20% off coupon Today - Let your buyers know!

[brian_burke@ebay]

All,

I thought I would let you know that from 8-8 Pacific time we are having a 20% off coupon - let you buyers know AND do some shopping yourselves - it's a great offer 

https://pages.ebay.com/promo/2018/0309/7020.html

[thevintagesilvershop]

@brian_burke_99, how do you propose we let our buyers "know"?  Email Marketing only works about 30% of the time.  The last 6 times I tried to use it to email my 800+ customer base about a sale I was having, it only worked 2 times.  4 of them failed.

[Anonymous]

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@jerzee908 wrote:

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brian_burke@ebaywrote:

All,

Sorry I dropped after posting this, but I wanted to get the word out - I then drove 4 hours to spend a weekend in Connecticut with my aunt and cousins - and disconnected.

I'm surprised a bit a some of the reaction to my post. I posted this elsewhere through other social channels and received a positive response - I was really just trying to share with you a very good promo.

Regarding SPAM - I never said to violate any policy, I only said to let your buyers know. Many store sellers have lists of buyers that they can communicate with. Many of you have social networks that you can post this to (FB, Instagram, etc.) without violating any their policies. 

For those afraid to use the eBay messaging system, I'm not sure how sending an email asking a buyer to come back to eBay and save 20% is considered taking a buyer off eBay. 

I'm glad some of you were able to take advantage of the promo and for those that experienced an issue, please reach out to our customer support team. 

And, I don't know if we are planning to do another one of these. But if we do and I receive it to push through my social channels I will post again to the Seller board.

Thanks for selling on eBay.

Brian

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You really have to put yourself in our shoes on this one.

You said to let our buyers know about the promotion.  How would one do this?  The only people I have access to are people that made prior purchases and people that have messaged me with offers with items without "Best Offer".  If I had access to the people watching my items I could message them or ebay could of sent out a message the day before along the lines of "Save 20% tomorrow on the item you are watching".  Maybe send a phone alert to everyone that has the ebay app?

Just about any store, website, etc. sends some kind of email, message, post on social media, etc. the day prior to a big promotion.  

Again, I thought this was a very-very great idea that ebay had.  I just think if it were properly executed, it would of been more of a success.  

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Hi @jerzee908, I wanted to step in and reiterate some of the suggestions that brian_burke@ebay provided previously; if you have any subscribers to your store Newsletter you are able to send out a message to your customers about a promotion like this. You could also post to your social media channels to notify friends and family or to your customer base if you have built up a professional presence. While we do send out notifications to customers ourselves for promotions like this one, touching base with your personal customers can definitely drive even more engagement on a coupon and increase sales for you! 

We hear your feedback about advance notice and while this would typically not be an option as the success of many offers is tied to a limited timeframe, we can definitely pass this along. Sometimes when buyers find out they missed a sale or promotion because they did not have communication preferences set up correctly or because they didn't check their notifications, this can prompt them to make changes that encourage even more purchases in the future.

I want to finish with some resources that I think will benefit everyone regarding marketing oneself with Social Media:

Our eBay Help Page for Social Media marketing

eBay For Business Blogs that discuss Social Media marketing:

The Modern Buyer: Evolving Buyer Expectations and How Sellers Can Meet Them

The Modern Buyer: How Baby Boomers and Generation Xers Shop Now

The Modern Buyer: How Millennials Shop Now

The Modern Buyer: The Growing Influence of Gen Z

The Complete Guide to Marketing Your eBay Items on Instagram

The Complete Guide to Marketing Your eBay Items on Facebook

The Complete Guide to Marketing Your eBay Business on YouTube

8 Twitter Chats to Inspire and Educate Entrepreneurs

[Anonymous]

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@thevintagesilvershop wrote:

@brian_burke_99, how do you propose we let our buyers "know"?  Email Marketing only works about 30% of the time.  The last 6 times I tried to use it to email my 800+ customer base about a sale I was having, it only worked 2 times.  4 of them failed.

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Hi @thevintagesilvershop, we were having some issues with email marketing late last year, but this has been resolved since the start of December. If you have run into issues recently, definitely let us know so we can get this reported for you!

[chrysylys]

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@Anonymouswrote:

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 We hear your feedback about advance notice and while this would typically not be an option as the success of many offers is tied to a limited timeframe, we can definitely pass this along. Sometimes when buyers find out they missed a sale or promotion because they did not have communication preferences set up correctly or because they didn't check their notifications, this can prompt them to make changes that encourage even more purchases in the future.

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I agree with NO adavance promotion.  Among other reasons and not to point fingers, but there are some sellers who would mark their items UP that 20% thinking people will still buy and they want to let Corporate absorb the discount while still realizing more profit.

[castlemagicmemories]

HI, Mr C!

[thenobletuckylife]

Hi Castle,

By the way, a very strange thing happen for the 1st time ever just a minute ago.

I saw my icon showed a notification...so I went to it...saw you kudo'd and then went to check because there were several there and POOF...yellow screen saying No Notifications...try posting to a discussion. Never seen this.

Mr C

[castlemagicmemories]

Brian:

Thank you for posting and for your continued communication.

I am sorry that you were surprised by some of the reactions.  I know you meant well, but some sellers have received warnings and sanctions for innocent messages that did not contain contact info or suggest taking a transaction off ebay, but the bots read the message as such.  I understand that a human is to read these messages before sanctions kick in, but somehow that may not have worked.  Yes, one could call CS if they are in this situation, but that may or may not help.  

Most sellers are  aware of Ebay's Spam Policy.  You are not allowed to contact a buyer unless they have requested that.  One can't assume that just because a buyer bought from you in the past, that they want to hear from you again.  Sellers cannot just message buyer because they have something they think the buyer might like, unless they have specifically asked that seller to do so.  Even newsletters are not supposed to be sent to past buyers unless that buyer has requested to be put on the seller's list to receive their newsletters.  This accounts for why some were reluctant to let their buyers know, or stated they expected you to have their back if there were any repercussions from disgruntled buyers who did not ask for this contact.  While one would hope that the buyer would not be adverse to receiving this info, one never knows.

Thank you, Brian!!  Hope you had a great visit and enjoyed your time with your aunt and cousins in Ct.  Thank you to you and all the Blues for all you do!

[d-k_treasures]

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brian_burke@ebaywrote:

All,

Sorry I dropped after posting this, but I wanted to get the word out - I then drove 4 hours to spend a weekend in Connecticut with my aunt and cousins - and disconnected.

I'm surprised a bit a some of the reaction to my post. I posted this elsewhere through other social channels and received a positive response - I was really just trying to share with you a very good promo.

Regarding SPAM - I never said to violate any policy, I only said to let your buyers know. Many store sellers have lists of buyers that they can communicate with. Many of you have social networks that you can post this to (FB, Instagram, etc.) without violating any their policies. 

For those afraid to use the eBay messaging system, I'm not sure how sending an email asking a buyer to come back to eBay and save 20% is considered taking a buyer off eBay. 

I'm glad some of you were able to take advantage of the promo and for those that experienced an issue, please reach out to our customer support team. 

And, I don't know if we are planning to do another one of these. But if we do and I receive it to push through my social channels I will post again to the Seller board.

Thanks for selling on eBay.

Brian

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Neither do we. But we aren't bots.

[timzbiz]

I had 2 whopping sales during your 20% off coupon event. Ebay can offer 100% off coupons and items still will not sell. Getting discouraged and bitter.

[jerzee908]

I have a bit of a problem with advertising on social media........

I don't have a personal social media myself, but we do have a social media page for our shop that we sell parts out of here on ebay.  The people that "like" our page live in proximity to our shop.  If we list items for sale on our social media page, it is usually parts cars and very large parts that we wouldn't think about selling on ebay.  If we provided links on our social media page like you are suggesting, wouldn't that be considered trying to make a sale off ebay?  Again, everyone liking our page lives in proximity to our shop.........  We currently don't provide ebay links on our social media page for fear of getting kicked off ebay.

[michael_atw]

Don't worry - bots are the perfect way to distribute harassment evenly and without discrimination.  

[gracieallen01]

I think it rather interesting that the ebay notice about the promo almost seems to be an afterthought - posted nearly 2 hrs after it started and 40 minutes after one of the board regulars posted about it.

Of course, it may have already been up on FB and twit and other social media - didn't check there since I don't use any of them.

[chrysylys]

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@gracieallen01wrote:

I think it rather interesting that the ebay notice about the promo almost seems to be an afterthought - posted nearly 2 hrs after it started and 40 minutes after one of the board regulars posted about it.

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I think it rather interesting that Staff posted about this promo at all, let alone more than one staff member and on more than one board.  That is something I've never seen before and I  think they should be given credit for that instead of taking flack for it.

I do however think they don't understand how aggressive the Bot warnings are and how gun-shy those warnings have made sellers about contacing buyers.

It's also clear that they do not understand how recent policies have adversly affected sellers and how bitter some sellers have become as a direct result.

I'm also surprised by how they have reacted to some of the posts here, and in emails.

[d-k_treasures]

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@michael_atwwrote:

Don't worry - bots are the perfect way to distribute harassment evenly and without discrimination.  

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Except for the 'if $seller_registration != "china"' in front of every check for a violation.

[lookng2015]

Is it just me, or do some of the blues seem a little shall we say, testy, lately?