Why Should You Promote Listings Online? Here’s The Benefits Of Advertising On eBay
If you’re familiar with promoted listings at all on this platform, you’ll know that it doesn’t come free. Unfortunately not a lot does, but at least with this option you’ll have some easy-to-read stats that show you exactly how your promoted listings are doing, and how they improve not just sales, but also traffic to your online store.
There’s a plethora of benefits that come along with advertising on eBay, so let’s go over those now in more detail, to see why they would be the perfect fit to add to your business.
Here’s a quick breakdown of the topics we’ll cover:
- So, What Are Promoted Listings?
- Are Promoted Listings the Same as Advertising?
- What Other Ways Can You Promote Your Items?
- Do You Have to Have Eligibility?
- Small Fees, Big Results
- Gain an Increase in Brand Awareness
- Encourage Tons of Exposure to Your Products
So, What Are Promoted Listings?
Have you heard of these before? Most likely, if you are already a seller on eBay. However, if you have not for some reason, allow us to elaborate on them.
Promoted listings are simply listings that you pay a small fee on (to eBay), to get your items pushed to the top of the user’s search results. This fee will come out automatically from your seller funds.
This is the one of the best ways to get your listings sold faster. Just type in the percentage of what you’re willing to pay eBay to push your items up to the top, and they’ll take it from there.
Have you ever read “Sponsored” beside listings? This is labeled as such when that seller’s items are being promoted, or advertised.
Most often, sellers choose a range anywhere from 1%-10%, but you’re more than welcome to choose a higher amount if you so desire. Take it all the way to 100% if you really wish! (Although we definitely wouldn’t recommend going that crazy).
Keep in mind that these fees come out just like your other seller fees, or shipping fees. You can check your seller stats to see how many items have sold because of being promoted, or if your traffic has improved any because of them being turned on. (Most likely it always will lead to a significant increase). These charts will show you the difference between your organic traffic and your promoted (advertised) traffic.
You can choose to create promoted pricing strategies that differ among each and every category in your online store. So, if you feel like pumping out some older listings, feel free to set your ad rates a little higher to entice more traffic to view your items.
If however, you would like to stick around the average percentage, you can easily set your ad rate to automatically hang out right above or even right below the trending ad rates. Or, just go ahead and do as we said before if you’d prefer, and set your whole store at one single rate. The choice is really yours!
Are Promoted Listings the Same as Advertising?
In short, yes. Promoted listings are essentially the same in every way as your original listing, with the exception that they are considered ads.
Many times, these both may pop up around the same area, or sometimes they can be distributed across different pages of search results. It just depends on the percentage that you’re willing to part with and the amount of traffic that’s going to your item.
When it comes down to it, you just need to decide what’s right for you and your business, and what you think it’s going to take to boost your items to the top and gain the visibility that you need.
What Other Ways Can You Promote Your Items?
There’s actually quite a few ways that you can do so, although promoted listings are the easiest and most effective.
You could try out some different coupons! This is a great way to entice potential customers to come and take a look at your store. eBay in particular is awesome for this option, since they have more than one way to send out coupons.
Here are the different ways available:
- Order Discount
- Shipping Discount
- Volume Pricing
- Coupon
- Sale Event + Markdown
With each sale option, you’ll have the opportunity to pick and choose exactly what you want to list at a discounted rate. You can decide to include just one category, or perhaps several depending on what you’re looking to liquidate in your online store.
Promoting your listings and offering sales or coupons frequently can help you to move through more inventory faster and easier.
Do You Have to Have Eligibility?
Eligibility for what you may be wondering? We’re talking about eligibility for using promoted listings. This is a real thing and you absolutely must be eligible to take advantage of promoting your items.
To become eligible for promotions, you’re going to need a few things under your belt. Let’s go over those, shall we?
First off, you need to make sure that you’re shipping on time, answering questions in a timely manner, and responding to offers asap. All of these things will ensure that you stay at the top of your game as an eBay seller, and you will soon rise to becoming a Top-Rated Seller.
However, if you are at the Above Standard level, (which is directly below Top-Rated), you are still considered eligible for promotions. But, we highly recommend trying your best to strive for the Top-Rated spot. (You’ll get more quarterly freebies and discounts as well)!
Secondly, the listings that you have in your store MUST be sold at a fixed price. This means that if you run your store solely on Auctions, or Auctions with a BIN (Buy It Now) price, they won’t be included in your promoted listings campaign. Bummer, we know.
Pretty much any category is applicable to fall under the promoted listings required criteria, but in case you were wondering which ones were not, here they are:
- Vehicles
- Real Estate
- Travel
- Other Select Listings
Lastly, you’ll need to ensure that your listings are NOT in the condition of “For Parts” or “Not Working.” These are not allowed in the promoted section, so you’ll want to try your best to have other items available as well that are in New or Good condition.
Small Fees, Big Results
No really, though. These fees can be quite miniscule on the grand scheme of things. Think about it, if you want to promote your items at a mere 1%, a $100 item will only cost you $1.00. Not bad, right?
Let’s say though, that you’re feeling generous and want to give eBay a little extra this time around. You opt in for 10% on your next item, and when that sells, you’ll pay out just $10. Still not bad.
Notice also how we said, “when that sells.”
Yes, you only have to pay for your promoted listings, WHEN they sell through a promoted listing. This is considered an ad as we stated earlier, and will most often be shown in a different area than the original listing.
So, if your buyer decides instead to simply search for what they’re looking for, and your organic listing pops up first, they may click on that one. If they do, you won’t be charged, as promoted listings are only charged to your account whenever the buyer purchases the item through the sponsored listing. Cool, right?
For such a small fee, you often gain big results. Just check out your stats page, to see how much better or worse the listings that are promoted are doing. (We’ll give you a hint, they’re DEFINITELY going to perform better).
Feel free to play around with this percentage to find what works best for you and your business strategy.
Gain an Increase in Brand Awareness
Like we said previously, you’re going to get all kinds of brand awareness like never before. Promoting your items is going to attract many more buyers that may have not stumbled across your store in the past. This is highly beneficial to obtaining new return customers and reaching different demographics.
Encourage Tons of Exposure to Your Products
Listing with your new promotions will make selling online better than ever. Another great tip is to enlist a service that can do it all for you! Learn how to be nearly hands-off when you sign up for Hammoq.
Hammoq has been developed to create a super simple way of listing your items online. With our help, you will be able to pump out more listings in less time, and increase your bottom line by doing so.
And yes! We can absolutely make sure to have your promotions turned on where they need to be for your listings as well. Sit back and relax. Just upload your photos on our app and chill! We’ll handle the rest while you rake in more sales.
