Insider’s Secrets to Selling on eBay

March 24, 2008 | 05:00PM PST/PT

Stephanie Tilenius
Hi everyone...I'm back with some good news. As you've heard us say a number of times already this year, great service will make the difference in 2008 and beyond. So to reward sellers who consistently delight their buyers, we're cutting insertion fees through the end of the month.
Starting tomorrow, if you have Detailed Seller Ratings (DSRs) of at least 4.5 on all criteria - and you specify your shipping costs or use the Shipping Calculator - simply list your auction-style item with a starting price of 99¢ or less to pay an insertion fee of only 1¢! New sellers who don't yet have DSR ratings are also eligible. This promotion will run through March 31st, so make sure to take advantage quickly.

Check out our information page for all the details.

Sincerely,

Stephanie Tilenius
General Manager, eBay North America

http://www2.ebay.com/aw/core/200803241700122.html

Posted by eBay Guru at 09:40 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

March 24, 2008 | 01:00PM PST/PT

Brian Burke
Hello...This is Brian Burke, Director Global Feedback Policy. Digital goods are often reproduced at little to no cost to the seller. On eBay, this creates the potential for Feedback Manipulation (both real and perceived). To preserve the integrity of the Feedback system, effective March 31 all goods that can be digitally downloaded or transferred electronically must be listed using the Classified Ads format.
Using the Classified Ads format, sellers receive a 30-day ad at a fixed price. This solution enables sellers to continue to market their digital goods on eBay; however, because Classified Ad listings are a lead generation tool and do not result in transactions that go through eBay, Feedback cannot be exchanged between buyer and seller.

Sellers who wish to continue to offer digital goods can do so by selecting the Everything Else>Information Products category in the Sell Your Item form and choosing the Classified Ads format (not auction-style or fixed price). For more information about the Classified Ads format, please read Advertising with Classified Ads.

Sincerely,

Brian Burke
Director, Global Feedback Policy

http://www2.ebay.com/aw/core/200803241300132.html

Posted by eBay Guru at 09:39 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

March 24, 2008 | 09:11AM PST/PT

Kristina Klausen
Hi everyone...This is Kristina Klausen from eBay’s Shipping team. Shipping is an integral part of the eBay experience. We’re focused on making changes that both improve the buying experience and benefit sellers who are working hard to create great shipping experiences.
There are several changes related to both these goals that I’d like to share with you.

Shipping Costs Factored into Best Match
As we’ve mentioned before, with the increased competition in eCommerce, buyers have become much more sensitive to shipping costs on eBay. Expensive shipping is a reason some buyers leave eBay. To address this, we’re doing a number of things to provide more exposure through Best Match for listings that provide good shipping prices and offer the best opportunity to deliver great buyer satisfaction.

As Jamie Iannone recently announced, Best Match is now the site-wide default for search results. Best Match already considers factors such as Time Ending, Relevance, Seller Performance, and Shipping & Handling.

Items from sellers with higher Detailed Seller Ratings scores for shipping costs may receive more exposure in search results, and items from sellers with below average DSRs may receive less. As sellers’ DSR scores improve, so does their search exposure. Over time, and category by category, how DSRs are treated in Best Match will be fine-tuned. As Lorrie announced, when the full Seller Dashboard launches in May, sellers will be able to see how their shipping DSR scores are impacting their visibility in search.

Coming soon, Best Match will also take into consideration how the shipping cost for an item compares to other items in the same sub-category, and also whether the shipping price is specified. Items with shipping costs significantly above the average cost for other items in the same sub-category may receive less exposure.

We will monitor as we go to make sure we’re achieving the goals of improving the overall buying experience on eBay and benefiting sellers who are creating great shipping experiences.

Phasing in Required Specified Shipping
Online buyers today expect to know the exact shipping price for an item before they place an order. And knowing the exact shipping price at the time of bidding or purchase on eBay is an important driver of buyer satisfaction.

When sellers specify the shipping price and service in the Shipping Details section of their listing (not just in the description) this information shows up for buyers in key places during the purchasing process -- on the Search Results page, at the top of the Item page, and in the Shipping Details section at the bottom of the listing. Listings with shipping specified in this way are more likely to sell and attract better DSR scores. For these reasons, starting this week, we’ll begin requiring that all new sellers who are listing for the first time specify their shipping costs using the Shipping Details section.

A few months later, specified shipping costs will become a requirement for most listings on eBay, including listings from 3rd party listing tools. (Exemptions will apply to certain categories like Vehicles, or services such as Freight.) The good news is that the vast majority of listings on eBay already include specified shipping. For sellers who are not yet taking advantage of specified shipping, we encourage you to adopt this important best practice right away.

New USPS Larger Flat Rate Box
Many eBay sellers have come to appreciate the Priority Mail Flat Rate Boxes offered by the United States Postal Services (USPS) for $8.95 to anywhere within the US. In response to demand, USPS recently introduced a new Flat Rate Box item, which is 50% larger. The Large Flat Rate Box measures 12 x 12 x 5-1/2 inches and is priced at $12.95 for domestic shipping.

The new Large Flat Rate box is now included in the eBay Shipping calculator, and we expect to incorporate it into our PayPal shipping labels solution later in the summer. Sellers are encouraged to make sure they use adequate postage - $12.95 domestically - when they use the Large Flat Rate Box. The Postal Service may return short-paid packages to the sender for additional postage.

International pricing and other details on the Large Flat Rate Box are available from USPS.

More Tips for Sellers to Improve their Shipping
We know many sellers are looking for ways to improve their Detailed Seller Ratings scores. In response, we’ve put together a list of tips that correlate to better shipping scores. Many sellers are discovering that making small changes in their approach can make a big difference. In particular, specifying a specific shipping service and price in the Shipping Details section of the listing, and making sure shipping costs are competitive with what buyers see elsewhere in eCommerce are important for earning high DSR scores.

To learn more, please visit our Shipping Best Practices

Sincerely,
Kristina Klausen
Senior Director, Shipping

http://www2.ebay.com/aw/core/200803240910422.html

Posted by eBay Guru at 09:37 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

March 13, 2008 | 03:17PM PST/PT

Hi everyone…This is Vamsee Nalamothu from our Buyer Experience team on eBay. My team and I are excited to let you know about the launch of a new version of eBay Checkout that has been in testing for several weeks. When buyers pay for an item they’ve purchased or won, eBay Checkout takes them through the steps necessary to pick their payment method, select or add their shipping address, and do the other steps necessary to confirm payment for the seller.
Our new, improved Checkout makes this process faster and easier, so buyers can quickly pay for items they have won – and sellers can receive faster payments. Some of the highlights include:

A selectable progress meter -- so buyers can gauge where they are in the process
Simplified editing of information -- including shipping address and shipping carriers
Improved coupon, gift certificate and gift card redemption
Automatic default to multi-seller checkout -- so buyers can go through Checkout once to pay for multiple items from multiple sellers
Improved merchandising of seller inventory post-payment – so sellers have an even better opportunity to sell more items during the Checkout process.
eBay Checkout also reduces the need for back-and-forth communication between buyers and sellers, because all shipping enhancements like Shipping discounts are captured during the process. This makes it easier for buyers to pay, and should result in fewer unpaid items and faster payments to our sellers.

eBay Checkout has been customized to meet the specific needs of many of our international markets, too. (The new Checkout will not be available in China, Germany or India.)

Launch plans
The new Checkout is being expanded to more of the marketplace over the next several weeks. You may begin to experience the new Checkout and payment flow, and once you see it, it will be your new default except in cases where sellers use a third-party listing provider.

We hope you enjoy the new Checkout. To leave us comments, please go to our Checkout discussion forum.

Sincerely,
Vamsee Nalamothu
Buyer Experience team

http://www2.ebay.com/aw/core/200803131516532.html

Posted by eBay Guru at 09:52 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

March 14, 2008 | 11:40AM PST/PT

John McDonald
Hi everyone, I'm John McDonald with the US Trust and Safety team. As Jim Ambach, VP of Seller Experience, outlined in his announcement in January, we're making some changes that are intended to make the buying experience on eBay better and safer. As part of this initiative, expanded safer payment requirements are scheduled to go into effect on March 17.
Since January 2007, all new sellers have been required to offer PayPal or a merchant credit card as a payment option to their buyers. On March 17, this policy will be expanded to sellers or items when they meet one or more of the following conditions:

the seller has higher than 5% buyer dissatisfaction rates
the seller has less than 100 feedback
the items are listed in categories with higher rates of buyer complaints, including: Gift Certificates, Video Games, Cell Phones, Computers and Consumer Electronics.
In addition, for a small number of transactions that have a higher risk of buyer dissatisfaction, we may delay the release of funds paid through PayPal. This hold will be placed on only a small percentage of transactions for up to 21 days. Then the funds will be released if there is no dispute. The funds may be released earlier if the buyer leaves positive feedback, or if PayPal can confirm delivery of the item. Sellers enrolled in the PayPal Money Market Fund will earn interest on any pending funds in their PayPal accounts.

Your payments will not be held if you meet the following requirements:

You have been an eBay member for 6 months or more, and
Your total Feedback score is 100 or greater, and
Your buyer dissatisfaction percentage is less than 5%.
Or

Your average DSR is 4.5 or greater and
Your have received 20 or more DSRs in the last 12 months.
I know that there have been questions among our Community about payment holds. Monroe Labouisse, my colleague at PayPal, explains holds in further detail on his post to the PayPal blog – I definitely encourage you to read it.

For more information about safer payment requirements in general, see the safer payments section of our FAQ.

Sincerely,

John McDonald
eBay Trust & Safety

http://www2.ebay.com/aw/core/200803141139352.html

Posted by eBay Guru at 09:47 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

March 12, 2008 | 10:01AM PST/PT

Raj Patel
Hi everyone...I'm Raj Patel with the eBay Stores team. As many of our Store sellers know, last November we began testing several new ways to display Store Inventory listings in the expansion area below search results. (As a reminder, this area appears when a search returns 30 or fewer auction-style and fixed price items.) For example, some of our tests included the display of Gallery images for Store Inventory listings when available. We also experimented with different quantities of Store Inventory listings in this area.
The purpose of all these tests was to determine what presentation makes the optimal experience for buyers. Based on our results, I'm pleased to let you know we'll be making two important changes:

Store Inventory Gallery Images Will be Displayed
Gallery images (when available) will now be shown in the Store Inventory expansion area when a search returns 30 or fewer core listings (auction-style and fixed price items).

Up to 50 Listings Displayed
We will now show up to 50 Store Inventory listings in this expansion area, a significant increase from our previous maximum of 30.

To learn more about eBay Stores, check out our information page.

Sincerely,

Raj Patel
eBay Stores

http://www2.ebay.com/aw/core/200803121000132.html

Posted by eBay Guru at 09:45 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)