Terrible eBay Policy News

Published in Trends and News

It was my impression that the new classified ads wont be such a bad thing. Earlier, eBay reps stated that it WAS ok to list direct checkout/paypal buttons on classified ads.

However, as of yesterday, Brian Duke from eBay stated that it is NOT ok to list any links inside classified ads that either:

Offer a direct checkout button
Link to a website where buyers can purchase more items off eBay

Here is the question an answer that clarified this rule for us.

Hall of Fame
eBay
Live 2007 Brian,

We’re hoping to have examples of Classified Ads running this weekend, but there are still too many open issues…. Repeated if you missed my last mail:

Are sellers allowed to put a PayPal "Buy Now" button in the Classified Ad for each of their multiple items? It could almost look like a shopping cart page.

Paypal has a webform button that is eBay compliant in construction (no scripts) that can be customized for each different product. That would turn the Classified Ad into a selling platform rather than just a contact form.

If so, can sellers put their own checkout button on the page?

And new questions:

Look at the links on the left of this sample Classified Ad - one to each product page. Will this violate links policy?

Can we put a cross-sell gallery in auction listings with links to Classified Ads?

Digital Delivery is how we get goods to our international customers. Our Classified Ads don’t show on international sites. Postal rates oversees are often several times higher than the product (like $18). How do we continue to reach and sell to international customers?

Thanks,

-ship

Brian Burke,
Director Marketplace
& Feedback Policy Ship, Sorry for the delayed response.

Sellers may not link from their Classified Ad to a site off eBay that offers goods for sale – so the ad you [referenced] is in violation. There is a static link at the top [and] links .. to the seller’s web store (checkout) with products for sale off eBay.

At this time we will not permit check-out links or PayPal buttons. I know I referenced using PayPal in a previous email – in concert with the current political campaign, I will claim, as all the current individuals running for President have, to have "misspoken" .

I appologize for any confusion my ealier email caused. All international sites are prohibiting the sale of digital goods (Germany has never allowed them). So, buyers will have to find your goods via the US site. Brian Brian BurkeDirector, Marketplace & Feedback Policy

So what does that mean. That means NO affiliate marketing or clickbank links, NO buy now paypal links, and NO instant sales from Classified Ads.TRAGEDY!But, what’s the good news?Glad you asked. The good news is, you CAN place email capture forms on Classified Ads. In fact, thats the ONLY thing you can do.You can either place your phone number (not good for digital item sellers), or place an email capture form with an autoresponder set up (very good for digital item sellers)How can you make money off an autoresponder?Let’s think for a second. If you normally got a sale conversion ratio of 3%, you were doing pretty good.BUT, that was for a direct sale.Now, we will be focusing on getting the EMAIL signup. You can look at signup ratios of 10+% on a great squeeze page (just means sales copy designed to squeeze out emails only)So, you take this new 10+% signup rate, and watch what happens to your autoresponder. You can set your autoresponder to do MANY things:

Promote your product and website via email
Promote CLICKBANK or any other affiliate products via email
Save their email in your list to promote MORE products for infinite years to come (until they unsubscribe)

So, normally when you would have just made $10 profit off one sale, now you can make $100’s profit from each person if you look at the long run marketing. Why is this possible? Simple, Because email signups are HIGHLY TARGETED ads, and most of the time these people would have simply clicked X and not purchased your item (using the original eBay Buy It Now format). But NOW, there is no cost involved for them to sign up for your email list, its FREE for them, so you can see a LOT more signups. Once your got their HIGHLY TARGETED email, you can sell to them like crazy. How do you highly target people? Thats all up to your Classified ad Title, and item description. I want to let you know that its not neccessary to have an insanely long squeeze page just to get their email. In fact, short squeeze pages (1 -2 pages at max) work best for getting emails.

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