According to a survey done by eBay at the end of August 2007, 21 percent of people did not buy or place a bid because the seller did not offer a return policy. Meaning that, if you do not offer a good return policy, you are going to loss 21% of your sales.
Buyers need to feel safe buying from you. When you tell them you accept return, you have just given them the sense of security that they needed. The strategy here is to structure your return policy properly so that your buyers feel secure dealing with you and you can protect your eBay business at the same time. Win-win situation.
The time provided for returns. What is the best period of time? Usually the longer the time the more secure the buyer will felt. 30 days is a pretty standard time for returns.
If you want to stand out from your competitors, try to offer 60 days or 90 days. The longer your return period the higher the risk your product is being worn or damaged by the buyer.
In this case, you can state another terms. Only accept returns if the product is still in unopened or unused condition. If the product is already used, you reserve the rights not to accept returns or only refund 50%.
Offer money back guarantee. Different sellers offer different type of returns. Example: money back, exchange for another product, providing credit for future purchase and so forth.
According to my own experience, the first option "money back" works far better compare to other options.
The better choice here is to offer all three options to the buyers and let them choose. Buyers will look at you as very professional and even feel more secure buying from you.
100% satisfaction guarantee. If you are very confident about your product and you are sure most of the buyer will be very satisfied using it, offer a "100% satisfaction guarantee".
If the buyer is not satisfied for any reason, offer full money back guarantee to them. This technique is used by most of the eBay Powersellers.
If you can offer that, you are likely to get more bids because you have developed a higher level of security for the buyers.
Refund only the purchase price. It is very important to state Clear in your description, refund only the purchase price, shipping & handling is not refundable.
If you sent the wrong merchandise to your customers, then you should bear the shipping & handling cost. Otherwise, you do not need to refund the shipping cost.
Restocking fees. Some of the big time sellers charge restocking fees of 5% for customers wants to return their merchandise. You can do this too because you have to spend time unpacking, restocking and marking the item back to inventory.
Be very clear with your buyers. Some products like limited edition collections have higher value when it is unopened. Once it is opened, its value will decrease. If you are selling this type of products, you do not want to accept opened products because you can not resell them at their original value.
State the terms very clearly in your description so that your buyer will aware of this.
I have just share some very good information about returns policy for your eBay business. Hope it helps.
Source by Ts Chan
0 comments:
Post a Comment