The eBay UK Spring Seller Release 2018 has much that large retailers and brands will appreciate with increased levels of customer service as well as enhanced support for eBay marketing tools and new business insight metrics. At the same time they have also reduced branding options for eBay shops.
Access to eBay Concierge
The monthly subscription cost of an Anchor Store rises from £269 to £399, but Anchor Shop subscribers will be invited to join eBay Concierge, eBay’s premier support service. eBay Concierge is an enhanced level of service offering: Direct access to a dedicated team of experts with minimal wait times and a choice of contact options; Support from top team members empowered to take responsibility for issues and concerns; and Tailored support on selling issues.
Enhanced support for marketing
eBay’s Promote your listings tool will benefit from enhanced functionality. Item recommendations are now available in Promote your listings based on trends in the eBay marketplace. From March 2018, Sales Reports will also be available in providing insights and reports to show which items sold as a result of being promoted across all your Promote your listings campaigns.
Seller Coupons will replace Codeless coupons enabling retailers and brands to drive traffic to their eBay listings from within eBay as well as on social and other marketing channels.
Additionally new API support for eBay marketing will enable direct integration with a retailer’s software solutions or third party management tools. The eBay Marketing API will support Sale Events and Markdown promotions.
New business insight metrics
eBay will make post sales metrics and benchmarks available from June, detailing when buyers report items they did not receive, or requested returns when an item is not as described. Factors used to create the benchmarks will include: the location of the buyer, the product category, the sales price, item condition, and more.
The new metrics and benchmarks are just for your reference, and will not affect your seller performance standards evaluation or rating, but will enable brands to identify problem products and take action to eliminate errors.
eBay Shops
eBay have announced that from May, it will no longer be possible to customise eBay shops. Existing eBay shops with a custom branded design will be kept, but once migrated to the native eBay shop design it will no longer be possible to convert back to a custom design.
eBay will be upgrading eBay Shopfronts to be more secure, better optimised for search engines, and more mobile friendly, as well as improving merchandising options.
eBay strongly suggest that sellers do not invest in custom shop designs between now and May, although it is still possible for those retailers and brands who wish to and can launch before the May deadline.
Other updates
eBay UK have released a number of other updates in their Spring Seller Release which are summarised here.
