Building Positive Feedback on eBay – Gain Customer Confidence

One of the best ways to decide if a seller is reputable on eBay is to check their feedback score. If that score is in the high 90’s or 100% then you will be more confident in purchasing from them.

You can also see in the feedback comments that have been left by the latest buyers, scanning through these will give you ideas as to how happy the buyers are. These remarks can be the difference between a buyer continuing with a sale or moving on to another store.

If you are building a store you need to start from the beginning building positive feedback on eBay if you are going to be successful.

So how do we get positive feedback?

The best way to accomplish this is to provide GREAT customer service.

That means you take your order and provide a quick hassle-free transaction and dispatch so the product arrives with the buyer in top condition speedily.
Get these things correct and more times than not they will provide positive feedback.

So how do we provide GREAT service?

Accurate listings – Provide a listing description and detail that fully explains the item in question. Make sure to try and think of all the questions a buyer may want to know about your item. The size, weight, condition, materials it’s made from etc.

Pictures – take good quality images of your items. You can use up to 12 FREE as part of your listing more will cost but you shouldn’t need them. Images need to be 500 pixels at least in size eBay recommends 1600 currently.

Use a decent camera to take the images or you can copy them from the manufacturer’s website which is OK if you are selling one of their products. If you are selling something homemade then you need to take your own images.

Package securely – Make sure to protect your items so they don’t get broken while shipping.

TOP TIP: You can buy good quality packaging on eBay bubble wrap, padded envelopes, packing tape, scissors, markers, address envelopes, printing ink etc etc.

These items when purchased by you will give you positive feedback from the suppliers who send them as part of the eBay system.

These little increases in your score can push it up quicker and so increase confidence from your buyers.

When packing your items pad up anything that will break easily, mark your package with fragile, use a courier with extra protection to cover costs when things don’t arrive in one piece. If something does get damaged rethink how you send it and do better. You will make mistakes just learn from them,… oh! and apologies for the broken item and resend.

Timely dispatch – On your listings you are asked to provide a dispatch time, this in conjunction with eBay working out estimations on deliver give your buyer the possible arrival date of the item. It’s important to keep these dates. If you say you will dispatch in one working day then make sure to do that.

If it takes a bit longer contact the buyer and apologies for the delay as soon as you know you are not going to make the required timeline. Most people are OK with a day or two when informed.

Cheap shipping – buyers on eBay when it first started were looking for bargains as items were bought on an auction listing.

Now though eBay offers the ability to list for up to 30 days with a buy it now option. However, even though this is selling as a basic shop or store buyers are still looking for bargains and it’s no different with postage costs.

If you list your item cheaply but put on extortionate shipping costs they will give you bad feedback. It’s much better to put realistic prices on your items with proper shipping costs.

I use the exact price it costs me to ship policy and if anyone complains I give them the link to the shipping details on my receipt.

You can always go for FREE shipping costs which are a great way to get extra sales however you need to work that into your item price.

The problem I find with this is when customers want to return the item if it’s not exactly as described or damaged you have to reimburse the return costs as well as sending a replacement that can eat quickly into your monthly profit.

I have to say though I have not been hampered too much with this as I do try and describe, pack well my items so returns are low.

When things do go wrong

Occasionally you will have a problem. An item arrives damaged and the customer is complaining. Quickly send a reply and offer a full refund or the item replaced.

I have found it’s better to keep a 100% feedback score in place for a small price than argue with a customer as to who has to pay for shipping.

As you build the store and your customer base a cost like this can dig deep into your profit but as things begin to move you should be making enough to cover any discrepancies that occur without worry.

If the item was lost in post or damaged you can always claim against the shipper depending on what cover you have anyway so don’t fight it out with a customer over silly stuff.

If you treat the customer fairly there is a GREAT chance they will come back for more sales as they know how you handled their problem.

Contacting support over awkward customers – sometimes it doesn’t seem to matter what you say or do the customer just gets annoyed with you and gives negative feedback.

It has happened to me. In these cases, I contact eBay through their online support panel and discuss the transaction out with them.

For example one Christmas when during the holidays there was no shipping, a customer purchased an item.

The shop was in holiday mode with a message stating the delay due to the holidays and processing would start again on a given date.

This didn’t seem to matter to the customer who slapped me with negative feedback. While discussing with the support representative he seen my many happy customer feedback scores and the holiday message that had been on the shop.

He then removed the negative score and slapped the eBay member instead for being unreasonable.  So it is worth putting your case forward especially if that score was not warranted.

Powerseller status is this worth getting?

Another thing to remember when working on your listings is that eBay is looking at your progress also. They measure all your parameters including transactions, turnover, 1-5 star performance, times the resolution center was used for returns, items missing etc.

So not only is it important to work hard to please your customers but you need to keep a clean slate with eBay or you can be penalized by them. Having eBay do that means you get less traffic to your listings so fewer sales.

However, if you work hard and follow all the eBay guidelines you can move up the powerseller rankings and end up getting a discount from eBay on your fees. I used to get 20% off my subscription fees before eBay changed the way they offer discounts.

Now you need to provide a one day dispatch, a 14 day returns policy, a holiday return, an express delivery option and a FREE delivery option. Some of these especially the next day delivery I cannot offer at this time so for now I am out of the scheme.

However, it is something I will work too in the future as every possible penny saved is worth considering. The seller dashboard is well worth taking a look every few weeks or so to see how you are progressing.

You can see how many times a customer gave you a 1 or 2 star in their feedback. These low scores need to be re-addressed to ensure you don’t keep building them up as you are only allowed a certain percentage before you get penalized.

Final thoughts on getting positive feedback on eBay

• Make sure to describe your listings well.
  
• Provide good quality images from many angles.
  
• When pricing don’t try to get too much from shipping costs or you will be found out.
  
• Put your items into good quality packaging that will hold up to rough handling from the shipper.
  
• Try to provide a quality service to your customers that way they will leave positive feedback and also come back for more sales.
  
• If things go wrong be reasonable and correspond with your buyer to try and resolve the problem as quickly as possible.
  
• NEVER ignore your customers they are your it’s not professional and will get you bad mouthed around the niche you are in.
  
• I am confident if you follow these options you will gain 100% positive feedback and have many happy customers plus gain powerseller status with eBay.