How about some advertising from eBid?

[mwhtackle]

I was delighted to come over here after being ripped off by eBay's extortionate fees, I paid my £50.00 and listed a range of my best selling items here. As far as what i have read in these forums goes, I don't think I was the only seller who did this, "Mass Exodus" it was described as in one thread.

So one month on, not one sale, loads of views but still nothing to show for my membership fee.

With all of these £50.00's rolling in, it would have been nice to see some sort of advertising from eBid. I know they advise sellers to promote their items, which I do... and I wear my eBid t-shirt too (honestly, I do!).

The last month has been the perfect opportunity for eBid to throw some sort of advertising into the public domain, "strike while the iron is hot" some would say, but i fear that the iron may be cooling down a bit.

I listed some of my items back on eBay last week, biting my lip as i saw how much it was going to cost me. I listed them in quantity and for 30 days to try and justify the listing fee. 5 days later, most of the items have sold. It was like i had never been away.

Don't get me wrong, I am not going to abandon eBid, I am going to stick it out because I feel that there is going to be a time when there will be a bit more competition in the market and I feel that eBid might have the edge when this does happen.

My only whinge is that with this massive influx of revenue that eBid must have enjoyed over the last month or two, it would have bee nice to see some sort of advertising in some of the tabloids or magazines, bus stops, billboards... anything.

I think eBid has a great selection of sellers, ready to start selling, it is like a huge market in town with everythig laid out on the stalls ready to go... We just need some signposts to let the customers know where we are!

The last thing we want is another mass exodus... back to eBay!

[greycastleus]

I found this site through advertising. It's out there.

[e_nviable]

Sorry to have to say this - your opinion is as valid as any other - but if you were to do a search of the Forums, I think you'd find that this subject has been discussed ad nauseum .........

I hope that elusive sale comes to you soon, but in the meantime here's some useful hints & tips as to things YOU could be doing to market your auctions and help things along a little

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/astral....and_tricks.htm

http://www.bykimbo.com/ebid/help/index.htm

Good luck and happy eBidding !
e

[damian_steele]

OP, eBid ARE advertising.
Check the forums and you'll find details of internet ads, radio ads, billboards ads and more.

[niglee]

Hi G E G

Some very usefull links there, being new to this site i was wondering if you had been a member of e bay before you came to ebid, and if so % wise what if any would you say your sales reduced by, thanks for your time.

[BAGHAG999]

Ive spent a lot more than 50.00 on feebay for a big sales drop and after ringing them apparently its all my own fault the search doesant work.
While here mine have increased .

[kengillam]

When I left Greedbay I had more sales in the first 12 months elsewhere than I had on Greedbay in the previous 12 months, and that didn't take into account the savings on their extortionate fees either.

I see you haven't taken the advice given on these forums either. Add a signature link, change your listings to say 10 days with 10 relists instead of run til sold, and buy a few items to kick start your feedback. Have you contacted your previous customers? get their email addresses from your Paypoo records.

[booksforsale]

You really need to do a fair bit of self publicity here.

Over on the dark side, they did it for us (ahem themselves) and we paid for it through our extortionate fees.

For being able to list for free, indefinitely, on ebid, it is up to us to do some self-marketing.

I also do other bits and pieces on the internet, and to get anywhere it is a numbers game. I know that in sales, quality counts, but selling on the internet you need quantity as well, simply to up your chances of making a sale over the other guy. So the more you have listed, the better chance you will have of selling.

Ebid allows you to list in quantity without the costs associated with the other side. So get listing.

I swear by social networking sites to get interest, especially Flickr. For that to work you need to be very active in Flickr, but it really doesn't take a lot of work. I have made a number of sales on the back of pictures Flickr hosted for me. Be careful though not to be seen as spamming, as there are a minority of anally retentive folk over there. There are a couple or so of ebid interest groups over there and millions of photos for you to comment on (i.e. mention ebid where appropriate). The nature of these social networking sites is to make 'contacts' - mutual contacts generally check out each others' profiles - yours will of course have a rundown of what you do and also have appropriate non-spammy links - i.e. you link to YOUR blog, which in turn links to your ebid shop.

ebid groups

ebid.net
Look what I sold on ebid

Look What I Bought On eBid.net

Should've bought it on ebid

See these threads

http://helpdesk.ebid.net/showthread.php?t=102269

http://helpdesk.ebid.net/showthread.php?t=113072

hope this helps

[rokins_toys]

In all honesty, eBid do advertise, however, those coming to shop on eBid need to want the items you are selling, same story no matter what auction site you're on or even with your own website.

Yes, things sell on Greedbay, and they sell on here too, as long as you have what someone is looking for, and a fair price and fair postage costs too.

I never benefitted from Greedbays advertising, and why? Because I have to compete with over 250 other people selling the same items as me, so sales were lacking. things were good for a bit on greedbay for me, but then, I started seeing my presence on Greedbay pushed to the back in favour of those with anchor shops and featured shops.

Ok, yes, I have almost 200 listings on eBid, but kept my listing on Greedbay under 100, why? Because on Greedbay, I'd have to pay for the priviledge of having an extra couple of pages to list just under 200 items, which would cost me £50.00 per month alone, plus another £50-£60 on top on in listing fees, every 30 days!! And with my sales on Greedbacy so few and far between, it's not worth paying out that kind of money when you're not even generating enough profit to cover those fees in the first place.

Like many will say in this thread, you've got to do your own advertising. You've got to get banners on other websites, like for myself, target places parents and collectors of toys go to fan websites etc. Something I can afford to do now, now that I'm not throwing money of the fire with Greedbay. Them counting MY profit in their pockets every month.

True, eBid could do more with advertising. They could get in the local and national papers a bit more, on local and national radio, hit TV as well, but it's a costly game advertising on that scale and TV adverts will set you back at least £30k just for the advert alone plus any extras like the time of day your advert will be on, prime time costs triple. Even radio can be expensive to advertise on, but if eBid was to limit it mainly to like BBC Radio and Heart FM which cover to massive listening areas in the south and the midlands, that's a few million listeners, but still no guarantee of any increases in sales for anyone - you need to have in stock what someone is looking for at the time they come on to the site, if not, they go elsewhere.

Greedbay will contiune to dominate, until other auction sites can afford the type of advertising Greedbay does, but, we know all too well why Greedbay can afford such massive and costly advertising - through the fees we "use" to pay, and not only that, Greedbay are now earning money from having other people/companies etc advertise on the Greedbay website. eBid has people advertise on the eBid website too, so maybe eBid should consider advertising on those sites that are advertising on here, as well as shop owners doing a bit of online banner advertising themselves.

Advertising is important. You can not rely solely on the advertising of the auction site you're on. If you had or have your own website, you need to advertise it anyway, so it's the same thing. And as above, having in stock what someone is looking for at the time they visit the site, if not, they do go elsewhere.

I have thought about listing one item a month on Greedbay, don't need a shop subscription for that. I went three months without selling a single thing on Greedbay, yet I still have to pay the fees every 30 days. So I think one item per month, if it sells, if not, keep the same item listed for each 30 day cycle until it does sell, but I just refuse to do it out of principal. I refuse to pay their subscriptions and fees when Greedbay's advertising never benefitted me when I have so much competition, and I still have to compete with my competitors on Greedbay, just I can do products cheaper than them now, and sell at a profit rather than breaking even or selling at a loss like most of my competitors are.

I knew starting up on a new site would be difficult and would take time, so I was smart, I've bought less stock for sale online until sales do pick up. And they will pick up and my own banner advertising will add to that. Eventually, especially with collectors of Star Wars stuff, they will see they;re better off shopping with me on eBid rather than with my competitors on Greedbay, because I'm cheaper on product, even undercutting Toys R Us and Woolworths, but with my competitors on Greedbay, I'm much cheaper on postage costs too. And I can afford to do that now because I can cut prices and still make profit, couldn't do that on Greedbay. Now, I can afford to do some deals that I would never have been able to do on Greedbay.

Business is about taking risks. And you need to ask yourself, is it worth having a featured shop paying £50.00 per month plus listing fees for 200 items, then only selling 6 or 7 items per week or month, then maybe going a month or two without selling a single thing, paying out all that money to only have to pay fee after fee, not even generating enough profit to cover anything let alone the fees, or would you rather pay a one off fee, have no monthly fees, pay a massively cheaper Final Value Fee on eBid because they charge a flat rate rather than Greedbays increase the percentage the higher the price of your item, and have to work a little harder and do a bit more advertising yourself?

Some people probably do benefit a little from Greedbays advertising, but only if they have in stock what someone is looking for when they drop by, only if the price is fair and the postage costs too, and then, only if you have very little competition, when you're selling something that a few hundred people are selling, the same item, but various prices, various postage costs, people will not compare every single price and postage cost for that item, which is where I get lost on Greedbay because there's just so many people selling the same thing as me, granted most are selling the new star wars figures for £8.99, £9.99 on average with £2.75 for the first figure and 75p per additional, yet, for me to undercut my competitors on Greedbay, I'd have to sell at a price where I only break even, and that gives me nothing to work with and grow. So I'd rather be on here, cut down on stock buying, save my money, not have monthly fees to meet every month, do some banner advertising directing people directly to my store on eBid, which will hopefully benefit other people on here to because they'll think, ok, I just got my kids star wars figures from here, so I wonder what else may be for sale on eBid with other people.

At the end of the day, you can not rely solely on the acution site's advertising, you have to do your own, even with Greedbay you still have to do your own advertising, even more so on there because of how much competition there is, and then, slowly, over time, you'll build your business up on eBid too.

And with what others have said, don't list everything on Run Until Sold. I've made that mistake on here, and on Greedbay, had everything on Good TIl Cancelled which probably worked against me, as because, potential buyers will think, ok, it's got no end time, they have a few in stock so I'll stop by in a week or so, or on pay day and buy it then, by which time, they've forgotten about you and bought it elsewhere.

Right now, on the list for my shop category, I'm in the top 10 (#5 or #4 I think due to how many items I have listed), and to stay there, I need to have x amount of listings, so I do not want to be relisting items all the time etc, so I figure, like you have, just put everything up on Run Until Sold so you can stay high up in the list, but, no one is saying list every item on shorter time spans, list 5-10 on a shorter time span for 10 days, while keeping a bulk of items listed on Run Until Sold, that way, you'll help boost sales, and instead of listing one item as 5 or whatever amount you have available, list it as only being one available, that way, you have a better chance of selling it other wise, something that happened to me on Greedbay, because I listed something as 3 available, I had 5 people watching it for 6 months with that item never selling, so if I had of listing as one available, I would have stood a better chance of selling it, then when it sold, list it as one available again. Over the next week, I'll be changing some of my Run Until Sold items and switching them to much shorter listings to get more coverage on eBid in the mroe frequently visited area where things end in 7 or 10 or whatever amount of days. There are a lot of items I will leave on Run Until Sold, but the majority of them I have them listed as only one being available despite me having 2 or 3 of that same item because as above, people will watch them for month after month without buying them because they will think, I'll leave it until next month, so shorter listings will help.

Some items I will leave on Run Until Sold because they are bad sellers, like I will have one action figure out of a case of 12 that is a bad seller, so I'll leave it listed until it sells as it helps keep me in the top 10 still, while I gain additional coverage from having shorter listings times for the things that I know will sell quicker, like the newer just released items. So stock left over from last year, I'll leave on Run Until Sold, while the new stock I'm buying I'll list on shorter listings maybe 10 days or so.

[kengillam]

By far the best advertising is word of mouth, if you get a bargain or absolutely first class service, you tell everyone. So if ebid sellers provide bargains and impeccable service it will encourage more to come and look. Steady progress is being made as the feedback of many show.

The current economic climate will make things very tough, but at least here you won't be paying fees every month to list and not sell like a certain other place.