eBay

dhbookds · ‎03-01-2019

https://community.ebay.com/t5/2019-Early-Seller-Update/Update-on-Good-Til-Cancelled/m-p/29556571#M18...

MODS..........please leave this one on the selling board for a day or two, or at least the link to the page on the Special Board........

03-01-2019 06:26:16 PM

Hey eBay sellers, this is Harry, VP of Seller Experience at eBay. As you read in the 2019 Early Seller Update, we are moving all Fixed Price listings to Good ‘Til Cancelled (GTC). As a reminder, this change does not apply to auctions. We’re making this change because we have seen that GTC listings offer more sales opportunities than any other fixed price duration. Over time, GTC listings keep and grow watchers, sales history, and SEO authority as they maintain the same item ID and URL for the life of the listing. We believe all of the above improves the ability for buyers to discover items on eBay, which thereby improves the likelihood of a sale.

We’re aware of concerns some of you may have around managing GTC listings. Today in the Seller Hub Active listings page, you can see the start date of each of your listings. You can also sort by the start date to see, for example, your oldest listing at the top. With the start date, you can determine how long a listing has been active – but, currently, this requires you to do some math. By the end of March, we’ll do the math for you and will show you the number of days each listing has been active. Today, sellers can also sort active listings by end date or time left. For GTC listings, end date indicates the next date of renewal, and time left indicates the time left until renewal. Just as you do today, you can start, end, or relist your items at any time you choose.

All sellers may also take advantage of the out-of-stock feature, which allows you to effectively pause the availability of the item to buyers by setting the listing quantity to zero. This comes in handy if you want to keep all the benefits mentioned above (same item ID and URL, watchers, sales history and SEO benefits) while either your item is out-of-stock or you need a vacation. When you are ready to sell the item again, simply update the quantity back to a positive number. You can also use our bulk editing tools to update multiple listings at once.

We’re also aware of concerns about the 30 day auto-renewal period not syncing with monthly billing cycles. We’re looking into this. Thank you for your patience.

We always want to create the best experience we possibly can for our sellers. That’s why your feedback is so important to us. We look forward to continuing our partnership with you to improve your sales velocity and build a better marketplace.

threshold.sales.group · ‎03-02-2019

Can't ague with that.

The issue with image corruption and lost images is unique to the GTC listings. Just a week or two ago there were threads about it and the answer was that it's an unavoidable side effect from using GTC listings.

@gracieallen01 wrote:
@threshold.sales.group wrote:
But, are the dead links caused mostly by shorter duration listings? I've never heard that that's the cause prior to a week ago? Fwiw, in my experience the vast majority of dead links are the result of a sold item.

Plus, isn't there an issue of image corruption related to GTC listings? Something about files being corrupted due to repeated GTC rollovers, iirc. That's been shown to be a real problem recently and we told there's nothing the GTC seller can do about it other than save our images.
I think that the reason for the dead links and the image corruption is due to poorly thought out planning, cut-corner programming, lack of supervision and oversight and a lot of wishful thinking. Like most glitches on ebay.

When one starts with a reasonable program and keep just adding things - on the fly - revising, correcting, deleting and ignoring, untoward things are going to happen. Usually, not for the better, either.

.

abfabvintage · ‎03-02-2019

And they also said with that video on one of the chats either during or after the Open (Audrey & a "google" expert) you need good pictures and a GTIN/UPC re: catalogue. Vintage and collectibles are not in a catalogue and vintage clothing or collectibles for that matter do not have GTINs or UPCs. I was advised to add a GTIN for a 50's coat to be seen in Google, NO? Ain't happening. And it has been back and forth on just what Google wants and what Google will show. I said in another thread, need an independent Google employee or expert to come here and explain how this new policy does affect SEO. I am still confused.

I ain't got the brains to make this up (Fantastic Beasts)

sharingtheland · ‎03-02-2019

@nowandthenvintage wrote:
I do the GTC often. They just sit there with very few views unless I run sales. I may sell a couple that way. I think this really has to do with promoted listings.

There are certainly some google issues associated with this new policy but increasing sellers' use of promoted listings has always been high on my list of ebay reasons to do this.

Sellers will feel tremendous pressure to "get to the top" via promoted listings. How else to be seen in the vast blob of all ebay listings?

We’re also aware of concerns about the 30 day auto-renewal period not syncing with monthly billing cycles. We’re looking into this. Thank you for your patience.

n_p got it right when she said no one looked at a calendar; it never occurred to this group of idea hatchers to think about a different, major component of this site: billing.

Sherry

=^.^= =^.^=
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" " =^.^= " "

this*old*attic · ‎03-02-2019

And their search is awful, and there’s a component where you have to run all over the site heart-ing other sellers’ stuff to increase views... like it’s a social media site instead of a sales platform.

castlemagicmemories · ‎03-02-2019

@rosie247 wrote:
I have a feeling that this is going to lead to a lot of occasional sellers forgetting that they have listings on eBay and selling items they tossed in the trash months before.

That wouldn't be a new thing. Been there, done that. Bought a GTC that the seller did not know they still had up as it had been listed a year before. The only difference was the item had not been tossed; seller had listed it elsewhere and it sold a year ago, the seller had abandoned her listings and forgot they were even still here. I wonder just how prevalent that may be.

nobody*s_perfect · ‎03-02-2019

It's probably pretty common. The Quick version of the listing form (which is the default for new sellers and for most small sellers) has been using GTC as the only duration for fixed price listings for a long time.

mg152 · ‎03-02-2019

See, they do listen. It might not change but they do listen.

Patricia
eBay member for 25 years

graffik_traffik · ‎03-02-2019

@sapphireseal wrote:
It is worth it for me to sell an item here and pay the 10% FVF. But, to be blunt, it is not worth it to pay $0.35 per item every month. eBay just doesn't have the audience they did in the 90s. And part of the reason for that is because they keep driving sellers away with policies like this.

They are going to LOSE MONEY because sellers will be manually canceling their BINs a day or two before they are due to expire / relist, meaning they will not appear in the "Ending Soonest" lists. Also buyers do not like it when items they're watching are canceled . . . This is so dumb.

Keep the 30 day BIN option (and the 10 and 7 day options for that matter).

I'm not convinced GTC appear in the ending soon list anyway.

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To err is human, but to REALLY mess it up, you have to be eBay

twnpopcards · ‎03-02-2019

@threshold.sales.group wrote:
Can't ague with that.

The issue with image corruption and lost images is unique to the GTC listings. Just a week or two ago there were threads about it and the answer was that it's an unavoidable side effect from using GTC listings.
@gracieallen01 wrote:
@threshold.sales.group wrote:
But, are the dead links caused mostly by shorter duration listings? I've never heard that that's the cause prior to a week ago? Fwiw, in my experience the vast majority of dead links are the result of a sold item.

Plus, isn't there an issue of image corruption related to GTC listings? Something about files being corrupted due to repeated GTC rollovers, iirc. That's been shown to be a real problem recently and we told there's nothing the GTC seller can do about it other than save our images.
I think that the reason for the dead links and the image corruption is due to poorly thought out planning, cut-corner programming, lack of supervision and oversight and a lot of wishful thinking. Like most glitches on ebay.

When one starts with a reasonable program and keep just adding things - on the fly - revising, correcting, deleting and ignoring, untoward things are going to happen. Usually, not for the better, either.

.

So as usual Ebay is going to throw all their sellers under the bus and into a program that loses or currupts our images because its a side effect of the GTC format?? This is going to be really interesting if Ebay loses the images as they already have at least 2 times which then forces the sellers to make their time to fix all of their listings and Ebay does nothing but say sorry but its not our fault. Can you see the day that Ebay suddenly has the post on their boards or even worse on Ecommerce Bytes informing the world that they have once again lost all the images that are associated with GTC listings and then also have to announce that this has effected every single Fixed Price listing on Ebay??

Based on history this will inevitably happen again and the backlash against Ebay is going to be much worse than the backlash on this proposal.

Anonymous · ‎03-02-2019

I use a third party site to manage all of my listings. They just released a GTC Watchdog feature. This allows me to select if I want to end my listings 1 or 2 days before they get relisted and I'm charged an insertion fee.

Piece of mind.

nobody*s_perfect · ‎03-02-2019

@graffik_traffik wrote: ... I'm not convinced GTC appear in the ending soon list anyway.

When search results are sorted by "ending soonest," the GTC listings are sorted by their upcoming rollover date, just as if they were 30-day listings.

But if you sort by "newest first," then they are sorted by their original listing date, not by their most recent rollover date. So older listings gradually sink down in the list.

sharingtheland · ‎03-02-2019

The issue with image corruption and lost images is unique to the GTC listings. Just a week or two ago there were threads about it and the answer was that it's an unavoidable side effect from using GTC listings.

Ah, but now don't we maybe think that was some ~~weasel word~~ pat answer given at the time while ebay was testing something to do with photos and GTC listings?

Or, the blues that gave us that answer may have had the only a bit of information as to what was actually going on with photos/GTC/testing.

I'll assume it again: Some of the glitches we've seen lately have been due to the upcoming switchover of all FP listings to GTC. It's a massive change with lots of related affects. Some of which ebay is just now, duh, realizing.

Sherry

=^.^= =^.^=
( ) ( )
" " =^.^= " "

graffik_traffik · ‎03-02-2019

And how then is this a "good thing"?

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To err is human, but to REALLY mess it up, you have to be eBay

yuzuha · ‎03-02-2019

@nobody*s_perfect wrote:
@graffik_traffik wrote: ... I'm not convinced GTC appear in the ending soon list anyway.
When search results are sorted by "ending soonest," the GTC listings are sorted by their upcoming rollover date, just as if they were 30-day listings.

But if you sort by "newest first," then they are sorted by their original listing date, not by their most recent rollover date. So older listings gradually sink down in the list.

Which is as it should be. An item that has been continually relisted for six months is not new and should not be treated as a new listing in search. When I do my regular "Newly Listed" searches in my categories for the things I like to collect, I want to see the things that are being listed for the very first time, not the same old things I have already looked at and decided I didn't want.

goodluckselling · ‎03-02-2019

@dhbookds wrote:
One of the reasons Ebay wants to go to GTC is because they want to keep the links "good" in other search engines... Listings that have expired aggravate buyers and probably discourage them from staying or coming back to ebay. I know some sellers "don't care" about Google search or others, but ebay's primary responsibility is attracting buyers to EBAY and, secondarily, trying to ensure they stay and come back.

It does look like they are listening to and going to try to make the process easier for GTCs to be managed, but I doubt they are going back down from the change itself... just my guess.......

They should just change GTC to 31 days and be done with it. This is the only concession I can see them making.

After all 7 months of the year have 31 days. Who knows how 30 days on eBay got to represent a month?

Good Luck Selling!