Every year, Cyber Monday creates a giant sucking sound on Amazon, where product just moves like crazy. This year may be different because of the current economic climate but you still have to be in the game. It may be slower for items with plus $200 prices (unless they are game systems) but I believe media product and items under $200 will still sell well.
Here are some tips for Amazon sellers:
Make sure Amazon has enough inventory, even if it means you reduce inventory on eBay or another marketplace. FBA sellers will just need to work hard this week to get as much product as they can up to Amazon’s FBA warehouses, so make sure you load up this week.
In the Amazon Marketplace, you don’t have to be the lowest price on Cyber Monday. I know this is counter-intuitive as everybody else is going to be discounting like crazy, but remember […]
Read More…
Most of us know that for commodity items, the lowest price usually gets the sale. That is especially true when it comes to media items. So, after listening to the eBay Top Seller webinar the other day and reading The Brews News’ take on eBay’s Low price Limbo, I figured I would give you my 15%.
What eBay wants for Christmas:
Lowest price on the Internet
Free Shipping
World Class Service
Now, how are they going to accomplish this? Oh, that’s right, they will pull levers to motivate (manipulate) sellers to do their bidding.
When eBay was an auction site, low prices were not a major concern. Most items started with a very low bid (1 cent to 99 cents) and then established a price based on the bidding. All you really needed was two bidders willing to duke it out for the item. Sometimes a seller was fortunate to get much more for their item than […]
Read More…
Amazon will be holding their first selling tips Webinar for this holiday season on Weds. Nov. 19th at 10:30am PST.
What will be discussed:
Managing your inventory, orders, and customer contacts can keep you extremely busy during the holiday season. To help you manage it all effectively, we’re conducting a quick webinar covering:
What to expect during the holidays
How to remain in good standing
Growth opportunities
Sources for further information
Amazon appears to be reaching out more to sellers to provide the information they need to be successful, don’t miss this webinar as space is limited. You do not need to be a current Amazon seller. Also check out the Amazon Seller Support blog for current Amazon related information.
Just my 15%
Read More…
Apparently, eBay has seen the wisdom in making tomorrow’s Top Seller webinar available to all sellers and thanks to Scot Wingo, I can give you the details.
The webinar is being presented by eBay’s top seller team tomorrow (Thursday November 13th) at 1:30pm Pacific, 4:30pm Eastern.
Here are the meeting details:
Webinar link
Meeting ID: 111308 - secret code for attendee entry: ‘attend’
Dial-in detals are: ( 866 ) 501 – 3202 / ( 706 ) 679 - 2073
Conference ID: 72758551
Here’s a sneak peek at the agenda according to Wingo:
Refresher on policy changes
Best Match/Search
Driving demand for the holiday season
Coming soon/2009 preview
I’m going to be listening in and will post after the presentation but I would recommend that you participate if possible. eBay is reaching out to provide information that will help your business, so make time in your schedule. Those sellers who do not get this information may be at […]
Read More…
It may just work!
While, I don’t believe coupons are a viable long-term strategy for eBay or any online retailer for that matter, they certainly are going to be big this holiday season.
eBay just launched their holiday marketing campaign, which is heavily weighted towards coupons and Microsoft CashBack, following a trend on the Internet this holiday season.
According to ComScore, those shoppers ”who earn more than $100,000, “the market meltdown has simply hammered their confidence. They’re on pins and needles,” he says. About 85% of those in this higher bracket agreed with the somewhat apocalyptic statement “I am more afraid about the economic future than ever before.” This group is driving the increase to coupon sites, with 37% more of these shoppers using them than before.”
So the wealthiest online shoppers are flocking to coupons sites for savings.
The nice thing about eBay’s coupon program is that sellers don’t have to discount their product, […]
Read More…
Seattle area TV channel King5 did a news feature on Bonanzle just recently, as the upstart website continues to grow and get recognized.
Alexa Ranking - 77,976
Items listed - >250,000
Users - 8,000
This is pretty impressive for a site that just came out of Beta in August. I will continue to follow the site and provide updates as I get them.
Just my 15%
Read More…
I’m going to be traveling for the next several days, so I may not have a chance to post much, but I wanted to solicit information from you for a project I’m working on.
I believe the only way to force eBay management to change the course they are on is by reaching out to the Board of Directors and specifically Pierre Omidyar, with details on the carnage that their changes have caused, but single letters and individual stories do not carry much weight I will need 100’s of real incidents to make my point. I am asking for my readers to submit their stories, so I can put together a little package for the eBay Board of Directors.
Here are the rules:
No anonymous submissions” If there is no way I can prove what you are saying I won’t include your story. I also need to have as much history on your account […]
Read More…
I get emails quite often lamenting the changes eBay has made to the marketplace business. eBay’s Trust and Safety drags their fishing nets through the marketplace hoping to get the sharks that are causing the most trouble, but more often than not they get the dolphins too. Dolphins are those sellers that get suspended by eBay because their system automatically singles them out for skirting the rules or something more grievous, yet if a human actually looked at the sellers account they would find it was a simple mistake and now they are screwed.
Last week a seller reached out to me with his story. I have decided to post his letter to me because I know him and can vouch for him. Unfortunately his story is not unique.
Yesterday I was a good eBay Seller. I had sold more than 50,000 items totaling more than $2.5M over the past 4 years. […]
Read More…
Don’t let it ever be said that I can’t be positive about something eBay does. Though, like in the post you are about to read, I have many caveats.
ProStores 9.2 With Pay-Per-Sale Marketing - The Announcement
“Hi everyone…this is Matt Ackley, VP of Advertising and Internet Marketing at eBay. Many of our sellers who run their own Web stores face the challenge of marketing their stores in a cost-effective way. With the release of ProStores 9.2, we can now offer sellers a way to take the hassle out of marketing their stores online with zero upfront cost or risk.
ProStores 9.2 includes Pay-Per-Sale Marketing (Beta), a new feature where ProStores can market your store for you and you pay a commission only on sales linked to the traffic we drive to your store. Just set a minimum commission rate of 8% and increase it for more exposure. This makes it possible to get […]
Read More…