eBay are implementing more Item Specifics Changes for women’s dresses this time around. The good news is that they’ve listened to sellers concerns from the last set of eBay Item Specifics changes they made and tried to make life easier for sellers. eBay will NOT be blocking existing Good til Cancelled listings from renewing which should ease the immediate burdon for those who have set their listings to roll over. eBay have also made third party tools available to assist sellers identify listings that need editing.
Sellers listing on eBay UK in the Women’s dresses category will need to adopt eBay Item Specifics for colour, dress length and style for any new and revised listings from the 13th of February 2019.
These item specifics will be mandated for new or revised listings only but eBay still strongly recommend sellers update any existing listings which are missing these item specifics as we can see listings with these values sell better than those without.
Why you should edit existing listings
eBay say that changes like this help sellers generate more sales by making it easier for buyers to shop on eBay. In terms of dresses (this was measured over 8 months from December 2017 to July 2018):
- Dresses listings with item specifics “style” and “dress length” completed sell on average 81% better than those without
- Dresses listings with the item specific “style” completed sold 86% better than those without
- Dresses listings with the item specific “dress length completed sold 76% better than those without
In terms of tops and shirts (This is based on an average of 5 weeks post November the 8th vs the previous 5 weeks):
- Since mandating two item specifics in the tops and shirts category in November year over year growth in that category has accelerated by 5% points vs a control group of similar women’s clothing categories.
Help making the eBay Item Specifics changes easier
eBay have listened to feedback from sellers and Tamebay and have made changes to the approach to this mandate, key points of difference are as follows:
- The mandate only impacts new and revised listings (GTC listings not blocked at renewal)
- eBay are offering free use of Optiseller tool to assist with identifying gaps, this will help sellers to find values from other data provided (such as title) and create an upload file to update their listings
- eBay are giving sellers data on recommended values for items specifics in excel rather than PDF, and sharing this more widely e.g. via email
- eBay are giving sellers a longer notice period – 5 weeks instead of 4
