So, we're all kind of focused on Cyber Week at the moment. That's the big period for massive deals. But what after Cyber Week? Well then it's gifting. The buyer is looking for gifts, so Cyber Week they're looking for awesome deals for either themselves or gifting, but then after Cyber Week they really focus on getting their gifts for their loved ones and family members. That's what we're talking about right now. And cell phone gadgets, tech gadgets or tech lover's coffee and tea, DIY.

Coffee and Tea? What do you mean by that?

Coffee and Tea gifts. So, things that are great for stocking stuffers. Oh, like little bags of coffee or tea or little tins of tea.

Yeah. Little sachets of tea for the tea drinkers out there. So British and Indian and Australian as well.

Melbourne tea is actually my favorite tea.

Melbourne tea. I'll have to look for some and then gift it to you for the holidays.

Thank you.

With some Marmite.

Vegemites?

Vegemites.  You don't like Marmite?

Not New Zealand.

That's right. That's different.

Get it right Griff.

But I like both of them.

Well I only like Vegemite.

I love Vegemite.

Same. It should be a phenomena here. Maybe we have to make it big on eBay.

Oh well it does sell very well on eBay. There are a lot of Australians out there, did you know? Twenty million of us did you know.

I didn't count them but I'll take your word for it.

20 million reasons to go and get some Vegemite.

And they're all looking on eBay too for gifts.

Absolutely, that is trending. Always trending on eBay.

So, Vegemite not Marmite because we're not in New Zealand.

Great gift for the stocking stuffers.

What about tea accessories?

Tea accessories?

Well you need like the strainer, the pots, the cups, the, you know.

I love a good tea pot.

I think I have 20. I'm actually a bit of a hoarder for tea pots.

See?

I love them.

So, if you have a good tea pot, this is a time just to put it up on the site.

You've got to have a tea pot to drink tea, don't you?

You can't make it in the palm of your hand, it burns.

The other thing that we're finding massive search on at the moment, obviously as it's getting cold out is winter wear. So, we had a great deal on UGG's this week. Hunter boots, Sorel and sunglasses.

And sunglasses primarily for those who are snow aficionados right?

Potentially on the West Coast. It's for those with the snow and potentially on the East. No West. I always get my West and East confused.

Well you can snow on both coasts.

That's right, but it's so sunny here in California at the moment. You need your sunglasses.

It's true.

So definitely don't need the winter woolies.

Ok, so sunglasses. I'll keep that in mind.

And then the other really popular gifting item is travel goods and accessories. So I, to be honest, haven't gifted anyone a travel kit or toiletry bag. But we do know that there is search for gifting around these items.

Does that include luggage as well?

Larger luggage. So, for the travel or the wanderlust lovers out there, get some fantastic travel goods and accessories. That's what buyers are looking for.

So, a small spinner bag. can you say that by the way?

No, I cannot. A what?

A spinner.

Spinner or a Spanner?

No spanner. We've talked about several episodes ago. The ones that have the wheels, four wheels that go in any direction and you can, you can wheel it around upright. They're very popular right now.

Oh yeah. I know I've had those. I do go to an airport.

I knew I wanted to hear you say the word spinner.

I'm not going to just to make my point. Now, my favorite site. Let's talk about…

What was your favorite disco band? Could it have been the Spinners?

What are you on today?

I can't get you to say it. Sorry.

I'm not going to. Get like a broken record.

Well you can put a new spin on this.

I will put a new spin on this--explore.ebay.com.

Oh, I remember that site.

Ugly Christmas sweaters are hundred percent trending right now.

They just don't go out of style.

Well they are like peeking at the moment and 21,000 searches in the last few weeks.

For ugly Christmas sweaters.

Definitely.

I feel like all the legitimate ones that were period of their time seemed to have disappeared and now people are making them.

How do you have a period? Ugly Christmas sweater?

Well, I mean because they were sincere. The real ugly Christmas sweaters were like made sincerely not as a sort of tongue in cheek like the sixties and seventies.

Oh, it was a real thing?

Oh, in this country it was. I remember women in my family wearing these proudly and I'm thinking, oh brother, what family did I get born in? But today it's all ironic. It's like a, It's like a statement about irony.

Exactly.

Yeah. You would never catch me dead and one of those.

Okay, we'll remember that. We'll keep that one in mind.

Put it on me while I'm sleeping.

While She's sleeping, and she doesn't want to be buried in a ugly Christmas sweater.

And then the other interesting one, which I'd love your point of view on. Post Malone Crocs. So, what's your thoughts on Crocs?

After Malone, Post Malone? I don't. What is Malone?

So, let's talk about the collaboration. So, Post Malone is an American rapper.

Oh, I knew that. I was just kidding.

Yeah, right. That you've got the song in your mind.

No idea who he is, sorry. So, he has a special branding thing with them?

He did a collaboration with Croc. And we love Crocs because we have a fantastic Croc partnership with Crocs online and Post Malone obviously does as well. And he collaborated with them and they're sold out.

Sold out. So, you must go to eBay to buy it.

That's right. So, they're sold out on Crocs. Crocs.com and then come on eBay and they're selling really well. Yeah. So, if you find some, pop them on eBay and make yourself a pretty penny as we say.

I wonder how many eBay sellers actually bought them when they could, so they could resell them on eBay.

It's an interesting collaboration, isn't it? We talk about sneaker collaborations all the time, but Crocs are getting into it now as well.

They are smart.

That's smart.

They've seen the writing on the wall. This is what sells shoes. So, we talked about what's hot on explore.ebay.com.

For those who may have not have heard our past episodes, what is that site and how is it built?

explore.ebay.com is my favorite site and it is where we use data to show everyone, our customers, our buyers and sellers what is trending on eBay. And they're trending particularly on this site because there's a scarcity play. Brands will drop a limited number of these items through collaboration, or they'll resurface vintage items and they'll turn up on eBay and the price will go up because there's a limited edition. But it's a really, I love all of these database insights because we see what's been searched by the buyers and then we share the data. Why not share it? In my mind.

It seems like such an obvious tool, every seller who's wondering what I should be offering for sale that's really hot right now, should be checking it out so it makes sure you go to..

explore.ebay.com.

It's always a revelation to me. I figured I knew what was hot on eBay, but I always learn something new every time I visit that sit.

And I love even just seeing the traffic go up. So, you see like the graph of all of the traffic going up and it just makes the site feels so dynamic and you feel like this marketplace is operating successfully. There are buyers and sellers, you know, having an exchange and that's why I love this site so much. The exchange is turning up these wonderful insights that we're sharing to our customers.

So, it's important information for you seller so make sure you check it out. You'll know what's hot on eBay and if you listen to the podcast every week, you'll hear Liz tell you what's "really hot" on eBay.

What is trending and what you got to follow is this site.

There you go. Liz, thanks. It's always a pleasure. Will you be back next week?

I'll be back next week.

We can't wait, so join us then when Liz comes back with more news about what's hot on eBay.

See you then.

We've been talking to Liz Austin. She's telling us "what's hot" at explore.ebay.com. Coming up next, your calls. Don't go away.

Hey, I know what time it is. It's time to take a call and we have a call. Let's go right to the call. Hey, welcome to the selling on eBay podcast. What's your name and what's your question?

Hi Griff,  Ari Levinson from Lion Brewing Solutions. First question, If I can get two?

Yeah, you can have two.

All. Alright. First question. Oh, we have a great customer that has our, we sent them a keg, a beer keg. It was stolen off of their porch. They even have a photograph of it on their porch, I believe that was from Amazon when there was an Amazon package on top of our eBay package, a nice tall box with eBay tape all over it. Both things were stolen and they sent me the photograph and tracking shows delivered. Obviously. But I can't afford to reimburse every time this happens, but I did tell them to contact their local post office, immediately file a police report immediately. They have done both of those. They've sent me back a police report and they said that their post office told them that the seller needs to file a claim, but my post office says no, tracking shows delivered.

Yeah. I don't know why they would tell you to file a claim if it shows as delivered. Your responsibility is over as far as eBay is concerned and the post office delivered the package.  So, it was a theft, post-delivery, and in this case, the photograph actually does not boost the buyer's case because what it shows is that they provide an unsecured location for package drop off. Most of us do, right? Most of us don't have a secure box where the package goes In. However, that's not your responsibility. It's not the marketplaces responsibility, but it is their responsibility. Now what can you do?

I know it's not mine, but I would hate to not handle it properly and have an upset customer.

What are you talking about here for money? How much did this item cost?

One hundred bucks.

What would I do in a case like this? It's a lot of money to reimburse. I don't know if I would do that, but I might give them a voucher or a credit. You can create a code less coupon in the promotions manager tool and say, hey, I can give you $25 off your next purchase. You can also suggest that they contact eBay. Sometimes eBay will actually step in and reimburse a buyer, in this case, out of their own pocket, not the seller's. It might be well to show some empathy, I suppose will help too. But you are under no, you're really under no obligation to be the one who takes the loss for this situation because you're not responsible for the recipient, In this case the buyer, for their location not being secured.

Well, I really like your suggestion about the code less coupon. I just noticed that the other day. I want to play around with that some more.

You can make it a substantial code less coupon that you're going to give a 50 percent discount and just use it that one time with this buyer. Once they use it, you can discontinue it so that it doesn't get used by anyone else, but maybe they want to buy another keg for 50 bucks, but again, as far as the rules go, you're not responsible. And I would argue that as far as the ethics go, you're not responsible. Now that's not to say that some businesses might reimburse, but I don't know what your sales volume is you may not be able to absorb $100 loss, not just as good customer service but also as customer acquisition. So, I would go with the code less coupon and hopefully they'll have their packages delivered to a secure location. I tell you what I do, so I'm really lucky. I work for eBay and eBay encourages employees to buy and sell. All my purchases on eBay are sent to eBay. So, they go to the mail room, secured and then they get dropped off for me because I don't trust my neighborhood either. There's always reports of people getting packages stolen from their porch.

Yeah. Unfortunately, I've heard a lot more and more people getting packages delivered to work instead of their home.

It's probably not going to make the buyer super happy, but in a case like this, I think you've done everything possible and hopefully they'll. It's a lesson learned for them.

They are not upset. They have, we've communicated positively. They've told me that the police department is working on a sting operation. The police department gave them a free Ring doorbell, some GPS'd packages for that they're going to try and bust…

Those Ring doorbells cost well and above 100 bucks. They're usually around $200, so they got a free Ring out of it. I guess that's how I look at it.

Yeah, they did. I don't know if they get to keep it, but yeah, we've had some positive interactions so they were okay. I just wanted to see what the suggestions were. I know it's not on me, but I, you know, I don't want to stand there. Just be like not my fault.

Absolutely.

Yeah. So, I think we'll maintain a customer out of it, especially if we give them a coupon.

Something to show that you aren't just brushing them off gives us a great way of showing empathy with the customer in this sort of unfortunate situation. What was your second question?

Regarding the new payment platform. Was hoping to make sure that we could have payment records in view back farther than 90 days. There's a lot of our brewing equipment we offer a one-year warranty on and customers may call up to a year later and uh, when the 90-day thing is up, it's hard to find them, but we can find them on PayPal. But it would be really nice to be able to just look them right up on eBay.

Well, the good news is there will be a similar history function as there is currently in PayPal. Where a seller on eBay will be able to go back at least a year, if not two. And I don't know what we've landed on yet. I, I would say two or more. This is a requirement primarily for tax purposes in bookkeeping. You know, 90 days for payments just wouldn't work. Quite frankly. I wish that the eBay sold listings went back at least a year. That would make sense as well, but the once everyone is ported to the new Managed Payments Platform, starting in 2020 and 2021, there will be a transaction history that will be similar to what PayPal has so that you'll be able to go back, search it, find the customer, and then in this case I guess is do you want to be able to honor a warranty?

Yes.

This will provide that functionality. The other thing I do, I save all of the emails that eBay sends that says this item sold. I have a whole folder of sold items, so if I couldn't reach PayPal, I could always search for the buyers user id and that GMail folder.

That could work.

So you should start. I think every seller should be keeping their email records from eBay as a sort of unofficial history of not just their payment transactions but have their, their actual eBay transactions and you can use those in the future as your records. what's nice about those, and I don't know what our reporting feature will look like, but what I love about the emails is that the image of the item is there as well, so it helps, you know, helps you remember it. Oh, it's that item.

And so, your answer is when we transfer over, you think we'll be able to go back past 90 days?

Oh yeah. No, it'll be at least a year. It has to be. I would assume. I would assume it like PayPal. It would be two years so that you'll be able to go back and see those transactions.

Yeah. Right now, it's only 90 days, unless you call customer service. They can, they can go a little deeper, but as far as I know it's only 90 and that's not long enough for a lot of products have a one-year warranty.

That's the eBay transaction record, which is not completely dependent yet on payments, but payments is a different matter. That's the money! The money has to, we have to show the history. Right, so that's important. The coolest thing of all, it'll be right on eBay, so you don't have to go to another website.

You know what's even cooler than that?

What's that? It's better than PayPal. It will be cheaper.

You could say that, but I couldn't possibly comment.

I heard somewhere that it was going to be a point, a decimal or two or three cheaper.

You know, how marketplaces compete. Perhaps, perhaps payment processors will compete as well. We'll see.

Alright, great. Well I love both your answers. So glad I called. Thank you.

Ari, It's my pleasure and we appreciate the call and continue happy selling and you can always call the show.

Awesome. Thanks. Thanks. Ari, I'll hear from you in the future, I'm sure.

Yeah. I'll always have questions.

Do you have an eBay selling question? We can help. Call us on our hotline. 888-723-4630. That's 888-723-4630, just listen to the message, follow the instructions and you too can be a part of the Selling On eBay Podcast. One more time. 888-723-4630 and now let's bring Audrey back into the control room. So, we can sign off this episode of the Selling On eBay Podcast.

Well Audrey, that's a wrap.

It was a full show this week. Lots of great info for sellers. If I do say so myself.  Before we go, I need to remind everyone about our hotline. You can be on Selling On eBay with your phone call. Just calling your question at 888-723-4630 and follow the instructions. You can call that hotline any time of day. Any day of the week. That's right Audrey, and we have our very own email address where you can send your questions. If you're too shy to call our hotline, it's sellingonebay@ebay.com. That's sellingonebay@ebay.com.

Time to go Audrey credits in the queue. Time to roll them. This is the selling on eBay team, all of whom contribute stories and talent on our show. First, Director of Community Brian Burke. And Community Manager Alan Aisbitt, Community Manager and Technology and News Editor, Doug Smith, Social Marketeer, Liz Austin, Editor in Chief and Host, Griff. That's you. Scriptwriter and Cohost Audrey. That you, babe.  We'll be back next week with a fresh new episode of Selling On eBay. Selling On eBay is produced and distributed by Libsyn and Podcast411. Nailed it. Stapled it... to the moon.

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