Effects of not offering GD & Free returns

[ymeagainlord]

For the first time in a LONG time only 1 sale yesterday.

Possible fallout from no longer being TRS+ and refusing to offer Free returns or just coincidence?

Only time will tell.

[castlemagicmemories]

Anyone remember the days before PP? And all those stacks of checks and money orders to take to the bank. Cash, too!

Those were the days, oh, yes, those were the days!

[timemachine777]

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@mudshark61369 wrote:

@ymeagainlord,

eBay would like to compete with Amazon, but since ebay does not sell anything, the only way they feel they can do that, is to try and force sellers to become mini Amazons.  They keep forgetting, that when they make it too hard for the lower volume sellers to make sales on the site, they quit, and they often take their buying dollars with them.  Do they have any toes left to shoot off?

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An they go sell on eBay's competitors site and the buyers follow them. Just like the bar crowd follows their favorite bartender when they go to work for the bar down the street. 

[timemachine777]

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@ymeagainlord wrote:

For the first time in a LONG time only 1 sale yesterday.

Possible fallout from no longer being TRS+ and refusing to offer Free returns or just coincidence?

Only time will tell.

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Just another way for eBay to punish sellers that don't adopt eBay's so-call suggestions. 

[tunicaslot]

No sales from the Free Returns yet - I've been watching some vloggers and most have reported increased sales - but Ebay works on a concept that if a seller's items are selling - they get a push in visibility and since I just got back from vacation 1 1/2 weeks ago and hadn't had sales in 10 days due to the store being on vacation - I haven't had sales for that boost.

[tiramisu41]

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@ymeagainlord wrote:

For the first time in a LONG time only 1 sale yesterday.

Possible fallout from no longer being TRS+ and refusing to offer Free returns or just coincidence?

Only time will tell.

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@ymeagainlord, I'm not sure that's what's causing extremely low sales for a lot of sellers.  The last time I had good sales was the end of March which was way before any of these latest shenanigans began.

In April, I would often have six packages going out on Mondays from Thursday-Sunday nights sales compared to 10-12 in March.  In May, I had only 14 sales all month.  So far this month, I've had absolutely none. 

In the past, when things would slow down I have this one small vintage novelty item that I always list just to test the waters and/or possibly get the "sales machine" rolling again.  Usually, this item either sells within hours for its BIN price or I will get at least one bid that often ends up turning into a mini bidding war by auction's end.

The item has been up for two days.  Not one view, bid, or watcher.  Believe me, that *is not* normal.  So yes, I agree.  Something definitely is going on.    And the today I get the following email from eBay:

Mind you, I have more than 200 active listings up right now, and I've been adding anywhere from five to 10 listings each day this week, yet this message sounds like it's targeted for sellers who haven't jumped on the eBay seller wagon yet and have no clue how to get started.

I'm sure piling GD and Free Returns on top of whatever else has been going on isn't helping no matter how many coupons eBay throws at people or how much they urge sellers to cross-promote their stuff on social media (as you note they are advocating via the email above).  As some of my friends back in my college days used to say:  "The place is dead and all messed up."     Lovely.

[castlemagicmemories]

I've often said that many buyers just don't care about TRS, they feel it means nothing.

[missjen831]

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@ymeagainlord wrote:
Tbh, I rarely HAVE any returns, but I just can't wrap my head around a company that on the one hand encourages returns while on the other penalising sellers for their return rates. Especially when said company does everything to shove "return this item" in the buyer's face.

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I agree. And something just occurred to me. Someone else said this was nothing but a big money grab for eBay. I am wondering if that is true....if they are making money off sellers who pay for return shipping. See.....eBay insists they’ve negotiated special rates with USPS. If that’s true, eBay is not sharing their discounted rate with sellers. So.....it seems to me that it’s entirely possible that ebays return labels that the seller pays for, are costing eBay less than what they are actually charging the seller. Or maybe I’m losing my marbles here? I mean eBay tells the seller the cost of the return label....but is that really what USPS is charging eBay?

[ersatz_sobriquet]

General reply-my sales are just fine. 

I am not offering free returns, I gave up TRS+, whenever I could switch from 30 day to 14 day remorse returns I did, and I opted out of guarantteed delivery, most of my listings have 4 days handling time, and my sales picked up since I made these changes.

Go figure. 

[ymeagainlord]

Apparently we can only use 14 day free returns in certain categories, yet it's still letting my relists with 14 day returns buyer pays go through with a warning.

Makes me wonder if I should change them to 30 days buyer pays as I rarely get returns anyway.

[dadsfloridatreasure]

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@keziak wrote:

Anyone remember the days before PP? And all those stacks of checks and money orders to take to the bank. Cash, too!

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Yes, Keziak!  I certainly remember those glory days!  I used to keep stacks of ATM deposit envelopes in my car, along with a FOR DEPOSIT ONLY rubber stamp!  Around the year 2000, I was doing eBay part time nearly making as much money as my full-time 9-5 job!  Every noon lunch hour break I went to the local Post Office to check my PO Box for incoming eBay payments and to drop off and pay for postage for the cleared checks, cash and money order payments from before!  I was cashing 10-15 eBay payments daily!

[calntom]

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@reallyhardtofind wrote:

I found this picture on another post, free returns is just asking for trouble regardless if ebay monitors the kinds of buyers. I mean come on seriously these excuses!!!

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I had to fill out one of those yesterday for a widget I bought to aim my digital TV antenna with. Perfect piece of absolute junk. Was supposed to be coming from a seller located here in the states but the return address in the message was from the far far far east, lmao.

As far as sales, things have been slow for 3 solid weeks. I think I am opted into everything you can opt into. Though I have not been listing daily and I did take a 3-day vacation a couple of weeks ago. I don't think that taking the store offline helped matters. I have been working other projects  around the house....

I have also started a restructuring of all pricing as to use Markdown Manager less going forward this year. Going back to the basics, so to speak as I believe, price is king. TRS+ will win one here and there on closely priced items but price rules most of the time, imo.  I have my work cut out for about another 1000 listings left to reprice.

I will share that I used MM effectively over the last 10 months. There was something about 30%, 33% or 35% off that triggered sales, even though a lot of the time with the "percentage off" of items I was running, actually put me in the ballpark with competitors.  

[papermoneyforme]

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@ymeagainlord wrote:

For the first time in a LONG time only 1 sale yesterday.

Possible fallout from no longer being TRS+ and refusing to offer Free returns or just coincidence?

Only time will tell.

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It's tough to keep a store when sales are the pits!

It's tough to keep on listing if you have to pay to list when sales are the pits.

It's tough to be motivated when sales are the pits.

When sales are the pits, you buy way less, if anything.

When sales are the pits and you are not buying anything, you leave Ebay.

Another seller goes poof, another buyer goes poof, and Ebay could care less!

[ymeagainlord]

True that about not buying. I have a few things on my want list right now but won't buy them unless I get the sales to cover the purchase prices.

[ersatz_sobriquet]

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@ymeagainlord wrote:
Apparently we can only use 14 day free returns in certain categories, yet it's still letting my relists with 14 day returns buyer pays go through with a warning.

Makes me wonder if I should change them to 30 days buyer pays as I rarely get returns anyway.

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I would check that the listings are category compliant because the others may drop off into the ebay abyss..

[ymeagainlord]

You would think if they are no longer allowing 14 day buyer pays returns they would just change them to 30 days. Lord knows they're willing enough to change other stuff on listings.