Does TRS US really improve search results?

[peter32123]

I read that on an official ebay page but just wondering if anyone has personal experience about making top rated US and if it increased their impressions/sales?

Making global TRS didn't change much for me but I realize most people use ebay.com.

thanks.

[rose-dee · Accepted solution]

Well, that's what eBay keeps telling us, that US TRS will improve our placement and visibility, but we've also been told that it's only one of many, many factors that their algorithms take into account. 

Let's say this -- if you're able to hang onto US TRS, it's probably better than not having it, but it's also likely not worth tearing your hair out over.  If you keep Global TRS (which is easier), that's probably good enough, assuming all your other metrics are favourable, i.e. be sure to follow eBay's best practices in listing and selling and keep your seller standard as high as possible. 

Due to sluggish sales and lowered volumes, I'm about to lose my US TRS after more than 10 years selling on eBay (I've had US TRS since it was first introduced), so I suppose I'll find out soon whether it makes things even worse. 

By the way, you do know that US TRS and US TRS-Plus are two different things?  The latter is very hard for most Canadian sellers to achieve and maintain due to the tracking requirements, but I would say it's the one most likely to make a difference of all the TRS programmes, especially if you're listing on .com.  

[pjcdn2005]

As you suggested, I'm sure that TRS is just a small factor in listing placement.

"Let's say this -- if you're able to hang onto US TRS, it's probably better than not having it, but it's also likely not worth tearing your hair out over.  If you keep Global TRS (which is easier), that's probably good enough, assuming all your other metrics are favourable,"

Global TRS may be easier for some sellers to keep now because it includes the US now but once US buyers are not counted as Global, Canadian sellers must have had 100+ transactions with Canadian and other Global buyers in the previous 12 months to keep Global TRS.

That will change in August although we won't see the change in our dashboards until Sept 20th and there will be a grace period for sellers who are affected by this.

http://pages.ebay.ca/seller-centre/news/seller-updates/2017summer/international-performance-standard...

To maintain your Top Rated status in the Global region, you may need to build up your sales to buyers outside of the United States, United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. To give you time to meet the eligibility requirements, we will continue to offer Top Rated Seller benefits to sellers who are currently Top Rated in the Global region and maintain good performance on sales to that region until February 20, 2018.

[hlmacdon]

Ranking criteria is a closely guarded secret, guarded more closely than the Coca Cola formula. Rumor has it not even ebay devs know what goes into the ranking criteria.

In general Top Rated Plus is what you would need, but only in concert with a number of other variables, and I suspect that rate of sell through and click conversion rate play a more important role.

[peter32123]

Yeah my global will be gone soon, not enough non US buyers, sucks to lose the discount and badge but aside from that I don't care.

Finally made it, then got the message about the new rules lol.

[reallynicestamps]

I don't care about the badge-- got pinkslapped on the dotCOM Boards for an extremely honest comment about the stupid new Boards and their 'rockstar/enthusiast/trailblazer' badges.-- but the discounts are always nice.

Still, it makes sense to me to set my prices according to the highest level of expense and be happy when I get a discount from that rather than depend on discounts for my profit margin.

[rose-dee]

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@pjcdn2005 wrote:

Global TRS may be easier for some sellers to keep now because it includes the US now but once US buyers are not counted as Global, Canadian sellers must have had 100+ transactions with Canadian and other Global buyers in the previous 12 months to keep Global TRS.

That will change in August although we won't see the change in our dashboards until Sept 20th and there will be a grace period for sellers who are affected by this.

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Yes, I was referring to the current situation.  

I expect a lot of us will lose our longstanding Global TRS status by late fall, but now that the discount is only 10%, sales for many of us are dropping anyway, and the visibility benefits of TRS unclear, it probably won't make much difference.  

On the other hand, once there are far fewer TRS sellers, eBay may tweak its search algorithms to deliberately increase its relative value.