[Don't Miss Out Even Late at Night] How to Catch New Listings from Followed Mercari Sellers 24/7
"This seller always lists good items at low prices"—as you continue sourcing, you will inevitably find several such "winning sellers."
You follow them, but have you ever experienced not receiving notifications for new listings despite following them, or finding that the item was already sold by the time you noticed?
I will state the conclusion first. This is not a configuration error; it is because Mercari's follow notifications have a built-in time restriction. And from a sourcing perspective, that restriction hits exactly where it hurts.
In this article, I will organize: (1) what the official follow notification specifications actually are (based on official help documentation), (2) why that is insufficient from a sourcing perspective, and (3) how to specify sellers and continue catching their listings 24 hours a day.
1. Official "Followed User Listing" notifications are for the 9:00 AM to 11:00 PM window
First, let's verify the facts. In the Mercari official help section under "Notifications/Feature Settings," there is a notification item called "Followed User Listings," and the description states the following.
When a seller you follow lists a new item between 9:00 AM and 11:00 PM
*Notifications are not sent during late-night hours
(Source: Mercari Official Help "Notifications/Feature Settings" https://help.jp.mercari.com/guide/articles/239/ / *As of the time this article was written)
In other words, for items listed between 11:00 PM and 9:00 AM the next day, you will not receive a notification even if you follow the seller. It is written as a specification.
Additionally, the official help page "Push notifications are not arriving" mentions behaviors such as push notifications not appearing while the app is open. Knowing these two things before jumping to the conclusion that "no notification means a configuration error" will save you from unnecessary research.
Furthermore, there are other reasons why you might miss new listings themselves. I have organized the causes for the issue of notifications arriving "late" into three categories in a separate article.
→ [3 Causes] How to Solve Slow or Missing Mercari Notifications from a "Sourcing Perspective"
2. Why this restriction matters to the sourcing side
You might think, "If I don't get notifications late at night, can't I just check in the morning?" If you are shopping for a hobby, that is true.
However, the situation is different for sourcing.
Reason 1: The battle for sourcing is concentrated "immediately after listing"
Items priced lower than the market rate do not last long after being listed. Even if you receive a batch of notifications at 9:00 AM, good items listed late at night may have already been sold by then.
Reason 2: You cannot choose the seller's lifestyle rhythm
People who list as a side hustle, people who list after cleaning up at night, people who list in bulk in the middle of the night—the listing time varies by seller. In other words, the restriction that "notifications are not sent during late-night hours" has the potential to completely exclude specific sellers from your monitoring target. It is common for the best sellers to have a different daily schedule than your own.
Reason 3: Keyword monitoring alone cannot predict "what that person will list"
Keyword monitoring is powerful, but it requires you to know "what you are looking for" as a prerequisite. On the other hand, good sellers are valuable precisely because they list unexpected items at low prices. It is fundamentally incompatible with the method of preparing keywords in advance.
In short, what buyers really want is a system that "notifies you the moment any new item is listed by a followed seller, regardless of the time of day or keywords."
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3. Use "Seller Watch" to pick up only new listings from specified sellers
Flea Market Hunter has a setting called Seller Watch. By registering the IDs of the sellers you want to monitor, it detects and notifies you of new listings from those sellers regardless of keywords.
There are four key points to the specifications (*as of the time this article was written).
① Keyword-independent
It operates on a different path from regular keyword monitoring. Anything newly listed by a registered seller is targeted regardless of whether it matches a keyword. It is designed for sellers who are valuable because "you never know what they will list."
② Supports both individual sellers and Mercari Shops
Individual seller IDs are numeric, while Mercari Shops IDs are alphanumeric. Flea Market Hunter automatically sorts them by looking at the ID format, so you can mix and register them in the same input field. Even if your sources include both individuals and shops, there is no need to separate the settings.
③ No time restrictions
As long as the app is running and monitoring, it detects items just the same in the middle of the night or early morning. There is no "9:00 AM to 11:00 PM" cutoff.
④ You can register more than one person
You can register multiple seller IDs separated by single-byte spaces. It is designed to handle lists of hundreds of people.
How to find seller IDs
It is not difficult.
Open the target seller's profile page on Mercari
Look at the URL. For an individual seller, it will be in a format like `https://jp.mercari.com/user/profile/123456789`
The number at the end (e.g., `123456789`) is the seller ID
For Mercari Shops, use the alphanumeric ID included in the shop page URL
After that, just paste the IDs you found into the "Seller Watch" field on the Flea Market Hunter settings screen, separated by single-byte spaces.
You can choose how to receive notifications
New items detected by Seller Watch can also be received through the same path as regular new listing notifications. In addition to desktop pop-ups, you can also have them sent to LINE, Discord, or Slack, so you can notice them on your device even when you are out.
4. Points to Note Before Using
To be honest, I will also write about what it is and isn't suitable for.
Listings made before registration are not covered
Seller Watch only picks up items newly listed after registration. It is not suitable for the purpose of "wanting to see a list of this person's past inventory." That is the job of regular search.
Notifications may become too frequent
If you register many sellers with a high number of listings, notifications will naturally increase. This is because keyword-independent means that no filters are applied. It is realistic to start with a few people who were truly "hits" and increase them while observing the situation.
It does not replace keyword monitoring
Seller Watch is monitoring centered on "people," while keyword monitoring is monitoring centered on "items." Since their roles are different, the proper way to use them is to run both in parallel. If you want to improve the accuracy of the keyword side, please take a look at this as well.
→ [Permanent Saved Version] 7 Secrets to Setting "Effective" Keywords for Mercari Reselling
It assumes the app is running
Furima Hunter is a desktop app that runs on your computer. You need to keep the app running while monitoring (*detection speed varies depending on the environment and network conditions).
5. Summary
Mercari's official "Listings from followed users" notifications are limited to items listed between 9:00 and 23:00, and it is clearly stated in the official help that notifications are not sent during late-night hours (*as of the time this article was written)
The battle for sourcing is won immediately after listing, and since you cannot choose the seller's posting time, this restriction leads to "not being able to effectively monitor specific sellers."
Keyword monitoring is a mechanism centered on "items," and it is not compatible with "hit" sellers of the type where "you don't know what this person will list."
If you want to pick up based on "people," you can use Seller Watch, which detects new arrivals by specifying a seller ID without relying on keywords (supports both individuals and Mercari Shops / no time restrictions / multiple registrations possible)
How to choose an overall monitoring tool is summarized in a comparison article.
First, please try it for free for 7 days.
You can use all features without restrictions. No complicated procedures are required, and there is no automatic billing after the trial.