Are still selling on Ebay?
Me and the Missus have started again this summer selling stuff around the house in a bid to de-clutter.
When I ebayed vintage toys a lot in my spare time in the early to late noughties Ebay was still the Wild West and you had to have your wits about you. To do it right and keep buyers happy you had to work hard at really good descriptions and decent photos. There was also a lot of communication with buyers and lots of planning as to whether unsold stuff got re-listed or not. Disputes had to be settled.
Nowadays I can't believe it. Ebay pre-fill descriptions, suggest pictures and yes, even create entire listings if you let them!
They also default an awful lot of things which they think are good for your listings, the most common of which is offers.
I was bemused by this. Offers on auctions. I thought you bid on auctions and offers were for fixed price items. They were when Ebay started up.
So if you don't switch off offers then they will appear in your listing at a fairly low level and before you know it someone will offer you £2. Then begins the whole rigmarole of accepting, rejecting etc etc.
Ebay also re-list items 8 times for free. Again, this was completely new and I had to look twice when I saw all our ended unsold stuff back on sale!
Look, I'm human. I like things being simple. But do Ebay really have to nanny sellers so much these days that they'll even create an entire listing for them? Where's the research, the unique facts, the care, the love?
What do you think of all this nannying on Ebay readers? or am I just getting old?
A bit different from my experience. My 'free' re-listings were being charged! And, thankfully, my unsold items were not automatically being re-listed which is a good thing. The charges are getting a little high though
ReplyDeleteReally, I thought the first 8 free-listings were free! I'd better check!
DeleteThe latest of it from the buyer's POV is direct offers from sellers targeted to those watching a particular item. The discounts not visible on the listing can be considerable, which makes you wonder about the pricing in the first place.
ReplyDeleteReally Arto, I didn't know sellers could do that!
DeleteI stopped selling on ebay a few years ago as it seems to have switched to being business friendly and not the community of individuals clearing the attic that it started as.
ReplyDeleteAlso, while it was reasonable to pay a fee to have access to a world wide buying audience if you wished, the fees have grown. It is now more costly to list and ebay takes a cut of PAYPAL payments and postage. In the US to add insult to injury buyers now have to pay sales tax for out of State or country purchases.
Yes, I remember when Ebay first bought Paypal Terran. No-one had ever heard of them, certainly over here in the UK. I have to admit that before Paypal it was quite hair-raising getting paid and paying for stuff. Cash, cheques, Western Union, it was all done back then! Oddly enough my Missus can list for free!
DeleteEvil feeble feeBay!
ReplyDeleteH