Number of listings shrink categories increase...........

[bringinitback4less]

whos really bothered if listings shrink and we have more categories

I am because it seems like its counter productive. It makes the shelves look empty. The categories are cumbersome and there are to many. People search by keywords and rarely use categories.

[tonyreddevil]

i, not bothered

[Maelbrigda]

When I am going to list an item I press sell then type in a keyword search. However I recently discovered that if a category has no listings in it, even if it has the word in it you search for, it comes up as "item not in database" . This has led to me listing items in a next best category in the past until I discovered all the other categories. It seems to me to be counter intuitive not to have these categories showing in a search. I have been with ebid a few years and didn't know this so what hope do new sellers have. Just my penny's worth

[burgyeb]

i, not bothered

I am bothered (concerned) if the shrinking listings, within the expanding categories, makes eBid look anemic. However, I would rather the listings increase specifically in the empty categories. This would be helpful to the site.

When I am going to list an item I press sell then type in a keyword search. However I recently discovered that if a category has no listings in it, even if it has the word in it you search for, it comes up as "item not in database" . This has led to me listing items in a next best category in the past until I discovered all the other categories. It seems to me to be counter intuitive not to have these categories showing in a search. I have been with ebid a few years and didn't know this so what hope do new sellers have. Just my penny's worth

When I list I usually search the categories. But I have done many searches that have resulted in "item not in database." I also was unaware of this, but I will keep it in mind the next time I search for an item of interest. That may result in me placing listing(s) in an unoccupied or under represented category. Thanks for posting this.

[tonyreddevil]

[QUOTE=burgyeb;1600613]I am bothered (concerned) if the shrinking listings, within the expanding categories, makes eBid look anemic. However, I would rather the listings increase specifically in the empty categories. This would be helpful to the site.



Why doesnt Ebid do more advertising then there wouldnt be any empty categories

[zaranvalesasterix]

I use the advanced search and look at completed listings and my informal, uneducated assessment is the reduction in listings is not due to sales. I hope I am wrong.

Zaranvalesaterix do you have any evidence to support the position youve taken?

The number of listings in the UK has dropped by around 350K in the last few weeks. A lot of the new listings each day, I suspect, is just reposts.
I hadn't thought about it before but now that it has been mentioned, it does seem that the numbers have reduced since the new apps came, so it is possible that there have been more sales that have not been replaced.
Although, as Burgyeb said, some have sadly removed their items, I have also seen a lot of new sellers, and some old sellers that have imported a lot of items from TOS.
I only have bits and pieces to sell so I wont make much difference, but four of the last five buyers I have had, have been new.
It would be nice to see a lot more listings, it nearly got to 3.5 million (UK) not so long ago.

[MPS16]

....Why doesnt Ebid do more advertising then there wouldnt be any empty categories.....

Simple question, straight answer required please.

Are you prepared to pay for it ?

I for one am not.

[madelaine]

How about working with eBid as it is instead of trying to change it?

If I had an iPhone to sell I freely admit I would not list it here. However, I can list the lid of a Denby butter dish here, let it autorepost and sell it (it happened) which would be totally uneconomic on TOS.

If an item has an easily estimated value, takes up little space and the value is not time sensitive (as it would be with the iPhone), then I list it here and wait - I sold a £60 coin last month and the total fee was £1.20. I remember someone selling a rocking horse which was in the hundreds of pounds - and most sellers never post on these boards so we don't notice their figures.

Fighting the site is a waste of seller energy.

[squern]

How about working with eBid as it is instead of trying to change it?

If I had an iPhone to sell I freely admit I would not list it here. However, I can list the lid of a Denby butter dish here, let it autorepost and sell it (it happened) which would be totally uneconomic on TOS.

If an item has an easily estimated value, takes up little space and the value is not time sensitive (as it would be with the iPhone), then I list it here and wait - I sold a £60 coin last month and the total fee was £1.20. I remember someone selling a rocking horse which was in the hundreds of pounds - and most sellers never post on these boards so we don't notice their figures.

Fighting the site is a waste of seller energy.

I heartily agree.
Like anything else, you have to work with what you've got. Whether it's a market stall or a large department store, you are what you are.
You can make yourself more attractive, more efficient, more well-known, but you remain what you are.

Do market stall holders long to be Harrods? No, they just get on with it and sell more bananas/fabrics/shoes/whatever.

Everyone seems to be searching for that magic secret ingredient which will transform the site into eBay on speed. Apps, advertising, more categories, advertising, fewer categories, different categories, advertising, newletters, bigger sellers, advertising, - you name it, it's been suggested. I would like to bet that if all these things were carried out, it wouldn't make much difference. What then would people ask for?

The only way this site and its sellers will prosper is if more people list more, different, things which present good value to buyers. The eBid mangagement can't do much about that. Only sellers can.

Buyers will find us, if we offer something they want. eBay used to be like that - it was a great place to pick up unusual interesting items at affordable prices. Not any more. All those odd quirky and usefull items have gone, most of the prices have increased, and the really exciting bit - the auction - has been diminished.

If eBid can take that vacant position - an international store full of useful and interesting items, it will prosper.

Here's a suggestion: We all tend to stick with what we know, what has worked previously, or what we think will sell. Let's all list something DIFFERENT.

Different to anything we have listed before, that maybe is outside our comfort zone.
Let's make it ten items, enough to make a difference.

We can do that because of the nature of the site - it costs nothing to experiment.
So, as Madelaine says, let's not fight the site. Let's make its virtues work for us.

[Juliebabe25]

Almost daily the number of "new" U.S. listings ranges between 75,000 - 100,000 so in a 7 day period if listings drop by 100,000 that's between 625,000 - 800,000 sold items in the 7 day period.
Quite possible and I would certainly like to believe that. Using 700,000 sold in 7 days that's 4,166 items sold per hour so I would think when viewing the items sold on the home page we wouldn't see the same items over a period of 4 hours. Unless of course this is just how sold items show and don't update very often. 4,166 items per hour appears to be an obtainable number.

Really ?
Ebid only gets a couple of hundred new members a day! (so 4,000 sales an hour is not possible)
The reason for the drop in listings imho is that people are giving up selling on line and on ebid.
lack of sales = lack of motivation to list more.