eBay

musicyouneed · ‎08-06-2016

I sell CD's and I have thousands. I have been selling for a few years now and have decided to switch to .com as the Canadian $ doesn't work for me. I can't rely on free listings all the time especially with so much inventory. It was great when I was selling in USD and I was selling 50-100 every month but now the only US buyers I get are for the listings on .com.

So this is what I was planning. I have about 400 CD's either listed on .com or ready to go as drafts.

I thought that I would sign up for a basic store on a month to month basis which will give me 200 free listings on .com. After I get those listed, I will slowly convert the ones I have on .ca and put them in drafts on .com. I have about 900 listed on .ca and it will take be about 90 hours to do that. In mid September I upgrade to the next level which gives me 1000 free listings and 10 cents for each new listing. Again I will do that on a month to month basis and see how it goes.

Any advice, warnings, etc.

Do you put them as GTC? or do you do them relist twice? I thought that I might use the relist twice as when it ends I can review the price or twik the listing.

silverpinups · ‎08-07-2016

That was very interesting reading... Thank you for posting it.

Thanks to "poco" for his very detailed (and intense) evaluation on GTC listings.

silverpinups · ‎08-07-2016

I use to run "auction format" on or before 2008 but have since abandoned it mostly due to the crumbling and weak economy.

Prior to 2008 it was absolute madness when the economy was booming and auctions were very exciting, bringing very high prices.

But like everything you must roll with the times....

I believe Auctions have suffered over the years, with most Sellers listing GTC or Fixed Price 30 Day formats.

silverpinups · ‎08-07-2016

This response was removed or disappeared from the post....

I use to run "auction format" on or before 2008 but have since abandoned it mostly due to the crumbling and weak economy.

Prior to 2008 it was absolute madness when the economy was booming and auctions were very exciting, bringing very high prices.

But like everything you must roll with the times....

I believe Auctions have suffered over the years, with most Sellers listing GTC or Fixed Price 30 Day formats.

pocomocomputing · ‎08-07-2016

@dutchman48 wrote:
Here is a post from poco in regards to double listings in one month for some information.

http://community.ebay.ca/t5/Seller-Central/New-store-plans-with-free-listings-Be-careful-May-is-31-d...

LOL, my old post on a listing coming up twice in a month. I was thinking about it and you already posted it. Interesting discussion but complicated to understand.

The simple solution is to start your GTC listings moved to eBay.com over a few days so that there is not one start date for a lot of listings. Ideally the perfect distribution would be having the same number of listings renewing on each day of the month. So if you had 1,000 GTC running, 33 (30x33=990) would renew on any day of the month with the GTC that were on the 1st of the month renewing on the 31st in 31 day months (Jan, Mar, May, Jul, Aug, Oct, Dec). So you have 33 double listings in the 31 day months. But at Premium store fee of 10 cents a listing, it would cost you $3.30 so insignificant to worry about. Or you could just have 970 GTC running all the time with 30 for the double months. February is a strange month with 28 days (29 on a leap year) listings running on the 29, 30 and 31 of Jan will skip Feb and you will use less listing to relist in Feb.

What you do not want to do is start all listings when you get a store on the same day of month if you move to the USA. Move over in batches and spread over a few days having say no more than 100 starting on the same day of month. So when a double listing month hits, you pay no more than $10 (100 x .10) extra in those months if you have used up all your free listings.

One small advantage of spreading the GTC listing over as many days of the months is that buyers searching by ending soonest may get some of your listings showing at the top of search over others if the item is what they are looking for or similar. They may view the listing and if not interested, they might browse your store and you get them indirectly into your store to perhaps buy something else. Even better would be to stagger the start time over the hours of a day so something is ending all the time in the day and coming up in Ending Soonest searches. A bit hard to do this but an interesting theory.

As for GTC listings, they work well for items with quantity and a history of selling. For one of a kind items that cannot have a sales history, conventional wisdom in the forums here is that they will drop in search because of no sales. Also as mentioned by PJ, buyers who search by Newly Listed will not see your listings because the start date used is that of the first time the GTC is relisted and not the auto relisting date. I think the best compromise for one of a kind GTC listings is to end the one of a kind GTC listings after 6 (3,6,9,12, whatever) months and use Sell Similar to give them a fresh start for Best Match and Newly Listed searches. I would do that for high view items that will not sell and for watched items too.

GTC listings are convenient since there is no work to relisting them. Other than a tweak for yearly shipping costs increases, they need no maintenance. The GTC stale issue as mentioned may be a problem but if a buyer finds your listings and then shops in your store though that listings and manually looks at listings, the stale search issue is is not a factor.

pierrelebel · ‎08-07-2016

Signing for a basic store on eBay.ca - on a month to month basis - makes sense. You have a relatively low investment and no long term commitment at this time. (Definitely open store on eBay.ca, not eBay.com, to save fees). The site on which you open your store has nothing to do with the sites where you list or the currencies you use.

The trend for the last ten years has been away from auction and towards fixed price listings - on eBay and just about everywhere else online. That said, I still list a few items at auction and used them as "bait" for those few buyers who still prefer the auction format.

All my "fixed price" listings are now GTC (Good Till Cancelled). Over the years I have experimented with 30 day listings where unsold listings were eventually bulk relisted and found the process a waste of time.

Fixed price listings are all Buy-it-Now so the end time has little effect on potential buyers.

When setting up my eBay store, I selected to show highest priced listings on my front page. Why? I want potential buyers to see my best stuff (the most expensive), not cheapest (lowest price).

Now I list on both eBay.ca (in Cdn$) and on eBay.com (in US$). From time to time I will also list on eBay.uk (in Sterling) and eBay.fr (in euro) for items I feel are of interest to those marketplaces. It works for me; may not work for others.

ALL listings, regardless of currencies and sites used are available in my eBay store.

Good Luck

pocomocomputing · ‎08-07-2016

@silverpinups wrote:
That was very interesting reading... Thank you for posting it.

Thanks to "poco" for his very detailed (and intense) evaluation on GTC listings.

Intense is a polite way to say over analyzed, lol. Still some interesting thought and ideas in that post but no great secrets to listing on eBay.

Pierre always say KISS is the best way to go. As for GTC listings, the KISS answer is to spread out the listings over as many days of month as practical when moving over to eBay.com. This should save on listings fees for 31 day months and make for a higher search profile. Of course, selling some items will make a higher search profile as well as great customer service.

musicyouneed · ‎08-07-2016

You mentioned: 'Signing for a basic store on eBay.ca - on a month to month basis - makes sense"

If I am in this for the long hall and have thousands of CD's to list, shouldn't I sign up for a yearly contract for a basic and depending on whether there are free listings or not and depending on the time of year, whether I would go for a premium month to month?

Signing up for a year, I will save $60 and a little piece of mind.

silverpinups · ‎08-07-2016

Yes, you would save money but right now you are going to experiment with a store that fits your needs.

Start off with a Basic Store month to month and see how that goes.....

This way your not tied down with a yearly contract.

pocomocomputing · ‎08-07-2016

@musicyouneed wrote:
You mentioned: 'Signing for a basic store on eBay.ca - on a month to month basis - makes sense"

If I am in this for the long hall and have thousands of CD's to list, shouldn't I sign up for a yearly contract for a basic and depending on whether there are free listings or not and depending on the time of year, whether I would go for a premium month to month?

Signing up for a year, I will save $60 and a little piece of mind.

The issue with a yearly contract is that if you cancel, you will pay cancellation fees. The cancellation fee depends on how many months until your yearly renewal date. Going month to month allows you to cancel at any time with no cancellation fee. See this eBay.ca web page for store cancellation fees.

http://pages.ebay.ca/stores/subscriptionterms.html

I would suggest going month to month for the first 2-3 months to get the listings moved to .com USA and for some store setup for store categories. See how sales are and if the store costs are acceptable for the sales you get, then go yearly.

One advantage of a store is that Final Value Fees are lower. Non-store is a flat 10%. Stores are 4 to 9% depending on the categories listed in. For Music category, the FVF rate is 9% so you save 1%. This savings helps pay for the store indirectly reducing the monthly store cost or even paying for it if you have enough sales ($2,500 CDN sales at 1% saves $25 CDN covers cost of store or $2,000 USD sales saves $20 USD = $25 CDN so the store monthly no contract fee of $24.95 CDN is paid for by the FVF savings). (If $1,000 USD sales, you save $10 USD = $12.50 CDN so the store monthly no contract fee of $24.95 CDN is paid for half from the FVF savings). Don't forget that the FVF rate of 9% also applies to shipping FVF so you save 1% on shipping FVF. A store never costs a seller the full monthly store fee if they have any sales because the FVF rate is lower and indirectly the monthly store fee is lower.

pierrelebel · ‎08-07-2016

"Signing up for a year, I will save $60 and a little piece of mind. "

Yes, but your original post indicated you wanted month-to-month store which makes sense until you know a store is for you.

You may want to delay the decision to make it an annual contract until the end of the year.

If you decide to continue on an annual basis at that time, you will have spent an extra $25 insurance so to speak ($5 month for 5 months). If you decide then that a store is not for you then you are not committed to pay for a year.

musicyouneed · ‎08-07-2016

I am very happy with all the advice. So thanks to each and every one of you.

set up a basic store on .ca - month to month to start
do a mix of GTC and 30 day listings (I don't list auctions)
set up categories in the store
move over listings from .ca to .com in batches
spread out listing over the month

For a few months I will still have listings on .ca and probably in the future I will still have listings on .ca, mostly Canadian Bands etc. I just want to move the majority over to .com to get back some of the US buyers I lost when I went to Canadian $. I had 900 listed on .ca and 400 listed on .com, in a few months, I hope it will be reversed.

What happens now that I have almost used my 50 free listings on .com without a store, when I sign up for a basic store does that mean I only get 200?

musicyouneed · ‎08-07-2016

Another question, do you find that buyers use your store to buy things? Is it a lot? Do you know they visited your store or how many?

silverpinups · ‎08-07-2016

"Another question, do you find that buyers use your store to buy things?"

That's a good question, either or I would imagine. I personally click on "see other items" instead of "visit store".

"Do you know they visited your store or how many?"

When you build a clientele you will have "followers" when you click on "visit store" or click on the store name (but you probably have followers already).

I also have a "item counter" on my GTC listings so you can see how many people have visited any particular item.

Some Sellers like them while others do not...

musicyouneed · ‎08-08-2016

I have been on ebay over 14 years and I seldom have looked at someone's store. Like you, I always click to see other items instead of store.

Yes, I have followers already and have item counters.

I just wondered if the store listed the number of views specific to the store. Do sellers only sign up for a store for reduced FVF, vacation mode and free listings, Do any sellers find that they make sales from their store? Just wondering. I'm signing up for the free listings.

silverpinups · ‎08-08-2016

I finally clicked on your I.D....

You basically have a store already.. without actually having one and paying for one. A store will help you save on FVF's, Listing Fees and you will have Selling Manager to help you with bulk editing to name a few.

Your already a Top Rated Seller with 14 years of experience and seem to be pretty savvy with listings already.

To conclude, a Store is just nice to have, you can officially leave your mark in the vast and complex eBay world.

musicyouneed · ‎08-08-2016

Yes, other than the categories, it is like I have a store. I have been very lucky regarding free listings over the past 3 years. On a lot of things I am savvy about because of the discussion boards and learning from other sellers and buyers. I have been using selling manager for quite a while now.

The main reason I am interested in a store at this point is because of the free listings and moving more to .com. Also when I do my research on listing prices, all the sellers that come out in best match have a store, in fact there are very few CD sellers that don't have a store. Now mind you these sellers have a huge inventory. Even having a new listing doesn't make me stand out in best match.

I find that I have to try different things, free shipping, combined shipping, no free shipping and change it up all the time. I constantly review prices and my descriptions and info. I have many repeat buyers and would like to have more.

Regarding a store, that is something I don't know too much about so that is when I come to the boards to find out all the valuable info. And of course I am just thrilled with all the valuable info I now have.

musicyouneed · ‎08-08-2016

One of the other reasons I want to move to .com is to be able to offer promotional things such as this to my US buyers. On .ca combined shipping is offered but only when you click the shipping tab and I had to remove the international shipping amount to do that.

pocomocomputing · ‎08-08-2016

@musicyouneed wrote:
I am very happy with all the advice. So thanks to each and every one of you.

set up a basic store on .ca - month to month to start
do a mix of GTC and 30 day listings (I don't list auctions)
set up categories in the store
move over listings from .ca to .com in batches
spread out listing over the month

For a few months I will still have listings on .ca and probably in the future I will still have listings on .ca, mostly Canadian Bands etc. I just want to move the majority over to .com to get back some of the US buyers I lost when I went to Canadian $. I had 900 listed on .ca and 400 listed on .com, in a few months, I hope it will be reversed.

What happens now that I have almost used my 50 free listings on .com without a store, when I sign up for a basic store does that mean I only get 200?

When you switch from non-store to store, you will lose any remaining 50 free from non-store for the month in which you switched and get the full 250 free with the start of the store for the balance of the month you are store. So in the month where you switch from non-store to store, you could use up all of your 50 free and then switch to store for another 250 and have 300 total free for that month.

One thing you should know is that the FVF rate used is from when the listing was listed. So any current active listings while non-store will have a FVF rate of 10%. When you start the store, the active non-store listings will still have the non-store FVF rate of 10% until they end and you relist them while having the store. Listing that are listed after you have the store will all have the lower store FVF rates.

The difference in the FVF rate of 1% for non-store and store is not significant enough to end non-store listing prematurely to relist as a store listing to get the lower FVF rate of a store. You may want to consider this for high value items where the 1% difference in FVF rates is large.

After a month of having a store all listings will be at the store FVF rate. A GTC listings started as a non-store listing will have the non-store FVF rate of 10% but when it renews after 30 days when you have a store, it will adjust to the new lower store FVF rate of 9% for the Music category.

I do think it is a good to list Canadian bands on eBay.ca in CDN dollars so that Canadian buyers can buy their Canadian bands in Canadian dollars. I dislike buying Canadian items from a Canadian seller in USD. I will go find a Canadian seller who lists in Canadian dollars first. But you should see what is the most effective selling strategy giving you more sales.

musicyouneed · ‎08-08-2016

Thanks poco. Just the last bit of info I needed.

I did some research on how to set up categories and how to move the listings into those categories, so when I finish listing my free 50 and providing in the meantime they do not have a huge free listing offer, I will order a basic store on a monthly basis.

I'm mailing 8 CD's out tomorrow, 7 to Canada and 1 to Germany. None to the US, which is why I am moving to .com. Pre Canadian $, 50-60% of my CD's were sold to the US. I should be mailing out at least 15.

tobyshitzu · ‎08-08-2016

"I do my research on listing prices, all the sellers that come out in best match have a store, in fact there are very few CD sellers that don't have a store. "

That is because they are multi quantity listings with sales history, not becuase they subscribe to a store