eBay is giving sellers an unusual incentive for adopting product identifiers, which will be required in at the end of February in certain categories. Sellers who receive the offer can earn a 2.5-cent credit for each eligible listing they update.
The credits earned can only be used toward Promoted Listing Ads. Only listings that are Good ‘Til Cancelled that existed prior to the promotion and are not yet compliant are eligible. The offer to accumulate credits runs through January 31st, and they must be applied to ads through April 30th.
eBay is eager to have sellers add product identifiers to listings such as brand, Manufacturer Part Number (MPN), and Global Trade Item Number (GTIN), saying they boost exposure for those listings both on eBay and on external search engines. For an in-depth look at eBay Product Identifiers, take a look at this June 7th article in EcommerceBytes Update.
The promotion is unusual in that it requires sellers to use the credits earned on advertising. Its Promoted Listing Ads lets sellers choose a rate for each listing that is a percentage between 1% and 20% of the item’s selling price – sellers pay that amount in addition to the item’s Final Value Fee. You can read about one seller’s experience using Product Listings Ads in this July 21st Newsflash article.
eBay is just as anxious for UK sellers to adopt Product Identifiers, but it’s not offering incentives. In an announcement board post, eBay UK did give a hint about some forthcoming benefits:
“Later in 2016, we’re adding even more benefits when you include product identifiers in your listings, such as merchandising advice, special promotions and inclusion in emails we send to buyers promoting items on eBay.co.uk. And if your item is listed in our eBay catalogue and has associated product reviews, we’ll automatically add them to your listing to help increase your chances of making a sale.”
It also told sellers how they could see which listings were missing product identifiers: “in My eBay > Selling > Listing improvements as long as you’ve got these switched on, or by using our bulk edit and relist tool. You can then add this information using your preferred listing tool.”
However, one seller described the problems they encountered in trying to update their listings, and stated eBay provided inconsistent numbers of listings that needed to be edited.
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