Ebay Sales Down

[Divino]

Having a heck of a time scheduling listings on eBay today. Maybe the Cyber Monday traffic? Typing out a title is taking literally 60-90 seconds for the text to show up after I type it. Borderline unusable.

[rwperu34]

Originally Posted by Divino

Having a heck of a time scheduling listings on eBay today. Maybe the Cyber Monday traffic? Typing out a title is taking literally 60-90 seconds for the text to show up after I type it. Borderline unusable.

Try a different browser. That happens to me when I use Firefox, but in Chrome it's fine.

[rwperu34]

November was my first month in a while the beat (crushed) expectations. Up 2.4x vs last year on maybe 15% more inventory. More that triple last month.

[jkampis]

Originally Posted by SunDevilCards

I believe if the buyer claims the item was not as described, ebay will force/allow a return even if you stated no returns in your listing.

Sounds like the buyer’s body was not as described

[griffan15]

Someone convince me that the Promoted Ad Rate on ebay isn't a scam.

I've been on ebay for 26 years now. I don't know all the bells and whistles they offer, but I've been playing around with the promoted ad feature they offer for a few years now.

In theory, if you pay more, you get higher search results, more impressions, etc. I've been anywhere from 5% to 9% in recent years. Last month, I decided to increase 20,000 cards to 14%, just to track and test.

Sure enough, impressions and page views are exactly the same. My listings are no higher in search results either. I have almost 50,000 listings and offer plenty of inventory, so sales are fine, but this feature makes absolutely no sense to me.

I'm a top rated seller, use the discount campaigns, offer coupons, send newsletters, all which do produce results when utilizing them. But the promoted ad rates don't seem to offer anything in terms of results.

Next I'll change the same 20,000 listings to 0% and see what happens.

[rwperu34]

Originally Posted by griffan15

Someone convince me that the Promoted Ad Rate on ebay isn't a scam.

I've been on ebay for 26 years now. I don't know all the bells and whistles they offer, but I've been playing around with the promoted ad feature they offer for a few years now.

In theory, if you pay more, you get higher search results, more impressions, etc. I've been anywhere from 5% to 9% in recent years. Last month, I decided to increase 20,000 cards to 14%, just to track and test.

Sure enough, impressions and page views are exactly the same. My listings are no higher in search results either. I have almost 50,000 listings and offer plenty of inventory, so sales are fine, but this feature makes absolutely no sense to me.

I'm a top rated seller, use the discount campaigns, offer coupons, send newsletters, all which do produce results when utilizing them. But the promoted ad rates don't seem to offer anything in terms of results.

Next I'll change the same 20,000 listings to 0% and see what happens.

My guess? There's a point where you are essentially "outbidding" everyone else for search placement. Anything above that point is not going to help. My second guess? That number is likely 2.1%.

I run my ads at 2.1-2.6%, upping them by 0.1% every 10 days (about how long it takes me to cycle through the inventory once). When I get to 2.6%, I go back to 2.1%. The only reason I even up it at all is because I want to have a "change" to the listing when I recycle.

Beauspencer did an experiment with promoted listings at one point. He took them all to 0%, and his traffic dropped by half or more. I can see from my traffic report that promoted listings make up 67-80% of my impressons on any given day. I know from long term experience that I pay the ad fee on about half of my sales.

[premium1981]

The problem with the ad experiments is that there are too many other variables to know if what you changed actually changes anything. Maybe you would have had a really bad stretch with horrible sales and the increased ad rate kept you level. Maybe you would have had an incredible sales stretch and the change in ad rate held you back after the listing changes. Maybe inventory is better or worse on a given stretch. There just isn't a way of being accurate with that information IMO. I think you would have to have 2 identical stores and identical listings to actually see if there was a difference. I do think it helps, but not enough to matter that much. Your actual inventory, prices, sales, offers, etc are much more important. But I wouldn't turn off ad rates. I think ebay would punish your store. Just keep the number low.

[paulcarlcards]

It's well worth investing in marketing and advertising. The speed of sales increases, and that's the name of the game. It's really easy to get double digit ROAS on eBay and gain a ton of sales momentum. If you have a strong brand and a high rate of earning repeat customers, you can capture future sales directly from your store (or email blast, or coupon blast, etc.) too where you are less likely to get hit with a promoted fee.

[nam812]

For those of you with an eBay store, you have just about 3 weeks to use your coupon for supplies before the 4th quarter ends. I know some don't use it, but for those who do, don't forget.

[Bosoxfan5990]

Originally Posted by nam812

For those of you with an eBay store, you have just about 3 weeks to use your coupon for supplies before the 4th quarter ends. I know some don't use it, but for those who do, don't forget.

Thanks for the reminder. Just double-checked to make sure I already used it.

[Divino]

Originally Posted by nam812

For those of you with an eBay store, you have just about 3 weeks to use your coupon for supplies before the 4th quarter ends. I know some don't use it, but for those who do, don't forget.

Thank you!!

[Dragonman]

Originally Posted by nam812

For those of you with an eBay store, you have just about 3 weeks to use your coupon for supplies before the 4th quarter ends. I know some don't use it, but for those who do, don't forget.

I have an Ebay store...Never looked...where do you get the supplies and what kind are there

[f2tornado]

Originally Posted by griffan15

Someone convince me that the Promoted Ad Rate on ebay isn't a scam.

I don't think it's a scam but it's difficult to determine how well it works. I get charged the ad rate on many sales but I do wonder how many of those sales would have occurred anyway. Card buyers are typically very efficient finding what they're looking for. I certainly have my favorite searches saved. This time of year might be the exception as some mom might hit eBay looking for a specific card on Santa's wish list.

[brev87]

Originally Posted by Dragonman

I have an Ebay store...Never looked...where do you get the supplies and what kind are there

If you go to your Overview page, scroll down to where it says "Shortcuts". Just click on eBay shipping supplies

[Dragonman]

Originally Posted by brev87

If you go to your Overview page, scroll down to where it says "Shortcuts". Just click on eBay shipping supplies

Cant find it

[rwperu34]

Go to your overview-->store-->Subscriber discounts

From there you should see a button that says "see details". It will take you to a landing page that has the coupon code. Underneath that it says "start shopping".

When you checkout, somewhere on the payment screen there is a button to use the code.

[Dragonman]

subscriber page didn't take me anywhere...a link is on there that says "see offer terms" but it doesn't go anywhere.,..thats ok I don't care that much

[nam812]

Originally Posted by Dragonman

subscriber page didn't take me anywhere...a link is on there that says "see offer terms" but it doesn't go anywhere.,..thats ok I don't care that much

In your seller hub go to the Marketing header and click on subscriber discounts.

[jamcas997]

Nov 1-12 , Items Sold 113

Dec 1-12 , Items sold 35

Slow month, but I am up 50% over the same period last December.

[Swipe79]

Woof - only three sales yesterday - that's a new record low. Already at 4 in this morning, I usually sell around 20-30 items a day.

[rwperu34]

Originally Posted by Swipe79

Woof - only three sales yesterday - that's a new record low. Already at 4 in this morning, I usually sell around 20-30 items a day.

Similar for me. Big slowdown over the last few days.

[Swipe79]

Not as bad today but still looking like slower than normal...probably will be the case until we get over the holiday hump and people have disposable again.

Originally Posted by rwperu34

Similar for me. Big slowdown over the last few days.

[discodanman45]

Originally Posted by Swipe79

Not as bad today but still looking like slower than normal...probably will be the case until we get over the holiday hump and people have disposable again.

Yup, I have been buying items for super cheap as well. A lot less people bidding. Putting something up for auction right now is a great way to sell for 50% of comps. I am just letting things sit on eBay right now and will see how 2025 begins.

[Bosoxfan5990]

Originally Posted by discodanman45

Yup, I have been buying items for super cheap as well. A lot less people bidding. Putting something up for auction right now is a great way to sell for 50% of comps. I am just letting things sit on eBay right now and will see how 2025 begins.

Hey, I had an older lot listed for $1.99 sitting for the longest time.

Started it as a $0.01 7-day auction and it sold for $6.50.

So at least one auction went for more than BIN

[beauspencer]

This month has been an absolute roller coaster. The first two weeks of December started out like it would be one of my worst months of the year. This past week has been much better and I'm now pacing for a good month. Guess what? Two main factors for the poor start....and both were changed by ME. It's not a bad market, it's not the algorithm. It was me.

1) Adjusting new inventory. I was adding inventory...but it was good inventory. I was adding a lot of $2 listings. I realized what I was doing, and not doing. Started mixing in some better inventory...and boom.

2) Promoted listings. At the end of November, I noticed a couple things. First, I have 4.6K followers to my store which is a good amount. I have a lot of buyers from my social media channels. I don't want to spend 10% promoted fee when I have regular customers buying. Second, since I started running more auctions it was nice to see the bottom line with no promoted fee. Maybe, if I decrease my promoted percentage, I'll still get my regular buyers and only pay half of the fee if I decrease to 5% instead of running 10%.

BUT...that wasn't the case. As I mentioned, the first two weeks of December started awful. I checked my numbers. My sales were down 24% compared to the same time period in November. Promoted sales were down 27%. I stopped my experiment and reverted back to 10%.

From 12/15 to 12/20, my sales were up 105% from the same time period a month prior, and promoted sales were up 99% from the same time period in November.

Small sample sizes, a lot of different variables in play...I understand that. But these are my numbers, and my business, so it's important for me to maximize my bottom line, and 10% promoted listings does just that.