The New Listing Tool - some reasons it's slower

[mr_lincoln]

I have been using the new tool for months and just finished a week of over 100 new listings.  Most of those were from my Templates ... but even with a lot of prefilled Item specifics and other settings the new tool on average takes 3 minutes longer than the previous Business Listing tool.

Some things I notice that slow the task down are the screen jump (happens on both Firefox and Edge browsers) and the Item specific layout and screen updating.

-SCREEN JUMP ISSUE:  When I copy the Title from the Title line to paste it int he Description window I move my cursor down the page and right click to paste.  This when the screen jumps and dumps me at the bottom of the listing tool.   Sometimes when I scroll back up it does it a second time before I can execute the paste function.

-ITEM SPECIFICS AREA:  This area is clearly designed for a mobile device because it is no longer in two columns, and each line has a set number of characters moving left to right.  When a line exceeds that count the last item "wraps" down to the next line.  This is common for the "Show all" pull down menu shown in the first pic below.  Currently they have it programmed to be at the end of the string of suggestions the AI program presents to sellers for consideration.  These will actually change at times depending on what is entered UP the tool.  Most suggestions seldom apply so typing winds up being required.

A better location for the Show all balloon would be at the beginning of each line where it applies, see pic below.  This would maintain page layout consistently and Sellers would be able to locate it quickly since it won't move around.

The next issue is how info is entered in some Item Specific fields.  There appear to be two approaches when typing is required.  One is to type what you want and then click anywhere on the tool to move to the next item.  The data you typed is recorded.  The other method is to type your info and the tool requires you to click a small "+" sign by the date below the typing field ... and if you forget to click that and move on the info is NOT recorded.  These two pics illustrate this:

Generally the "Show all" balloons have pull down menus with info in alphabetical order ...but you have to scroll down the list to find what you want.  Some of those lists do not have what you want so typing winds up being the preferred method of data entry.

Some items like MPN and UPC used to be in convenient and prominent locations at the top of the tool .... now, depending on your item they are seemingly buried in the list of Item Specifics on the left OR in the case of the UPC they have to be accessed by expanding the item specifics displayed on the screen ... 

The font and size are small and thin so for me I have to look hard despite needing corrective lenses. 

So using the tool requires more pointing, clicking and scrolling then the previous Business Listing tool and the process strings out listing time.  

The picture uploading places the pics in the grid quickly but when Editing images it is a slow process at times.   And sometimes the pics do not upload.  With regard to image size I know eBay allows up to 7 MB per pic ... personally I think that's overkill and 3 to 4 MB would be plenty.  That change alone would allow the venue to process a whole lot less data and some pages might work faster.

As a side comment:  If the Category is changed the tool resets and you basically have to start all over. 

[mr_lincoln]

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@siamjane8 wrote:

Mr L- I did not take a screen shot but i tried to recreate what you were doing.....what a hassle to switch between auction and gtc BIN!    I actually have to click on the BIN toggle to turn it off BEFORE i can click on the auction toggle to activate.... what a mess of extra clicks and bad design.

Althought to deactivate immed payment you should just have to to payments section then click edit all then click immed payments- then click the toggle to turn it off.  only 3 extra popups and clicks to do what should be 100% automated for an auction- auctions do not allow immed payment so how in the world does the lister have it auto checked on?  I guess its just another missed programming/design flaw.

Ive been trying to list today and its dumping my pics every third listing.  whole page goes white and reloads with no information- frustrating....... cant even imagine why GMV is down for 2nd quarter.

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@siamjane8   When the tool starts to reject ALL the pics I upload at one time I learned I had to go back and load ONE pic ... then another ONE pic ... then maybe 2 or 3 Pics before it learned how to do its job again ... 

[aeparts1]

You're forgetting the huge added bonus of being able to add videos to your listings, & the background cleanup tool in the pictures section.

Oh, wait, people report that videos don't load as they have to be approved & there is no one to do that, & the background cleanup doesn't work. I've tried the cleanup tool, it does half the background & makes the picture look like a pile of....... garbage.

The think I dislike most about eBaying is creating listings. It was bad enough when they axed Turbo Lister, but I could get by with the classic tool. I dread the day they force me into the new tool. I'm glad I was able to opt out after trying it for 1 week.

[siamjane8]

The problem with ebay runs deeper than just that but what you are describing is a huge problem. They have built the search engine around item specifics and weighted the algorithms far too heavily that way to the point of it ignoring the majority of the keywords in the search box.

    It has also given large sellers the free reign to spam the item specifics with thousands of key words which has only made the search more and more irrelevant.    Instead of search the 80 character title that really nobody can spam -we find searches for vintage chevy car parts result in search results of Ford parts that say "fits your chevy" lol... search is an ongoing disaster at ebay and i think it is tied to the item specifics and the promoted listings and who knows what else

[chapeau-noir]

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@mr_lincoln wrote:

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@chapeau-noir wrote:

I'm still having the disappearing first class shipping.  Still having the dumped seller item specifics so I have to add.them.back.each.time.

The rest I can live with, but I think the tool was easier in its first deployment.  Now it's just kludgy.

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@chapeau-noir   This is something I have seen too AND I think it "may" have something to with the weight or dimension entered in those fields in that section.  Several of my Templates have 1 or 2 LBS pre entered but occasionally I have an item that can ship for First Class ... several times I could not find /first Class on the pull down menu until the tool updated with the First Class weight entered ... if I can capture some screen shots of this I will ...

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@mr_lincoln 

@siamjane8 

In these cases I have no weight or dimensions selected, it's just a 'first class' shipping designation, and I change the price of shipping according to my own capped flat rate shipping scheme.  Yesterday I changed first class shipping to priority on an item, then reweighed the item and realised it could go first class after all.  When I tried to revert the shipping back to first class, the option was completely gone and not findable on the search. I had to use 'standard' and specify first class shipping in the listing description. 😖

I seldom use calculated shipping or enter dimensions.  It's like the various priority classes remain no matter what, but first class shipping disappears if I change anything in the shipping panel.

[siamjane8]

@chapeau-noir     interesting.... but a PITA for you.... its just a glitchy mess. I honestly cannot figure out for the life of me that we are even in this situation. This is not a startup company..... Its a multi billion dollar 25 year old "tech" company.

Did they literally just get rid of everybody that has a lick of sense and experience and are using college freshmen as part time designers?   The most basic functions of the site have been overlooked and its not like they are starting from ground zero- the stinking classic tool has been working fine for years- there is no excuse to have fumbled this up so bad. Its BASIC

[gurlcat]

Not about the slowness (I agree with all of that), but my little additional 2 cents: in photo editing, I miss the Magic Wand!  I've always found it to be hit-or-miss, roughly 50/50 "disaster" or "WOW" ..... but WOW was pretty awesome.  I have no use for 'Remove Background' as I already shoot with white backgrounds.  

[simply-the-best-for-you]

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@meme6253 wrote:

Question!, Kludgy???

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I'm not @chapeau-noir  but kludge means, bloated, inefficient, confusing, etc.   It's often used in IT & has been for decades.  Everyone has their own spelling of it, but here's the official wiki.   I don't 100% agree with this definition.  The workaround is not what's kludge, the product is kludge.   The workaround is usually referred to in IT, as a  "quick & dirty". 

Kludge

A kludge or kluge is a workaround or quick-and-dirty solution that is clumsy, inelegant, inefficient, difficult to extend and hard to maintain. This term is used in diverse fields such as computer science, aerospace engineering, Internet slang, evolutionary neuroscience, and government.  

[chapeau-noir]

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@siamjane8 wrote:

@chapeau-noir     interesting.... but a PITA for you.... its just a glitchy mess. I honestly cannot figure out for the life of me that we are even in this situation. This is not a startup company..... Its a multi billion dollar 25 year old "tech" company.

Did they literally just get rid of everybody that has a lick of sense and experience and are using college freshmen as part time designers?   The most basic functions of the site have been overlooked and its not like they are starting from ground zero- the stinking classic tool has been working fine for years- there is no excuse to have fumbled this up so bad. Its BASIC

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It was Wenig who kept wanting to call eBay a "tech company" - it's not, it's an ecommerce platform that uses tech because they all use tech.  I think Wenig wanted to feel like he was running with the "Big Dogs" - the *real* tech companies, given how ego-driven he seemed to be.  I recall seeing him begging for applause at the last eBay Open he attended.  😒

At any rate, the developers, etc., that eBay uses can only do what they're told to do, but there doesn't seem to be much continuity, documentation or anything else - Whitman used to brag that they 'coded on the fly' and never documented anything, so the legacy code is probably a mess.  They couldn't fix the shipping page because 'no one knew how', so had to write a new one, which was the usual rough beast until they finally got it to work.  I wonder if the listing tool is the same deal and why it's such a bodge.

[chapeau-noir]

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@simply-the-best-for-you wrote:

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@meme6253 wrote:

Question!, Kludgy???

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I'm not @chapeau-noir  but kludge means, bloated, inefficient, confusing, etc.   It's often used in IT & has been for decades.  Everyone has their own spelling of it, but here's the official wiki.   I don't 100% agree with this definition.  The workaround is not what's kludge, the product is kludge.   The workaround is usually referred to in IT, as a  "quick & dirty". 

Kludge

A kludge or kluge is a workaround or quick-and-dirty solution that is clumsy, inelegant, inefficient, difficult to extend and hard to maintain. This term is used in diverse fields such as computer science, aerospace engineering, Internet slang, evolutionary neuroscience, and government.  

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Also used in the home workshop and hillbilly technology.  Paired with "That'll buff right out."

[evry1nositswindy]

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@mr_lincoln wrote:

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@siamjane8 wrote:

   And for crying out loud- why does it not remember common selections like the classic lister did- I select immed payment required for EVERY listing , yet it does not keep that selected automatically.  I list unique items so everyone is different and not conducive to templates BUT the mundane things like payments are always the same-

PS- if you want us to have a cleaner less cluttered look- give us the option to shut off whole sections that we do not want to use- like the promote section- where is a toggle to hide that from view? it would be nice to not have to scroll over that every time.

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@siamjane8   Another good point on Immediate Payment required ... when creating a Fixed priced GTC Buy it now listing the Default setting is Immediate payment require is turned ON.  I know this because at times I will change a listing back and forth between Auction and GTC ... when going from GTC to Auction style if I do not delete the GTC Buy now price and simply enter the Auction starting bid when I go to list I get a red banner error message at the top of the tool (pic below) ... when this happens I have to scroll down and delete the BIN on the auction pricing section because the GTC Buy it now price gets put in the Auction format BIN field ... yep, that's what happens.  You see, on the tool's regular flow there is NO Immediate Payment required check box ... it does not exist.  If you are seeing it on your tool please take a screen shot because I do not have it on mine (and that's on two different browsers).  It DOES exist in the Bulk Editor.

Am I going NUTS or what?!?

                 

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^^

I was just opted into this mess this morning.  I was trying to change from auction to GTC on the sell similar screen.  I'm not seeing it.  Also not seeing immediate payment required.  Haven't tried making a new listing yet...more questions will probably follow! @mr_lincoln 

[mr_lincoln]

@evry1nositswindy 

-There is no Immediate payment required selection if the listing STARTS as a Fixed Price GTC.   The default is Immediate payment required is ON

-If you change from Auction to Fixed Price GTC you will get the error I posted 

-Below is a sequence of screen shots to change an existing Auction listing to GTC ... each pic has a different color arrow ... 

Green arrow - click there for the listing Format pop-up

Orange Arrow - UN click the Auction switch (note the Buy it now in the lower right circle, this is ONLY to add the BIN to an Auction).

Blue Arrow either click in the area to the right of the word Price or use the arrow over on the left, either will give you the next pop-up to enter your price.

Purple arrow - enter the price then click the Done in the upper right, you will go back one screen for other choices before clicking through completing the change.

[gurlcat]

Wait, when you say "I was just opted into this mess this morning" --do you mean you were involuntarily switched to using the new listing tool?  

So it actually BEGINS now? @mr_lincoln  do you know if they are already forcing people over, and if they're doing it to everyone at once or an incremental rollout, like with Managed Payments?  

[mr_lincoln]

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@gurlcat wrote:

Wait, when you say "I was just opted into this mess this morning" --do you mean you were involuntarily switched to using the new listing tool?  

So it actually BEGINS now? @mr_lincoln  do you know if they are already forcing people over, and if they're doing it to everyone at once or an incremental rollout, like with Managed Payments?  

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@gurlcat   They started to activate it on accounts a while ago and the Opt out function was available but it memory serves there was a note that in time the Opt out function would not be available.  Like most global site changes they have to do it in groups ... sort of like when we all got forced in to Managed Payments, they did that in groups.

I Opted out the first time it appeared on my account without hesitation and without bothering to look at it.  Earlier this year I intentionally Opted in to learn about it AND so I could answer questions about it AND possibly affect improvements through posting about it's issues.

I have no knowledge of eBay's time frame but I can tell you that more and more members are posting about it now which means Home Office is actively switching accounts over to it.

[evry1nositswindy]

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@gurlcat wrote:

Wait, when you say "I was just opted into this mess this morning" --do you mean you were involuntarily switched to using the new listing tool?  

So it actually BEGINS now? @mr_lincoln  do you know if they are already forcing people over, and if they're doing it to everyone at once or an incremental rollout, like with Managed Payments?  

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Yes.  This whole time I have been reading how horrible this new listing tool is and hadn't been forced into it yet.  When I hit sell similar, I could use the same old listing tool.  This morning, I hit sell similar, and got the new tool.  No option to opt our or return to the old listing tool.  Yes, it is that bad!  I don't even want to list.

A lot of wasted space on my desktop, SO many clicks. 

@mr_lincoln I had found the immediate payment required.  I was on an auction and didn't see it but did see it when I was doing a GTC.  I will use your diagram because I'm still not seeing how to change from auction to GTC.  Thanks for the help!

[gurlcat]

I wonder where/how Ebay advertises their job openings, and if the tech salaries might be sufficient to maybe entice EXPERIENCED EBAY SELLERS with coding skills to quit or scale down their business (or hire someone to take over the work) and get involved with site changes and fixes, with the eyes of someone who knows what it's actually like to have an item, set up a listing for it, pack and ship it, etc.    

Heck even when it comes to 'little' areas like determining pertinent Item Specifics with pertinent menu options, they could consult people who don't even have coding skills, just sellers with expertise in their categories.   As it stands, so many categories' IS's look like they were set up by people who knew absolutely nothing about them, like the clothing fabric types appear to have been sourced from a pre-mid-century sewing book or something (actually I'm a seamstress and I don't even know some of those words) lol!  And jewelry, omg, WHY am I required to type 'n/a' for a dozen IS's about precious gemstones for every 'fashion' piece, when Ebay's OWN definition of fashion jewelry is that it doesn't include any precious stones or metals?  Why can't selecting 'fashion' as opposed to 'fine' simply eliminate alllll those precious material IS fields???  

Funny thing is, they appear to base IS's importance on data from buyers' search habits, what filters they use more or less than others, but buyers can only use the choices that are THERE.  In things like clothing and jewelry there is (arguably) an overwhelming number of IS's for buyers to filter by, whereas (from what I hear) categories like stamps, postcards, antique glass/pottery etc. have an almost worthlessly low variety of filters.  

And considering the changes like that are meant to be the permanent 'new normal' and impact so many sellers and buyers, yet not really require all that much time to make the decisions about what to change/include, they could offer the work to expert category sellers on a short-term freelance basis!  Heck I would have told them about the precious gemstone thing for FREE if they'd asked me!  Look, I just did! ^    😖