News came from Etsy at the weekend that they will be ending the experimental testing of including postage costs in the price when displaying items in search. We wrote about the test last week: Etsy to include postage on prices shown on search pages.
An Etsy spokesperson said: “This experiment has ended and shoppers will again see separate costs for shipping and the item’s price. This experiment has given us valuable data that will help us make informed decisions about any future changes to how we display shipping costs on Etsy. Our top priority continues to be getting you more sales. Thanks for all your feedback about this change.” Apparently Etsy will be sharing the results of the trials in August.
It’s not clear whether it was always supposed to be such a short trial (which seems unlikely) or if it was a response to the largely negative response that the text received from Etsy merchants. For some it looked like an attempt to strong arm sellers into offering free P&P by the back door which, understandably, sellers are sometimes reluctant to do.
That said, it’s vital that companies and marketplaces like Etsy do undertake test and experiments of potential new features. You can only really ever now what works when it’s been stress tested by real users. And without such data and experimentation, the marketplaces just can’t develop.
One Response
Perhaps they are going to do a Amazon and Ebay where they will take a cut of postage costs as well, as this will increase turnover for themselves.