One more post for the day (using up my limit just
after midnight!)
Bruce, excellent information as always. I do want to
offer a little evidence, as I earlier mentioned as one
of the few obsessive ebay searcher/browsers left, that
the landscape for ebay stores is not as grim as it
used to be.
I closed my ebay store a good while back because of
just what Bruce mentioned, the lack of searchability
and appearance in regular listings. But in the last
few months, some rare improvements have been made to
this end. I'm not here to defend the overall scheme
of things, but do want to offer these tips for those
who might not have discovered them.
If you search any category's straight index listing,
at the bottom of each page, you can generate a list of
all store items in that category. If you're in
originals-US, it will give you those; if you narrow to
60-69, it will provide that list as well. Granted
it's "hidden at the bottom" but it is there and it's
great for browsing stores, something that was
impossible before.
Also, doing title searches will produce store results
after the listings. Finally, I know that the new
"sidebar" listings on "view sellers other items" was a
source of contention to some, but this, too, has a
purpose to a person like me who often clicks on
sellers other items, finds that the seller has a
zillion CDs and maybe 10 posters. You can click on a
breakdown by category now, in the sidebar, to narrow,
so you don't have to look for the 10 needles in a
zillion CD haystack.
Again, just a few random tips from a
still-browsing/searching collector. And thanks again,
Bruce; the store tips are definitely good advice for
dealers occasional or regular on the e-behemoth.
Take care,
Fred
--- Bruce Hershenson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I thank all those of you who replied to this thread
> I posted (both here and
> on Movie Poster Talk). There were lots of
> thoughtful intelligent replies,
> and they make for good reading.
>
> I was not trying to be cute in posting this. I do
> NOT in any way think I
> have any personal cause in this lessening of the
> number of sellers, and the
> number of sellers listing quality items. Why?
>
> Because most sellers sell in a completely different
> way than I do. There
> ARE one or two sellers who list lots of items with
> low opening bids as I
> do, but their results are lackluster at best, and
> they keep with it for
> reasons best known to themselves. I know they would
> net more money if they
> consigned those same posters to me and saved all the
> overhead they
> currently have.
>
> But with the exception of those sellers, most
> sellers list five or ten or
> twenty items, and they list them with an opening bid
> that is the lowest
> they can bear to take for that item, and they hope
> they will get at least
> one bidder, and maybe two.
>
> I don't see that I am in competition with those
> dealers at all. I might
> have the same items as them once or twice a year,
> and if I get a lower
> price than they want, they can dismiss it as an
> oddity, but if I get a high
> price they can use it to justify the price they are
> asking (often dealers
> reference prices I have realized, unattributed, in
> their auctions).
>
> I did not give my opinion as to why so many of these
> dealers are offering
> less on eBay when I first posted, because I wanted
> to hear what all of you
> thought first. But now I have and I want to give my
> opinion.
>
> I think the biggest reason is that eBay is as
> "seller-unfriendly" as a site
> can be! They have a jillion policies that make it
> hard to sell items, and
> they do ZERO to screen out bad bidders who wreck
> auctions. Worse yet, they
> keep making unwanted changes, and I think it is this
> that causes so many
> sellers each week and month and year to suddenly
> say, "Why bother?" and
> find another way to sell.
>
> But I am surprised more of you have not found the
> best solution under the
> current rules (a very few of you have, but not many,
> although lots of rare
> book dealers, comic book dealers, etc, have, which
> makes me think it is a
> matter of time).
>
> Here's all you have to do. Open an eBay store. Get
> TurboLister (it is
> free) and create auctions for every item in your
> inventory (using a stock
> template, it is not that hard to do) LISTING THE
> RETAIL PRICES YOU WANT TO
> GET. Put all of them on eBay in your store at 5
> cents per item per month,
> and put them as "good until cancelled" so you have
> nothing to do until they
> sell.
>
> Now comes the tricky part. How do you get people to
> see these items, since
> store items don't show up in the basic search? One
> way is to list a FEW
> items as regular items with major promos on each one
> telling those looking
> about all your great store items. Another way is to
> post to Internet sites
> like this one, or to put links from your website to
> your store items.
>
> The most important part of this is that eBay has a
> free listing day every
> couple of months, and when they do, you list all the
> store items as REGULAR
> items, and it is free and for those seven days your
> items DO show up in
> searches.
>
> Is it worth it? Say you list 1,000 items. It costs
> you $50 a month, and
> if you can't sell a few hundred dollars worth of
> items out of 1,000 listed,
> then your prices are way too high! And your only
> expense is the 5 cents an
> item store fee, and the seller's percentage after
> items sell, so your
> overhead is pretty low.
>
> A side benefit to this is that if every dealer did
> this, there would be
> tens of thousands of quality items in the stores at
> all times, and that
> would give customers a lot more incentive to go
> looking, which would result
> in more sales for everyone.
>
> Of course, that's just my opinion.
>
> Bruce
>
> Visit the MoPo Mailing List Web Site at
> www.filmfan.com
>
>
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