struggling with sales this week.

[nicole-n-daz]

Hi

Having a soft week here,page views are way down.

Anybody have any ideas ?

[phorum_junkie*]

Wow, Hawker --------------- you've got some GREAT items for sale.  Such low prices !  And very low postage, too

Perhaps therein lies part of the problem. many more discerning buyers do actually avoid the cheap Chinese tat and prefer to pay a bit more assuming they are getting a better quality product so if you list your items at a very low price it can be counter productive.

Often if I have an item that isn't selling well I will take it off for a couple of weeks and then list it at a higher price and that often does the trick. (at least that would be what I would do if I had three selling ids ;-))

I am sure there are many reasons for a general decrease in sales across the board and perhaps ebay could do more to help but if you add up the reasons they are many and varied.

The full credit card bills for profligate spending over Christmas and New Year are really starting to bite as people realise that making the minimum payments each month means they are going to be paying for ever.

It is getting near tax time and those who live in the moment are realising that they may have a large bill to face shortly.

Everyday costs for fuel, food and other living expenses are rocketing.

Postage costs have increased, not ebay's fault and thanks to them working with AP there is a more economic, safe way to post but many people refuse to even look into it.

B&M shops are under performing so are having more and more knock down sales which mean only buyers without access to those stores are interested in buying on ebay.

Many more companies are now selling on-line, and offering Paypal, so there is increased competition.

Australia is no longer immune to the world recession, especially as the economy in other countries are showing a glimmer of recovery.

The high exchange rate impedes selling overseas.

Some people refuse to change anything and adapt to changing circumstances.

etc

etc.

[nicole-n-daz]

Thanks for the sensible reply .

I only sell items cheaply to be competive,and it has only got really bad in the last week.

I only sell authentic items as well,no cheap copies or anything like that,and i make it quite clear in my store front that i list honestly and refuse to sell items that are not in good nick.

So i believe the real problem here is that my items are not always visible to the public,,Propably because Ebay have overloaded servers,and it is a fact that they ebay like to control our numbers.I have been keeping an eye on the trends for a long time now,.you might get 9 sales in 3 hours and then not another sale for 48 hours,then you get a block of sales again and then no sales again.This is too inconsistent to be an accident or trend.

And for anybody wondering i have always traded under 1 username (Hawker1967)

I do not and have never had another username on Ebay.

[davewil1964]

Okay, hawker, I will elucidate.

I sell second hand books. Most of which are available NEW from allegedly Australian multi mega dropshippers for less than my postage costs.

My sales are split roughly between out of print 60s and 70s science fiction, which the MMDSs don't have access to, and mass market paperbacks of many topics, which the MMDS do sell, for cheaper than I can.

My point was, and is, that I make sales regardless. It might be my 100% rating, but many other sellers have that; it might be my service, but almost all of my buyers are first time with me. I have no idea why my sales are good, therefore cannot offer you any prescriptions as to how to increase your selling rates.

My original post was highlighting that fact. ie Not all sellers are experiencing a downturn in sales due to eBay's fee changes. They work to my favour. I will admit that my sales volume is not up there compared with yours (30 per month is good), so a week without sales is not unusual.

I do apologise if I came across as antagonistic.

[shepherdsrule]

And above is a man big enough to apologise - a very rare breed it seems of late.

Kudo's davewill

and for those reading, I do not know dave, but have seen his and his other id post and this is why I earlier stated he was a well respected responder.....just to be clear.

No alterior motive, no boys club, no clicky group.

[nicole-n-daz]

I contactted Ebay about this,and here is there reply,

Dear Daryl (hawker1967),

Thank you for contacting eBay in regards to searching for your item.

When you search for an item on eBay, the search results are categorized according to Best Match by default. Best Match is eBay's default sort order to present search results. The goal of Best Match is to help shoppers find just what they're looking for from sellers they trust. For you as a seller, this means getting your listings in front of the buyers who are most interested in your products. This means that your item may appear on page 4 for one buyer but appear on another one for a different buyer. Delivering great value and service to your buyers is key in determining your position in Best Match.

While we are continually improving the algorithm behind Best Match, the key principles will always remain the same, so you should continue to focus on these best practices in order to perform well over time. Please refer to the link below for more details of how Best Match works.

Absolutely No hope at all with these guys,They totally ignored the part where i mention that i think there are technical problems which makes listings invisible to buyers.

And to Dave I accept your apology,

[appletreeaaa]

The item might appear on the first page if the buyer uses''  Best Match '' but if the buyer uses'' Lowest Price '' for the search of the item , it could appear first so it all depends on the percentage of buyers who use which system .

I have noticed that when ever I advertised in newspaper classifications , the advertisement at the top and first of the listings were not as good as the middle or the end of the listings and that was over a 20 year period for every day .

A book written on the science of advertising shows that with newspaper advertising , the first and last pages are the best with page 3 being far better than  page 2 so maybe having your listing at the very top of the first page may not always be better than page one in the middle of the page when listing on the internet .