Hate to beat a dead horse but........

[caninekopz]

First time in YEARS that I have not had a sale in two consecutive days (other than being on vacation).  This is getting ridiculous.  I don't want to hear well your selling clothing or your prices are to high or any other baloney the Cheerleaders want to feed.  Fact is EBAY is falling way short of allowing my items to be viewed.  This is what I pay you for Ebay.......and I am not even talking about the other elephants in the room.  GET IT TOGETHER SOON, your costing me money.

[twk]

You are not alone.  Sales have been way down since mid-December.  The only thing we are getting is very low offers (and not on Best offer items) and people wanting free shipping. 

I think that that promoted item thing is hurting a lot of sellers.  I mean just how much extra can you afford to spend to sell an item after all the original costs unless you are a Big Seller.

Then there are the Buyer Protection Policy scammers...dealing with one of those now.  You know them, the ones that want to switch items, or buyers remorse but don't want to have to pay any shipping, to or from, to return item.

Grrr.

One thing I have noticed is that places like that big replacement place for china, etc. have higher prices on the items they have listed on ebay than the SAME item if you go to their site and purchase it.  Of course they do this to cover all the fees they incur but most buyers don't realize that.

Hubby and I have already started setting up garage to have a downsizing sale when the weather warms up.  We have quality items and figure while we may get less, it will break even after ebay and PayPal fees and no worry about SNAD.

[ericajones10]

I've only been re-selling since November, but I've noticed a serious decline in views and sales as well. I haven't sold an item in 10 days. Some days I used to have 4 sales in a single day and averaged about 10-20 sales on a good week. I've revised things, dropped prices, etc. Nothing seems to help. I completely feel your frustration. I'm just glad to see I'm not the only one experiencing problems. Thank you for sharing!

[laurabeardsley]

Over time sales have diminished, views are way down fees are way up, etc. Promotions were taken away, seller discounts were taken away, there is no more ring on your device when a sale is made and just more demands for less money slapped onto the sellers backs. What is next?

[orangehound]

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@caninekopz wrote:

Fact is EBAY is falling way short of allowing my items to be viewed.

---

Fact, speculation, or something else?

The "fact" that I've experienced is that every time I've noticed a period of slow to non-existent sales, and I've gone back and looked at the traffic views, I find that my items are being viewed, but are just not selling.   In other words, the poor sales are not due to a dearth of views, but rather the ebb and flow of commerce where some days all the viewers are just window shoppers.

This past week on one of our accounts, we had robust sales for 10 days in a row, and then a 36-48 hour period of silence on Feb 14-15 ... then BOOM ... robust sales again since Saturday evening.   I bet when the traffic is finally available to us, it will show views and traffic to be fluctuating in a normal range through all these days ... as it always has shown.

[axiombody]

Fact is my impressions 2 years ago was over seven million and now its at 1.5 million.  Loss of traffic and too much competition.  Selling clothing is the easiest thing to do on ebay, but it gets harder every year because there is new competition every day.  You can't increase buyers but the amount of clothing on Ebay increases exponentially.

[sweetpieces4you]

Well your selling clothing and Your prices are to high !! There I said it !! You are selling what thousands of other people are selling. So you blame ebay for your lack of sales. Who knows what will sell from one day to the next. Wish you all the luck !!

[rustedcrowandoakstudio]

I have been selling on ebay for a long time. This is seriously the worst Jan/Feb I've had since my first year when I was just starting out. Instead of running to the post everyday, I'm lucky to run twice a week. I have a theory, which has little to do with ebay (I am an artist, I have 4 different online shops). Prior to the recession, I sold jewelry here. And I could watch the news in the morning and tell you what kind of day I was going to have. Good financial news, good sales. Bad, bad sales. And while we are having financial positives in the news right now, we are also living in a world of uncertainty. Record breaking government shutdowns, to reopen only under the threat of another. That goes away, but now everyone is figuring out that the tax breaks from last year, don't translate to this year. And I honestly believe that has a lot to do with it.

On the ebay side of things, I feel like they make it harder and harder to be seen. Big business companies are also taking over here, so the regular people who were selling here, get lost in the shuffle. And can we say something about all the hoops they make us jump through? Free shipping (have ya'll seen how much postage has gone up?) 

I wonder where else we will get lost. 

[orangehound]

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@axiombody wrote:

Fact is my impressions 2 years ago was over seven million and now its at 1.5 million.  Loss of traffic and too much competition.  Selling clothing is the easiest thing to do on ebay, but it gets harder every year because there is new competition every day.  You can't increase buyers but the amount of clothing on Ebay increases exponentially.

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Yes, over time one's average impressions can change due to competition or a flooded marketplace ... in the case of clothing, I've observed that the volume of clothing listings has increased 4-fold over the last 3 years on eBay, but there has been only a slight increase in buying.

But the OP was talking about a sudden 48-hour sales drop.  I'm suggesting that this is not due to eBay somehow obscuring the OP's items, but that it is consistent with normal sales traffic.  More technically, such statistical lows (or highs) are predicted by a branch of mathematics called queuing theory.

[caninekopz]

Really....... I am not selling clothing......THAT IS MY POINT.....My actual clothing store is selling fine.  

Rich 

[caninekopz]

No Let me make this clear.  Orange we talk about this all the time.  

First I do not sell much clothing on this account.

Second, my sales have completely dropped off the charts over the last year, but I have never gone 2 days without at least 2 sales a day.  I usually post around 10 sales a day with some days dropping to 2-5 sales.  But lately it has been 1-2 sales and 

MY POINT OF THIS POST IS.......IT HAS BEEN YEARS SINCE I HAVE GONE 2 DAYS, 48 HOURS WITHOUT A SALE.

I sell all over the board so, yes, it could be the ebbs and flows of the season, but I feel like it is more that Ebay is throttling my sales.  And you may ask,  Why do I believe this.

Well first I look at my impressions and click throughs and see they are way down.  And I find it very funny that one of the things I sell is 5 gallon buck lids......yep kind of a goofy thing, but I sell them.  Well last week I sold 4 sets of 3 bucket lids to 4 different people in Texas..... I mean a lid here or there over the last year and then 4 separate sales to 4 different people in Texas in 2 days.   Sounds kind of fishy to me but that is what Ebay pushed in that area on those days.  I can site at least 10 different instances over the last 6 months of selling patterns like this.  Ebay pushes certain items by certain people in certain areas.  Don't ask me I don's make the rules and I don't call that normal, but what is normal on Ebay.

Rich  

[axiombody]

A person watching an item can send it ahead in the search so the fact that a person bought a lid and may have put it on his watch list can send the listing higher is results and can sell easier.  So many times a person will be haggling with me about an item and asking questions and the item sells to someone else because he put it on his watch list and it went higher up in the search. 

  I'm sorry to hear your sales are down most Ebay overall as far as over time i.e. monthly average are down from the previous year(I know a new seller or someone increasing their inventory can have a different story)I don't believe in any grand conspiracy theories, but I believe competition is greater each year on Ebay and throughout the internet.  This is my sole income and as far as accepting this fact of dwindling income it is hard to do because I can't lose much more business.  I've lost 40,000 in sales the last year compared to the previous and this is after an ongoing slowdown since the recession.  If a person at his job got a pay cut of about $1,500(my lost profit) a month  from the previous year how would he pay the bills he already has.  God is watching over me and I am surviving but this really is unnerving. 

[usmediamass]

@axiombody 

I sell clothing and ebay sales are down greater then 10% vs. last year.  That could be 10.01% or 99.99% ebay won't say on seller hub.

I have heard over and over about inventory increasing all the time on ebay however that is not true.

The clothing categories I have sold in for 7 years have been dropping for some time and so have the total sales.

THERE ARE LESS ITEMS FOR SALE THEN THERE WERE 12 MONTHS AGO.

Traffic equals sales and ebay's force sponsored listing are making buyer leave the site.

Sponsored listing take over 20% of the traffic away and it trumps the search, or is not what the buyer is searching for.  One out of every five items shown in not what the buyers want.  

I spent more on ebay two years ago but am over seeing the wrong size or type every time I shop. 

[johnrj1226]

Sure see a  lot of college jerseys from all over but a bunch from Tennessee.

Selling is like fishing or panning for  gold.  When  things   get slow you changes baits - color, type, etc  or you move  other products where there aren't so many fishermen or folks panning.

Sales activity goes up and down like a  yo-yo and  the ebbs and flows are  hard to predict.

eBay is no longer  the  top dog in the on- line selling game - more competition  plays hell with everyone's bottom line.  Even The little ole Dollar Tree and Dollar General  is taking a chunk out Big PaPa Wal-Mart check book.  The Big 3 auto companies ain't anymore.  In a nutshell time  changes everything + or -.

[caninekopz]

I get your point, but I will go back to my original post........which is......

Its been over 5 years since I did not sell anything for over 48 consecutive hours unless I was on vacation.

That is the main point and I am not real happy about it.  The jerseys you speak of are but 1% of the items I have for sale.  

More of the American people are back to work these days which I believe has lessened the sellers on Ebay and Amazon (as individual sellers), we sell there also.  This would lead one to believe that the competition here has actually decreased.  

I do believe that Ebay has lost share in the market for many reasons and yes one of those is competition.  However I feel that a lot of buyers feel frustrated over the lack of adequate search results and the whole experience here on Ebay.  I don't want to hear that it is because the sellers or buyers are shady because it is more like Ebay is wishy Washy about everything they do.  No confidence from either sellers or buyers.  As I have stated before, I used to come here for EVERYTHING.  Now not so much.

GOOD THING IS I HEARD AN EBAY COMMERCIAL TODAY ON MY LOCAL RADIO WHICH IS PROMISING BECAUSE I HAVE NOT HEARD ONE IN A WHILE.

Before I leave, I will say this.  One of our other accounts, which is made up of 90% new clothing with everything from high end to cheap stuff is up 250% over last year this time and is pushing over 10 to 20 sales a day.  So like I said before I do not want to hear that clothing is not selling......I know better.  And the account I am talking about is not selling anything, like the switch was just shut off.  No views and just not being seen...PERIOD. 

Thanks 

Rich