Shipping Discounts get "top of page placement"???

[dhbookds]

Read  shipping tip from side bar....

https://community.ebay.com/t5/What-s-New/Shipping-discounts-plus-an-expert-tip/ba-p/34292840

Does #2 mean Top of Page Placement in searches?  outranking Promoted Listings?   What kind of discounts do they mean?   Never seen this before.

This apparently a tip from a seller........but to get this kind of exposure from ebay.......it's true?????

devon@ebay 

elizabeth@ebay 

kyle@ebay 

[mcdougle4248]

@dhbookds 

Thank you for sharing. I will be interested to hear what the blues say about "top-of-page placement". I have used shipping discounts for years and I do not see my listings always appearing at the top of search page results.

It looks to me that this seller is talking about shipping discounts and overstating/misstating what I see here:

https://www.ebay.com/help/selling/selling-tools/promotions-manager?id=4094 

[ittybitnot]

 What kind of discounts do they mean?

@dhbookds 

I think it was in reference to "passing along the discount rates to buyers" that you get when purchasing a label.  Instead of charging buyers the retail rate, you bill them for the rate you obtain from eBay.  You still get charged a fee on shipping the buyer pays.   

I don't think it was a very popular idea, because it was met with SILENCE when asked if eBay was going to reduce THEIR take as well to help sellers who decided to play along.  As far as "top of the page" placement, I don't think they ever said if it was page one or page 245 or commented at all. 

You can see the discussion about this here if you scroll down and see the post.  Choose "all comments", but I think they filtered some anyway: 

https://www.facebook.com/eBayForBusiness

[gator08041971]

I took this to mean having shipping discounts when people add items to cart from different listings you may have.

I have already set this up for most of my listings, where the buyer gets a discount for combining items that I sell in their cart, both from the multi-variation listings and from multiple listings.

I don't think they mean offering the buyer direct discounts on the price, though we do have the option to:

• Offer retail rate
• Offer discount % off the retail rate
• Offer ebay rate (what the seller pays)

At least I think that is what they are referring to.  Who knows.

[gator08041971]

Here are the settings:

These are found under:

It should be noted, you can also setup your calculated shipping (which is what I think this is primarily about)

And you can create promotional options too:

These are all found under:

Under Shipping Preferences.

[valueaddedresource]

@dhbookds great question!

My first thought about "top of page placement" was maybe they meant top of the View Item Page - like when you run a shipping promotion or other markdown it shows at the top of the listing.

But then that doesn't make any sense with the "get your listings seen first" part so who knows? 

Also. while not as important as placement, number 3 doesn't make much sense either - eBay will send out notifications to buyers with items in their cart encouraging them to complete checkout regardless of whether you offer shipping discounts or not.

With that in mind, I'm leaning toward @mcdougle4248 's thoughts here that some of this may have been overstated/mis-stated by the seller and I'm guessing whoever at eBay was tasked with putting together the image didn't have enough knowledge of how any of this actually works to be able to catch the potential problems or confusion.

[mr_lincoln]

@dhbookds 

I watched the short video on that link, the Seller made no mention of shipping discounts.  Since that thread was posted by eBay to me it's just another sales ploy to try and get Sellers to offer discounts on shipping by adding those 4 bullet points which all seem to be unrelated to shipping discounts but "imply" that they are.

In unpacking those 4 bullet points they have no specific references to support them and some make no sense in the context of the "Why you should be offering shipping discounts" statement.

1. Helps increase your buyer's cart size.

Okay, help me out on this one ... it makes zero sense.  "cart size"?  

2. Top of page placement gets your listing seen first.

No kidding ... stating the obvious here but no details on how to get the top of page placement unless they mean via PLA where you pre-pay fees to compete for the top 4 spots in a returned search.  Maybe they mean the combination of item price and lower shipping cost with the discount but that's subjective if the item prices are all over the place.

3. Notifications to Buyers with your items in their cart encourages them to complete their purchase

This is no way related to the subject of Shipping discounts.  It is just a stand alone statement

4. Flexible promotions help meet your needs with ease.  

This is just a generalized statement without reference to specific promotions nor a definition of what "needs" they are referring to.

To me it's a poor ad to be honest, doesn't make sense, doesn't connect to the topic of Shipping discounts, includes generalized statements, implies too much and I think is banking on a Seller's "perception" that they will sell more by offering shipping discounts.

So if I missed on any of that analogy it wasn't  by much ... 

[mcdougle4248]

@mr_lincoln 

I think you hit the nail on the head!

When I read  "Helps increase your buyers' cart size", I thought the seller meant to help increase the number of items the buyer places in their cart.

[gator08041971]

Okay, help me out on this one ... it makes zero sense. "cart size"?

That's easy.  Cart size, in how much is in the cart.

This is no way related to the subject of Shipping discounts. It is just a stand alone statement

Maybe they get notified if there is a discount because they have multiple items from the same seller?  That's what I get from that.

Don't get me wrong, there is a LOT of vague in this.  But that's how I got to where my thinking went.

[mr_lincoln]

---

@gator08041971 wrote:

Okay, help me out on this one ... it makes zero sense. "cart size"?

That's easy.  Cart size, in how much is in the cart.

This is no way related to the subject of Shipping discounts. It is just a stand alone statement

Maybe they get notified if there is a discount because they have multiple items from the same seller?  That's what I get from that.

Don't get me wrong, there is a LOT of vague in this.  But that's how I got to where my thinking went.

---

@gator08041971 

In our account Communication settings as a Buyer there is a notification when an "item" price has been reduced but no for a shipping cost reduction.

Much of that post has to do with perception, implication and assumption ... none of which have any basis in fact ... it's a sales ploy would be the best way to describe it, and not a very good one in my opinion.

[mr_lincoln]

---

@mcdougle4248 wrote:

@mr_lincoln 

I think you hit the nail on the head!

When I read  "Helps increase your buyers' cart size", I thought the seller meant to help increase the number of items the buyer places in their cart.

---

@mcdougle4248 

I think it was time for that eBay team to post a regular blurb on something and the JV team put that one together ... 

[dhbookds]

All very interesting responses.........and thanks to everyone for their opinion on what is meant.....  hopefully, we'll get an answer from the blues about the "top placement" thing......  If there is a key to that, it would be nice to know it.    Clear communication is so important with stuff like this...........

[mam98031]

I agree and I'm no fan of this program.  I'm sure glad it is optional.

[ittybitnot]

 Clear communication is so important with stuff like this...........

@dhbookds 

it will be interesting to see if any of the 'blues' respond to the tags.  Maybe we should "contact customer service"  to find out more, huh?  or wait around for some reply from a "team"????  

One of the best ways eBay ever had going for them for "discounted shipping" was combining multiple purchases for one shipping price.  After all these years, mobile app users still have no "request total" in their cart, and the requirements that buyers put up a payment source in order to make an offer or bid, were certainly combined shipping killers as well.  Even if there is a 'request total' button in the cart, most of the time if throws an error message anyway. Can't combine if one of the items is already on sale, can't combine if one has free shipping, can't combine if.....etc. etc. etc.   

The eBay for Business staff were asked what this stuff means in the link I gave upthread....maybe I missed something, but it appears to still be the usual "crickets".  Maybe the blues have the holiday off tomorrow, but I will certainly check back to see any communication of substance on Tuesday. 

[dhbookds]

@ittybitnot   Was just habit that I called in the individual blues.....  the ad/informational squib was put up by ebay community team which I probably should have called out (which may/may not be the same individuals)...  Had to play around to get the @ to work.   @community_team 

In any case, it's their informational display and I trust they want it to be accurate......and understandable.  If not, we'll just add it to the list.........