Help! Nothing I have up is selling!!

[thefieryfairy]

So, this year I decided to reopen shop after Ebay wiped all of my listings from 2018 that had ended. Now, I sell use sheet music and books. I am NOT an expert seller and just a beginner. But I've had this Ebay account for 16 months and only sold maybe 5 or 6 items? This year, 0 items? And I know I'm not perfect at this, but it seems so slow and I have many items at a base price where with fees, I would make almost nothing if I went lower. 

I donno if it's me, but nothing's selling and I am up to 'here' with it.

Help me, please!!

Thanks.

[membersinceaug2001]

I think it's about the same for a lot of us.  Sell-thru is about .25%.

Really good stuff will sell quickly, good stuff takes forever now.

[thefieryfairy]

So, it's not just me? I'm not just sitting here with 25+ listings looking like an ebay failure? I don't have that much space to store things I thrift for, so i've been WAITING for MONTHS until I got wiped to sell it all before buying new. But NOTHING has moved. I've had 3 watchers on 1 item FOREVER and none of them are buying something for $15.99 with FREE SHIPPING. Sorry if this a little ranty, I am just so HAPPY it's not JUST ME. I'm NOT insane here.

[thefieryfairy]

Oops. Pressed post twice.

[fashunu4eeuh]

Hi Fiery, welcome to the boards. Not as many people are around this time of night so don’t be discouraged by the few responses so far. More will see your post in the morning.

Sorry you are not seeing sales. To really offer you some good advice, i will want to spend a little more time looking over your listings. But i did have some thoughts on first glance.

First, i would reevaluate what you are selling. While it has been slow on eBay for some, many sellers are doing well. My sell-thru right now is about 60% or better. So the buyers are out there.

When you researched your items to see if they were suitable to sell here, what did you find? Are other sellers’ same items selling? At what price points? Do you keep up with the competition? If they are not moving, it may be they’re just not the right items for this venue.

Rework your titles and include more keywords. For example, the word “book” needs to be in the title for your book items. Some of the listings i was not sure what the item was exactly. The Star Wars game—what is TCG? Also, remove punctuation from titles because it interferes with Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Google won’t include your listing on its platform if it can’t “read” the title. Read up on SEO to learn how to optimize your stuff.

I will spend a little more time looking at your listings to see if there is anything more to share. But hang in there! You can do this!

[robot-hands]

Sheet music, cookbooks and C list manga.

That's what clogs the shelves of every thrift shop.

Diversify and dump dead stock.

[jklfindings]

Pricing, and shipping costs are holding you back.  Just glanced at a few of the Manga you are selling, and your competition is much cheaper.  $8 shipping will turn a buyer away real quick.  Just take Dragon Knight Vol 5 for example.  You are asking $6.99 plus $8 shipping, so $14.99 total.  The last copy that actually sold went for $3.99 plus $2.75 shipping or $6.74 total.  If the rest of your listings are similar, you're just pricing yourself out of the market for the specific items you are selling.

[laurabeardsley]

Sales are VERY slow on this site if you are selling used, antique, collectible items because Google will not show anything on ebay unless it has a catalog number which used items do not. This is why you hear some people say they are doing well because they are selling new items with catalog numbers. Ebay is totally unorganized right now and the only hope is that the new management can straighten some of this out.

[luckythewinner]

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@thefieryfairy wrote:

Now I sell sheet music and books. I am NOT an expert seller and just a beginner.

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Sheet music and songbooks are a slow but steady seller for me - but generally in the $6 to $10 range, not the $15 to $30 range. I also find that stuff from the 1960s and 1970s sells much better than stuff from the 1980s and 1990s.

[mysalonsavings]

I think it is just no one is buying right now. I have taken almost all of Ebay suggestions (other then giving it away for free lol)

[mysalonsavings]

I have tried to get in items that Ebay thinks will move. They are sitting. It has to be the economy. I am thinking we are all pretty much in this same boat. Hopefully it will pick up soon. 😊

[southern*sweet*tea]

Books and sheet music are long tail items that can take A VERY LONG  time to sell. You're selling to a limited buyer base of people looking for wants, not needs.

For books to sell and be profitable they need to be out of print and/or collectible in some way and you need to be able to find them for free or less than 50 cents to a dollar each.  If it is or was a best seller within the past 30 years, you may be able to give it away for $3.98 with free shipping.  I do have a few pieces of music listed, and I have sold a very few pieces of music over the past few months. It has to be - again - out of print and/or collectible in some way.

[sharingtheland]

Google will not show anything on ebay unless it has a catalog number which used items do not.

False.  

[around-the-block]

Welcome to ebay. The sellers outnumber the buyers about 10 to 1 here with more sellers coming and more buyers leaving every day. Ebay is dying

[juststuffisell]

Yep - it's a slow train so far this year for may sellers. I find that interesting about eBay & google.

My bonanza store used to show in google - though I don't list there anymore - was to much hassle to manage. I have inventory from another website that shows on Google all day. I think I have seen only one of my items listed on eBay showing up in google shopping this year so far....but I don't do a lot of searches for my stuff - I just run into it when researching other stuff 🙂

Cheers