Many Ebayers are Complaining about the lack of sales

[jersey..authentix]

I can open these discussion forums and find Many Ebayers are Complaining about the lack of sales. You can put me on that list. 

So I am just posting my reason for one possibility. Wrong or right.

Ebay is a dinosaur. There are a lot of fresh faces now in the online sales arena. 

Ebay doesn't stay current. They lack any effort to remind people that they are still around. I live in Canada, and I can not remember the last time I have seen any advertising. I hear they had a disastrous Comercial in the US that they had to pull due the flack they received. Goodgoing Ebay

You look at Amazon and Wayfair. They advertise the heck out of their site. Where would you go to do your online shopping? A Place that tells you every day "hear I am", or to a site where the only time you hear the word Ebay is in a Joke. Whats really bad is lately you dont even hear that much of the jokes anymore. Ebay is getting lost and forgotten.Ebay needs to pickup there sox and get the word out. Not just collect the fees.

[trustedbasset]

I compare the posts here regarding slow or no sales to a mouse in the house.
If you see one mouse there are many more you don’t see. In this case the Slow sales posts are like that one mouse. One poster claims slow sales how many are not posting here that are experiencing the same thing? Or, where there’s smoke there’s fire!

[Anonymous]

I would just like to say, As A Buyer on here for over 13 years. This site is falling apart.. I have a hard time finding what I am looking for and I shop a lot... I look for is used, vintage, and hard-to-find items . Its what brought me here and also why I sell here , I sell My used items I no longer need to buy other items I do..

I have bought clothes, Collector items,House hold items, Rugs, Bedding, Shoes, And every computer we have owned for over 10 years came from Ebay, I also have sold every old computer , and items we no longer needed.... But shopping now is a joke, When i do find items we want, So many Sellers are shipping Media mail that shouldn't be, I have had a lot of sellers charge Priority , then ship economy,  Buy an item and then find out it was dropped shipped from amazon( I do not shop on amazon) Or from China with a smell that just wont go away....

  I know a lot of great sellers that have left Ebay.. A lot. So you can sugar coat it as Change with the time, But The Change Ebay is making and all the Glitches Is not a change for the better......

 I went from Power seller Trs for a very long time with out even trying to,  maybe 1 sale  every 20 days No longer a power seller or Trs. this all happened in one months time with ebay changes.. glitches, Messed up searches...

[joesoucie22012]

I saw a new ad a few times for eBay last nite where the customers in a store were laughing at store prices and then checking eBay. So eBay is advertising, at least for clothing.....

[doubledz-a2z]

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@cashvaluerecovery2011 wrote:
While this isnt wrong its not complete. Ive watched 100s of old sellers like myself close shop this year on this forum.

Ive been here 20 years. 

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I have been selling too since Feb 1998.  When I first started there were less than 200,000 items listed and not many other internet options.   Folks know about Ebay.  Advertising IMO is not the issue.   Folks not having lots of disposable income coupled with the boom in sellers and places to sell has created the dinosaur.   The world shifted to tech gadgets and those cost money for service.  Folks stream movies, podcasts etc where once we watched VHS tapes.   Folks started to sell on Ebay then had to get a store and list hundreds and thousands of items.   The site is clogged with stuff I can get locally.   Baby boomers are retiring and sadly passing away.  No one collects anymore so their stuff is worthless.   Cash is King.   Young people are back to shopping by touch and feel aka Brick Stores.    Lots of changes in lifestyle as everyone seems to be a seller.  CL, FB porch pickup there are so many other options.  Sellers would do better if they got rid of their glut afterall there are only so many first pages to be seen on.  

[csbbct]

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@joesoucie22012 wrote:

I saw a new ad a few times for eBay last nite where the customers in a store were laughing at store prices and then checking eBay. So eBay is advertising, at least for clothing.....

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Where are the ads that promote eBay as the site that made them a household name to begin with - used, vintage, antique, and hard-to-find items?  eBay lost their way when they tried to focus instead on carrying NIB items that thousands of other sites carry.  It's fine to offer those options also, but they abandoned the business that they were built on.  And, with endless glitches in their system and poor search engines, they have now become a very poor imitation of every other site on the internet instead of the leader and the very best in the unique site they were at one time.  I worry now they have lost too many good sellers and buyers over these last several years who may never return to eBay.

[coolections]

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@poke_magz wrote:

I'm getting tons of sales, the problem I have is eBay brands themselves as a bargain site so it's hard to sell anything remotely close to it's actual value for new products.

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That is what Ebay started out to be and most every buyer in the world still thinks Ebay is.  Sellers like the OP trying to get retail prices wont see many items sold no matter what they do.

[csbbct]

Yes, I agree this must be very difficult place for sellers trying to sell new items unless their prices, including shipping costs, are lower than everyone else including every brick-and-mortar stores.

I started selling in 1998 soon after eBay started and at that time they did not promote themselves to be a bargain site for new products.  They advertised to be a vintage, antique, collectible, hard-to-find and used item auction site.  Rarely were new items sold here in the beginning.  There were no Buy it Now listings, only auctions.  You had to pay for every listing and the fees were based on the price you started for the auction - the lower the starting price the lower your insertion fees, so it encouraged sellers to start low and buyers had the potential for getting a great bargain.  Over the years, eBay changed their focus and preferred to promote new Buy it Now items at a bargain, but not in the very beginning.  

[luckythewinner]

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@csbbct wrote
A billion dollars difference is a lot of money!  Sometimes we forget how much a billion of something really is.  It's always put into perspective for me when I compare it to seconds of time.  A million seconds is eleven and a half DAYS.  A billion seconds is thirty-one and a half YEARS!

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And sometime we forget that raw numbers can be misleading when put in an irrelevant context.

The sensible context for understanding the drop in eBay's gross merchandise volume is to compare it to eBay's total gross merchandise volume ... which amounts to 4.4%.

[luckythewinner]

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@trustedbasset wrote:
I compare the posts here regarding slow or no sales to a mouse in the house.
If you see one mouse there are many more you don’t see. In this case the Slow sales posts are like that one mouse. One poster claims slow sales how many are not posting here that are experiencing the same thing? Or, where there’s smoke there’s fire!

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Does that same argument hold up when you see a post form someone like me who says their sales are holding up just fine? 

Someone who has no problem with sales, and thus has absolutely no reason to come to this board and complain?

Are there many more that you don't see? 

[monstertoybox]

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@luckythewinner wrote:

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@trustedbasset wrote:
I compare the posts here regarding slow or no sales to a mouse in the house.
If you see one mouse there are many more you don’t see. In this case the Slow sales posts are like that one mouse. One poster claims slow sales how many are not posting here that are experiencing the same thing? Or, where there’s smoke there’s fire!

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Does that same argument hold up when you see a post form someone like me who says their sales are holding up just fine? 

Someone who has no problem with sales, and thus has absolutely no reason to come to this board and complain?

Are there many more that you don't see? 

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I know this is your posting ID, but are we able to see your sales ID? I would love to see what it takes to have great sales on Ebay now-a-days. You can private message it, if you don't want to post it on the board.

[divwido]

It's too late. sellers are moving on. Saying you sell on eBay isn't met with Really? Is it hard to do?

It is met with a face of pitty.

[divwido]

Unless there is a major change, and I'm not sure that would help, the best option you have is to look around.  I'm on three sites now and happy where I am.  But I understand that this takes tons of inventory to do, but I have that times two.  If I'm honest-maybe three.

Don't waste time hoping.  Look around, see what might work.

Yes, eBay shot themselves in the foot making this an online garage sale. 

[north40sales]

Also lost in the mix is how many sellers was that billion loss spread over? How many are still active on eBay at lower sales volume. eBay's entire business model is dependent on sellers using the site to offer items and make sales that generate ALL the fees that pays ALL of eBay's bills...from their electric bill all the way to management bonuses. eBay sells nothing, the only "Product" they have is the website and that is sold as a service to the sellers.

[uncseniorsportsfan]

Yes, eBay shot themselves in the foot making this an online garage sale. 

Actually, I view it  as just the opposite - eBay shot themselves in the foot when they stopped being an online attic and garage sale and decided to compete with Amazon in the new merchandise market.  

[this*old*attic]

Well, I use my real ID and my sales are fine. Very consistent, too.

That's important to consider when you realize I struggle to get more than 20 or so items up at any given time, and I've only added items 4-5 times in nearly 2 years (long time seller but took a 5 year break).

That doesn't mean the site hasn't changed. I used to basically have a 100% sell through over the course of a month, if you count items I stuck in my store (which cost 5 cents to list and weren't even in search back then) when they didn't sell at auction. 

Sales are much slower now, and items need to be more desirable than they used to be. Ordinary used to sell (I think because people didn't realize they were common when the site was new) but not so much now. Fees were also low enough that you could make a profit on a $14.99 item.

On the other hand, my average sale price has more then doubled. I used to "plan" how to list items at $34.99 instead of $24.99....... now my average price is somewhere around $60-70.

Selling is super fast and easy, too, with the phone app. I used to spend WHOLE WEEKENDS editing pictures and writing code and creating dramatic text for my listings and fiddling in general. Now I can list a batch of items in 2-3 hours.

So..... Ebay is different but by no means dead or ruined yet (although search IS seriously broken).