Share your tips for increasing sales

[vintagechinashop]

Good afternoon to you all 

it's very easy to get bogged down with negativity. I for one have in recent times been quite negative, but this morning I had a sale and yesterday I had 3 so I've decided to try and be positive in these uncertain times 

so I thought it would be a good idea to start a positive post 

would anyone like to share your tips for increasing sales. Something that has worked for you maybe or something you are trying to see if it has results 

I know there's no magic wand to be waved but let's see if we can try to improve our sales by sharing the love 

my first tip is to use sell similar on ended listings and to change just one thing. I think in the past I have been very complacent and just need to up my game a bit. I've been taking fresh photos of ended items to refresh the listing 

over to you 

[simplyessential_uk]

Thanks Sheba heres mine in full 

Selling costs are at 21% but £840.25 sales via Promos so only approx a third (35%) of my sales are via promos so for those who think if you dont pay you dont get sales kind of proves otherwise 

My sales on Ebay many moons ago used to be £6-7k a month but I now sell across Ebay, Amazon and Etsy and my own website and like yourself juggle to stay under VAT threshold with all sites combined so I want to get the best profit returns not just a race to the £85k so I refuse to pay more than 2% (used to be 1%)  Infact my own website, for the first time, has exceeded Ebay in revenue this month (and I dont advertise) so thats more profit and certainly the way to go but takes a while to get established. 
As mentioned previously I did great last year until I did my tax returns and realised actually I had done worse with more outgoings, so I do my returns monthly now so to see the actual profit not sales.

I often find sales slow down in Dec and I switch off a week before - Experience tells me that its those late shoppers who dont appreciate the post is slower at peak times so I send everything to Amazon FBA and switch off, I can see how December a problem for you as its Xmas dresses etc and then return, probably damaged to get a free return too.

[tabletop-hobbies]

Some useful insights on here, so thankyou all.  Like everyone else I've suffered inconsistent sales and maybe briefly hovered on the 'it's a conspiracy ebay actually hates us all' posts but then I get back to work and do the following things...

I list every day, this is probably the most difficult as I have to maintain a pipeline of goods to list and sell.  The last time I stopped doing this my business suffered and It took months to recover (I had a great month a took my foot off the gas pedal).  List every day.  If you have 10 items list one a day for ten days, I'm convinced this is more effective than list 10 then have 9 days off.

End and sell similar, if things are looking a bit sluggish this seems to pep things up.  Ebay likes new listings and it drives people to my replenishable stuff (paints, glues etc)

Promoted listings, everything currently at 2% PL with a couple of exceptions which are dynamic, once again to bring people in.  I don't touch PPC or the next thing, paying eBay approx 20% of turnover is enough for me.

Finally the most useful thing I've found on ebay is to be consistent and GET AFTER IT, optimising listings, getting new stuff on etc yields results and it rewards a consistent (daily) approach.  The times when I've been crying into my beer over poor sales usually follows me slacking off, to the point where my wife asks me if i've been listing if things get quiet which gives me a nudge to get to work.

One thing I've noticed is that all of this info is out there already but the difference is that only a minority act upon it.  The info is free but it's worth potentiially an infinite amount- it depends on you.  I'm still learning, still messing up but generally things are improving at a difficult time in the economy.

[ojewellery]

@tabletop-hobbies Your wife sounds resiliant (and tollerant) for the peeks and troughs in business.  That must be great to have someone who's in your corner nudging you on. 

I think I need to programme an ai bot with all these tips to do the equivalent for me.  The IT equivalent of have you tried turning it on and off again.  Frustrating but so often works!

Another random thought...Turning on international sales by offering international postage and/ or GSP can give things a bit of a boost too. 

[simplyessential_uk]

Everything you say 100% - I too list daily and then get complacent and then see sales tale off and I remind myself so sometimes I save some in draft as "spares" so if Im busy I can just put them live for my quota.  It definitely plays a big part,lots of YT vids concur with this method and see then other slow items are seen.

[pg_kicks]

I'm glad its working for you, but its the opposite for me, I tried the sell similar and updated pictures/description on a test amount of listings and it actually dropped in viewings. I think it all depends on the categories you list in which makes it even more of a minefield.

For the people who use Promoted listings standard whats your ratio for promoted to non promoted sales wise? I only use a very low % wise and its currently 10 promoted to every 3 non promoted. My ROAS is £33 (should increase once I get refunded for the current bug in the system too) so I'm happy with that, I'd just like to know if my ratio of promoted to non promoted is high or low compared to others.

[fatbobfan]

Ditto to all on the thanks, as a 'solitary' seller the the information has been invaluable, its the food for thought and opened thoughts I would not have not considered.

[fatbobfan]

Thanks for taking the time

Your quote 'called ebay and was told that just enrolling 1% (as it was at the time) puts you in the queue, ebay fills the sponsored slots in order of highest % so once those slots are full everyone elses sit behind'

Great insight, thak you

[fatbobfan]

ROAS 21.48 and trying to reduce our PL standard rate from 5% to lower between 2 and 3.5) with a few exceptions, all inventory on PL, will probably stick with all 

Not all sales are PL though (but alot) but we have stiff competition

There is a lot on this thread on PL, other seller rates and strategies, its long but worth a read, genuinely the infor is there. 

Dont think its ratio's its more stock quality and competition. Understand your market and competitors and set promotions accordingly, no need to PL a dream pair of  premium Air Jordans I guess but maybe you need to for a black pair of Dunlops, youd be the one to make the calls, hope you get where Im coming from. 

ROAS of 33 to me seems very good but again it relates to your inventory/market

[goingfishinguk]

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@simplyessential_uk wrote:

 so for those who think if you dont pay you dont get sales kind of proves otherwise 

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It's spooky then to see your amount sold, sales value and ad fees all seem to be down the same 25%

[fatbobfan]

Just echoing,

It keeps coming up, I put three into drafts today for tomorrow

Another good habit to add to an ever growing list

[ojewellery]

Typically I have all listings on promoted listings standard and this is the first time I've played with this particular metric.

My 'promoted listing sales over 31 days'/'total sales over 31 days' = 0.618  

I think that means that 61.8% of my sales are from promoted listing adverts

Taking the last 31 days my ROAS on the promoted listings tab was 31  

So I think if ROAS is just on actual items sold with a promotional fee, my across account advertising spend is 31 (my ROAS) /0.618 = 50  or I'm paying an average of an extra 2% per sale to increase visibility/ sales.

Spend will go up as I increase my dymanic spend and change my product mix more towards my own brand rather than known brand.  I have far more control over profit on these and if I generate traction I have good control over replenishing, so the cost of design, product creation, imagery, video etc in theory gets written off over a longer run.

[simplyessential_uk]

meaning Ive sold 25% less via promos not 25% less sales.  As the comment said only a third of sales were made via promos 

My sales are down 6% on prev month Look at the right figures if youre trying to make a point. 

[goingfishinguk]

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@simplyessential_uk wrote:

meaning Ive sold 25% less via promos not 25% less sales, which is actually a good thing to sell less by promos .

My sales are down 6% on prev month Look at the right figures if youre trying to make a point. 

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You said this - 'so for those who think if you dont pay you dont get sales kind of proves otherwise'

Your figures show items sold, sales in £ and ad fees in £ all down neigh on 25% thus they are directly proportionate.  Therefore in your case your claim that 'so for those who think if you dont pay you dont get sales kind of proves otherwise' actually contradicts what the data you show to illustrate otherwise.  You data actually backs up you have to pay to play.

This thread is riddled with examples of how people are wrongly interpreting data or scewing it to show they are doing well when actually they are not.  I would also suggest you forget about the importance of impressions.  I've proved time after time (and most data in this thread shows it) that they are often 99% plus ineffective.

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[ojewellery]

@goingfishinguk  Lots of the screen shots used are from the advertising dashboard and are only showing sales as a result of advertising - hence correlation in drop in sales and ad fees in the listed example.

We are all but mere humans, I'm sure I've made many mistakes in how I do things and how I interpret them.  I'm grateful when its (gently) pointed out to me that things can be interpreted in a different way (a polite way of telling me I'm wrong).  Our primary objective in selling is after all to make at least some money.  Thats why this info sharing is fascinating to me, it opens up my mind to different views. 

I don't claim to be doing well on eBay, I'm down quite a bit on my historical sales but I am doing better in the business as a whole. I am still making enough money on eBay that its worth it for me and I am still clinging onto the hope that I can find a way to turn the tide.

[simplyessential_uk]

Your figures show items sold, sales in £ and ad fees in £ all down neigh on 25% thus they are directly proportionate

The £840 sales are sales via promos not my total sales which is £2447 therefore only 35% of my sales came via promos hence my comment.

In otherwords approx 2/3rds of my sales didnt come via promos.

The screenshot is from advertising dashboard not overall sales.  

[goingfishinguk]

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@simplyessential_uk wrote:

The screenshot is from advertising dashboard not overall sales.  

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I know exactly where it is from and I know exactly what it means.  You basically stated that your figures that you showed proved that you do not have to pay to play.  The thing I'm trying to illustrate is the figures you showed contradicts that since there is a directly proportionate decline across the board hence actually suggesting you do have to pay to play.  This is the HUGE problem (not with you personally) but with the data itself.

I know what you mean about your promo sales vs total sales.  All I mean is if you were to increase your ad spend then your sales would go up proportionately.  Or they would looking at your figures, so in essence you have to pay to play to some extent. 

Turn ALL your advertising off.  All promoted listings, standard, advanced etc etc for two weeks, maybe less and then come back with your total sales figures.  I am assuming they will have plummeted.  So sorry to say but saying you do not have to pay to play is rather nonsense.  Yes reduce ad spend, yes opt out of PPC but to have no advertising at all or NO pay to play then you I would imagine would be on a one way ticket to zero sales.

[oceanartsnorthdevon]

I also go through my listings on a daily basis, end items with no watchers for that month and sell similar with a few tweaks so that it is slightlly different.  I end items that are just over 3 months old that have watchers on but have not sold so nothing in shop is over 3 months old, it may or may not be a good thing loosing your watchers on an item but I can honestly say from my experience it has not had a detrimental affect as I have had listings with watchers on that have been ended and relisted as sell similiar and sold upon relist or starts to gather more new watchers to which it will sit for another 3 months unless sold.

Another thing I try from time to time if things go very quiet it to bulk edit all or part of my items without making any changes as I read somewhere this can have some sort of an update effect, not sure exactly how or the reasoning behind it but guessing the algorithm detects a change on the large quantity and does some sort of refresh? (maybe someone can explain).  The jury for me is out on this one, I have noticed some improvement once I had done this, not immediately as I am guessing it needs time to reindex or what ever it does but other times it hasn't made much of a difference but I don't think you have anything to lose by giving it a go.

All items are promoted using the standard promotions where I have control, you could try tweaking the percentage for promotion on a few items by a small increase of maybe 1% or 2% and then make a small increase on selling price by this amount to counteract the increase on promotion so the price increase is minimal but hopefully that small increase in promotion pushes it that little bit further into view.

[simplyessential_uk]

Another thing I try from time to time if things go very quiet it to bulk edit all or part of my items without making any changes 

Never heard of this so interesting. I know in the past just changing something eg price (not necessarily down) refreshed the listing but that seemed to stop working once the listings old so I now close and sell similar so nothing in my shop older that 4mths but ill try this bulk editing. 

[sheba-knows-best]

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@oceanartsnorthdevon wrote:

Another thing I try from time to time if things go very quiet it to bulk edit all or part of my items without making any changes as I read somewhere this can have some sort of an update effect

A

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This made me smile wistfully. Not at you. But at this darn leviathan called ebay. Because that is what I used to do maybe three-four years ago. I would just do it just twice a year. After Christmas. And after the summer holidays. And that was it. Job done in 10 mins each time. Sales flew. I'm not saying this doesn't work. In fact - thank you for reminding me of something I had forgotten about - but blimey, has selling on eBay taken on a whole new dimension.... it's not for the faint-hearted, that's for sure. 

[sheba-knows-best]

I was just popping back to this thread - as having slept on it, and looked at my items - I just want to throw price back into the equation.

If anyone can be bothered to go back to posts 46-48 you will see @btr.style - one of the only pre-loved clothing sellers to comment, so obviously I was very interested in his business and thoughts  - utterly flabbergasted, possibly affronted at my prices. I mounted a defence. And I stand by it. It still amazes me that people can spend £30-90 per head (and more) on dinner out but baulk at £200 for an amazing pure new wool coat that will last any number of lifetimes. 

But my point here - is that although my ROAS is rubbish - and I am going to try and reduce it - maybe it is what allows for these prices. Because a lot of people are going to baulk at £28 for pre-loved High Street jeans but the right person will grab them because they know they loved them when they bought them before. I have to pay a lot because I have to put my stuff in front of A LOT of people. I wonder if competition is way worse for preloved (not helped by the private/business seller army which has come out of COVID and cost of living crisis). 

Just musing - I can see from my campaigns that my nicest items - once shoved to cherry pick - become slow movers... I think I need a higher ROAS than others presumably because I am high priced and in preloved...

Although @ojewellery you seem to have gone higher priced too... BTR was right, your listings/photos look great. Any comments on your competition on ebay vs. elsewhere?