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This week we dive into what listing practices are most likely to result in Google Shopping rejecting your fixed price listing. Brian and Griff answer your questions about Time Away, Best Offers, and the IRS form 1099-K.

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Episode Links:
Google Shopping Title Guidelines
Google Shopping Description Guidelines
Google Shopping Image Guidelines
Google Shopping Image Guidelines Video
Using a Cash Back Card for eBay Labels
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Brian: I'm Brian.

Griff: And I'm Griff. This is the eBay for Business Podcast, your source for the information and the inspiration to help you start, manage and grow your business on the world's most powerful marketplace. And this is episode 221. Joining us this week of course, how could I do the show without him? Our dear friend, Brian. Hi Brian.

Brian: Hey, Griff. It's great to be here. Happy Friday.

Griff: Happy Friday. Getting towards the end of the year.

Brian: It is. It's coming up quick, although I'm looking forward to like the 20th 21st. Why? Because then the days start getting longer again.

Griff: Yeah, that's true. And it's a six month journey to the longest day.

Brian: Yes. It makes me optimistic that I've made it through another year when that starts getting longer.

Griff: What's your week been like?

Brian: Actually, you know, I got a really good email from a seller who I met at eBay Open in Los Angeles. Dean sent me a question about in his views. He's seeing page view zero, watchers one. Mm-hmm. And he said, how can that be? So he first looked because page view says last 30 days, and he goes, wait a minute. The watcher happened within the last 30 days. They must have looked at the item, correct? I told Dean, it's possible for someone to be watching an item for two reasons without a page view. The first is we only do show page views for the 30 days. So if the watcher happened before the 30 days, it's possible to have zero page views with a watcher.

Griff: We don't reset watchers.

Brian: Correct. Right. And then the other time that it can occur is if someone does a search, they get the list of all the items. There's a little heart in the right hand corner.

Griff: I know it well.

Brian: Someone just clicks on that heart. They've become a watcher for that item without actually viewing the item. And so a really good question, and I'm sure he's not the only one of our listeners or sellers who come across that and see that and think that's a little odd.

Griff: Yeah. A lot of our sellers don't actually spend a lot of time buying on eBay so they're not aware that you can watch the item by clicking that little heart. I'm a buyer, so I know all about clicking hearts. Yes. Trust me, I've been clicking hearts since I was 13. ,

Brian: And I'm sure others have been clicking your heart.

Griff: With little success I may add. Yeah. Well that's a great one.

Brian: It was. Who's our guest this week? Griff?

Griff: This week's guests are me and you.

Brian: You and me?

Griff: Yeah. Me and you. And Google Shopping.

Brian: Google Shopping?

Griff: Yes Brian. Google Shopping, though many shoppers online start their searches on eBay. On eBay. There are many more that start on Google. So making sure that your eBay listings appear in Google, specifically Google Shopping as opposed to what's called Google Natural Search is super important if you wanna increase your listings visibility. But there is a lot of confusion about Google's policies and best practices. So I spent a few days last week and I really spent like all day doing this exploring and testing various practices so we can better determine what is and isn't a best practice. And I wanna share what I found because some of it's pretty interesting. So the topic this week is Google Shopping.

Brian: Oh, that's great. But you didn't include me in the research, so...

Brian: Well, Ryan, you're a busy guy, so I didn't wanna impose on you and I did all the footwork for you. And all you have to do this week, and I know you can do it, is just follow the script. couldn't be easier!

Brian: We'll see, I'm just thinking now to my horror flashback from two weeks ago.

Griff: Oh no, you'll be fine. . In the meantime, I have a sneaking suspicion there's still no eBay news to report this week.

Brian: You must be a mind reader because there is in fact no news again for the fourth week in a row.

Griff: Well, I'm kind of sorry to hear that, I guess, but I do in fact myself, have a small bit of news and I can't wait to share it.

Brian: Really. And what would that be?

Griff: Well, just listen. Hey Brian.

Brian: Hey Griff.

Griff: Many listeners to this podcast consider you and I to be the ultimate eBay experts.

Brian: Really?

Griff: Mm-hmm. .

Brian: I think they're talking about you Griff, not me.

Griff: No, no, no, no. They include you as well. Always.

Brian: But you're the real expert.

Griff: I'm not as expert as you might think, Brian. eBay is an exciting and effective platform for starting an online business. We all know that. But there's no getting around the fact that it can be very complicated.

Brian: It is, with all the tools, features, services, and policies. But you always have the answers. So I've always assumed that you have all that info stored in your noggin.

Griff: Oh Brian, please. There's simply no way that my old and frail brain could hold all that information. That's why eBay's Help Pages are my daily go-to when looking for answers to seller questions.

Brian: Ah. But anyone can visit the eBay Help Pages to find answers to their questions. Mm-hmm. , are you trying to make our podcast irrelevant?

Griff: Absolutely not. So many sellers actually don't use the Help Pages to find answers to their questions. And I thought we should tell them about it, cuz it would be a disservice to all sellers if we didn't encourage them to use them.

Brian: And it's so easy to do. Mm-hmm. Just click Help and Contact at the top of any eBay page, then search by category or enter a keyword that relates to your query. Scroll through the return page titles and click the one that matches your question.

Griff: Exactly! The Help Pages should be your first choice. When you have a question, why not try it right now and see for yourself.

Brian: eBay's Help and Contact Pages, a mother load of eBay knowledge at your fingertips!

Griff: . Well Brian, that was our first ESA or eBay Service Ad. What did you think?

Brian: I like it. Will there be more?

Griff: Oh yes, of course. Many more. I'm gonna build a whole library of them. We'll have several in rotation over the coming months and we'll be using them to highlight and remind listeners of features, tools and services and policies that can help us sellers business on eBay.

Brian: I like it. So kind of eBay commercials.

Griff: Yeah, eBay commercials. But short and sweet. No more than two minutes. And totally eBay selling related.

Brian: And in the meantime, onto this week's topic.

Griff: Yes. Our guest this week is a website. It's called Google Shopping. Shopping. Let's explain what it is first and how it matters to an eBay seller. Google Shopping is a Google service that provides a sort of aggregate platform for any business's inventory. That business simply sends their inventory to Google through a special process and then Google displays it in shopping.

Brian: So not like natural search.

Griff: Not like natural search in that that picks up other websites. And there's a good reason a business might want to do this because millions of shoppers every day start their shopping searches on Google Shopping. So appearing and shopping well that can make the difference between a success and a failure for many businesses.

Brian: So how does it work?

Griff: You know, it's pretty straightforward. A business has to actively send their inventory to Google Shopping and they have to do so in a specific format. And there are specific guidelines that this inventory has to meet in order to be included in the Google Shopping searches.

Brian: Sounds complicated, Griff.

Griff: And it can be, but again, I have to stress this, the potential benefits in the way of buyer exposure are huge. So it's worth it to learn how to set your business up and send your inventory to Google Shopping.

Brian: If you're a seller on a marketplace like eBay, still?

Griff: Yeah, it's even more straightforward because the eBay seller doesn't have to send their inventory to Google Shopping themselves. Ah, the marketplace sends your listings to Google on your behalf. But I suspected you knew that.

Brian: I did. And it's not really possible for a marketplace seller to send their inventory to Google Shopping.

Griff: That's correct. It wasn't always the case. Some may remember years ago, prior to Google shopping that there was this service they had called Google Base. It was Google's early attempt at creating a type of marketplace search engine that aggregated all of the inventory across the internet. eBay sellers back then did have to send their inventory feed to Google Base manually.

Brian: I bet that wasn't easy to do either.

Griff: Yeah, it wasn't. I never did it myself. But I was in contact with sellers that did use it. Beth, if you're listening and over time Google transformed Google Base into what we now know today as Google Shopping.

Brian: How does it work today for an eBay seller?

Griff: Well, every evening, and it's true, it's every evening, eBay automatically feeds the site's entire inventory of live fixed price listings to Google Shopping. And it's a lot of listings, correct me if I'm wrong, it's over a billion right now.

Brian: Over a billion.

Griff: Yeah. So that's a billion Li . It's like McDonald's over a billion listings sent, right? Yeah. And we do that every night.

Brian: So it's an automatic feature for eBay sellers. They don't have to do anything to be included.

Griff: They don't. But here's the rub. Even though eBay sends every fixed price listening to Google Shopping, that doesn't guarantee that every fixed price listing will show up in Google Shopping.

Brian: Aha. Mm-hmm.

Griff: Google uses an algorithm, wouldn't you know it? Based on a set of guidelines to determine which listings will and which listings won't appear in Google Shopping search. That is, they get blocked.

Brian: And like any company, eBay, Google does not reveal the inner workings of the Google Shopping algorithm

Griff: Spot on. And their shareholders would have a riot if they did. But Google does provide some guidance on what is and isn't acceptable. But the actual gating mechanism itself for that algorithm that allows or blocks a listing from eBay's daily feed of billions over a billion listings to Google Shopping can sometimes seem like a mystery.

Brian: And they change over time.

Griff: They do. And in fact, during my research last week, I discovered that some of their merchant help pages have definitely changed since the last time I looked at them. And that was maybe two years ago. So this week I wanted to share what I learned about Google Shopping to help sellers understand it better.

Brian: And can we share the links to those Google help pages?

Griff: We will. I'll put them in the summary overview for this episode. But first let me point out that if your listings follow the eBay best practices for search optimization, they are almost always guaranteed to show up in Google Shopping.

Brian: And it's probably why we have them, the search optimization listings written that way. But they are our best practices and they can be found in our wait for it help pages.

Griff: Oh, an ESA! I feel the one coming on. No, we already did it. Just search help on Best match and the page that first shows up is titled Optimizing Your Listings for Best Match. Read that those best practices are still applicable today,

Brian: But that's for best match. Are the same practices for best match also the best practices for Google Shopping?

Griff: Well coincidentally they are, but there are important details we have to point out. So let's start off with a few examples I combed from my research. Now my first example here is a listing, and I'm gonna keep it anonymous because I don't want to call out any seller, but it's for a fragrance that some of you may remember if you were clubbing in the eighties, cuz you smelled it everywhere. It's called Drakkar Noir. I searched for a bunch of them and I found one listing and then I went and searched for it on Google Shopping. And this listing for Drakkar Noir did not appear in Google Shopping. And at first I couldn't figure out why because when I looked at it, it had all the right items specifics, there were no title issues. In fact, the title says Drakkar Noir by Guy Laroche, 3.4 ounce spray for men new inbox.

Brian: That's with two Ks. For those of you who are unfamiliar of the with this, like I was.

Griff: Drakkar is with two. Exactly. And the first photo, it wasn't the best, but it certainly wasn't the worst. I mean I've seen worse photos on Google Shopping. So I was stumped. I really was stumped. But then I looked a little deeper and...

Brian: It's not the best photo but..

Griff: No, no, no. I know it's, I have a photo here.

Brian: But I'm trying to look at it now and see if I can figure out why. Oh, I know why.

Griff: You do?

Brian: Well I think I know why.

Griff: Why?

Brian: The text box underneath the ..

Griff: No no, that says hover to Zoom. That's actually eBay overlay . Okay, we'll get into overlays in a minute. No, no. That had nothing to do with it because I was stumped. I noticed after I had looked at this deeper, looked at all the examples that were showing up on Google Shopping of eBay listings and they did have one thing in common in this search for Drakkar Noir. You know what it was? I'll tell you. They all used the eBay product catalog entry for Drakkar Noir.

Brian: Yeah. Okay. And so this one did not, they listed it on their own.

Griff: Without using the product catalog. And I use this example because of this, because this is such a standardized product. It's been in production for 40 years. It's still in production today. It has its own catalog page on eBay.

Brian: And I bet when we push it over we're pushing over the catalog page.

Griff: Right. And if so, if you're not listing with the catalog, it seems to get blocked. And I went and checked a few other listings for this that weren't using the product catalog. They also weren't showing up on Google Shopping.

Brian: Interesting. That's a really good point. So our conclusion, if your product has an entry in the eBay product catalog, use it.

Griff: Bingo! And our next example is one that highlights the text overlay issue that you kind of pointed at eBay. While not actively blocking listings that have images with text overlays definitely does not recommend it as a best match search optimization. And in fact, I can remember it, I'm sure you can. A few years ago we actually made it a prohibited practice but we didn't enforce it.

Brian: No. In fact, eBay may suppress a listing with text overlay in Best Match Today.

Griff: Some sellers have told me that they've discovered that's the case. And the conventional wisdom is that Google Shopping will also block listings with text overlays. But the research I did last week shows something else. I found a listing for an iPhone case. And again, I'm gonna keep it anonymous. I've included a picture here for Brian's edification and it's just, you know, it's a nice photo but over the photo itself, right in the middle on a diagonal it says iPhone 14 and a text overlay and it's not very nice. It's actually got a drop shadow as well.

Brian: And it's not even needed because the packaging says 14 on it.

Griff: I looked at the title, the title was fine Insipio4me series MagSafe case, iPhone 14 6.1 small camera. That's a perfectly okay title. It had all the right items, specifics. The photo again wasn't the best but not the worst. And even more confusing cuz my first assumption was it's that text overlay. When I searched for similar listings on Google Shopping, I found many that did have text overlays and were in which were allowed. So for example, I got one here and it shows an iPhone case and up in the left hand corner it says metal frame with MagSafe. Why does this one show up? And yet this other example doesn't?

Brian: That is interesting cuz I would think they would just block both.

Griff: Right. This threw me. So what I did is I dug a little deeper and I discovered that it isn't the text overlay that will result in a block in Google Shopping. It's where that text overlay actually appears in the image.

Brian: Okay. That is really interesting. So that's new to me. So where in the image does Google Shopping allow a text overlay?

Griff: If the text overlay is not superimposed on the actual product of the image, it seems Google Shopping's algorithm lets it through through the gate. The listing that was blocked has that text overlay watermark directly superimposed on the image of the case. The one that was not blocked had the overlay text position in the upper left-hand corner of the image and it wasn't covering any part of the image of the case itself.

Brian: So then for text overlays, our conclusion might be, although text overlays are not a recommended eBay best practice and their use can actually result in a listing suppression in best match text overlays do not result in a block from Google Shopping if the overlay is not super imposed on the product image.

Griff: That's what it seems to be to me. And in fact, I did dig a little deeper into their policies about images and there it mentions something about that.

Brian: You know, in some ways Griff, as I think about that, it does make sense because what they're doing is they're basically, if you have a text overlay over the actual image, then the person who's purchasing that item isn't actually able to see the complete image.

Griff: That's exactly right. I think that maybe clears that up a little bit, but I wanna make it clear that neither Brian or I or eBay are recommending you ever use text overlays. It's just not professional. No. Uh, the first thing I think of when I see them is how amateurish.

Brian: Exactly.

Griff: I don't recommend it. Even though we know that in some cases Google Shopping will allow it through. Now our next best practice, it's about something that I think is probably the most popular and controversial topic when it comes to what gets put on Google Shopping. And that's the whole concept of backgrounds, specifically white backgrounds.

Brian: The conventional wisdom has been that Google shopping will block listing with photos that do not have a white background. Is this still not the case?

Griff: I don't know if it was always the case, but I can tell you right now, it definitely isn't the case today. If you do a quick search on Google Shopping for any product, you will find a whole range of images with different backgrounds including black, white, colored, and in some cases even busy.

Brian: Well it's interesting, one of the images that you showed on that iPhone, it was actually the iPhone on a tabletop.

Griff: You know, it's not recommended. We still, and in fact Google also recommends your images best served on white, but for whatever reason, and I think they used to be more strict about this, they don't block them now.

Brian: Yeah. So our conclusion then is really best practice is white backgrounds are still preferred on eBay. A white background is not a requirement for inclusion in Google Shopping. Another best practice that generates a lot of seller conversation is the use of all caps in a title. How is that working on Google Shopping today?

Griff: Okay. Although not prohibited or blocked on eBay, it's considered not a best practice to use all caps for a title. And talking about conventional wisdom, that CW has stated in the past that using all caps can result in a Google Shopping blocking that listing and appears that this no longer is the case with Google Shopping. While all caps in a title may have been blocked back then, what appears to happen now, and this is pretty interesting, is if you have a listing on eBay with all caps and there's nothing else that's gonna get it blocked on Google Shopping, Google Shopping will allow it. But it changes the title from all caps to lowercase with initial caps. I found several examples of this for eBay listings with all cap titles.

Brian: So that's fascinating.

Griff: They show up in Google shopping but with their titles transformed into texts with initial caps, not all caps.

Brian: I wonder though, if let's say there's two items, one has all caps, one doesn't, do they still convert it or do they just ignore the other one?

Griff: No, they convert it.

Brian: Oh. So they will convert it still.

Griff: Other things being allowed? They just rather than block it for all caps, which they say don't use all caps, but if you use them they just transform it.

Brian: Your conclusion here is that while all cap titles are definitely not recommended as an eBay best practice, they won't result in a Google Shopping block.

Griff: That's correct. And again, I wanna say we don't recommend this.

Brian: Do not do it. It's yelling at your buyer.

Griff: You know, I always take my cues from retail sites who's, you know, they depend on their online business for survival. They never do things like busy backgrounds or all caps or free shipping and their title, which we'll talk about in a minute. And while we're on the topic of title best practices, this next example about is about extraneous characters in a title.

Brian: Sorry, I read ahead.

Griff: He read ahead and he saw exactly what I'm gonna say. I use the most common, historically the most common one for this example, everyone knows it. It's L@@k!, L, at sign, at sign, K, exclamation point. My least favorite thing to see in a title. It'll actually turn me off to looking at that item cuz I'm a contrary and I hate being told to do anything including look. Now I found several examples. It wasn't hard of listings on eBay that still use this word in their title. And I made sure that the listings were following all the other best practices. And guess what? None of them, let me be clear, a hundred percent of them are blocked from Google Shopping.

Brian: Doesn't surprise me.

Griff: You know, I have these glasses here. There were several instances of these, uh, McDonald's Walt Disney World remembered the magical lot of six glasses Look was the title and all the other ones showed up that didn't have that in the title, but this one was blocked.

Brian: Do you know why it was blocked?

Griff: Look, .

Brian: I know, but I, I'm thinking it's probably the special characters.

Griff: Oh that's obviously that was the only thing that was different. Everything else being the same fact. There was the images were so similar, it wasn't the images. They were all had the right items, specifics all had titles that otherwise had no problems. Everything else was fine except that this one listing and several others had L@@k! at the end with an exclamation point and Google said, yeah, no, those aren't showing up on our site.

Brian: So the conclusion on this one has to be that extraneous characters will result in your listings being blocked from Google Shopping.

Griff: That's true. I actually did other searches by the way, with other extraneous characters...

Brian: Exclamation points or?

Griff: Lots of Tildas. Oh yeah, lots of asterisks. You're gonna, you're never gonna show up in Google Shopping. So while you're trying to be fancy schmanzy putting those things in your title, you're basically cutting off millions of potential buyers.

Brian: And it's taking you extra time.

Griff: Yeah. So that's uh, that's one you you don't wanna do.

Brian: So what about editorial words in a title like free shipping or made in the USA?

Griff: Okay, that's another one we don't recommend. Right, right. That's definitely one we say you don't, shouldn't use. It's not prohibited. So I ran several searches for listings using those words and my title search and I did this because I remember in the old guidelines Google said we won't allow those. But the results I saw this last week were well they were a bit ambiguous and I'm not quite sure why sometimes listings with these words or phrases in their titles will show up and sometimes not Google Shopping guidelines definitely discourage their use but they don't seem to be automatically blocking them all with their algorithm.

Brian: So what's your conclusion for this best practice?

Griff: Ah, well it's not good news because this one I'm, I don't really have one. Although we don't recommend using these types of phrases in an eBay listing title. Apparently their use won't automatically result in a Google Shopping block. And I need to explore this one a little further to find out why some listings and phrases like free shipping, still displaying shopping and some don't.

Griff: But we still discourage its use.

Brian: Yes we do. They are unprofessional and they are definitely not a recommended best practice. There's one more I want to talk about and this is the final one in our list and it's about putting the item condition in the title.

Griff: And this is another one I didn't know about. Is this a potential issue for listings in Google search? I know it isn't an issue on eBay itself.

Brian: It's not. And this is another one that seems ambiguous. Cause my research using several eBay listings showed that titles with words indicating condition usually do not show up in Google Shopping. But sometimes they do. Even my research was not enough to unshroud the mystery behind another one of these practices. And I had examples I used like there was one that was an Apple iPhone 14 pro Max two fifty six gigabytes gold at and t mint condition and friends don't judge each other. Williams Sonoma tea towel like new condition. The first one didn't show up and the tea towel didn't show up. Everything else about those listings was okay except the title had condition issues where they talked about condition and neither of them showed up. But there were other examples that did show up. Go figure.

Brian: Hmm. So in other words, although condition indication in a title is risky and may result in your listings block from Google Shopping, it also may not. So a mystery.

Griff: For now at least, Brian.

Brian: I have a suggestion what one of our listeners go work for Google and tell us what the AI actually does.

Griff: Yeah. Give up your selling career , apply for a competitive job at Google. Relocate to the Bay Area if they ask you and then let us know what you find out about the search algorithm please. So my recommendation on this point is for sellers to search Google Shopping for any of their listings that indicate condition in their titles and see if they do or don't show up. For those that don't try changing the title to take out that condition text, then wait a day for these next feed to go out and then search Google Shopping for it again and see if it appears. Now there is some experimentation here. Google provides some guidance by the way, for shopping ads and will provide links to the relevant pages. But keep in mind that these guidelines were created primarily for non marketplace businesses who submit their own product feeds to Google.

Brian: And remember, eBay sellers don't have to submit feeds of their eBay inventory. eBay does that for you free of charge every 24 hours. Like I said, we submit the entire site inventory for all fixed price listings. Still, I have to tell you, following Google guidelines for merchants is still a good idea. If you want to ensure your fixed price listings are gonna appear in Google shopping and you should want that, the links to the relevant guidelines can be found in the summary overview for this episode 221 by visiting www.ebay.com/podcast. And then clicking on the link for eBay for business podcast. This is episode number 221 and it will appear at the top of the episode list.

Griff: That was some good information, Griff.

Brian: I'm glad you liked it. I spent a lot of time doing the research.

Brian: You got questions? Well

Griff: Who could blame you? I mean, why would you not have questions listening to this episode? But don't worry, we got answers. And our first question this week, Brian comes from listener AtTiskett who's emailed us before. Happy holidays to you. I have an update. My eBay store AtTiskett seems to be gaining momentum selling clothing.

Brian: That's a good thing.

Griff: It is. You might recall I asked about how to tie a corporate card earning cash back to eBay, shipping charges via PayPal. I wanted to let you know that not only did your advice work, I have now saved and acquired through opening the card almost $900.

Brian: That's fantastic.

Griff: And this was just back in September. That will go a long way with purchasing inventory for my store. Thanks so much for helping me out. And now another question. Why don't you read the the other question.

Brian: Like many sellers, I plan to take some time away over the holidays spending time with family. I'll be out of town for 10 days and I plan to put my store on Time Away. I do plan to allow shoppers to be able to purchase while I'm gone with an automated message mentioning when they might expect their orders to be shipped. In the past, I've run into trouble with eBay regarding overdue shipping on orders placed prior to my store being on Time Away but not paid for until after time away has been enacted. My buyer seem perfectly okay with my message to them, but it seems eBay adds a ding to my account on these orders considering them as a shipment that wasn't shipped on time. How best might I alleviate this so that my Top Rated seller status isn't jeopardized, which I assume also affects my store traffic upon return. Thanks so much for all your answers and happy holidays to you and your listeners AtTiskettThat's an amazing amount of savings. First off, more sellers might want to adopt this cashback option for their shipping labels.

Griff: Yeah. And for the record you can learn how and you can read the original Tiskett question in episode 208 and we'll put a link to that episode in the summary overview for this episode 221.

Brian: And Tiskett, the old vacation feature now titled Time Away allows for more options now than it did before. I recommend reading up on the topic in our Help section. Just click on the help and contact link on the top of the eBay page and type in the keywords time away.

Griff: Deja vu.

Brian: Yes.

Griff: But to your questions tike first I wanna point out something that your performance status does not limit your store and search. Let's make that clear. If people are searching for items, this should not have a big impact on you. A few dings, I wouldn't worry about that. But it seems the issue here is with sales that don't have immediate payment or they could be auctions. If it's an auction listing and the auction ends before your Time Away, but the buyer doesn't pay until your Time Away has started, that's not gonna be covered. So this can be an issue and that's why we recommend that if you have auction listings running, make sure they are all closed out and paid for before Time Away starts. And that can mean you might want to reschedule auctions a few weeks before so that they start at another time once you get back. Now if you aren't using immediate payment for your fixed price listings, and I know there's several reasons that some sellers have or not using it, but we highly recommend you do because if somebody buys a fixed price item before your time away and then pays for it after you've left, it is not gonna be covered by the time away cuz it's based on payment.

Brian: Our advice would be to require immediate payment for your listenings and that would eliminate this potential.

Griff: Along with rescheduling your auctions. I hope that helps you AtTiskett.

Brian: And Tiskett, do check out the new feature because it does provide a lot more options than even just a year and a half ago. It was enhanced quite a bit.

Griff: There are still some places that needs to be enhanced and you know which ones I'm talking about. Global shipping, you know.

Brian: Right. But but you can set it for 30 days and you know away. You know, or up to 30 days away

Griff: If you're pausing.

Brian: Yes. If you're c if you're no longer showing your inventory.

Griff: If you're gonna show your inventory and have it available, you'll be covered for up to 15 days and we'll change the handling time for you except for some listings. Those that where the purchase is made with Global Ship, the Global Shipping program. There's others like, uh, an accepted offer is one local pickup, Digital goods. These are not covered. The authenticity guarantee. If somebody buys a pair of sneakers from you for more than a hundred bucks, that's not gonna get covered. Will they in the future? I think they will. I'm not sure if these were shortcomings, oversights or just a necessity to get the product out because like I said, this is a complicated site.

Brian: Yes. And, the one other thing that she does bring up, which is a really valid point, which is if you're going on vacation and let's say you're going on vacation for the holidays and you're leaving on the 20th, if you have one day handling, you may wanna set your vacation setting for the 19th. Because then it becomes anything that comes in for that day, you've got the one day to, to still ship it. And the expectation would be that that would clear out your orders. Now there's still a risk that maybe someone doesn't pay if you don't have immediate pay on. And it happens a few days later.

Griff: Okay. Well there's that. So, um, I hope that helps you out and thanks again for writing in.

Brian: Our next question to podcast@ebay.com comes from eBay seller Suzanne who writes, hello and Happy holidays from Western New York. I've been using the Best Offer feature, but I'm curious if there are plans on showing who we're actually sending the offers to. It would be helpful if I'm sending one offer to one watcher, but another watcher emails me. I understand by sending offers to everyone watching could be a solution. Your thoughts. Thank you. Always learning Suzanne.

Griff: Well Suzanne, thanks again, she's a regular contributor to our email to the podcast@ebay.com mailbox. There are no plans for revealing the user ID or email addresses or any information about buyers that are watching your items who have or who have items in their shopping carts or who have viewed your items. And I have to be honest, really, we would never reveal that information to the seller. You're right though. The solution that you were thinking about is already in play. Anyone who's watching the item gets the best offer unless you've sent that best offer to them originally. And another group, you can only send a best offer to any person watching or any anything to do with that listing once during that listing's life. When you send offers using the sendoff feature for a single listing, you're sending that offer to every buyer. Again, whether they're watching the item or has the item in their shopping cart or has even viewed the item recently, I get those a lot. A seller cannot select specific buyers to receive that offer. This is the sendoff feature. I'm referencing here. So yeah, this is never gonna happen, but again, I don't see any reason to worry about it. When you send an offer, you're covering everyone who's associated with that item.

Brian: Thanks Suzanne. And our next question was sent to podcast@ebay.com by seller Rick. Hello, I'm an occasional seller of baseball cards from my 1960s collection. I have kept hard copy records of my sales and archived the eBay payment notifications that I receive. By my estimation, my combined sales for product costs and shipping come to $726 in 88 cents. I assume that I will receive a 1099 K form. Will these sales be considered as income that I will be required to report on my 2022 year end federal tax reporting form? Thank you for your time to consider this question Rick Ross.

Griff: Well Rick, as we've said many times are on the podcast. Neither Brian, I or Rebecca or any eBay employee is able to provide specific tax advice for that. You'd have to talk to a tax attorney or CPA, but we can tell you this much because it does apply in all scenarios to all US taxpayers ready? Brian?

Brian: Yes.

Griff & Brian: All income is reportable.

Griff: There is no exemption to this rule.

Brian: Correct. There's no exemption to the the rule. So if you sell something and you earn it, then it's reportable. It's reportable. And regardless of the $600 threshold or the previous $20,000 threshold. Now, whether or not certain income is taxable or whether your expenses for selling is deductible depends on your situation. And again, we're not able to provide specific tax advice.

Griff: So Rick, you might wanna check out the eBay Tax Act page for more information and we'll put a link to that in the, uh, summary overview for this episode. But again, we can't provide that advice. We love the questions. There's a part of me that's dying to provide an answer, but there's also a part of me that really likes my job and I'd hate to lose it. And I'm sure you understand.

Brian: The nice thing is that Tax Act page has become a really good resource for this specific question. Yes, absolutely. So encourage courage folks to check it out. And if you have a question for which you cannot find an answer, why not call us on (888) 723-4630.

Griff: That's (888) 723-4630. Call that hotline. You can call it any time of the day and leave a question or comment. And who knows, we just might put your dulcet tones on the air.

Brian: And if you're not a call on the phone person, you can always email us podcast@ebay.com. That's podcast@ebay.com.

Griff: And now it's time for your weekly reminders.

Brian: Check the announcement board at ebay.com/announcements for UpToDate Seller News every day.

Griff: The holiday selling season for 22 is about to come to a close. What a year it's been. And we hope it's been successfully for you. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't be upgrading your office equipment and by office equipment, I mean your label printer. And by label printer, I mean, will you please buy a thermal label printer, please?

Griff: I think most of them have.

Brian: No they haven't. I buy from them and I still get non-label printers on my boxes. It's infuriating!

Griff: Okay. They have to buy one because I bought one this year.

Brian: Yeah, Brian did it. If Brian did it, you can do it. Okay. That's the last time you'll hear for about this in 2022.

Brian: Maybe.You can always review anything you heard on the podcast by viewing the overview and transcript for this and all episodes, including any links we referenced during the episode.

Griff: Now on our next episode, we're gonna have a 2022 look back with myself, Brian, and Rebecca in the studio. And you're not gonna wanna miss it because the hijinks are definitely going to be high octane.

Brian: That sounds like it's gonna be a fun one. Next week.

Griff: It'll be Jolitty Farm here in the studio.

Brian: Maybe we'll have to bring some libations. We'd like to again thank our guests this week by proxy Google Shopping.

Griff: Thank You Google Shopping. The eBay for Business Podcast is produced and distributed by Libsyn and podCast411.

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The eBay for Business podcast is published every Tuesday morning and is presented by eBay, Libsyn and Podcast411.