As an ecommerce entrepreneur, you know every dollar counts when operating your eBay business. One often overlooked strategy to boost profits is to fully utilize eBay‘s combined shipping discounts. Offering enticing combined rates for your buyers can increase sales while shipping items together in one box can seriously cut your fulfillment costs.
In this comprehensive guide, we’ll cover everything entrepreneurs need to know about reaping the rewards of combined shipping on eBay app, including:
- Benefits of Combined Shipping
- Exactly How Buyers Request Combined Rates
- Step-by-Step Setup for Sellers
- Policies of Top eBay Sellers
- Recommended Best Practices
The Value of Combined Shipping for eBay Sellers
Offering combined shipping gives buyers an incentive to add more items to their cart instead of making multiple smaller purchases over time. According to eBay [1], "listings with a combined shipping option can result in a 10-30% increase in conversion rate."
As an added bonus, when you ship multiple eBay orders together in one box, you stand to save big on fulfillment costs. eBay found that "sellers save an average of 22% on shipping by combining orders."
Let‘s look at an example based on actual eBay shipping calculations:
- Selling 1 textbook media mail: $3.86 shipping fee
- Selling 1 textbook + 1 DVD media mail: $4.28 combined shipping fee
While the buyer enjoys 42 cents in shipping savings, the seller ships two items for only 42 cents more than shipping one. This adds up to major cost reductions over time.
Step-By-Step: Requesting Combined Rates as a Buyer
Requesting a combined shipping rate from eBay sellers is easy right within the eBay app:
1. Add Desired Items to Cart
Browse listings as usual and tap "Add to Cart" for any items you wish to purchase.
2. Proceed to Checkout
Head to your cart and tap "Proceed to checkout". If the seller offers combined rates, discounted shipping fees reflecting your multiple items will display.
3. Contact Seller If Unsure
If you don‘t see confirmation that the seller combines shipping, tap the "Contact Seller" link on the listing BEFORE purchasing to request they send you an adjusted combined invoice.
4. Pay Combined Invoice
The seller will send you the payment invoice reflecting the discounted combined shipping rate for all your items. Simply pay the invoice to complete your purchase with the adjusted lower shipping cost.
Pro Tip: When contacting sellers about combined shipping, be polite and reference all items you plan to purchase in your request. Most sellers will happily oblige and provide a combined invoice.
How to Set Up Combined Shipping as an eBay Seller
As a merchant, offering enticing combined shipping discounts is crucial for boosting conversions and retaining customers:
1. Determine Your Shipping Rules
Consider factors like item size, average order totals, and your profit margins when defining combined shipping policies. Common options include:
- Free shipping on additional items
- Fixed flat discounted rate for additional items
- Percentage discount off total shipping costs
2. Configure Combined Shipping Discounts
Log into your Seller Hub account and navigate to Shipping Preferences. Here you can easily set rules to apply automatic percentage discounts or conditional free shipping based on number of items purchased.
3. Communicate Discounts In Listings
Prominently promote combined shipping discounts in your listings with messaging like "Save 20% off shipping when you buy 2 or more items!"
4. Regularly Review Data & Optimize
Analyze your shipping data to identify opportunities to boost profits. For example, you may find that offering 50% off shipping nets you 3x as many 2-item orders, resulting in major savings from combined shipments.
Top Rated eBay Sellers Lead with Generous Combined Shipping Policies
Savvy entrepreneurs know offering tempting combined shipping deals wins more multi-item orders. Let‘s examine the win-win policies from two top-rated eBay sellers:
1. eBucksStore
This top-rated seller with 99.9% positive feedback offers aggressive combined shipping discounts to incentivize multi-item hauls:
- Buy 2-3 items, get 60% off second highest shipping fee
- Buy 4+ items, get free shipping on additional items
They promote this clearly in listings and have likely found offering generosity here pays dividends in the long run.
2. The Media Man
This well-known media seller combines orders with savings of:
- 50% off the second highest shipping charge for 2-3 item purchases
- 75% off the second highest shipping charge for 4-6 item purchases
- Free shipping on additional items with 7+ item purchases
Given their specialty in media mail items with lower shipping rates, they can afford to offer deep combined shipping discounts to secure those profitable multi-item orders.
Best Practices for Combined Shipping as an eBay Seller
- Clearly communicate your combined shipping policies across listings, stores, and post-purchase messages. Assure buyers you‘ll happily combine items.
- Consider insured flat rate shipping at set discounts for simplicity. Buyers love predictability.
- Reinforce policies during checkout by showing combined rates before buyers must contact you.
- Review analytics regularly to find shipping discount sweet spots that balance profitability with enticing multi-item order conversion rates.
- Automate combined invoicing through integrations like ShipStation to simplify processing many combined shipments.
The Bottom Line
eBay combined shippingunlocks serious savings for both merchants and shoppers. As an eBay entrepreneur,implementing deliberate combined shipping discounts and policies will elevate your profits while keeping loyal customers returning to your listings again and again thanks to shipping deals they can‘t refuse.
[1] eBay Inc. "How to Increase Sales with Combined Shipping." eBay.com
