good untill cancelled has started, with a "to help your item sell better" flag..

[esclyons]

just did a bunch of relists, and they all default to good till cancelled.. if they didn't switch back to 30 day listings for the USA, i really doubt they will listen to our concerns..

[silverpinups]

I have used GTC with Best Offer for over a decade with great success. I don't know what everyone is complaining about. The movie memoriliblia categories still do very well in auction format and I bid on a weekly basis.

I like GTC because it usually takes longer then a month to sell an item and for people to find a particular item. The longer items are listed the greater the chance those items have of selling.

Relisting items every month is counter productive to me. Relisting items means your starting over and you lose that initial momentum of the original listing.

Of course GTC with Best Offer works well for the items I sell and may not be helpful for other categories. I also have a store so I never have to worry about free listing promos....    

[femmefan1946]

What is the chore part?

You don't have to worry that a listing will end abruptly and disappear off a Watched List.

• I know, watchers watch, but some sellers seem fixated on these looky-loos.

You can close any item any time you want.

• If you put your Active Listings into Ending First order, you can see what is about to relist and close it with a click if you wish. It will stay in your Unsold Listings for 90 days.

EBay just confirmed that the listings will close and reopen monthly, not 30 days as first announced.

• This was worrying sellers who refuse to use anything but their Fifty Free Listings each month.
• https://community.ebay.ca/t5/Announcements/Fixed-price-listings-are-now-Good-Til-Cancelled-renewing-...

I strongly doubt most buyers know that all Fixed Price listings are now Good Til Cancelled.

• If they want it, there it is, buy it now before someone else does.

If you have another problem let me know, I might even agree with you.

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

@silverpinups @femmefan1946 

I think for some sellers, they just liked having the control over their listings and access to several choices or options on how and when to list. Not having to worry about something relisting and then having to cancel it. For me, in the past, as I relisted/or used sold similar I could update as I so chose. Adjust a price or the wording. Also, others like to cycle items in and out. It was about having personal control of their listings. Sellers were told in the past that sell similar WAS getting better visibility. Then GTC was going to be the new magic pill and it was going to magically cause more views. No one really knows what to believe anymore. Now when something relists automatically it becomes out of sight out of mind. Not sure what the problem was with having the extra options. Another point to take into consideration, what works for 1 seller may not work for another. Again and still, we will have to wait and see!!

-Lotz

PS. To me, it now seems to be a glut of listings out there and much less traffic. 

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

The tags from the April 1, 2019 Announcement for this "Improvement" are ummm delightful? Not super positive, that's for sure.

-Lotz

[silverpinups]

PS. To me, it now seems to be a glut of listings out there and much less traffic. 

Yes, this is a major problem. My last six weeks of sales have been terrible. I get lots of views and watchers but nobody wants to pull the trigger. I guess that summer slow down has started earlier for me this year and now that it's July, sales should traditionally slow down to a crawl.

Although last year I had the best July ever!!

eBay is in trouble though, if they don't start generating customers their going to lose sellers. As eBay continues to change their polices there going to further alienate more and more sellers. I believe when managed payments becomes mandatory (2-3 years from now) it is going to be the final nail in coffin. I know I will be leaving.....      

[mrdutch1001]

"eBay is in trouble though, if they don't start generating customers their going to lose sellers. As eBay continues to change their polices there going to further alienate more and more sellers. I believe when managed payments becomes mandatory (2-3 years from now) it is going to be the final nail in coffin. I know I will be leaving..... "

Yup! I now have 90% of my items moved over to other venues in preparation for leaving eBay when managed payments becomes mandatory for all sellers. Hopefully by then, my other venues will be generating as many sales as eBay currently is...which is about 10% of what eBay used to bring me for sales, back before spring of 2017 ....eBay is barely viable for me anymore...

[femmefan1946]

@lotzofuniquegoodies 

for some sellers, they just liked having the control over their listings and access to several choices or options

I can see that, but surely that is MORE work than GTC.

Or the same amount of work, since with GTC the seller can still end or revise at any time.

Not sure what the problem was with having the extra options.

EBay tells us the longtail listings will appear on Google searches, something sellers have been complaining about since eBay messed up that relationship some years ago.

Maybe.

what works for 1 seller may not work for another. Again and still, we will have to wait and see!!

We are in total agreement on that!

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

To my thinking, if I'm looking for something specific, I'm just going to search on eBay. Otherwise, I would just go to Wally World and pick it up and not worry about the shipping. Checking out my numbers, 95% of my looky-loo's at my items are through searches IN eBay. GTC has been in place in the US for a while now. If it was going to make a difference, I think I would have seen by now. So really entirely depends on what you are selling as to how it will help or hinder.

-Lotz

PS. In the past, I have rarely needed to end a listing early. So doing it because of an eBay change makes little sense to me. Especially when its on my dime.

[great_junque_finds]

The only real issue I have with the mandatory GTC is what to believe. Ebay has told sellers for YEARS that GTC listing go "stale" after a time and basically drop like a rock in search results.

Yet now they're telling us they're the best thing since sliced bread for getting sales.

So which is it?

[ypdc_dennis]

---

@great_junque_finds wrote:

.... Ebay has told sellers for YEARS that GTC listing go "stale" after a time and basically drop like a rock in search results.
Yet now they're telling us they're the best thing since sliced bread for getting sales.
So which is it?

---

That was then, this is now.

The world of online selling keeps changing year by year.

...

I'm in the camp of wanting my paid listings to end when I want, so I do not regard required GTC as an improvement for me.  It might be for eBay overall -- but I don't think the extra google exposure that GTC will get is going to result in that much extra sales value.

-..-

[mrdutch1001]

For the past few years I have been using mostly fixed price format with various durations of 5, 7, 10 and 30 days, I found over the many years of listing on eBay that 10 day durations work best for my items.

However, with the forthcoming mandatory GTC, I had been listing a lot more items with auction format.

My last 12 transactions:

fixed price format = 4

auction format = 8

I will continue to use auction format for most of my listings even though my item categories are not typically known to work well with auction format.

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

@mrdutch1001 

For those listings that sold by auction, did you start off low or closer to what your optimistic wish final price? And were there multiple bidders or just one at the bitter end? I just wish there were more categories available with the lower fees for auctions. When I've considered using auctions it never seems to be in one with the lower fees.

-Lotz

[mrdutch1001]

I rarely get more than 1 bidder on an auction format item...for me  the days of multiple bidders was years ago...

When I use auction format, the starting price is similar/close to/slightly lower sometimes, than the price for fixed price format.

I don't have a store on eBay so my listings arise from the free monthly and the free listing promos and those free listing promos dictate whether listings are auction, fixed price or either one.

[reallynicestamps]

I think, and this is just me, that both are equally true and untrue.

GTC goes stale in eBay Searches, slowly dropping down if the items are unsold. Less of a problem for sellers of multiples but important for those of us with OOAK collectibles.

GTC is more easily found by Google and Google Searches because the more eyeballs (and sales) the higher it will be in that Search.

EBay royally messed up their relationship with Google some years back, and this might possibly be how they are worming their way back in.  As sellers have been screaming  politely asking for ages.

If you think your customers Search on eBay, then you should be closing GTC listings manually from time to time, and relisting as Sell Similar.

If you want your customers to find you through Google, do nothing or relist with Relist which I think includes watchers and views(?) , and hope your listings get found there.

[reallynicestamps]

While I think of it.
If you have Watchers, and close your listing, when you relist your Watchers will be notified on their List.
But.
Watchers watch. Buyers buy.

[esclyons]

why i advocate leaving it up to the seller, is 99.95% of all my search and sells are coming from within ebay, so i have 0% need fro good till cancelled.. So whatever numbers ebay tells me, i have zero faith in there numbers,, i only care what works for me..  And as a store owner/renter they have changed the terms of our agreement.. by eliminating my option to sell in 30 day listings..

[forester_studios]

As well it was just proper to give us sellers the choice of how we sell. I often listed items at 5 or 10 days to generate quick cash flow. Log term items would be listed at 30 days. I still think flexibility is a good strategy in business.

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

I always have a number of looky-loos with my listings. My end it shows the 1 or 2. Buyer side that number is invisible. The recent pattern though, the last 2 times I hit the "Magic 5", a day or 2 later both those items sold at the asking price. Coincidence? Who knows?  Under 5 sometimes but it usually takes some time. Why hide any watcher? Is it just a courtesy for the sellers monitoring your prices, for those that have the time?

-Lotz