topic Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store in Selling

Question for sellers that have a basic store

beallieblue-oz — Sun, 15 Feb 2015 11:22:07 GMT

Hi, I have been doing a bit of thought about opening a basic store,

as half my stock is unlisted waiting on the extra freebies.

I have read up on the FVF from 9.9 to only 8%. Which will save a few cents.

Another option is I have to leave for a few days and the odd weeks holiday during the year,

I know you can put yourself on holidays, as I have had stores in the old days.

Which would save a lot of stress and taking items off.

Okay do you find you sell more with a store now days

When stores get free extra listing are they for 30days.

I only have handmade items on this ID, but can add extra bits and pieces

From another.

Any hints would be appreciated, as its been 5yrs aprox since I have had a store.

Thank you Pam

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

Anonymous — Sun, 15 Feb 2015 13:49:39 GMT

i find that i sell no more now than i did when i didnt have a store but i list a hell of alot more than i did then too

yes its great that i can list alot more items. Has that translated to more sales? sadly not. In fact my second most productive month on ebay last year was the month BEFORE i opened a basic store, and i would have had 1/4 of the listings i do now.

Yes we get more decent free listings offers.. 10,000 and even 100,000 freebies (fixed price) for which i use maybe 200

Yes its great you can put your store on holidays and still leave listings active (stopping buyers for a week was very handy when i went away)

Yes all listings are up to 30 days which i also love... so there are alot of real advantages to opening a store, but sadly increased sales isnt one of them (for me anyway)

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

putney32 — Sun, 15 Feb 2015 20:53:21 GMT

you will need to do the maths, you will be making very little on your items, at say $4 +$2 postage after ebay fvf and Paypal fees now,

so can you get an advantage by adding $20 a month store fee and paying lower fvf and longer 30 day /more free listings

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

beallieblue-oz — Sun, 15 Feb 2015 23:40:47 GMT

Thank you, you have answered most of what I need to know.

Hope your business picks up.

I am only a hobby seller, as we small sellers say, and don't intend to try to have a business, been there, done that.

now time to relax.

just figured out how not to have a big blank space at the bottom.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

clarry100 — Sun, 15 Feb 2015 23:47:13 GMT

Not sure if/not you are aware that when you have a store only your But-It-Now (BIN) listings are free. 200 per month for a basic store.

Your auction listings you have to pay $1.50 each for (category etc dependent) unless ebay hand out the occasional freebie.

You will lose the 40 free auction listings that you have been used to each month.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

beallieblue-oz — Sun, 15 Feb 2015 23:52:14 GMT

yes the FVF etc is something to think about, I use mailing flat boxes, so the postage is darer, rather than chucking them into a envelope.

and they are too fat for a 70c mailing. But I know they arrive safely without being squashed.

As for the price, there is a lot of other sellers doing my craft as well, so have to keep prices minimal.

So have had a little think, and if i can sell some other items , and use that profit for the store fee. Maybe it could work.

Then I wouldn't have to worry about holidays etc. I'll have until next week to think more, and see if there are more hints out there,

as I am going away. Thank you for your imput.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

beallieblue-oz — Sun, 15 Feb 2015 23:55:47 GMT

Hi Clarry,Yes I am aware its only BIN, I don't have any auctions on this ID.
Thanks, no way would I pay them 1.50 for an auction.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

clarry100 — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 00:53:57 GMT

Yes we have 5x selling IDs.

Three of them are basic stores and two are non-stores.

This way we can take advantage of the 200x BINs on each of the store IDs.

Plus 40x free auctions on each of the non-store IDs.

And if they hand out freebies to either stores or non-stores we can catch them either way.

We cannot recover the lost $1.50 auction listing fee when only about 10-15% result in a paid sale. So we simply can't afford to pay that.

Works for us!

Sales have been down about 50% since Xmas tho.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

englishrosegardens — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 01:55:44 GMT

If you're listing in Crafts, they come under Collectibles (for some reason known only to ebay), so you'll be paying 9.5% final value fees, not 8%.

You'll be able to have free auctions as part of the 200 free listings if you're listing under crafts/collectibles, and probably with the extra listings that we get about every four weeks. I don't do auctions so I'm not sure about that side of it.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

englishrosegardens — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 01:58:57 GMT

One advantage of having 30 day listings is that people watching your items don't have to renew them every 7 or 10 days when your listing is renewed. They still have to do them every 30 days, unless you have them on GTC (good till cancelled). You pay every month with GTC, unless you've got less than 200 listings.

If you have similar items you could think about using multi variant listings to save on listings.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

beallieblue-oz — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 03:00:13 GMT

I couldn't find anything about crafts, just says collectables.

can anyone with a craft shop help with this one. Do you pay 8% or 9.5% FVFs.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

twyngwyn — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 03:06:06 GMT

http://sellercentre.ebay.com.au/ebay-for-business/about-store-packages

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

englishrosegardens — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 03:06:18 GMT

I have a craft shop so I know it's TRUE. It's somewhere in the fine print but you have to look hard to find it.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

englishrosegardens — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 03:14:25 GMT

http://sellercentre.ebay.com.au/sites/default/files/fees_by_category.pdf

This is the page that shows crafts come under collectibles - second 'box' from the bottom in the right hand column.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

englishrosegardens — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 03:27:57 GMT

Do you always tick the box to get the three free auto relists, and do you always check the forums for a link to the extra free listings that we get? Have you got your preferences ticked to receive promotional emails from ebay, which is what you need to do in order to get the emails for the extra freebies. The links in the forums usually work but it doesn't hurt to have the right boxes ticked in your preferences as well.

We had 150 free listings very recently and if you'd used all of those and had the auto relist box ticked, you would still have 150 listings now, minus any that had sold. That's on top of the 40.

If you have everything on 10 days and tick the auto relist box each listing would run for 40 days, which would allow you to have approx. 50 running at a time even without the extra freebies.

Have you thought about listing your cards in a different category and not crafts? I have no idea what categories are available but I'd imagine a lot of people buying cards wouldn't necessarily think of looking in crafts. They may not be looking for handcrafted cards but if they saw them in another category they might buy them.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

beallieblue-oz — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 05:37:36 GMT

Hi Thanks for that, what a blimey ripoff, all those sellers with little crafty bits.

I could put them under home wares ~parties and occasions. some of them are.

now yes I tick the box for 3 relistings

yes I use 10 days and yes I come to the forums for the free listing link, as the messages don't come through until late in the first day.

But this time it didn't work out right, as with the time before last , they had a few days to go, then a new month, so by the time they unrelisted it was too late, so hense they are still sitting there, as i like to put new ones on with my monthly 40.

alright if they did it fortnightly, but it was 3 weeks, so puts me right out.'

Now I will have to rethink again, as the stuff i was going to add to the shop is all crafty stuff.

so I may as well puddle around with what I am doing, for the moment.

Thanks everyone for your help, it pays to come here first, before you go for the big splash.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

englishrosegardens — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 06:32:49 GMT

Park your new stuff in scheduled so it's sitting there ready to go when we get extra freebies. You can edit the start date in scheduled so if they're not ready to start at the right time you can easily change it.

If you've still got one cycle to go when the freebies come up, you can remove auto relist so that they drop into unsold and can be relisted, or you can change the duration so they end during the promotional period. It won't always work but it often will, especially if you spread your listings over the entire time that they give the extra freebies.

For example, if something is on 10 days and it's on day 6 of its third cycle when the freebies start, you can change it to a 7 day duration and remove AR, and it'll drop into unsold on the second day of the freebies. If it's on day 4 when the freebies start, change it to a 5-day duration and remove AR.

Just remember to change the duration back again when you relist, but you can do that easily enough with bulk edit - so long as you remember that you can only edit to a longer duration in the first two hours after a listing starts. Yes, it's all more work, but a lot can be done with bulk relisting/editing, and it's either do extra work or pay extra money for a store or listings.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

beallieblue-oz — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 07:46:34 GMT

Thank you, you are a mind of information, I will take up your hints , and see if they work, I am sure this will also help other sellers, if they haven't worked it out.
I only have about 80 , try for 100, but don't complain, as i know they are selling, if I don't get there. Will put the store on hold for awhile and see how I go.
cheers Pam.

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

jillywinkle — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 20:00:08 GMT

Traffic reports via omniture service show that nobody has viewed my "storefront" for the past 3 to 4 months. Not one view of the storefront & dismal spasmodic sales for yonks. Whether omniture software is not working properly, or the stats are true I can only surmise. This fact has led me to close my basic store at the end of this month & begin using the 40 free listings per month. I've had a store on and off for over 8 years. Mainly on. Sales are lousy since Google changed their ways, I don't see the point of the $20 per month anymore as I only run around 80 to 100 listings these days. Ten day listings on a revolving basis should have items ranked higher on a regular basis I assume or so the story goes. I no longer see the point of a store for this amount of listings..jilly

Re: Question for sellers that have a basic store

i-love-my-sheep — Tue, 17 Feb 2015 01:43:55 GMT

And don't forget the promotions that give you 150 free listings too for non stores!