Slowest week since I started...is it a search rankings thing?

[estep84_popsandmore]

I'm used to having a good day, then a slow day, then a huge day, then a couple slow ones, but I'm sitting at about $100 in 8 or 9 days. I can deal with things being slow sometimes, but I can't help but wonder if it has anything to do with showing up lower in searches.

I recently shifted away from free returns, as I sell a lot of heavier electronics these days, and I just can't afford to ship this stuff back when I get bombarded with returns. After that transition I had 2 really nice days, then lights out.

Is that the kind of thing that can happen? Seems a little...excessive.

PS, if you check my store you can see I'm all over the place, as I've shifted focus and haven't really settled on rebranding, but sales WERE good, so it's not an issue of the whole thing not taking off.

[namtrag1]

You have a nice selection of items

I Luv the Raquel Welch VHS!!...lol

But seriously eBay is going through massive changes ( my opinion ) and those changes are hurting many many sellers.

The common thread is that sellers (me included ) are complaining for a sudden and massive decline in sales for no logical reason.  For the last 10 months I've had sales go from 50 sales/ month to just 8 so far this month.  I haven't changed a thing.  Look at my 100% feedbak.  happy customers and a fair amount of sales.

Just hang tuff and hope eBay realizes what they are doing to good sellers.

Peace

[dougsue123b]

I did a search for your alice in wonderland. When using auther in the search yours comes up on top. without it though you are invisible. Maybe put the auther at the end of the title.

[orangehound · Accepted solution]

This is a general comment, and not directed at you.

Whenever a person starts a thread like this, like flies to a light, there will be dozens of other sellers who swarm around the thread and mutually confirm how bad eBay is treating their listings.   Resist the urge to be drawn into this.

The reality is that eBay, as a whole, is doing fine and there are lots of sellers who are doing great on here.  Assuming that you are not below standard, falling sales or dead periods are much more likely to be caused by market fluctuations, too much competing inventory (e.g., 1 buyer for every 100 listings), or prices that are too high.

So, perhaps use this dead period as motivation to seek out different lines of products that might be added to your inventory to better even out the sales ... also, consider changes to listing practices that might improve sales.

(By the way, your listings look very good).

[orangehound]

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@namtrag1 wrote:
For the last 10 months I've had sales go from 50 sales/ month to just 8 so far this month.  I haven't changed a thing.

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This struck me as odd.  If sales were falling that dramatically with me, I would be doing all sorts of changes ... otherwise, I'm offering Blackberries to an iPhone world.

[sakic92710]

It's a triple D situation - Depressing, Discouraging, Disheartening!  lol  On April 6th, I sold about $200 US.  Over the last 8 days, I'm at about $60 & that includes a possible NPB ($7).  UGH!  Please turn the lights on, eBay & leave them on!  haha  Good luck to all.

[rschissler]

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@orangehound wrote:

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@namtrag1 wrote:
For the last 10 months I've had sales go from 50 sales/ month to just 8 so far this month.  I haven't changed a thing.

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This struck me as odd.  If sales were falling that dramatically with me, I would be doing all sorts of changes ... otherwise, I'm offering Blackberries to an iPhone world.

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It wasn't that long ago that Blackberries were the hottest and coolest phones.  Now, a lot of people probably have never heard of them, though they are still in business.  It just shows you, and sellers, how much and how quick things can change.

[estep84_popsandmore]

Thanks for that, I appreciate it. One of my top eBay goals is to NOT become a crabby, jaded "old" eBay seller. I don't think every refund is an eBay enabled scam, I try to keep in mind what other selling platforms charge for fees when I feel burdened under my monthly fees, and I'd like to think my listing visibility isn't suffering over what I firmly consider responsible changes.

I'm going to wait it out, of course (because everyone loves a good I'M LEAVIN' EBAY rant.)

[stl_vintage]

Hey there - 

Orangehound - just saying, after going through your own listings and completed sales, you don't seem to sell that many items daily, nor do you have a large quantitiy inventory for sale on ebay.

We have roughly 8,400+ listings on here, and with a very large inventory, I can feel the fluctuations come and go I think much more gradually than most. The days slowly rise to a climax, then taper and fall to mid month lows, and lo, they climb back up. I think a lot of sellers don't understand a lot of the items they sell have stronger and weaker sales months every single year. I deal in clothing so of course seasonality is much more of a factor for me, however even selling media or what have you, there are certainly strong sales months and weak.

I think when you don't sell a lot of items, the months where pro sellers have sales decline result in sales completely falling off a cliff for smaller sellers, and when the time of year returns to their favor, then they feel it come back and are comfortable again with it for a while because when it's there for them, they quickly comfort themselves into feeling like that is the "norm".

All this being said - it is impossible to avoid the reality that ebay experiments on and highly disadvantages lesser sellers and sometimes in a big way. The best example I can think of is way back before ebay had ever started advertising promoted listings to all sellers, they started it as a "Beta" program they only allowed certain sellers and stores access too. My dad is an ebay seller that does it as a career as well (although with a different strategy and carries a lower inventory), and in short we had access to the beta program and he did not, and it really ruffled him that certain sellers like us got that benefit whilst he did not. That was back in 2014, and let me tell you 2014 was as much the greatest year in our business's history as well as his worst, and although there are always so many factors that narrowing down to PROVING causation is near impossible, one sure couldn't help but notice that us having our store completely promoted was just destroying the competition and for him, it nearly ended his business.

[orangehound]

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@stl_vintage wrote:

Hey there - 

Orangehound - just saying, after going through your own listings and completed sales, you don't seem to sell that many items daily, nor do you have a large quantitiy inventory for sale on ebay.

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(a) I manage multiple accounts on eBay ... I sell on other platforms.

(b) I use the "out-of-stock"option, and using that option one cannot see the sales that I have (unless they are via a multi-quantity listing, and then one can still not tell the quantity of items sold)

(c) Why are you "just saying"?  I'm not sure of your point ...

[clamebake99]

Me too. Unbelievably slow. I even had to look to make sure my items were even for sale. Slowest ever. This will put me out of business.

[cooltronix]

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@estep84_popsandmore wrote:

but I can't help but wonder if it has anything to do with showing up lower in searches.

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Possibly. It's impossible to answer that with a one-liner.  The search rank depends on many points.

• general seller status (feedback, returns, open questions etc.)
• return policy
• free shipping
• good quality images
• the right title
• price
• category
• sales history
• gtc vs. timed listing
• new listing vs. re-listed

And many more. Best is to look at similar items that rank higher in searches. Here is a tool to help visualize your search rank: https://ranktool.bid

[home.stock]

I did a search for your alice in wonderland. When using auther in the search yours comes up on top. without it though you are invisible. Maybe put the auther at the end of the title.

[public-direct]

I don't think you're imagining this. I've been on ebay for a real long time and this last couple weeks has been the slowest I've seen in several years. There is always fluctuations as someone else mentioned here but something just doesn't seem right which is why I'm visiting the discussion boards. Early summer is typically slow for my categories but this is crazy slow right now.

[coolections]

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@namtrag1 wrote:

eBay is going through massive changes and those changes are hurting many many sellers.

The common thread is that sellers are complaining for a sudden and massive decline in sales for no logical reason.

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@namtrag1

It isn't that at all. Changes Ebay makes has no bearing on buyers, they do not even notice a selling policy change. In fact each and every change Ebay makes comes posters such as yourself saying the sky is falling. The numbers Ebay has is the same as always. What you have been saying for the last six months or so people have been saying for over 10 years. As far as search rankings it should not hurt much. Buyers rarely ever buy the first thing they see on the default best match. They switch to lowest price, ending soonest, or newly listed.