General Question, selling across multiple platforms

[aspme]

Not here to Dump on Ebay, they have worked very well for me over the years. and I will continue to sell here. Nor am I looking to discuss any Specific  competitive selling venues.  But I am looking to possibly expand my Horizons, and use a couple different venues.  I know many of you sell on multiple sites.  

the majority of my inventory are single items,  some in small quantities  4-5, very rare I have anything 10 or more. and nothing I have a constant source for restocking. when its gone, it's gone.

Questions, Do you have the same inventory listed on multiple sites, and just cancel the others when the item sells? (Seems risky)    have certain inventory on one site, and different inventory on another?   or things you have in Qty.  list 5 on one site and 5 on the other?

Any Blunders/Mistakes you've made that I can try to avoid?         THX

[johnson_junk_company]

Most people do cross list the same items to multiple platforms. It is risky because there is always the possibility an item will sell on two platforms close together. This is especially true for high demand items. Cross listing manually is time consuming, listing tools are available but that is just more expense. Especially when starting out with expanding your business, I found selling specific items on specific platforms way easier to manage. 

[chapeau-noir]

I cross list some things, and tailor the other listings to the site I'm listing on (younger demographics and vintage on Posh, general items on eBay, clearance on Mercari and I used to sell on Etsy but no longer - that was vintage, of course).  The cross listed items are the slower sellers.

You have to stay on top of anything you cross list.

I don't find cross-listing to be particularly time consuming - the photos are taken and description is written and it's just c/p, but I'm really small time. It's not as quick, of course, as having a multi-channel app like Sixbit to do it, though, so if you have a lot of listings or are in a time crunch, that's an option. I'm too small time for any of that so I do it manually.

ETA: What can be time consuming is listing on social media sites like Posh - that's some digging in hard ground due to sharing, etc., so you want to be selective when it comes to sites. eBay is still the best all around in general.

[duffy4444]

   For many years I sold the same items on both eBay and Amazon. I stopped last year when my Amazon sales went into the tank and I deleted my Amazon account...

   The problem I also had was keeping track of having to delete the item on the other venue when it sold. I neglected to do it a handful of times, and had to take an out of stock demerit on either site. I now have no out of stock demerits, I have extra time to devote to eBay sales only, and I don't have to rely on either my memory or a listing of multiple platforms (except for my new use of Etsy with new multiple-platform procedures).

   You MUST stay on top of things in order to avoid the gotchas, if you're listing the same items on multiple platforms, especially if you have many hundreds of listings like I have..

Cheers, Duffy 

[tobaccocardyahoo · Accepted solution]

Listing items on multiple sites simultaneously is a high risk strategy as @chapeau-noir points out.

But you have another issue to deal with. Although Ebay provides New (Other) condition for New Old Stock, other sites like Amazon do not recognize NOS. This creates another issue for you to deal with. To be NEW on Amazon an item must have the full manufacturer's warranty and it must be valid on purchased from you.

Amazon also has its own fitment guide which your listings must integrate with.

It can be good business, if you are feeling an unmet demand, but can be a lot of wasted effort if your parts are in oversupply like most items which are listed on Amazon.

Amazon is also exceptional strict on the use of trademarks in their listings, and your listings can be taken down if they view your product name or description to be a potential IP infringement. No manufacturer's complaint need have occurred for them to accuse you of a violation - its done by bot.

You cannot assume your Ebay listings will pass muster on Amazon.

Returns policies also differ, and auto parts sellers complain of high return rates with a lot a justification.

This is not a simple decision, and the tradeoffs differ from many other types of product.

Think hard, and good luck

[profitweb]

I list on both eBay and AMZ but do not crosslist.  The item goes on one platform or the other, depending on which will get more for it.

It keeps it simple.  I've only been doing it for 2 months and my AMZ stuff goes to FBA, so they store and handle everything (very cheap service, excited).

[coastaltechsolution]

While there are negatives and positives with selling across multiple platforms, as has been discussed here already, one thing to think about is if you rely solely on one platform (putting your eggs in one basket) what if one day suddenly you are suspended and locked out, get a life time ban or any other thing that might disrupt your livelihood (not saying you ever would), you would still have X amount of other venues to hopefully make sales.

Just food for thought 😁   

[soh.maryl]

How do you know that most people do cross list the same items to multiple platforms?

[dbfolks166mt]

     I cross list across several venues and platforms and will often list the same item on multiple sites. First I use only the auction format on eBay and most of the other sites I list on do not have an auction capability. It takes some monitoring but as soon as I get a bit on the eBay listing I remove it from the other sites none of which have any kind of cancelation penalty.

     If it sells on one of the other sites I simply end the eBay auction, no harm, no foul, I have only missed a couple of times with not catching a bid on the eBay item and a buyer on another site making a purchase. I preserved the eBay bid and sale but had to cancel one of the orders on another site but was able to find a duplicate item and fill the order on the other site as well as the eBay auction order. Several venues I utilize are local forums and the potential buyer will usually ask if I still have the item and it is fairly easy to simply respond the item just sold, which in essence it did, and then delete the item. With the rising cost of shipping local forums have become my major outlet. Most of them have very low or no fees and there is seldom any shipping involved and very low return risk. 

     I am not a major seller and I am not sure I would cross list if I had 1,000's of items but I may divide the listings up across multiple platforms/venues. There are of course a LOT of items that I cannot or will not list on eBay for a number of reasons. Either they are banned or prohibited, monitored by VERO, to expensive to take the risk or too large to viably qualify to ship. 

[iamalwaysright]

I only cross list for items that I know that have a quantity high enough to handle the loads regardless if they sell fast or not. As time goes on you'll get a little better with your moves, but it'll never pan out so you have a buffer to account for that. All the other stuff I just solely leave in ebay.

[bashort]

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@aspme wrote:

Not here to Dump on Ebay, they have worked very well for me over the years. and I will continue to sell here. Nor am I looking to discuss any Specific  competitive selling venues.  But I am looking to possibly expand my Horizons, and use a couple different venues.  I know many of you sell on multiple sites.  

the majority of my inventory are single items,  some in small quantities  4-5, very rare I have anything 10 or more. and nothing I have a constant source for restocking. when its gone, it's gone.

Questions, Do you have the same inventory listed on multiple sites, and just cancel the others when the item sells? (Seems risky)    have certain inventory on one site, and different inventory on another?   or things you have in Qty.  list 5 on one site and 5 on the other?

Any Blunders/Mistakes you've made that I can try to avoid?         THX

---

We used to also sell certain repeatables on Amazon also, the way that we did it was say buy 20 widgets, list 10 on ebay and 10 on Amazon then periodically  readjust the inventory between the two sites as needed, the key is never list more in total than you have, we have had on more than one occasion where a the same buyer bought all our stock on one site and some from another site to get the qty that they wanted

[ebeths_eclectic_collectibles]

It is easy to cross list in multiple sites and not that hard to monitor and maintain since everything since everything can on my phone.  Of course never cross list any item that you have listed as an auction. 

I would recommend you tailor the prices to each venue based on their fees and shipping policies

[aspme]

 Thank You all!   Great input and much appreciated, I don't think anything can beat Ebay Motors for the majority of the items I sell. and I don't think Amazon would be a good fit for my type of selling.   I may still test the waters on other sites, with different Merch. but will go slow and heed the advice you all offered!    THX

[quicksilverdiecast]

I would discourage selling the same item that you may only have one of on multiple sites, it will make you crazy trying to sort things out, take a certain block of items and list on one site only, and build from there and see which site developes into the best sales and less headaches.

[pinkbarbie50]

Thanks for this. I spend hours and hours finding a unique item to buy, communicate with buyer about an item and while they are accepting my offer, it is being sold on another platform. Had I known it was being cross-listed, I could have not reached out to the buyer for any questions and just bought it essentially beating out the other buyer, if PayPal or whatever method decided to process faster.  It makes sense that a seller would want to go with the platform who has the least fees, essentially the most profit. But a seller can't be in two places at one time even if their item can. It's impossible to communicate fairly IRL with more than one buyer as sales are happening AND remove your listings as they are sold. In addition, both buyers funds are then tied up because even if you cancel only one buyer, their payment already went through and it takes several days to get it back. If you are in person, typically, whomever picks up the tangible item gets it first no matter how long they choose to carry it; they can even put it back at the end. If a buyer buys on many platforms for certain items (i.e. collection of vases), it is very easy to find the item, user names, etc because the lusting details are the same. If you are selling multiples of the same item or an item that can easily be purchased elsewhere, it doesn't seem like a problem. But if I buy a completely unique item and  I am IN COMMUNICATION about the item and another buyer on a different platform buys it, I do not expect to have offer accepted and then canceled within 60 seconds. That is how much time we are talking because you can check that, too, as to the sale times. I also haven't found a seller who is up 24/7 and responds immediately because they usually have a life. Don't we all. So I am now at the mercy of several nationwide timezones, if and when a seller responds (some don't respond even after you buy much less before) and the human nature of how people read their messages (most recent on top, so the buyer that communicates FIRST usually had their messages read LAST). Add in the sellers on a certain platform that insist you MUST contact them to confirm the item is still available and the sellers on another platform that are allowed to stay on or not reply for months even years, it's not a very good process. Most buyers and sellers are not going to know how things work for each other unless they talk about it or they buy and sell which is rare. Add in that sellers have to manually remove their listings once they've sold and people can STILL buy the item during however long that takes- could be seconds, minutes, hours, days, a weekend! Buyers are also at the mercy of sellers then choosing one buyer over another with no equality enforced; you can cancel the seller you want to and they wouldn't even know. But I do. And I did. The cross-selling would be great, if it has some transparent checkpoints in place. For example, if I knew a buyer was getting charged less fee on one platform, I would want to match that purchase price so they get the same final value/fee. But that's not how it works. If you think these platforms are interested in helping you, the seller, get more sales, think again. It's for them. Otherwise they'd have it where your listings would come down immediately once sold so that you could not have a buyer at the same time. Who's the one who has to cancel a buyer? YOU And who takes the hit? YOU Plus negative reviews or feedback? YOU Who has to deal with removing the listing? YOU 

And who doesn't get your item? Me (possibly) An immediate payer with no cancellations and 100% seller or buyer feedback,reviews, and ratings. But I do get to have my money taken so I can't look for another buyer or item where the same thing might happen all over again, especially if they've cross-listed too! I can see things from both perspectives and I would not cross-list the same exact item because of it. Because not only do I have to compete with bots, resellers, snipers, scammers and fraudsters, but now I get to compete with an ambiguous set of non-rules in the wild West of all things internet cross-selling retail (see above) YAY! 

And that ain't fair.

Life's not fair, you say? I know that. It doesn't make it right, though. Put yourself in someone's shoes. If you are in a buyer vs seller mentality, you're a fool. Things aren't swayed one way over the other.  Oh, wait a minute, they actually are...towards the platforms themselves! 

All it takes is one horrible experience to turn off a buyer, only you won't know if it's a good or repeat one that got away. If your dealings are more troublesome or you feel bad about the repercussions of cross-selling remember life's not fair. And while you may think you are increasing your sales, the platforms won't tell you quantifyingly how many sales you are actually losing. But I will.

Because there's no algorithm or AI for that. 

Sorry for the rant, but "playin' with my money is like playin' with my emotions" and I'm sure we can all relate to that.