mam98031 • Volunteer Community Member • Buyer/Seller since 1999
Simply-the-best-for-you Volunteer Community Mentor
Noticed today that on the View Item page in the Feedback module for some sellers eBay is showing an average message response rate.
It's not showing for all sellers and I'm not sure what the criteria is - I don't think it's only for sellers that are particularly fast because I'm seeing anywhere from 1 hr to 24 hrs.
devon@ebay kyle@ebay - any insights on this you can share?
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@valueaddedresource wrote:
devon@ebay kyle@ebay - if you could please check with the team on this one and find out for us:
A.) Over what time frame is the average calculated?
B.) Do messages that are not responded to count against a seller for this stat and if so, what is the proper way to mark when a message does not require a response to avoid having it counted?
C.) If a seller has working days/hours set for the purposes of shipping cut offs, will those settings also apply to messages for this stat (ie. only counting "business hours" for response time).
Thanks!
Hey @valueaddedresource! The product team was able to share some insight and here is what they said:
"Hi all,
Firstly, thank you for providing your feedback on this topic. I am a product manager on the buyer experience team, and am happy to address any questions you may have on this topic.
We are testing this feature because we heard from buyers that they value knowing if they can expect timely responses from a seller, and that it would encourage them to engage more on eBay. Currently, this signal shows up on the View Item page and is being tested with a subset of buyers to help us understand if it helps with increasing sales for our sellers and trust on the platform.
Please see our responses below regarding some of the specific questions raised in this thread:
[Question 1] – What signals can show up on my listing to indicate my response time?
- Your listings could display one of the following 7 signals:
- “Responds within 1 hour” OR
- “Responds within 3 hours” OR
- “Responds within 6 hours” OR
- “Responds within 12 hours” OR
- “Responds within 24 hours” OR
- “Responds within 48 hours” OR
- No signal will show up on your listings
[Question 2] – How is this signal calculated?
- The signal is calculated based on data over the last 12 months for sellers. We only look at the response from the seller for the first question. More details below:
- Seller has received at least 1 question and answered 60%+ questions over the last 12M
- Only the first question and response in each conversation are included. So not responding to a follow up question or a “thank you very much” response from the buyer would not be factored into this calculation.
- The result is rounded up to the nearest bucket from the list of 7 signals mentioned above
- The signal is not shown if the calculation shows a seller responds in more than 48 hours.
- The signal is also not displayed when a seller has received no questions over the last 12 months or when a seller’s response rate was lower than 60%.
[Question 3] – Will this new response time signal impact my seller rating?
- No, this response time signal will not impact your seller's rating in any way, and there are no plans to add this as a criterion to qualify as a Top Rated Seller.
[Question 4] – If a seller has working days/hours set for the purposes of shipping cut offs, will those settings be considered in the calculation of this signal?
- At this time, we do not factor this into the calculation. We will explore the possibility of incorporating the working days/hours set by sellers in the future.
[Question 5] – As a seller, I am concerned that I will be penalized if I fall sick for a few days, take a weekend off or am temporarily not able to respond with the speed with which I usually do.
- As mentioned in the answer to Question 2 above, the response time is calculated based on your performance over the previous 12 months. Therefore, occasional fluctuations in response time would not considerably impact your overall performance evaluation.
I hope this information helps clarify the purpose of this feature. If you have any additional feedback, please let us know. We will keep the community informed on the learnings and if we decide to launch the experience more broadly.
Thank you."
Devon,
That is interesting. I haven't seen that yet. For buyers that could be useful. For sellers that could set up unrealistic expectations for buyers.
I personally see this as harmful for sellers.
It is kind of like what Amazon does. It doesn't matter what you set your handling time for, if you ship consistently in less time than that, they will change your handling time to the shorter time and you can't get it changed.
So now if a seller doesn't answer in an hour or so [whatever it says for that seller], then the buyer could be upset.
Well, that's interesting! Kind of makes it clear that they DO in fact track that, which has been rumored for years. Whether or not it affects the ranking algorithm is still uncertain, though that's been rumored for years too. This doesn't bother me though b/c I reply to ALL messages & really fast. Etsy does this & has for a long time.
@vintagecraze50 wrote:It’s going to be very helpful when a customer really needs wants more details for a quick purchase. I say great. I get a lot of people needing or wanting an item for a birthday etc. Think of holiday time coming up as well when it gets to the last week before Christmas. If sellers are not being “ON IT” as far as responding to questions quickly then the buyer can just go right to the next seller who is ‘ON IT”.
What about when a seller can't meet that expectation? Is the buyer going to be happy? Doubtful. And if the buyer goes ahead and buys the item then hits the seller's FB for not responding to messages fast enough.
I try to answer my buyers question as quickly as I can. But this could come back to bite me now if I'm away from home or simply out enjoying life, which we all have every right to do.
NOPE this is going to bite some sellers right in the feedback!!!
@buyselljack2016 wrote:I wonder what not replying at all to lowballer messages, and or to questions that make absolutely no sense will do to skew the timeframe.
The rumors of it affecting search ranking, which have been around for a VERY long time, is why I have NEVER done that. Not willing to risk it, if it's true.
