More Ebay Listings and Less Traffic - Not a Good Combination

Ina Steiner at Auctionbytes just posted two incredible stories - that Ebay's listings has risen a whopping 670% in the last 2 years, and Ebay's traffic has declined 13% during the same period.  The stories were so surprising, that I had to read them twice.

In the first article (posted 4/13 here), Ina points out that since January 2008, the average number of listings has increased a huge amount - and even more-so in specific categories, such as "Books" (2,222%).  My first response was that she must be counting individual items, and not individual listings.  I thought that for sure she was counting a fixed price listing for 50 widgets as "50" in her count.  Surprisingly, she was not.  I verified this by looking at the "gift certificates" category - which does, in fact., have 15,000+ listings - and many are multi-item.  I am not sure if the 2008 numbers were for "core" listings only (auctions and fixed price) and excluded store items, but even if they did, that would only account for a mere doubling of listings (45 million to 100 million) - certainly nothing like the six-fold rise being reported.

She goes on to give a series of reasons for this astounding rise in listings - 2 of which point the finger squarely at large retailers - those pesky Diamonds, and those importing SKU's with the new Large Merchant Services API.  I wish we could ferret out exactly how much of the rise is due to these sellers, because in many categories, they actually have a minimal impact.  Most of the bigger ebay retailers are in electronics (particularly refurbs and accessories), media (all kinds, including books), and more recently, clothing.  Are there any Diamonds in Art, Antiques, Collectibles, and Crafts?  I don't think so - yet these categories have grown by leaps and bounds (300-700%).

I believe a significant amount of this "growth" in the "non-big-seller-categories" was from the store-to-core move at the start of this month, as well as the introduction of the cheap fixed-price listing (one of Ina's listed reasons).  Many of these fixed priced listings are virtually "permanent".  The crafter that make custom mailboxes might have a fixed price listing for 50 boxes, which he continuously updates over time, and gladly pays .35/month (now probably only .05/month) to keep this listing up so he can sell dozens throughout the year.  "Sell through" rates no longer apply when a listing is really a fixed price item with virtually unlimited quantity and unlimited duration.

eBay is Retailer with Most Feb. Search Queries - Retailer Daily

Here is an interesting article I almost missed (but didn't thanks to ColderIce).

Although Google was the leading online search provider by several different metrics in February 2010, among online entities whose primary function is providing retail services, auction retailer eBay had the most search queries last month.

eBay Leading Retailer for Search Queries

Search queries

While many of the sites which reported the most search queries in February 2010 have a retail component, eBay was the leading specifically retail-oriented site for search queries last month, according to comScore qSearch data.. eBay had 624 million queries, a 5% drop from 659 million queries in January 2010. eBay ranked 14th overall for monthly search queries.

See entire article here:

eBay is Retailer with Most Feb. Search Queries - Retailer Daily

What Every New Ebay Seller Needs to Know (Part 1)

A good friend of mine called me this morning and said that his boss was preparing to sell a bunch of expensive collectibles on Ebay and wanted to know if I had any words of advice.  I asked him if his boss had used Ebay before and if he had a Paypal account.  He said, "No.  He just signed up for both.".  All I could do was sigh.  There is a LOT he needs to know.

Every Ebay seller was once a newbie, but not until recieving this call did I realize just how tough it would be to be a newbie right now.  Much has changed in 10 years.  When I was a newbie, I signed up, I sold stuff, people sent me money, and I shipped stuff out..  I didn't even have a paypal account for about a year.

But what if I was a newbie right now - with a brand new ebay account and a brand new paypal account - ready to start selling today.  What would I really need to know to get good prices and avoid major pitfalls?

Let's start with a few basics.

Brace Yourself - More Ebay Changes Coming After April 2010

While I predicted there will be some serious problems with the 3/30 Update (see March 18th Entry), I did not think Ebay would simultaneously attempt to make even more changes.  Well, Auctionbytes just reported that Ebay will be announcing more changes in April that will take effect later in the year.  The kind of change?  Best Match search changes of course.  Somebody at Ebay must have a programming job for life just working on search.

But here is what bothers me: -  If these changes are in response to the "store to core" because "Store listings to core next week, it could exacerbate the problem [with search] and create a glut of merchandise in certain categories." - then why didn't they think of that before proposing the 3/30 changes?  Their approach sounds reactive instead of proactive.  If you and I can anticipate issues with a massive change like this, shouldn't Ebay?

Another way to look at this is that Ebay has no idea exactly what effect the 3/30 conversion will have on search, listings, and sales.  In that case, wouldn't it make sense to let these changes settle a bit with sellers and buyers before immediately launching into yet another new series of changes?  After giving the market a chance to absorb and normalize after this change, then they could see exactly what tweaking is needed - or if any is needed at all.

Right now sellers are frantically trying to decide exactly what to do.  Do they upgrade their stores?  Do they list more or less?  Will they sell more or less?  Nothing hurts a market worse than uncertainty.  Some people tend to sit on their hands doing nothing while they wait to see how things pan out, while other embrace change as an opportunity to "get a jump" on everyone else.  It will probably take a couple of months before anyone really knows the full effect of these recent changes.  Sellers sitting on the sidelines may then join in - or quit completely.  Most sellers will make a series of adjustments during those first couple of months.  Personally, I need to decide exactly how many fixed price listings is optimal in this new selling environment.

So wouldn't it make a whole lot of sense if Ebay actually sat back for a few months, took a deep breath, and let this change sink in a bit before racing towards the next series of confusing search modifications?  Better yet, why not plan on dedicating the entire programming staff for 60 days to fixing all the new glitches the 3/30 changes are certain to create.

Only 12 Days to Ebay D-Day - Convert Your Store Inventory NOW!

Sure, you can wait until midnight on 3/30 and hope and pray Ebay converts your 2,500 store inventory listings properly to fixed price listings, or you can do the conversion yourself.

After all, what could go wrong?

1. Store inventory "upgrades" (bold, subtitles, etc) are supposed to be renewed at the store inventory rate "as a one-time courtesy and then removed at the next renewal cycle".
2. 30-day store inventory should convert as 30-day fixed, and GTC store inventory should convert as GTC fixed price.
3. All store inventory items will be given new Item ID#'s.

I  predict that there will be problems with one or all of the above processes.

For #1 above, what if you are charged potentially thousands of dollars for upgrades that are now very expensive on each listing?  How long will it take Ebay to reimburse you, and will you have to pay it before your next billing cycle?

For #2, what if your GTC's become 30 day's, or vice versa?  Since you cannot change this parameter once a fixed price listing is started (either directly or in batch mode), you could be forced to manually delete these listings (if GTC).

Then there are the new ID#'s.  I've already run into this possibly big problem, at least for those using 3rd party auction management systems.  If 1000 store items become 1000 fixed price items with new ID#'s, my management system will no longer know they exist.  Yes, I can import them, but I can no longer use the imported data to re-list.  For some this is no biggie, but I'm sure that having all of your ID#'s change over-night is going to have unforeseen consequences.

And finally....what if the entire conversion process fails altogether?  What if the process takes days due to the huge server overloads this will probably cause?  What if all your entire store inventory is simply lost....or scrambled?

As Dirty Harry would say "..you've got to ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?"

Some Ebay Sellers Really Don't Understand the Store Inventory Changes

As was evident in several recent Auctionbytes "Letters to the Editor"

There are some basic misunderstandings here that could use some clarification.

- Store inventory format items are not in core search, and will never be in core.  Period.  The point of signing up early for the store upgrade is to allow sellers to have everything in place for the new setup and NOT be charged for the upgrade (until after 3/30).  The .10 fixed price promo is for much of the same thing.  I converted all of my store items to fixed price, and upgraded my store, so now 3/30 will be a non-event.

- After 3/30 there will only be auctions and fixed price.  Both are in core search now, and will continue to be.

- Fixed price items do - in fact - show up in Google.  All of my fixed price ebay items (formerly store items) are in Google.  There are factors to consider - how long did you wait?  Google can be slow.  Also...if the item is exactly the same as your old store-inventory item, there is a duplication issue.  Google might need to expire your old item before it inserts the new one - that can take a few weeks.

- Many sellers, including myself, are experiencing both a huge rise in item views and sales as a result of having items in core search.  Many of my older store inventory items are having a robust resurgence - which really shows how poorly store inventory was being handled before.

Nobody know how things will be on ebay after 3/30, but I'd guess it'll be similar to how it is right now since most of the larger sellers have already done much of what they are going to do.

I'm not finding any noticeable increase in alt site or website sales (which remain good), so I'm not seeing buyers flocking elsewhere.  However, I do think buyers will continue to move towards direct webstore sellers - especially the big ones - over the next few years..

Shelbyville Times-Gazette: Is eBay coming alive for you? Especially store entries?

Yes Mr. Mills, there is a Santa Claus.

Shelbyville Times-Gazette: Blog: Is eBay coming alive for you? Especially store entries?

Is it really that mysterious that Fixed Price items in Ebay's "core" search do MUCH better than store inventory format that is virtually invisible to many ebay buyers? Fixed price sellers (like me) have known about this for years....and now....so does everyone.

Ebay Changes: Fixed Price & Best Match

So back in July of 2009, Ebay announced they were changing their Best Match algorithms later that year (as if we understood how they worked to begin with). These changes went into effect in late 2009, and affected how "Best Match" would be scored in certain of categories. In these categories "time recently listed" would now count more than the "listing performance score". The listing performance score is basically how well an item is selling in relation to how often it's viewed - a sort of popularity contest that places best selling items above poorly selling items.

These changes are spelled out by Ebay on their "Best Match Tips" help section, and mentioned prominently in this excellent Brewsnews article, "An Analysis of the New eBay Pricing Change by a Seller In-the-Trenches"

Beginning late September 2009 eBay changed the Best Match criteria for Art, Antiques, Coins & Paper Money, Collectibles, Dolls & Bears, Pottery & Glass, Toys & Hobbies, Stamps, Sports Mem, Cards & Fan Shop, and Entertainment Memorabilia. In order ”To keep the freshest inventory on top and surface a broader selection, the main sort factor for Fixed Price listings in these categories will be recency of listing instead of listing performance score“

Conventional wisdom said it was always better to use a Good Til Canceled (GTC) listing over a 30 day listing because only the GTC format carried over the accumulated "search score" - sometimes over many months. In fact, according to my own tests, the single most important factor was "recent sales". I noticed that as soon as an item sold, it would often be followed by several other sales. This was due to the sudden search ranking boost from the first sale. Immediately following a sale, a keyword search would often find that item in the top five "best search" placement, and often remain there for several days. Some items with many sales (20 or more) would remain in the top ten for weeks at a time - even if there had been no sales at all for several weeks. I also noticed that items with more "watchers" and identical sales histories would usually rank a few places higher.