eBay

tyler@ebay · ‎11-03-2021

Thanks for joining us for the Weekly Chat with eBay Staff. We don't have a specific topic this week, so feel free to share any general buying or selling questions you may have.

The chat thread will remain open until 2 PM PT at which point we'll close it from additional responses. After that time, we'll continue to work on responding to any queries that might still be unanswered.

To post your question, click Reply in the lower right corner of this post, type your question, and hit submit between 1-2 PM Pacific Time. The format of our chat mirrors the format of our Community Discussion Boards, where each post will appear in the thread chronologically. The Community Team will review each question as it comes in, and will quote the original question in our reply. This quote and the reply will appear later in the thread, so just keep scrolling down to see our answers.

Missed the chat? Send your questions to the podcast by calling 888-723-4630 or email us at podcast@ebay.com and maybe your questions will make it on the air! Or listen to past episodes while you wait for next Wednesday!

Tyler,

donsdetour · ‎11-03-2021

@neglus wrote:
I have had NO sales since Oct 31st! I typically sell 5-6 items/day in the postcard category. I am a top rated plus seller, 100% feedback with 1800 + listings. I have a premium store, promote my listings. I used item specifics before you required them. In other words, I have been a good little eBayer, and yet where are my sales? I would like some insight into what could be going on and what I can do to fix it. Thanks

Use odd times to list as this seems to aid the indexing.. Just some thing I have noticed.

Oh and you are not the only one, it is such a mess.... Just saying..

velvet@ebay · ‎11-03-2021

@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:

Still waiting for the stores team to launch the delayed newsletter prompt in the About tab, and the sale/promotions link in the "Banner" section. has the team provided you with an ETA for these features?

Sorry, @my-cottage-books-and-antiques, no ETA yet.

Velvet,

pjcdn2005 · ‎11-03-2021

Hi Tyler, this topic has come up a few times on the boards, especially since there has been quite a few new sellers from other countries who are starting to list on .com.

From the help pages..

When you offer international shipping in your listings, your items are automatically available to buyers outside the United States.

You can either offer international shipping or list directly on supported international sites. An additional international fee may apply.

Before you can sell internationally, you'll need to:

Have an eBay account in good standing
Have earned at least 10 feedback points as a seller
Have made your first successful sale more than 90 days ago
Post in an eligible category. Ineligible categories for international sales include Video Games, Movies & TV, Hunting knives, Auto parts, and Vehicles

https://www.ebay.com/help/selling/selling/selling-internationally?id=4132

Is that bolded part for all ebay sellers? If so, would that mean that an international seller who does not have an ebay site in their country and lists on .com is only allowed to sell to the US and their own country until they meet the above criteria? I’ve always found that ‘rule’ very confusing as it seems odd that ebay would say that someone in Sri Lanka can only sell to the US but not anywhere else until they have 10 seller feedback and have been selling for 90 days. Plus, I’ve never actually seen this rule enforced by ebay.

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Edit: A reply to your question can be found here.

neglus · ‎11-03-2021

So, in pursuit of trying to figure out why I am getting no sales, I attempted a mass edit of all of listings to bulk edit what I could in "item specifics" (I sell OOAK postcards so there isn't much bulk editing I can do). I was really puzzled when I was presented with this (see screen shot). It showed I had 1823 total listings but then only showed a total of 981 listings (between Topo, non-topo and trade card categories) ...where are the other 842 listings? Thanks for the helpEbay bulk edit screen shot Nov 2 2021

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Edit: A reply to your question can be found here

jasmen@ebay · ‎11-03-2021

@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:

Speaking of marketing, ebay recently make significant changes to our store home pages. This question is a two parter:

What does ebay intend to do to drive traffic to our store home pages?

What "best practices" would ebay recommend we use to drive traffic to our store home pages (from within ebay, I'm not talking about sellers using social media.)

Hey @my-cottage-books-and-antiques I'm not sure what the plans are but if any are presented to me I'm happy to share. Buyers on eBay usually are looking for specific items not necessarily stores, but the best way within eBay to promote your store is maybe adding something in your descriptions or emails to like your store.

That logo is found on your storefront, pointing customers there is your best bet outside of social media!

Jasmen,
Community Team

coffeebean832 · ‎11-03-2021

@mr_lincoln- I know this doesn't fix the bell issue- but if a notification is hanging on and annoying you- you can hover over it and click the X in the upper right and it will go away.

valueaddedresource · ‎11-03-2021

In the Fall seller update there were supposed to be some new features coming for the Listing Quality Report "this month" (which would have been September). I'm not seeing any of these yet - any updated timeframe?

This month, the Listing Quality Report will be available to download in three formats:

A PDF “one-page summary”
An Excel “full report” with one tab per category
A CSV “raw data” file, to be exported for further analysis

In the past, you could see the analysis of your 10 categories with the most live listings. You’ll now be in control of which categories will show up in the report. You’ll also have the option to keep the existing analysis, using the top 10 categories with the most live listings.

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Edit: A reply to your question can be found here

tyler@ebay · ‎11-03-2021

@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:

We're a third of the way through Q4. I've made this suggestion many times, and am making it again: ebay should share its marketing plans---at least in general---with the seller base, and the Community would be a good place to do that.

At least one online competitor---run by a former ebay exec---has already launched Holiday videos. Will ebay be launching videos? Or just what marketing does ebay intend to do?

Hi @my-cottage-books-and-antiques - I don't disagree with you that it would be helpful and enlightening to learn more about broader marketing plans for the quarter. I don't have that insight, but I can point you to last month's Check-In (link here) for some commentary on Holiday.

I'll get your suggestion shared upward!

Tyler,

neglus · ‎11-03-2021

Not my first ride around the block jasmen. I have been selling here for 20 years. I know what is selling and I know what is normal for my listings and it's not jiving right now. Please look into this problem for me. All of the postcard sellers are reporting problems with sales since the recent category/storefront changes. Thanks.

tyler@ebay · ‎11-03-2021

@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:

In light of the invigorated "About" tab on the Stores Home page, will the About Me/Profile page be retired soon?

Great question @my-cottage-books-and-antiques - I haven't heard any rumors of deprecation of those pages, so I think for the time being they're here to stay.

Tyler,

casprrr · ‎11-03-2021

Another issue, which is an inconvenience rather than a serious problem, is that when I "sell similar", I lose all my item specifics and have to re-enter each one. The same thing happens if I merely update or modify the category of an existing listing. It's not like the material or manufacturer suddenly changed. Maybe there is a way to fix this? It sure would be helpful!

jasmen@ebay · ‎11-03-2021

@pjcdn2005 wrote:

Hi Tyler, this topic has come up a few times on the boards, especially since there has been quite a few new sellers from other countries who are starting to list on .com.

From the help pages..

When you offer international shipping in your listings, your items are automatically available to buyers outside the United States.

You can either offer international shipping or list directly on supported international sites. An additional international fee may apply.

Before you can sell internationally, you'll need to:

Have an eBay account in good standing

Have earned at least 10 feedback points as a seller

Have made your first successful sale more than 90 days ago

Post in an eligible category. Ineligible categories for international sales include Video Games, Movies & TV, Hunting knives, Auto parts, and Vehicles

https://www.ebay.com/help/selling/selling/selling-internationally?id=4132

Is that bolded part for all ebay sellers? If so, would that mean that an international seller who does not have an ebay site in their country and lists on .com is only allowed to sell to the US and their own country until they meet the above criteria? I’ve always found that ‘rule’ very confusing as it seems odd that ebay would say that someone in Sri Lanka can only sell to the US but not anywhere else until they have 10 seller feedback and have been selling for 90 days. Plus, I’ve never actually seen this rule enforced by ebay.

Hey there @pjcdn2005 thanks for bringing this up! The rules you stated are only specific to members listing on and that are registered on eBay.com. each site (.DE .CA . UK etc..) has their own set of rules. It all depends on what site a member registers on.

Jasmen,
Community Team

ittybitnot · ‎11-03-2021

Good afternoon!

I have a question as to WHEN a tracking number should be updated to the sale info. There seems to be some confusion regarding a policy that used to state that it must be updated PRIOR to any claim or dispute. Now the policy pages say the seller has three days AFTER a dispute is filed.

Here is the part in question:

Starting September 10, 2018, you will be required to upload tracking in the structured data field before the estimated delivery date has passed in order to appeal an "item not received" claim. eBay will not protect you from a claim if you send the tracking number to the buyer via email.

Without tracking information, eBay can't protect you because we won't be able to confirm your item was delivered. Tracking also benefits buyers by enabling them to track the status of their deliveries. We will also update the eBay Money Back Guarantee policy with the new guidelines.

Could you please explain why this is no longer part of the eBay policy, and generally when the requirement was removed? Perhaps I am missing something, but I can find no information or announcement regarding when or why the guidelines apparently have changed yet again.

If that policy were still enforced it would seemingly aid the numerous BUYERS that do not receive their products, file an INR, only to lose the case due to some fake tracking number being provided to show "delivered" even when the number originated prior to the buyer even making the purchase.

Thanks!

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Edit: A reply to your question can be found here.

tyler@ebay · ‎11-03-2021

@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:

I've been waiting for the Stores changes to redo my Store Categories, and now that we have the ability, it would be really, really nice if ebay would provide a tutorial as to the easiest way to revise store categories across an entire store. Any chance that is in the works? And maybe a tutorial about how to best use the new store features?

More store resources and how-tos are always a good idea. I will get this suggestion to the Seller School and Stores teams so they know there's interest!

Tyler,

velvet@ebay · ‎11-03-2021

@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:

Any time line for when video will be available? It would be nice to have that in this Q4... Also, if we get ebay hosted video, what happens to our existing links to YouTube videos?

Hi @my-cottage-books-and-antiques! We don't have a timeline or additional info to provide for eBay.com but appreciate the feedback about wanting it in Q4. In the meantime, you can go here to see an announcement made in the eBay.ca Community Announcements board. I hope this helps to give you some context for now!

Velvet,