posted on December 15, 2006 01:09:54 AM new
Hi gang,
I'm a long-time (7+ years) Ebay seller of vintage advertising, with a major focus on certain niche markets, as well as some general-interest pieces, 1900-1980.
I would like to know your opinions - is a web site or Ebay Stores a more cost-effective expansion solution?
I have no experience in either, but wonder about Search Engine keyword submissions, building traffic to either venue, etc.
My items usually sell for $5.00-$10.00 as a rule, and my listing pace has been relatively leasurely in the past few years.
posted on December 15, 2006 06:09:43 AM new
I had an eBay store, but quickly abandoned it when they went through the latest fee-hike. Right now, they charge an astronomical amount for fees. For items in the $5-$10 price range, you're looking at $0.05 per listing every 30 days, plus a $15.95 monthly fee, PLUS 10% in final value fees for anything that actually sells.
I switched to a website, where I'm saving TONS of money. (website costs about $500 a year, Google Ad-words costs about another $500 a year, and a credit-card merchant account about another $500 a year). So... my total yearly costs are around $1500 a year... no matter how much I have listed, and (with the exception of credit-card processing fees) there's no fees to be paid when an item sells! Right now, I have over 7000 ads listed. If I was using eBay stores, that would be the equivalent of around $4500 PLUS 10% of anything I sold.
My sales have been steadily increasing since opening the site in September, and it looks like I'm well on track to make far more profit than I ever did with the stores. Not to mention that I just didn't trust doing business with the eBay stores any more. I feel like I'm actually running my own business now, rather than having eBay run it for me. Definitely wouldn't go back to eBay stores.
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posted on December 15, 2006 09:18:59 AM new
Not only the basic savings but if your site is advertised on a major search engine (ex Google) the traffic you will reach is far better than ebay. Ebay has gotten to a recent point where there is so much fraud and stolen goods being sold, the customer base is dropping dramatically. Websites are far more effective.
posted on December 15, 2006 09:22:25 AM new
Your own web site. If you want to test the waters, eCrater is free and very simple to set up. I've had pretty good success so far. Your site is fed to Froogle and Google. I still run auctions. When I send out invoices or I acknowledge receipt of payment, I steer my buyers to my web site.
You'll have to do much of your own advertising, but you have to do the same with eBay stores. The big difference is NO FEES!
posted on December 16, 2006 09:09:16 AM new
I'll go against the grain here and recommend an ebay store.
I, like you, sell a lot of stuff in the $5-20 range. It isn't cost effective to list them as regular auctions (with gallery = 70 cents) for 7 days and hope someone buys 'em. I can put them in my store for 30 days for 6 cents. When someone buys a $5 item I pay 56 cents instead of 70.
I have my store connected to Google Base (free) and with a click of a couple of buttons my inventory goes to Google. I use PayPal (another expense, but what are ya gonna do?) so I don't pay extra for a merchant account.
I'm not an internet wizzard so I don't know (and not really interested in learning) about search engine optimization, site submissions, etc. ebay, for good or bad, is one of the most well known sites on the net.
As far as the store items being "hidden", if someone does a title search and there are less than 30 regular listings, your items will show up in the regular ebay search. You just need to make sure your headings are well written.
I, again like you, use ebay as more of a hobby. It's not how I make a living. If it was, I might have a different opinion of stores vs sites. If you're gonna jump in with both guns blazing maybe a site would be the way to go. If your life isn't going to revolve around internet sales then I think a store is the easiest way to test the waters.
The other advantage to opening a store is, if you see that it's not for you, you can close it and it's gone. You don't have to worry about the ongoing fees for a website, merchant account, etc.
Just my 2 cents...
[ edited by neatstuffusa on Dec 16, 2006 09:09 AM ]
[ edited by neatstuffusa on Dec 16, 2006 09:11 AM ]
[ edited by neatstuffusa on Dec 16, 2006 09:12 AM ]
posted on December 16, 2006 04:46:25 PM new
Those with off eBay stores, might want to submit their stores to http://www.like.com/. Seems like a really great site!
posted on December 16, 2006 05:02:00 PM new
Dorrie - here is the link to download the "Google Base Store Connector" to upload your store items to Google in bulk: http://base.google.com/base/storeconnector
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posted on December 16, 2006 05:06:40 PM new
I only have about 4500 out of about 8000 items showing. I don't know why there is a discrepancy - it seems it isn't picking up all of my categories for some reason. Oh well - something is better than nothing I guess.
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posted on December 16, 2006 05:12:53 PM new
For those of you who have migrated from eBay stores to a website - is there an easy way to export your listings?
posted on December 17, 2006 06:37:08 AM new
pixia,
Exporting listings from your eBay store is pretty easy. You just need to subscribe to eBay's "File Exchange" (which is free for PowerSellers, I think). Then you can download all your active listings in, I think, a CSV (Comma Seperated Values) file.
Then, in my case, I used some GREP search and replace commands in a text editor to remove all the junk that had accumulated in my listings... so that I was left with just descriptions. I then copied those descriptions to my bulk upload file for my website, and then uploaded them. Not exactly a quick process, but not that difficult for any one comfortable with text editors and spreadsheets. I also had to download all my images from my then host (vendio), put them into zip files and then upload them to my new site.
I'd say that using this process, I was able to move my (at that time) 3000+ store listings to my web site in about 50 hours worth of work (keeping in mind that I was learning as I went). Not exactly an experience I would want to have to do again, but all-in-all... I was pleased with the speed I was able to make the transfer. It was much faster than re-creating all the listings!
By the way... the company I set up with actually would import active listings directly from eBay. I just chose to go with my previous method, because it gave me a chance to clean up my listings and get rid of ebay-specific terms-of-sale, old Bidpay information, etc...
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posted on December 17, 2006 12:29:37 PM new
I like the vendio stores because you can cross promote your ebay items pretty easily.
Most of my long term customers know to go to my vendio store first as I will most likely have the same thing listed and at a lesser cost. With my plan the store is "free".
Also, when I get inquiries about ads, I can quickly set up a small gallery just for that buyer and no cost to me if does not buy (unlike eBay where you would have to pay a listing fee).
I will probably close my main store on eBay which still has about 1600 items. We will run the number Jan 1 and then make a decision.
I also have a niche store on eBay that is doing well. Personally I think you hit the nail on the head with a niche store which is associated with a a strong buying group that are pretty price resistant. You also want to have multiples on these stores. In this particular area, I have been collecting these trade journal from 1910-1950 for over ten years. So, I might have 6-10 of the same ad from 1912 that no one else on eBay has.
There is a lot of competition among ad sellers. We have a lot of folks selling ads for .99 to $3.99. Mine range from 9.99 to $34.99. Mine have to be different than everyone elses to get the higher prices.
So, my answer is if you use vendio, consider their store. Buy your domain name and point it to there. Submit to google, froogle and everyone else.
posted on December 17, 2006 05:09:13 PM new
Thanks, Vintage Paper Ads. I've lightly explored the File Exchange and backed away because of the work needed to clean up my listings. I need to buckle down and do something though, it seems that eBay and Paypal are grabbing 1/4 of my sales.
posted on December 17, 2006 08:38:06 PM newMy sales have been steadily increasing since opening the site in September, and it looks like I'm well on track to make far more profit than I ever did with the stores.
Ditto on that. At work, we dropped eBay all together. Sales via our website are way better than they ever were on eBay plus we don't have nowhere the fees involved as we did with eBay.
