Half.com Seller Commission Fees Increase
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As of December 16, 2016 and into 2017, stores and individuals that sell on Ebay's Half.com will experience a significant increase in the commission fees they pay when a listed item sells.
Half.com nearly doubled its fees for all commissions, ranking it as one of the highest profit losses for online sellers of most marketplaces, second only to Amazon.com which takes a significant cut.
The benefit of Amazon.com is enormous popularity and online presence. In polls and interviews conducted by How To Sell Online in 2015 and 2016, we discovered that the first place those polled think of when desiring to locate and purchase a product online is Amazon. Only 2% mentioned eBay as the first place that came to mind. None of our participants polled or interviewed ever mentioned Half.com.
Half.com focuses on Text Books, Books, Music and Audio Book CD's, Video Games, Movies on Blueray, DVD and VHS tape. While prices can often be great for shoppers, the already low profit margin compared to similar marketplaces where these items are sold, is often a poor return on a sellers investment. This calls forth the question of why Half.com would increase their fee beyond their level of popularity and online brand recognition.
As for why Half.com would raise the commission fees during fourth quarter and right before the holiday rush, the answer is more obvious. It's a tacky and cheap attempt to make more profit at their sellers expense. Reputable marketplaces announce fee increases in early Spring or during the summer in third quarter to allow its sellers and merchants the opportunity to adjust their prices, decide if they will continue selling on the marketplace and if necessary move their merchandise to another more competitive marketplace.
In 2014 Storenvy.com did similar when it introduced a 10% commission fee mid-November. It back fired horribly, causing a large exodus right before the highest selling period of the year.
Half.com, though owned by eBay, originally operated independently of eBay when it was first acquired. For a few years prior to eBay's introduction of it's current search engine Cassini, Half.com search results had been integrated into eBay's search algorithm; this allowed products sold on Half.com to appear on eBay.com for those who opted-in. Ebay dropped the Half.com integration when it introduced eBay's current Cassini search engine algorithm.
Over the past few years, Half.com has operated independently of eBay again, with no integration for PayPal commission payments to sellers. Instead, sellers receive a direct to checking or bank account deposit twice a month.
What Half.com has done in this 2016 Holiday season, is placed its sellers and merchants in a horrible situation. Unfortunately, being half-way into forth quarter may cause some merchants to suck-it-up since all their products are already in Half.com inventory. Listing product, creating product descriptions and taking photos requires a hefty amount of time that most sellers on Half.com will simply have none to spare until first first quarter 2017.
In How To Sell Online's opinion, eBay's Half.com's poorly orchestrated decision will most probably backfire similar to Storenvy in 2014. In our opinion, current Half.com sellers should put their inventory on hold through the rest of fourth quarter and focus their energies on products they are selling on other more competitive marketplaces. This will prevent the suffrage of unexpected profit loss and allow merchants to begin moving their inventory to another marketplace in first quarter 2017.
If you would like to learn about the actual fee increases and how these changes may ultimately affect Ebay sellers in 2017, view our recent video below or jump over to our How To Sell Online YouTube Channel at http://www.randydreammaker.com
Half.com nearly doubled its fees for all commissions, ranking it as one of the highest profit losses for online sellers of most marketplaces, second only to Amazon.com which takes a significant cut.
The benefit of Amazon.com is enormous popularity and online presence. In polls and interviews conducted by How To Sell Online in 2015 and 2016, we discovered that the first place those polled think of when desiring to locate and purchase a product online is Amazon. Only 2% mentioned eBay as the first place that came to mind. None of our participants polled or interviewed ever mentioned Half.com.
Half.com focuses on Text Books, Books, Music and Audio Book CD's, Video Games, Movies on Blueray, DVD and VHS tape. While prices can often be great for shoppers, the already low profit margin compared to similar marketplaces where these items are sold, is often a poor return on a sellers investment. This calls forth the question of why Half.com would increase their fee beyond their level of popularity and online brand recognition.
As for why Half.com would raise the commission fees during fourth quarter and right before the holiday rush, the answer is more obvious. It's a tacky and cheap attempt to make more profit at their sellers expense. Reputable marketplaces announce fee increases in early Spring or during the summer in third quarter to allow its sellers and merchants the opportunity to adjust their prices, decide if they will continue selling on the marketplace and if necessary move their merchandise to another more competitive marketplace.
In 2014 Storenvy.com did similar when it introduced a 10% commission fee mid-November. It back fired horribly, causing a large exodus right before the highest selling period of the year.
Half.com, though owned by eBay, originally operated independently of eBay when it was first acquired. For a few years prior to eBay's introduction of it's current search engine Cassini, Half.com search results had been integrated into eBay's search algorithm; this allowed products sold on Half.com to appear on eBay.com for those who opted-in. Ebay dropped the Half.com integration when it introduced eBay's current Cassini search engine algorithm.
Over the past few years, Half.com has operated independently of eBay again, with no integration for PayPal commission payments to sellers. Instead, sellers receive a direct to checking or bank account deposit twice a month.
What Half.com has done in this 2016 Holiday season, is placed its sellers and merchants in a horrible situation. Unfortunately, being half-way into forth quarter may cause some merchants to suck-it-up since all their products are already in Half.com inventory. Listing product, creating product descriptions and taking photos requires a hefty amount of time that most sellers on Half.com will simply have none to spare until first first quarter 2017.
In How To Sell Online's opinion, eBay's Half.com's poorly orchestrated decision will most probably backfire similar to Storenvy in 2014. In our opinion, current Half.com sellers should put their inventory on hold through the rest of fourth quarter and focus their energies on products they are selling on other more competitive marketplaces. This will prevent the suffrage of unexpected profit loss and allow merchants to begin moving their inventory to another marketplace in first quarter 2017.
If you would like to learn about the actual fee increases and how these changes may ultimately affect Ebay sellers in 2017, view our recent video below or jump over to our How To Sell Online YouTube Channel at http://www.randydreammaker.com