eBay

mypaperstuff · ‎07-04-2023

Hi there,

I notice something very strange lately on Ebay.ca. When I do searches, I notice that the first few pages of results contains ONLY sponsored/promoted items, instead of "some" sponsored items in selected spots in the result page. Some items do not display as "sponsored" in the first place, but if you do a CTRL+F (find) on the result page, all the items on the page (even if you switch to 240 result per page) appear to match and are highlighted. I also noticed that ALL my sales from June 28 to July 3 (except auctions, as I don't use the promotion feature for these) are sales that are from promoted items in my store. I'm really wondering (although worrying may be more appropriate here) what is happening with the good ol' organic placement in search results. Has eBay and Cassini borrowed from the videogame marketing concept of "pay-to-win" so that eBay sellers now heavily need to "pay-to-display"?

flipistics · ‎07-04-2023

It's a good question. Over the weekend 5 of my 11 sales were organic and 6 were promoted. I (think) all the items were enrolled in promoted listings.

I agree that if search is only showing promoted, especially if someone sorts by price, that's a big problem that is likely to frustrate buyers. It's even worse if items that are showing via promoted listings aren't what the user searched for. Were your search results at least showing the correct items?

doc_scribe · ‎07-04-2023

@flipistics wrote:
It's a good question. Over the weekend 5 of my 11 sales were organic and 6 were promoted. I (think) all the items were enrolled in promoted listings.

I agree that if search is only showing promoted, especially if someone sorts by price, that's a big problem that is likely to frustrate buyers. It's even worse if items that are showing via promoted listings aren't what the user searched for. Were your search results at least showing the correct items?

That might also explain why messages like the following have suddenly been spot-welded to my Seller Hub Overview + Manage Orders + Active Listings pages :

...with no layout Customization option available for repositioning or removal:

msau4301 · ‎07-04-2023

This irks me every time I search for something. I remember the good old days when what you were looking for was actually on the top!

For myself I have never (nope not ever) used promoted listings, but then again I mostly do auctions which don't apply, and by some stroke of luck/fate my sales have still have been somewhat the same pace, maybe a little less. Sometimes it amazes me anyone found me at all but I chalk that up to die-hard collectors (I sell vintage Barbies) who plug in real specific info, and also to my followers and repeat buyers (love them to pieces!)

The silly thing about eBay trying so hard to get everyone to pay for promoted is if we all did, and everything was promoted, wouldn't it just be right back to square one and everyone being the same anyways!??!

2nd-time-around-jewelry · ‎07-04-2023

I have been seeing that same banner for Promoted Listings for awhile now. They want you to use eBay's Daily Suggestions. I sell vintage jewelry & their suggestions start at 10% on my items and go up from there. And noticed that a lot of them changed from 10% one day to 12% & higher the next day. I stopped using promoted listings when they forced us to start with 2%. My sales are lousy but if I can only be competetive if I promote listings, that is pretty sad. We already are paying high fees for the regular stuff.

mrdutch1001 · ‎07-04-2023

my sales may be lousy but there is no way in H**L that I will use eBay's promoted listings...

byto253 · ‎07-04-2023

I thought the clutter from sponsored was from the defaul "best match" and by sorting by price it got rid of the clutter. That seems to be the case when I search on .com anyway.

reallynicestamps · ‎07-04-2023

It may depend on the category, but if I were paying for better placement with PL, I'd be ticked if my listings didn't get better placement.

What categories were you Searching?
It seems like in saturated categories like Clothing and Cellphones, PL becomes necessary, and the organic Search comes into play within the PL listings--do those you see also have many pictures, long time sellers, high feedback ratings, lots of Item Specifics?

Also what Search were you using? Best Match would very likely turn up a lot of PL listings, but Highest Price plus Shipping or Closing Soon might not. It would be interesting to know.

*While eBay doesn't use FB to assess members, it does make sense that a seller with a lot of negs and neutrals would also have Disputes which we can't see for privacy considerations.

lotzofuniquegoodies · ‎07-04-2023

@msau4301 wrote:
This irks me every time I search for something. I remember the good old days when what you were looking for was actually on the top!
For myself I have never (nope not ever) used promoted listings, but then again I mostly do auctions which don't apply, and by some stroke of luck/fate my sales have still have been somewhat the same pace, maybe a little less. Sometimes it amazes me anyone found me at all but I chalk that up to die-hard collectors (I sell vintage Barbies) who plug in real specific info, and also to my followers and repeat buyers (love them to pieces!)
The silly thing about eBay trying so hard to get everyone to pay for promoted is if we all did, and everything was promoted, wouldn't it just be right back to square one and everyone being the same anyways!??!

@2nd-time-around-jewelry

Would be nice to know what happed to the "promise" by eBay to move the Promoted Banner BELOW item description. Just what sellers need!!! Someone looking at your listing and seeing promoted items lower in price and going elsewhere.

-Lotz

reallynicestamps · ‎07-04-2023

Yeah.

Placement in Search is one thing.

Putting ads on the selling page we bought/rented is quite another.

femmefan1946 · ‎07-05-2023

Random post-- Today while listing, I noticed the "suggested" fee for PL Standard on some of my items was under 10%!!

Granted it was nine point something, but we have an outlier!!

As usual, I only 'promoted' one of the listings and that at 2%.

mypaperstuff · ‎07-05-2023

To answer reallynicestamps's question, I was searching keywords related to collectible game cards, but I've search multiple categories (such as stamps, watches, jewelry, shoes, etc.) and the results were the same : all items from the first few pages were promoted items. Some had the word "sponsored" displayed while all others have the word masked underneath, but still identifiable with a CTRL+F on the page. So no unenrolled item seemed to show up in the results. Try it in your favorite category, you'll see.

lotzofuniquegoodies · ‎07-05-2023

@mypaperstuff wrote:
To answer reallynicestamps's question, I was searching keywords related to collectible game cards, but I've search multiple categories (such as stamps, watches, jewelry, shoes, etc.) and the results were the same : all items from the first few pages were promoted items. Some had the word "sponsored" displayed while all others have the word masked underneath, but still identifiable with a CTRL+F on the page. So no unenrolled item seemed to show up in the results. Try it in your favorite category, you'll see.

@mypaperstuff

Just started a new promotion, all items in the same category. eBays suggestion (default) for dynamic was 25%. Using fixed items went from 11%, 11.1, 11.4% and 11.5%. Using my standard 2 %. Best advise I can give to anyone using promotions if they choose to use.....NEVER RUSH the process. Double check after when it is up and running that it running as you want.

Current traffic report. Last batch of promotions ended June 30th.

16 sales. 5 were promoted.

-Lotz

ricarmic · ‎07-05-2023

@mypaperstuff when I do searches, they come up as they normally have, some showing sponsored, some auctions some BINs without "sponsored".

I see what you mean using the "CTRL F" search, with unsponsored ones "hidden?" but my understanding is that if it doesn't display "sponsored" in the query results, it is an unsponsored showing, even if it is defined as a sponsored item by the seller. Ie if I were a buyer and I clicked on it, it would not count as sponsored, with the caveat that in the new order of things if I've already clicked on a different sponsored item from that same seller, then anything subsequently from that seller I purchase that is a sponsored item by that seller, counts as sponsored from ebay/the sellers perspective. (That might be what we're seeing via "ctrl f"??)

I'm still selling items not sponsored that are sponsored, so there are ways for folks to find my stuff without it counting as being sponsored. The majority of items (other than auctions) are sponsored but this is more the factor that 90% of my items are sponsored.

I use a sub category that has a lot of high promoted rates being used. I did an experiment with an "exhorbitant" rate, and that generated a lot of sales, meaning I exceeded the average rate. I'm about to shut my store for summer break but when I reopen I'll have to continue experiments to identify the most economical way to bring buyers in.

doc_scribe · ‎07-05-2023

@reallynicestamps wrote:
Yeah.
Placement in Search is one thing.
Putting ads on the selling page we bought/rented is quite another.

The last time the Hard Sell Team introduced something like this, which I politely declined to participate in, it cost me almost one full month of zero sales. This time, with steady sales up to evaluation date, but nada since...I'm assuming it will take another month end column of red ink before PL marketeers 'get' it.

femmefan1946 · ‎07-05-2023

A question about jargon.

I understood that "sponsored" meant the seller had purchased advertising space on eBay. Money up front from a non-member.

While "promoted" meant the seller was an eBay member who had opted into the Promoted Listings, promising to pay a percentage to eBay, but only if the item sold.

devon@ebay

Has this changed?

femmefan1946 · ‎07-05-2023

I use a Mac and the control F thing doesn't work for me.

I did a Search on Best Match /firefly/kaylee which gave a reasonable 447 results. (Actually I thought that was high for a character from a cult TV show cancelled after only 13 episodes had aired.)

My Search was for 60 items per page.

The first five showed Sponsored.

The next nine didn't

The next three showed Sponsored.

The next dozen didn't

The next four were Sponsored

Then six not

Then one sponsored

Then 19 not.

Then two sponsored.

Those last three Sponsored were all from Australia.

Highest price was $462Cdn/ Lowest $7.14 Cdn

One of the item showing was mine. It is not Sponsored. Nor is it Promoted. It does have Free Shipping (Canada and USA).

femmefan1946 · ‎07-05-2023

it cost me almost one full month of zero sales.

It seems like the algorithm sends more customers to members who have recent sales than those who don't.

So when you are not selling, it gets worse. When you are selling, you keep on selling.

As a corollary, if you sell something for the first time ever to Idaho (low population) then you are more likely to sell another thing to Idaho in the near future.

It's all guesswork, but I think the algorithm is programmed to believe that if your stuff is of interest to Idahoans, then it should show your stuff to more Idahoans.

Sort of the opposite of throttling.

flipistics · ‎07-05-2023

@femmefan1946 wrote:
it cost me almost one full month of zero sales.
It seems like the algorithm sends more customers to members who have recent sales than those who don't.
So when you are not selling, it gets worse. When you are selling, you keep on selling.
As a corollary, if you sell something for the first time ever to Idaho (low population) then you are more likely to sell another thing to Idaho in the near future.
It's all guesswork, but I think the algorithm is programmed to believe that if your stuff is of interest to Idahoans, then it should show your stuff to more Idahoans.
Sort of the opposite of throttling.

Yeah, I'll often see most sales for a given day go to the same province. It also feels like when one type of item sells, more often sell in the next few days from that category.

doc_scribe · ‎07-05-2023

@femmefan1946 wrote:
it cost me almost one full month of zero sales.
It seems like the algorithm sends more customers to members who have recent sales than those who don't.
So when you are not selling, it gets worse. When you are selling, you keep on selling.
As a corollary, if you sell something for the first time ever to Idaho (low population) then you are more likely to sell another thing to Idaho in the near future.
It's all guesswork, but I think the algorithm is programmed to believe that if your stuff is of interest to Idahoans, then it should show your stuff to more Idahoans.
Sort of the opposite of throttling.

I don't pay much attention to the ebbs and flows of niche media sales. They are natural and expected, especially seasonally. My sales just tend to putter along, if not predictably by destination or recurring business, then consistently in terms of overall demand. And like any other collectibles they seem to benefit most from organic - and very specific - keyword Search.

Then suddenly I see an ON / OFF sales switch like this:

Overnight, something changed. Like you, I suspect that new PL "algorithm."