Low sales/views

[jaei03]

Ok so I never visit message boards anymore, I don't spend anytime on this sort of this. I hope to achieve some information from other sellers or anyone with some intellect to offer to this post.

I do around 3-12 items a day, after the update thing have dropped in all aspects.

• I sell MTG, pokemon, sports cards, and all sealed product in those categories.
• I make my daily quota on posts, relevant cards that are trending, cards people need(I do my research)
• Views are non existent(and I know they don’t work because I have 3 computers at work, 2 at home, and lots of people I know to click my ads, and the views do not reflect. So I have no way of knowing if I’m over price, because if I have a low price I get lots of views, high price still some views, I’m at no views. I use this as a bench mark to raise or lower prices. All my stats say I’m on a HEAVY HEAVY decline. I search online with many singles and I see people over pay when I’m lower in price.
• I fill out all my item specifics, more than even other bigger stores do when it comes to cards.

I don’t know what’s going on, but I could post 50 a day and I don’t improve, and I could keep doing this, every day or every month. Before this update I would miss days here and there and I would get better sales. I’m doing more, but getting less results. Why am I wasting my time? I wanna pivot and sell more clothes, fix my margins and just move it, I could lower my card prices. I’m 99% card shop, how can I have 5000 items and not sell at least 5 a day? 1 per 1000 posts. This is sickening. So I can post 50 items a day and I won’t even cash out 5% of that? So I have to post 500 a day to get what? This is more than a little dejecting. So many countless times can I search and see people over paying massively for things I have considerably cheaper. I promote everything @ 7%. All my prices are good, max 10-15% over priced some cards, I always offer best offer on all my products.

People need clothes, I should just post the high end cards people will seek it out even if ebay has me blacklisted or whatever the issue is,.I love working hard and grinding, but I feel betrayed and insulted and I’m very angry, because I’m donating time and it’s going right down the **bleep**ter.

Time to pivot? Get a 2nd job again? I can work hard in real life and actually  make money, at a loss currently.

[femmefan1946]

Are you aware that eBay changed how views are reported recently?
Now only actual human views are shown, no bots, and only those in the last 30 days.

Second possibility, with the pandemic buying surge slowing down, online shopping is also slowing across the industry.

How do your May sales compare with May 2019? 2018?  The pandemic surge, and quarantined workers finding they were more efficient when working from home, gave a boost to sales in 2020 and 2021.

I haven't personally found that Promoted Listings work any better at five percent than at one percent. Slightly better sales whichever is used, but lower profits.  When we had a retail shop we found the same, that lowering prices meant lower prices.*

*We did two things about this. We did lower prices on "deadstock" stuff that was out of season or had proved unpopular. Those sales often lead to knockon sales of regularly priced merchandise.

We also instituted a trade dollar loyalty program. If a customer spent over $100, he got the value of the ON sales tax in trade dollars (think Canadian Tire) which he could use on future visits.

[dreambaowei2011]

I think that there are viewing and searching problems for almost a month. Even you know that eBay changes method of show views, but some sellers here see that there are NO views but there are watchers for the same listing. So there is still something wrong with that. So still no idea what is happening. 

[ilikehockeyjerseys]

eBay changed how views are reported. 

Depending on your category, it is normal to get very few or no views. All that has changed is how eBay calculates the views.

If you read through any eBay or online sales forum, there are lots of "Why are my sales so low" posts. We are very likely in something like a consumer recession. The price of fuel and food has gone way up over the last 2 or so months. People have gone back to work, which means higher expenses (travel, lunch, clothing, etc). The pandemic was a boom for online sales, because people who weren't effected by layoffs received huge raises by proxy through work from home. That has now ended. 

I would gather it isn't just you. Pretty much everybody has seen a huge drop in sales. Some people speculate it is related to eBay algorithms with item specifics or promoted listings boosting the best match placement of certain sellers, but I don't think this is the case. The more likely answer is people have less money because the cost of living has gone up. Which is why sales on eBay are down. 

[femmefan1946]

Less money and less time.

If you have a one hour commute, not unusual in big cities, or even here in Victoria where the Colwood Crawl is a twice daily event, that's time you can't be shopping.

And with the cost of gas pushing $2.249 here on the Island, an hour of idling or driving is expensive.

The one of my many nephews who dropped his Ram 150 for a Prius last year is now laughing at the guys on site who snickered.

[ericsells75]

My sales are way down. There is a lengthy post I started recently you can check out

[100milehowie]

I have a dozen or so listings at competitive prices and made regular sales before May this year. Sales for May were zero. June 1st, I sold one item, yippy, yeah! Maybe things will pick up.

[aramatic]

There's definitely a glitch. After 6 days I have 0 views for an item that I've sold before and is reasonably popular in the calculator community. I know it's been viewed because I've asked friends to. Another item not now listed had 0 views and 1 watcher, however that works. My son also on eBay has 0 views for several items he's sold before. We're used to eBay's search engine being pretty useless (picclick.com shows them how it can be done) but can't they even get something simple right?

[idlebabyboomer]

I have been on E Bay since 2003. Two sites. It ia always feast or famine depending on the product you are selling. Dealing with algo rhythmns will account for some glitches as will consumer confidence and inflation.

[ypdc_dennis]

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@dreambaowei2011 wrote:

... but some sellers here see that there are NO views but there are watchers for the same listing. ...

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That is possible for BIN listings if the watchers are from more than 30 days ago.  I have several listings on my watch list that have been there for months (with no recent visits from me).

-;-

[darak10]

honestly I dont trust the view numbers - they have been haywire for a long time, since at least MP implementation, and possibly before.  

[darak10]

bingo.  the simplest explanation is almost always the right one. 

[triber]

I have over 700 listings, and always sold at least 20 sales a month in good months a lot more. Today my 2 week payout was $4.05!

[dvdtopbuyca]

I hear ya dude.Same exact  situation for me.

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

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@triber wrote:

I have over 700 listings, and always sold at least 20 sales a month in good months a lot more. Today my 2 week payout was $4.05!

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1200 + listings. 7 Sales for May. 214.00 Total....113.00 was Tax Collected/Shipping. Like clockwork 30 to 40 sales per month in past. Cruises are definitely out of the question at this rate!!

-Lotz

[musicyouneed]

"Cruises are definitely out of the question at this rate!!"

Lotz, do you go on cruises?  I do, so far this year, cruised to Hawaii and back and to Alaska and back.  What cruise line do you use?  Maybe we can meet up on one.