Sales Reports on eBay is very useful tool to give better direction to your business. You MUST read and use these reports if you want to:
- Know what sells
- Get ready for busy months
- Keep your loyal customers
- Up sell to the existing customers
- Minimise surprises
Sales reports are free and Sales Reports Plus is £3.00/month which is
nothing compared to what you get out of it. I have taken in three reports with
particular item which is important to business from my perspective. However,
there is plenty of data that are useful and easily spotted which I have not
wasted my time writing on !
Sales Summary
Sold items% – I will be worried if there is no increase in this value. If
there is decrease you I would be looking why my items are not selling more ? Is
there problem with price ? Is there problem with feedback ? I would
definitely check my competitors price.
Avg. Sales Price per item – I am not too much worried about this figure
because you could be selling low priced item. However, you can formulate a
strategy to sell cases of the popular product so that you are selling more to
one customer which is easy operationally.
Repeat buyers %
– Most of the eBay buyers are unique. Repeat buyers are great
sign of better customer service and product. Repeat buyers are there when you
are offering product having short span of life and they come back to you rather
than wasting time for other suppliers if they are happy. It is very important to
keep buyers happy with better packaging, quick dispatch and better customer
service. These are the customer who will talk about your business to their
friends and families !
Net eBay and Paypal Fees
– If you get % of this against sales, you will get
average eBay and PayPal fees which will help you setting up the price of the
item.
Listing Feature Fees
– I would keep this to zero. You could be paying for the
extra picture feature fees without knowing. Keep an eye !
Have a look at why
you should be paying for it.
Sales By Category
Sales Vs Ended items – Increase in sales results more ended items which
is why it is best to invest on the software which automatically relists or shows
the data of the stock availability across the sales channel. Be mindful of not
showing stock with less than certain quantity. This will prevent loss of sales
opportunity from ended items.
Sold Item % – This helps to show how much you sold in certain category
indicating you to invest more on that particular stock if you have the
increasing trend from past. It is also wise to compare this data with past years
so that you know if particular category demand normally increases in particular
month. This will help you to buy the stock in advance ready for that month.
Repeat Buyers % – This will show you if you have loyal customers which is
good thing and you know you should be keeping up with the stock all the time.
The last thing
you want is your loyal buyers come in to your store looking for
the product and its not there !
Marketplace Data by Category (All Sellers)
Sold item % – The month-to-month comparison shows you the increasing /
decreasing demand of the product. You will get the right answer when to stock
right product if you look into the past years data. Similarly, it will be nice
to create strategy like case deal, free shipping on the peak month. Don’t worry
too much about free shipping, you just need to add shipping cost on the top of
the item price. However, you should only take cost of the shipping while adding
on the top of the item price. Believe me it works !
Avg. price per item – You know what sort of price people are paying on
certain category. It is good idea to explore the category with high end average
price. This will also help you to try multi-buy deals on the certain category.
I would advise you to look into these reports every month so that you don’t miss
out the opportunity. It is also wise to look into these data when you are
planning for next period of time so you know when you should be contacting
suppliers. All these will help you to know exactly when you should do what !
Isn’t this helpful ?