Canadian Sales D.O.A
Summary: jewelbay started a discussion about a dramatic 86% drop in their eBay sales since last fall, a situation they've never experienced in 23 years. mrdutch1001 shared a different experience, noting an increase in sales after listing on eBay.com, while reallynicestamps described fluctuations based on geographical sales and inactivity. marnotom! and factoryproducts suggested expanding shipping options and listing locations to international markets, noting potentially lower costs. ilikehockeyjerseys gave extensive advice on optimizing shipping, listing strategies, and running promotions, while jewelbay expressed confusion over eBay's promotional settings. They received guidance from ilikehockeyjerseys on how to navigate these options. Throughout the thread, participants discussed strategies and considerations for improving sales in a challenging online market.
Dropped like a rock.
Who else Experiencing this.
reallynicestamps
·2 years agoduplicated
wilsonharborsales
·2 years agoilikehockeyjerseys
·2 years agoThe pandemic was a boom in ecommerce. Sales are down for everybody. With that said, 86 percent is a very steep drop.
Someone else pointed out that some of your shipping rates are high. Using the same Sabres cap as an example, we're in the same city and the shipping calculator gives me a rate of $24. For a cap, that's way too much. That isn't a judgment on what you are charging for shipping. That is me saying you seem to have room to make your shipping rates more efficient, which would lower the overall price of your items and increase sales.
I would consider pre-packaging or pre-weighing smaller items to ensure that they are below 200g. If you print your labels through eBay, you can ship them within Canada using Expedited Lite (200g weight limit) for about $8. The other option would be to use a fixed shipping rate and go with an extra-small flat rate box ($16.99).
Also consider the supplies you use. While I love to ship as many items as possible in a box, with something like a common mass produced hat (not something rare), shipping it in a poly bag is worth it if it means that I can charge someone $8 instead of $20-$30.
Consider running steep sales. Start at 10 percent. Go all the way up to 50 or 60 percent if you have to. Stale inventory is stale inventory. Your options are to generally sit on it, or liquidate it.
You have quite a few lots of different types of items like patches and pins. I would consider relisting them as individual items if there is a market for them. People generally don't like lots unless you sell at a complete rock bottom price. For example, if I am going to lot together items that sell for $10 "Buy It Now" each, I would probably expect to get $1-$2 per item as part of a lot. That's just the way it is with lots of common items. Your average person doesn't want to buy lots. Lots are usually purchased by resellers who break them up for individual sale, or very prudent collectors who know what they are buying.
I would also look into a read about promoted listings. If you aren't promoting your items at all, consider trying standard promoted listings at the lowest possible rate (2.1 percent). This amounts to giving eBay an extra 21 cents for every 10 dollars of revenue, but sometimes can lead to quite a few extra sales.
jewelbay
OP2 years agoBut promoting your items scares me. I tried it and had sales by promoting but once had to pay a extreme rate of paying per click and my promoted items were advertised off eBay. It complicated the settings in promoting your items. I do not mind paying 2.1% more fees if it helps me sell. But somehow eBay default put me into a higher promotional division. I am still hesitant about using promotional sales. No idea how to change from standard promoting to more pay Er click off eBay promoting.
EBay Canada needs to be more clear. Everything I read, tried to learn about promoting your sales is very ill written. Understanding it it very confusing. I want eBay to know that. You should have a clear click selection for picking standard promoting. Not the way it is now.
mrdutch1001
·2 years agoPersonally I do not believe in the Promoted listings game and refuse to participate...why? >because it is a never-ending circle of trying to out do competitors...once a seller engages in this PL game, there is no going back because you've been sucked into it and eBay will keep you in "their" game at YOUR cost. I firmly believe that the most smart & most savy buyers will intentionally bypass PLs as they continue their search to find what they came to eBay for in the first place.
ilikehockeyjerseys
·2 years agoWhat you want to look for is standard promoted listings. Then you can set the ad rate cap at 2.1 percent.
On the Desktop version of the website, go to your listings section. You will see four drop down menus above your listings (Edit, Sell Similar, Actions, Sell It Faster). Click on Actions, and then select Promote.
Follow the steps below, just avoid dynamic ad rate or promoted listings advance. They both have a purpose for certain types of listings, but for the kind of stuff that you're selling (niche one off items), you may not benefit as much.
What likely happened before is that you accidentally set a dynamic ad rate or something along those lines.
factoryproducts
·2 years agoIf by chance you are only selling in Canada you will need to expand to all other countries. you will be amazed that the shipping cost to other contries is less than shipping in Canada. I can also say that Ebay Canada foot print here is not like other countries. we have fewer options to use with e-bay Canada. You Might want to start you own Web Site and slowly build it up with the help of e Bay and Amazon. the more you can take away and build a customer base for you web site the better. Just my opinon
marnotom!
·2 years agoAlso, have you considered expanding your list of shipping locations? You may be limiting yourself by only shipping to Canada and the US and excluding post office boxes.
reallynicestamps
·2 years agoFor a few weeks my Canadian and overseas sales doubled, and my US sales dropped to only about 80%.
Value of the sales did not change much, but destinations did.
It seems the logarithm is trained that if we get a sale in a particular area, we get more visibility in that location.
Things are back to normal now.
My sales are off this past two weeks but I also have not been doing as much listing. There is definitely a relationship.
mrdutch1001
·2 years agomy sales in the past 2 years have been down from previous years...
However, I have had as many sales in this first half of 2024 as did for the entire year of 2023....
edited to add> that since starting to list on .COM after over 2 years of listing on .CA only, has seen an increase in sales to the USA.