The Secret To Boosting Sales on eBay!

by Kathy Terrill | Jul 31, 2016 | eCommerce News, eCommerce Selling Tips, Selling on eBay

I’ve just returned from the exciting eBay seller event eBay OPEN in Las Vegas!

When you get eBay sellers together, you know that they are interested in hearing about increasing their sales!

2 of the eBay OPEN workshops for sellers dovetailed nicely. The 2 workshops were Marketing On eBay and Using eBay Stores To Build Your Business. Both workshops were targeted to eBay store owners.

Nick Shah, a Group Manager at eBay for B2C Seller Growth was joined by eBay‘s Gaurav Jain, Adi Behara and Deepak Pillai in the Marketing on eBay workshop. Dylan Henryson eBay‘s Senior Director of COO Seller Experience and Kevin Clark spoke at the Using eBay Stores To Build Your Business presentation.

Both teams explained the 1-2 punch for eBay store sellers of using paid Promotions integrated with Promotions Manager.

Powerful eBay Sales Combination!

For paid promoted listings, the Marketing on eBay presenters clearly explained that eBay store sellers ONLY pay the promotion fee IF the item selected is sold from a customer clicking and buying through the promoted link. If a customer finds the promoted item from a Google search, or through social media work the seller does and buys through those searches, the seller DOES not pay a Promoted Listing sales fee for those sales.

eBay‘s Promoted listings is NOT pay per impression.

Dylan Henryson in the eBay Stores presentation compared Promoted Listings to Google adwords. Dylan emphasized that with eBay‘s Promoted Listings the seller only pays for the sale from a customer clicking and buying the item through the Promoted listing. There are no fees for impressions without purchases.

Gaurav Jain pointed to Promoted Listings as a powerful tool to increase the visibility of seller’s eBay Store listings, eBay store categories and the seller’s entire eBay store.

Let’s say you sell coffee mugs. When you promote 1 multi quantity mug, most sellers  find increased traffic and sales to that eBay store category and their entire eBay store. The promoted mug works to increase customer traffic overall in the seller’s eBay store

Get Customer Traffic With Promoted Listings!!

You’re only paying a fee when the customer clicks the promoted link. The residual traffic is a bonus!

Promoted Listings are available for multi quantity fixed price items in an eBay store in certain categories. Click Here for the FAQ information from eBay.

If the seller only sells 1 of a kind items I have discovered a work around. Let’s say you sell coffee mugs. You have no multi quantity fixed price items as your mugs are each unique and one of a kind. Go on eBay, or a local retailer and buy 2 of an interesting mug. Go on eBay and list the multi quantity mug. Then go to your growth tab in Seller Hub, click the Marketing tab to access Promoted Listings and select your promotion rate and launch your promotion.

This short video from eBay shows you how to set up a promotion in Promotions Manager

Test different promoted items and categories and see what works best for you and your eBay store. eBay gives you the data you need in your Promoted Listings dashboard.

Ready for part 2 of the 1-2 punch to increase your eBay store sales? Part 2 is using Promotions Manager.

Deepak Pillai stated that eBay has data showing that sellers using Promotions Manager see a 10% increase in sales across their entire eBay store. He further stated that 75% of shoppers are looking for some kind of deal, sale or promotion.

Shoppers Look For Deals, Sales And Promotions!

eBay is a very competitive marketplace.

Online selling competition will only increase. When you showcase an item in a Promotion through eBay‘s Promotions Manager you greatly increase the likelihood of a shopper browsing and buying from you. An effective promotion with Promotions Manager helps to keep the eBay shopper in YOUR store. Experiment to see what groupings and what promotions in Promotions Manager work best for your items.

I find micro niching promotions effective.

To get ideas of content I look at shopping blogs and brick and mortar retail to see how they are grouping products. I also use Terapeak to investigate my competitors and see what Promotions they may be using.

Deepak Pillai encouraged sellers to use Promotions Manager to get traffic during retail moments (Back To School, Christmas etc), to put the spotlight on newly arrived inventory and to clean out stale inventory.

Adi Behara pointed to the importance of firing Promotions with Promotions Manager at the best time to get traffic. He reminded sellers that eBay spends enormous amounts of money to bring shoppers to eBay around retail moments. Targeting Promotions to these moments has immense value. Promotions in Promotions Manager also have social sharing buttons for the sellers to use to gain additional traffic from Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.

eBay helps sellers target their Promotions with a retail calendar in Promotions Manager.

eBay Retail Calendar!

eBay Retail Calendar

Back to School shoppers are on eBay now! With my FREE The Ultimate Guide To Back To School Products target your inventory for Back To School shoppers and score sales!

Use fixed price multi quantity listings in Promoted Listings. Combine that with Back To School promotions in Promotions Manager now to increase your eBay store sales! Click HERE to get your free guide!

Adi Behara emphasized that every eBay store is different and it’s important to test promotions and tweak promotions.

Promoted listings done right are an effective tool for sellers to drive traffic to their eBay store. Once there, targeted promotions through Promotions Managers fired at the right time converts shoppers to buyers!

All the eBay staff at both presentations at eBay OPEN emphasized the importance of sellers testing and finding the right combination for for their shoppers. Both Promoted Listings and Promotions Manager offer data and suggestions to help sellers make effective choices.

eBay Store Owners using these Promoted Listings and Promotions Manager see increased traffic and sales!

eBay gives sellers the tools to increase visibility and sales with 1-2 punch of Promoted Listings and Promotions Manager!