Impressions broken again??

[swiss_expert_uk]

Can you please check if there is another problem with impressions? Another counting glitch? These stats can not be correct. Organic impressions promoted views down to under 3000 views today at time of writing. This time last week almost 73000 views. Please help.  dave@ebay kat@ebay 

[lord_and_lady_m]

I do love stats  so i'm happy to share, although I do think it doesnt paint the whole picture, as impressions are only relevant with sales stats. The assumption being is impressions go up so should sales etc and vice versa however that may not be happening ..

Here's my graph, you can see where i switched off last year. You can also see in April when my PL impressions last took as sudden drop and after my sales did too, I then started reporting it on here. And you can see where I switched off again for a week. Turning back on and hardly any difference.

Heres the detail, like for like with your dates:

Mon – drop of 3848 impressions = 21% drop

Tues – 10932 = 56% drop

Wed – 10169 = 53% drop

Thurs – 11055 – 58% drop

Fri - 14117 – 73% drop so far today how I have switched off PL advanced as of today.

All the equates  to  67% drop in sales in this period vs same last year. This is always my quietest period but that's VERY quiet and seemingly linked to the impressions dropping. Page views follows the same pattern. So I 100% know it's not a problem with the impression figures report as everything fits, but what i cannot know if why they're dropping so much. My year on year sales were up on last years like for like right up until April when I first noticed something didn't seem right. I'm now getting more sales on my own website and impressions are nothing like ebays. They're much lower but conversion is better and cheaper from those impressions and the low impressions is mainly beacuse I neglected it for a long time ... until now.

[lingerie0nline]

The only stat that is moving in a positive direction is the "external site views" in the traffic Total Page views, this stat has jumped up at the same time all the other stats in traffic are down...............any idea's?

[the_book_seekers]

The only stat that is moving in a positive direction is the "external site views" - the same. 

The issue with impressions isn't lmited to promotional side. I don't promote my listings and my organic impressions are not what they were.

[andyorell2002]

It's been 5 days of this now, impressions still massively down. Yesterday they did climb a little but that is normal for a Saturday, they were still way way below a usual Saturday. It's so frustrating that it's been five days and we are still none the wiser as to why this is happening. 

[paul*tribesandvibes*]

@andyorell2002 call me cynical, but I didn't really expect any kind of a response from ebay that made any sense, or apologised for any inconvenience, or offered a discount on next month's fees for our trouble.

I've been selling on here since 2007 - the good old days when ebay did not interfere with your business: you just listed stuff, it was seen, and it was sold - but I've never known it to be so expensive for so little in return. Soon it will be another Alibaba because there will only be Chinese sellers on here!

I'm sure it probably depends on what you're selling, and in what categories, and maybe ebay just wants us old timers out of the way so that it can become another version of the river without being questioned all the time but us mere mortals. And I expect there are Sellers on these boards who are reading this and thinking 'oh, boo hoo grandad, get with the program', but you have to ask yourself - why? for what? more money for ebay, less for me? a constant race to the bottom on pricing? And a constant struggle to understand the algorithm and why the impressions are bottoming out without any good reason. Nah. I dont think so. You can bet there is a fiendish plan being hatched here by ebay to get more money from you ...

[teflon2237]

i am having the same issue can you add me as well pls dave@ebay

[caz1718]

I turned off my PL last weekend and had a few sales granted not many but a least something, added PL back on early in the week, a total of two sales totalling £33 all week on an available stock of over £480K. Impressions are through the floor and PL seems to kill off any sales potential. Add to this the issue with multi variation listings this weekend results in zero sales driven through eBay again. 
Its starting to look, as others have pointed out on other threads, a lot like the introduction of dynamic has somehow created a conflict,  is actively undermining impressions and having a very serious negative impact on UK small businesses. Beta testing once again drives small businesses to the brink. 
Sadly I was on the brink of closing my shop last month, thought I'd give it this month to try a few last ditch changes to try drive sales, but in the time I've completed two surveys eBay have sent me and written this I've had 3 sales on another marketplace, 4 on another and 5 sales on my own website with another pending and a flat zero on eBay. Promoting on here it appears is not only a waste of time but is actually causing a downturn in impressions and revenue. Only on eBay ! 

[the_book_seekers]

Looking at my traffic ebay is saying that my impressions are 16.3% down on the prior time period. Looking at the figures they are down far more than this. I'm down over 40% today alone. Either I'm getting the impressions and the graphs aren't working or ebay's calculator needs new batteries. I don't think the figures for the views are correct as well. 

[sdjwales]

That's 3 different accounts plus the promoted listings ADVANCED that I was using on one of the 3.

Certainly no coincidence, whatever it is.

[wakeson]

Its sole destroying isnt it...

I thined out the advanced keywords and i had a big drop, but then the remaining keywords started to get hit a lot more.

how many keywords are you using and are you biidding high, im not trying to teach you how to suck an egg but i noticed they creap up to silly levels without realising it, and my bids then became less than the lower side of the predicted %

[laptopsandtablets]

My impressions were up again yesterday after 5 days, is anyone else seeing this?

 

[goingfishing]

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@laptopsandtablets wrote:

My impressions were up again yesterday after 5 days, is anyone else seeing this?

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*Touches wood* mine were up Sat and Sun but still 40-50% down on where they should be and sales likewise.  However I'd expect an increase on a Weekend.  Not out of the woods yet by a long shot.. and I mean a very long shot.

[caz1718]

A very marginal increase over the weekend but zero sales as has become the trend, so treading water on here. So far nothing to convince me that eBay right now can compete in even a small way with other marketplaces for traffic let alone convert it to a sale. I don't trust eBay figures my own figures simply are too far removed. EBay has my impressions down by 42% but revenue driven by promotions up 436% I've had two sales this week neither driven by promotions and significantly down on last week. They can't even be truthful about that. 

[goingfishing]

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@caz1718 wrote:

I don't trust eBay figures my own figures simply are too far removed.  They can't even be truthful about that. 

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That is my main problem with all this 'data' and promoted listings malarkey.  Today we are driven by data, the data shows this the data shows that - HOWEVER if the data is wrong what is it showing?

How on Earth can I plan effectively (and that is the point) my advertising campaigns if the data is inaccurate?

[swiss_expert_uk]

Impressions are generally higher at the weekends, not sure anything has been changed, I doubt it. 

Problem is sales, Saturday £400+ Sunday £35. Sales patterns such as this are 100% at the feet of eBay not buyers. 

Can I expect any sales today ebay? 

[caz1718]

Unfortunately the errors in their data are easily shown up by business sellers who keep their own records. EBay seem, at the moment to be thrashing around in the dark desperate to push dynamic promotion to raise revenue from a smaller pot of sellers, which, when you do the simple maths, most small businesses simply can't afford. It all indicates they'd rather have a few large scale sellers than the loyal small independents, who at the moment enay seem to be content to let them collapse. PL standard is clearly dead in the water as a result of the big dymnamic push.  it's very sad to see so many loyal businesses struggling on under the weight of adding listings, tweaking listings, end and sell similar pretty much any trick to try to stay afloat, all the while eBay likely know this will fail. 
Traffic generally is down with customers voting to shop elsewhere, this maybe why impressions are sinking. I'm seeing strong improvements in sales on all other marketplaces which bears this out and I read on a post on a different thread that they've lost 30% of their app users so their search "improvements" clearly haven't been welcomed by potential buyers.  I wonder what that number rises to when you count desktop users.
To be honest I don't have many sales records to keep this month,  sales and impressions have been so poor on here, after many years I have to consider whether eBay are capable of pulling the site round, it takes up a lot of head space which is better served in many ways on sites that do have the traffic and offer better data 

[caz1718]

My last sale was on the 20th, a big fat zero over the weekend and I'm sadly very much expecting that trend to continue given the current impression downward trend. 

[goingfishing]

Clutching at straws here but what are folks thoughts on the newer dynamic promotions being broken hence the slide and that the standard ones are fine?

Or is it both are knackered?

[the_book_seekers]

Whatever it is ebay can't get or won't get a grip of it. It's been a growing issue since the 5th and we're now approaching the end of the third week. 

[caz1718]

It's an interesting thought, I have and would only use standard PL and impressions have nose dived and sales are non existent so I can only see it from one perspective and from my end standard is failing in an ever downward spiral.
I'd be interested to hear from those who've used dynamic and see if it improved the projected  50% if at all? 

My general thought is the two running in tandem are causing a conflict in whatever algorithm they are running causing a nightmare for small sellers but I'm guessing.