Sales down

I know, everyone makes these posts... but 8 sales in the last month and a half. I know my stuff isn't the greatest but it's never stopped me from making at least 2-3 sales a week at minnimum. The Post office ladies even commented they forgot what I looked like since i used to be in all the time. 

 

I'm finding my heart's just not in it anymore but before i just have a big yard sale does anyone want to peak at my listings and see if there is anything obvious going on?

Message 1 of 30
latest reply
29 REPLIES 29

Sales down

Ever since work from home ended and the cost of everything started going up via gas prices and inflation, sales have been down. I want to say that was roughly 2 months ago. 

 

I keep an eye on different sellers who sell in my same category (media), and it looks like all sales are down. You're mostly selling games, media, and smaller collectibles.

 

Unless you're selling something that has huge wide appeal, it takes quite a high volume of listings to produce sales. If someone is selling 10-20 percent of what they list every 90 days, that's a pretty solid turn around. Just looking at your active and sold listings, you have listed about 500 items with only about 20 sold. So that would be a bit of a cause for concern, but it's also a very small sample size. My advice would be to look at the kind of stuff you're buying to sell, and try to re-evaluate or learn more about what kind of items move or work to re-sell from whatever your source is. Based on the type of items you're selling, I assume you're getting them thrifting or from garage sales. (Unless it's your own personal stuff, in which case, ignore that advice).

 

Lower prices, run sales, liquidate stuff in lots via auction, etc. Maybe liquidate some stuff just to get some momentum going and have some cash flow, even if you lose a bit of money per item. You have nearly 200 video games for older consoles. Put some of the more common games together in lots.

 

Try to lot up things like your Fingerlings. I notice you have three for sale. Each cost over 20 to ship in Canada. Even if you offer combined shipping, the seller may not know that you have multiple Fingerlings in stock, because they are going to find your listing by searching all of eBay, not searching your store. Right now, you're charging almost $50 a Fingerling because of shipping, if you put all three together in a lot, you could charge $60 BIN + the same shipping price (since the weight/size won't increase much) and all of a sudden you're offering a much better value (80 for all 3 instead of 40-45 each). 

 

I'd also consider going through your inventory and figuring out creative ways that you can sell things lettermail. For example, you could sell the Monster DVI cable you have new - open box with the paper packaging and the cable. If you remove the hard plastic, and lay the cable flat, it would qualify for lettermail, where it would cost under $5 to ship. Someone who wants the cable won't care about the hard packaging. You've now lowered the shipping cost by almost $20, meaning you can sell the cable for about $15 instead of the $35 shipped to Ontario I am seeing now. You likely have more items you could apply that line of thinking to. Even if it means selling them used - like new rather than brand new, there are certain items where cutting $20 off the price and selling used - like new will do better.  

 

Just think outside the box a bit in how it relates to pricing and shipping. Like with your package of 10 CD-RW's. If those have been sitting there for $45 shipped (25+shipping) forever and not selling, maybe you could sell them as a quantity listing and list 10, each at an individual price, shipped via lettermail. 

 

Also, go through the time to re-price your items. At 500 items, it wil take an hour or two at most to see what other people on eBay offer for them. An item that might have been competitively priced a few months ago can end up overpriced if the offerings change. What I started doing with my inventory last year was give everything a custom sku that tells me the month and year it was listed in. While a majority of the lower priced stuff I list sells within a year, there are items that are duds. This way, in terms of accepting or declining best offers, or re-pricing items, I know roughly when an item was listed. If someone offers me 50 percent for an item I listed this month, of course, I am not going to accept that. If someone offers me 50 percent for an item tha was listed in January of 2021, I am going to accept that because clearly I either should have never listed that item, or I did a bad job pricing it in the first place. You don't make a cake without cracking a few eggs, or however the saying goes. 

 

In short, I'd find ways to get things selling, even if you don't turn a profit on the items. Just to get cashflow. Ask yourself, with what I know now, if I had the chance to buy that item to re-sell today, would I do it? If the answer is no, then liquidate it. Even if the answer is yes, maybe consider liquidating some stuff just to get some momentum going with sales, and to open up some cash/space if you're running your eBay store out of your home. 

Message 2 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

@ilikehockeyjerseys 

@ericsells75 

 

Recent traffic report below.

 

Screenshot 2022-05-17 103935.jpg

 

Because of the new supposed better way buyers are now finding my items along with everyone elses(sellers who sell using other selling sites) externally. In the past buyers found mine and anyone else that sold 1 of a kind items/antique/vintage using eBay search. (3 to 1). My traffic report bared that out pre August 2021. I have always consistently had 30 to 40 sales per month and that includes with mega less listings. Total sales for May, 2022 =  4. 93.00 and 53.00 of that total includes shipping/taxes collected. So anyone that is able to say these new changes to views, search and traffic are better bully for you. Has NOT been my experience. (Or anyone else that sells similar type items I have been in contact with.)

 

-Lotz

Message 3 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

My sales have gone from 10-15 a month, to 4 so far in May. I can't see any reason, it's very discouraging, and I am not sure what to do. I have reduced the cost of many, deleted and re-listed old listings, but no help.

Message 4 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

If everybody has seen a reduction in sales, are you guys sure it wouldn't be a consequence of the rising cost of gas and food, rather than eBay re-tooling their search algorithm or view counts? 

 

If eBay re-tooled their search algorithm, there would be winners and losers, not just losers. 

 

The sales drop I experienced coincides very closely with the rise in gas from the Russia/Ukraine war, and inflation taking off at roughly the same time. Add in work from home also mostly ending during that time period. 

 

People have seen a huge reduction in disposable income, even if their salaries remained the same on paper. The pandemic was a boom for people selling online, because there was less competition due to local businesses periodically locking down, and workers all received huge raises by proxy since working from home is a lot cheaper than working from an office. (No eating out, no transportation costs, etc)

 

 

Message 5 of 30
latest reply

Sales down


@ilikehockeyjerseys wrote:

If everybody has seen a reduction in sales, are you guys sure it wouldn't be a consequence of the rising cost of gas and food, rather than eBay re-tooling their search algorithm or view counts? 

 

If eBay re-tooled their search algorithm, there would be winners and losers, not just losers. 

 

The sales drop I experienced coincides very closely with the rise in gas from the Russia/Ukraine war, and inflation taking off at roughly the same time. Add in work from home also mostly ending during that time period. 

 

People have seen a huge reduction in disposable income, even if their salaries remained the same on paper. The pandemic was a boom for people selling online, because there was less competition due to local businesses periodically locking down, and workers all received huge raises by proxy since working from home is a lot cheaper than working from an office. (No eating out, no transportation costs, etc)

 

 


@ilikehockeyjerseys 

 

My ongoing drop in sales started right after the IS changes. I've never searched that way. It connected directly to traffic. Same goes for anyone else that sells OOAK/unique/vintage type items. In speaking to sellers where IS was not exploded their sales have only seen small drops in business and traffic. eBay mentioned antique in one of their adverts but then it goes straight to collectable cards. If you check posts for sellers that sell glassware/similar type items they saw the same kind of drop when they lumped everything in a master category. Most of suggest IS phraseology was poorly chosen and not applicable.

 

-Lotz

 

 

Message 6 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

Good stuff here. I might look into some of this. I’m just discouraged as this way a decent side hustle for the last two years and I enjoyed it but it’s becoming a grind.
Message 7 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

You and I both sell a lot of video games. I took a look at the first 10 or so video games that showed up under "Best Match" for your listings. For all of them you were not the cheapest option; for many of them your price was double or even triple that of a comparable item from a different seller.

 

I just assume everyone is searching via "Lowest Price + Shipping" and price my items accordingly, directed to the Canadian market. I realize not everyone searches this way, but by matching or beating the lowest price offer for an item in comparable condition it gives me a better chance of selling the item.

 

Also make sure you're adding in as many keywords as possible to your titles. Use all the characters they give you. I was trying to find comps on the "Rocksmith 2014 Edition Xbox 360" game you have for sale and then noticed yours didn't even show up in search because your title didn't have "2014" in it and there are multiple versions of the Rocksmith game.

Message 8 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

My ongoing drop in sales started right after the IS changes

 

Okay, what are the IS changes?

 

Message 9 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

I usually base my price on sold prices so as someone mentioned above my price might have been competitive at the time. I think I’m just going to mark everything down and start moving some stuff. My initial costs were awhile ago on a number of items so it almost feels like anything would be pure profit at this point. Lol 🙂
Message 10 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

My records show a downturn in sales every May for the past 5 years, but this year has been the worst. I've averaged 4 sales a day, now less than half that.

Message 11 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

I think IS is Item Specifics. I have to agree with lotz here as I noticed the same drop after them being implemented and also the large groups they decided to just combine together (i.e I mostly sell and collect Vintage Barbie and that was lumped in with Dolls & Doll playsets which is massively larger). It's okay if someone has something real exact they are looking for, but if not the search is overwhelming. I know because as a collector and I barely search anymore since there are about 11,000 items where there used to be about 1,500 in what I was looking for, big difference.

While all the changes may help people that weren't going to look on eBay find something here I think we are losing out on some people that came directly to eBay and are searching here and don't have tons of time.

Message 12 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

i agree.  Ebay is no good for browsing.  If you know exactly what you're looking for, great.  Otherwise you get bombarded with a load of completely unrelated **bleep**.

 

I used to search for model kits and diecast models, usually in specific scales.   Before AI i would type in something like 'atlas 1/72 tank'....Atlas is the company that makes the models.  Before AI i might get a couple of hundred listings, all of 1/72 tank models made by Atlas.   After AI i would get 11,000 car part listings with the Atlas tank models interspersed among them.   Most of the car part listing titles did not have one single word or character that i typed in search.

 

With refinement and figuring, i could find the listings i was looking for, but since i was just browsing for something of interest, nothing specific, i couldn't be bothered.  To this day i still get bombarded with car part listings when i  look for model kits/diecast models.  There were loads of other examples where i would get an avalanche of unrelated listings, but i can't recall any now, as i have given up browsing on ebay.

Message 13 of 30
latest reply

Sales down


@fergua3 wrote:

i agree.  Ebay is no good for browsing.  If you know exactly what you're looking for, great.  Otherwise you get bombarded with a load of completely unrelated **bleep**.

 

I used to search for model kits and diecast models, usually in specific scales.   Before AI i would type in something like 'atlas 1/72 tank'....Atlas is the company that makes the models.  Before AI i might get a couple of hundred listings, all of 1/72 tank models made by Atlas.   After AI i would get 11,000 car part listings with the Atlas tank models interspersed among them.   Most of the car part listing titles did not have one single word or character that i typed in search.

 

With refinement and figuring, i could find the listings i was looking for, but since i was just browsing for something of interest, nothing specific, i couldn't be bothered.  To this day i still get bombarded with car part listings when i  look for model kits/diecast models.  There were loads of other examples where i would get an avalanche of unrelated listings, but i can't recall any now, as i have given up browsing on ebay.


@ericsells75 

@triber 

 

In day to day research (books, electronics, unique collectables)  and the times I've posted crazy examples in the past a basic simple search as brought up pokeman cards or totally unrelated clothing. If you try the same search several times or in incognito mode you will eventually get close to what you are looking for. Just saying in the past it wasn't this difficult to find what a buyer was looking for. Most will only try so many times before they give up and go elsewhere. If people are going elsewhere that could definitely cause a drop in sales and/or traffic.

 

And if you do choose to search with something like google you are fighting through all the other selling sites of products with in many cases the main one being top of todem pole. How is a little seller to stand a chance against those odds? Back to the needle in a haystack theme.

 

-Lotz

Message 14 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

Maybe liquidate some stuff just to get some momentum going and have some cash flow, even if you lose a bit of money per item.

 

Gosh, I hate to lose money, but the algorithms apparently like sellers who have sold recently.

So getting a few "loss leaders" out there and in the mail, could lead to better visibility in Search.

Using the Best Offer to Watchers could also help, maybe.

 

May is a weak month for me too, normally. Not as bad as December, but never as good and Jan-March.

 

Message 15 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

Hi everyone! There has been mentioned of decreased sales on the .com boards too and we've passed usernames on for a closer look. I've gone through this thread as well and grabbed usernames for anyone that said they've experienced a loss in sales recently and passed them on.

 

I don't believe there is anything more going on than a drop in sales across the board due to situations going on in the world right now, but you never know. It's good to take a closer look to see if anything is standing out. If they come back with information for us to provide you, either Jasmen or I will be sure to let you know. Thanks!

Message 16 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

I am a member of different Ebay boards since 23 years, mainly at Ebay.com. Believe me, the thread like "sales are down" is definitely the oldest and the most common thread ever 😉 I saw hundreds of explanations of the phenomena, none of them was accepted as a satisfactory one. Here is my advice: take some vacation and wait until the sales resume. Because it will - earlier or later, as it happened for the past 23 years   😀 

Message 17 of 30
latest reply

Sales down


@38e_avenue wrote:

I am a member of different Ebay boards since 23 years, mainly at Ebay.com. Believe me, the thread like "sales are down" is definitely the oldest and the most common thread ever 😉 I saw hundreds of explanations of the phenomena, none of them was accepted as a satisfactory one. Here is my advice: take some vacation and wait until the sales resume. Because it will - earlier or later, as it happened for the past 23 years   😀 


Throw out a couple of other possibilities and see if they sticks to the wall.

 

Buyers are having a hard time finding stuff because of the major overhaul to how search is done. (eBay search vs external). Causing bad search info being returned this could cause a good portions of sellers' sales to drop off a cliff. Also, if the new go to is MUST PROMOTE at high %, sellers who can afford to promote will continue to get sales. Sellers who can't will end up hurting. 

 

-Lotz

Message 18 of 30
latest reply

Sales down


@lotzofuniquegoodies wrote:

@38e_avenue wrote:

I am a member of different Ebay boards since 23 years, mainly at Ebay.com. Believe me, the thread like "sales are down" is definitely the oldest and the most common thread ever 😉 I saw hundreds of explanations of the phenomena, none of them was accepted as a satisfactory one. Here is my advice: take some vacation and wait until the sales resume. Because it will - earlier or later, as it happened for the past 23 years   😀 


Throw out a couple of other possibilities and see if they sticks to the wall.

 

Buyers are having a hard time finding stuff because of the major overhaul to how search is done. (eBay search vs external). Causing bad search info being returned this could cause a good portions of sellers' sales to drop off a cliff. Also, if the new go to is MUST PROMOTE at high %, sellers who can afford to promote will continue to get sales. Sellers who can't will end up hurting. 

 

-Lotz


The alternative is to use the Traffic View but not sure how much it has been directly affected with this new change for views.  See below.

 

Jan to Mar 2022  40 Sales (90 days)

 

Jan Mar Traffic.jpg

 

April May 2022    17 Sales (51 Days) (-29.2% drop)

 

April May Traffic.jpg

 

-Lotz

 

Message 19 of 30
latest reply

Sales down

Outstanding post!  

Message 20 of 30
latest reply