@gamersbaystore wrote:
As for GTC, the biggest problem this presents is the fact smaller sellers have all their listings drowned out in search results very quickly. They're forced to either purchase a store subscription, or wait forever to sell anything. How ebay thinks this is a good idea I don't know, it definitely is not.
Honestly, it's not just smaller sellers. It's affecting "everyone" and the only ones who are actually making out well by these changes are "poor" sellers. The wealth is being spread.
If you check my history you can see I've posted logs of top sellers (or you could check Terapeak to see the information for yourself). As well, we are the top seller in our category and have been for years.
In our category, all of our competitors have been plummeting 30% per year.
I also have screenshots in my posting history showing the "Top Seller Market Share" from Summer. In Summer 2017 the top seller market share was 40%. One year later in 2018, 27%.
This means TOP sellers have seen their drops averaging around 33%. Which matches up perfectly with our category. Despite the market of our category being UP year to year!
What does this mean? It means top sellers are suffering as well (I've mentioned many times, we lost half our full time staff last year). This year, we're currently making similar cutbacks and dropping from 4 warehouses to 2 warehouses.
And smaller sellers are suffering (as you already know). Who is making out on this?
Poor sellers. China sellers. Less serious sellers. It doesn't matter. Those who have poor performance, and receive the SAME SEARCH PLACEMENT as those of us with 99.9-100% positive feedback. EBay is enticing more and more sellers to come and spreading the wealth.
This is a poor design. It does not encourage sellers to take care of their customers. It does not allow businesses to survive. It has basically destroyed all forms of "healthy competition" which is required for any marketplace. EBay CSR's don't even know what advice to give. The category managers don't even know what advice to give!
It does not help customers. Prices are higher, quality control is lower. It makes it nearly impossible to survive for sellers.
Then you mix in silly ideas like punishing sellers with 4% extra FVF for sellers with high SNAD return rates, while at the same time encouraging free returns? And the SNAD rate is dependent on customer claims, rather than decided cases?!?
This is all in addition to the algorithm issues (that I've also detailed in many posts). But to summarize, it USED to be based on your "selling history" of your listings. If your listing performed well, you got more impressions. This worked amazingly well because if customers are happy and return as repeat customers, this brings your listings up in search.
Nowadays, selling history is only a minor variable, and they are mixed in with dozens of other variables. And the biggest reward in search placement is how much you're willing to pay eBay for sponsorships and promotions, which in turn increases prices and making it WORSE offerings to the customers.
As much as eBay claims they are "customer focused" since last year, the site is not any better for customers. The return policies might give that impression, but considering there's no possible way of quality control of sellers, and search placement is directly built upon how much you're going to raise the price to pay eBay for exposure, it's not a better site for customers.
It's not seller focused either. The only one making any benefit of these changes is eBay. Meanwhile, this is just a bandaid, as higher prices on eBay compared to other marketplaces is going to continue eBay on the path of having a lower market share each year.
