@tunicaslot wrote:
@rdj831 wrote:
Consumer confidence is at its lowest point in almost two years. The trade war with China is spooking people into slowing their discretionary spending.
I'm seeing a 30% decrease in sales compared to last year from late May to today. I was up 25% for the year prior to then. Not anymore... This was averaged across all 3 selling platforms that I sell with. It's not just eBay.
Here's a news article for you to check it out:
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/25/us-consumer-confidence-june-2019.html
Most of us know that there are outside influences that affect sales and that we've always had to deal with. The problem is the site itself has many glitches due to new updates and the old glitches have not been rectified. Sellers - who were buyers - have also left the site to try their hand elsewhere and those that stayed have a hard time making purchases as they've had no sales - so no money to spend.
No offense - but I take every report form a news source from either side of the political spectrum with a grain of salt as they are both trying to push their agendas for the 2020 election.
Spending has been down across the board for many product types, that's true.
But let's be real, eBay customer and seller confidence is even lower than average these days. I can't recall the last time I heard any positive buyer stories off eBay, but I've heard a large number of horror stories, even as recent as the last couple weeks. Say what you want about Amazon and their shady acts, but you hear a lot more "good news" from buyers on Amazon than eBay.
Again, let's be real... often times buying from eBay is buying from Amazon anyway. As recent as Monday we ordered an item only to receive an Amazon package shipped from across the country from the originating zip code. If Amazon is functioning well enough that they're actually fulfilling eBay orders, there's an obvious problem.
Buyer experience is at an all-time low in the last ~15 years that I can think of. Not since the early days of eBay have I ran in to or seen so many issues with purchases.
What good news do we even have as buyers or sellers on eBay right now? Anything big that we should be excited about? Has the catalog or AI backed search actually helped sellers? Or buyers? The statistics say no. And apparently, the AI is leading everyone to China sellers anyway.
Their crack down on China dropshippers isn't even working. There's more than ever since the Spring update.
I don't make claims against eBay without sufficient information to back it up, and I've provided eBay with the same information. You can't completely blame eBay, this is true. But you can sure blame most of it, because they're sticking to their path even despite statistics showing things are NOT working well!
People doubted it was the case since last year, and I understand that. It's safe to be sceptical without seeing things yourself. But out of all the issues I've warned sellers about, or brought to eBay's attention personally as a problem... how many of them were actually addressed?
I posted extensively all the way from last summer until the beginning of this year about the inevitable decline based on the direction the graphs were going, and that the design was unsustainable. Then we got evidence with the Top Seller Market Share plummeting.
I posted that the decline wasn't stopping and they won't be able to hide it from the stock reports in October of last year. Then we got the evidence in their stock reports that it did indeed happen.
Most recently I warned people before GTC happened. I let them know that before 30 days are even up you'll see an immediate change in traffic, because 7-30 day listings ignored the algorithms, and GTC is exposed to broken algorithms. I've been sharing the evidence of this for a year, actually. People didn't believe me, then it happened.
Then once it was happening, people still doubted. They said "GTC hasn't made a difference yet, it hasn't even been 30 days!". Then 30 days passed, and it got even worse. Not a surprise, this is the trend that has been going on.
This isn't hearsay. There's clear signs of decline, and with a large enough sample set of data and sales information, it's very obvious.
The customer confidence in sales has led to a much smaller decline than eBay is having right now. People don't realize how big 27% GMV value lost in 30 days actually is...
mam98031 • Volunteer Community Member • Buyer/Seller since 1999
