Ebay pulling traffic reports

[saarzi]

Just a general chat!

RE: Ebay pulling traffic reports.. I know we already know this, but I was just reading some recent news stories on Ebay recently.

Some interesting comments in them.

ALL the articles I read from the various sites/ writers (from Ecommerce to Forbes to marketwatch) suggested pulling traffic reports could possibly* be a way for Ebay to hide wrong doing against small sellers / blackouts / invisible listings (theyve already admitted more or less to throttling, which is different) etc. All suggest the reports available possibly* clearly show evidence for this type of activity. Obviously. But was a little amazed at how widespread it was being talked about in the media, particularly in market watch sites.

Most are strongly suggesting sellers to print off and keep ALL reports they possibly can, for as far back as they possibly can, probably in liew of action against Ebay in the future.

Save, save ,save, print print print before its all removed forever.

Also been reading up in the finance sites, and theres plenty about Ebay underperforming significantly. They are comparing the whole of Ebay, not just the small sellers, to the sector,  so when it comes to us, we are doing even worse than reported.

Sometimes I think you only hear the bad stuff on forums like this, so I dont take much heed. But financial reports and media reports are heavily supporting the negative thinking here.

I wouldnt be at all suprised if we hear talk of a sell off or take over in the future if they cant increase the traffic significantly and lay rest to corruption rumours and reform dodgy business policies over the next finacial year.  Just putting this here so that in 2 years time I can say.. "see... told ya!"   Lol

[thecatspjs]

I subscribe to inkfrog to list from as well as provide reports and real-time information on traffic.

The service was once able to record most if not all of the views recorded - however with the advent of mobile phones only a portion of views are now able to captured by this service, due to descriptions being buried on the phone app, with many buyers not even reading them. 

Nonetheless, the data on visitors that is captured is highly useful and confirms to me that my eBay traffic patterns, are not particularly unusual as far as I can see.  The data includes ISP details, browser used, device type, location of viewer, exact times of listing views etc

[expanded_perceptions]

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@gtx305 wrote:

Just a general chat!

RE: Ebay pulling traffic reports.. I know we already know this, but I was just reading some recent news stories on Ebay recently.

Some interesting comments in them.

ALL the articles I read from the various sites/ writers (from Ecommerce to Forbes to marketwatch) suggested pulling traffic reports could possibly* be a way for Ebay to hide wrong doing against small sellers / blackouts / invisible listings (theyve already admitted more or less to throttling, which is different) etc. All suggest the reports available possibly* clearly show evidence for this type of activity. Obviously. But was a little amazed at how widespread it was being talked about in the media, particularly in market watch sites.

Most are strongly suggesting sellers to print off and keep ALL reports they possibly can, for as far back as they possibly can, probably in liew of action against Ebay in the future.

Save, save ,save, print print print before its all removed forever.

Also been reading up in the finance sites, and theres plenty about Ebay underperforming significantly. They are comparing the whole of Ebay, not just the small sellers, to the sector,  so when it comes to us, we are doing even worse than reported.

Sometimes I think you only hear the bad stuff on forums like this, so I dont take much heed. But financial reports and media reports are heavily supporting the negative thinking here.

I wouldnt be at all suprised if we hear talk of a sell off or take over in the future if they cant increase the traffic significantly and lay rest to corruption rumours and reform dodgy business policies over the next finacial year.  Just putting this here so that in 2 years time I can say.. "see... told ya!"   Lol

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It is strange you say this, because this was my gut reaction on hearing the news in last weeks thread! No question in my mind that it is to hide traffic and throttling, too coincidental that it happens when there has been a lot more talk on this recently. I was also going to suggest like you, that people download the reports before it does happen, may just be the evidence needed in future.

But kudos, for the research done!!!!

[expanded_perceptions]

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@myiipreciousones wrote:

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@misty_blue_treasures wrote:

clarry100, what other venues are  you using

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I love your post and research GTX, it seems the implosion is inevitable.

I have been using a new Aussie site that is just opened only a few months and

getting plenty of traffic and some good results for such a young site, their support is excellent

and they seem to be at least trying hard to create a good place for sellers, likewise I might get

a slap but meh it is a forum for sharing so the site is (swapmeet.net.au) have a look there and 

share it with everyone so it grows:)

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Not sure how much traffic it is actually getting? But I certainly welcome these new sites and hope at least one of them take off! I have listed some items over there, and to be honest items appear to be viewed early and then nothing or trickle views the longer they are listed. Happy to just list and wait and see to be honest, but at the moment the site is very much in its infancy, perhaps with the upcoming advertising it may raise the profile needed?

[clarry100]

We went and had a look at this new site today.

Sent them some questions about managing multi-variation listings which we rely heavily on.

Currently they have no way to list with variations at all. It would all have to be done in messaging.

They also have a 5x picture limit on a listing which is hard for us to work with.

But you can link to a service such as photobucket from a little bit of HTML code embedded in the description field.

Then you can have virtulally unlimited pictures in the description field.

They answered our queries within 1-hour too on mother's day. So that in itself is impressive.

They did say that they are working furiously to add this functionality in as they have had a lot of requests for it.

They also said that they are seeing a very high number of disgruntled ex-ebay sellers moving across to their platform.

There is only one other seller listing in our particular category at the moment.

So we thought we might put up a few popular items and see how they go.

[saarzi]

Do your inkfrog traffic reports match the Ebay ones?  I do look at the Ebay reports, but never really trusted them.

[arlottstreetstation]

I totally agree with everything you say. But IMHO I think it may be the beginning of a new Era of problems as the Architect of all of the trouble begins to spread the poison to PayPal.

So far PayPal have always been fairly reasonable to deal with apart from their 21 Day Holds & 180 Day Returns Policy... I'm now wondering what they will be in 12 months time...

The thing that constantly amazes me is why the Shareholders haven't deposed him. Surely by now it must be evident to all that the future, as it stands, holds nothing but ruin.

[i-love-my-sheep]

That's one of the many things I like about that place Clarry, they are open to any and all suggestions. They try and implement as many as they can. Sometimes it just takes a little while because they get overwhelmed. 

I'm the only one in my category at the moment. I figured someone had to kick the category off, it may as well be me! I'm planning on putting a few more things on there, I just haven't got around to it yet. I've got the next 2 days off, I might look at putting a few new things on. 

I think once the advertising campaign goes ahead things will pick up. I'm not planning on leaving eBay yet, but it doesn't hurt to have your eggs in a few baskets. 

[thecatspjs]

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@gtx305 wrote:

Do your inkfrog traffic reports match the Ebay ones?  I do look at the Ebay reports, but never really trusted them.

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I stopped looking at eBay traffic reports at the end of last year ...  they have been broken for some time now IMO.

Incomplete and not reflective of actual listing views - ok to ascertain key word searches etc but not much else.

[clarry100]

Yep Sheepie those are pretty much our thoughts as well. Free to give it a go. The more sellers that do list will help kick things along.
So you will see a selection of our stuff going up there soon too.
I particularly liked their responsiveness.