Have you ever gotten negative feedback in your Etsy shop? Do you think it had an impact on your sales? Two months ago, I received negative feedback on four items from a seller. I paid quickly for my items using paypal, did not ask for a refund, and I left the seller positive feedback on each item. I could not understand why they gave me negative feedback.
After many emails I determined the seller was upset that I had sent a message asking about the finish on one of the items I had purchased. I did not give him negative feedback or ask for a refund, I was just asking a question. For two months he refused to change the negative feedback, the seller said I was “a trouble maker”. Contacting the Etsy support team was not successful; they could not help me because the seller did not leave a comment, he just selected negative for each item. In my opinion this is a bad Etsy policy. Maybe the feedback system needs an overhaul.
After some research on Chinese traditions and more emails to the seller about bad Karma and losing face, he finally changed the unfavorable feedback to positive this week (two months later).
Today, I had my first sale since the negative feedback was changed. I do feel that potential customers may have been lost during the time that my score was not 100% positive. During the two months that I was negotiating with the upset seller, I did not have one purchase.
Please give me your thoughts on the effects of negative feedback. Would you purchase from a seller that has less than 100% positive feedback?
Thanks for your comments in advance…..
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Aw...how sad! I think when I buy from a fellow Etsyer I only check the feedback if it's not 100% but if I saw that the feedback was for an item that was bought by you and not sold (although I don't think there is anyway to know if no comment was left to indicate this). I am glad you go it fixed! Do you have your shop monitored by an analytics program (like Google Analytics?). If so, maybe you could check your traffic to see if you had people looking but not buying? There's no way to prove it was due to this person of course but at least you might get an idea. Hope sales pick up! Thanks for your comment on Tropical Blonde!
ReplyDeleteOuch! That is a terrible thing for him to have done. I have not had that experience on Etsy but I guess I would look closer at a seller with less than 100%. On Ebay if its less than 100% I look at who gave them negative feedback- if they are a newcomer or gave others negative feedback then the problem is with them (in your case, HIM)
ReplyDeleteI'm only a buyer, never sold on any site and I love negative feedback. I wonder when I see someone with a high number of sales without any unhappy customers, are they really that good or do they intimidate people to get rid of negatives? I've noticed most negative feedback is related to slow shipping, which is out of the control of the seller, so I disregard that. I'd like to think that most people are able to disregard negative reviews when purchasing. From looking at Amazon you can see that reviews vary wildly, yet purchases get made. As long as most of your reviews are positive and the negative ones don't say your product is crap then I think you're doing fine and I would buy from you.
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