How is the Ebay search engine working now on 8mm query? so confusing...

[Winbert Hutahaean]

Hi all,

I have been in hiatus of buying 8mm for 10 years.... but just now I browsed Ebay pages (Ebay.co.uk and Ebay.com) to find Tom & Jerry on 8mm films using the following keywords:

Tom Jerry 8mm

and the results were zero on both websites.

Here is the link I got after putting the above keyowrds in the search box:

Ebay.co.uk: https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_f...film&_osacat=0

Ebay.com: https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...y+8mm&_sacat=0

I don't know if you click from your country will give results or not, but I am in Indonesia and got zero results. This is almost impossible since I knew 10 years ago there would be tons of Tom & Jerry listing on 8mm as this is a very common films

Any thought?

cheers
winbert

[John Halfacre]

Hi Winbert. That is strange as we have 20 Super 8 Tom & Jerry's currently listed on our Ebay UK Store. I clicked on your search link and changed the search to 'Tom Jerry Film Super 8' and 98 results came up so there are still lots of films out there. Maybe just using 'Tom Jerry Film' as the search is too wide a term.
BR
John

[Melvin England]

Winbert - As far as Ebay UK is concerned, I am convinced that their search engine has deteriorated in the last year or so.

One of my default searches is "Super 8 sound" which is reasonably good, but does bring up the odd standard 8 film, too.

The one that is totally up the creek is "super 8 feature." Once upon a time it would indeed only list all the features on ebay which has the word "feature" in it. Now, anything goes..... even without including the word "feature." Very unreliable. I fully sympathise with you, Winbert, as I am sure that the "Tom Jerry 8mm" search would have originally worked, but not anymore. The best thing is to take John's advice.

I have also found this the case with non film related searches too, so to quote from a certain film..."We are not alone."

[Ed Gordon]

Winbert, I did a search at Ebay.com in the US using "Tom Jerry 8mm" and got 66 hits. The Ebay search translated into:

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...y+8mm&_sacat=0

I wonder if previous search histories taint new searches on Ebay like it does on sites like Youtube where you get hits on things you watched before?

I set up a automatic search for new 8mm films on Ebay that sends me results by email daily. I have noticed that there is a trend in that there are days when nothing new has been added.

Another problem is sellers often create titles that contain too much information such as:

"film, super 8, sound, color, cartoon, tom and jerry"

This results in emails from Ebay listing what is new will have titles like:

"film sound color super 8" which is useless information.

[Osi Osgood]

Sometimes, I don't think that the search engine even does a new search, as, overnight, I check the next day and absolutely no new titles, (searching "Super 8 sound films"), but I just check "Super 8mm", and lo and behold, lots of new titles!

[Winbert Hutahaean]

Thank you for your replies.

I believe Ebay now localizes search results based on what site we are using and where we are:

Ebay.com = For US, North American and South American buyers.
Ebay.co.uk = For UK buyers
Ebay.de, Ebay.fr. Ebay.nl, Ebay.es, etc = For EU buyers
Ebay.com.au = for Australia and the rest of the Pacific

So for example, as I'm in Indonesia, if I searched on Ebay.co.uk, I would only see listings posted on Ebay.co.uk where sellers have chosen worldwide. So I wouldn't see anything listed on Ebay.co.uk if it was aimed at local buyers only and results from other Ebay websites although they are aimed at worldwide buyers. If you want to see local listings items of websites where you are not located, then you must "cheat" Ebay using VPN.

Since 8mm is very niche market, I suggest you check each website for your own luck and even use VPN. When using VPN and local sellers did not want send overeseas then try to get members here to receive the films and forward it to you.

And now, when I act a seller ...as you may know...I've listed the Elmo 16CL brackets and lenses (and also several turntable styluses/needles). Because I have several of the same items, I have now listed them simultaneously on the respective websites to attract more buyers. And today I checked, a particular item which I listed on 3 different websites, has more viewers and watchers compared to last week when it was only listed on Ebay.com .

However, this type of strategy can't work for my CDs because I only have one CD per title. If I listed them on different websites and coincidentally they received bids at the same time, I would be in big trouble because I would only be able to serve one buyer.

Your thoughts?