My store sales are up! Whoo hooo!

I don't know if the shoppers are just back and ready to spend, or if the new store tab has made that much of a difference, but I am getting store sales and I'm thrilled! I've only sold 17 items this month (and received my notice that I'll be losing my Powerseller status ...:-(...first time since I got it 5 yrs ago), but 8 of those sales were store sales! That seems like a lot to me. I'm happy and I hope they keep up! Trying to get my butt in gear and get listing. I hear that the Back to School shoppers are out and buying!

Hallelujah! The Ebay stores tab is coming!

This was just posted in the Ebay announcements:

***eBay Stores Link in Header and Updated Stores Hub***

If we can't have stores back in search, I truly hope this is the next best thing. I can't tell you how many customers I've had in the last 5 yrs or so, mention to me that they didn't even KNOW about Ebay stores! Truly! So many novice users just assume there are only auctions on the site. I really hope this will help all of us store sellers by making the stores more visible.

Ebay vs Craigslist with new Kijiji classified ads

Look out Craigslist! Apparantly, Ebay has opened up it's free classified ads site Kijiji here in the US.

EBay Launches Kijiji Classifieds in U.S.

Unlike its category-killing sibling companies PayPal and Skype, Kijiji, which means "village" in Swahili, is one of eBay's least-known brands since its 2005 launch, in part because it did not have a U.S. presence. The site gives no indication that it is an eBay property, offering no "About Us" link or corporate information. The Kijiji Canada site does however contain a link to eBay Canada. Its China site clearly displays an eBay logo at the bottom of the page.

I really wish they would just fix what is broken on plain old EBAY, instead of launching new projects, threatening more changes than we've ever seen before, and ignoring us sellers. OK, vent over..............for the moment!

EBay's Whitman Says Changes Needed to Placate Sellers...huh?

EBay's Whitman Says Changes Needed to Placate Sellers

You'll see more changes in the next 12 months on our site than you've probably seen in the last three or four years,'' Whitman said in an interview. ``EBay was so successful that we did not keep up with the user experience that was required.

My worst nightmare come true.......more changes!

EBay doesn't allow users to pay through Google Inc.'s rival Checkout service on its sites because only one in seven Checkout users were ``pleased'' with the service, Whitman said, citing an EBay survey. ``That has to get higher,'' said Whitman. ``We will continue to look at Google as a payment mechanism on the EBay marketplace.''

I just can't see this EVER happening....would also love to know how many people took the survey.

Last, there is some discussion about how there are "too many listings" and buyers can't find what they are looking for. One example they gave in the article was this:

"Buyers have a tough time finding what they want. If you're looking for an Apple iPod, you're going to get 5,000 search results, and most will be accessories."

To address this, EBay last year imposed higher fees to reduce the number of fixed-price listings because buyers couldn't find the items. The goal was to increase the number of completed sales, boosting revenue for the company and its sellers, Whitman said.

I can see how this could be a problem for buyers. I truly can. I've had a similar thing happen looking for Gameboys and wanting the system but finding too many games and accessories listed in the wrong catergories to wade through everything.

I think that Ebay's way of addressing the problem though, is wrong. They need to enforce the rules that they have in place for sellers. Instead of enforcing the rules, they count on the community to enforce them. This is not how society works, I don't understand why they think they can make it work for their company. They need to focus on usability issues, and some of these can be addressed just by creating a task force to enforce the rules. Ban those sellers who continually Keyword Spam, list more than 10 duplicate listings or charge exorbanent s/h to bypass the fees. By doing this, not only would it make the buying experience better, but it would also benefit those sellers who play by the rules. Happy buyers, happy sellers = higher bottom line for Ebay.

Is Ebay "Broken"? A telling tale:

I just came across this article on AuctionBytes that talks about the theory that Ebay "broke" sometime in the spring of 2006 when they implemented Stores in Search and then took it out again. Check it out here: Data Points to Problems on eBay.com Be sure to check out the blog discussion that follows here.

I have to agree with this article. It is dead on. My sales were at an all time high the year of 2005, and peaked when they placed Stores in Search. When the took them back out again, my sales have never been the same.

Someone in the blog discussion mentioned that it was also around this time, that they implemented Ebay Express. This was not mentioned in the article and it very well could be a part of what is "broken". I don't know what the hell is wrong, and I think too much time has gone by for even Ebay to know what the is wrong. All I know is that I agree with many other sellers, that something in Ebay's system is broken, and they need to figure it out. If things don't pick up for me this fall, it may be time to call it quits for me there and time for me to go out and get a real job.

Busy Back to School time soon

I'm gearing up for Back to School time sales on Ebay. My sales in the past and this year again, have been pretty dead since the end of April through June. I'm hoping for things to really pick up this month. I'm hoping that Ebay's announcement of adding a Store Tab to the top of the header, will also help with sales.

I've also decided, it is time for me to close up shop on Wagglepop. I truly hope that they do succeed. But I have been paying them $9.95 per month for unlimited listings for a year now, with a total of 6 sales. :-( I can't afford to keep hoping. I do think their site shows a lot of promise, and I think you can even do well there right now, if you have a real niche type of store. But for me, who sells a little of this, a little of that, the traffic just isn't there yet. Perhaps with Googles new programmable search, it will have better success.

Google vs Ebay: the battle continues

Apparantly, the battle is not over between Ebay and Google. In my previous post, Ebay pulls Ads off Google, I mentioned how the two companies were feuding in Boston during Ebay Live. Then, it was announced, that Ebay will run "limited" ads on Google once again. Now, it seems that there is a complete Cyberspace Showdown: Google vs Ebay, the results of which could completely change the world of online retailing.

This will be extremely interesting to watch playout. Both of these companies are such monstrosities, that I do believe things may change way beyond what you and I can imagine in the near future.

All I know is, Ebay is not what it used to be, and with battles like this one to fight, no wonder.