OnBuy have migrated to a brand-new hybrid cloud solution with UKFast. They are now working on optimising this, making performance changes and working to ensure that they deliver the best possible solution. We had a couple of emails last week due to OnBuy down time and this is why it occured.
TV Advertising
Due to the new server platform, OnBuy say that they are ready to push OnBuy out to a wider audience and so have launched their TV advertising on ITV channels, currently airing on ITV2.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9gxkYAZ2V4
Building the number of listings
OnBuy say that they’re working with some major multi-national brands, as well as some huge online sellers, to deliver a very healthy number of products onto OnBuy over the next three months. This will help to raise exposure and credibility of the site, before they market on ITV1.
This makes sense, I had a quick browse of the site for men’s shoes and at the time of writing they don’t have any listed (They have one pair of boots and one pair of gaiters). Frankly no site is going to survive when they don’t have inventory in major categories so it’s good to hear they’re working to bring more sellers on board.
There are two ways of looking at the lack of inventory – either as a huge downside and an indication to hold of listing until the site matures, or as an opportunity to sell on a site which is advertising on TV where there is very little competition so however many sales there are you’re likely to get them all.
It’s also fair to say that if you’re in at the start then your products are much more likely to feature in OnBuy advertising.
Integrations
OnBuy have partnered with Parcelforce and working very closely with Royal Mail to integrate Click & Drop in the coming weeks.
The marketplace is also currently integrating with Linnworks, ChannelAdvisor and StoreFeeder to make managing the channel virtually seamless for retailers who use these solutions.
Traffic
OnBuy say that in the first few days of June they are already seeing a huge spike and orders are going up. As more of their TV adverts are aired, they expect this upward trend to continue. They will also start investing on YouTube, Facebook, and other marketing partners as well as investing heavily in Google marketing from 8th June.
Are you listing on OnBuy or have you purchased anything from the new marketplace yet? If so we’d love to hear your thoughts.
32 Responses
whats with the little competition line
just because it has an advert on Itv 2
ebay amazon etsy etall are still there
on buy are doomed if they think they have a marketing advantage excluding acess to rest of the world
Maybe if they hasn’t used a bait and switch approach to the free subscription model they would have more listings. I spent a week getting 8,000 products into their file format in a category where they had very little products. What a waste of my time, I will never waste my time on them again.
The site is good but the categories are very difficult for buyers to find their way around. The main categories we sell in are split in very strange and pointless ways. You have no facility to list products without barcodes so bespoke items are not possible.
The subscription changes seem to be acceptable but the recommendation to boost products for exposure was fine under the free subscription still allowing you to be cheaper than your other platforms as final fees were just 6% but now the 3% boost fee and the subscription make it impossible to offer cheaper which is what OnBuy requested. So we are having to look at unboosting items or repricing already.
But we have started to see sales, so prepared to stick with it and see if they really can offer a UK alternative to eBay and Amazon while paying UK tax. Small things need changing like the ability to put tracking on etc.
If you want to see the year out ditch the subscription model.
Collectables is our business and Onbuy initially had a few items selling similar to ours.
However, having checked today, the whole antiques section is empty again and now awaiting launch.
It would take a great deal of hassle to put thousands of collectable items on Onbuy and I’m doubting their commitment to this area of selling.
Is Onbuy fully committed to sellers in collectables on their site, or is just a case of stringing us along in the hope it takes off?
Hi OnBuy
Outside of the paid placements, I would be interested to hear how OnBuy ranks products within search. Is it tied to sales history?
As we sell our own brands, its essential that we have that kind of information available so that we can have our products ranked consistently for broad search terms.
If this information isn’t available, experience tells us there is little point listing products if the strategy is to just upload products and then do nothing 🙂
OnBuy – I submitted you our product CSV feed on the 18th May but they’ve still not been listed, what’s going on?
Spent time adding products, asked if they would change the subscription , told no, then removed the free listing option, so wasnt impressed, emailed contact and no reply
You would need to drop your subscription or fees to attract more sellers and competition. The majority of the products I have looked at on OnBuy are available much cheaper on Amazon.
Munchkin Fold’n Go Travel Bassinet – Onbuy £34.99 / Amazon £28.97 (both being sold by the same company).
It seems sellers are charging more on OnBuy due to the lack of competition and this in turn will drive away buyers.
Signed up when they 1st posted on tamebay and paid the money per month, told no subscription, etc huge adds on ITV which would start in Feb 2017. Integration with 3party systems.
WHAT A JOKE
Tamebay have gone way down in my estimations allowing this company space back on here to plug false promise.
A month ago I foulnd myself reading an email saying I needed to switch to a subscription based model, something they said they would never do….
No integration with stock management systems.
When they 1st started out someone at OnBuy sent out a group email, but didn’t bcc and just sent it out to a few 100 sellers.
These sellers have been speaking with each other since, in mass emails and it looks like it’s most of this email group that thinks OnBuy are a joke with how they have treated sellers, and with the U turns on subscriptions.
we feel building a seller base on the disgruntled or those unable to succeed in other markets wont work
quality sellers with quality products will attract buyers
Well we signed an account way back at the beginning. We have set up on 3 other markets since then and up and running. We paid the £49plus VAT fee and did not generate any sales. We then changed to the free listing offer as we were just throwing away hard cash. When a sub model with fees came along we dropped it.
However they did phone us and tell us they were not dealing with channel island companies avoiding VAT and offer us a “bit of a deal” to relist some products. Thing is we got those other markets now. They did have issues with advertising with ITV etc, however for the cost their could have been a much better social campaign run in the time. We are in June now.
Actually I liked the £49 model but if they were not doing anything but just taking a DD every month. Issue Not enough got on board with it. I would rather pay that out every month than what Amazon and eBay charge which are to high. Anyway we started to get a few bits back on we will see how it goes.
Hi Onbuy, will Onbuy be integrated with Volo anytime soon? As I’ll sign up if it is.
I signed up when they previously offered a non subscription option and did fairly well to start with. Things started to quieten down and I was then told I would need to pay a subscription so gave it up.
2 big problems I had with the site were:
1) Each listing needs a unique barcode number but as I sell primarily action figures this meant I couldn’t list most of my products as a lot of action figures will have different characters within a range that share the same barcode. The only option I would have had was to offer a listing as an assortment and buyers would have to take pot luck on which character they received which often leads to increased returns or negative feedback if they don’t get the character they hoped for.
2) There doesn’t seem to be an option for a store front or even a “view sellers other items” link which is standard on most marketplaces.