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Good Morning:
Having a discussion here at MDC Galleries in Atlanta about the start up of a new Etsy Store. We have the notion that since we use a listing software program that will not only handle Ebay listings but will keep data about items that are sold on other platforms and prvide reports on items that get sold off Ebay.So we were thinking about just taking all of our Ebay Listings [approx. 748 at this time] and cross list all of them in an Etsy store. For those of you here at SL that sell on Ebay, the question is what are your thoughts on cross listing [actually duplicating your Ebay store] 100% on Etsy?
One thing that is not a problem for us is that we are two people that work our store full time and do so about 14 to 16 hours a day, 7 days a week. And when we are out of the office we have mobile apps that tie us into our home office server. So any sale that takes place can be deleted off of either venue within minutes of it getting sold. So, removing the thought or fear of something might sell twice [very slim probability] then what are everyone’s thoughts about duplicating / cross listing all of one’s items for sale on both platforms?
Thanks for any replies ….
mike at MDC Galleries in Atlanta -
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Hey Jay:
From what I gather from a couple of sources.. One is that I can use WonderLister to export a file that will import into Etsy. WL will create a .CSV file and then I will edit that file to only contain the columns that will import into Etsy. Doing some experiments this week, but I did one into Shopify and everything worked and moved over except some scrambling of the item specifics.Also the WL Tech. Engineers are also working with Etsy for permission to access Etsy directly and developing a module that will do the same thing it can do on Ebay. Unsure of how long before it goes live. It is not even in BETA yet, but I hear that is coming. If successful, then everything would be automatic, and as you have said before though, it will have a subscription cost associated with it. But we are willing to pay to have “Robots” do a lot of work for us. LOL 🙂
Worst case scenario will be as we create a listing and upload to Ebay from WL, then just copy and paste the listing into Etsy one at a time. I can pull the description from WL as either HTML code or directly from the WYSIWYG view. I use two monitors side by side so having multiple views and screen open really helps. And I think there is either a third party app that helps do this. Depending on cost, that would be an option that would just be classified as a “cost of doing business” for us.
Then of course as you and I have heard we will have to do some interior work on the Etsy listing by inputting the meta tags, tweaking the title and paying attention to standard SEO protocols that Google pays attention to.
Guess you can see we are just on the beginning cusp of maybe doing this. So, if we have to just create two separate manual listings we will. Just more time but probably worth it if Sales increase.
Wonder what Omfug and others on here that have a stable Etsy store do for their process?
But the fear of selling an item when it is cross listed just doesn’t concern us.
mike in atl.
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Good day Mike. I’ll be behind you and would love to hear how it goes and whether you find a third party service to assist effectively. I haven’t heard anyone mention one before for importing to Etsy. Margaret at Texas Gal Treasures on Youtube did a video I believe discussing cross posting plus a how to Esty video involving both. If I remember correctly she posts first in Etsy and then in Ebay.
I just don’t have time to stay on top of it and I also sell newer items on Ebay. Things like vintage wrapping paper (just as one example) are not getting many views on Ebay, but allegedly sell quite well on Etsy for more than my current Ebay prices. I think more of my vintage listed items that have been sitting on Ebay would go on Etsy. So, I see them as two different markets with some more collectible crossover items that would appeal to both consumers. Since I’m so part-time, two separate inventories make sense for me. I’d love to hear about how sales go once you get things on both platforms concurrently. Perhaps you’ll see some patterns in the types of items you can share with us. Good luck!
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Hi Christine:
Thanks for the reply. I will follow up on researching and viewing the videos you mentioned. We are eager to see how it goes also. Will check out those videos before we make our next move onto Etsy.
Will definitely post back the results and the trials and tribulations of the process after we work through it all.
Thanks for the reply…
mike at mdc galleries in atlanta-
Mike I don’t see any problem with cross posting your entire store from eBay to etsy. I pretty much do the same thing except I have a lot of things on eBay that are newer and can’t be posted on etsy. I don’t remember ever selling something on etsy and eBay at the same time. I just end my eBay listing if an item sells on etsy. I wish stuff was selling so fast I couldn’t keep up with that 🙂
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I have about 30% of my inventory cross listed–I do it the old fashioned way, but since I tend to find the same sort of things over and over, I use my previous sold listings on etsy (which thankfully never fall off) as templates–makes listing go much faster.
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You’re welcome Mike. I also like this gal, Carly, who doesn’t cross post so much but sometimes discusses in her videos which platform she lists on. She also uses a photo editor effectively to make the most of her 5 photos. Here’s a link to her channel playlist with a listing how to
I’m sure there are others, but these are just two who I found. Don’t forget to report back. People often say their stores are slow to take off in Etsy. I suggest pinning your listings when you create or revise them.-
Appreciate the reply and reference links. I listened to several of her videos using headphones. Boy her rapid fire, non-stop delivery with her high pitched voice, gets a little tough after several of these, :-).. but found some interesting tips here and there.
Thanks… mike at mdc galleries in atlanta
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Ok: Time for an update and new round of questions.
We finally got around to proceeding with cross listing some of our Ebay inventory in our Etsy store. We have 890 items in our Ebay store and now have 122 of those items also listed in the Etsy store.
We have worked out a fairly quick process of getting the Ebay listing into the Etsy form mainly by just copy and pasting. Actually it is fairly quick. I did 17 of them the other day.
We now have several custom folders created in WonderLister where we will be able to track and handle the separartion of items on both platforms. WonderLister is still working on their cross platform module and we are told that will be coming in a new release in the near future. until then we have just customized WL ourselves to keep things segregated.
OK, now on to the questions for the ScavengerLife Etsy members.
We noticed that as we started to grow the Etsy listings, we started to get our listings and the store “Favorited” by a number of Etsy members. We can also see on the Etsy stats area that the number of views are starting to climb and the graph is climbing upwards. But no sales as of yet, thus “zero” feedbacks and or sales showing. At 122 listings guess it is time for the next step to try to get some “juice” going. What do all of the SL Etsy sellers suggest to do at this step?
* Do we need to start visiting other Etsy stores and “favorite” there store and items?
* Start participating in the discussion forums like we do here at SL?
* Start running Sales, or what?We remember years ago Jay saying that 250 listings was the magic number on Ebay. Is that the case on Etsy. We just need to keep adding items and the more we have then Etsy will start paying some attention? We think there are going to be about 350 to 400 listings +/- that will qualify as “vintage” and suitable for placing on Etsy.
So, would appreciate it for any insight into what all of the SL Etsy sellers started to do to give a kick start to their Etsy stores once they started to accumulate a number of Etsy listings.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Mike at MDC Galleries in Atlanta
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I am a part-timer on eBay but have been selling since 1999 with a couple of different stores. I have about 500 listings, typically. I opened an ETSY store in 2013 and listed duplicates of my vintage stuff for about 18 months. After that, I closed the ETSY store. I found ETSY was only accounting for about 10% of my sales. The extra listing time just didn’t seem worth it. I know ETSY has grown in popularity since 2013, so I’m wondering if it might be worth giving it another go. Does anyone have duplicate listings (vintage stuff) and a comparison of sales between their ETSY & eBay stores? Thx.
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Mike at MDC Galleries in Atlanta,
I have an Etsy Store. I had it for a while and tried to sell handmade jewelry on it. It didn’t sell there, so I just stopped listing. More recently, I have started listing vintage items. One of the draws for me is the variations option in listings. I saw that another cookbook seller was essentially putting up a lot of books and counting the titles as the variation. You can have 10 variations per listing. So, 10 books for 4 months is 1/2 cent per month listing expense. Plus the seller fees are %3.5 of purchase price not counting shipping costs to Etsy and 3% + 25 cents of sales priced plus shipping costs for the credit card vendor (“etsy payment”). That is significantly lower than the final value fees on eBay, particularly now that insertion fees are jumping to 30 cents and FVF are going to 10% Plus 3% to PP or whoever their successor is.
I have about 25 listings in my Etsy store now (www.etsy.com/shop/reclaimeddame). I have sold one encyclopedia set for $150 and accidentally only charged $5 for shipping, bringing the price down by about 30 bucks. Still was a profit and the STR on that is obviously good, but lacking in statistical significance with that low count. My friend purchased and item for me and left me good feedback. I honestly think that is a necessity in the beginning. I also know that pinning your listings on pinterest actually draws visitors in. Because Esty makes it so easy to do, it seams worthwhile.
Because I have a limit of 1000 items in my store on eBay, I’m going to start putting all my vintage books on Etsy to free up space. I may also put my vintage clothing there too. I have to spread the wealth around so to speak, eBay fees will kill me before I get off the ground if I don’t.
As with anything, there’s a learning curve. I’ll keep my eye out for best practices you all discover along the way and I’ll post them here on this thread as well.
happy listing! Marjean
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Wondering if anyone wants to chime in with recent cross-posting experience? I’m considering re-starting my Esty store, hoping to get more interest in my vintage (mid to late 19th century jewelry).
I’ve got jewelry listed on Poshmark, eBay and Mercari. I thought it would be doing better on eBay and Mercari with the free shipping, but it seems slower than my other categories.
Here’s the majority of my jewelry up for sale if you are interested in what I am hoping to sell:
https://poshmark.com/closet/chaoticgood?department=Women&category=JewelryOther facts about my possible plan and me as a seller:
The cross-posting would probably be done manually. I’d enroll in Etsy payments, which wasn’t available when I last sold on Etsy. I’m a part-time seller, and have decent photography skills. I’m more motivated to make money these days as we just had to purchase a new family car.-
A few thoughts.
I have cross posted on Etsy for a few years and the last few months have been pretty dismal on that platform for me. That being said, it being the Christmas season I would think it would be a good time to cross post.
Another thought I had was that jewelry seems to be an over saturated category on etsy. I don’t know how vintage jewelry fares in comparison to new handcrafted. Your photos are really nice so I think you would make good competition for other vintage jewelry selllers.
Of all of the platforms I list on, ebay and etsy take the most amount of time to create a listing. Etsy has changed photo size requirements recently which I’m having a hard time figuring out. The photos that used to work for me no longer work and I have to edit the size just for etsy. That is a time suck so I’m more picky about what I cross post to etsy.
Since you are selling a lightweight item I would work shipping into your price and offer free shipping. Without free shipping your items get pushed down. I offer it on everything except large heavy items.
I did find that after etsy rolled out etsy payments my sales went up but they have gone back down again in the last few months.
Fourth quarter is always my best time of year on etsy. I sell miscellaneous vintage. I also cross post on poshmark, ebay and mercari Hope this helps 🙂
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