Ricarmics last year's experience selling in both $C (.CA) , $US (.COM) currency now.....

[ricarmic]

As the regulars here know, a year ago now I took the monumental step of selling on both .CA and .COM (having been only .COM up until that point).

Generally I sell Canadian centric stuff in $C on .CA, everything else is in US$ on .COM.

.COM free shipping to Canada and USA, .CA free shipping to Canada, sometimes free shipping to USA, oftentimes an additional shipping charge to USA depending on size. (despite the fact I'm a "stamp guy" this pertains to everything from envelopes up to bankers boxes).

In the last year, here are my experiences thoughts:

Advantages:

- everything I sell in $C on .CA I save 3% currency conversion fees

- I believe there is a higher sell rate of the .CA stuff to Canadian buyers than when it was on .COM

- .CA lets me schedule auction items for free, it costs me to do this on .COM

- I do seem to be selling again to dormant Canadian customers that haven't purchased for a couple years or so (presumably because I'm selling in $C now)

Disadvantages:

- mixed currency transactions when a buyer buys 2 US$ things and 2 $C things. Interestingly most of my buyers already know to buy them as 2 separate groups

- I believe there is a marginally lower sell rate of the .CA stuff to NON Canadian buyers than when it was on .COM. Generally they do not seem to mind the additional shipping charge, the regulars in the US are buying as they always did even though it is sometimes not free shipping to them now as it was before.

- Canadians not noticing some items are $C and some are US$ and getting very confused the odd time in mixed currency transactions.

[tyler@ebay]

This is really interesting, and hopefully the higher sell through rate on CA makes up for the work that it was to set up and maintain!

[ricarmic]

Getting it going wasn't much work because (sadly) the main store is still on .COM, I'm just listing items on both sites.

Normally I list new items via relist or sell similar so once I had a couple on .CA I just reuse/recycle them!

This does remind me of a disadvantage I forgot:

One can't send an invoice from the other site.

Normally I still live on .COM and .COMs seller hub.

I cannot send invoices to .CA buyers from .COM hub, I have to also go to the .CA hub to send invoices to the .CA buyers. (I can do everything else from .COM, contact buyer, provide feedback and mark as shipped, so it is frustrating that sending an invoice is the only thing I've found so far I have to be dual logged on for).

[ricarmic]

Hmm another disadvantage I also just remembered as I'm starting today's batch:

One can't use "relist another item" across sites

I relist unsold auctions all the time, having run on both .CA and .COM

Within a site one can "relist again"  after the first one, which takes you back to the unrelisted list to relist the next one.

However if one reslists a .CA item from .COM, it functions ok but relist again drops you back to active items I believe, it doesn't send you back to the proper place.

So it means I have to:

-group all .COM listed items together to relist

-group all .CA items together to relist (unless there is just one then I do it last from .COM)

[kawartha-ephemera]

Interesting. I've had a similiar experience, the change to CAD from USD listings on .ca has been positive. Canadians really dislike paying those currency conversion fees.

RE; invoicing

What happens if you toggle between hubs using the dropdown menu at the top right just underneath the comments | messages links, it has a tiny little flag icon to denote which sites' hub you are currently using.  Pretty quick and easy way to switch hubs but you proba ly already know that functionality is there.

[ricarmic]

WOW, see this is why the boards are good, one learns something every day!

I've always lived on .COM hub primarily, it doesn't have that feature.

I've noticed the flag on .CA but I never dropped it down.

I'll be experimenting with that now, thank you very much for mentioning it!!!!

[ricarmic]

Sad experimental update:

Changing the .CA hub to US does not let me send an invoice for a .COM item

Changing the .CA hub to US does not let me relist .COM stuff repeatedly, same problem as before (only reverse).

RATS, I thought this might work!!!

[kawartha-ephemera]

Shoot ... I guess that feature is just for looking not doing!

I confess I've never toggled to the .com hub to do anything else but check the impression stats over there. Since those stats are kept separately by listing site every  so often I toggle to the .com hub to check my .com traffic stats. Those stzts are not included on the .ca hub and the opposite is true for the .com hub traffic stats. 

[kawartha-ephemera]

Ah ... now I see why switching hubs in that way did not work. Do not understand how it is done but toggling that dropdown does not really take one to the .com hub. Instead it is a .ca page that somehow displays the .com hub.

[ricarmic]

Yes it is really just a pretty picture so to speak.....it was a very good suggestion though!!!