Book report: The Independent UK Guide to eBay 2010
February 6, 2010
I know it’s February already, but I’ve just got my hands on The Independent UK Guide to eBay 2010. The Guide has been around for a few years now – I was made aware of it when they first reviewed TameBay in the 2008 edition. It’s an odd sort of publication: it looks like a magazine, both in size and in layout, but definitely has a bookish price tag.
The Guide bills itself as “The Essential Guide to Buying and Selling | How to make SERIOUS money on eBay” (that latter seems a bit familiar, doesn’t it). And I don’t know what’s happened to it over the last 12 months, but where before it felt patchy, unfinished, almost as though it were written by someone who’d never used eBay but knew how to write a how-to book, this year it’s turned into something a lot more useful.
Mostly this is a guide for sellers, aimed probably at those who’ve sold a couple of personal items but want to sell more, or who are considering going pro. The two longest chapters are “Introductory Selling” and “Advanced Selling”, which cover all the basics, with extensive sections on what can go wrong and how to deal with it, and auction management for people who look at their ever-filling inbox and freak out. There are numerous case studies on sellers who are “already doing it” – from running an eBay business alongside your B&M shop, to (intriguingly) a seller who’s quitting online retail and advises others to do the same.
There’s more. There’s the inevitable “how to buy on eBay” chapter, which in a “how to sell” book is almost entirely pointless: I’ll forgive this one because it jumps on my own favourite bandwagon, asking why eBay has no proper shopping cart. There’s a chapter on PayPal and alternative payment methods, and another on eBay competitors which runs through the basics of selling on Amazon and PlayTrade. There’s a useful “Reviews Directory” of eBay-related software which even experienced sellers might find worth a look.
The magazine format has one huge thing to recommend it: colour pictures. And there are a lot, mainly in the form of screenshots which walk you through how to set up an eBay shop or take a decent photograph, or even how to list on Amazon marketplace.
If you’re a seller newish to eBay, this is worth getting: it pretty much covers the basics, it’s reasonably entertaining and the format is easy to dip in and out of, especially as it’s peppered with “memorable auction” boxes highlighting some of the more unusual listings in eBay’s history, and website reviews, suggesting places you can get further help and information (including – disclosure – TameBay). If you’re a seller who’s already running a full-time business and knows what they’re doing, on the other hand, there’s very little here you don’t already know – and anything you need to check, you’d be better doing online where the information is bang up to date.
And if you want to see what the IUKG2e2010 said about us, here’s their review.
Why the Amazon affiliate link, not eBay? Because the only copy listed on eBay UK at time of writing is coming from Malaysia. And because the Amazon affiliate program makes linking it, with piccie and price, so simple. EPN, are you taking note?
Spoonfeeder shutting up shop?
February 5, 2010
If you’ve ever registered with eBay listing/management/hosting provider Spoonfeeder, you’ve probably received this email this morning:
We regret to inform you that SpoonFeeder will cease business operations immediately. Although some parts of the system may remain operational for a very short time, we cannot guarantee how long.
Please take immediate steps to end, revise or relist your item listings with another tool (such as eBay’s free tools), as SpoonFeeder features such as picture hosting and hit counters will be discontinued abruptly. Please take immediate steps to minimize the impact to your item listings.
We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience our sudden shutdown may cause.
I’m 95% certain it’s not a spoof: I’ve received it on both the email addresses I had registered with Spoonfeeder, and an awful lot of other eBay sellers have also received it. If, of course, there’s a follow-up email from another listing software provider, I might reconsider that thought. 
At time of writing, there doesn’t seem to be any further information on Spoonfeeder’s website, and listings using their hosting still appear to be working. How long that might last is anyone’s guess: it’s a reminder, if we needed another one, to host your images somewhere that stays under your control.
More info if we get it.
Update: email confirmed genuine. Sorry to see Spoonfeeder go: they were a life-saver for me. 
FAQs: How do you remove an unpaid item strike?
January 30, 2010
It used to be so simple. If you’d closed an unpaid item dispute and given the buyer a strike, and then they paid, you had a choice: refund or return the payment, or remove the strike and send them their goods. Unfortunately since the unpaid item process was “improved”, things haven’t been quite so simple. James, eBay UK’s community manager, has now confirmed what many of us have long suspected: that the ONLY way currently to remove a UI strike is to email Support and ask them to do it manually.
It’s one of those things that eBay think is a minor inconvenience – but sellers know can make for unhappy buyers, and can easily turn transactions which are hanging in the balance completely to the bad. Let’s hope they fix this one soon.
HDN Discount with Parcel2Go for January 2010
January 21, 2010
Parcel2Go have negotiated a discount with Home Delivery Network for their 1-3 day service. Normally priced at £6.49 through Parcel2Go it’s been reduced to £5.99 until the 31st January 2010.
The service covers parcels up to 25kg in weight, up to 120cm long and total size up to 6 cubic feet with standard compensation of up to £50. Compensation can be increased up to £500 per parcel for more valuable items.
50p discount might not sound a lot, but if you multiply it by the number of parcels you send it’s worth switching your parcels for the next 10 days. You can book collections at the discounted price on the Parcel2Go website.
Disclosure: Parcel2Go advertise with TameBay
Snow affects UK postal deliveries and collections
January 5, 2010
As snow once again covers much of the UK, delays to postal deliveries and collections are being announced.
Royal Mail breaks down service information by region: areas currently listed as affected by the weather include Scotland, the north east and north west of England, and Devon and Cornwall.
ParcelForce has made an announcement detailing affected areas, mostly in Scotland and northern and central England:
- areas covered by the Manchester, Preston and Liverpool depots had deliveries suspended today
- in many areas ad-hoc collections were suspended today and will not be made tomorrow
DHL and UPS don’t apparently have anything on their websites yet, but anyone with a time-sensitive delivery might do well to check if a collection is coming to them, and if their buyer has any hope of getting it delivered.
Regardless of which service you use, it’s worth warning your buyers in advance that delays may happen due to the weather. Buyers in more clement parts of the country can easily think they won’t be affected – and even those who’ve received no post for a few days still blame the seller rather than the snow for their non-delivery. So – even though it seems too obvious to need saying – it’s worth adding a line or two to your dispatch or payment receipt emails.
End all your good til cancelled listings
January 3, 2010
It’s almost the first Monday back at work and like many sellers I’ve been making some changes ready for the New Year. The lull between Christmas and New Year has been a great time for evaluating my business and getting organised for the future and the biggest tip I have for anyone else doing the same is to end all your good til cancelled listings
Good til cancelled (GTC) listings are for lazy people. They’re the worst listing format for keeping control of your business and the easiest way to lose control.
The big problem is that (unless you run out of stock) your listings will never ever end. You may or may not be getting sales and you probably don’t even know if you are. The chances are that your listings are way out of date and either the price is wrong or the product itself simply isn’t desirable to buyers any more.
The most shocking fact I ever heard regarding GTC listings was that there were some GTC listings over five years old on eBay UK, that had never had a sale. These were the old Shop Inventory Format GTC listings that have now been retired and rolled over into 30 day fixed price GTC.
When researching a new product or checking prices on eBay it’s not unusual to see competitors with pricing way above the norm. Now there’s a lot to be said for not being cheapest but if the average sale price is around £25 – £30 there’s not much point having a listing at the £90 – £100 price point that the product sold for when it was released a year ago. The price might have been competitive when the listing was created, but a year or so later they’re at the bottom of Best Match and unlikely to ever attract a sale.
30 Day Fixed Price listings force you to review your listings and pricing every month. If an item ends without a sale you’re prompted to ask yourself why before you simply relist it. Is it the price? The product? Have you got the wrong desciption or wrong picture? Have you deleted the picture from your webspace? Has eBay changed the categories or Item Specifics?
There are many reasons why a product might not be selling and almost always there’s an easy way to start it selling again. GTC listings hide this vital information and leave stock sitting idle on your shelf costing time and money instead of making money for you.
There is only one advantage that GTC listings have over 30 day listings, and that’s the ability to use Mark Down Manager to hold sales. Few sellers use Mark Down Manager though and if you’ve not used it in the last three months don’t use it as an excuse to keep GTC listings running.
To regain control of your listings bite the bullet and end all of your GTC listings. Any GTC listings that have had sales in the last 30 days can be relisted as Fixed Price 30 day listings and the remaining items need a spring clean.
Go through the GTC items without sales one at a time and research why they’re not sold. Use Terapeak to check average selling prices and sell through rates. For old stock, especially if you only have one or two items remaining, liquidate the stock using auction format.
All sellers are aware what’s selling and what products are making them money. What most sellers don’t know is what’s not selling and what products are costing them money.
Ending your GTC listings and changing to fixed price 30 day listings will force you to kick start your sales on items that might not have had a sale for many months. More importantly it will give you back control of your business for the future and ensure you know what’s not selling just as well as you know what is selling.
How to sell your Christmas presents on eBay (without offending your family and friends)
December 26, 2009
♫♪This Christmas, I gave you my heart, but the very next day, it was sold on eBay… ♫♪
Running out of real stories in the days before Christmas, the press has been full of advice on how to sell your Christmas presents on eBay. What journalists fail to tell you though, is that your granny is going to be seriously upset if she spots that Rudolf-design sweater up for sale the day after she gave it to you. Make sure you get away with it, with our handy guide to guilt-free gift selling.
Have a secret ID
Never, never, NEVER let your family, friends or work colleagues find out your eBay ID. You don’t want your boss to know about your penchant for Dilbert. You don’t want your trendy friends to know about your Bridget Jones pants. And there might be a million things you don’t want your mother to know about!
If by some act of carelessness on your part, your eBay ID has become known, then register a new one; you can have as many as you like, all they need is different email addresses. Believe us, this will save you grief in the long-run.
Don’t let your own home be visible in the photos
You will not be able to deny it’s Auntie Doris’s plaid pantaloons you’re selling if your living room can be seen in the background of your photograph. Photograph larger items against a plain, neutral-coloured wall. For smaller items, a light tent makes your photographs so much better, or use a plain sheet.
Have a tidy out
Bored with mince pies, sherry and TV holiday specials already? Us too. Have a tidy out. That Des O’Connor CD won’t show up nearly so badly if it’s part of a job lot of discs you no longer listen to.
Leave it til Easter
Let’s face it, by Easter, everyone’s forgotten about Christmas. Give it a few months, and no one’s going to spot your ingratitude, you undeserving traitor 
But if you really think eBay’s a no-no…
Give it back to them next year
“I loved mine so much, I got you one just like it! Merry Christmas!”
Christmas Day shoppers hope to bag a bargain
December 22, 2009
Christmas Day is set to be one of the busiest shopping days of the year, according to new research by Kelkoo. Bargain hunters are likely to hit the sales earlier than usual this year as VAT is set to increase to 17.5% on January 1st. High street shoppers will be out in force on Boxing Day, but online shoppers should be hammering their credit cards even earlier: Kelkoo are predicting 8pm on 25th will be the most popular time for an internet shopping spree.
Lots of eBay sellers – especially those who work on their own – shut up shop between Christmas and New Year. Royal Mail won’t be collecting until 29th, so orders won’t go anywhere – but will that matter to a rabid bargain hunter?
Will you be closing up shop, or trading through as normal? And what about buying: does your computer get switched off on Christmas Eve and not powered up again til New Year’s Day? Be part of our totally unscientific polls: two for the price of one this time…
Will you be closing your eBay Store for Christmas?
- No way; I want those bored shoppers on Christmas night. (76%, 42 Votes)
- I’ve got holiday settings on saying I’m not posting til xxx. (16%, 9 Votes)
- I’ve closed my eBay Shop but not my website: I’m not risking my DSRs! (5%, 3 Votes)
- Yes! I don’t want those whinging last-minute shoppers. (2%, 1 Votes)
- Yes: I won’t be able to answer email so I’ve closed up for now. (1%, 0 Votes)
Total Voters: 55
Loading …Will you be shopping online on Christmas Day?
- Yes! I love a bargain any day of the year. (44%, 20 Votes)
- No, but I’ll be Twittering/gaming/chatting to friends. (31%, 14 Votes)
- No way; my computer stays switched off. (25%, 11 Votes)
Total Voters: 45
Loading …Via Internet Retailing.
eBay Community raises a record $50m for charity in 2009
December 21, 2009
eBay’s charitable programs, eBay Giving Works in the US and eBay for Charity in the UK, raised a staggering $50million between them during 2009. This is a 17% increase on last year – meaning that every minute, $91 is raised for good causes via eBay. Lunch with billionaire investor Warren Buffett raised $1.68million from a single listing.
eBay’s CEO John Donahoe said, “It’s what makes the eBay marketplace so unique, and what enables our community to do good things for causes they believe in. Your generosity this year, especially in such a tough economy, isn’t just impressive – it’s inspiring.”
For charities, online is where it’s at. A recent survey* found that online donations were increasing at 44% a year, seven times faster than offline giving. And if you needed a less philanthropic reason to run charity listings, eBay items advertising that 10% of proceeds will be given to charity is nearly 20% more likely to sell than their non-charity equivalents. Charity listings increase traffic to everything you’re selling, so it’s a winning situation for everyone.
We’d really like to hear from anyone using eBay to raise money for their favourite cause, particularly for smaller organisations who might struggle to get themselves noticed otherwise. If you’ve got a great story you’d like to share in a future post, leave us a comment, or @ us on Twitter.
Via eBay Ink.
* Blackbaud online giving trends analysis 2009
PayPal reserves, holds : policy changes explained
December 21, 2009
We’ve heard from a number of sellers recently that PayPal seem to be stepping up the number of rolling reserves and 21 day holds they’re putting on accounts at the moment. There’s been some conflicting information going about – not least from PayPal support staff – so we asked PayPal to clarify exactly what’s going on. Here’s what they told us.
(If you’re unclear about the difference between holds and reserves, then this post has more details.)
Firstly, PayPal will never place reserves on every seller’s account. Some support staff seem to have made comments like “it’s not just you, it’s everybody”. Obviously that gives the impression that reserves are coming to all accounts, but PayPal have categorically denied it. Just because their T&Cs allow for hold on any account does not mean that holds will be applied to every account: they will not.
Reserves are for “the accounts that seem to be statistically the most dangerous”
There are a number of criteria which influence whether a reserve will be applied to your account. These include (but are not limited to):
- how long you’ve been in business,
- number of disputes/claims raised against you,
- negative feedback,
- high priced items,
- risky categories (mobile phones and tickets were mentioned specifically),
- sudden changes in selling activity such as a shift in prices or inventory.
The majority of reserves will be 10% or less, though there is no stated maximum and PayPal have confirmed that holds of 40% are possible.
21-day holds may now be applied to off-eBay transactions. Yes, you may get holds on website transactions as well as eBay ones. The release for these holds will be the same as eBay: proof of delivery or 21 days without a complaint (positive feedback won’t, obviously, be applicable to off-eBay transactions).
Account-based holds rather than transaction-based holds. Rather than looking at individual transactions, PayPal will now be looking at sellers’ overall activity. In other words, they’re looking at you, not your buyers:
good sellers who had one strange looking transaction will no longer see a hold, but sellers who have a bad run of disputes or negative feedback might start seeing holds placed on their account until things calm down.
Previously, sellers with more than 100 feedbacks, who had been registered for longer than 6 months and who had buyer dissatisfaction rates of less than 5% had been told they would never suffer a hold: now it seems that may not be so cut and dried, as a run of bad feedback or complaints could get a hold slapped on your account.
Indeed, not even eBay’s biggest sellers are immune now: White Elephant Media, one of eBay.com’s biggest media stores with a feedback score of 327,000, has recently closed down operations, due, they say, to being asked by PayPal to hold over half a million dollars in reserve:
Our PayPal/eBay account was closed November 18, 2009, after selling successfully on eBay for almost 6 years. Several weeks ago, we were asked by PayPal to give them a “deposit” so we could keep accepting PayPal payments. … At first PayPal asked for us to pay $212k into this deposit account. They expected it to be funded in about 3 months. On November 13th, … PayPal increased the amount they needed in our “deposit” account to $600k. … They closed our account after we indicated it would be impossible to come up with $600,000 in about 6 weeks during the holidays. Why they wanted more than a half a million dollars and when it would be repaid if ever was exceptionally nebulous and never explained to us. 48 hours after we were locked out of our account, there was well over $230k in the account. That is the money we use to pay for our merchandise and postage. We were denied access to it and therefore we are unable to operate.
If it could happen to White Elephant, it could happen to you.
So what can sellers do about it?
Firstly, bear in mind that it could happen. Many of the sellers I’ve talked to about this have said that their biggest problem was lack of warning. Some weren’t even aware that PayPal *could* put this kind of hold on their account.
Secondly, remember that this is about PayPal’s assessment of the riskiness of your account. Be realistic about that. Some areas *do* have the potential cause more trouble than others (mobile phones and tickets as PayPal said; I’d add software, refurbished electronics and designer clothing to that). If your courier consistently damages goods, or you’re using a less-than-reliable drop-shipper, or your customer service procedures are not keeping up with the level of your business, then you are at risk.
If you want to carry on trading on eBay, dropping PayPal is not an option. But you should (everyone should) consider if and how their business would survive without eBay and/or PayPal. Do you have an alternative? Is it *enough* of an alternative that you could ramp it up to replace eBay if you had to?
And if PayPal put a 10% hold on your turnover, could you trade through that? For those who take their buyers’ payments and use them to pay a drop-shipper, I suspect the answer is no. But – especially after this incredibly difficult year – many more retailers are cutting their cash-flow ever closer, using this week’s takings to buy next week’s stock. This is trimming it far too fine.
Look realistically at your cash flow and consider what would happen to your business if 10% of it were held for 180 days. If you couldn’t survive, then PayPal isn’t your problem – your cash flow is the problem, and you need to reassess it, and build up a cushion to protect you not only against PayPal holds but against any other unexpected thing that might be thrown at you.
Gumtree unveil new site with UK wide search
December 11, 2009
Click to embiggen
Up until now it’s been difficult to browse multiple cities, and for myself living equidistant between Reading and Oxford I’d happily sell or buy in both locations. Changing city would lose the search and category information and you’d have to start over again to look for items near you. Now with a simple drop down you can change your search criteria and Gumtree even highlight similar products in nearby locations.
As well as the location enhancements Gumtree have improved the category structure which now highlights similar ads in categories you might otherwise have missed. You can also refine your search by price or restrict it to only ads that have pictures of the item offered.
One thing I really like is the ability to see recently viewed ads which are automatically saved for you. If there’s an ad you really don’t want to lose you can also click to save it manually and it’ll be added to your saved items list in the “Your Gumtree” section at the bottom of the page.
The biggest change on the new Gumtree is how buyers search for a product. In the past it was essential to select your local Gumtree city before you started your search, otherwise the chance are you’d be searching London listings only. Now you can search the whole of the United Kingdom, and only when presented with your search results do you need to narrow them to your location. Best of all is the ease of switching between cities and the visibility of how many matching ads are in locations close to where you’re based.
This is Gumtree’s first Beta of the new site, watch out for Beta 2 next year where they’ll be adding even more new features and improvements.
If you’re an online seller and haven’t tried Gumtree yet I’d encourage you to give it a go. I know many sellers have been put off from using the site in the past as they “didn’t have a local Gumtree”, but now with UK wide search more users should be finding your products and services. Also of course Gumtree is free.
VAT changes for 1st January 2010
December 10, 2009
Following confirmation in yesterday’s pre-budget report that VAT will be returning to 17.5% as of the 1st January, eBay have updated their advice on VAT changes. This will only affect you if you’re VAT registered.
eBay’s help page confirms that listings can be edited in bulk and that fixed price listings don’t need to be ended to make the VAT changes. Changing prices to take account of VAT is more time consuming as you’ll need to calculate them for each listing (unless you sell everything at the same price). Personally I won’t be editing prices, mainly because I never changed them a year ago when VAT dropped to 15%.
There are bound to be some listings sold with the wrong VAT rate unless you edit your listings at the stroke of midnight. If you use Selling Manager Pro you’ll be able to manually edit the inclusive VAT rate prior to printing invoices on the Sales Record page.
If you intend running auctions over the New Year make sure that you use the new 17.5% VAT rate when you launch your listings. Although they’ll display the wrong VAT rate for the last few days of 2009, when they end after January 1st 2010 the correct rate will be used.
Will you be changing your prices when the VAT rates change? Or like me did you not change them when the rate dropped?
If you’re not a TRS here’s how to qualify in a month
December 4, 2009
Many sellers are struggling to meet the Top Rated Seller (TRS) criteria due to low volume sales combined with DSRs received prior to the progammes announcement. After careful consideration and reviewing the 12 month rating period eBay have decided not to make any changes to the TRS programme (Links to PowerSeller board – log in required)
One of the reasons for this is that it would result in less TRS than keeping the status quo. I can sympathise with eBay here as if they changed the rules again and took away TRS status from those who currently hold it there would be uproar. However it can only mean that those who would suffer if the rules changed have more recent low DSR scores than those that would benefit.
Leaving the status quo continues to penalise sellers who have low DSRs from before August when TRS was announced. There are only two viable options if you’ve got low ratings last summer and still have six or seven months before they drop off the radar:
1) Up your selling volume to become a volume seller – if you sell more than 400 items in a three month period you’ll be measured on the most recent three months sales only.
2) Open a new eBay account and scrap your old one – If you have a buying account more than two months old you can qualify as a PowerSeller and TRS within a month. Simply sell more than £2250, at least twelve items and get 100 feedback and you’re there. If you don’t have an existing eBay account opened at least two months ago then it’ll take you three months to qualify as a TRS.
Compared to waiting until the middle of next year to be a TRS on your existing account, option 2 above is the most attractive course of action. Don’t forget that if you start selling on an existing buying account today you could qualify for discounts as a TRS in January. If you stick with your existing selling ID then your discounts will be slashed by 15% or more in the new year compared to those that qualify as a TRS.
Why eBay would be happy for you to abandon your existing account transfer your listings to a new selling account and qualify for TRS but won’t let you qualify on your current selling ID is beyond me. If you want to be TRS open a new selling account today, it’s easier than reviving your existing selling ID and if you don’t eBay will financially penalise you with the drastically lower discounts.
Finally if you don’t have a spare eBay ID that you’ve been using as a buying account go and open a couple of new eBay accounts today. Sell a few items on them and then continue to use them as buying accounts – you never know when the next eBay rule change will trash your selling account and you’ll need an emergency selling account already set up and ready to go.
Best Match Secrets: Webinar replay
November 27, 2009
If you missed yesterday’s eBay / ChannelAdvisor webinar on Best Match the recording is available online to review.
The Q&A after the official content is well worth listening too as there’s information on the likes of how best to work with Best Match when selling one off unique items (and the answer wasn’t just to use auctions ) and also the promise of a tool in the near future to help you understand how your impressions, item clicks and sales are performing.
Disclosure – ChannelAdvisor advertise with TameBay
eBay add tracking feature for selected carriers
November 25, 2009
eBay have enabled tracking numbers in Selling Manager Pro (SMP)which is great news for both buyers and sellers. Hopefully it’ll cut down on the “where’s my item” questions as buyers are able to track the item themselves.
Click to embiggen
Once you enter the tracking details for your
Click to embiggen
Overall I’m impressed with this new feature. I have a barcode scanner and I’d recommend if you’re shipping large numbers of trackable items you invest in one too. It enables you to simply scan the tracking barcode directly into SMP without having to waste time manually typing it in. Adding a tracking number also automatically marks the item as dispatched. The one feature I would like is to be able to specify a default carrier rather than having to select the drop down for each shipment as that’s what’s currently slowing the process down.
Thanks to Suz of Designer Clothing 4U who spotted the new feature. I’ll be using it as of today, but what do you think? Is it too much trouble to enter tracking information? Do you already send tracking details via another method? Or will you start adding tracking information even though you may not have in the past?
10 Tips for maximising Christmas sales
November 23, 2009
If you want to take full advantage of Christmas sales then Thursday and Friday this week are the best days of the year to list auctions on eBay and the best time to launch them is between 1 and 2pm. That’s the prediction of Simon from ChannelAdvisor if you want them to end on the busiest online shopping day of the year.
Last year Monday 8th December was the busiest online shopping day of the 2008, so Simon is betting on Monday 7th December being the top shopping day in 2009 for Internet businesses. Starting auctions on Friday this week will ensure that they’re ending and at the top of search on the 8th to take full advantage of the predicted influx of buyers.
Regardless whether or not Simon’s prediction is spot on, there’s no doubt that next week buyers will be busily spending their last pay cheque before Christmas, so here are our top tips for making the most of the holiday selling season:
Tips for making the most of Christmas
- Increase the number of auctions you run concurrently on eBay. Auctions are the one way to guarantee you get to the top of the search results page.
- Add “Buy It Now” feature to eBay auction listings.
- Schedule eBay listings in advance to ensure they’ll finish at the best time on the busiest days.
- Top up inventory on fixed price listings and your website – Don’t run out of stock and lose your position in eBay Best Match.
- Add Best Offer to your fixed price eBay listings. Consider automating accept/decline on Best Offers if you don’t already.
- Use Markdown Manager on eBay and discounts on your website to attract buyers with discounts.
- Use Featured First for products for which you have deep inventory.
- Review shipping options, offer customers guaranteed fast shipping options such as Royal Mail Special Delivery or 24 hour courier.
- Use email marketing to promote season goods and special offers to your website mailing list and eBay shop subscribers.
- Send out discount vouchers for your website valid from January 1st with all orders. Offer incentives to keep customers buying from you after the holidays.
Disclosure: ChannelAdvisor advertise with TameBay
9 ways to say “ja” to overseas buyers
November 21, 2009
With eBay adding 180 million potential new buyers to the site, there’s really never been a better time to think about selling outside your home market. But if you’re not already selling abroad, the thought of foreign buyers might seem daunting: non-English speakers paying in the wrong currency, and what about your shipping time DSR?
Aside from those 180m new potential new buyers, eBay have made it easier to trade overseas recently. TRS status is dependent on domestic DSRs only, so there’s less danger of slower international deliveries bringing your average down. There’s now the potential to control which countries you ship to more closely than ever before, so if there’s a particular European country you don’t want to ship to, you don’t have to cut off the rest of Europe in order to avoid them.
Apart from eBay, the very weakness of the pound makes British shopping incredibly attractive on the continent: when £1 is more or less €1, it’s often cheaper to buy from the UK and have it shipped over, than it is to buy in domestic markets. If you’re restricting your sales to the cash-strapped British, you might be doing yourself a disfavour.
So here, with my buyer’s hat on, are my top tips for selling to non-UK buyers:
Know what the postal options are, and what they mean
If you’re going to list items as available outside the UK, you need to be able to advise your buyers what shipping is likely to cost. For most sellers, that will mean airmail small packets: Royal Mail rates are here. There are two tariffs, Europe, and the rest of the world (here’s a list of what’s included in Europe). Airmail reaches most countries within 5 days.
Surface mail is cheaper but is much, much slower than airmail, e.g. RM estimate up to six weeks to North America. Unless you really like PayPal chargebacks, this is a false economy.
If you sell anything that could be time-sensitive – e.g. car parts or computer spares – know what an overnight courier would cost, and if you could make that available.
Insure appropriately
If insurance is needed, you can add International Signed For to any Airmail or Surface price for £3.70. Some sellers add this to every £5 t-shirt or 99p CD they sell. This is offputting not only because of the expense, but because it tends to read as “I don’t trust you, I don’t really want non-UK buyers”. If you wouldn’t send it special delivery in the UK, it doesn’t need to go ISF.
Tell us what postal service we’re paying for
If you’re going to charge me £7 to post a t-shirt or £25 to post a pair of shoes (both real examples), let me know what postal service I’m paying for. If you send everything by courier or ISF, I want to know; if I’m paying five times stamp price because you want to “put foreign buyers off”, I want to know about that too.
Communicate about delivery times
Either alter your standard dispatch email to take account of overseas deliveries, or send an extra email to foreign buyers. Under-promise. A buyer who’s been told delivery could take 1-2 weeks will be delighted if their parcel arrives in 4-5 days. A buyer who’s just had your standard domestic dispatch email telling them the parcel will probably arrive tomorrow is going to be disappointed.
They’re all about duty (and customs)
If you’re shipping within the EU, you won’t normally need customs documentation.
Outside the EU, you’ll need a CN22 form for goods up to £270 in value, and the more complex CN23 for more valuable parcels. These can be picked up from post offices, or downloaded from RM. The following EU destinations *do* need a CN22/CN23: Channel Islands, Andorra, Canary Islands, Gibraltar, San Marino, Vatican City State.
Royal Mail has more advice about customs documention.
If you ship by courier, they will advise you exactly what paperwork they need from you (there’s normally a lot more than if you just ship by post!).
Buyers outside the EU whose countries have low import thresholds will often ask you to falsify customs paperwork to help them avoid import duties. Don’t. If you’re caught, it’s you that’s made the false declaration, so it’s you that takes the rap. Remember to include a note that buyers may be charged import duties on your listings in line with eBay’s policy; that way if you receive non-positive feedback over customs issues, it can be removed. If you do this, it’s also worth saying even more prominently that EU buyers won’t be charged customs.
PayPal n’est pas mon ami
Though eBay likes to think that PayPal is the one size that fits all, different countries have their own preferences for payment, based on the quirks of their banking systems. The French like cheques. German, Belgian and Dutch buyers like bank transfers. You might think you can’t help, but check with your bank whether you can accept these payments, and what it would cost you.
If your bank won’t cash non-sterling cheques, then Auctionchex will.
If you shout loud enough…
Be prepared for some ASQs in other languages; Google Translate will help you turn them into English. If your listing is in English, it’s okay to reply in English too. It’s always easier to translate *into* your native tongue, so let your buyers do that rather than sending them Babelfish-mangled communications in their own language. Learn “sorry I don’t speak…” in a few languages, and send the translate link with your message. Keep responses to short, simple sentences and your potential buyer should be able to translate them easily enough.
Be clear
If you’re excluding countries from shipping, say so. On eBay (or your website), block purchases from countries you don’t ship to. Don’t let people buy and then refund them with insulting messages about their postal services (yes, it happens). And finally…
No one thinks of themselves as foreign
Don’t refer to “overseas” buyers on your listings. I learned this one the hard way:
US buyer: … and I’ll be sending you a personal check.
Me: Ah, no, my listing says overseas buyers have to pay with PayPal.
Her: But I’m not overseas!
Spell it out: US/Canadian buyers, European buyers, and so on. The more clearly you can communicate, the more you make it look as though you’re used to dealing with buyers from all over the world, the more attractive your listings will be to those buyers.
Best Match Secrets: Webinar
November 19, 2009
Following the Best Match Secrets series on TameBay there’s going to be a webinar on November 26 at 3pm (GMT) on how to make Best Match work for you.
Billed as “Making Best Match Work For You“, the webinar will be hosted by ChannelAdvisor and eBay with Susanne Kaden, Manager Best Match Europe for eBay on hand to answer your questions and give tips on how you can improve your listings visibility.
This is one event not to miss, the opportunity to put your Best Match questions to the experts. There’s been a lot of interest in Best Match since the articles appeared, even as far away as Australia. Yesterday I was invited onto the Oz Round Table forum to talk about Best Match strategies and found that the Aussies have pretty much the same questions as us in the UK. If you’ve still got Best Match questions there’s no one better placed than Susanne to answer them.
Sign up early for the Best Match webinar as places are limited.
Disclosure: ChannelAdvisor advertise with TameBay
RM strikes may lead to seller penalties after all
November 18, 2009
eBay UK have announced that the suspension of the dispatch time DSR star is to end on 23rd November. Dispatch time was removed on 22nd October as one of the four criteria on which buyers can rate sellers, due to industrial action by the postal workers’ union. eBay say that this “industrial action is now over and we have been informed by Royal Mail that deliveries are now back to normal”.
Unfortunately, that’s not the end of problems caused by the postal strike. When eBay UK suspended the dispatch time DSR star last month in response to the Royal Mail strikes, many sellers – including myself – applauded their action as protecting us. Turns out, we were wrong.
We’ve heard from a few sellers who have seen their dispatch DSR score drop like a stone over the last few days. This isn’t surprising: as older scores fall out of the 3-month window but are not replaced by new scores, older low scores assume a greater significance when calculating averages. And with localised RM strikes ongoing throughout the UK for months before the national strike was announced, there were plenty of low DSR scores to take into account. Several sellers have told us they’re facing losing TRS status purely on this criterion.
We asked eBay for clarification on this: surely the company that’s suspended the dispatch DSR for the last month wouldn’t, now, penalise sellers due to this same DSR score? eBay said:
When we re-instate we will be enforcing low DSRs as normal. However if a seller believes that they have a valid case their first port of call should be their account manager.
If you are one of those affected, then do contact your account manager if you have one and PowerSeller support if you don’t. Kick up a fuss. eBay could be flexible on this if they chose to be: we don’t need to create a whole new pod of dolphins due to circumstances outside everybody’s control.
Why you need to update your SMP auto emails
November 17, 2009
There have recently been several changes to the emails that eBay send buyers so it’s time for Selling Manager Pro (SMP) subscribers to review their automation preferences. Many of the emails which SMP can automatically send on your behalf are now being duplicated by eBay. At the same time it’s worth reviewing automated feedback options.
There are three sets of emails that buyers receive when purchasing an item. Some emails buyers can opt not to receive, but most are either compulsory or automatically sent on behalf of the seller through SMP.
Seller can edit the emails sent through Marketing Tools, in addition SMP subscribers can opt to send automated emails as well as adding a note to the compulsory emails sent by eBay.
Marketing Tools
End of Auction Email: eBay automatically send an email to winning bidders and you can customise this email with your Shop Logo and a personal message. Buyer can turn this email off, but in reality very few do. The few that do discover their eBay Communication Preferences to stop winning bidder emails are generally the most experienced buyers and they don’t generally need any hand holding from sellers. They’ll buy, they’ll pay, they’ll wait for their purchase to arrive.
Invoice: For those buyers who don’t complete checkout the seller can click to send an invoice. This invoice can also be customised with your Shop Logo and a personal message. This email can’t be turned off by buyers so they should always receive it.
Compulsory emails eBay sends for you
Order Confirmation: This is the email sent when a buyer completes checkout. Most of the time it’ll be because they’ve paid with PayPal, but for the few buyers using cheques, postal orders or other off-eBay payment methods it’ll mean they’ve notified you how they intend to make payment. This email can be customised by SMP subscribers with your Shop Logo and a personal message.
Order Update: If you don’t already you’re going to start needing to mark your emails as despatched. Once you do eBay will send an order update email to let your buyer know their item is on it’s way. This email can be customised by SMP subscribers with your Shop Logo and a personal message.
If you previously sent an automated Dispatch email this has been replaced by the new Order Update email
Payment Reminder: If you don’t mark items as paid, eBay will start sending your buyers payment reminders 48 hours after the item is won. You can’t stop this email and you can’t edit it, not even through SMP.
Optional SMP automated emails
Winning Buyer Notification: The winning buyer notification email should be switched off for most SMP users. It largely duplicates the end of auction email in marketing preferences (which you can customise). The only time you might want to justify keeping this email turned on is to request details for custom made items for those few users who turn the end of auction emails off.
Payment Received: There’s very little justification for keeping this email turned on. The vast majority of eBay payments are with PayPal, and buyers will receive the Order Confirmation email as well as a payment confirmation from PayPal. Sending three emails is just overkill! You can of course manually send this email for buyers that pay by alternative payment methods if you wish.
Don’t forget as soon as you mark an item as dispatched the buyer will receive the Order Update email to let them know their item is on it’s way, so consider combining any payment received information into that email.
Feedback Reminder: If you have this automated email turned on please turn it off, especially if you only leave feedback on receipt of feedback. Buyers hate being hassled for feedback and it’s worth remembering that eBay themselves also send out feedback reminders on your behalf.
If a buyer wishes to leave you feedback they will, but don’t forget a buyer that doesn’t leave feedback or doesn’t rate your DSRs is counted as a high DSR when eBay calculate your Top Seller Rating qualification.
If you’re not yet convinced, below is a real feedback left for a seller who had automated feedback reminders turned on:
Automated positive feedback for buyers
There are two options for automating feedback:
- Buyer has paid for this item
- Buyer has paid for this item and left me positive feedback
This is probably the most contentious of all automation preferences but (and it’s only my opinion), if you’re going to leave automated feedback leave it on receipt of payment.
I know eBay still has the option for leaving reciprocal feedback, but in general buyers don’t like it. I’m convinced that buyers like sellers to leave feedback first and you can no longer leave a negative for a buyer anyway. I’m also of the opinion that leaving feedback first is likely to encourage buyers to leave better feedback than they might otherwise, after all it’s hard to neg someone who’s already left you a positive.
If you’re using SMP automation for emails or feedback differently to the suggestions above, let us know which options you use and why in comments below.
Dan Wilson: eBay is a Sphinx
November 12, 2009
After a long summer of revisions the latest revision of Dan Wilson’s book, Make Serious Money on eBay UK, 2010 Edition, is in the shops and available on Amazon.
Dan, formerly Community Manager for eBay UK, has a wealth of knowledge and experience and I caught up with him yesterday to find out what’s new in his book, what he’s been doing since he left eBay and his advice for businesses that want to make serious money on eBay.
Best Match Secrets Part 1: Getting found
November 11, 2009
This is the first of a series of three articles looking at how eBay recalls products when a buyer searches eBay, the order those products are presented to buyers, and tips for getting your items to the top of Best Match.
Other parts to this series are:
Best Match Secrets Part 2: How products are sorted
Best Match Secrets Part 3: 5 Top Tips for Best Match
Best Match has been a tough change on eBay for sellers to come to terms with, so we’re going to look at why it was introduced, the benefits for both sellers and buyers, and the best strategies to get your products to the top of Best Match on eBay UK.
Why Best Match?
Sellers have long called for lower insertion fees on eBay. Historically sellers would flood eBay with listings on the basis that items were sorted time ending soonest so the more often you listed the more often your products appeared at the top of search results pages. Then to get an even greater boost sellers would pay for expensive features such as Featured Plus to boost their listing to the top of the page and Bold or Highlight to make their listing stand out on the page.
eBay’s problem with lowering insertion fees is that it could encourage sellers to list even greater quantities of the same product. Another way to order listings on eBay was needed to prevent spam listings and that’s why Best Match was introduced.
eBay aim to make sure the buyer quickly finds and buys the best deal that results in the best buyer experience. If buyers purchase more items more quickly that makes them happy and keeps them coming back to eBay, which is ultimately what sellers want.
The difference between “Search” and “Best Match”
Before an item is sorted into the order presented to a buyer by Best Match, it needs to make it into the search results. Search is what decides which products are recalled when a buyer types a search term into eBay. Best Match then determines what order those search results will be presented to the buyer.
Search and Item Specifics
Search uses a combination of the keywords in a product title along with category and in some instances Item Specifics to determine which listings match a buyers query. Buyers have the ability to refine their search results by drilling down into relevant categories and using Product Finders in the left sidebar. Product Finders rely on sellers filling out Item Specifics and it’s sad to see how many sellers still ignore this listing feature.
Click to embiggen
Buyers simply don’t have the time to browse through almost 800 pages of listings to find what they’re looking for, and with jeans will generally narrow their search by Waist and Leg measurements. That means without using item specifics almost half the jeans listed on eBay will never be sold simply because they’ll never be found.
Use common Item Specific attributes
When you’re listings items on eBay do a search for the product an check the Product Finder (in the left hand column). On many Item Specifics you can use a free text field to define your items attributes, whenever possible make use of the attributes that appear in the Product Finder as that’s what your buyers will see.
As an example if you’re choosing a colour to describe your product don’t type “Crimson” for the colour Item Specific – use “Red” as that’s the option buyers will use to refine their search. In some categories there’s an additional Item Specific for “Exact Colour” so specify crimson there.
Search Recall
When a buyer enters a search eBay recalls all the matching listings back from the eBay servers. As a seller you need to ensure that your items are in the recall so think like a buyer. What keywords will they use and what are the options they’re likely to use in the Product Finder to refine their search?
At this stage the matching listings are unordered so the next stage is for eBay to sort them, ready to be presented to the buyer. In tomorrow’s Best Match Secrets article we’ll look at how the search recall is ordered.
Why aren’t eBay named as a Google Marketplace Partner?
November 10, 2009
Google have announced the full launch of the Google Product Search Marketplace Partner program with the initial partner marketplaces being eBid, eCrater, and Etsy. This replaces the need for individual merchants to upload their own marketplace listings to Google product search (Google Shopping). Individual Marketplace sellers are now no longer able to upload their own listings so it’s essential that the marketplace they trade on do this on their behalf.
I have to admit to being somewhat surprised at the absence of eBay in the list of partners – does this mean that eBay aren’t currently submitting product feeds to Google or is it a given that eBay listings are included in Google Shopping results?
A quick test for some of my own eBay listings does show them appearing in Google Product Search, so at least some, if not all, are being included. What about your listings though? Are your eBay fixed price listings appearing on Google or are eBay feeds not currently being uploaded?
Google Merchant product feed replaces Google Base
November 6, 2009
If you’re used to logging into Google Base to upload your website feeds and get them indexed in Google Product Search (Google Shopping), you’ll need to visit Google Merchant Center in future.
You can still upload non-product data, Google Base should be used for data such as recipes, jobs and property listings. Your product data feeds and account settings should have been migrated to the new Merchant Center when you sign in using your Google credentials.
It’s important that if you are uploading product data that you wish to appear on Google Product Search you switch to using the Merchant Center immediately. Items loaded into Google Base will now be treated as non-product and will not appear in shopping search results.
Many thanks to Gill from FoilPlay for the heads up on this information
Last Royal Mail Christmas 2009 Posting Dates
November 6, 2009
Now the CWU have canceled further postal strikes, at least until after Christmas we can publish the last Royal Mail posting dates for 2009 with confidence that they’ll be correct.
UK
| Last Recommended Posting Dates |
Service |
| Friday 18th December | Second Class (Including Signed for) |
| Friday 18th December | Royal Mail Tracked |
| Monday 21st December | First Class (Including Signed for) |
| Tuesday 15th December | Standard Parcels |
| Wednesday 23rd December | Special Delivery |
Parcelforce
| Last Recommended Posting Dates |
Service |
| Tuesday 22nd December | Express 48 |
| Wednesday 23rd December | Express 24 |
| Wednesday 2nd December - Friday 18th December (Varies by destination) |
Global Priority |
International Airmail
| Last Recommended Posting Dates |
Destination |
| Friday 4th December | South & Central America, Caribean, Africa, Middle East, Far East, Asia, New Zealand, Australia |
| Thursday 10th December | Japan, USA, Canada, Eastern Europe |
| Friday 11th December | Western Europe |
International Surface Mail
| Last Recommended Posting Dates |
Destination |
| Thursday 1st October | All non-European destinations except Canada, Far East, Hong Kong, South Africa, USA |
| Tuesday 6th October | Far East (except Hong Kong and Singapore), Middle East |
| Tuesday 20th October | Canada, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Africa, USA |
| Tuesday 10th November | Eastern Europe, Greece, Cyprus, Turkey, Malta, Iceland |
| Tuesday 24th November | Western Europe |
