Author Topic: Buying and Selling on Ebay  (Read 15277 times)

Offline Clonehead

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #15 on: January 28, 2010, 08:01:59 PM »
Dudes, the more I read into this, the more it upsets me. I have enjoyed operating that little ebay store for years and have used it to supplement my income during the slow times, like this one.  I still haven't decided what I am going to do, at this point but it is obvious that buying and selling on ebay is going to become worse for all involved. With higher fees and rates, sellers are going to be forced to push the price onto the buyers and the prices will rise. I guess that ebay no longer cares for the common small everyday seller which is who the site was created to serve, in the first place.

Offline RunDown

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #16 on: February 01, 2010, 06:24:47 PM »
Is it possible to sell here on the shipyards?   Why not set up auctions on here, and for a while, pay for the ad on ebay, and reference this website,.  State that many popular customizers will soon be selling here.  All of us who are still trying to somehow make it thru the gauntlet of ebay fees would be happy to do the same.     I would be glad to sell only on here, and kick somebody something for the ad space.    just my thoughts . . . . .
sean aka customsd

Offline Clone_General_1977

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #17 on: February 01, 2010, 06:40:36 PM »
I think that idea sounds pretty cool.

Offline Clonehead

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #18 on: February 01, 2010, 06:41:55 PM »
Well, we do sell here, on the Shipyards. I have sold resin parts here for over a year now and several of our members sell figures and vehicles here.

As far as sending shoppers here from ebay, It's a good plan, although I don't know what it would cost to advertise about the shipyards on ebay. I do have links to the shipyards in my ebay listings and some of my ebay customers have bought stuff from me, here, but I don't mention in my ebay listings that I sell stuff here. I don't think it matters much as I believe that the official rule is that our ebay listings are supposed to be at least two clicks away from anything for sale on any other site. I have even invited many of our members here from ebay"your self included". The vast amount of traffic is the only thing that makes it enticing to sell on evil bay as the more traffic you get, the more sales that you get.

In your case, Ric-Saie, they are raising your final value fees for all of your auctions as well as the insertion fees for your fixed price auctions. I believe that the open auction listing fees will be the same although that hasn't been mentioned much, yet. This will work good for your custom figure auctions as I believe that you start them under $1, right?

Offline RunDown

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #19 on: February 01, 2010, 06:54:16 PM »
Yes true, due to be able to count on a good sale these days, I can start them low and not have to worry about them making it up to what i would like to get to at least break even.
And you're right CH, the reason  I found the yards before and after you talked to me was your ads.   I followed the link a couple times.   
I too will start mentioning the yards in my ads.  And will look into how its set up to sell here.   I knew I had seen that but hadn't looked into it. 
I am definitely not loyal to a site that is going to continue to find reasons to increase prices, even tho the cyber world is only getting less expensive to operate in!   
ps I also have a facebook account where I can mention this - however unless someone is a member, isn't access fairly limited?

Offline Clonehead

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #20 on: February 01, 2010, 10:35:11 PM »
Sean,
I put all of my parts for sale here, in the parts bin thread which would be a good place to put custom figures for sale, also. Also, there is the Star Wars for sale thread. And, yes, we also have a feedback board. I report feedback there when members complete a transaction with me here, or even on ebay.

True that until you are a member here, all you can do is look and read but not post.

I have started preparing for the big ebay change and have started shrinking the store and currently only have 63 items for sale, there, down from 90 or so. By the time the change occurs, I plan to have my listings shrank down to about 50. I have also killed my picture manager which gave me more space to store pics and allowed me to post more pics per listing without an added cost per picture, past the one free one. I figured out how to post hosted pics in my auctions for free using html and can now use that method to put more than one pic in each listing. None of that will matter after the change as then, a store owner will be able to have ebay host up to 12 per listing without the extra fees so you see, the picture manager wasnt going to be needed anyway. That will save me $10 a month and with that savings and cutting myself down to 50 auctions in the store, my cost will be about the same that it has been. The real question is, after the change, with all fixed price listings getting full exposure and the flood of all of the 99cent listings that will be out there, will anyone see my listings any more than if they were just sitting in my store getting limited esposure like they do now.

I do know one thing, I have been getting more sales, this week. either it is because alot of sellers have been dropping out as they are angry about the change, or since i shrank the store, my auctions are easier to navigate within the store. It could be both. I will have to check my traffic coming from youtube and here, Perhaps they are all coming from Jay's channel. Whatever the case, it is helping me to kock down some of the extra inventory.

Offline wraithnine

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #21 on: February 02, 2010, 05:23:52 AM »
That's one reason I gave up on Ebay alltogether,  they are pricks and add the fact they own paypal, they basically screw you twice on many types of transactions.

  Maybe a ISY storefront is in order

that is an excellent idea !
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Offline Tamer

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #22 on: February 03, 2010, 11:35:37 AM »
Hmmm....I have a few wheels turning here. We have our regular For Sale thread where you can list anything you would like and we have it broken down into Star Wars and Non-Star Wars. Would any of you be interested in a dedicated web page(s) off our main page where I would list your items you have for sale and set it up kinda like a regular auction? Perhaps I could also offer front page exposure to your listing? Now, that would entail a decent amount of web work so perhaps a small fee would be involved per listing, but nothing like ebay fees and there would be nothing you would get hit for after the sale.  You would just email or pm your pics and your text you wanted included for your auction and I would get it listed.  Don't mean to jack your thread here Clint, but besides our free for sale threads perhaps this is a service Shipyarders would like? Wouldn't it be great to become the dedicated Star Wars For Sale Site? Like I said, just thinking out loud. Let me know if that is something you might like.

Offline Clonehead

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #23 on: February 03, 2010, 12:01:22 PM »
You sure you are not biting off more than you can chew here, buddy? Sounds like a great idea and one that our members would enjoy from both ends. It sure could mean more members and more traffic for the site.

Would one have to be a shipyards member to purchase from this page? I would think so.

Offline Clone_General_1977

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #24 on: February 03, 2010, 12:08:12 PM »
I agree with Clint on being a member to buy stuff.Another idea,  If they are a member who has made the FP at least once, they should get a discount, in my opinion.

Offline Tamer

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #25 on: February 03, 2010, 02:21:15 PM »
I don't know if I would be biting off too much Clint, like I said, I might have to charge a small fee (perhaps a dollar or two per listing (just thinking out loud) and if you wanted more exposure (front page more than once, bigger pictures, more than one picture, clickable picture to a bigger one,  longer listing time, etc.) perhaps another dollar or two, but I wouldn't want to charge our members much and I would have to get with Wayne and Pat to flesh this out a bit more as I am just thinking out loud now folks, but I have thought about this a small bit before mentioning it as I do think we can help our members here with thier auctions and sell thier stuff. 

As for discounts, I do agree that our members here should recieve discounts, more so than the general public who just wants to sell thier stuff here. I think we could actually allow non members to sale too, but would have to decide how selling folks would want contacted, either via pm or email, or the whole thing to go through me period and I send out the messages, etc. It still needs fleshed out a bit. Still, if members would like something like this, be willing to pay a small fee, I think I can speak for Wayne and Pat when I say we could probably get this set up through our Site. You guys wouldn't believe the page views we get a day so I feel pretty good now that we could through the use of the main page, peripherals, and forums that we could help you guys get your items sold and keep more money in your pocket than ebay will let you. If I see more interest posted here, I will start a poll where we can see if members would want this and if so I will look into setting up a Shipyards Storefront as Wayne has suggested.

Offline Reconsgt

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #26 on: February 03, 2010, 02:26:08 PM »
I have an idea on how thi smay work for all parties,

Shawn, Pat   lets discuss offline and give it a trial



Offline RunDown

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #27 on: February 03, 2010, 07:29:26 PM »
Here is two more cents from a new member :   If ebay is going to continue this trend, I for one have nothing to lose by trying to sell a couple customs here.     I have no idea how much exactly sells here, but it seems as though people offer things up for sale regularly, so there must be some movement.   
I guess my point is that I agree wholeheartedly with the idea of moving the custom ebay business, here!

Offline narceron

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #28 on: February 03, 2010, 08:42:30 PM »
I do not like EBay, as they shrink, they are attempting to get more and more from fewer and fewer, I closed my store up years ag0, :(

Offline Art deWhill

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Re: Buying and Selling on Ebay
« Reply #29 on: January 18, 2011, 05:21:05 AM »
just found this topic, looked over it and learned alot about this figure and customs sales and the market. For I am not an official licenced star wars artist its not possible to sell or trade my artworks (in public), anyway it was very interesting to read about all your thoughts and opinions regarding ebay, costs and sales page - expaning my horizion :)