eBay

tomorrow_landtoys · ‎06-04-2017

What is going on!!

We had a great first few months of the year. But starting May 1 our sales just died!! The first two weeks were pretty slow. The third week was awful. Like dead in the water! Last week wasn't really much better. I've talked to a few other eBay sellers and it seem like the ones in my local area are in the same boat. I plan on sitting down today and looking at some listings that should've sold quickly and they did not. And doing a comparison between TY vs. LY sales. We sell mainly toys. Didn't know if it was just the toy industry part or eBay sells as a whole.

aurora777_58 · ‎06-05-2017

Same here. But this has been ongoing now. If you ask, they'll tell you it's competition or your tags. Impossible. The tags worked last year. And while the competition might sell my basic colors, I've kept my prices low and I mix colors nobody else has, so it's not competition either. It's the search engine. Someone has messed up the algorithm of the search engine.
I have had 1 sale in a month. I used to have several a day. Unreal. No way to pay bills like this.

aurora777_58 · ‎06-05-2017

@cal_w62 wrote:
Maybe you need to reduce the prices on a few items, I do that when things are slow, people are really being tight with money now days.

Tight on money? They are out buying and paying retail prices in the retail stores, but they come here to squabble about our prices! In my other account, something that's listed for $79, which is already discounted from brick and mortar prices, they want to pay $25! And I have it listed with FREE shipping! So that customer wanted me to knock off over 2/3 of the price and still pay for shipping too. I countered at $65. Of course they didn't want it with a $15 discount and free shipping. They wanted it practically free with free shipping.
I have new merchandise there; the same kind of "new" as any brick and mortar store out there, so why should I sell mine at bargain basement prices when they'll pay twice my listed price in a brick and mortar store? It's the same merchandise.

aurora777_58 · ‎06-05-2017

I meant all the years before, not just last year. I've been here since 2001. Never had this kind of drop into a black hole.

keziak · ‎06-05-2017

@kyal wrote:
My sales for 2017 have been the best they've ever been. I've had to work harder, pick more unique stuff, list more and live with a lower sell-through rate. But sales have been up.

May was my best month since 12/15 with one exception, May 2016 when I sold a lot of expensive collectible books. May was better than both 11/16 and 12/16. What I've done different is really push auctions hard. Mostly book lots and media. Some have sold immediately after I roll the unsold listings into my store (I am guessing people interested in the items but not in auctions).

Right now I have a bunch of auctions with no bids but I'm hoping some will sell in the end. Sales of my fixed price books have been so-so.

dknight027 · ‎06-05-2017

100 sales in 90 days with a $2.95 sale counting as an example sale? If you were to give a full account of just how much you are making as an eBay seller I think you would only be suppporting the argument of the op. From where I sit that is what it looks like to me - but I would be happy to be proved wrong.

dknight027 · ‎06-05-2017

I'm not sure about the google argument - I did a google search for " Mikasa Chapelle " knowing that it was a somewhat hard to find stainless flatware pattern that I recently listed. The google search brought up the listings front and center. Not saying that is proof of anything, but my experience at this time might not supported the google search argument proposed here at this time.

aurora777_58 · ‎06-05-2017

My past experience with auctions.... waste of time and money.
Every item I ever put on an auction went for exactly what I started it for. Ebay says, start at .99 and attract more buyers. Bologna. Attract more cheapskates. Unless it's something collectible, auctions aren't for the average merchandise.

aurora777_58 · ‎06-05-2017

@haute_again wrote:
@tomorrow_landtoys wrote:
What is going on!!
We had a great first few months of the year. But starting May 1 our sales just died!! The first two weeks were pretty slow. The third week was awful. Like dead in the water! Last week wasn't really much better. I've talked to a few other eBay sellers and it seem like the ones in my local area are in the same boat. I plan on sitting down today and looking at some listings that should've sold quickly and they did not. And doing a comparison between TY vs. LY sales. We sell mainly toys. Didn't know if it was just the toy industry part or eBay sells as a whole.
I was watching a documentary last night about investment corporations and how much effect they have on sites like eBay. For example, the #1 investment corporation who has interest (and #2 holder below Omidyar Pierre) is controlled by a Chinese business man. His name is nowhere but he seems to be everywhere and has his hands in quite a few areas of interest that affect those of us with no voice. He seems to make alot of decisions on sites like ebay, where we have come to depend on for our survival but stand no chance.

I don't know what the policy is about linking things like that but I found it on Youtube.

Yes, and just look around at all the sites that are overcrowded with Chinese sellers these days! Hundreds of thousands of feedback....many negative, yet they keep selling. Has anyone else heard that our government helps them with shipping and that's why they can offer free? Yet it costs us $15 and up for anything above the weight of a pound to ship around America, let alone other countries.

America has been screwing Americans for quite a few years now, just under the radar instead of out in the open as they do now. The Chinese saturated market is just another nail in the coffins of Americans looking to survive.

zinda2010 · ‎06-05-2017

exactly what I've been saying for the last year. Waste of time plus even though I have a store I'm being billed to sell as an auction!

mam98031 · ‎06-05-2017

@zinda2010 wrote:
exactly what I've been saying for the last year. Waste of time plus even though I have a store I'm being billed to sell as an auction!

Of course you are. Why would they not charge you for running an auction, unless you run one in the specific categories that Ebay does provide some free auction listings? I tried to explain this to you on another thread that you were the OP of. You have some clear misunderstandings of how a few things work on Ebay. With a better understanding of how it works, the better your little business might do because you are making decisions with bad information or assumptions that are not correct.

http://community.ebay.com/t5/Selling/1st-Invoice-after-changes-and-I-paid-19-in-eBay-seller-fees/m-p...

The last post on the above thread may help. At least that was my intention.

mam98031 • Volunteer Community Member • Buyer/Seller since 1999

zinda2010 · ‎06-05-2017

If I get 2 sellers who are unhappy my account is restricted, plus neither one of those buyers is being truthful, they most likely were confronted by me while they were caught lying about an item that they were trying to return and make me pay for their mistakes.

So it's OK to anger thousands of buyer each month because you sell cheap junk in huge quantities, but it's not OK to have 2 liars caught in their plans to defraud me per year?! Plus when I tried to report them to ebay I got a defect for it?!

What you are seeing now is the final step in eBay's overall plan to finally squeeze out the little sellers. Notice how there's no complaints from large sellers? This has been ongoing for years, eBay has special plans for large sellers and big box stores. Those same rules we follow do not apply to them.

They know that high volume sales sellers are less likely to ne wasting ebays resources making calls "to find out what's going on" or even bother to challenge a fraudulent buyer, or to call after a case is closed to find out what happened. It's these reasons why eBay has decided to get rid of those small sellers, we cost ebay more than we are worth, (in their eyes) but never realizing that without those small sellers there will be no reason for buyers to even bother to come here in the first place.
Since many sales are made by buyers who may be hunting for a very hard to find item and then impulse shop after they cannot locate what they were looking for or they were just checking prices. Once those buyers realize that they will not likely ever find anymore of those types of items here, they will seek out other sites that now will have those sellers, most likely those sellers will also be offering those items for much less since they are just getting started and the sites are far less greedy than abay.

It's just a matter of time before other lesser used sites become saturated with small ex ebay sellers, those same sellers that made ebay the go to place for weird and unusual items, basically the backbone of what made ebay popular, from beginning to present time this holds true.

It won't take long for buyers to notice that their chances of finding things like old lunchboxes and collectibles of all types are dwindling and will have few options to choose from. Then of course word gets around that others have found fantastic deals on other sites, that's when buyer tend to forget about the past, everybody loves to find deals and search new places, it may take some getting used too and trusting new platforms but I think it's already becoming much easier for buyers to trust buying from places outside ebay.

Since auctions are now irrelevant that closes the gap between ebay and all other privately sold used item selling sites. Since Paypal will still be the binding force for sales guarantees I don't see why buyers will be worried about making purchases elsewhere.

cal_w62 · ‎06-05-2017

Your Google search is showing an expired listing.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/43-Piece-Mikasa-CHAPELLE-Stainless-Flatware-Set-18-8-JAPAN-/121663885418

In addition eBay is spending cash on that search term because there was an ad at the top, so Google is throwing them a bone.

mam98031 · ‎06-05-2017

If I get 2 sellers who are unhappy my account is restricted, plus neither one of those buyers is being truthful, they most likely were confronted by me while they were caught lying about an item that they were trying to return and make me pay for their mistakes.

It takes more than 2 buyers to cause this to happen. Confronting a customer will rarely ever have a happy ending. These are business transactions NOT personal transactions. ALL communication with a customer should be polite and professional.

http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/seller-non-performance.html

So it's OK to anger thousands of buyer each month because you sell cheap junk in huge quantities, but it's not OK to have 2 liars caught in their plans to defraud me per year?! Plus when I tried to report them to ebay I got a defect for it?!
You did NOT get a "defect" for reporting a buyer for any reason. That just doesn't happen. There is NO defect a seller can get for reporting a buyer.

What you are seeing now is the final step in eBay's overall plan to finally squeeze out the little sellers.

There are millions of small sellers on Ebay.

Notice how there's no complaints from large sellers?

That is an assumption on your part. Large sellers rarely if ever come to the discussion boards. The sellers represented here are a fraction of a fraction of the active sellers on Ebay.

It's just a matter of time before other lesser used sites become saturated with small ex ebay sellers, those same sellers that made ebay the go to place for weird and unusual items, basically the backbone of what made ebay popular, from beginning to present time this holds true.

Many sellers have made such moves over the years. The problem is that many still have to sell here as well because they just don't get the traffic on those other sites to support what they need to make financially. However it can be beneficial for sellers to sell on multiple sites so that their eggs are in one basket so to speak. It is good advice, it just isn't new advice. There are many sellers here that have been selling on two or more sites for YEARS.

mam98031 • Volunteer Community Member • Buyer/Seller since 1999

keziak · ‎06-05-2017

@aurora777_58 wrote:
My past experience with auctions.... waste of time and money.
Every item I ever put on an auction went for exactly what I started it for. Ebay says, start at .99 and attract more buyers. Bologna. Attract more cheapskates. Unless it's something collectible, auctions aren't for the average merchandise.

One element of being collectible is being (fairly) unique. The auctions I run are for lots of books and media (not single items for the most part). Usually there are no identical auctions or fixed price listings. The trick is figuring out how many books to put into the lot.

As for selling for what it started for, why is this a problem if you are listing at the price you want to get? Then bidding up is gravy.

aurora777_58 · ‎06-05-2017

@keziak wrote:
@aurora777_58 wrote:
My past experience with auctions.... waste of time and money.
Every item I ever put on an auction went for exactly what I started it for. Ebay says, start at .99 and attract more buyers. Bologna. Attract more cheapskates. Unless it's something collectible, auctions aren't for the average merchandise.
One element of being collectible is being (fairly) unique. The auctions I run are for lots of books and media (not single items for the most part). Usually there are no identical auctions or fixed price listings. The trick is figuring out how many books to put into the lot.

As for selling for what it started for, why is this a problem if you are listing at the price you want to get? Then bidding up is gravy.

I think you missed what I was saying. First, I was agreeing that auctions are not for ordinary merchandise...that it was relatively a venue successful for collectibles and yes, the oddball item.
When I said my auctions went for what I put them up for...I meant if I listed it for the .99 eBay swears will bring more buyers, the final sale almost always ended for .99. Not the price I would have wanted. That happened twice. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. I learned and I haven't done an auction since then.