Power Sellers Unite

pshah · Joined: 17 Oct 2010 Posts: 1

Hi all,

Just trying to figure this out.

I have been selling on Amazon for about 6 months.

Before October 5th, 2010, I had about 5 to 10 orders per day, then all of a sudden, it slows down, to getting about 1 order a day, then on October 14th I get 14 orders on that day, then after that, i.e. on Friday and Saturday I get only 1 order per day?

What's happening? does anyone have any ideas? I have a feeling Amazon is either doing something to restrict sales, or have some issues on their platform

would greatly appreciate any input anyone has.

Thanks,
pshah

jcut92 · Joined: 29 Jul 2007 Posts: 853

Yes as a matter of fact on Oct. 5th Google had some major trouble with their feeds, and I do believe this may have affected everyone. On or about Oct. 13/14 they corrected them. That should give you some idea huh?

ArthurIhde · Joined: 01 Oct 2010 Posts: 43

jcut92 wrote (View Post): › docWrite("quote")
Yes as a matter of fact on Oct. 5th Google had some major trouble with their feeds, and I do believe this may have affected everyone. On or about Oct. 13/14 they corrected them. That should give you some idea huh?

hmmm i have no idea

portocall · Joined: 05 Jun 2009 Posts: 156

This has been going on with Amazon for awhile now, started back in September. Like you I had a certain number of items per day that I could almost count on. Not alot - about 3 per day on average. In the past 6 weeks I've had periods of up to 4 days with no sales at all and then I get 7 in one day. I've had none now for three days.

Amazon supposedly had search troubles back in Sept, but was fixed they say. Sometimes their orders get backlogged and they don't report them to the seller right away, maybe that's the case here and they're coming in bunches.

Also, many sellers have noticed that (like ebay) Amazon has some sort of rolling blackout system that only shows part of their inventory. I've noticed sales in bunches in terms of location too (on Amazon and ebay) I sold two items to Hawaii last week and have never sold anything there in almost three years on Amazon. It was much more obvious on ebay.

Also, many sellers claim that Amazon has a "speedbump" system that will only allow sellers to sell a pre-determined amount depending on their length of time selling and their feedback. The idea supposedly is to prevent a bad seller from taking advantage and selling lots of items and then not following through on the sale. Don't know if this is true.

Don't know for sure what's going on at Amazon, but sales have been "funny" now for at least a month.

8)

quicksrt · Joined: 26 Oct 2009 Posts: 401

There was another recent thread about "a slow down in Amazon" late Sept.

I also saw a slowdown that month, and then the first 10 days of Oct.

But this last week has been very good, back up to normal levels. I have a fairly good summer, so I was ok with a slowdown as long as it was only a temp slowdown.

Last 7 or 8 days have been hot. I just got back from PO and it feels good to get a good chunk mailed out.

I just thought it was a back to school, end of summer slow period. Did not know about Google choking us off, or amazon rolling blackouts.

mfaust · Joined: 08 Jun 2009 Posts: 9

My sales were slow for the first half of October, but they seem to be doing better now. Glad to hear it wasn't 't just me!

quicksrt · Joined: 26 Oct 2009 Posts: 401

My sales were way down for end of Sept. and beginning of Oct, and then picked up. But the last week has been down again.

Is everyone else having a pre-Christmas rush of sales?

Is anyone else seeing an after-summer spike of sales?

Is everyone else also seeing a decline in thr last week?

I need to know if it is just me, or sales are stalling out in Q4?

c6z06man · Joined: 22 Nov 2010 Posts: 2

My sales have also taken a major dip in the last 2 weeks. Down from 15-20(been this way for about 4 months) sales a day to about 5 sales a day. Not sure what the deal is. Checked all my listings and seems like there are no major changes.

gooddealsbooks · Joined: 08 Mar 2007 Posts: 1048

I see slowness on amazon and all across the net. We are getting some sales but down

c6z06man · Joined: 22 Nov 2010 Posts: 2

addition to my previous post. Sales on my other venue sarts with "E", have been quite fine. I think it has something to do with Amazon.

Digmen1 · Joined: 12 Feb 2010 Posts: 1007

c6z06man wrote (View Post): › docWrite("quote")addition to my previous post. Sales on my other venue sarts with "E", have been quite fine. I think it has something to do with Amazon.

There are 3 other venues starting with "e"
You need to be a bit more specific

quicksrt · Joined: 26 Oct 2009 Posts: 401

While my Amazon sales have been slower for orders, I have sold some of the bigger ticket items which makes up for it somewhat.

My lowest priced items at 3.99 to about 8.99 have slowed down, and 16.99 to 49.99 are a little bit up.

So the past two weeks have been ok. Not through the roof or anything, but I am making those wonderful cash deposits into checking acoount regularly, and the monthly amount is roughtoly the same, with items sold per month in the 58 to 66 item range.

So as long as this holds up for a year or so, it is all I can expact. Add in some ebay and ecrater action here and there, and this is about all a small time seller can expect.

I work part-time, so this is not the only thing going. But without it, I'd be a very broke person.

theplainsman · Joined: 27 Dec 2010 Posts: 150

I think quicksrt has online selling all figured out with him posting this:

So as long as this holds up for a year or so, it is all I can expact. Add in some ebay and ecrater action here and there, and this is about all a small time seller can expect.

///// Alot of people don't seem to understand how wasting time harms one with using up time for so little profit per hour. Using up time and not taking this time to work health and life correctly will come back to bite people with higher medical and other costs

The working with ebay and amazon and the one free site that works google shopping good and has stayed around not needing to make good profits itself is yes, all that a seller can do without harming himself.

Most all sites that begin, over 50% will be gone or stopped from working much at all within 5-10 yrs. I see a site trying to jump start his site maybe cause he is not making enough to survive and needs to take a risk to bring in sellers with making an auction part of the site. Doing this I think will not work cause ebid is not growing with their auctions and several has Already tried and they did not work.. The owner who is risking his site with auctions which will take more of his time and lower the results for the current members may have no other choice but to take that risk if he is not making enough profit on the site as is to survive.

quicksrt · Joined: 26 Oct 2009 Posts: 401

I'm seeing a slowdown since I posted that post in Nov.

As a matter of fact, each week since 12/1 has been a little slower than the week before. I would think the problem is not my merch, because I have plenty in every price range stil, in other words, my top priced items are not sold out, nor my loswest prices ones are not completely picked over.

And for 80% of my items, I am the only one selling that title, or I am the lowest priced by $1.00. I think I need to go over that remaining 20% and under-cut the other seller(s) ny $1.00.

But with 800 items up currently, it is odd to see such a slowdown last few weeks.

30 ebay items closed last night, 3 sales.

Ecrater, not one sale during holidays

So I ended the year a little slow. I wonder if others saw a slowdown? See generally I make runs to the post office every day, shipping items out well before expected shipping date. But when it is slow like this, I must slow down as well. I broke even on the $39.99 amazon pro merchant fee this past month, with 40 items sold over last 30 days. I'm heading out to PO in a few minutes with only 2 items.

I think I am going to copy and paste all Ecrater items pages back into ebay, and see if that drums up a few more sales.

My music items are modern classical genre, and that stuff takes longer to find buyers, and it often international buyers. But this slowdown is a little odd this month.

theplainsman · Joined: 27 Dec 2010 Posts: 150

Bonz has now got a good thing for people to check to get an idea how alternatives are doing.

With this amazon seller with 800 items listed his slow month is 40 sales

On bonz i checked classical music and shows 118 items and with 4 sold over the past yr.... bonzs listings has not changed much at all since last yr so one can run these sell thrus to understand things.

Ebay has stopped the free 100 listings a month which will hurt trying to make profit on ebay. BUT them stopping the free listings may have them to lower the listing fees to help bring sellers in this way back to ebay. When they allowed free 100 listings then their paid members were getting hurt by these non paid listing groups listings, So ebay still needs to bring in sellers but doing it with free listings was unfair to the paid members so they may lower the listing fees to make it fair and also to help bring back more sellers