eBay Summer 2024 Seller Update
eBay's 2024 Seller Update is here! Checkout all the details including marketing and advertising changes, reporting and payment updates, international shipping and regulations, and more!
Marketing and Promoting
Grow your business with redesigned marketing and promoting experiences
Store subscribers will see an improved Seller Hub Marketing tab interface with marketing and promotional tools to help elevate their sales.Help your listings sell faster with more ways to manage and launch marketing promotions from your Seller Hub Active Listings.
View all your campaigns in one place with a new advertising experience in Seller Hub.
The Seller Hub Marketing tab is getting a facelift with streamlined navigation, quick-view snapshots of your active promotions and marketing toolkit, and personalized recommendations.
eBay is also streamlining the Promoted Listings ad experience, including a simplified portfolio of advertising products and a new dashboard with enhanced metric tracking capabilities.
As part of this process, Promoted Listings are getting fresh names and upgraded reporting, with Advanced and Standard products being renamed to Priority and General campaigns - but don't worry, general campaigns will still be a cost per sale model just like Promoted Listings Standard has been.
Details:
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Improved Tools
Improved tools to help you run your business more efficiently
- Get the information you need on the go with Product research, now available on your mobile device.
- Easily manage your messages with buyers in a new desktop experience.
- Get all the earnings details you’ve been asking for in one comprehensive report.
- Your buyers now have another fast and safe way to pay with Venmo.
Most of these have already been previously announced.
The Terapeak Product Research Update was part of the Spring Seller Check In.
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And the addition of Venmo as a payment option was announced earlier this month.
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The messaging experience has been a work in progress since 2022 and still has a lot of bugs or missing features - including the very important option for sellers to have messages CCed to their emails.
One seller asked about this functionality in the dedicated Summer Update section of the eBay community, expressing their frustration about this messaging experience being forced onto desktop users.
I was ready to punch my computer when I read this is being forced on sellers within the next few weeks.
The new message experience has been around for years and eBay still has not resolved major issues such as CCing messages to our email.
Others have complained about the lack of reporting option and the lack of "reply with offer".
At the seller check in a couple weeks ago the team said CCing messages to email is being added but said nothing more. Can we get a specific time frame for that? I heavily rely on that function for record keeping and it's the sole reason I try to never use the app when messaging buyers (no ability to CC my sent messages to email).
Predictably, the answer from eBay staff was not particularly helpful.
We are still evaluating features such as CCing and we will be sure to let sellers know when new features have been rolled out!
To which the seller responded:
Thank you eBay for strengthening my focus on upping my selling game at Amazon.
Someone had asked a similar question during the recent seller check in event, with Director of Product, Reviews & Messaging Patrick Hildebrand responding that eBay definitely plans to add this functionality - meaning it should already be in development and on the roadmap, not still being evaluated as to whether or not it's even possible.
CCing to emails is absolutely business critical functionality and it is simply unacceptable for eBay to force sellers into this new messaging experience without that capability.
The new earnings reporting does sound like it could be useful, especially once they figure out how to get Cost of Goods (COGs) added in.
All your earnings details, now in one place
You’ll find the new report under your Payments in My eBay and Seller Hub.When you land on the report, you’ll see a summary of your earnings, along with your gross amount, expenses, and refunds for the time period you select. From here, you can filter by date ranges, view your earnings trends, and download a report with your per-order earnings for your selected time period.
We’re working to bring you even more insights
We've heard your requests for even more detailed reporting. That's why we’re working to introduce a way for you to input your Cost of Goods Sold (COGS).COGS is the cost associated with acquiring or producing an item, and it can include things like material costs, labor, or inbound shipping. When you enter your COGS, the new report will show not just what you earn from each sale, but also help you gain more insight into the overall profitability of your eBay business, helping you price smarter, manage inventory more effectively, and grow your business.
Some sellers however may not trust eBay with proprietary business information like COGS - especially if they've also sold on Amazon and are all too familiar with how marketplaces can use that data to their advantage and to the detriment of seller margins.
Considering eBay trustworthiness and Bezos' "your margin is my opportunity," WHY would sellers provide eBay with their COGS? Seems ripe for abuse IMO.
— Pat(ricia) (@materialculture) June 26, 2024
That concern is especially noteworthy as eBay has recently moved to compete directly against third party sellers on its own platform in the collectible card game space under the eBay-owned subsidiary TCGPlayer brand.
Liz Morton
International Shipping and Regulations
Optimize your business operations with the latest improvements and info
- Prepare to comply with the upcoming General Product Safety Regulations if you sell to buyers in the EU and Northern Ireland.
- Ship to global buyers easily with eBay International Shipping managed exclusions.
Sellers who ship to the EU and Northern Ireland will need to prepare to comply with General Product Safety Regulations (GPSR) that go into effect December 13, 2024.
Scope of the GPSR
The General Product Safety Regulation applies to new, second-hand, repaired, and reconditioned items sold on eBay and all other marketplaces. There are few products and categories that are excluded from the GPSR—you can view the entire list of excluded categories on our Seller Center page.Complying with the GPSR
The GPSR requires all business sellers to add the following information for eligible items available for sale in the EU and NI:
- The product manufacturer's name and contact information
- If the manufacturer isn’t located in the EU or NI, you’ll have to indicate an EU or NI-based Responsible Person or entity, along with their name and contact details
- Any relevant product information like model number, pictures, type, and CE marking
- Product safety and compliance information like safety warnings, labels, and product manuals in the local language
eBay is working on a new feature that’s designed to simplify the process of adding the required information to one or multiple listings and will notify sellers in July when they can start updating this information to their listings.
Managed Exclusions for eBay International Shipping were already announced back in April.
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And don't forget EIS will soon expand to include Alaska, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico!
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Payment Method Record For Some Auctions
eBay continues their attempts to "solve unpaid items on the platform" by announcing "select" auctions will be required to provide a payment method upfront before bidding.
For those auctions that require a payment method, buyers will have 1 hour after winning the auction in which to make adjustments to shipping addresses or request combined shipment before the payment is processed.
Changes are coming to auctions
As part of our continuing effort to ensure timely payments for our sellers, we'll be testing changes over the next few months that are designed to streamline your selling experience, ensure you get paid without delay, and minimize the hassle of re-listing.What you need to know
Buyers on select auctions will be required to set up a preferred payment method and shipping address before they can place a bid. After winning an auction, we’ll let them know they have one hour to adjust their order or payment details as needed, otherwise we’ll automatically process their order using their preferred payment method. No action is required from the seller.These changes aim to improve the auction process on eBay by providing buyers with the ability to decide how they want to pay, while also ensuring that sellers receive payment for their sales. The goal is to foster a more efficient and dependable experience for the entire eBay community.
That sounds similar to some of the tests sellers saw eBay running last year.
Liz Morton
User Agreement Updates
eBay also provided a summary of changes being made to the user agreement as part of the 2024 Seller Update.
Updates to our User Agreement
- We’ve provided details on how we use artificial intelligence (AI) on eBay to provide and improve the Services we offer you, including, when available, customized and personalized experiences.
- We’ve updated our purchase conditions to clarify that in some clearly identified transactions, a legally binding contract only occurs when the buyer pays for the item.
- We describe additional types of conduct and content that are prohibited when using eBay Services.
Stay tuned for an in depth look at the User Agreement update with side by side comparisons from Value Added Resource!
Seller updates for other eBay markets were also released today.
In the UK, sellers will be seeing changes to the local pick up process in addition to many of the same changes outlined above.
To help cut down on 'item not received' claims and payment disputes you have to manage, we've improved the cancellation experience for eBay local cases.
If a buyer can't pick up an item, or changes their mind after seeing it, they can request to cancel the order up to 30 days after payment or until the collection is confirmed.
As a seller, you can review and approve cancellations, and the item will automatically be relisted so you can sell it again.
Sellers in Australia can look forward to improvements to seller protections for false not as described claims.
For buyers reported from 1 August, we’re removing the $9 return label credit cap on falsely claimed Item Not as Described requests.
If you provided an eBay return label, you will now receive a credit for the actual postage cost. If you’ve provided your own label to the buyer, we’ll credit you up to $11 per transaction.
While sellers in Canada are only getting the updates to eBay Ads, desktop messaging, and EU regulations.
What do you think of the eBay 2024 Summer Seller Update? Let us know in the comments!
