eBay Affiliate Program

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FEATURED POSTRichard Brewer-Hay / Monday, May 5th, 2008

eBay Affiliate Program

One of the presentations I attended at the eCommerce Summit was given by Will Martin-Gill, Sr. Manager of Internet Marketing, Advertising Optimization, eBay Inc. Unfortunately for Will, his presentation was at the end of the first full day of sessions and a number of attendees had already opted for networking with an adult beverage or two over one last 45-minute session in a ballroom. For those that were able to attend, however, it seemed an engaging opportunity for them to think beyond their eBay sites and to marry eBay to their off-eBay online storefronts, driving revenues in the process.

He offered to share his presentation with eBay Ink readers, so here it is.

PeSA Summit – eBay’s Affiliate Program – Upload a doc

Read this doc on Scribd: PeSA Summit – eBay’s Affiliate Program

For those folks that have yet to pursue the possibilities of applying eBay affiliate marketing to your business, there are a number of user resources and educational tools out there: eBay Partner Network, PeSA Rewards Program, and on Squidoo, for example. There was also a PeSA/ECMTA eBay Affiliate Marketing best practices call back on April 3 but I was unable to attend. Does anyone have notes from that call?

Cheers,
RBH
More

CrunchyPostingGoodness / May 5th, 2008 at 1:21 pm

The current website I have and the other two I’m creating all have my business name associated with them (branding). I do this to reassure my customers that they can trust any seller, item, or site that I may link them to, as having equivalent standards to mine.

There are many other venues which offer affiliate services that I would happily participate in. However, since I do not trust eBay or its unstable environment, I could not do a disservice to my customers and visitors by linking them there.

The money I may earn in commission is simply not worth using my company to advertise another that so many dislike. Doing so would effectively reduce the trust my customers and visitors place in me and my business.

Just my opinion.

Mechelle / May 5th, 2008 at 2:07 pm

WOW! now those are some serious fill in the blank – to want us to advertise for them on our own websites. Especially in consideration that they undercut our sells- my sells- by running directly competing ads for off eBay companies next to our- my- auctions that we- I- pay for, yet get less exposure than the ads of these other companies. No amount of money would be incentive enough for me to ever advertise eBay on my own site. Unbelievable!

Yes, I have more consideration for my customers to point them in eBay’s direction (because of what eBay is not the community)- and my own name

Noblespirit / May 5th, 2008 at 2:45 pm

Richard,

This was #8 in our series of PESA Community Conference Calls. The recording can be found here:

8) PESA/ECMTA Best Practice Round Table Conference call – eBay Affiliate Marketing

The Recording:

http://www.noblespirit.com/PESA/Conf_recorded_on_Apr__3_2008__3-49PM.mp3

The Power Point Slides:

http://www.ecmta.org/affiliate

Regards,

Joe Cortese

CrunchyPostingGoodness / May 5th, 2008 at 3:19 pm

Just to clarify, my statement above is purely from a professional selling viewpoint and not personal emotion.

As a business person I must accept that, to a certain extent, people buy based on emotion. Buyers also learn to trust in certain brand names and/or stores.

From a strictly financial standpoint, earning those amounts simply by referrals is very enticing. However, I must also take into consideration the trust and reputation my business name has earned. Is the amount of money I may make from these referrals worth the potential loss in credibility from my buyers and website visitors?

At this time, I do not believe it is worth the risk. Plus, who knows, eBay may have more changes in plan for this feature and as I stated before, I do not subject my business to guinea pig experiments.

Mechelle / May 5th, 2008 at 7:49 pm

Let me clarify – My position is predominantly rooted in emotional disgust.

Ticket Guy / May 6th, 2008 at 7:41 am

Noblespirit the recording page you are sending does not work. What is the connection between PESA and EbayAffiliatePartner Program. is Pesa a part of that or is Pesa just giving a credit back like a ebay referral store credit? I am looking to see how I can get higher credits back from the partner ship program and get paid as an affiliate but with higher commissions.

Noblespirit / May 6th, 2008 at 8:51 am

Hello Ticket Guy,

I just tried the recording.Please allow a couple of minutes for it to download on to your computer. Then open the file.

Hello (Crunchy…),

Have you had an opportunity to listen to the recording? There is a significant number of eBay sellers who have a long history of driving buyers from their websites, post sale email communication, and other promotions directly to their eBay sales.

Regards,

Joe Cortese

TW / May 6th, 2008 at 8:56 am

As a small time seller I would not even consider sending customers found elsewhere to eBay. It would be very counterproductive. But, like so many programs released by eBay these days, I am sure this program was not designed for the small seller.

I think a lot of members are reversing this process and using eBay as an advertising platform for other sites.

It is becoming increasingly obvious that the dismal 1% growth is what prompted eBay to come up with this. Unfortunately I doubt that it will work. eBay would be better off spending money to save the membership they already have instead of showing them the door with policy after policy designed to make it more difficult for the core seller.

But even that might be too late given the pig headed attitude in the front office. The execs have already alienated the members that stood by them for years to the point of no return.

Patricia1 / May 6th, 2008 at 11:24 am

@ Noblespirit

“Have you had an opportunity to listen to the recording? There is a significant number of eBay sellers who have a long history of driving buyers from their websites, post sale email communication, and other promotions directly to their eBay sales.”

To the contrary, I’ve been doing the opposite with good success. My large commissions are coming from my website and more often than not they are coming from customers who originally bought from me on ebay. Maybe for what I’m selling, this was the best route. Art is kind of different than widgets – though ebay has never considered that.

Noblespirit / May 6th, 2008 at 12:36 pm

Hello Patricia1,

Yes, I’m aware that for certain types of sellers in certain categories, eBay is an advertising medium to drive traffic, cross merchandising and up sell opportunities to their off eBay sales. But, for those who use eBay as a primary channel, affiliate revenue is a one time initiative that can bring regular, consistent and significant residual income each and every month.

Affiliate models are not for everyone. But for those sellers who should be pursuing this avenue as a viable, seamless supplement to their eBay business it makes all the sense in the world. The purpose of the affiliate opportunity is not to self-compete but to induce new creative opportunities for sellers to earn additional income.

The sellers who were featured in Richar’d presentation above make $2,000-$3,000 a month without lifting a finger. Once you get it started, the program is generally self-sufficient and runs itself.

When eBay is paying up to 75% of the FVF, every sale becomes compelling. The PESA Rewards Program transfers all the affiliate fees directly to the PESA member who incorporates the model in their promotional activities.

Regards,

Joe Cortese

Noblespirit / May 6th, 2008 at 12:39 pm

The purpose of the affiliate opportunity is not to self-compete but to induce new creative opportunities for sellers to earn additional income….

…from things they are already doing, and more.

-JC

Patricia1 / May 6th, 2008 at 12:56 pm

@ noblespirit – some of us simply don’t sell widgets…a fact ebay has never understood :-( About all we can do with their platform is to use it as an advertising base….they don’t make it appealing in any other way.

Noblespirit / May 6th, 2008 at 1:44 pm

Hello Patricia1,

Could you point me to an example of the products/items you sell? If you wish, please email me at service@noblespirit.com, I will have them forward my private email address to you. Are you subscribed to the Ominiture store reports? Have you ever reviewed some of the key words, entry pages, etc that buyers use to find you on eBay? How are you placed among your competitors and what does your competitive landscape look like?

Regards,

Joe

Henrietta / May 6th, 2008 at 4:19 pm

Hi Joe
I have been on your mailing list for at least 8 years so I know that you are being nice.

I don’t know about Patricia1 but I don’t have a store any more. My inventory is such that when the FVF went up to 12%, by the time eBay, Paypal and the Post Office all got their cut I could either work for 2c an hour or quit. I have my pride, I will not work for a penny less than 5c an hour which is about what I was making after the FVF went up to 10% from 8% the year before.

I did find the omniture reports extremely useful when I had a store and I had no competition, niche to the max.

Patricia1 / May 6th, 2008 at 5:02 pm

Thanks Joe. I just shot you off an email. I don’t get store reports anymore…had to close my store early this year. I should be in the top 10 percent with 100 percent feedback and DSR’s of 5.0, 5.0, 5.0, 4.9. Been selling on ebay since Sept. 1998. I’d welcome any pointers you can give.

We do have an ongoing problem in the Arts category feature plus listings. Its due to the delayed indexing they instituted awhile back. They’ll hold flag a listing and hold it for a couple hours or more then put at the top of the newly listed page. Well, some artists discovered that under certain circumstances they can simply revise their listing and it will be placed back at the top of the newly listed page – so they revise their auctions constantly and that keeps them on the newly listed page. Some listings stay there for the duration of their auction! That bars other listings from any exposure on the newly listed page. We’ve complained about it and ebay polices it for awhile but then it starts all over again. Its a glitch that they just haven’t bothered to fix. So, some of us end up throwing away $20.00 a pop and are getting little exposure. I believe this may be part of the problem.

Patricia1 / May 6th, 2008 at 5:05 pm

@ Henrietta,

” don’t know about Patricia1 but I don’t have a store any more. My inventory is such that when the FVF went up to 12%, by the time eBay, Paypal and the Post Office all got their cut I could either work for 2c an hour or quit. I have my pride, I will not work for a penny less than 5c an hour which is about what I was making after the FVF went up to 10% from 8% the year before.”

Same here – I closed mine early this year for much the same reason.

Patricia1 / May 6th, 2008 at 8:37 pm

Wow! 50 cent listing fee for a week….what a surprise…..! Like I said, they can’t keep up listings without a gimmick…so where is the profit in all these changes? They’ve done irreparable harm to their own site.

CrunchyPostingGoodness / May 6th, 2008 at 10:08 pm

Hello Noble, yes I have had a chance to listen to it. Two of the stated goals for this program, according to the recording, was to drive more traffic to eBay and to drive more traffic to my eBay listings.

First, I do not believe that eBay is a stable site, so therefore I would not wish to use my good business reputation to drive more traffic to a dysfunctional site. Second, I do not currently sell on eBay, for reasons I have stated before, so this will be of no benefit to me.

Since I opened my website I have driven a lot of traffic to it, resulting in numerous sales, by using post sale email communications, business cards, and coupons from my Amazon.com sales. The beauty of that is that my Amazon customers are already used to paying me close to retail for the products I offer and reasonable shipping, so they are not surprised or upset to see that my items and shipping cost are the same on my website too.

I have also included the same promotional material to my eBay customers, when I was selling on it, but not one has bought from my website. The primary reason, of course, is that they are used to getting a bargain price on eBay, and therefor are not willing to pay the prices I charge on my website or Amazon.

Not to mention the fact that my website analytic show that some of my customers come to my site by searching the internet, but eliminating eBay listings from the search results. So why would I want to direct my valuable customer base to a site that they clearly do not wish to be involved with?

The fact of the matter is that eBay attracts an entirely different customer base than the one which Amazon and my website attracts. Aside from my concern for my business’s reputation, the eBay affiliated program would serve no practical use for my business. At least not until eBay begins to attract the same class of buyers that Amazon, my web store, and hundreds of other reputable sites do.

Furthermore, most of the sellers on eBay which sell items complementary to mine, also sell the same items I do. Since these items are listed on eBay, these sellers have to sell them for significantly less than I do. I’m in the business to sell my inventory, so why would I want to show my website visitors where they can buy it for less from another seller?

The only practical use I can see for this program is if a person was to create a link farm website, consisting of nothing but eBay listings. However I have never found those type of sites very appealing, and I’ve heard they are pretty unsuccessful for the most part.

Sandi / May 7th, 2008 at 2:08 am

We’re not all like that:-). I have two sellers that I purchases about 200-300 dollars from each every month for the past 5 or 6 years. Since I primarily purchased from their ebay store, when ebay raised store prices bigtime the first time, I emailed both and asked I could start buying direct from them – knowing no rules being broken since we had an established ebay relationship.

They both obviously agreed and thanked me. I did not think ebay deserved 8% of my money given they were doing anythng for me. I had no problem paying the regular price. Granted, as a buyer I knew about the increase because I was also a seller.

In Feb when I decided to not only quit selling AND buying, I slowly tracked down the sellers I previously purchased from on ebay elsewhere. It’s NOT the sellers who drove me a shop elsewhere afterall. ebay management drove me off ebay. I have located 75% of the sellers I regularly purchased from on other sites. What do you sell? Maybe I ned to add you to my list:-)

I was a buyer who spent $1,000 a month on regular monthly supplies/books, then depending on what else I would need, I boughht additional.

I also purchased business items on ebay, we have numerous large format printers, standard printers, fax machines, etc on ebay – but every staff member has been told no company purchases on ebay any longer. My adult children got plasma TVs, computers, etc that I purchased on ebay – like my husband says, I was always more of a buyer than a seller on ebay.

And I will admit I did make an ebay purchase in April. I looked for 3 months elsewhere, I could have bought new but I liked the discontinued version better, the design in the fabric was much more to my liking. I needed 4 of the items. I had seen them on ebay before i stopped selling/buying (think Jan) and saw two typically sold for 32-40 dollars, new they are 29.99 each.

I broke down and bid using auctionsniper (I have a lousy 3.00 credit with them that I guess will get donated at this point). I put in 38.87 for both auctions from a seller with 1400+ 100% 4.8/4.9 feedback.dsr. She said combined shipping would be 11.89. Auction ended Sunday evening 9pm et.

As you can see she did everything right. She had 2 each in the 2 auctions – exactly the ones I wanted in the color I wanted.

I won each auction for 1.04, so I got the 4 for a total of 13 bucks with shipping. New they would have been over 100.00.

I did not feel victorious at all. In fact, I felt sick to my stomach because I knew what it cost the seller, the time she took.

So I could sleep at night, after they arrived I sent her a thank you note and included the balance of the amount I had been willing to pay. (I did not want paypal to get any fees so I waited until I had her address).

That will be my final purchase on ebay under this environment. While I love my items – the experience simply did not feel good at all.

My point Crunchy, not all buyers are the same. There are many of us out here who are seeking out sellers like you.

ebay miscalculated the number of sellers who were also buyers.

CrunchyPostingGoodness / May 7th, 2008 at 8:25 am

Sandi, I agree that not all buyers are the same. I can only speak to my experiences within the category and items I sell. I also try to learn from the experiences related in forum/blog posts by other sellers on eBay who offer the same products that I do. Based on what I’ve researched, read, and seen, those on eBay looking to buy the items I sell are not willing to pay the just-under-retail price I charge.

Currently I offer the largest product selection, among independent merchants, for the brand I sell, on both Amazon and the Web. So I’m sure that anyone searching for these products will find their way to me if they are looking to pay the amount I charge, instead of a bargain basement price.

One thing that I have discovered by researching the completed listings, using both eBay and Terapeak, is that my items sell for a lot less on eBay. I also noticed that the few sellers which have tried to list those items for close to retail on eBay, have those listing end unsuccessfully without a buy or bid.

So I’m sure that there are a few eBay buyers who may be willing to pay what I charge, but how many unsuccessful listings can a seller afford while waiting for those few buyers to happen upon their eBay listings?

I’m keeping a watchful eye on eBay, their changes, and the successful vs unsuccessful completed listing for the items I sell. Should things with the site, policies, and quality of the buyer pool improve, then I may come back to eBay and re-establish my eBay store. However, based on what I’ve seen and read so far, that type of enviroment is not likely to become a reality anytime soon.

harihar / June 5th, 2008 at 4:05 am

plz tell me how to find the cost for doing affiliating of anti virus product through e- bay

Toney / July 9th, 2008 at 4:27 pm

Hey Sandi & “Crunchy”,

Please excuse the interruption, but have you
seen the New eBay ‘Certified’ Software for
eBay Affiliates? It actually goes ‘official’
on Aug. 1st, 2008.

http://www.BestSoftwareever.com

You can DOWNLOAD it free from that website.

No contact info, not even your name. I will
only get a License Key # if you download it.

Play with it for a while & tell me what you think!

take care.

Toney

eBay Affiliate Program

CrunchyPostingGoodness / May 5th, 2008 at 1:21 pm

Mechelle / May 5th, 2008 at 2:07 pm

Noblespirit / May 5th, 2008 at 2:45 pm

CrunchyPostingGoodness / May 5th, 2008 at 3:19 pm

Mechelle / May 5th, 2008 at 7:49 pm

Ticket Guy / May 6th, 2008 at 7:41 am

Noblespirit / May 6th, 2008 at 8:51 am

TW / May 6th, 2008 at 8:56 am

Patricia1 / May 6th, 2008 at 11:24 am

Noblespirit / May 6th, 2008 at 12:36 pm

Noblespirit / May 6th, 2008 at 12:39 pm

Patricia1 / May 6th, 2008 at 12:56 pm

Noblespirit / May 6th, 2008 at 1:44 pm

Henrietta / May 6th, 2008 at 4:19 pm

Patricia1 / May 6th, 2008 at 5:02 pm

Patricia1 / May 6th, 2008 at 5:05 pm

Patricia1 / May 6th, 2008 at 8:37 pm

CrunchyPostingGoodness / May 6th, 2008 at 10:08 pm

Sandi / May 7th, 2008 at 2:08 am

CrunchyPostingGoodness / May 7th, 2008 at 8:25 am

harihar / June 5th, 2008 at 4:05 am

Toney / July 9th, 2008 at 4:27 pm

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