I have tried the ‘stopping one hour before time and re-starting again’ combination over the last couple of days but with limited success.
On my system, GS performs auto-cancel every 5 mins.
Note now that the RESTART checkboxes are greyed out and cannot be changed. This item was not restarted. This can cause problems when selecting multiple items with multiple statuses. The restart check boxes can not be activated.
The Activity Viewer Window.
I find that because GS constantly clears this window, many activities are missed and it a bit of messing to find out what has happened. Maybe it would be more beneficial not to clear the window but have it scrollable backwards to see what activities have taken place. Maybe a timestamp to the window every 5mins or so would also help.
Maybe there is already a way of doing this. If so please point it out to me.
On just a couple of occasions I noted that items that had been sold were restarted by GS.
And on other occasions, I have manually selected a group of items to start not realising that an item with status SOLD was among them. I believe, others may differ, that it should not be possible to start an item with status SOLD. To me it makes no sense to do so as that one to one record with the order is lost. I always make a duplicate. If others are in agreement is it possible to have a pop up warning to alert that this is going to happen.
Note: I only use Quantity=1.
I am running a couple of versions behind at the moment. 9.0b13 (1414). If upgrading will help me, please let me know.
MANY times I have multiple quantities of a “unique” or old item, and only list it with a quantity of 1, then when that 1 is sold, I relist, or start, the same listing for a 2nd one. I believe, when you then do a relist, the “watchers” MIGHT get notified by eBay.
I THINK this way, the item seems more “valuable”, applying the laws of “supply and demand”.
More information on the items that did not restart.
I tried to restart them manually today and GS informed me that there was an issue with the Return Profile. And indeed there was. See the two images below
Once I reset them to my own Return Profile. All was well. I have no idea where this strange non-profile originated.
Others had a title which was too long. I must have edited them whilst they were active.
In summary, it would be useful if this sort of information was also sent to the Activity Viewer along with other suggestions that have been made in the last couple of days.
I do have a Smart Group for failed to restart items but it is fairly basic. ie No reason why the restart failed.
David
I think that UNKNOWN PROFILE has to be manually removed from your ebay profile list on ebay. GS downloads them from the ebay profile list. Ebay constantly adds to your profiles list. I know they do add to my shipping profiles list when I set up a special listing with an actual shipping cost for a customer. I have all my set profiles numbered from 1-? so I can tell which ones ebay is making up and adding. It also keeps them in order so I know which one to use.
Thanks
I have actually done this but then this one just appeared out of the blue and caught me off guard. The fact that it does not exist on Ebay makes me wonder where the hell it came from.
Also, I USUALLY use Best Offer for any item priced over $20. Most of my items are Old Stock Electric Train items, many “hard to find”, so the “value/price” is hard to determine.
I end up with 7 sold listings.
SOMETIMES I do this, and list with a quantity of 7. It just depends on the item itself. IF it is possible that someone MIGHT buy more than 1 of that item, I’ll list it with a multiple quantity. But if it is HIGHLY IMPROBABLE that anyone would want more than one of that item, I’ll list it with a quantity of 1, and gauge the “supply and demand”, which SHOULD keep the price up. And sometimes, I’ll even raise the price after selling the item each time.
And using the Best Offer, with a quantity of more than 1 gives the impression that “you have lots to sell, so I’ll just offer a low price”.
Oh, sorry, one more question - what reason do you give in GS for ending the active listing? I think the selection is ‘Mistake in Listing’, ‘No longer available for sale’ plus one other.
Exactly what reason GS passes to Ebay, I have no idea. I just know that this method works. However, if you have large numbers I would be cautious using GS restart function. I have 25,000 and I keep encountering Queueing problems so I have disabled that again.
Another thing to be aware of is that if GS, for whatever reason, does not cancel the item, then Ebay will re-list it.
Ebay search results considers a 12 month old listing as “dead” and only allows it to be shown as a specific search you do to a sellers name or store. The rationale is that no one has bought it for 12 months so ebay wont “waste” time showing a listing that has been unsold for 12 months. Yes, end the listing every other month at the very least BUT NOT if you had a sale on a multiple quantity listing. Those with recent sales are looked at as a listing that others bought and possibly a new buyer would buy. The reason I like to use is “there was an error in the listing” or “the start price was wrong”. These reasons only matter if you hope to bring “watchers” to your new listing from the old one.
I THINK so. I manually Stop and either Relist, or Start, all my items after they have been listed for 28 or so days. Below is a photo of the Smart Group I use. I just leave the Smart Group triangle “open” and take a peek at it every day (morning and evening) and check to see when items show up in the Smart Group, then I Stop them, adjust the price, and Relist, or Start them.
David’s suggestion is a good one. But… I THINK you have to leave GarageSale running constantly and make sure your Mac does not goto sleep. I suppose you could set the Time Interval for 2 or 3 days, then GarageSale should check every day when you open the application, but be sure to allow for Friday morning until Monday morning. Also, make sure you turn this setting On for every listing. Maybe a Smart Group would help to show running listings that do not have the checkBox checked and also to be sure the correct Interval is set.
I just always use: “The listing contained an error”, and it has not been a problem. The dialog remembers this choice.
Neal in the USA
Smart Group title: “Days Remaining < 2 (Select All, Reveal Original, Stop Listings, Start/Relist Listings)”
I usually give the reason involving an error in the price, but I also usually randomly shift the prices up or down a few pennies every time.
And I’ve done the statistical analyses over the years. Broadly, items that are listed and renewed automatically (because somebody is watching them, I usually don’t kill those) are about 1/5 5% of my sales. Most items sell when I cancel them after a few days (I aim for 6-7 days) and list then again as new items, within the first 24 hours after the relisting.
The extra 100k fixed price listings I get per month for having a store makes it easy to “fake” the old 5-7 day listing periods.
Since I sell unique books (which people do NOT search for on google), this will be very different for anybody who sells commodities and manages inventory >1 each.
The one thing I have been doing is changing the SKU randomly for each “new” item.
| 
davidelliott:
