eBay

calntom · ‎01-30-2019

Sales tactics that are working.

Selling in Lots of 2 or 5 etc. This has been working really well over the past 6 months since I did that with a ~couple hundred listings.

Promoted listings at 1%. I noticed that eBay creates a duplicate listing that is promoted. I think eBay takes the 1% when a customer buys off the promoted listing that they added. I just started doing this a month ago and noticed a certain uptick in sales during what was consistently a slow time for my sales.

I am just dabbling with the Volume Pricing. This looks like it should be a winner going forward. I kind of cringe when I see that my competitors are already using it on identical items that I have listed.

Been having some success lowering the price by 5% on items that are being watched or in carts. I only do select items from the list that eBay sends out. The conversion rate has been about 20% right of the get-go, translating 5 sales out of about 25 that I have lowered the price on by 5%.

I need to always be checking pricing to make sure that a competitor has not cornered the market on a certain item and make adjustments with some of the tools mentioned above to stay competitive. This is hard to do with 1,400+ listings.

I quit using markdown manager last summer after I went through all 1,200 listings at that time and got everything re-priced right where I needed it. I may start running a few markdowns again to see what that can drum up.

I try to get this verbiage towards the top of the description to help buyers identify that I am a USA seller:

--> Item in Stock by Seller and Ships from Seller's Location in Texas, USA. Prompt, Free Shipping.

Anyone else have any tools, processes, must haves/do’s in listings, tricks of the trade, etc. that they have been having success with and willing to share?

herecometheplayas · ‎01-30-2019

I have also just made several listings of 2-3 of 1 item. With the postage increase it only adds a little to the price and is much better than sending out singles of everything. The only thing I run into is that most buyers don't seem to look down far enough to see the listing.

I also bought large poly bags and cut them into 2 sizes that many of my items will fit into. They weigh a little less and sometimes that is enough to keep from going up another ounce on first class pkgs. If you sell a lot, it does add up

cashvaluerecovery2011 · ‎01-30-2019

Something I have always done is send a personal message with each sale to the buyer right after i print a tracking number. Letting them know I appreciate their business and that Im taking their merch to the post office and feedback is already uploaded. Gives it a human touch and sets yourself apart from 90% of other sellers. I also say please let me know if there is anything you are looking for in that same category and I will give you a heads up through ebay messages before listing it if it comes in.

My repeat buyers are my best buyer by far. Never complain. Never return. Both buyer and seller are comfortable with the other and the best part is I can get a little bit higher price than competitors on the same item because these buyers would rather deal with the known than take a risk with the unknown.

Other than that...........and may not be what you are looking for but its worked wonders for me..........is listing all my items locally on non fee platforms with safe local pick up at a bank. The few items I sale that way per week are automatically 13% less in fees but there is no free shipping, no returns etc.

Goodluck.

dogofwar777 · ‎01-30-2019

When I buy I always appreciate a quick note from a seller letting me know the status. Some sellers have told me they won't be able to mail my item for a few days due to something going on in their lives, but it doesn't bother me because at least they messaged me and don't leave me hanging for days wondering when my stuff is being mailed.

gopetersen · ‎01-30-2019

@calntom wrote:
...

Been having some success lowering the price by 5% on items that are being watched or in carts. I only do select items from the list that eBay sends out. The conversion rate has been about 20% right of the get-go, translating 5 sales out of about 25 that I have lowered the price on by 5%.
...

If an item is in a buyer's cart, they were interested enough to put it there, which means you don't really know if they bought it because they were already going to buy it or if it's because the price was lowered 5%. There's no way to assess the statistics (especially since eBay sometimes tells you something is in the cart when it isn't).

ekmadonna · ‎01-30-2019

I will tell you a sales tactic that used to work REALLY WELL that is no longer available-- BUYERS SEEING THE AMOUNT OF WATCHERS ON A LISTING! If 1 or 2 or 3 or 4 people were watching an item that did spur quicker sales by those who did not want to risk waiting to long and losing an item they were interested in. WHY they changed the number to ONLY SHOW with 5 Or more watchers is a head scratcher?? I can't tell you how many times I would slap a watch on dozens of my items from my buying account when there were only 1 or 2 watchers on items in my main store and and guess what, the item would sell quickly about 50% of the time. sales have dropped since this feature was changed. That is a fact.

my-cottage-books-and-antiques · ‎01-30-2019

gopeterson,

The OP is measuring the only thing that matters in his experiment: the conversion rate. Did the action he took result in a sale? In 20% of the cases it did, which is actually a pretty good rate.

You are correct, there is NO way to know whether the buyer would have bought at full price or not. But that is immaterial.

The OP's objective was to prompt conversions, the OP was apparently quite satisfied to reduce the price by 5% in order to obtain the sale, and the OP actually ended up with a good conversion rate. (I've tried it, and have sold nothing, so it didn't work very well for me. But I'll continue to do it, because it takes only minutes and my margins allow me to lower the price by 5% or more without heavily impacting my profits)

Sitting around wondering whether it would have sold had the OP done nothing would be a profound waste of time.

castlemagicmemories · ‎01-30-2019

It's great that you are willing to try and test new ways of doing things to see if they are successful. You are reaping the rewards of your labor in increased sales, and that is just what you were hoping for, so I wish you good luck and continued success as you test and tweak your listings.

duncanvr · ‎01-30-2019

Im not telling anyone my secret tactics that increase my eBay sales. If I share everyone else will be doing them

castlemagicmemories · ‎01-31-2019

Loose lips sink ships?

coolections · ‎01-31-2019

@ekmadonna wrote:
I will tell you a sales tactic that used to work REALLY WELL that is no longer available-- BUYERS SEEING THE AMOUNT OF WATCHERS ON A LISTING! If 1 or 2 or 3 or 4 people were watching an item that did spur quicker sales by those who did not want to risk waiting to long and losing an item they were interested in.

I am exactly opposite as a buyer. Unless it is a new listing within a few days, if it has more than a couple of watchers I delete from my watch list. I figure if there are that many watchers and no one is buying it, is either over-priced, or not in as much demand as I originally thought. Unless it is something I know for a fact is a really good deal which is rare here in Ebayland.

frock_my_world · ‎01-31-2019

I took another seller’s advice from the PS Bosrd and shortened my handling time by quite a bit. This seems to have helped.
But I also re-did a bunch of listings too so not sure if the shorter Handling time is what has helped me or increased and revised listings.

mcdougle4248 · ‎01-31-2019

Wish I knew...impressions are down, click through rate is down, page views are down, conversion rate is down, but sales are up 25% compared to last year. Seems to me that somewhere I am doing something right, I just don't know what it is.

my-cottage-books-and-antiques · ‎01-31-2019

Personally, I think too much is made of the up and down of these stats. It takes only one impression to become one click through that converts, and you've made a sale. The significance of these stats is not so much about whether they are up or down over a period of time...it's more about the relationship between them. A lot of impressions, few click throughs? A lot of click throughs, few conversions? These are the numbers that can be helpful.

Your post makes my point: Despite the fact that those rates had all declined, your sales were UP. That's the number that matters. If there were a direct correlation between lowered impressions and lowered sales, that would be another matter, but people with lowered impressions can have lowered or increased sales.