eBay

lilla-1 · ‎12-28-2016

My store (primarily women's used clothing) sales have plummeted over the past year and I took some time to take a look at Ebay prices, products etc... to understand the competition out there and what I might do differently to increase my sales. I noticed there are literally tens of thousands of multi-variation clothing listings with a price range of $1 to $9.99 (as an example) based on the variation chosen for purchase. However, the lowest price item has nothing to do with the listing category. e.g...listing is for a women's long sleeve shirt, but the "variation" in the listing for $1 is a necklace, belt, panties, halloween mask, earrings, etc...but no shirt at that price. Is this an acceptable multi-variation listing? Or, are thousands of sellers manipulating browing/searching by listing this way? I generally don't do multi-variation listings, but this business selling model (if acceptable the way it's being done) is an interesting thought. Thanks ahead of time for feedback!

bubbleman2010 · ‎12-28-2016

No its not a selling model thats correct just a loop hole sellers found to take advantage of the system. ebay might close it might not,but having a couple hundred items listed like that and one day they just disappear due to listing violation thats a lot of work trying to save pennies,nickels and dimes....

bubbleman2010 · ‎12-28-2016

What would be good for a chuckle sellers are paying for a basic store,but list at premium store and above amounts ebay smack them with a years worth of fees for services they've been using and not paying for...

slippinjimmy · ‎12-28-2016

It's Seach & Browse manipulation and it's getting more and more common (and it's not just sellers from Asia or even sellers on eBay).

It has nothing to do with fee avoidance and everything to do with getting click throughs and showing up on page one of a Low - High price sort plus a big boost in Best Match.

bubbleman2010 · ‎12-28-2016

So if I'm getting this correctly I can list a item in a category that allows variations say a shirt and then put several different unrelated items in as variations and pay fees for only the one listing and ebay doesn't consider that fee avoidance?

slippinjimmy · ‎12-28-2016

@bubbleman2010 wrote:
So if I'm getting this correctly I can list a item in a category that allows variations say a shirt and then put several different unrelated items in as variations and pay fees for only the one listing and ebay doesn't consider that fee avoidance?

That's not the intent of this twist.

The intent is to add a VERY cheap item to the Variation set so that Search see that as the price for ranking purposes in Best March or Lowest Price.

The secondary intent is to have buyers see the widget they are searching for or browsing for and see a price as $0.99 - $14.99 but when they go to the listing all the variations for the item they are interested in the price is $14.99 and the only item that is 99 cents is some unrelated piece of junk.

Similar misleading listings are found many places online, the most common example if an item that is "on sale" but when you click through to the details page you find that of the 6 sizes offered the only ones actually available at the sale price are the XXXS while S-M-L-XL are still at regular price.

Buyers don't get ripped off by these techniques but they do get frustrated and upset.

bubbleman2010 · ‎12-28-2016

I guess that would work if a systems search was designed and ran that way,but ebays search is more like duct tape and baling wire and luck of the draw....

goodluckselling · ‎12-28-2016

@slippinjimmy wrote:
@bubbleman2010 wrote:
So if I'm getting this correctly I can list a item in a category that allows variations say a shirt and then put several different unrelated items in as variations and pay fees for only the one listing and ebay doesn't consider that fee avoidance?
That's not the intent of this twist.

The intent is to add a VERY cheap item to the Variation set so that Search see that as the price for ranking purposes in Best March or Lowest Price.

The secondary intent is to have buyers see the widget they are searching for or browsing for and see a price as $0.99 - $14.99 but when they go to the listing all the variations for the item they are interested in the price is $14.99 and the only item that is 99 cents is some unrelated piece of junk.

Similar misleading listings are found many places online, the most common example if an item that is "on sale" but when you click through to the details page you find that of the 6 sizes offered the only ones actually available at the sale price are the XXXS while S-M-L-XL are still at regular price.

Buyers don't get ripped off by these techniques but they do get frustrated and upset.

Although I agree this example outlined by the OP is not a valid variation listing and would be removed by eBay if reported to them and they review the report.

I disagree however that this is an advantage to the sellers who create listings in this manner. Every time a potential buyer opens the listing to review the findings the sellers listing gets an impression against it. If the potential buyer does not engage further into the listings albeit by watching the item or making a purchase from the listing these are signs that eBay monitors that this listing is not performing once a potential buyers enters the listing. eBay uses this info to demote listing that are not performing as good as newly listed and highly performing listings.

This is one of the most misunderstood concepts about how eBay search works.

This is one area many sellers have exploded about in the past and this is a prime example of why it is in place today.

slippinjimmy · ‎12-28-2016

Every time a potential buyer opens the listing to review the findings the sellers listing gets an impression against it.

There are two metrics in play, views/impressions ratio and click through conversion rate.

Views/impressions is the ratio of the number of times a listing is displayed in search results vs the number of views from those results.

Conversion rates are the number of sales that result from the viewing of the listing page.

I can't say with any certainty which is more important but I can say for sure that if your listing appeara in search results and buyers never click through your views/impression ration will suffer badly and eBay will remove you from the top of the heap (in Best Match).

Also views/impressions are not as relevant if buyers use any sort order other than Best Match but for the many buyers who use a Price sort views of the listing page are very important, second only of course to conversion rates. You can't get the later (conversion) without the former (a page view) so page views are important both for eBay's metrics and to allow for potential conversion to a sale.

lilla-1 · ‎12-29-2016

Very interesting thoughts from a metrics perspective. I was initially just thinking about it from a manipulation perspective from a low-high price sort and from a customer perspective thinking the're about to get an item they want for potentially $1 (as an example). Glad you pointed out the click through and conversion rate side of it. Very sad how overwhelmingly prevelant this "gimmic" is and how much this hurts buyers and sellers alike. When my potential buyer enters Ebay and does a low-high sort, viewing & clicking on these thousands of listings and then feeling "duped", I got to believe they just think...."so this is what Ebay has become now?!" and simply walk away.

rashaunnie · ‎12-04-2017

I recently purchased from a listing for Confort Click belts. The seller has two for sale at $6.99 black and brown and then one for $1.79 which was a "deposit on 100 custom orders", I would assume the price per was $6.99 or maybe $1.79 who knows. I payed the $1.79 and waited for a reply. After asking them to change their listings they indicated that it did not violate any policies, I replied witht he following. I was kinda peeved bc I see this so so mcuh from the, presumably, chinese sellers.

"Actually it does violate the policy of search manipulation! You are listing two items with associated picture then an unrelated custom order for an unrelated quantity in order to rank lower in price sorted searches. I have noticed this to be a common trend. What I do Is record about 25 violations and escalate an email correspondence with ebay. When an ebay employee has to remove listings It seems that they are more likely to make a strike against a seller when I show them many listings that violate. This eventually increases your final value fees ... I have about 15 saved sellers that I get notifications for new listings and scroll through them when I am in a bad mood. It would be silly for your final value fees to increase over a small thing like this. :'(

http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/search-manipulation.html

Please change your listings for any belts being sold so the price matches the item title and picture presented. I will get emailed about now listings.
I paid $1.79 for a belt which is in the picture and matches the title.

"