eBay and Etsy Ad Rates Set From Contribution Margin

Etsy takes twelve percent of an attributed Offsite Ads order once a shop passes ten thousand dollars in trailing twelve-month sales, and above that line participation is not optional, while eBay's suggested ad rate on Promoted Listings Standard reflects what competitors are bidding rather than what your margin can carry. This engagement produces the ad rate ceiling for each SKU, the rate above which promoting a listing costs more contribution than it creates, and an estimate of how many promoted sales you were going to make anyway. Both numbers come out of your own cost and fee data rather than category benchmarks. What the model is built from: Landed cost per unit including inbound freight and duty. The marketplace's own take by category: eBay's final value fee sits near thirteen percent plus a per-order charge in most US categories, Etsy's transaction fee at six and a half percent before payment processing and the listing fee charged per listing per four months. Shipping actually paid against shipping charged. Returns and refund rate by SKU rather than a blended figure. And the Offsite Ads fee where it applies, with the per-order cap taken into account. The output is a contribution figure per unit sold that most sellers have never seen at SKU level, and it is usually the part of the work that changes the most decisions. The cannibalisation test: Ceilings mean little without knowing what share of promoted sales was incremental. The catalogue is split into two halves matched on trailing units and seasonality, promotion goes dark on one half for three to four weeks, and the read is on total units for that half rather than on promoted units. I will tell you in advance what invalidates the test: a Best Match position shift inside the window, a seasonal SKU with no matched pair, an offsite placement still serving against a listing that was meant to go dark. What you receive: An ad rate ceiling per SKU. The listings that should not be promoted at any rate. The listings that should be delisted rather than promoted. A call on Promoted Listings Advanced against Standard by category, on the arithmetic rather than on preference. And a rule for updating the ceilings yourself as costs move. The model is a spreadsheet you keep and can maintain, not a dashboard you rent. Not included: Product photography, listing copy, tag and keyword work, review solicitation, store design, multi-account structures or anything else sitting near the edge of either platform's policy, and day-to-day running of the campaigns. I set the ceilings and the rules; your team or your operator works inside them. Skip this if: Combined marketplace revenue runs under roughly twenty-five thousand dollars a month, where the contribution recovered will not cover the work. You cannot produce landed cost per SKU, which is the case for most drop-shipped inventory and turns the model into decorated guesswork. Or you want someone to raise ad rates until units go up, which does work and destroys contribution, and I would rather you hear that before paying me. Running both marketplaces at once: Sellers on eBay and Etsy usually carry one catalogue and two very different fee structures, and the same SKU can be worth promoting on one and worth delisting on the other. The model handles them separately and then says where the catalogue itself should diverge. I work in English or Hebrew, and read Hebrew-language supplier invoices without needing them translated first.