SELLER'S BEWARE OF THE PROMOTED LISTINGS

[the-hook-and-the-loop]

2 THINGS

1. I have a listing set up with a 2.5% ad rate. Ebay decides they want to take 7.5% out when there are "promoted listings". I know for a fact that a particular customer visited this listing to purchase it generically. Not only did ebay take 5% more, they are calling a generic sale a "sold via promoted listing" sale.

2.On November 25, Thanksgiving Day, a buyer purchased an item and then messaged me about something else he was looking for after looking through my whole store. I sent him a link to an item at 11:01am. At 11:29am he purchased the item and I see that ebay has considered this sale a "sold via promoted listings" sale. So they helped themselves to the 3.6% ad rate that this item was set for.

I just got off the phone with customer service after having to explain and investigate for over an hour and I was credited back the couple of dollars and apologized to.

So that is all, watch your **bleep**!

[sin-n-dex]

I find this concerning. I checked some of my listings, and most were at the 5% cap (I put suggested ad rate, with a cap at 5% as some people want stupid rates for stuff which pushes up the average).

There were a couple that were above the 5% and I can only figure that I put the suggested ad rate (and forgot to put the cap because they were all under 5% at the time I set that up).

I can't explain why you had to pay the 7.5% instead of the 2.5% that you set up.

C.

[the-hook-and-the-loop]

It must be my fault for expecting this program to function properly. I find that if I don't promote, my listings rarely get seen. So your kind of forced to pay about 20% to sell on eBay now.

[dbfolks166mt]

I have not and will not use promoted listings but have no problem with views or with items selling. It probably depends a lot on what you are selling but to me promoted listings is simply a revenue generator for eBay. What happens when everyone is promoting or what would happen if nobody was promoting? Prisoners dilemma sort of scenario. 

[luckythewinner]

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@the-hook-and-the-loop wrote:

I sent him a link to an item at 11:01am. At 11:29am he purchased the item

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You are absolutely positive that the buyer had never visited that item at any time in the previous 30 days? 

[the-hook-and-the-loop]

I am certain.

[the-hook-and-the-loop]

Ebay credited back for both incidents because they had absolutely no explanation. I know the CSR's don't know that the higher ups are a bunch of thieving liars. Anyway, time to fight fire with napalm.

[mrdutch1001]

I briefly gave promoted listings a go when they were first introduced on eBay, but since I'd already had experience with using them on Etsy, I already knew it was not really of benefit to me. After several months of using PLs on Etsy, 0 sales from them and really nothing to be gained. My experience on eBay was similar = 0 sales resulted from using PLs and simply nothing to be gained by using them. I now refuse to use PLs on any site on which I list and sell items.

Successful selling: It's all about the product>uniqueness, quality, price points, supply & demand, target market & so forth so the success in sales will result from the desirability of the product and not how much a seller is willing to pay to have that item seen.

[the-hook-and-the-loop]

Speaking of Etsy, I learned of the pay-per-click advertising method on there which is ebay's now Promoted Listings Advanced. I am mainly speaking of Promoted Listings Standard. The best thing I've heard is rather than give ebay the extra 5%-10%, you can give it to the buyer instead by not promoting and lowering the price.

The only problem with this for me is, my 400 listings don't get much visibility when PL's are off. So I guess I have to just spend an hour on the phone with ebay everyday.

[buyselljack2016]

It's all about the product

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And there it is^^^^^^

I don't sell in overly saturated  categories, but sometimes there is a slump.

I could promote, but don't really need to. 

I get the impressions, but my problem is that bigbob is undercutting everyone by selling the same items for 50-75% of what the rest of us have been listing/selling at, thus destroying the market.

Another seller  is listing/selling an item for $14 that I have been selling consistently for $45.  That's just stupid on their part.

[glasser]

I am not familiar with how PL work. I sell mostly auctions and you can't promote. However, I do wonder if the buyer first purchased through a PL and then soon after purchased another item, whether eBay says that the second item was result of the original PL?

[bill.purvis2012]

What do you mean the buyer visited 'generically'?  If a listing is promoted you will owe the fee no matter what.  The buyer can only see that one listing and it is a promoted one.  Years ago there would be 2 listings, the initial one AND the promoted one.  No longer.  You only have 1  listing. When bought it is the promoted one.  

[mrdutch1001]

BTW, I never spend time on the phone with eBay...I prefer to use the chat line and although one can still spend a great length of time in that process too, at least you are dealing with someone that can actually review your circumstance and you have a copy of the conversions in written form.

[pjcdn2005]

2.On November 25, Thanksgiving Day, a buyer purchased an item and then messaged me about something else he was looking for after looking through my whole store. I sent him a link to an item at 11:01am. At 11:29am he purchased the item and I see that ebay has considered this sale a "sold via promoted listings" sale. So they helped themselves to the 3.6% ad rate that this item was set for.

When I entered that listing number I was shown two of the same listing, one of them was the promoted listing. It's possible that the buyer clicked on that one.  It's also possible that they had clicked on it earlier when they were "looking through your whole store."

But they definitely overcharged you for that other listing.

[the-hook-and-the-loop]

In my experiences, if ebay's promoted listing connected you with that buyer, ebay will consider it a promoted sale for the rest of both your lives on every sale.