topic Re: Community chat in Selling

Community chat

roseychook — Sat, 03 Jun 2017 08:36:27 GMT

Hi, 1st time here.

Can anyone tell me if they are seeing no sales or less sales in last 6 months

Re: Sales declining

davewil1964 — Sat, 03 Jun 2017 08:41:23 GMT

No. Since February when I got the increased free listings, my sales have increased.

Re: Community chat

kopenhagen5 — Sat, 03 Jun 2017 08:55:24 GMT

I am only a hobby seller and I have seen a downturn in the last 2 years

Especially in the last few months.

Re: Community chat

stickerswa — Sat, 03 Jun 2017 09:18:41 GMT

Some folks have ...some have not. Plenty of other threads around about low sales.

My sales were ticking along until 2 weeks ago when I decided to add more items so setup an ebay shop. For the last 2 weeks I have seen a drop of 90% on my sales. Lucky to get 2-3 sales a day. Funny thing is it has affected all 3 of my accounts (2 do not have shops). Sales have dropped to almost nothing. However today I have had 14 sales across 2 selling accounts. I cant figure it. Ebay throttling - maybe ...just no one buying - maybe could be anything.

Well at least I made beer money this week so I am happy.

Re: Community chat

mbselections00 — Sat, 03 Jun 2017 09:29:07 GMT

@roseychook wrote:
Hi, 1st time here.
Can anyone tell me if they are seeing no sales or less sales in last 6 months

I'm seeing considerably less over the last 12 months

Re: Community chat

davidc4430 — Sat, 03 Jun 2017 09:33:53 GMT

buyers have more choice these days, ebay is just 1 of many online shopping avenues

Re: Community chat

love_of_cars — Sat, 03 Jun 2017 12:26:14 GMT

Sales are significantly down for me, now selling about 20% to 25% of what I used to sell, on a steady decline since the end of 2015.

Re: Community chat

chameleon54 — Sat, 03 Jun 2017 15:35:09 GMT

I,m not listing any new items, but this month has been the worst in the last 5 years. I might have to pull my finger out and start putting up a few new listings to get things going again, before they grind to a complete stop.

Once your sell through rate drops, your visibility drops and it starts a vicious downward cycle that can be hard to get out of if left too long. New, fresh listings of popular selling items can help break the cycle .

Re: Community chat

porcelain_dolls_by_me — Sat, 03 Jun 2017 23:28:43 GMT

Numerous factors will determine where your items appear when a visitor does an item search.

A critical factor is what EBay determine is your "Transaction Defect Rate" (TDR). Once your TDR exceeds 0.30% over a rolling 3 month period then your listings shift from the first few pages of search results to the end of the pack.

In our case we had 3 "defects" (which is a whole new story) out of 955 transactions over 3 months.

As such we were slapped with a ""Below Standard" rating, our listings were dropped to oblivion in the search results and sales dropped from 70-80 per week to just 3-4.

To add insult to injury, when you do make a sale, Ebay hold the sale proceeds for 14-21 days.

Ah, the joys of selling on EBay!!

Re: Community chat

chameleon54 — Sun, 04 Jun 2017 00:04:46 GMT

As mentioned by some-one else on a similar thread on the PS forum, the 0.3% transaction defect rate refers to cases in the resolution centre which are not resolved by the seller. If the buyer asks ebay to step in, sellers are hit with a defect. Three of these in a year and your selling account is severly restricted.

For most normal defects, a seller is allowed 2% before they are classed as below standard and face visibility issues etc. Unfortunately the moral of the story is REFUND, REFUND, REFUND or find another occupation.

I dont think defects are the reason for my sales dropping away. ( I dont have very many ). It is mainly due to me not spending the time on ebay as I am building an alternative business venture at the moment. You only get out of ebay, what you put in. If you want good sales you need to be answering questions promptly, mailing daily, listing new fresh stock on a regular basis to keep loing term buyers interested and revise / refresh older listings. I,m not doing any of these things at the moment and my sales are falling away.

Re: Community chat

clarry100 — Sun, 04 Jun 2017 01:10:17 GMT

For this tax year our sales are 50% lower than the previous tax year.

And that year was about 30% down on the previous year.

The steady decline for us has been happening over about a 2-year period and if it continues at the present rate it will no longer be economically viable to continue selling on here. We could be closing down about the end of the year.

I would advise against procurring too much stock until you are quite certain where its going to take you.

Things do not look very good for lots of sellers.

Having said that there are a few who do report good sales. I think it depends on your niche market.

Good luck.

Re: Community chat

rocket2retro — Sun, 04 Jun 2017 02:45:04 GMT

Like others I've had a significant decrease in sales which started 2 years ago. At present my sales are at an all time low.

I also can't see myself selling on here for much longer. It's no longer worth the time & effort for the return.

Re: Community chat

yeoldecoinco — Sun, 04 Jun 2017 07:09:28 GMT

"You only get out of ebay, what you put in.

If you want good sales you need to be answering questions promptly, mailing daily, listing new fresh stock on a regular basis to keep loing term buyers interested and revise / refresh older listings.

I,m not doing any of these things at the moment and my sales are falling away."

Perfectly summed up.

Re: Community chat

porcelain_dolls_by_me — Sun, 04 Jun 2017 09:06:20 GMT

I don't think anyone would argue the issues raised.

BUT, it would be nice and very helpful if EBay were to have a page (or 10) summarising all of the points and issues that a seller needs to bear in mind.

Re: Community chat

roseychook — Sun, 11 Jun 2017 04:32:33 GMT

I am 100% seller & have always been, with only very good feedback being left.

Have lowered prices changed things around. Still it seems no one is looking or buying.

The products I have can't be purchased in Store's anymore, only a few on ebay still have stock.

Its just frustrating as I don't have questions from buyers so the are no responses needed.

There is no more that I can do, 1 sale in 6 months is beyond ridiculous.

Will just have to hang in here & see what happens.

Re: Community chat

roseychook — Sun, 11 Jun 2017 04:35:37 GMT

How do ebay hold sale proceeds, I accept payment via PayPal it show there immediately.
Not sure what you mean

Re: Community chat

lyndal1838 — Sun, 11 Jun 2017 04:44:16 GMT

New sellers are restricted in the number of listings they can put up AND paypal holds their funds for 21 days or until the tracking shows as delivered or the buyer leaves positive feedback.

Re: Community chat

chameleon54 — Sun, 11 Jun 2017 12:41:50 GMT

@roseychook wrote:
I am 100% seller & have always been, with only very good feedback being left.
Have lowered prices changed things around. Still it seems no one is looking or buying.
The products I have can't be purchased in Store's anymore, only a few on ebay still have stock.
Its just frustrating as I don't have questions from buyers so the are no responses needed.
There is no more that I can do, 1 sale in 6 months is beyond ridiculous.
Will just have to hang in here & see what happens.

When B & M stores and most ebay sellers no longer stock certian lines it is often because the items are no longer popular or fashionable. I know that my main stock lines are already past their prime as technology is making them obsolete and cheap chinese reproductions are devalueing the genuine article that I stock.

Could your fantasy item sales also be suffering from a change in buyer trends ?

I have noticed different lines of stock that I sell on my non store account are still selling very well, while my stores are gradually slowing down. This is a clear indication that demand for my main store stock is gradually declining, but there are still buyers out there for " the right" items. Basically we need to sell things that people actually want to buy.

Re: Community chat

heihachi_73 — Mon, 12 Jun 2017 09:16:29 GMT

I used to sell around 20 items per month, these days it's between 5 and 10 on average, despite eBay introducing 30-day listings for non-stores. I sold 21 items in the last 60 days (e.g. 2 months), of which all of 12 people actually bothered giving feedback.

@ davewil: What increased free listings? They're still only 40 a month for non-stores except that they now last for 30 days instead of 10. Sitting there for longer doesn't magically increase sales when the same things would have been relisted anyway. In fact, the free listings have actually decreased, as I haven't had free listing promotions ever since they stopped giving away the 100 listings every couple of months - not once have I ever been eligible for the 150 listing bonus, otherwise known as Promotion 2664.

I cannot justify paying the price of a basic store account when sometimes I barely even make the cost of a store account in a month; sometimes I might only sell six items for the whole month with the ones I sold going between $2 and $4!

Re: Community chat

sloanranger62 — Mon, 12 Jun 2017 12:45:33 GMT

The same here I was doing really well just with free listings and decided to reopen my shop and sales have plummented.