Since we started up rp fashion avenue, we have tried various means of getting traffic to our blogshop as well as getting traffic elsewhere to increase sales.
That was when we discovered Yahoo!Auction Singapore and Ebay Singapore. We began listing our items in both portals, with varying results.
Firstly, a background introduction on the two
Ebay.com.sg started up shop in Singapore in 2006. A fairly new service compared to other Ebay portals . Yahoo! Auction Singapore started in around 1999.
Being a new player here, Ebay is trying to encourage more people to sell through their auction portal by offering promotions such as "new sellers get free gallery pack", but with conditions. Read more here if interested
It's obvious that Yahoo! and Ebay are rivals. It's more obvious that Ebay is more established in most countries, with Yahoo! Auction US retired in June 2007 as a major sign of defeat on Yahoo's side, in my opinion.
But Yahoo! Auction do have their supporters in countries like Taiwan and Japan. This maybe the reason why Ebay does not have auction portals in these countries (Ebay Japan having closed down in 2002).
A quote from website M/Cyclopedia of New Media
Despite its failures in Europe and Australia, Yahoo! Auctions continues to thrive in Asia. Along with its sites in the United States and Canada, Yahoo! boasts international sites in China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan and Japan (http://auctions.yahoo.com). The Japanese site has proved to be so popular that in 2002, eBay was forced to shut down its own business ventures there (Anonymous, 2002).
As mentioned earlier, we had different results from the two auction portals. Guess which generated more sales for us?
.....I am a supporter of Yahoo! Auction Singapore
Yes, Yahoo!
Why?
There are more people using Yahoo Auction Singapore then Ebay. Based on our experience in selling at both portals, more people here use Yahoo! Auction then Ebay, judging by the pageviews per item.
And also......
Yahoo charges on their other auction sites but it's a FREE service here, for both sellers and buyers. And though they are a free service here, they DO have a customer service running and they're pretty efficient. I have emailed them in regards to problems with listing my items and they have replied to all queries and resolved the issues at hand most of the time.
However....
It's a common problem for us that after days of listing our items, we are unable to find them using the search function. The only solution is to keep re-listing until you find them in the search results.
But it has become worst recently as results reflected from searches are inaccurate. Meaning you can't find items using keywords!
As I googled on the web, I found similar user complaints like below: Read more here
And I also found good news on their homepage. Yahoo! Auction Singapore is trying to fix the problem
In the meantime, we are giving ebay another try, as an alternative, maybe...
We have started using Ebay to list our items again, after giving up on it as we have not had much luck selling at Ebay and also because they charge fees for listing pictures in search results (!), fees for listing bigger pictures (!), you get the idea...
In Conclusion
I am hoping Yahoo! Auction Singapore is able to fix their technical problems asap and keep their portal free for all!
** Somebody posted that the search function had recovered. We checked and yes things are coming up after we type in relevant keywords.
However, we are having problems with logging into our own accounts. (31/05/08)
** Still having logging in problem. Log in , log out again and again (04/06/08)
5 comments:
The Yahoo! Auction seems to have recovered today.....
At least, it looks better than the last few days.
Hi there,
I tried the search function and it seems to have recovered.
But I am having log in problems..
Anybody facing same issue?
Glad that you posted this article as I do agree that yahoo singapore is a fantastic site for both buyers & sellers. but it really pains me that yahoo do not seem to be very concern about losing their reputations as seen in the way they have been so slow to rectify the piling problems that are happening in the yahoo Singapore auctions … I wander if we should all try to voice out our concerns to spur yahoo to do something and rectify the problems that yahoo auctions is having .
These days , the sg auctions site are basically down, Trying to do any search, list or buy is simply a tormenting and time wasting act. Unless Yahoo Singapore puts their acts together and get the problem fixed fast , I think they are simply losing their loyal yahooers .
p.s come across this yahoo answer that I wander if flowerpod would like to consider submitting your comments to stomp being that you pals are a weighted online body.
http://sg.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080603205101AAE4OJ6&pa=FYd1D2bwHTHzJbhjEes_R6fjIhoISjNfR32vMZnbGStj6Q--&paid=asked&msgr_status
Hi there,
Thank you for leaving us a comment.
I followed the link you gave and yes we are having the same problems of listing, editing our items. It's frustrating as this basically handicaps any possible selling at yahoo. I can try up to 10 times logging in but still cannot edit my listing, :(
I think yahoo will eventually restore their service, but I agree with you they are definitely losing sellers and buyers alike, especially some people have set up new auction portals and inviting serious sellers over.
Even though we are facing these problems we have not written yahoo any emails this time round. Think they have received alot of emails and know very well what's going on.
Think it will spur them with publicity at stomp?
**Just as a side note, we are not affiliated or close to flower pod in anyway.
It looks like yahoo auctions have finally gone.......... August and still nothing.
Kaqoo have opened a free auction for Singapore, http://kaqoo.com/index.html
If you sell worldwide your items will appear on all the sites in the Kaqoo Auction Network, over 1000 of them. If you sell locally they will just appear on sites in SG.
Give it a try.
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