"international visibility"

[raro11]

I am trying to list an item which I would like to appear on Ebay.com and Ebay.co.uk

I have read the article about International Visibility http://pages.ebay.ca/help/sell/globalexposure.html?fb=true

Yet when I go to review my listing, I do not see this feature offered anywhere, even though I believe I qualify for all the listed criteria.

I don't know where I am going wrong, and neither the Ebay automated listing maker or the real live rep I talked to at Ebay seems to be able to help.

If anyone has experience with this, I am all ears.

Thanks!

[femmefan1946]

You can just go to eBay.co.uk and list there in sterling.

Would that help?

I would certainly suggest listing in US dollars particularly for the US market. The world understands the US dollar and Americans understand nothing else.

Your item has UK shipping enabled, so it is available to UK customers. However, they may be put off by not being familiar with the loonie.

Your UK shipping is not enabled. At least, I couldn't get the cost with my default zipcode 90210. Do the dimensions of your parcel match the parameters for the service you have chosen?

And keep in mind that only about 40% of items listed ever sell (which is still higher than most online sites) and that the lower your feedback the harder it is to sell anything.

You might want to re-think offering that Royal Mail jacket and cap at auction, unless you are willing to sell it for the opening price. Auctions get very few bids and most of those arrive in the last few seconds of the listing.

[femmefan1946]

Oh dear.

Shipping is Canada Post.  Precise rates are set by them, for international small packet mailing it is usually in the $15-20 CAD range. 

I do not make money from shipping or charge a handling fee. I charge what CP charges. 

Don't say this and don't do this. You need some wiggle room for packaging and the shipping fee charged by eBay. Use Calculated Shipping and the customer will see the price on the S&H page as well as just before he agrees to pay.

By bidding you are certifying that you have read and understood the above, and you assent to the shipping charges levied by CP. You further certify that any excise or customs importation fees which may or may not be levied by the buyer's country and are beyond the control of the seller, and not my responsibility. 

Drop this. Your customer either will not read it or will be turned off by it. If he doesn't like the total price, he will not pay. And you open a Dispute and he gets a Strike.

Of course, given the nature of the listed item, if you are an interested buyer of RM material, than you probably understand quite well how these things work. 

A further note that I have excluded many countries from my "ship to" destinations (e.g. Eastern Europe, Africa, most of Asia, etc). Please verify that I will ship to your destination before bidding. 

Again not relevant and TLTR. If you get a bid from a blocked country, it will be blocked. If you are willing to entertain bids from that country, unblock it now. If you are not, don't waste time chatting with an unwanted bidder.

Bid with confidence that item is as described; however returns cannot be accepted on this item. Not responsible if the items do not fit your person to your satisfaction. 

Nope. If you take Paypal you take returns.

Any questions about this item, please ask before bidding; buyers with 0 feedback please contact me prior to bidding.  Thanks for looking! 

Buyers with zero feedback will either not bid or will ignore. You can add a Block against buyers who do not have active Paypal accounts, which does pretty much block newbies. But frankly while some newbies are timewasting thrill bidders, the real scammers have lots and lots of feedback and know how to fiddle the system.

[raro11]

Hi Femmefan, thanks for adding your perspective, not just once, but twice!

I do not claim to be an expert seller; I purchase much more than I have sold.
With regard to your first suggestion, it was my understanding (from Ebay reading) that one can only sell through the Ebay site where the seller is registered/resides, in my case Canada, then you select international options and the listing is routed through to the other sites. I guess I will try and put a listing up on Ebay.co.uk, and see what happens.

I assume in your third paragraph you mean "US shipping not enabled", not UK. I have been over my listing several times to look at the options, and I have tried to find the international options, but there is really not much there. I read on another thread that a seller was actually trying a way to disengage the international visibility option, to save on the listing cost. I do not see the option to select it at all, which is the heart of my original question. I don't know why. My listing is free, which I guess is nice, but indicative that the international visibility is not there.

When I input the exact item listing number, it does show up on Ebay UK, but if I try to search for it it does not appear at all, even when selecting worldwide listings. This is by design, it would seem to me.

As for selecting auction format, I was just basing that on a similar item sold recently which had a healthy dozen or so bids spread out throughout the auction duration. However if no one in my target audience (UK or North American Anglophiles) ever sees the listing, it is really moot. I am probably going to pull this listing and start over.

[raro11]

As to your feedback in this section, with regard to my various disclaimers and explanations, fair enough, I suppose; I defer to your far superior rating which is an impressive 100%. After reading various sellers' ratings over the years, I must attribute this luck above all else.
Customer service only carries you so far in a world of unethical and irrational buyers. As has been pointed out on various other forums, so many sellers' ratings have been corrupted by vindictively unfair and frankly stupid negative feedback. I would prefer that not happen to me.

Having said that, I do see your point that most buyers are either good - or not. The good ones will play by the rules and therefore probably don't need to read what I have spelled out, and the bad ones don't care.

I did use the calculated shipping option, again this is just to give an independent reminder of the ball-park shipping costs. If the shipping cost is enough to turn them off, then they should not have bid in the first place. We should not be doing business.

The ever-increasing costs of shipping things around, and from, this country is making Ebay, from a seller's perspective, less and less viable. But we don't want to get started on that.

As to returns, I did not realize this, but am not shocked. My question is therefore; why does Ebay not disallow the "no returns" option once you have selected Paypal as exclusive method of payment? It is little details like this which are distasteful to infrequent sellers like myself, and do not encourage more activity on Ebay. I like to believe I have an average (at least) level of familiarity with Ebay and online tools in general, so why is it that I find aspects of the site --be more intuitive -- obtuse and misleading for no good reason??