I'm leaving....sniff....

Okay, the time has come to move out of Webstore.  I have given the site about 8 months, and the sales just aren't doing anything but creating a log-jam of stuff in our warehouse space.  I've gone from 550 items down to about 40 in the past month and a half.  As soon as I posted the music on half.com, I sold a hundred bucks worth. 
What I realized as I was listing, was that I had marked stuff down, down, down, trying to get it to move, and in most cases, I was very pleasantly surprised at how much more I would be able to get for the same item just because of having some good exposure.  If everybody used google to buy, then I would have probably done great at Webstore, because they do a good job with SEO.  But I think most people tend to head for the big 3 when they want to buy media....the devil, half or amazon.

BACK TO LISTIA, half.com, Ebay.....UGH !

I decided a few weeks ago, that it was time to clear some of the log-jam of stuff created from having everything sitting collecting dust on Webstore and started the task of putting the media on half, some of the really expensive things on Ebay, and putting the stuff that would appeal to the younger people on Listia.  I was thinking spring tag sale, but those things are a LOT of work, and you don't get anything if you live in a more financially depressed area, as we do.  It was the right thing to do.  I have sold a hundred dollars of media on half in just a couple weeks, and moved a LOT of stuff on Listia.  I was much more careful to specify how I will handle the people who don't pay the shipping, and included the "don't write asking for me to fan you" line, which cut down on the unwanted emails, and I made sure to get shipping money on pretty much everything unless it was a very light item.  As far as putting the expensive stuff on Ebay, I'm not really impressed with the results.  I sold a lalique bowl, but had to ship it free, and by the time Ebay got their cut, not so great.  But at least stuff is moving instead of just stacking up higher and higher.  It's funny. When I had over 500 items on Webstore, all I sold was pretty much dvds.  Now all that's left are the clothes and shoes, and now the clothes are starting to sell....not quickly, but at least they are going.  I would rather see a pair of shoes leave, than a dvd any day. 
My only complaint with Listia right now, is I did a netflix free trial, which was supposed to get me 4500 free credits, and the credits have not been credited to me.   I have submitted 2 support tickets on the issue, and received no reply or credits.  Hopefully Listia will resolve this soon.

MAYBE I SPOKE TOO SOON?

I think I'm reaching a point, where I'm questioning how well things are going on Webstore.  I have sold a few larger things, but mostly what I'm selling there is DVDs.  I have been told by some of my customers that I directed there, that they found the searches to be crazy town.  So I tried it, I knew I had at least 5 different pair of size 10 womens shoes listed.  I put "size 10 shoes" in the search box.  It kept trying to "help" me by changing what I had typed and ultimately I couldn't put that in as a search.  I had to do it as a category search, and when I did, it only bought up the 3 pair that said the words size 10 womens shoes exactly in that order.  That is a pretty crappy search function as far as I'm concerned.  So I thought I would go and check out Mondro, which I had passed by to go with Webstore way back when.  It is a GHOST TOWN !
The only thing I would expect to see results of is the search for "tumbleweeds".
Does ANYBODY have some good news of an ebay alternative that's actually thriving?

So yeah, in the meanwhile, I moved some of my bigger ticket items over to list with the devil.  Not much choice, gotta pay the bills.  On the upside, I'm sure it will generate material for several more blog posts.  Wah!

Urgent update.... Only kidding....but got your attention, right?

It has been sort of quiet sales wise, compared to last year, but I have all but closed out my clock inventory, so I'm not comparing apples to apples.  I'm doing fine without the ebay drama and feel very happy to open my credit card statement and not see that I have given them a big pile of cash in fees.
I haven't put anything on listia in a very long time, so I guess that romance is pretty much over.  I have been doing okay on etsy and webstore.  The cost of selling on etsy is palatable, and it's even better on Webstore, since there are no fees.  I hope you have been trying out some of the other sites out there, keep me posted if you find any that are fabulous.

You have GOT to be kidding !!!

In the truth is stranger than fiction department, I sold a TV on Ebay the month before last for a client.
(no....that's not the strange part)  The buyer didn't pay for it.  (also not it).....So I had to go through the whole rigamarole where you wait a week, then wait another week for the credit.  Actually, I think that was more like 2 weeks, but felt like 7 weeks in dog years.
Anyway, after doing all the hoop-jumping, finally, I see an email saying that my account has been credited the over 90 dollars I was charged.  On my previous credit card statement, yup, the funds for final value fees sure had been seized by Ebay quick enough....but then wait a minute.....THIS statement had no credit for that money.  I log into ebay, and yup, it's listed....a credit.
I start poking around, and find out that I have to ASK them for my money back !
   So I start trying to find the path to do that, and am looped endlessly through "learn more" pages with blue links saying things like "request a refund of credit" and yet when I click them, I'm just given the opportunity to "learn more" until I learn that I'm just freaking fuming !!!!   Oh, and just for variety, there is the little gray button saying "submit request" that doesn't do anything at all.   Finally, I hit the telephone icon, in hopes of being granted an audience with somebody in book keeping, and have to put up with that let me restate your problem in a super-duper helpful way before I can possibly answer your question or act capable of thought phase of the phone call....and have to be put on hold not once, but TWICE, listening to horrifyingly loud muzak, while she goes fact-checking so that after 20 minutes on the phone that I shouldn't have had to spend, I may finally be getting back what they should have automatically returned to my credit card.....JERKS....

I GOT A BADGE, I GOT A BADGE !!! :)

I know, I know, Nobody bought me flowers or anything....It's not a giant deal, but kind of cool.   I just hit 50 positive feedbacks on Webstore, and now my store has the coveted "top rated seller" badge.  I have also garnered some pretty good placement in the stores lineup.  It's so nice to have Etsy and Webstore.  If you're had enough of Ebay's b.s., come'on over to Webstore where they don't treat you like crap and you get to keep ALL your profits. 
Interestingly, my Ebay account is still limited from the 2011 Ebay smackdown back in May.  Of course my seller dashboard used to say my compliance was LOW.  Now that I hardly ever sell there, it's HIGH.  That makes sense, right? 
Where is the box where I get to rate my opinion of THEM?   Cause it's still really LOW.  :)

Economics 101 - Westfield Home & Garden

As surely as warm temps in the Summer, economics plays a part in everything we do.  Everything from sex to the choice of a cheeseburger for lunch, to that little online purchase has a cost, whether we see the price tag or not.
So I have a little story for you, to mark the 10th anniversary of a seemingly meaningless interaction that took place at Westfield Home & Garden 10 years ago. You're gonna love this....true story.
10 years, 6 months ago, I purchased 3 red bud trees from Westfield Home and Garden.  It was the end of August tree sale, buy 2, get 1 free.  I paid 69.99 for the 3 red bud trees.  In the spring, despite planting to specifications, one was dead as a doornail.  I still had my receipt.  I called Westfield Home and Garden, explained the situation to the sales associate who answered the phone, and she told me to go dig up the dead tree, bring it back to the store with my receipt, and they would give me a replacement.  So I dug up the tree and headed to the store.  When I got there, the owner was at the counter.  I put the dead tree on the counter, and the same sales associate I had spoken to on the phone explained to the owner what had transpired.  The owner gave me a sneer, and this is what he actually said..... "The free tree is the one that died.  We're not replacing it".  The sales associate was in mild shock.  I was livid.  I left the store, and have not returned since.  He had no idea at the time, but I had been a regular customer there for years.  This is the breakdown of what it cost him to date, to not replace my tree....his cost, probably about 14 bucks....
  I had been buying all my mulch there every year, filling our suv several times each season.  Since, I have switched to a 5 yard drop once a year....$120 X10 years =  $1200.
I used to buy my garden tools there, rakes, hoses, and yard ornaments.  Figure minimally $200 per year, x 10 years = $2000.
 I used to purchase my bird seed there.  At least 25 pounds of mixed bird seed annually at $20 per bag x 10 years = $200.  So over the 10 years since this jerk showed me just what a total ass he could be, he has lost $3400.00 just because I won't shop there anymore.
Now let me tell you, that I have shared my story with ALL of my friends, pretty much anybody who will listen.  I happen to know that some of them were appalled and also do not shop there any more.  What did he lose in sales to them?  I am unable to tabulate.  But even wtihout their data, how stupid was it to not fork over the 14 dollar replacement tree?  I will be happy to report the more than doubling of this figure 10 years from now, actually, more when adjusted for inflation.  The lesson here....Sometimes saving yourself a couple of bucks at someone else's expense is not economically the wisest choice.

KEEPING YOUR HAND IN IT

I think every once in a while, I need to throw one thing on Ebay just to remind me of what happens to my money there.  I had a rare book that I knew I needed the Ebay audience to sell, sold it for 39.99 and got billed for 5.65 for the final value fee !  That doesn't even include the listing fee.  Ridiculous.  It makes me even more grateful for my life after ebay and to have webstore.com, where I get to keep ALL of the sales proceeds.

Your very own website...sales booster or just lots of work?

I know I hadn't mentioned this yet, but I feel now might be a good time.   I sell primarily artist made products and vintage items.  For the past 2 years, I have had my own website hosted by tiptopwebsite.com. 
  I'm going to tell you the pros and cons of using tiptop and similar website hosting companies.  You can decide for yourself if it's something that can help you sell.  First, I have to say, that they have nice layouts, helpful support people, and for about 150 for a couple of years, the price certainly beats the heck out of ebay pricing.    I made an absolutely gorgeous website for myself without having a heck of a lot of experience, and without a huge knowledge of HTML, although it helps to have some html background because you can get very creative with page layouts and such if you know how to use it.  The good thing about it was I could have separate pages for each category I wanted to create, nice little boxes for products, give as much or as little information about myself as I wanted, which I thought was pretty cool at that time, because any site making money on your sales wants the buyers path to you to be exclusively through their doorway.  Makes sense right?
  So here's the rub.  LOW exposure.   I did pay them an extra 95 dollars for keyword optimization, but when I did my little checking on google thing that I like to do, my products on my website were way buried in the google quicksand, wheras the stuff I had on basic sales and artist sites were ready available...front page, maybe 2nd.  Yes, there are tricks to that to.  Artists that have no idea how to capture google's attention, will probably not have their products making placements like that, but I do know how to do it, and I get very good placement.  So I started to ask myself, how could I get the attention to my personal website.
Answer?  SEO of course.....
Nope.
With hosted websites, there is no SEO except what they do for you.  You have no way to optimize anything on your own.  So you really have to view your hosted site almost as a vanity site, because YOU are going to have to bring the people there for the most part.  Yes, some will find your site and may even purchase, but I found the frequency of that happening to be largely dissapointing, especially when you factor in time required to maintain.  What do I mean by that?  Well, I'll tell you.
As a seller of stuff, the two things I edit most, are prices and photos.  Photos have to be uploaded to their system, and assigned names before you can use them.  It is very time consuming, and then once you have 250 photos, just try and find one.  Tip top had no way to sort, and the numbers kept moving from 1, so that you couldn't even write down that photo 75 was a daffodil, because when you add a new photo, the daffodil is now photo 76....if that makes sense to you.
Also, to have things be paid for, you have to set up a merchant shopping cart with paypal.  Changing a price is quite an event.... You have to log into paypal, enter the name of the item, costs, get an HTML code, paste it in at the website, hope the box ends up where you want it.  Suffice it to say, it is extremely time consuming compared to entering normal listing information onto an artist site.  When my website comes up for renewal in November, I will be downgrading to the single page, single photo website that will simply tell the viewer where to find my stuff for sale....on Etsy...and webstore.  I did cancel my artfire account.  They are now charging 11.95/mo. regardless of what you sell.  So if you have a crappy month, you still owe them a pretty good chunk of change.  However, still hideously cheaper than Ebay.

MONTH 2, STILL THRILLED WITH WEBSTORE

At the 2 month mark, sales are picking up, and I did a little test I like to do sometimes.  I put the same item on in a few different places, and then I check google to see who has done the best job making my item visible to the public.  SEO is important.  Webstore and Etsy won.  Hands down.   I LOVE YOU etsy & webstore !

In that vein, knowing that what I put here also will be searchable by google, I want to mention here,  that my prices on rare classical music CDs are lower than anybody elses...by a LOT.  If you love classical music, check our store, and when you see classical music CDs that you want, please do go check the prices on half.com, amazon, ebay or where ever else you buy them, and comparison shop.  You will save in some cases $30 on just one CD compared to the prices you will find on those sites.  We also have amazing combined shipping rates for media items, including books, movies, DVDs & audio books. My webstore.com store simply does have the lowest prices on the internet for classical cds.  Know why?  Cause I don't have to fork over a big pile of the proceeds to ebay or anybody else.  So I can afford to roll with the punches of this economy, and still manage to entice buyers to buy, even when they would rather not.  Try that on Ebay!  Ebay will make money, but you won't make squat by the time you finish paying their fees.  When your frustration level has peaked, come try webstore.