Sales I've Run

Thursday, March 8, 2018

Sales on Poshmark are a difficult tactic.  Who doesn't love a good deal?  Unlike major department and clothing stores, there's no way to send out fliers, e-mails, or truly post an ad for buyers to see.  You could make a sign in your closet announcing your sale.  Most shoppers on Poshmark find an item and purchase that item alone; sometimes they'll sift through a closet looking for an opportunity to bundle and save on shipping, but you have to hope they stop and see a sign mentioning your sale.

I've dabbled with changing my Seller Discount before, but following are a few of the approaches I've taken to snag that sale prior to the release of the Offer to Likers feature.

Sale to Former Buyers
In January, on the exact one year anniversary of my first sale on Poshmark, I reached out to every single buyer who left me a 5 Star Rating in the past year with the following message:

This was a simple sale in terms that I wrote out my message once, then copied and pasted my notice and tagged the buyer.   I would say about 20 of my former buyers liked items after they received my message.  Initially, I was really hopeful on this one. Out of 240 buyers, however, only 4 previous buyers took me up on my offer.  Four.
Positive: I unloaded a lot of stuff that wasn't moving and got my money back for items I deemed mistakes...and a few extra dollars!
Negative: I only had a success rate of 1.6%.  Woof.
Personal Analysis: I think I will definitely replicate this sale in January of 2019, despite the success rate, simply because my former buyers bundled a bunch of items and a lot of stale inventory moved.  I also liked that I wasn't advertising a specific item for sale - it was completely up to the buyer to choose.

Monday Sale
In April of 2017, I decided to run my very first sale which also led me to creating my very first closet sign - something I previously fought against.
I picked a few items that I really wanted to move - in particular, swimsuits.  I'd managed to get my hands on a few new with tag bathing suits.  I wanted to really unload these before the Poshmark market flooded with suits.  I'd been steadily selling them in February and early March, but saw a decline in late March.  I also had these new with tag bralettes and despite Poshmark highlighting the bralette trend, I didn't have one bite. I wrote the above message and tagged every person who liked the item.
Positive: I sold three items.  I got rid of the bralettes and bathing suits.  The buyers all purchased outright with no offers.  It was also a spur of the moment idea, so it did not take a lot of effort and planning on my part.
Negative: It did feel like a lot of work in the moment, but because it was only over the course of one day, it definitely felt manageable.
Personal Analysis: I do like this type of tactic and I think I'm considering doing consistent Monday sales in May.  May through July were slow for me, so I want to find ways to boost traffic and sales.

Daily Sale
Based on the success I had in April, I decided this past October to jumpstart my closet and fall by performing a daily sale.



Beforehand, I opened up a Google Spreadsheet and determined items I thought really needed to get out that door!  I wrote up a script each day so I could simply copy, paste, and then tag every person who liked the item.  I also chose October because it's my birthday month and I thought that might entice buyers or at the very least some extra shares from kind Poshers.
Positive: It was way easier to know ahead of time which item I was featuring and the majority of the work the day of was accurately typing out usernames.  I did this from a computer (my setup is two-monitors) and it was easier to copy and paste.  I also found the most success and traffic the earlier in the morning I announced the daily sale.  I sold 4 items through this method!
Negative: How does a whole month of daily sales feel?  Eh, exhausting.  Some days I woke up late and I wasn't notifying buyers until later on in the day and I think I lost ground that way.  Also, when you look at the statistics, for 31 days, I only sold 4 featured items which means my success rate was 13%.  Better than my January sale, at least!
Personal Analysis: I liked the planning ahead.  I hate routines though (*working on it!*) so I think that's what made this feel exhausting.

Looking To The Future
I would definitely like to try out different sales strategies.  Here's a list of sales ideas I'm interested in pursuing:

  • Direct Sharing to buyers who like an item over a specific amount of time (a day, a week, a weekend)
  • A 40% off sale
  • A 50% off sale
  • Sales on specific items (tops or dresses, most likely)
Buyers don't seem to be as enticed by a free item as I hoped.  One of my biggest struggles is that I'm an awful shopper/buyer and I'm targeting the me's of the world (read: cheapos).  We aren't buying as much, as often, or at a truly profitable level, so my goal throughout 2018 is to shift the focus to true buyers and not pain's-in-the-but like moi.

Have you run any types of these sales or a different variation?  Did it work or bomb? I'm all for input and sharing experiences.  Leave me a comment here, comment on this Instagram post, e-mail me, or slide into my DMs on the 'gram.  

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