Posts Tagged ‘ebay seller’
How Well does eBay’s Best Match Feature Stack Up?
Thursday, May 29th, 2008
On March 3rd Ebay launched a few new features. One of these was Best Match. Has this addition helped or hurt their business? Let’s take a look and find out.
Now when you log onto eBay and search for an item, instead of getting several thousand items that only match the words you type in, you get millions of items that all have the keywords you typed in - some not having anything to do with the item you are searching for.
Best Match - Changes Made
Along with the best match feature, they also made changes to their feedback system. For the past ten years, you could be honest about your experience on eBay.
You could give a positive, neutral, or negative feedback to a person or business, depending on how well you felt you were treated after a purchase or sale. Now, you can only give positive feedback to anyone you make a purchase from.
That means even if you were to get ripped off, or never get your item, you still have to leave positive feedback.
Search Results Changes
eBay also changed the way search results are displayed. Now, the higher your feedback score, the higher your auction will be displayed when someone searches for products, instead of the way it used to be.
In the past, this feature would display search results from the auction ending the soonest to auctions with more time. Now, if you have a 99% feedback rating, your auctions will be listed higher than someone who has a 95% feedback score.
This has many of eBay’s top sellers thinking of finding a new place to sell their items. The longer a person or business has been a member on eBay the more they have dealt with people and developed a feedback score. Sometimes, no matter how much you try, you just cannot satisfy everyone - so the ones that are not satisfied may leave a negative feedback.
This can impact your score, and put your auctions at the end of the search results.
The Bottom Line - Better or Worse?
With your items at the bottom of the search list, you have to find ways of getting your auctions noticed. You can sell your products for a lower price, but you still have to make a profit.
You would have to get your merchandise way below wholesale to sell below wholesale and make a profit. Also, don’t forget that eBay will get 10-20% just for you selling on their site. Since the changes were made in early March, many eBay sellers have been losing more money than they are making.
With some of their top sellers looking for other places to sell their items, eBay has to be asking themselves if these changes were a wise move, or if they took something that was working well and made unnecessary changes that will cause them to lose business.
Tags: E-Commerce and E-Business, ebay, eBay Edge, ebay seller, Leeia Ladipoh
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To Drop Ship Or Not - That Is the Question
Wednesday, January 3rd, 2007
Blind drop shipping is where you have the products ordered from your company shipped from the factory directly to the customer with your label as the return address. By having your business’s return address on the package, the product supplier information is kept confidential from the customer and they deal with your company for any returns or customer service issues.
Advantages of Blind Drop Shipping
There are several advantages of using the blind drop ship delivery model for your business:
* Inventory levels can be kept at a minimum
* Less exposure to shipping difficulties and stress is limited
* Revenues are collected up front for what you sell online, and you pay for the inventory at whatever terms you have negotiated with the supplier
* With your address label as the return label, your customer think it’s coming from you
When blind drop shipping works smoothly, it is an excellent business delivery model. There is no inventory piled up at your location, no seemingly endless trips to the post office or UPS. You just set up your website, process the orders, send them along to the manufacturer or wholesale drop shipping company, and the products show up coming from you. Some drop ship manufacturers and distributors will even help you with advertisements, special deals, and pictures to help you with the advertising of their products. Many of the retail catalog companies you are familiar with use blind drop shippers as their means of supply.
Disadvantages of blind Drop Shipping
There are several disadvantages to drop shipping that can be detrimental to your sales and profits, depending on your business model. If you are an eBay seller, you might want to think twice before attempting to set up shop with a blind drop shipping delivery system. It can be difficult to find a drop shipping supplier who can always deliver on a consistent basis. Manufacturers and wholesalers have run out of product before, and if they run out of a product you’re auctioning and you wind up back ordered, the negative feedback can add up in a hurry (there are ways, however, to deal with back orders ).
Depending on the supplier and your relationship with them, there can be fees in order to get the product out of their factory or warehouse and into the hands of your customer. That fee can range anywhere from 5.00 to 10.00 dollars, or even higher depending on the item. This fee in addition to the eBay fee can eat up profits, so you need to be very careful in establishing your item selling price points.
In today’s information age, customers like to track the shipping path of their products, knowing exactly when they are going to arrive at their door. This desire for tracking the package can cause a kink in your blind drop shipping delivery strategy. It is possible to work with your drop shipper and have the shipping source listed as a remote warehouse, but astute consumers will find out you are drop shipping. Your business has a choice to make at this juncture. You can either have a policy of not giving out tracking information, or you can give out the tracking info and be prepared to deal with any consequences that might arise. Most retail customers will not be concerned about the source of shipping; but you could have a question from a business to business customer, so be prepared.
Returns
When a customer wants or needs to return or exchange a product, you need to be prepared. You can either use prepaid shipping labels to your business’s address, processing them at your location, or on the prepaid shipping label have “remote warehouse” or your company’s name and “Return” on the label so the drop shipper knows it is a return. If you handle the returns yourself, you can have more control over the customer’s experience; but you will incur extra shipping charges. It really depends on the type of business you are running and what you are comfortable with.
Blind drop shipping offers an interesting delivery vehicle option for those wanting to start an online business requiring little to no inventory. As with any potential supply chain, there are advantages and disadvantages to using this type of product sourcing and delivery. Evaluate your options, potential suppliers, and costs carefully and make the best decision for your situation.
Tags: advice, drop shippers, drop shipping, ebay, ebay seller, larry Slusser, Product Sourcing, source, tips
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