So the dust has settled somewhat. How will you handle GTC? Do you know?

[castlemagicmemories]

There's been a lot of venting on the new GTC listings which is understandable.

This is not that kind of a thread, therefore no redundancy.

Reactions and opinions have been freely shared as to what was thought of this change. The dust has settled somewhat after the announcement of the Early Seller Update. As you know, there has been much reaction. Many don't like it. Some are optimistic. Others don't feel it is a concern. Some have already made plans and know how they will handle it. Some may not have any plans.  Some may be planning other things. 

So this thread is an opportunity to share your plans, if any, and share what you intend to do about it and how you will handle it. Some have shared strategies on when to post to avoid additional listing fees which would be costly. Thank you!

May it help any who are undecided solidify their plans. Together, we're better! Thank you!

[mam98031]

Yes, I've been running them at least send 2013.  Maybe before that.  I honestly don't remember, but I've been running them for years.  Maybe someone else will know when they started.

I agree with you that Ebay is gotten way too involved with sellers at certain levels.  I call in Micro Management gone WILD.

[sharingtheland]

Ah, thanks, mam.  I do remember the "no changes" to FP listings that was temporarily in effect.  I was really worried there for a minute; not being able to revise or change price or edit would be my downfall.  I have a few listings right now that I've added/deleted photos about 16 times each; keep trying to get better ones (not succeeding).

Truly, wires crossed; I don't think in any way that calntom was saying ebay would justify or explain the GTC decision in the official Update; the question was - and I'm paraphrasing -

If ebay is telling us we must use GTC because of google requirements, then what are the google requirements?  UPCs?  Ebay's EPIDs (which no one uses)? 

Not what is ebay doing, but what are we supposed to do - what hoops do we jump - to obey the new rules?

And now I must get back to work...and not ebay work.

[mam98031]

Oh it wasn't temporary.  That is the way they were for many years.  It was horrible.  In many cases the only way we had to change a listing was to close it.  Fix it and then repost it.  That was at a time that you were charged a listing fee each and every time you listed something.  Free Listings promo were a real unicorn back then and Stores did not have any free listings.  

Ebay is just never been good at the extended explanation that many members want on any given subject.  It is just not at all likely they are going to give what is being desired.

But I do think there are a lot of misconception about what a GTC is and how it Functions.  I love GTC listings.  They work very well for me and have for years.  I change them and/or update them whenever I want.  I do however respect that for some sellers GTC is not the answer for them and others misunderstand what a GTC is.  So it appears to me to be a mixed bag of issues.

[fern*wood]

I thought GTC listings have been around since fixed price listings started.  I know my husband has always listed this way in our store.  

I hope when the final update rolls out that ebay schools the reps on the discussion board a little better.  It doesn't help much when a rep doesn't know a listing that rolls around twice within a month gets charged twice.

[calntom]

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@mr_lincoln wrote:

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@calntom wrote:

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@mr_lincoln wrote:

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@calntom wrote:

I am awaiting the finished version of the spring update. I would assume there are other updates within the GTC iniative that have not yet been mentioned by eBay. 

Looking for a lot more documentation surrounding GTC listings. Thinking that the finished product is still in a work in progress at this time. 

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The finished version of the GTC mandate is out, it came out early by design ... its more about what will sellers do to work within its constraints.  If you mean what can and can not be changed on a GTC listing once it goes live then that is certainly a good question.

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@mam98031 @mr_lincoln 

eBay will/should be providing a lot of documentation surrounding the required listing information that is expected to play well with google and other search engines. There will be more long term hoops to jump through with listings, I am wondering what they will be?

(Previous reports of GTC listings being ended by eBay due to no sales for an extended period. Though, this has not happened to me.)

Since eBay is moving more towards this being the norm, there should be “Required Maintenance” over the course of the GTC listing to keep it active over the course of “years”.

At this time, eBay labels stagnate listings with “This listing hasn't had any sales in at least 16 months. Please consider updating it".  What are going to be the requirements going forward to keep a GTC listing active for the longterm?

I heard the poorly thought-out, rapidfire presentation of information supplied by the eBay reps on the chat session just after the “early” update was released. This was the part where they were suggesting on what to do to improve GTC listings.

I will expect that eBay will have all these thoughts documented in the final release of the spring update. eBay has some documentation surrounding this now but I expect it to be more in depth moving forward.

There will probably be more hoops to jump through as I would expect to see the listing form updated at some point and possibly more information to be “required” for listings to be activated. Maybe not in all categories.  

This initiative with limiting fixed price listings to GTC is an extreme measure. One would hope there is a lot more behind it than perhaps more listing fees even if eBay actually ends up with that.

I reckon I have a lot of expectations of eBay on the issue moving forward.

i.e. There is a method behind the madness

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Not to get off topic too far but these are valid points and will influence how people respond and what their plans are moving forward with GTC.  I too remember last year the purge on stagnant GTC listings that sat for over a year, they weren't reports, they were real events.  They were taken down by Home Office with the expectation that they be updated, tweaked, changed, modified, etc before being Relisted.  I have never used GTC, my understanding is once a listing is clicked to go live one can not "Edit or "Revise" it as easily (if at all?) like a normal 30 FP listing.  I assume the price can be changed but again, I need to learn the current dos and don'ts with the format ... what I DO know is they Relist every 30 Days so that part I am working through as previously posted.

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As you have probably already gathered, every field can be edited on GTC listings except when you are in the received an offer or made an offer process. 

[my-cottage-books-and-antiques]

Correct. GTCs have indeed been around for years. Not sure when they started, but it has been a long time. As for revisions, I agree....they can be revised same as a 30 Day FP. No problems there at all.

The questions about what other hoops will there be, what restrictions etc? We'll find out in late April, with the full-on Spring Seller Release. Which may have very little new to say about GTC. I do agree that the switch to all GTC is only one component of eBay's effort to increase sales velocity on the site. We've already seen some other components in this release: making Terapeak available for free means more sellers will be able to access more data about what to source, how to price, etc. The ability to increase or decrease listing prices directly from the Active Listings page? It's a little thing, but it can save sellers time , and that can be a component of sales velocity as well.

As to GTC and Google. ebay has already told us, many times, that Google wants good photos (especially the Gallery photo) and preferably with a solid background (generally white). Whenever possible, include UPCs or other codes. These are already "best practices"....nothing surprising about any of this stuff.

We were told last year that ebay will be releasing a way for seller's employees to access the seller's account with limited, not full, access. For larger sellers with employees, this could help with sales velocity by making it easier for sellers to delegate some of their workload.

I'm not going to speculate about a lot of this stuff, but if you grasp that "increasing sales velocity" is not just a buzzword, but a basic business practice, that would help. Sales velocity is not merely "sell more"....it's "sell more in the same amount of time". So, if I usually list 1000 listings, and usually sell 100 of those a month, and I can increase my sales velocity to 1000 listings a month with 300 sales/month...that's a good thing, right?

ebay can't increase MY sales velocity. It can take steps, provide tools etc, that will hopefully increase the sales velocity of the site overall. It's up to me to increase my sales velocity (assuming I want to) Each seller has to look at their own business. Sure, 300 is better than 100, but what if I simply don't have time to prep and ship 300 packages? Growth for any business can be tricky, and we each need to decide how fast (or slow) to grow, or indeed whether we want to grow.

What eBay is looking to do is increase sales velocity sitewide. Maybe they'll succeed, maybe not. Personally, I'd be happy to see an increase in sales velocity.

[bridgetown247]

I have nothing that stays listed for over a year, so I will simply list on days that won't get the double-whammy before that time is up.

[femmefan1946]

@mr_lincoln 

I have never used GTC, my understanding is once a listing is clicked to go live one can not "Edit or "Revise" it as easily (if at all?) like a normal 30 FP listing.

GTC can be revised. I just raised the price, added Promoted Listings, added a couple of Item Specifics and modified the Description.
I could not change "GTC" to "30 Day".

Took maybe 45 seconds. 

[femmefan1946]

It doesn't help much when a rep doesn't know a listing that rolls around twice within a month gets charged twice.

That's one change that should come in with mandatory GTC.

The fee period should not be a month. Either make the fee roll around every 30 days to match the listing period or make the fee period 31 days even for February. Either one should take care of the problem.

While we Canadians don't get nearly the number of promotions you Americans do, I would like to see at least the Free Listing promotions be 30 day Fixed Period, all ending within the fee period.

That way, ignoring the angst about unexpected fees*,  the seller can gauge whether it is worth her while to relist the promoted items or not, based on their performance during the Promotion.

*If we add a NOTE to each Promoted Listing when we put them up, which can be done in bulk, we can then spot them when they approach their end and remove them to our Unsold Lists before they automatically relist.

And GTC listings in our Active List have the listing date on them.  We can quickly survey those dates and end the items that are too close to relisting if we want.

[mr_lincoln]

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@femmefan1946 wrote:

@mr_lincoln 

I have never used GTC, my understanding is once a listing is clicked to go live one can not "Edit or "Revise" it as easily (if at all?) like a normal 30 FP listing.

GTC can be revised. I just raised the price, added Promoted Listings, added a couple of Item Specifics and modified the Description.
I could not change "GTC" to "30 Day".

Took maybe 45 seconds. 

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Thanks Femme ... I never tire of learning ...

[ms.rodriguez*]

I bought a big calender.  I am going to do more multi-item auctions.  MOre auctions and all of my GTC will really be 28 or 29 day listings.  I am going to write up  a bunch and they will also start on the same day  .  They will end late at night.   I will start closing the GTC on day 28  or day 29 .   If necessary, hubby will be trained on how to close auctions so that he can help me.  I will be damned the day that I let ebay steal fees from me.

Sales are just dismal here and I think that they will get worse as auctions keep rolling over and over. 

[marbleslost23]

 I plan on sacrificing a few characters in the title of my listings to include the date I started the listing. I have never been a fan of the GTC because it really is so forgettable. Having some listings go for over 30 days isn't so bad. But I have found after you hit that 90+ day mark, that listing "disappears"  Keeping track of listings that end from month to month is easy. Keeping track of a listing I want to revamp every 3 months or so will be much harder. So that is how I intend to remind myself of what has been put up when, at a glance.  Hopefully that will ensure better rotation.

[mam98031]

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@marbleslost23 wrote:

 I plan on sacrificing a few characters in the title of my listings to include the date I started the listing. I have never been a fan of the GTC because it really is so forgettable. Having some listings go for over 30 days isn't so bad. But I have found after you hit that 90+ day mark, that listing "disappears"  Keeping track of listings that end from month to month is easy. Keeping track of a listing I want to revamp every 3 months or so will be much harder. So that is how I intend to remind myself of what has been put up when, at a glance.  Hopefully that will ensure better rotation.

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@marbleslost23 

Your title is very valuable real estate, not a good idea to use part of the title for a control number / date that is easily accessible In your My Ebay or Seller Hub, whichever you use.

I use the Seller Hub.  You can go to your active listings and you can sort those listings by their end date if you want to.  Or your start dates if you prefer.  There are lots of ways to sort your listings in the SH or My Ebay.  I hope you will reconsider using up space in your title to put a date that gives you no value in the searches.

Since you feel your listings disappear at 90 days, look at a the list of those listings that are getting close to that date.  Revise the title, price, pictures or ISBs [item specific boxes] and this will cause the listing to re-index on Ebay over the next few hours and act as if it was all new again.  No need to close and sell similar and no need to lose any watchers you may have.

[berserkerplanet]

>>I plan on sacrificing a few characters in the title of my listings to include the date I started the listing.

I use the seller notes field for the start date, and shipping weight/options, BO indicator, MQ indicator, price drop/raise ($↓) etc, and just keep adding to it as I relist with entries like R3/7$↑


4oz L11/14/18 500PR │ R12/15 100PR │ R1/16/19 │ R1/16/19 │ R2/17 200Pr

3#SP/PS/PM L8/31/17...$↓10/5/18 | R10/31 │ R 11/30 │ R12/31 │ R1/31/19 │ 2/16$↓

The shipping weight and options notes are good for knowing which listings to pick to clone for sell similars (to have the shipping mostly already close to right), and the promo notes just in case eBay billing ever tries to hose me and charge for promo listings after the fact (may quit doing that as it's never happened and takes up valuable note field real estate)

The notes have to be purged every once in a while as the field is limited, and eBay keeps reducing it too. This one was trimmed (bunch of date and notes replaced with ...)
3#SP/PS/PM L8/31/17...$↓10/5/18 | R10/31 │ R 11/30 │ R12/31 │ R1/31/19 │ 2/16$↓

Keeping the original listing date let's me know at a glance how long ti's been listed and relisted.
(the vertical bars │ are alt-179,  ↑ is alt-24  ↓ is alt-25 on the keyboard number keypad. using a comma with no spaces instead of the  space│space I use saves even more characters, but harder to read at a glance)

If you update the field just before relisting, a record is saved in the unsold item, and in the relisted item.

[mam98031]

Don't relist listings unless you want the views, sales and watchers to follow the listing.  It is good to use relist when you have some watchers on the original listing and you want them to get notified of the new listing.

Use Sell Similar if you want to create a new / fresh listing with no views, sales or watchers to follow the listing.