Are my items not being seen?

[luvcash]

I sell in the Midwest.  Seems like 98% of my sales go to California, Texas or the East Coast.  A lot of my items are Collectibles from the Midwest.  Does the Bay only send my listings to those areas or is the Midwest just not buying.  I NEVER see EBay ads anywhere now days.

[toybrats]

I'm in NY with 2 selling accounts and most of my sales are to California, Oregon and Washington.  I do think that ebay sets it up this way to get more fees since the shipping east coast to west coast is the highest. I sell mainly toys and it's always been this way for years. I do realize that there are more diecast collectors out there too.

In your case, perhaps the folks in the Midwest have those same items and do not need them. Perhaps your winners used to live in the Midwest and need to get those types of items from a midwest seller.

[stainlessenginecovers]

For 10 of the previous 12 years all my items were 'free shipping' so the shipping thing would not be a reason for me.

I was in Cali (till last year) yet 90% of my items go to these 7 states. Tex, FL, NY, MIch, Penn, Okla, OH. Cali is 10% of the entire USA Population so go figure?

[nobody*s_perfect]

I see that you are charging a flat price for shipping. When you charge a flat price for a zoned service, you inevitably overcharge some buyers and/or undercharge others.  Perhaps other midwestern sellers who use calculated shipping are showing lower total prices for midwestern buyers.

[ckimodog]

@luvcash 

In the last month you've sold 20 items.  Bravo!  Be happy you're selling where ever they are buying.  You're making money and doing better than a lot of sellers.

Happy Selling and Holidays!!

[allen1853]

Good luck trying to figure this out. Ebay is not transparent and there is no way to figure out what they do as far as promotion. I hear an ad on the radio for EBay Motors, NOTHING ELSE. 

[onefootflipper]

You need to switch to calculated shipping. Flat shipping or free shipping means that your items are most desirable to those in the furthest away zones from you. 

Ebay spends most of its ad money on google shopping, exactly where it needs to. Reminding people that ebay exists is not needed. It has no direct competition.

[doug_5857]

I sell U.S. coins and I have shipped to every state including AK, HI, U.S Protectorates, and APO/FPO. I will not ship International. I live in Wisconsin and offer Free Shipping on most of sales.

[springvalleywi]

OMG this is me. It seems that a lot of my items go to the west coast, east coast, and not much in between. I am in the midwest. I understand the whole population thing but I have only sold items to Montana, Idaho, North Dakota, and South Dakota a handful of times. I complained one time about an item not selling and within 2 or 3 days all three of them sold, all to the east coast!!! How do you explain the odds of that? The ebay cheerleaders will say that items are not being hidden. I call baloney based on my comments above.

[springvalleywi]

Yes, ebay will collect more fees on shipping.  And they don't hide auctions LOL!!

[onefootflipper]

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@springvalleywi wrote:

OMG this is me. It seems that a lot of my items go to the west coast, east coast, and not much in between. I am in the midwest. I understand the whole population thing but I have only sold items to Montana, Idaho, North Dakota, and South Dakota a handful of times. I complained one time about an item not selling and within 2 or 3 days all three of them sold, all to the east coast!!! How do you explain the odds of that? The ebay cheerleaders will say that items are not being hidden. I call baloney based on my comments above.

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There is one overwhelming thing almost everyone has in common that says ebay is "hiding their items" or "killed their sales" and that is the fact that their items are almost all priced well above what is normal for the specific items or categories.  Like your Land's end needlepoint blank stockings. Those essentially sell EVERY SINGLE TIME, when they are posted under $30. They have one of the best sell through rates on ebay.  In the under $30 pricepoint there are 5 available and 32 sold in the last 90 days. For an average sale time of under 2 weeks. As soon as you cross over $30 however the sell time goes up to 6 months. All of yours are priced at $30 and over. I know, I know you are doing your own thing with those and have your own plan with them. There is another seller that sells them that consistently prices at $29.xx and they are getting most of the sales in that niche.

[gotta-have-it-collectables]

I also have coin buyers all over the US but do see a lot of west coast sales.

[yuzuha]

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@springvalleywi wrote:

OMG this is me. It seems that a lot of my items go to the west coast, east coast, and not much in between. I am in the midwest. I understand the whole population thing but I have only sold items to Montana, Idaho, North Dakota, and South Dakota a handful of times.

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I can count on one hand the number of times I've ever sold to any of those states. Hardly anyone lives there, so it shouldn't come as a surprise that there will be very few sales to those states.

[chapeau-noir]

I'm in the very upper left corner of the lower 48 and charge capped flat rate, so eBay gets nothing from sending my sales east of the Mississippi.  But they go there because that's where much of the population lives.  My other sales go to California, also populous, and with a huge economy, and Texas, also with a big economy.

IMHO it's population centers.  In a 500 mile radius of where I am live a lot fewer people than in a 500 mile radius of say Chicago, or New York.

[slippinjimmy]

More stuff related to population distribution here:

https://vividmaps.com/us-population-density/