Selling Overview page says "Add recommended item specifics" to almost ALL listings!

[drenchfur]

This happened just today. In the selling overview page, it shows 5 listings with a grey box that says something like: "Recommended item specifics missing: 6 item specifics" with a blue box beside it "add item specifics" for me to click and add... what? In nearly every case, any "item specific" that matters (I sell mainly video games) has been filled in already. In many cases, there's not even enough blanks to satisfy the number of "missing" specifics! I am stumped.

And on my selling > active list, the warning is more dire: "Add item specifics that are required soon"... like what? The name of the video game is the only one I saw that was flagged as "required soon" when generating the listing - so I always made a point to add it - which is oddly unnecessary work because I've also chosen the specific title matched straight from eBay's catalog to begin with!

I know there are some things I haven't filled in (country of manufacture, mpn number, california warning) but I can't see that being of any importance to anyone looking for a certain video game. They're not even "recommended" just "additional" info.

All this began after making a bulk edit to the description of most of my listings. Then, while trying to figure it out, eBay invited me to "click here to use the new seller hub" and now that's where "sell" takes me... ugh... it's been a long day.

Anyone know what's going on here? Surely there's a glitch in the system?

[cumos55]

Does the following link help?

https://www.ebay.ca/help/listings/creating-managing-listings/listing-item-details-catalogue?id=4653&...

[drenchfur]

No good, nothing new there. Surely this can be only happening to me? All these listings have been up for some time, some for over a month. It just happened all at once. It's not until eBay "stops" me from listing or renewing because of this that it will really become a problem. But right now it's killing my OCD.

[dhslk]

Hello. I had 5 listings flagged today, too, for the first time. ALL of them were variation listings with many different colours. I was told that COLOR was missing, even though, obviously, each variation was for colour. However, all I had to do was 'pretend' to update the listing and it disappeared from the flag list.

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

@drenchfur 

You may want to add the following link as a bookmark. It should bring you to your listings that require updating. You can also add it as a shortcut for your Seller Hub page and check in from time to time to see if there are you've missed.

https://www.ebay.ca/mys/overview

From past experience when I've been ummm "fortunate" to get one of these requests from eBay I find it the easiest way to proceed. I just take my time and do 5 or 10 at a time individually. So it isn't as overwhelming.  As you fix they will get removed from the list.

Lotz

[drenchfur]

Thing is, I can't seems to satisfy eBay on even ONE listing, filling stuff in, trying to trick it or otherwise!

I will add a edited together screenshot pair, where one item (a golf game) went from maybe 5 to just 4 "missing" specifics after filling things in. Things that don't really apply, either. I don't think this game is part of a series, for example. It would be so much easier IF it simply flagged in red what it wanted. Take a look... any ideas?

[kawartha-ephemera]

In my collectible categories they've recently added some new item specifics too. On the face of it the additions didn't seem to make much sense either ... 

For example, on .ca in collectibles > postcards > canada they've added "Country" and "Theme" with the suggested values being "Canada" and "International Cities and Towns". My first thought was this is nuts, after all I'm already listing in postcards > canada, why the need to specify country again? And why would the suggested theme be International Cities and Towns?

After awhile I came to the conclusion these 2 new postcard specifics were added to improve the filters found on the left side of ebay.com search results. I'm fairly sure this came about because of differences in postcard taxonomy between .com and .ca

On .com, to list a Canadian postcard subject one uses postcards > international cities and towns > canada.

On .ca to list the same card one uses postcards > canada. 

The taxonomy used for .com does not match that used on .ca which causes search filter difficulties on .com.

I checked, it is now possible on ebay.com, by using the filters found on the left side of search, to narrow the results by using the "international cities and towns > canada" filter. I'm not certain but I suspect the new specifics were created to solve a category compatability problem between the 2 sites. Same sort of situation in the antique photograph category.

I'm not familiar with the video game category. Are there taxonomy differences there too? If there are, perhaps ebay is trying to fix filter problems.

Below are screenshots of current ebay.com search filters .... see anything new?

[drenchfur]

I've come to conclude eBay is broken. I'm gonna fudge my way through this and forget about it.

Here's how I got this to go away. Using the "add item specifics" from Selling Overview did not help, perhaps only reducing the count by 1 or 2 on things I truly may have missed. The trick, it seems, is to revise each listing individually. First, I uncheck the box labelled "Prefill this listing with eBay catalogue info" and instantly eBay removes any info it may have added on its own earlier. (For this reason, it's probably a good idea to "revise" in a new tab so you can refer to the old listing.) Anyway, now I re-enter anything that looks missing - doesn't even need to be complete - the essentials seem to do. Save changes, refresh my overview page, see if it's down to zero (it may show just the "add specifics" box for a short while) but once it's fully updated throughout the system the item disappears from the top of the list.

I've tried un-checking the box, then re-checking it so eBay removes then re-adds what it claims is no longer there, but that doesn't seem to work. This is surely a bug of some sort, rather annoying, but I doubt it will get fixed. Perhaps my experience can help anyone who stumbles upon this problem themselves in the future.

@kawartha-ephemera I don't think they added any item specific, but there are so many seemingly useless specifics it's really hard to tell if a new one snuck in. This would have made my job easier, knowing what my target to update actually was. This problem is different, where it's simply claiming specifics that ARE there are not, it seems. Like internally, their yes/no status was all flipped to "no" until I go in and manually change them again. Weird.

[kawartha-ephemera]

It must be frustrating being on the receiving end of all these "helpful" recommendations. Glad you were able to sort it out ok.

Personally, I never see this sort of thing in my selling overview, maybe I can thank listing in non catalogue categories for that. I do find listings with missing specifics all the time but no warnings are ever triggered. 

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

@kawartha-ephemera 

@drenchfur 

I updated a single listing earlier today because a customer noticed something was missing. Originally, when I created the listing I just filled in the choices shown and added a couple I thought of at the time. Later today I received a message saying this particular listing had missing required fields. Went in to update the listing and one of the suggested fields was Manufacturer. Problem being, that was no box included as an available choice to update. So another case of 1 step forward and 2 steps back. I just added it manually.

-Lotz

[drenchfur]

A few hours later, I only have 84 listings to update now. Getting faster at it, yet still being cautious.

Something I've noticed (at least in Video Games category) when I go to revise my listing is the UPC number isn't showing. When I click "don't use catalog data" the UPC box appears. I enter a UPC, and instantly that box checks itself again, and fills in stuff "for me" which doesn't count. So I'm required to un-check the box (again) and this time the UPC stays. I then add the recommended fields properly (some "filled for me" fields were completely hidden when the box was checked) and submit.

You know what really gets my goat (other than a goat trap) is that if I choose "manual included" as a feature, and people looking for my game filter the features by "not specified" my listing is not part of the returned list... a nice punishment for being thorough. But if someone DOES manage to filter like this they're more likely to choose "with manual" I hope.

[rebelphoto]

If you’ve updated all the info possible, simply click on:
“Don't remind me about these recommendations again”

Located after the list of specification to update.

[reallynicestamps]

ZOMBIE THREAD FROM JULY 2020

 The problem with zombie thread is that the information and advice may be out of date or incorrect.

[mrdutch1001]

When I prepare a listing &/or re-list &/or use "sell similar" I fill in required item specifics and these are re-checked from time to time but for the most part I have ignored all the "add recommended item specifics" and the only ones I pay any attention to are the ones that are "required". And in some categories there are a whole bunch more"required" item specifics being put into place that will become a necessity to be able to complete the listing.

[teenytrinkets]

I get these messages all the time. I just ignore them. The item specifics requested are supposed to help customers with searches, apparently. When i have time, i look for listings with a low number of views and beef them up, but nothing that's required

[cardconnoisseurs]

The issue with that is you have to do each individually. Ebay should be allowing us to edit this field in bulk like any other, IE, select all "Don't remind me about these recommendations again", CLOSE. it's *incredibly* annoying, nagging, and unprofessional. If they so determined to have all these fields filled in, either make them mandatory, or give sellers a discount on their fees for filling them out. This constant nag, essentially making us choose between leaving the annoying notification there, or endless pointless busywork is degrading.

[mindbender3]

It's total **bleep** to be honest.  I'm getting the same thing with my CD listings.  Everyday there is more added to the list.  This seems to be because eBay changed their formatting and requirements for the listings and the listing were created by me "prior" to their changing the requirement.  Now i have to go back individually to edit every listing.  Extremely painful.

[byto253]

I fill in the ones that make sense and ignore the recommendations as most do not apply.   In the active listings overview I used "Customize Table" to drop and not display the items specific column.

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

---

@mindbender3 wrote:

It's total **bleep** to be honest.  I'm getting the same thing with my CD listings.  Everyday there is more added to the list.  This seems to be because eBay changed their formatting and requirements for the listings and the listing were created by me "prior" to their changing the requirement.  Now i have to go back individually to edit every listing.  Extremely painful.

---

For me as of late it's been DVD's. Mostly information that is detailed in the body of the listing or irrelevant information. There is no way to confirm the specifics they are wanting from the the listing. It has to be done using their tool. Very backwards way of doing things and most annoying.

The other area these suggested/required specifics are a major fail are the listings where multiple different items are combined as 1 listing(Mixed Lot). Clicking do not ask again requires checking off again when the same  listing comes up a day or 2 later.

-Lotz

PS. This is the Zombie Issue that never goes away!!!!!!!

[zee-chan]

I have been ignoring them ever since this warning started appearing on my listings lol