eBay for promotion

[Mac]

Just a quick thought on eBay as a promotional tool for those in online retail:

The theory for our business was that opening an eBay shop would attract potential customers who had an interest in Spanish food.... it worked. Basicly every time we sold on eBay we included literature/business cards etc - the customer came to us instead of us going to them. What we sold through eBay were light items, end of line products etc etc, breaking even was good enough as the opportunity for building a customer base and relationships was free (most of the time)

We have now stopped trading through eBay. Why? The unpopular feedback changes disallowing sellers to leave negative feedback came into force May 2008. Paypal fees on top of selling fees on top of shop fees on top of a poor exchange rate made the process eventually non viable (certainly for our business anyway)

And the main reason: Adwords - for the same expenditure we can achieve three times the site visitors with no posting and wrapping involved. ebay was a good idea to begin with but when something starts not to be beneficial its like flogging a dead horse.

Just a thought! Anyone else use eBay alongside their online business?

[sheffy]

We sell on Ebay and it has been good for us. We have only had our website up and running for a couple of months and we pop a flier in with every item we sell promoting our website. Ebay has been good for us in its own right, however, and we have gained a lot of repeat customers through it and had quite a few leads from it. The only problem is that it is hard work because of all the changes, relisting etc.

[Stu]

We have used ebay before and found the costs were a bit high, especially with the slim margins on a lot of catering equipment. I agree with Mac on the policy being bad where the seller cannot reply to feedback. It only takes a bodge with the transport and a customer could leave negative feedback like 'they were unable to deliver on time', or 'they are only interested in taking the money and give no after sales support'. Without being able to reply you would be unable to say the real truth that 'the truck broke down, the customer was informed straight away and the item was delivered first thing the next day'. I know a lot of people who do very well for low cost smaller items. Maybe customers on ebay are less trusting because of previous scams and are more likely to give bad feedback if anything seems wrong. It is a way of getting better service as sellers need their reputation to do well and is prompted to rectify the issue quickly.

Regards

[sheffy]

I agree that if you sell high cost items then the new changes must make it very difficult. Your customers will have spent a lot of money and will be very exacting indeed and you just need one thing to go wrong and could get negg'e and that will be a high percentage of your feedback because you will not do the volume. We sell lower cost items usually with large sales occasionally. For instance , now and again we put a canteen of cutlery on for auction or we get a bulk order from a cafe or restaurant or a caterer. We have approx 5.550 feedback with only 1 neg (unreasonable, of course), so , for us it works. Amazon operate the same system, of course. Personally, I think it helps give the buyer confidence and think in the long term it will benefit the site.

[banoffeeboy]

Just a thought! Anyone else use eBay alongside their online business?

Hi Mac,

I used ebay quite a lot in 2007 to promote our Motorsport events and also to promote late bookings for fishing holidays. It was very effective. I used it a bit in 2005 & 2006 but frankly cheated .... used it as a window to promote our website.

However, ebay have tightened up the "links" rules - we cannot display our web address and only a single page website is allowed and it must display info not in the add. Also you cannot promote any options.... you must sell a single product but we have loads of options to choose from. They have pulled my adds countless times. Now I display my email contact addy steve@bountylemans.com ..... so the clever peeps can work out the website and take a look. I had a shop but shut it due to fees.

For 2008 we switched to Google Adwords ..... MUCH MUCH more effective ..... about 25p per click and every campaign gets enquiries and often bookings.

Finally, magazine ads .... specialist ads in fishing magazines for fishing holidays ....a TOTAL waste of money! About £ 400 a pop and usually NO phone calls. Google Adwords all the way!!!