eBay

mod-designs4u · ‎04-22-2019

Come one, come all to eBay's new CANCEL-THON sale! Step right up and search for vintage items in your favorite categories or by using your favorite search parameters. What? There's very little or nothing to see? You bet. Sellers like myself have had to waste time CANCELLING many of our listings so the automatic renewal doesn't infringe on our monthly allotment. I've already had my monthly allotment eaten up since I forgot to manually cancel some GTC listings. Now, I won't be relisting anything new and refreshing until next month. Now, I've listed some of my items on other online sales platforms. Now, in addition to cancelling listings on the 29th day I'll be cancelling listings when my items sell on other online sales platforms.

Guess what you eBay "geniuses" who concocted the idea of forcing your sellers into GTC and "cancelling" the 30 day list option...your revenue will diminish as your online sales competitors get the sales commissions. And as for eBay's sellers who all peddle the same new widgets good luck with that! You all will eventually out-price yourselves into oblivion (assuming your eBay business activity involves earning a "profit"). Unless eBay reverses the forced GTC onto its sellers I don't see a future here. This is the thanks I get for selling on eBay for the last 20 years and weathering the long history of adverse decisions affecting the vintage and art marketplace. I suppose things could be worse...I could be invested in eBay stock! 🙂

jason_incognito · ‎04-23-2019

You have the exact same number of free listings now as you have previously.

I don't understand how you think that means there will be fewer things for me to see?

"Believe in something, even if it means sacrificing everything" Colin Kaepernick the new face of NIKE

mod-designs4u · ‎04-30-2019

Well stated!

mod-designs4u · ‎04-30-2019

Indeed! March was a horrible month for me and April was way better than last year. The month of March for "any year" has historically been a very good month (tax refunds = disposable income...the majority of tax refunds happen in March). I also will be engaging in another "cancel-thon" sale on the 29th day of some of my listings in May (no listings=no sales). If eBay were to simply "promote" we sellers engaged in the used, vintage, antiques and art business then I would consider opening a store (and pay the extra fees). I don't find it economically viable to spend the extra costs with a store at this time. As it stands, eBay promotes new stuff for which can be purchased anywhere and has left we "oddity sellers" to fend for ourselves. This phenomenon serves as evidence that eBay management lacks creativity and can only "mimic" other online sales platforms. My advice for eBay is to hire creative geniuses (they'd have to pay me enough to live in Northern California) and sway against the typical corporate hacks who have recently graduated from our inept university system.

mod-designs4u · ‎04-30-2019

I noticed that. My GTC listings maintained the hit and watch count after the automatic relist. A typical sales strategy involves the "urgency" of the sale (Salesmanship 101). I'm not sure how maintaining the hit and watch count will affect sales but I'm open this strategy. Thank you for bringing that up!

ekmadonna · ‎04-30-2019

at least your GTC are rolling over mine have been getting stuck and NOT rolling over, on top of the fact that sales have tanked since this policy change now I have to woory about this major headache and make sure listings do not disappear or renew at a later date with duplicate listings. I have 1500 items to keep track of and this new glitch is getting a little hairy!

auctionpet · ‎04-30-2019

So you object to the auto renewal due to the fee, yet your paying to list the exact same item at the same time on another site! So your already paying twice to sell an item you have only 1 of. It's risky to have things listed on multiple sites at the same time, unless it's a multi quantity item.

You act like your the ONLY one being affected by policies with this statement "This is the thanks I get for selling on eBay for the last 20 years and weathering the long history of adverse decisions affecting the vintage and art marketplace." Ebay policies affect ALL sellers! Yes, it's a PITA to have to manually cancel items, but you are NOT the only one dealing with it.

mod-designs4u · ‎04-30-2019

If the web link with the other search engines (whether it's Goggle or some other 3rd party "special interest" link) connects an expired eBay listing it should also allow the searcher to view the "relisted" item (whether or not the web searcher does this is open to speculation). You do have a point...the automatic relist with GTC would convert expired listings into current listings provided that the seller hasn't cancelled the GTC listings to conform with their monthly allotment. The next question is how accurate and timely will Google and other 3rd party "special interest" links be relevant to the current listings. Great point!

mod-designs4u · ‎04-30-2019

I trust by your response that GTC is working for you and that's okay. What is your argument for forcing GTC on other sellers?

mod-designs4u · ‎04-30-2019

eBay has qualified Darwin's "Theory of the Fittest" theory and I understand your frustration. I'm not paying any listing fees with eBay as I only use my free 50 listings per month plus any additional free-cost allotments per month. My like-kind listings on other websites are free or cost very little (as it relates to eBay's FVF fee with the shipping cost). I've already sold some items on these other websites and have had to cancel my eBay listings (for which I would have gladly paid for the FVF including shipping). I don't understand your argument that "it's risky" to have things offered for sale on multiple sales platforms. I realize I'm not the only seller dealing with this adverse decision which is why I posted this comment in the first place.

equid0x · ‎05-01-2019

@pargran3 wrote:
Humm. You don't make anything on a 3 dollar item anyway.
It is amazing how many sellers are shooting themselves in the foot with this policy change.
It really is not that big a deal.
If you must end listings at 29 days to avoid selling anything because you might have a 15 cent (or whatever) insertion fee if it rolls over just check mark ending soon in your actives. Click delete.
I will admit it is slightly different with a store, especially with one of a kind items that may not be seen by a buyer immediately, but not much different. I use GTC. Have since it was available. Easy peasy to monitor.

Radine

All things considered.. the fees do add up when you have a lot of listings. I think what many are saying about rotating stock definitely has merit. Sometimes when something doesn't sell in 30 days... give it a rest... put it back up in a few months or at a time of year where it better matches a seasonal purchase and you'll make a sale.

I normally run an item for 90 days and if it doesn't sell I'll pull it down. If its cheap junk I may throw it out or donate it or put it to use in the house. If its something more expensive I may sit on it a while and then put it back up for sale. You'd be surprised how many things you thought were unsalable suddenly find a buyer the second time around.

This is all part of the game, but now ebay wants you to pay to play indefinitely.

equid0x · ‎05-01-2019

@sweetpieces4you wrote:
I agree with you !! But these people seem to rely on the last day or two of a 30 day listing to sell whatever it is they sell !! Or they want to list their items for 5 or 7 days . I understand the choices are gone. But if what they are selling is not worth buying it don't make a hill of beans how they are listed or for how long !! And I have looked at many,many listed items people are selling . I have seen some very nice items to lets say undesirable items at least for me personally !! To each his/her own in what they sell !!! If the GTC doesn't work out money wise for EBAY it will be reverted back to the way it was !! My Opinion / Money Talks !! Good Luck

Meh.. I've had stuff that I've sat on for a year or two before I found a buyer. When I did find that buyer, it was high dollar and high profit. There is more than one way to play this game. Some of us are in it for the short game and some of us are in it for the long game.

Just because the seller's business strategy isn't YOUR business strategy doesn't mean that the strategy does not have merit.

There are people who overprice items and just sit around and wait until all the lower priced sellers run out of stock. *boom* make a high profit sale. If you can afford to play the long game the returns are going to be higher. That's how this works. Its just one of the ways to business here....

equid0x · ‎05-01-2019

@mod-designs4u wrote:
Indeed! March was a horrible month for me and April was way better than last year. The month of March for "any year" has historically been a very good month (tax refunds = disposable income...the majority of tax refunds happen in March). I also will be engaging in another "cancel-thon" sale on the 29th day of some of my listings in May (no listings=no sales). If eBay were to simply "promote" we sellers engaged in the used, vintage, antiques and art business then I would consider opening a store (and pay the extra fees). I don't find it economically viable to spend the extra costs with a store at this time. As it stands, eBay promotes new stuff for which can be purchased anywhere and has left we "oddity sellers" to fend for ourselves. This phenomenon serves as evidence that eBay management lacks creativity and can only "mimic" other online sales platforms. My advice for eBay is to hire creative geniuses (they'd have to pay me enough to live in Northern California) and sway against the typical corporate hacks who have recently graduated from our inept university system.

All things considered... oddities sellers whether online or B&M have always been on their own. I do agree that eBay may have a potentially untapped market here, though. Oddities tend to sell for higher margins than the day-to-day common stuff.

yseaton71 · ‎05-01-2019

Thank you

equid0x · ‎05-01-2019

@auctionpet wrote:
So you object to the auto renewal due to the fee, yet your paying to list the exact same item at the same time on another site! So your already paying twice to sell an item you have only 1 of. It's risky to have things listed on multiple sites at the same time, unless it's a multi quantity item.

You act like your the ONLY one being affected by policies with this statement "This is the thanks I get for selling on eBay for the last 20 years and weathering the long history of adverse decisions affecting the vintage and art marketplace." Ebay policies affect ALL sellers! Yes, it's a PITA to have to manually cancel items, but you are NOT the only one dealing with it.

I'm not the poster but I would point out that I don't pay anything to list anywhere else I sell (multiple venues). I only pay when I actually make a sale.

I think this is one of the reasons that sellers get so bent out of shape about eBay's policies because we are already paying to have the listings seen. You can't make as many complaints about the visibility policies of other venues because it doesn't actually cost anything to get an item seen.

Maybe its time for eBay to update its business model to the year 2019 and let all the listings be free like they are everywhere else. Its called competition.

eBay is suffering from Machiavellian syndrome where it thinks its still the market maker when, in fact, its being out-competed by virtually every other venue and has been for quite some time.

The fees are higher on places like the river but I actually make more money there because the market there generally demands higher prices and the shipping gets subsidized.

Here I get penalized on my shipping for making a sale with the FVF. I'm not saying eBay is a bad company but in many ways they need to start getting with the program. They keep instituting new fees for sellers because their revenues are declining without recognizing or making any changes that will allow them to keep or increase their revenues in the first place without making changes that harm sellers.

This place is really starting to stink of Sears and JC Penney.... outdated business model... refuse to update... the clock is ticking. The market has moved on. eBay needs to take a good hard look at whether it wants to be in the market in another 5 or 10 years because if they don't make the necessary changes they are going to be relegated to internet sales history.