eBay

musicyouneed · ‎08-13-2021

Do you offer any discounts to watchers? I know that I have been offered discounts, but mostly watching for competition purposes that I have taken advantage of 2 of the 40 I was offered. What about you, do you offer and what is your opinion of it? What percentage do you usually do?

. I think

mr.special-editions · ‎08-13-2021

I use it when I want to unload product that is devaluing quickly or my time to claim an ITC is running up and sometimes to attract new buyers, they may like my service and come back again.

femmefan1946 · ‎08-13-2021

I'm of the opinion that watchers watch and buyers buy.

I prefer the Promoted Listings, which only cost me when they work, and setting high/low parameters on Fixed Price/Best Offer.

My items tend to be long tail at the best of times and not particularly bulky.

mr.special-editions · ‎08-13-2021

You make a good point, promoted listings get the job done.

I forgot to mention a downside to sending offers. There's been a few occassions where eBayers in countries I exclude were able to accept the offer. eBay won't let them checkout but I found it odd that they were allowed to accept.

t_bjarnason · ‎08-13-2021

I've used the offer feature quite a few times, but never with any success. I find that if a buyer really wants and item for a better deal, they will just message you anyways, even if your listing doesn't accept offers.

Speaking of offers on listings, I have not accepted offers for quite some time. I find it's much more work than it's worth going back and forth, and as I said above, they will just message you anyways.

dinomitesales · ‎08-13-2021

I like the "Offers to Watchers" option and will send them every time I see them available in Seller Hub. The level of discount I give depends on how old the listing is. If it's a newer listing I'll just do the minium 5%, but I will often offer a higher discount if it's something that's been sitting around for a long time or I don't have much money into and still have a lot of room for profit.

I've been surprised at how many items I've been able to sell using this method; sometimes even that little 5% discount is enough to push them over the edge!

femmefan1946 · ‎08-13-2021

The thing about having Best Offer on a listing is that we can set our parameters.

Not only does this automatically reject (politely) the ridiculously low offers without any emotional committment of the part of the seller, but it allows the seller to accept without any labour.

Sometimes I don't even realize that an item sold to the Best Offer until I am recording the sale for bookkeeping.

rocketscollectibles · ‎08-13-2021

I'm doing it most of the time, but from my small experience, for me it never works. I did it around 20 times+ and got only one sale from it. For me 5% discounts seems like it's not enough, the sale i did with it was a 10%. If i consider that ebay taking me 12.35% + 0.30$ fees, + 12.35% on shipping/handling too, + 15% taxes on those fees (LOL), those 10%+ discounts are just too much. I would do it if i know my item is kind of overpriced or if really i wanna push a sale

Tho i personally never sending one on the first days i feel like you're sending sign of deseperation to sell. I mean as a buyer when i receive a discount offer very quick i always asking myself what's wrong with that item, why the seller wants to sell it so quick, what's the problem. It shows that the seller is quickly ready to discount so he's either probably struggling to sell it or his item might be overpriced, why others did not bought it. Well you understand the idea, i feel like a too quick discount bring a lot of questions and could chase a sale instead. That's paradoxical but you can convince to not buy too with a discount... I always wait at least a few days before sending one to not show ''weakness'' to the buyer

I'm almost sending offers more as a reminder, it notify the buyer so it's like a ''hey you remember that item? Re think about it with a discount''

hlmacdon · ‎08-13-2021

For watchers of multiquantity listings I just decrease my available quantity and find that more effective. Never found offers for single quantity to be effective. In my niches the buyers tend to just use watchlists as virtual wishlists and lean heavily towards the tirekicker camp so YMMV.

femmefan1946 · ‎08-13-2021

In some sectors there is a season for various kinds of merchandise.

You can't sell a BBQ after Father's Day for example.

Or bathing suits in August.

But mostly, we found that having a Sale on non-seasonal merchandise just meant the same number of buyers but a lower profit.

With seasonal merchandise, the B&Ms use a mixture of advertising, "false" sales prices*, and constantly reducing stock** to move product.

*Advertise it at $100 for one week, then put it on sale for the next six months giving the inflated price as what you are discounting from. Sears used to get fined regularly for that one, back when there was a federal Consumer Protection department.

**If you don't buy that swimsuit in June, it will not be available in your size in July or in stock at all in August.

byto253 · ‎08-16-2021

Are there particular categories or types of items that the Offers to Watchers is effective with? I can see that with video game items and cards it may be better than more niche items.

dinomitesales · ‎08-19-2021

I mean possibly, I do sell a lot of video games and stuff and that's where I tend to see them work the best. But theoretically it could work in any category - just depends on how susceptible they are to impulse buying haha.

lady.stark · ‎08-20-2021

I did sell a few things that way. Especially on collectibles items like props and wardrobe. Sometimes it works on magazines too. I would say I sold 30% of my items that way.

15westcoast · ‎08-20-2021

I usually consider the "buy it now" price that I have listed the item at to be fair

and have not given any offers to watchers.

lotzofuniquegoodies · ‎08-20-2021

@hlmacdon wrote:
For watchers of multiquantity listings I just decrease my available quantity and find that more effective. Never found offers for single quantity to be effective. In my niches the buyers tend to just use watchlists as virtual wishlists and lean heavily towards the tirekicker camp so YMMV.

@rocketscollectibles

@musicyouneed

As a sidenote it's been determined by some dot com sellers that if you send random offers to buyers with multiple unit listings it only offers them 1 unit. If they send an offer to you they are able to choose up to the available quantity. Shipping as per however you have indicated.

Put another way if you have 3 "new" watchers each would get an offer for 1 unit. My guess first come first serve.

-Lotz

musicyouneed2 · ‎08-20-2021

Update, well yesterday, I offered a 12% off to watchers to about 125 items and did get 2 sales from it. So I am happy, I will do it again. Whatever works.

rocketscollectibles · ‎08-21-2021

Had an item at 26.80$ tonight with best offer on, someome offered 10.00$... I counter offered at 20.00$ saying that's my best offer, he sent a 14.00$ offer... I did set automatic decline 19.99$ and less, he ended accepting my offer. I personally think that it works, but really with 10%+ offers. Anyone really experiment buyers accepting 5% discount? I feel like buyers accepting 5% are buyers that would have bought it anyway at full price, 5% never ever worked once for me. 10%+ worked a couple times

parts_and_diecasts · ‎08-22-2021

yes, it boost the other listings visibility.

e.g.: you send an offer for item x, but item y and/or z end up selling

I usually do 10%, maybe 5% if already priced competitively (i.e. 1st in search results)

my experience has been about 25% of offers end up in a sale (direct or indirect)

take the 2 TLV Ferrari F40 diecasts I sold last friday. first one I send a 5% discount which sold for US$104.50, relisted same day, second one sold for full asking price of US$110. This is despite having some Japanese sellers better priced than me all-in (price + shipping). If I was of the same "NO, I'll only take top dollar" kind of mentality of some people on this forum, I would have forgone US$214.50 in sales that day...

zee-chan · ‎08-23-2021

I use it once in a while, usually 10% off, if I happen to get a sale. It's in hopes that the buyer who bought one item would add another item to their order, or hoping that someone else will buy something to make my post office trip more worthwhile lol. I didn't do a tally on the success rate but I'm sure it's less than 30%...