EBAY STILL FLATLINED. Is the end near? What if sales drop below the cost of listings?

[darrellschweitzer_pa]

I am concerned I will not be able to pay for my listing and subscription fees out of declining eBay sales. With over 1300 listings I have sold one $3 item this week.

So I am thinking of, at the very least, a reduction strategy, which is to invite friends and customers over and sell them books from my eBay stock, deleting those listings as I go. If am am still losing money by having listings, I may have to cease selling altogether. Is this what eBay wants? I fear they may be suicidal and in denial about what they are doing.

The promotions seemed to help momentarily, but sales have collapsed again. The change is in eBay, not me, because I did far better with the same listings or the same type of listings before GTC. It wasn't even that Good Till Cancelled itself was a bad idea. I manually relisted most of my listings every month. Something has happened to make them invisible.

[goodluckselling]

I think your strategy for selling books locally is a good path for you.

• What do you think eBay is doing differently?
• and what do you think they are in denial about?

Good Luck Selling!

[darrellschweitzer_pa]

I don't know what they are doing wrong. Somehow the exposure is way down. Is it possible that my listings, even the promoted ones, are not appearing in searches? Is it possible that eBay has somehow driven away most of the buyers? I note that I am not hearing from my regular customers anymore, people who have been buying from me for years.

Yes, the best solution seems to be to sell books off eBay. But I have too many. For years I have depended on eBay to maintain a steady stream of sales between the times I can get to shows or conventions or invite buyers over. Now, I can no longer rely on eBay.

[darrellschweitzer_pa]

As for how dramatic the collapse has been, I am down 49.5% in the past 30 days. There actually was a small spike in sales during that period, so the real decline is much larger. Down 60.2% from the same time last year.

[femmefan1946]

Certainly selling on more venues would be helpful.

Have you considered taking or sharing a dealer table at cons?

The small fan-run cons are relatively inexpensive. Relatively.

Online, few realize that etsy sells 'vintage' books and Ruby Lane has a strong following for vintage. But both lean to a female following who may not care for the Golden Age SF/F, although fandom is a lot more woman-friendly than it was at TorConII, my first world con, when the Women in SF panel was cancelled in favour of a panel on dirty jokes.

However, in my experience, eBay has always been the strongest platform for my books, even with the cost of shipping from Canada.

[dtexley3]

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@darrellschweitzer_pa wrote:

I don't know what they are doing wrong. Somehow the exposure is way down. Is it possible that my listings, even the promoted ones, are not appearing in searches? Is it possible that eBay has somehow driven away most of the buyers? I note that I am not hearing from my regular customers anymore, people who have been buying from me for years.

Yes, the best solution seems to be to sell books off eBay. But I have too many. For years I have depended on eBay to maintain a steady stream of sales between the times I can get to shows or conventions or invite buyers over. Now, I can no longer rely on eBay.

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There appears to have been a significant change made to Searching just a couple weeks before the GTC change was implemented.  There have been multiple threads regarding a huge increase in the number of unrelated items being pulled in that don't match the keywords being used.  When pressed about this the blues took some examples to the "tech team" and came back with the message "it's working as expected".  Another HUGE gap between the so-called "tech team"'s ideas of how it should work and the reality of how ecommerce works.

Showing buyers dozens of non-related items just irritates them and chases them away.  Someone on the eBay dev team just doesn't get that.

[the*dog*ate*my*tablecloth]

My sales are way down off Ebay too. I'm wondering if people are concerned about tariffs raising prices for staple items leaving less money for wants?

[dtexley3]

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@the*dog*ate*my*tablecloth wrote:

My sales are way down off Ebay too. I'm wondering if people are concerned about tariffs raising prices for staple items leaving less money for wants?

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I've heard the same from others but usually with the caveat, "but not as much as eBay's drop".... subjective statement I know.

[luckythewinner]

Something has happened to make them invisible

I searched black static under Best Match in Books and your listing was #2.

I searched pickaninny under Best Match in Books and your listing was #2.

I searched pickaninny under Best Match in All Categories and your listing was #9.

I searched analog dune under Best Match in Books and your listing was #1.

I searched farmer woman a day under Best Match in All Categories and your listing was #1.

I searched avram davidson adventures under Best Match in All Categories and your listing was #1.

In each of those searches, I was able to view the listing, and there was definitely a "Buy" button available to me.

[bonjourami]

The summer slump has begun...happens every year.

[yuncreations]

actually it's finally getting better for me!! 🙂

[rograc-37]

I'm glad I upgraded to a store. I have far more listings available to me. It has allowed me to end all my GTC listings every month and sell similar each month. First time trying and I sold 4 items yesterday. Zero the previous 12 days.  Paid for my upgrade and then a lot more.

[coolections]

There are millions upon millions of books on Ebay. There are millions upon millions of books at every garage sale and thrift store for 50 cents each. The best thing you can do is go through those 1300 books and eliminate 3/4 of them and only sell the best left over. Having a store and adding more books most likely will not help . You are right, paying a store fee for items not in demand will cost you.

[tunicaslot]

Actually if you look at the OP's listings - what I see are niche specific magazines and books that are not over saturated on Ebay - less than 50 listings and a decent sell thru rate - so your explanation does not really apply to the OP.

As stated OP - you can cross post your listings - join Facebook groups that are niche specific - but keep your listings up here as there is a market for them.

[upgradedendmills]

I just bought one of your books. Not much, but sometimes any sale helps. Five or six years ago SCI-FI booksellers were on top of the world, who knows what happened. I buy books I like and still sell a few now and then, but the 12% FVF sticks in my craw. I have promised myself I would get out of it a few times, but every time I do, I end up selling a couple. I hope it works out well for you whatever direction it takes.