Still no sales on Ebay.

[whf-southampton]

The season has changed, the weather has changed, and everyone has been paid. We are top rated, with 100% feedback, yet still no sales on ebay. If we could actually get rid of our stock we would close today.

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.......

[style_wise]

If we could actually get rid of our stock we would close today.

There's a lot of despair behind this statement. Before you put everything up for 99p bid, I took a look to see if there are any obvious suggestions to help.

You're been selling on eBay for a long time, and have seen a lot of changes. Plus experienced sellers need systems, and sometimes those systems need refreshing.

So you'll have seen that modern eBay has different descriptions. They are much shorter and simpler than before. Most people don't even read them! You're doing a good job with pro photos and filling in dropdown menu details, but the all caps rainbow doesn't. It is too hard to read, takes too long, and gets unread due to too much T&Cs. Best to write them in black, sentence case, with item details at the top, and essential details only.

Although your descriptions are long, they don't have enough detail about the actual wear / damage on used items. These days 'as shown' or 'see photos' just doesn't cut it. I saw very worn soles in a photo that weren't described in the listing. Also photos of used shoes with dirty soles is unhelpful, not to mention they are against eBays policy that used items must be properly cleaned.

These things especially matter when you have low demand with infrequent Viewers your listings.. You want the description and photos to be good like your listing 406116611063 - to lock in that rare Buyer when they come along.

eBay makes comparison shopping easier and easier. When sales are slow do you check Completed Listings? I saw one item in similar condition to yours with same brand/model/colour/size that sold for 1/3 of your asking price.

Last but not least, if you choose not to close up shop, you will have to be more patient. Do you use the Research Tool to get an idea of when realistically to expect sales? I did a few and saw that for one brand/model/colour/size none have sold in the last 3-years. Another only had one sale in 3-years. That's okay if you have a good warehouse space and are willing to wait. Even experienced Sellers who do everything right can't magic up Buyers who aren't there!

Again this was just a quick check to see if there were any obvious solutions. You will know your stock better and have more time to take a more in-depth look. Good luck with your family business! I hope Q4 brings an increase in sales next month.

[whf-southampton]

Interesting comments!

As you have only been on ebay since 2023 and had only 396 feedback (with 99.6% score) and there is no sign of you selling footwear, trying to critique a long term seller with over 24,000 feedbacks and 100% score seems a little presumptuous - you don't work for ebay do you? The time you must have spent going through things!

Sales have tailed off since they introduced - No fee selling for private sellers, then the buyers protection fees and now Simply delivery, ( It had been going downhill since promoted listings was introduced). We know our market and at this time of year for the last 20 years we would expect to see sales start to increase - but the tumbleweed is blowing across the site!

[pegr-834437]

Fully agree, since the move to try and copy what is basically a website that doesn't offer anywhere near the protections eBay has always offered, the reach or the ease it use to offer sales and support has died. There are many things wrong with the site that should be fixed but instead they have went full speed down a track that really should never have been taken. 

I'm not one to try and run somebody else's business but have you tried listing on the site eBay seem to find so attractive they wish to be themselves? Your items and price point seems to fit them perfectly, not that I'd like to be the person doing 400 new listings but start with 25 of the womens pre-owned and see how it goes. Worse case you return them to here and they sit for longer, as long as you return within 90 days they will be in the unsold so its an easy return. 

Really though eBay should be phoning you up and finding out your personal views on whats going wrong, accounts dont sell 38k and then just slow to a crawl, its basic business to reach out to your 'big' small customers (not the likes of AO and shark) who are the bread and butter of the site if they are struggling and actually try and help.

[cobwebcottage]

A very condescending reply to an experienced Business seller considering you are a private seller and all of your items are brand new brand name products.

Maybe you should take some time looking at your own account and become accustomed with all of Ebays policies before giving advice on the business boards.

Business seller policy | eBay

[theshoecupboard]

I closed my shop nearly a year ago because of the way ebay was going, and fully agree with you that 'the other site' is not as good as ebay but ebay went headlong into trying to become them. I stopped when no fee selling was offered to private sellers as I could see this as being the end for business sellers.

Ebay has made no effort in asking the actual people who have been on this platform for many years, the small business sellers, what they actually think or what their needs might be. They are just the money pot for ebay, without them ebay would have no business model but they are the most ignored group on the platform.

Ebay needs to wake up!

[pegr-834437]

Fully agree, the open event will be interesting considering the last one was all small businesses are the lifeblood of eBay and we will try everything to help you, but we shall not mention free to sell for private accounts launching 2 weeks later as we don't think of you enough to even give you a heads up on such a huge issue.

I can't think of any business who has ignored their customers as been successful, they have a source of so much knowledge yet ignore it and chose a path that has clearly been set out by people who do not sell on the site as a business.

[padanpcparts]

style_wise gave you a long well thought out answer there. Bit of an aggressive response considering they went out of their way to answer your post, they were mainly valid points. 

[whf-southampton]

Just to let you know that a year or so ago we had a person from ebay contact us to provide advice on 'improving our sales', we had a number of calls and in between did the changes they suggested but when the next call was scheduled no one phoned - and no one from ebay has since!

Did our sales improve - NO!

Over the last few years our winter period would see sales of £10k a month - we are now showing just over £2k!

We know our product and had a good understanding of our market place until all these recent changes made by ebay have completely destabilized the platform.

Before offering advice perhaps novice private sellers need to gather more information and experience before regurgitating tired ebay advice

[sheba-knows-best]

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@whf-southampton wrote:

The season has changed, the weather has changed, and everyone has been paid. We are top rated, with 100% feedback, yet still no sales on ebay. If we could actually get rid of our stock we would close today.

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.......

---

I'm having my best year ever on ebay but given your response to the last guy who tried to help would I bother to take time to help... er, no. 

Has anyone else tried after he did... er no. 

So my input is: You're quite right! Down with Ebay! Ebay is dead! 

[whf-southampton]

Thank you for your comments and glad to hear that you are doing well.

My husband is an accountant of 40 years experience and he enjoys reading some of the posts on the forum as it enables him to see how people see and understand how businesses work.

For instance your site has over 1500 listings and about 90 feedback per month, so this means you turn over your stock every 15 to 16 months - this is a long time in the fashion industry. Ours is about 430 listings and 86 feedback so we turnover our stock every 4/5 months.

Since fashion is seasonal, businesses don't like carrying stock over from one season to the next but your business model seems to accept this and that's fine if that is your plan.

Now stock turnover levels vary according to the business you are in so why people come on these forums trying to tell people in different trades how to do things baffles me! There is no one size fits all, so when ebay labels you as a 'Specialist' a specialist in what exactly?

Going back to your stock turnover rates, your rates being much longer than ours means that you are also slower in seeing trends, we have seen a difference since February but you are probably not seeing that yet.