posted on February 12, 2004 12:40:17 PM new
I have just concluded my auctions on yahoo Fld and it was very profitable. The reason it was profitable is because of the FREE Listing Day. I put on 413 auctions in collectables. 34 sold and 379 did not sell. I listed items that range from $650 to $5. This gave me about an 8% sell thru rate. My FVF was $16.84. If I had to pay listing fees they would have been $105, which would have ate up my profit. Ebay Fld was somewhat better, I had a sell thru rate of 15%.This just goes to show that listing fees are usually higher than FVF, because of the low sell thru rate. It is more profitable to list a couple times a year on ebay and yahoo during FLD with a greater profit and less work for the dollar. People are finding this out more and more. It is the starters on ebay that are decieved into thinking they can make large profits on ebay with the high fees.
posted on February 12, 2004 02:00:12 PM new
Great report! Keep spreading the word and maybe some of those thousands of postcards on Ebay will find their way to Yahoo!
That way, my sellthrough rate can improve as well (on Ebay, of course)
I looked. Out of hundreds of listings, 35 have bids. Do I want to waste my time...definitely not. But, I am all for half the sellers on Ebay moving on over there
posted on February 12, 2004 02:02:19 PM new
If a 8.97% sell thru rate is your idea of success and $105 in fees would have have resulted in a net loss in a sales total of over $900 you hve no place trying to play business person. If you made less than $105 for the time it took you to create 413 auctions.... that's failure even for a hobby seller.
~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~
If it's really "common" sense, why do so few people actually have it?
posted on February 12, 2004 02:07:29 PM new
dbest..... just how much TIME did it take you to set up 413 auctions?!?! Even if you're increadibly fast.... and can create one auction every two minutes.... that would be roughly 14 hours worth of work. If $105.00 would have eaten up ALL your profit... then you're only making $7.50 an hour ($105/14). Not to mention all the time involved in packaging, sending e-mails, etc... which would only make your hourly wage lower! Not really worth it, is it? Maybe you'd be better off creating a real business model rather than worrying about catching every free listing day. (just my opinion!)
posted on February 12, 2004 02:22:22 PM new
eauctionmgnt: You still live in the dark ages. Who creates auctions manually anymore? A guess you haven't used Yahoo's bulk loader. Very quick an easy, just upload a spreadsheet. Since anyone in business is probabally tracking things with a spreadsheet, uploading them 413 items to Yahoo is perhaps a 10 minute task.
posted on February 12, 2004 02:31:12 PM new
Really, can you list all those COLLECTIBLES from a spreadsheet??? Are they identical collectibles? I cannot imagine this--but maybe I'm still in the dark ages too.
True collectibles are almost one of a kind and take a lot of work to describe and photograph. But I have 75 - 90% sell-through.
___________________________________
"I have resolved to allow my friends their peculiarities." -- Samuel Johnson
posted on February 12, 2004 03:00:05 PM new
hello, and first i am glad you consider this effort profitable..
you stated:
"The reason it was profitable is because of the FREE Listing Day. I put on 413 auctions in collectables. 34 sold and 379 did not sell."
"...which would have ate up my profit."
[3]"This just goes to show that listing fees are usually higher than FVF, because of the low sell thru rate." HOW COULD LISTING FEE EVER BE MORE THAN SELL THRU...I ASK THAT KNOWING YOU ONLY SOLD 34..
[4]"My FVF was $16.84."
$16.84 IS 5.25% OF WHAT NUMBER..
I NOT FAMILIAR WITH YAHOO, SO I AM GIVING YOU THE BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT AND THAT YOU PAID 5.25% FVF -WHICH MAY BE MORE THAN EBAY'S FVF...THAT MEANS, BY MY MATH, YOU GROSSED $320 IN 34 AUCTIONS...
..YOU LISTED 413 AUCTIONS WITH 34 SELLING -THAT MEANS YOU SOLD 10PERCENT OF YOUR INVENTORY WHICH POINTS TO: $105 IS THE AMOUNT THAT "wOULD HAVE EATEN UP YOUR PROFIT.."
..AS SOMEONE ELSE ALLUDED TO: YOU APPEAR TO WORK CHEAP..OR YOU HAVE A SECRET WE ONLY DREAM ABOUT...
..i dont mean any of this in a facetious manner, i bottom line when people start talking profit...and making extraneous statements like, "list only 3 times a year, etc."
YOU CLOSED BY SAYING:
..It is the starters on ebay that are decieved into thinking they can make large profits on ebay with the high fees..
posted on February 12, 2004 03:06:32 PM new
It may take 10 minutes to upload but how long does it take to photograph and then edit the image as well as writing 413 description. I'm thinking that takes a little more than 1 0 minutes.
~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~
If it's really "common" sense, why do so few people actually have it?
posted on February 12, 2004 05:28:01 PM new
rsmith...we both be in de dark ages then...
.. i load manually..using SmPro..
..i consider myself a business..
..i reinterate: how can a person incur[accumulate] only a FVF of $16.84 for selling 34 items..
..i cant benchmark yahoo because i know nothing about them, EXCEPT, back in the dark ages when i used them, their inadequate[for me] bandwidth kept me knocked off..i wonder how yahoo handles 400 auctions, IF THE SELLER IS TAKING A LOT OF HITS..its called activity..yahoo mayhaps, they handle it now..i guess this is not a problem now..
..how do you download a spreadsheet of 400 unless you create the auctions first..
posted on February 12, 2004 07:54:57 PM new
What is wrong with you people? do you think I am lieing. Why should I deceive anyone. I just gave the facts. I am glad I made a profit, although it was not much. OK here is a cut and paste from my yahoo account. notice the $105 was credited back to me because it was FLD. Billing Period: 01/09/2004 - na
posted on February 12, 2004 08:03:52 PM new
Now my gross was $1075. I do not know exactly my profit because I have not figured it up yet, but my margins are small. Buy low sell high, not much difference in between. But let me tell you about 2-3 years ago I was selling this same stuff and I had a 95-98% sell thru rate with great profits. My collectables are individually different. COINS. I use yahoo's seller manager to load my items in. These items have been made up ready to go for a long time. I was ready for FLD.
posted on February 12, 2004 08:09:50 PM new
To OHMy Luck: I know it does not seem like much, most of my friend have given up on ebay along time ago, I am one of the few that remain. Ebay is only good for some who want to clean out their close or move a lot of stuff cheaply to get it out of the way.
You must remember that the ones who have quit do not look at this board, they have gone. I alone am left to tell the truth about ebay, the rest are ebay employees trying to con the newbees
posted on February 12, 2004 08:17:26 PM new
You complain about my model, that my profit margin is small. So it is, not like it use to be with great sell thru rate, but it is profitable. If I used the model that is advocated by some on this board I would have to quit because of no profit like my friends have done. The listing fees would eat me up, I have been down that road before. My plans are to have 2000 items next FLD, whish me well.
posted on February 12, 2004 08:21:24 PM new
I still say you are in the wrong business. It constantly amazes me that rather than reshuffle our businees module to something that provides you with a minimum of a 50% profit margin per piece and has at least a 50% self thru rate you think that ebay should switch their business module to accomodate bad business people. I have been selling on ebay for at least 6 years. I have had to constantly adjust my business module to remain profitable. That's what life in the real world is about. You anticipate change and adjust to it. You don't drop to the ground and pound your fists in protest.
You want my honest opinion.... your decision to sit on your inventory and list only on free listing days as the world moves on and the world of collectibles changes and evolves is extremely niave and has more than likely cost you a great deal of money. You have allowed your rapidly devaluating inventory to further devaluate in order to save a few pennies. It's bad business and it defies common sense logic. When you saw values dropping back when you should have dumped the majority of your pieces and reinvested the proceeds in a more current inventory.
~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~
If it's really "common" sense, why do so few people actually have it?
[ edited by Fenix03 on Feb 12, 2004 08:22 PM ]
posted on February 12, 2004 08:30:30 PM newYou must remember that the ones who have quit do not look at this board, they have gone. I alone am left to tell the truth about ebay, the rest are ebay employees trying to con the newbees.
posted on February 13, 2004 09:05:23 AM new
I agree Lucy...you can't win the lottery if you don't buy a ticket and just count on going through garbage cans for discarded ones. You don't sell on eBay unless you list.
I returned last Monday from spending a week with my mother and I had NO listings on eBay when I returned. It always takes me a couple of weeks after a break to get up to speed..if I don't list a lot I don't sell what I do list. There is a lot of value in the "click to see seller's other auctions" feature.
I may list 100 items/day, sell 30% of them with average sales price of $10 meaning a gross of $300, $35 listing fees, 15.75 FVF, $3.00 to Vendio leaving $247 for me...do this day in and day out. In twelve days you will have made $2967.
At the same time you can list 1200 items on FLD, 15% sell through rate, average sales price $6, meaning a gross of $1080 - 0 listing fee, 56.70 FVF, $10.80 to Vendio, leaving $1012.50 for me.
ADDED: Where did I get those figures? From my own sales data is where! In the day-in day-out example I had to pay eBay $420 in listing fees (remember that is already deducted from the $2967 figure), SO WHAT??? The higher sell through rate and higher average sales price more than make up for it!
I do take advantage of FLD but it is the day in and day out listing and selling that is my bread and butter..sure I have to pay listing fees, that is a fact of life.
dbest you sound like an ebay "dabbler" and there is a place for dabblers on ebay, but the professional sellers (and not newby sellers) are in the market every day. I would think that coin sellers especially would profit from a constant market presence.
[ edited by neglus on Feb 13, 2004 09:45 AM ]
posted on February 13, 2004 09:40:12 AM newThere is a lot of value in the "click to see seller's other auctions" feature.
Truer words were never spoken...today.
My auctions get at least 50% of their hits from "View Seller's Other Auctions" On some auctions it reaches 90%.
To me, this argues in favor of diversifying one's offerings and having as many auctions up as possible...up to a point.
Why "up to a point"? I think there is a critical number of auctions beyond which the average bidder will give up from fatigue. I see it in my own behavior and I've seen it from bidders when I had more than 500 auctions up. There are sellers who have 3500 auctions up complaining because eBay's search algorithm breaks if they have many more than that, but I think they're missing the Big Picture...which is that people *like* to browse Seller's Other Auctions, so don't make it a daunting task.
Signed,
Mr. Melvin
--
Being denied live help is unacceptable.
[ edited by fluffythewondercat on Feb 13, 2004 09:40 AM ]
posted on February 13, 2004 09:42:39 AM new
....YOU SAID..
"The reason it was profitable is because of the FREE Listing Day. I put on 413 auctions in collectables ---- 379 did not sell"
-------
"It is more profitable to list a couple times a year on ebay and yahoo during FLD."
------------------------------
"People are finding this out more and more. It is the starters on ebay that are decieved into thinking---- "
--------------------------------
"You still live in the dark ages. Who creates auctions manually anymore?"
-------------------------------
"What is wrong with you people?"
-------------------------------
" most of my friend have given up on ebay along time ago,"
---------------------------
"Ebay is only good for some who want to clean out their close or move a lot of stuff cheaply to get it out of the way."
------------------------
"I alone am left to tell the truth about ebay, the rest are ebay employees trying to con the newbees"
-------------------------------------
"My plans are to have 2000 items next FLD, whish me well."
----------------------
I FOR ONE DO WHISH YOU WELL, ESPECIALLY AFTER READING SOME OF YOUR COMMENTS..
posted on February 13, 2004 09:42:39 AM new
....YOU SAID..
"The reason it was profitable is because of the FREE Listing Day. I put on 413 auctions in collectables ---- 379 did not sell"
-------
"It is more profitable to list a couple times a year on ebay and yahoo during FLD."
------------------------------
"People are finding this out more and more. It is the starters on ebay that are decieved into thinking---- "
--------------------------------
"You still live in the dark ages. Who creates auctions manually anymore?"
-------------------------------
"What is wrong with you people?"
-------------------------------
" most of my friend have given up on ebay along time ago,"
---------------------------
"Ebay is only good for some who want to clean out their close or move a lot of stuff cheaply to get it out of the way."
------------------------
"I alone am left to tell the truth about ebay, the rest are ebay employees trying to con the newbees"
-------------------------------------
"My plans are to have 2000 items next FLD, whish me well."
----------------------
I FOR ONE DO WHISH YOU WELL, ESPECIALLY AFTER READING SOME OF YOUR COMMENTS..
posted on February 13, 2004 09:53:38 AM new
Fluffy - I agree with you about overkill!! I hate that all my store items get mixed in with my auctions when pulling up a sellers list!! I try to run about 400 auctions all the time (still not up to speed after my visit with Mom)- I prefer that buyers see those items before they look in my store (sometimes I have the same item cheaper in my store ).
posted on February 13, 2004 10:56:24 AM new
The great thing about on-line selling in general is that it can accommodate many different business models and levels of seller. There are certainly many high-volume, aggressive business people on board, but the casual seller can also do OK.
But this is no different from any other venue - you have to understand what you are doing and why you are doing this.
I agree about keeping a presence to take advantage of the "sellers other auctions", but even that is not relevant for everyone.
As for how much profit it takes to make it worthwhile, that is up to each individual seller. One size definitely does not fit all.
I don't really see the demise of eBay in the near future, or ex-eBayers leaving to have resounding success on the other auction sites (remember years ago on this board when sellers were trying to convince us all to move to Gold's and give eBay its comeuppance?
[ edited by Damariscotta on Feb 13, 2004 10:57 AM ]
posted on February 13, 2004 11:54:49 AM new
Man, you guys are a tough audience. I say, good for dbest for finding a model that works for him. As someone said here, you have to constantly adjust your approach for continued success. It works better than whining. Really.
)
