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"send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

HI 

 

Some of my listings are eligible for the send Watcher an Offer function and some show up as "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers"

 

They are all the same format; Buy it Now + Best Offer.

 

Has anyone worked out what the other criteria is? It would be great to know so I can make all my items for sale eligible.

 

Thanks

J

Message 1 of 23
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22 REPLIES 22

Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

eBay have put checks in place to ensure that buyers aren’t overwhelmed with multiple offers from different sellers so there’s no guarantee that you will be able to successfully make offers to every potential buyer watching your items.

 

As with all new eBay feature, it is being tested with a small group of sellers to test the experience for both buyers and sellers. If testing goes well, eBay plan to make the feature available to all sellers in the coming months, although of course it might be tweaked before being rolled out.

 

Here is a link to the article  -  Click Here

 

Note the article is from the fall 2018 when this feature was in testing, things might be different now?

 

Good Luck Selling!

Message 2 of 23
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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

Very good question.

I can provide only one possible data point based on observation: It appears that a watcher must be watching the item for a certain amount of time (48 hours maybe?) before I can make them an offer.
Message 3 of 23
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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

Personally, I think this is just as stupid as most of eBay's ideas have been recently--like buyers need to be pestered any more than they already are here--endless emails, notifications, and constant reminders already of what you are watching, looked at, thought about, etc. 

 

What could possibly be the benefit here for the buyer? Obviously, a seller who has "Best Offer" on their listing is open to offers --or is willing to negotiate (unless, of course eBay has added "Best Offer" without the seller's knowledge or consent)--and buyers certainly don't have any issues asking me to negotiate (even if I DON'T have "Best Offer" on my listings).  If a buyer is really interested, I am quite sure they can click a few buttons on their own, and make the purchase happen.  I mean really--how ignorant does eBay think we are? Don't answer that.....

 

I was looking at something recently, and I put it on my watch list as a possible Mother's Day gift, as they had a lot of them, and I obviously don't need to purchase a gift right now.  I was then sent an offer every couple of days--always for the same amount--a whopping ONE dollar off, as if that is going to make me hurry up and buy. I ended up getting so annoyed, that I instead took the item off my watch list. 

 

I don't appreciate being "reminded" into buying--I am perfectly capable of making offers, negotiating, and reminding myself what I am interested in purchasing. Furthermore, the fact that they were sending out the same old boring offer over and over really wasn't enticing--not only was it irritating, but it also gave me nightmares of every seller sending offers on every item I am watching, every week--what a message-clogging mess. 

 

This site can't keep our unsold listings available for us for over what--60 days? They evidently can't show everyone's listings in a search, as they are constantly showing only a handful of items, and leaving the other 90% of items invisible to buyers. Yet they have enough memory space to seriously entertain sending millions more messages? Wow--this is what we gain from losing so many other great features? 

 

I really wish people would stop jumping on board with whatever eBay throws at them--ever notice how all these "great" ideas are only good in the short term? However, when applied site wide or for any length of time they quickly turn into at best, a nuisance, and at worst--a nightmare. Stupid idea--from some stupid corporate shirt--who has probably never bought OR sold on here.  And those of you who are looking forward to using this idiotic feature--be prepared to lose more sales than you ever get--because as soon as everyone starts doing this, it will get old real fast--just like every other stupid, visionless, short-term, jump-through-our-hoops, idea that eBay has had the last two years. 

Message 4 of 23
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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

I've sold lost more this month with this feature, selling laptops and I offer the watcher a £10 discount, 1 in 4 offers turns into a sale so it's worth doing

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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?


@mczombies wrote:

Personally, I think this is just as stupid as most of eBay's ideas have been recently--like buyers need to be pestered any more than they already are here--endless emails, notifications, and constant reminders already of what you are watching, looked at, thought about, etc. 


I disagree. As a buyer who watches many items a week I would gladly accept many of the offers assuming the offer was good enough for my price range. From my experience those who have items "overpriced" has the most watchers on almost all items on Ebay. If those same people sent offers of reasonable asking prices they would actually sell things instead of them sitting for months with watchers.

Message 6 of 23
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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

And if a buyer wants it cheaper, all they need do is put it on their watch list. I HATE it. Ebay reputation will be that of a $2 Shop.
Message 7 of 23
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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

I like this feature, and I do not have "make offer" buttons on my listings because it's a PITA to deal with a lot of them.

 

But, when I have time and can send an offer out, it seems like good business

 

EXCEPT....

 

I have items with 15+ watchers, yet when I click through to send the offers, sometimes it says I'm only sending to "2 eligible buyers" - what about the other watchers?

 

If I can't target all the watchers, it is, once again, a waste of time as I don't know until I hit the button how many of the watchers I'll reach.

 

Really bad decision on eBay's part to reduce my/their opportunities.

Message 8 of 23
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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

Watcher's who have opted out to receiving marketing emails from eBay are not eligible to receive a offer.  My understanding as well is that once an offer is sent, that buyer is no longer eligible to receive another offer.  That's why the eligible offer count can decrease while the watcher count stays the same.  eBay doesn't want sellers to send watchers offers over and over again.  This was relayed in the send offers workshop at eBay Open.  First offer to your watchers should be a good enough offer to entice them.  I believe a lot of our watchers are competitors tracking our pricing.  We do the same, so that's understandable. 

Message 9 of 23
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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

Other buyers have opted out of spam. 

 

I think its a bad decision for ebay to allow sellers to spam watchers. Thank god we can opt out.

Message 10 of 23
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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

I’ve sold 3 higher priced items using Send Offer in the last few weeks.

 

It only works on a small proportion of watchers though, and works best with a significant discount.

Message 11 of 23
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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

I do the same. None of my listings have a best offer so when something is eligible to send an offer to and it hasn't sold in a while, I will send an good offer. If you only take a tiny amount off, buyers will not buy the item. This isn't that bad of a feature because I don't use best offer so sending the buyer an offer makes sense because they can't otherwise do this.

Message 12 of 23
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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

I hadn't realized about the opt-out feature, which makes sense.

 

That explains why some watchers have contacted me post-sale, piled off, knowing the item they were watching was sold to someone else for less than the asking price.

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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?


@this*old*attic wrote:

I’ve sold 3 higher priced items using Send Offer in the last few weeks.

 

It only works on a small proportion of watchers though, and works best with a significant discount.


I do offers. Anyone who knows the coin business knows that at trade shows there's a lot of haggling going on. Dealers trying to make a buck, buyers trying to save a buck. The send offer and best offer features have brought this concept to eBay's coin selling platform.

 

How good an offer I do depends on a few things... how much I discounted it for being listed for a long time, how badly I want to get rid of it,  how much I overpriced it for immediate listing (and failed to sell it just the same). A small offer from me is 10%, a big offer is 25%. I don't think I usually offer more than that.

 

I think I get around 1 in 5 acceptance an when I look at my selling history, how half of my items are selling through the send offer feature.

 

I do have make offer on more expensive things ($20 and up), but I don't want to haggle about pennies, so I don't bother using best offer on small priced items, but I will send an offer with a lower price if I have the opportunity.

 

C.

Message 14 of 23
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Re: "send watcher offer Not eligible to send offers" What makes it eligible?

I have similar issue. In my case, when I send the offer, eBay tells me the item is invalid !?

 

I went back 10 minutes later, and now I do not have the possibility to send an offer anymore!

 

Weird behavior and no help or explanation on why item is invalid or why the option of sending offer suddenly disappear.

 

 

 

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