eBay – What Are You Thinking??
June 5, 2008
It looks more and more like eBay is shooting themselves in the foot… and although I am a firm believer in the idea that if you think creatively, you can find a way around just about anything – it seems like eBay keeps making it tougher and tougher.
The most recent changes announced to eBay sellers is to eliminate the ability to link to any outside website/page from the About Me page and eBay Blog. They have always had this policy in place for actual listings… and many have gotten around it by including a link in their listings that point to their eBay About Me page. Then, on their About Me page, they would promote their non-eBay website by offering an opt-in of sorts to a newsletter or service.
No More… according to eBay.
So, how can you take advantage of the traffic from eBay to grow your non-eBay business?
Here are a couple of ideas…
First of all, you can make your eBay ID your website address or something similar – be sure to follow eBay’s rules when choosing an ID. A friend of mine uses: auction-moms-newsletter as her ID. If you google Auction Moms Newsletter, her site for her other business will come up.
Another MUST DO… is to follow up with your current customers – It is even more critical to have a follow up system to collect names and email addresses of your eBay customers. Be sure to not have all your eggs in one basket – get your customer list off of eBay by offering them discounts, coupons, or a free report on something they might be interested in (they are all over the internet if you google ‘free report’ and the topic you are considering)… whatever you need to do- do it. I highly recommend you find a strategy that works for you to get the names and emails of your customers.
It’s hard to say what eBay will do next – but, by keeping a list of customers and actively communicating with them will ensure that if you ever choose to go somewhere other than eBay… they will go with you.
(You can view eBay’s announcement here)
Stay tuned… there are a few things that are actually GOOD about this announcement that I’ll be covering net week…
Jenni
Last 5 posts by Jenni Hunt
- A good change about the links policy... - June 14th, 2008
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Jenni, I like your ideas for the eBay seller (create your eBay ID as a Web address — I’ve seen that done before, and having a followup system in place) ! I’ve added a link to your blog on my page:
http://www.cashbackatebay.com/eBaysellers
Best wishes to all surviving eBay sellers. We closed our listings May 18, 2008 when we discovered that eBay would retroactively turn our neutrals into negatives, which ruined our perfect feedback score.
You’re absolutely right. In ebay’s present state of “disruptive innovation” they’re banning website links on About Me pages. That won’t stop a seasoned seller – not one bit but in ebay’s tiny little mind its a stopgap measure. I believe the majority of sellers, like myself, put a dandy little card or note in every package they mail out – that card generally should contain their website URL, plus any other sites they’re listing on and – a smart move is to offer a discount or free shipping if they use any of those places. I’ve been doing it for years where my own website is concerned. If a seller has not been keeping track of buyer’s names and addresses one way they can get them is off of their Paypal account – takes a bit of time but its worth it.
As to what ebay is thinking? Absolutely hungering after Amazon’s revenue. They’ll fail, of course, because they have no customer service and don’t want to spend that precious revenue to dedicate the manpower to do it and they treat their customers worse then the dirt under their feet. Those are attitudes for failure….this is one 10 year seller who is sitting back waiting for the crash ;-)
http://www.ACEOart.net
“…this is one 10 year seller who is sitting back waiting for the crash ;-)”
Patricia – I hear you… although I think it is a long ways off. Obviously, I agree that eBay is not implementing the best policies for growth — but, what is unique about their business model is that their service is free to buyers… and as long as the buyers are there, there will be sellers too.
I was thinking about this last night – I bet that most bidders don’t have a clue what eBay has been doing to their sellers community. Unless they are sellers themselves, I doubt they realize how the feedback policy has changed and what those changes mean. I’m sure they won’t notice that links are no longer allowed on About Me pages… It just doesn’t affect them.
Nothing lasts forever though… and you are wise to keep a watchful eye and have a website outside of eBay (as well as a customer list!). If you can harness the eBay traffic – you are sitting on gold! :-)
Jenni