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Retro: Debatable, but definitely in the top group for 80’s movies…
Luftmentsh: Yep. She is quoting Better Off Dead
Ryanne: Yep! Love it!
Retro: Better Off Dead! Excellent!
βThis mountain is pure snow! Do you know what the street value of this mountain is?β
07/11/2018 at 12:57 pm in reply to: Scavenger Life Episode 368: Is Our Business an eBay Hack? #45149Absolutely agree with you SalarySteve!
I should probably preface this more often, but we always come from a perspective of Full Time Sellers where eBay is 80%-90% of our income. If eBay is on the side, or not your major source of income, then the validity of any advice to forecast, review listings, etc. has to be seen through that lens.
I think the forum is great because of these different perspectives. Many, many part timers, some retirement sellers, some where eBay is one of a few strong streams of income, and some where eBay is the One Thing.
And cash needs for the business revenue is different as well. Single and no kids? Low burn rate. Married with 2 kids in college in an urban setting (US!). High burn rate (and we are frugal everywhere else).
So needs for the income change the work invested to gain the most profit potential.
Been there and would be right there with you.
A buddy and I once had an entire conversation…only in movie quotes…
Got damn funny in parts!
07/11/2018 at 11:46 am in reply to: Scavenger Life Episode 368: Is Our Business an eBay Hack? #45139Retro: I would say that 1 week is too short to tell. The buyer that would have paid that may have been gone that week. Or 50% may not be enough.
This is why I don’t do auctions much anymore. Unless the demand is high, the chances of a sale are low.
The bait has to be in the water longer than that. Our average sale is 120 day. Meaning the average time it is on eBay before a sale is 120 days. And that is just the items sold (doesn’t count the long tail items that are still Unsold).
I think any test on this platform has to be much longer. A month at least. And even then, depending on seasonality of the items, it may not be long enough.
I got a lot of christmas stuff, sweaters, jackets, and suits that are looking long tail right now… but will be nice to have come Q4.
07/11/2018 at 11:39 am in reply to: Scavenger Life Episode 368: Is Our Business an eBay Hack? #45137Interesting on your take on GTC. Have you looked at your traffic numbers on eBay? Specifically the eBay Views vs the O/S eBay Views, both before the switch to after? It would be interesting to see if you can follow the O/S View drop to your switch from GTC.
Always an opportunity cost in every action taken. Yes, you could have done more new listings. But your knowledge of your business, what works, what doesn’t, would be less.
There are few paths of new learning that don’t yield a positive result. You don’t know if you don’t try. And skills in one place yield skills in another.
Had I never spent time forecasting our numbers, I would have been freaking out when cash is low after hiring a new person. Yet I know the hole is 4 months long, and we have about one more month to go.
All in perspective on what you learn with your time…
07/11/2018 at 11:33 am in reply to: Scavenger Life Episode 368: Is Our Business an eBay Hack? #45135I have a (loose) theory that how a person handles fishing says a lot about how they handle life…
07/11/2018 at 11:01 am in reply to: Scavenger Life Episode 368: Is Our Business an eBay Hack? #45129Thanks for the heads up Mike. We only had a couple of items on sale recently, and those that were are no damage.
Interesting news on the GTC vs 30-Day issue. I hope to talk to the eBay folks at length on this issue, especially how “stale” listings are ranked in search. I have no problem going to GTC as long as we don’t get dropped in search by being “stale”. Last time we did GTC…sales tanked for 3 months. We went back to 30 Day and sales popped back up.
Ostap – Here is our trajectory. Other results may vary…
2015
Starting Inventory – 331
Ending Inventory – 808
Average Sales per Week – 392016
Starting Inventory – 808
Ending Inventory – 1,225
Average Sales per Week – 472017
Starting Inventory – 1,225
Ending Inventory – 1,644
Average Sales per Week – 682018
Starting Inventory – 1,644
Current Inventory – 2,405
Average Sales per Week – 8007/11/2018 at 10:44 am in reply to: Scavenger Life Episode 368: Is Our Business an eBay Hack? #45124Very good points. The mindsets are different between the two. The key may be in how to use the tools that are at hand in conjunction with the type of items that are sold and the goals of the seller.
There is only “good” and “bad” metrics based on the type of store and goals. You and Jay and Ryanne have shown that long tail stores can be successful. They just require large inventories, and the risks and rewards that go with it. Possible obsolescence, but less requirement to “feed the beast”.
Just don’t think you can get rich quick or recoup capital fast with this type of store. It is long term strategy, and pretty much a lifestyle. It is definitely a winning strategy. But sales are less frequent, storage is an issue, and if cash is an issue, know that you will invest in inventory and labor (if you have employees) and you will not see that investment pay off for a long time.
If you Churn and Burn, know that you will get your investment back, but less money per hour, you will always have to source. Inventory is less of an issue, but more work is required.
I love metrics on our store (and others) as it shows what each store is generating. All types can be successful, you just can’t expect A when your store is B.
π
Mike: “Strange game. The only winning move is…not to play”
π
My favorite: “Mr McKitrick…After careful consideration I have come to the conclusion that your new computer system sucks!”
I update and graph out the following data by day:
Listing Impressions
eBay Page Views
O/S eBay Page Views
TransactionsI find it interesting to see what type of traffic our store is generating. This is the only view into how many “customers are browsing your store”.
I line this up with our Inventory level to see some percentages.
Page Views as a % of Impressions – What percentage of the time does a shopper click on our item when it is on the screen in front of them? For us, currently 1.5%.
Transactions as a % of Page Views – What percentage of the time does a shopper purchase our item when they click our listing? For us, 1.46%.
Impressions per Transaction – How many Impressions does it take to land a sale? Right now, we are at about 4,400. So we have to get our listing in front of a shopper 4,400 times to get a sale.
This leads to Jay’s point about needing a good size inventory to get consistent sales. We are selling our items about 4 times as fast as Jay and Ryanne, and we still have to have our item put in front of over 4,000 people before we get a sale.
Plus, it is interesting to see that we have about 40,000 impressions per day right now. Imagine a store that has 40,000 people per day looking at your items!
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