Ebay Marketing

[DCnotPC]

Wonder what they are up to? I'll do some digging.

[DF]

I don't know of any other way of managing eBay listings other than through the 3rd party software previously mentioned.

I know of one person who utilized 3rd party software where the software/website that managed their eBay listings them prevented them from utilizing search engine optimization, so you'd want to double check that part first if you think you may want to move in that direction at some point.

Once you take the plunge and register with eBay, I know one site that has a lot of free marketing tools and also allows you to import and market your eBay listings for free in your local area as well as nationally. It's new, and there is a site for most every major metropolitan city in the US. www.freefornetworks.com - you can find the closest one to you.

Hope this helps and good luck.

[zinruss]

OK, more about Ebay:

I don't really use Ebay to sell a lot of product. I do use it to create brand awareness. People see the listing and learn about my brand.

Here's what you CAN'T do:

1. Direct clickable links to your web site.

2. Contact bidders and offer to sell them stuff directly, outside of Ebay.

Here's what you CAN do:

1. Use your logo prominently

2. Use your brand name prominently

3. Refer to your url by using it as your company name "Here's another great product by HenryNelson.com" (no link)

4. Use great photos and great copy describing your products

5. Start an Ebay store and set the options so people can subscribe to a Store Newsletter. Send newsletters out regularly.

6. Sell on Ebay with a low or no margin, you're generating leads here, not making profit

7. (very important) On every sale, put a catalog and a coupon in the box with the item

You are 100% right. Brand awareness is the key here. Most of the time, ppl will purchase the product if they "believe" the product is popular. No offence bro, i am just sharing my personal point of view in this matter.

You have done a lot of good promoting method where ebay can't ban your account because you do not break the TOS. Logo and trademark is an indirect marketing method to remind others ppl regarding your brand.

Great job!

[Steven1976a]

"Gosh, don't'cha just love the sarcasm of someone poking at newbies instead of being positive and helpful? Could it be that our "gremmie" has some ideas that strike fear of competition in the heart of Mr. Highly-Experienced, prompting him to taunt rather than teach?"


Lets be grateful that kula never invented the wheel. Who knows if he did Ferraris would probably still have stone or wooden wheels.

[Steven1976a]

Kuala said

"as for editing products individually, selling on ebay is just SEO all over again, with the ebay search function as the target engine."

So basically what I am suggesting will work right? I want to send optimised info from our database to Ebay to generate a store set up with all the Optimised bits of info. Why do i need to repeat work if its already been done in my database?

As for the customer service part
"kissing customer ass 24/7, many times over the telephone (on your dime from Bangkok ha, ha)"

We dont sell to any customers in Thailand now. Our customers are all around the world from South America, North Amercia, Europe, Middle East, Japan, Australia.

Any calls to America are done around 8am in the morning our time. Evening time for Ebayers.

Europe I call my mum all the time in England and it works quite well. usually around 4pm-5pm which makes it 10am England Time.

Middle East - Call them around 2pm (10-11am their time)
Australia/Japan - Call them around 10am (2pm their time)

So i guess this answers your query about our time zone. ha ha

[a8llison]

"as for editing products individually, selling on ebay is just SEO all over again, with the ebay search function as the target engine."

Not to toot my own horn, but we built a company on optimizing sellers for eBay. Our sellers pull down over $2 million a month. It's more complex than SEO keywords.

First, web keywords are not the same as the top keywords within eBay. These vary by category. Second, you have a 55 character limit in the title so you may have to choose which keywords get you more pull and conversions. Third, you must run listings in the auction core to get traffic to your store and this is where the strategy of what to list becomes complex and expensive.

You do have one incredible advantage compared to other eBay jewelry sellers and that is your international experience. eBay US is growing slower than the rate of US ecommerce, but eBay international, especially China, is driving eBay's overall growth. Kudos to you for being able to hitch your wagon to the international train!

[Steven1976a]

Hi ALlison,

Do you have any further details of the services you provide for ebay?
We are looking for a solution which will run next to our new website which is under construction.

I tried to PM you but for some reason it was having problems sending.

Steve

[bugnbelle]

If you own an ebay store you get free statistics through omniture which can be useful. You can also pay for ebay market research (I have never paid for it) and get detailed information on key word search volume, etc. You can also subscribe to www.sellathon.com and get auction monitoring which will allow you to see what key words drove someone to your auction and how they go there. It can help you feel out the waters for your selling category.

Also, check out the ebay community boards there is probably one for your selling category. I have found so much useful information there.

As for feedback... YEP it matters. Especially if you are out of country. BUT you can buy and earn feedback that way. It's a quick way to break 100.

I've noticed that ebay is extremely well placed in the Search Engines. You can now write reviews and guides on ebay on just about any subject and I'm seeing those turn up with top 10 placement on some subjucts I've googled. There is a lot you can to do help people find your ebay listings.

Ebay is not an easy beast to figure out, I've been there for 3 years and it is a sharp learning curve. The items I sell are pretty unique in many ways, but it's so competitive also now that you have to really be smart about what you are doing. And the fees... definately check out the fees and run some numbers.

Good luck!

[Beaker]

Kuala said

of course its always amusing to watch the eagerness and confidence of gremmies. and just as amusing to watch their discomfiture when they go belly up.

Hey Just so you know you can there fast. I became a Powerseller on Ebay in 3 months because I had a great product. I may not have a 1000 rating but I have a great product and great feedback check me out at (moffetttrading) on Ebay.

As for the most part I agree with what every body is saying. I Do howeve wish someone Like CUBECART or XCART would get together with Ebay to develop a link between them. It would definately help my business on both fronts.

[/quote]

[Steven1976a]

I cut straight to the chase. I did a search for "xml ebay" on google.

Is there anyone out there who knows their xml? Is it or will ebay be open for sending xml feeds with our product information direct from our database so that we can create our optimized google ebay store?

Im really lazy and i only want to have to enter new products into our database once.