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All you can do is represent your reason with PayPal. I have found them to be willing to listen and they don’t always rule for the buyer.
I haven’t seen that unless I make a change to any aspect of the policy, that will trigger a new policy with a generated name. Back when I was listing with InkFrog, which has been years ago, I used to get a new policy for every listing it seemed. Just one of the reasons I went away from them. It took me quite a bit of work to clean that up and just have a few standard policies.
12/03/2019 at 6:03 pm in reply to: Porch Pirates on Steroids. 297 packages left outside closed Post Office stolen. #71321
I was chatting about this with the clerk at our post office this afternoon. She said she had found bags of Amazon packages at the back door several times when she opened at 7:30, but now they are being handed off somewhere upstream and come in with the other mail. I thought to myself I guess it’s a good thing to live in a small town, but then I looked up Pioneer, its population was 1,094 at the 2010 census, abut the same size as my town.
I used to do detective work when I found an item that wasn’t listed, but over time I became less interested in why and just got it relisted. I’m more concerned about the opposite situation where something sells that I no longer have, that situation causes extra customer service work and can be a bad experience for the buyer.
The process I am using now reduces these inventory issues. I use a picklist from my inventory app to pull daily orders, that list shows the number remaining and I physically verify if qty shows zero or only a few remaining on multi-quantity listings. Maybe once or twice a month I find an error and correct it without it ever becoming an issue. I started using the inventory app to keep inventory in sync between multiple marketplaces and the picklist is a bonus benefit.
I can also print the inventory list for an audit, but I haven’t done that for quite some time but probably should.
I dislike that offers we send don’t show up in offer history. I received an offer yesterday which I countered only to have the buyer reply to say I sent them an offer to them for $xx.xx a few days ago. Kinda’ makes us look foolish I think.
In my opinion, it’s not good to attack the buyer in feedback. Think about what other potential buyers might conclude about you based only on the feedback you leave. Better to be more professional, perhaps something like “I’m sorry you are unhappy, but there is no smoking at our end. Please return”.
Really slow, as expected with my product line.
I started selling almost 11 years ago when I was 60 in order to have something to do in retirement and perhaps add to my retirement savings if things went well. About 3 years in I lost my job due to outsourcing and was out of work for 17 months. That’s when I really ramped up the business and I was able to survive that challenge without having to dig into my retirement accounts or savings. Then I worked another 3 years until finally retiring from my paycheck job at the end of 2015. Now selling is something to fill my days.
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This reply was modified 1 year, 9 months ago by
Old Dad.
60-80 orders per week on average.
That will go down starting this week, we don’t have giftable items. That will drop to 40-50 orders from now to mid-January since we don’t have giftable items.
We have an advantage in that we are in the center of the country with a narrower spread on shipping costs. Most of my items are light enough to go first class, or they can ship in a flat rate box or the USPS cubic rate on small heavy items. For heavier large items I only have free shipping to the Continental U.S. I take into consideration expected shipping cost when sourcing items and stay away from heavier and odd-sized items.
I rarely lose money on an order due to shipping cost, it just all averages out in the bigger picture. Since I don’t specify shipping service, just economy or extra cost expedited, I can choose the lowest cost shipping option that will get the order to the buyer on time.
I used to use calculated shipping and was worried about the effect of free shipping on profit. The total shipping as a percentage of sales is actually lower, while sales went up noticeably.
There are 2 or 3 other sellers for most listings I sell on over on Amazon, maybe up to 10 or more on very common parts. I generally see the same 3-5 other sellers but not on every listing but I don’t pay a lot of attention to that.
In general, prices are higher on Amazon and using the same price there will make me competitive or lowest and I can often sell for a higher price there. I generally hold the Buy Box on 30-50% of my items, many of which I am the only seller.
Most 3rd party sellers on Amazon offer free shipping (of course all the FBA sellers do), I rarely see a seller who charges shipping having the Buy Box.
It’s a jungle over there (a jungle river) and it’s not the same as eBay. It’s strictly business and what is good for Amazon, sellers get treated better currently on eBay. It’s 1/3 of my sales buy 1/2 of my problems or more.
Oh, by the way, there is no need to apologize at all, if I came across as upset it wasn’t intended. I’ve listened to most of the podcasts you and Ryanne do and I can see we have many of the same general ideas and outlook on selling (and life too I think).
Sell (whatever you can find cheap) and be free.
I don’t see us as an Amazon-like business. We were selling on eBay for about 4 years before expanding to sell on Amazon. We sell NOS (new old stock) auto parts which typically fit 1990-2010 models, with some parts for older and newer models. I’m pretty sure the typical eBay or Amazon customer has never bought or is interested in what we sell but there is a definite demand.
We source and buy what would otherwise be scrap (trash) and make it available to folks who need or want it.
I am one that dislikes paid shipping as a shopper because it makes it harder to compare prices. For one-off more unique/vintage/expensive items like many here sell, I can see that paid shipping could be a better model.
About 99% of my items have free shipping, or free to the continental U.S. shipping, and I have been doing that for over 5 years. It works for me but I have a different type of product line (NOS auto parts).
I was able to pick out the URL from the page source code. https://imgur.com/yS8kUuu
I’d like to see the other side of that part and the dimensions.
11/26/2019 at 8:23 pm in reply to: Listing on Amazon, UPC not found for items from Sears, Can’t Seem to add. #71101You will find out that way if Sears, or more likely Craftsman, is a restricted brand when you try to complete the listing. I think you are OK but Amazon seems to want to keep the restricted brands a secret, so much for transparency.
Ther is an unofficial list in this Amazon seller forum thread, https://sellercentral.amazon.com/forums/t/latest-list-of-pay-to-play-restricted-brands-and-its-growing-daily/187172
That was started in 2016, so don’t just go by the first post other brands have been added as responses as they were discovered. I’m sure it’s not 100% accurate.
I strongly recommend listing those as Used-Like New or Used-Very Good instead of new. That hurts sales a little but I sell parts with those conditions all the time. If there are no other sellers you will do well anyhow.
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This reply was modified 1 year, 9 months ago by
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