Third Annual Report.

[theElench]

This time last year I was optimistic that my selling here was taking off, I was selling regularly. I can't remember how many items I had sold but my FB had gone up from 1 to 19 and considering that less than half my buyers here leave FB that means I sold at least thirty-six items.

Selling in Collectables Categories is always going to be erratic but I thought my strategy was working. Although I don't have that many items to list I would start a new seven day auction each week ensuring I always had at least one item visible near the top of a category. As I've yet to have a bid on any auction I would then re-list the item RUS and start another auction with another item.

Most of my sales came from buyers with zero FB so I also thought that putting a note about my listings here in parcels of things sold on TOS was attracting those buyers here. My sales were running neck and neck on the two sites.

I started selling over there the year before I started here and have come to realise that after a few of sales in early January I have a dead period during late January, February and early March so was not suprised to sell nothing during that period. Things picked up again in mid / late March over there but not here.

Not one single sale this year. No questions apart from an enquiry from Australia asking if I would send a small and delicate piece of glass there, which I politely declined. I started posting on the Plug Your Auction board each week to try to drum up some interest but all this seems to have done is reduce the number of views of items in the early days of each auction. The only up-side I can see is that my listings have increased in number for when buyers do return. I'm hoping that interest might pick up in the run-up to Christmas but am not particularly confident as this period is generaly slow. Hoping for a flurry of post Christmas sales to start next year with a bang.

So a rather disapointing year for me, especialy after the previous successfull one.

[damian_steele]

So a rather disapointing year for me, especialy after the previous successfull one.

Run until sold will do that.

Search through the hundreds of threads on the low sales topic to see why RUS is a bad idea.

[theElench]

While I appreciate what you and a lot of threads are saying about RUS I'm not sure that is the cause of the loss of interest in my auctions. This last year I have been doing the same as the previous one when my sales went up. My main area (Art Deco Glass) has a total of 128 listings, which is down a few since this time last year. I can see that it is of great importance to have items near the top of the search in categories with thousands of listings to even get seen but with so few listings I didn't think it is so important. Other categories I have listed in have even fewer listings, sometimes only a handfull, one or two I seem to be the only seller with anything in the category.

Perhaps I am missing something? My own searches start by being quite wide like Art Deco Glass and get more specific to whittle down the results if necessary. I assumed most people would also do the same unless looking for something specific like a particular maker or colour.

The search here is great and I regularly check my new listings to make sure they show up in as many searches as possible. The more key words I can get in the title the more searches an item does show up in. No best match or other squewing of the results, just the all important use of key-words "Large Art Deco Frosted Green Glass Vase" will show up in almost any and every combination of the words in the title. My auctions and RUS still get views so they must be being seen, it just seems to me that the viewers are being rather more carefull with their money this year.

[sidthelamp]

While I appreciate what you and a lot of threads are saying about RUS I'm not sure that is the cause of the loss of interest in my auctions. This last year I have been doing the same as the previous one when my sales went up. My main area (Art Deco Glass) has a total of 128 listings, which is down a few since this time last year. I can see that it is of great importance to have items near the top of the search in categories with thousands of listings to even get seen but with so few listings I didn't think it is so important. Other categories I have listed in have even fewer listings, sometimes only a handfull, one or two I seem to be the only seller with anything in the category.

Perhaps I am missing something? My own searches start by being quite wide like Art Deco Glass and get more specific to whittle down the results if necessary. I assumed most people would also do the same unless looking for something specific like a particular maker or colour.

The search here is great and I regularly check my new listings to make sure they show up in as many searches as possible. The more key words I can get in the title the more searches an item does show up in. No best match or other squewing of the results, just the all important use of key-words "Large Art Deco Frosted Green Glass Vase" will show up in almost any and every combination of the words in the title. My auctions and RUS still get views so they must be being seen, it just seems to me that the viewers are being rather more carefull with their money this year.

you are correct without much competition in the cats you list in it would make sense to use RUS, were your incorrect is if you use run for 7/10 days auto repost this will see your items reuploaded to GS and enhance your position in search results there, so it is better to use the auto 7/10 day relist.

[theElench]

But I was doing exactly the same last year and getting regular sales.

[maxfli65]

Can I say that it would appear that it's not just here sales are lower. On the other site if you read the blogs much the same is happening there too.
Brexit - low value of the pound - people with less spending power, all these type of things get blamed. Also if you read the headlines it is happening to major stores too all are recording lower takings.

[theElench]

I did read somewhere that we are supposed to be entering the down-side of the economic cycle, I do read the boards over there and a lot of sellers are saying sales are falling. But the economic experts are often wrong and sellers on TOS always have something to complain about, as I don't really keep up with business news I didn't realise falling sales were so widespread. Selling collectables is always a bit hit-and-miss but after a good year to go to zero was shocking. Even with the doom and gloom my sales over there have carried on at about normal. I suppose I can take some comfort from being in such exulted company.