Unless you pay to promote your listings you're not going to get viewed or sold. PERIOD

[4-peepsandpaws]

Some time ago I stopped listing much on eBay because I wasn't getting views or sales.  I didn't know anything about this promoted listing stuff except I glanced once and they wanted some ridiculous amount, like 7%, before I even posted the listing so I just ignored it.

Recently I started to list a few items again and after many weeks and months of getting no views and chatting endlessly with eBay Representatives about why I'm getting no views, I'm still getting no views and no sales.  

I paid to promote a couple of items just to see what would happen and I got a couple of views and I mean literally one to two views...

This pay to promote makes NO sense!  If a buyer is looking for an item it should pop up, PERIOD!  I have had other people go looking for my listings and they cannot find them!   

eBay should just come out and call it what it is.  Either you pay the fee or your listings aren't going to get viewed.  PERIOD.  eBay just needs to advise that they have changed their selling platform and that unless you "pay to promote", as they call it, just forgeddaboudit.  

[mam98031]

You sold items show you have had a dozen or so sales so far this month.  I understand that you would like to have more, that is pretty normal.  But you said you haven't had sales for quite awhile.

[paraquip]

Here is what my math looks like on a $100 Air rifle

Air rifle $100 free shipping

Item Fee $9.09 assuming $70 of the $100 with profit

Shipping cost $ 30...... so $ 3.90 fee   0% profit

Marketplace tax average  $ 8 so $1.03 fee there 0% profit

Total fees on the sale are $14.02 or $14.02% follow?

However if you look at the item fee only because the fees come out of your profit the selling fee is 20%

Ebay pushes you to do free shipping.......there is no profit in that....so the overall selling fee of 12.99% mathematically lands all on the product you are selling.

HK

[mam98031]

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@paraquip wrote:

Here is what my math looks like on a $100 Air rifle

Air rifle $100 free shipping

Item Fee $9.09 assuming $70 of the $100 with profit

Shipping cost $ 30...... so $ 3.90 fee   0% profit

Marketplace tax average  $ 8 so $1.03 fee there 0% profit

Total fees on the sale are $14.02 or $14.02% follow?

However if you look at the item fee only because the fees come out of your profit the selling fee is 20%

Ebay pushes you to do free shipping.......there is no profit in that....so the overall selling fee of 12.99% mathematically lands all on the product you are selling.

HK

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Shipping is NOT a fee charged by Ebay.  It is a cost of sale like buying the product.  If you sold on another site you would have to pay for the shipping too.  You are mixing COGS [costs of sales] with Ebay selling Fees.  While our FVF do become a COGS, not everything that is consider COGS is an Ebay selling fee.

Your item was $100 for the product + $8 for sales tax = $108.00 x 12.9% = $13.93 in Ebay fees.  FYI you do NOT EVER only pay your FVF on the profit of any item sold on Ebay.  It is ALWAYS the amount sold for.  You also do not pay a FVF on listings that you do Free Shipping on.  Only on listings that you have separately stated shipping charges.   You stated "Item Fee $9.09 assuming $70 of the $100 with profit".  Ebay has no idea what your profit it and they charged your FVF on the full $100 as I stated above.

If you did state your shipping fees separately, then it would have been $138.00 X 12.9% = $17.80

Ebay doesn't "push" anyone to offer Free Shipping.  They certainly suggest it, but they suggest all kinds of things.  Sellers should be able to decide for themselves if they want to do that or not.  Free shipping has been proven to be a favorite by buyers.  You can Google it and find that out easily.  But in some categories Free Shipping works great and in others not so much.  You need to know your category and figure out what is best for you.

There should NOT be any profit in shipping.  You should recover your costs to include fees and shipping supplies, but sellers should not profit off of shipping.

[rfatlanta1]

I have noticed that "regular" items get little or no views but my more unique things sell. As a buyer, I refuse to use "Best Match" because I want to see everything by how I choose to see it, whether by ending soonest, nearest, etc. The collectors and people who are searching for something specific will find you. However, if you are listing things like a pair of jeans, a puzzle, a DVD, or a tool, you will be buried. I don't like it either and I won't pay to promote. As a result, I have listed a lot less items and am now looking at other sites. 

[mam98031]

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@rfatlanta1 wrote:

I have noticed that "regular" items get little or no views but my more unique things sell. As a buyer, I refuse to use "Best Match" because I want to see everything by how I choose to see it, whether by ending soonest, nearest, etc. The collectors and people who are searching for something specific will find you. However, if you are listing things like a pair of jeans, a puzzle, a DVD, or a tool, you will be buried. I don't like it either and I won't pay to promote. As a result, I have listed a lot less items and am now looking at other sites. 

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@rfatlanta1 

This is a very old thread.  But to your issue.  If it were true that sellers that didn't promote their listings don't get sales, then Ebay would surely fail.  Promoted listings is not the highest percentage of the listings on Ebay nor does it cause the most sales.

"The company’s Promoted Listing revenue is about $222 million. While shares repurchased as of Q1 2022 are $1.3 billion."

https://startupbonsai.com/ebay-statistics/

https://www.webretailer.com/marketing-advertising/ebay-promoted-listings/

[kh-phdan]

Hello Everyone,

Due to the age of the thread, it has been closed to further replies. Please feel free to start a new thread if you wish to continue to discuss this topic.

Thanks for understanding!