I asked Ebay what new changes have damaged my sales...and they responded...

[Anonymous]

I just opened a chat with an Ebay representative and asked them "what changes have recently been made that has seen my sales drop by 95-100% this month?" I received the following response

Jean Su. "We have done nothing to destroy any seller's account. It is up to the buyers to buy items and some items are seasonal. Also, there are many sellers nowadays that the competition is very stiff."

....I then mentioned that the drop in sales happened instantly which is neither seasonal nor due to competition being "very stiff" and the response I received was ...dead silence... It appears that rather than tell the truth o a lie Ebay will just go silent and wait for you to go away. So after years of advertising and telling us all to build our own Ebay business and encouraging us to rely on it for our living this is the response we get when they decide we are no longer of any use. I would have some more to say but i have already received 4 warnings from the Ebay moderation team today for speaking out of line. I guess they will shortly send me another dozen or so.....because i know I have been speaking my mind a lot lately. Shame on me.

[wishuponastarcelebrationsandgifts]

Hi movie_models

So sorry to hear about your sharp decline in sales. Unfortunately over the past few years I have found this to be the norm when it comes to ebay rolling out changes. I appreciate your frustration as I have found that with each change comes a decline in sales that is not necessarily rectified when changes are made to listings that are consistent with what ebay suggests.

Jen, as usual, has provided a lot of sound advice. Personally I have found that litsing new items has the most positive effect (possibly after offering free post). It is not that the new items are popular, as more often than not it is existing items that sell rather than the new items that have been listed. I have come to the conclusion that ebay merely "reward" sellers when they list more items so they gain some confidence and invest in even more stock.

I believe it has come to the point where you cannot rely on ebay as a sole source of income.

[kustomizer99]

I once tried having an email conversation with eBay on some problem or other.... every time I sent a question or response it was answered by a different person who seemed not to have been following the conversation from the beginning. They simply weren't able to comprehend what I was asking of them, so I just had to give up.

Good strategy they have there.....

[msscheese]

Is that why we are seeing a lot of OS sellers items on the first page of Best match. I was looking and researching  for an item to buy but the first 5 pages are all from OS sellers. There don't seem to have many sellers that are located in Australia in this category.

[extra-keen]

mss cheese, This is most certainly a problem for Australian sellers. Even when changing search criteria to Australia only, the overseas sellers still seem to appear ahead of Australian sellers in many categories. Although it does help by weeding out some of the overseas junk. You might find you only have 10,000 items to search through rather than 300,000.

[carly2579]

the economy is really bad right now  too

[bright.ton42]

Wow, there was no need to speak to a well respected member like that.

Couldn't agree more.  It removes any sympathy I might have had.  

[lane-ends]

Offering free post wont fix it. All my listings have free post and have for a while. My sales hit the very same brick wall about a week ago. So thats not the reason

[polocross58]

Hi Lane-ends  :-x

Nice to see you again coming out on the side of sanity and reason

Don't know why ebay sends in the trolls to silence and discredit people.  Counterproductive these days when ebay is seemingly intent on closing down Aussie ebay

I can understand the OP no problems

I can understand the OP's frustration

It's clear the OP has been doing a hell of a lot right for a long time, based on the OPs numbers

Doesn't seem to count for much though, despite the OP must have paid a fortune to ebay over the years

Anyway, good on you Lane-ends 🙂

and hope things pick up for you and all those who BUILT ebay - and funded ebay - and supported ebay - and put ebay on the map

You all deserve better in my opionion

[margni_australia]

movie_models:

Yes, it's sad that most discussion topics (on any discussion board you care to name, eBay or otherwise) can't go for more than a couple of days before the dingbats and stooges appear.

One problem is that whilst most people can read, comprehension skills might be lacking.

This also will be the last time I either look at or respond to this particular subject.

Best of luck.

[***super_nova***]

eBay 'live help' are great for sorting basic problems, and I always found them very helpful and pleasant to deal with.  For instance;  when I had problems listing, and had to go backwards and forward, when I finally hit the "list" button I realised that I somehow ticked the option to feature my $10 item, which meant a charge significantly large than it could possibly sell for. Quick chat with the "live help" and both the feature and the astronomical charge was gone.  

To expect a person in call centre in Kolkata, to be able to answer why is business in Australia so slow, is somewhat ambitious.   My sales were lousy since before Xmas, but in the past few weeks sales are picking up, and I also have considerably more people looking & watching. 

People are worried about what horrors will the budget bring.