Enter the StubHub Bonnaroo Total Access Sweepstakes!
Enter for a chance to win an experience of a lifetime to the biggest festival of the year. The winner and 8 of their best ‘Roo friends get into the festival for an all VIP/Total Access opportunity, which includes backstage passes, limo, concierge service and more! Make this summer rock and enter here.

Further News
+ Facebook gains in public debut after record $16 billion IPO.
+ Starbucks brews loyalty with mobile payments‎.
+ Is Pinterest the next billion dollar company?

Looking Back on eBay Ink
May 23, 2011: Cheers to all small businesses out there! I just wanted to reiterate how grateful I am to the eBay Ink Social Media Sellers who contributed articles last week to celebrate National Small Business Week. The response I’ve received from folks has been really positive and I plan on making it more of a recurring feature on the blog moving forward. I’ve already received interest from additional social media sellers who’d like to contribute articles for the blog so, if you’re interested in either becoming a certified eBay Ink Social Media Seller or just have a cool story to share with readers, please feel free to email us.

eBay Ink Roundup is a summary of news and updates around eBay, PayPal, Social Media, Technology and E-commerce. Let us know what interests you.

eBay On Location Around Corner
A quick reminder for those looking to join us in Denver May 24-25, 2012 for eBay OnLocation. Register now for your chance to find out what works best from eBay experts, business gurus and your fellow eBay sellers.

Further News
+ Will your Klout score get you hired?
+ Infographic showing five things we’ve learned about social sites, Pinterest and Facebook.
+ How to use social media for powerselling
+ Is the online shopping checkout harming or helping you?

Looking Back on eBay Ink
May 11, 2011: From The PayPal Blog: “PayPal leads, others follow”. You may have heard that Visa announced plans to launch a digital wallet in the US and Canada later this year. As the lines between online and offline commerce continue to blur, this is yet another sign that the payment industry’s model for success in our new digital world is looking more and more like PayPal’s.
While other companies are following PayPal’s business model, we’re already light years ahead. More than 98 million people around the world have already trusted us with their digital wallets. PayPal was built 12 years ago, because traditional payment methods weren’t designed for the digital world. We’ve offered mobile payments since 2006 and expect to do more than $2 billion in mobile this year. We’ve offered micropayments since 2005 and launched our solution for digital goods last year. We plan to be at retail point of sale by the end of this year. You can read the full blog post: PayPal leads, others follow.

eBay InkWeekend Roundup is a summary of news and updates around eBay, PayPal, Social Media, Technology and E-commerce. Let us know what interests you.

Enter eBay Green Driving Contest
Who doesn’t love the smell of a new car? Enter for your chance to win a Toyota Prius, and learn how to save money at the pump with the wide variety of unique, green vehicles available on eBay Green Driving. eBay Green Driving is the latest in a series of programs and experiences designed to help eBay buyers and sellers make more sustainable shopping decisions. It offers user-friendly tools and resources, as well as eBay’s unique green vehicle and parts inventory, in a single location, to help people determine the best ways to “green” their daily driving routines – including information on electric vehicles, hybrids, clean diesels, compressed natural gas and ethanol vehicles, as well as high-MPG gasoline vehicles.

Further News
+ Take a look at this music video and get shopping.
+ Does mobile commerce encourage laziness?
+ A winning social commerce strategy: Don’t ask how, ask why
+ Ten habits of global online shoppers.

Posts From the Week
+ eBay Sellers Go To Washington
+ The Magento Imagine eCommerce Conference Kicks off in Las Vegas

Looking Back on eBay Ink
April 28, 2011: eBay sponsor Shazam App for Android giving users unlimited tagging. Shazam updated its Android App today bringing unlimited tagging sponsored by eBay for all “Shazamers” using the Shazam Free App and “Shazam Friends”, a real-time feed with the App of songs that Facebook friends have tagged. This essentially creates a continuously updating list for Shazamers to discover and share new music with their friends. The deal with eBay means that instead of just five free tags in a month, users can now tag as much music as they want between now and January 1st, 2012. This is the first exclusive App sponsorship deal agreed by eBay anywhere in the world, and the first time Shazam has selected a partner to provide free services to their customers.

eBay InkWeekend Roundup is a summary of news and updates around eBay, PayPal, Social Media, Technology and E-commerce. Let us know what interests you.

Imagine is where merchants, partners, developers and Magento enthusiasts from around the world come together for three days in an engaging and exciting environment for collaboration, learning, networking, inspiration… and of course – Imagination!

Don’t worry if you weren’t able to make it down there (unfortunately, neither was I). There are a number of ways to stay up to speed on news and happenings down in Las Vegas:

* Subscribe to the Magento Blog.
* Follow @MagentoImagine on Twitter.
* Follow all tweets coming out of the conference, using the #MagentoImagine Hashtag.

To follow all content in real-time, check out the Imagine eCommmerce LIVE page.

Cheers,
RBH

Further News
+ E-commerce is driving up prepaid card usage as consumers have started to use them more to pay bills and make online purchases.
+ HTML5 is the latest version of the ubiquitous web programming language, and it’s especially important in mobile commerce.
+ There is a growing trend within the converging spaces of social media and e-commerce.

Posts From the Week
+ eBay Ink Wants You!
+ eBay’s Topaz Data Center Gets Even Greener

Looking Back on eBay Ink
April 18, 2012: eBay Instant Sale now offers $$ for broken devices. My 2 broken iPods may no longer be worthless. eBay has opened up its Instant Sale program to include new, limited-time pricing for broken or damaged iPods, iPhones and iPads, offering consumers more value for their broken gadgets than ever before in celebration of Earth Month. Additionally, eBay will offer every user that sends in their device – broken or not – a bonus $5 eBay gift card and a matching $5 donation to Global Green USA.

Through April 30, eBay Instant Sale will begin paying up to $150 for broken iPads, $100 for iPhones, and $50 for iPods. Until now, Instant Sale offered free shipping and responsible recycling for all broken items, but limited cash value. As a result, I now have two otherwise useless iPods that could translate into about 100 new songs from iTunes for my functioning one.

eBay InkWeekend Roundup is a summary of news and updates around eBay, PayPal, Social Media, Technology and E-commerce. Let us know what interests you.

I’m working out of the eBay UK office in Richmond this week and have had some great meetings with a number of folks talking about all things social – from commerce to media to business. I’ve also been able to check out some cool stories coming out of the office here first-hand. Earlier this month, eBay UK launched its first-ever pop-up shop in London’s fashionable West End. The UK’s first-ever QR code shopping emporium, the eBay Christmas Boutique enabled shoppers to browse over 350 items provided by top-rated eBay sellers, who could purchase using mobile technology with just a few clicks.

Although there were physical items on display, all items were purchased on eBay using mobile devices. Naturally, I asked what was going to happen to all of the gifts on display throughout the shop. Turns out that many of the toys and gifts displayed in the Boutique have been donated to children’s charities.

The boutique was open Dec. 1 – 5 and although it meant it was only open for 5 days, they managed to attract over 2,500 walk-in customers. You can check out a full behind-the-scenes video below…

Cheers from the UK!
-RBH

Related Reads:
TameBay – Shopping at the eBay Christmas Boutique
techradar.com – In Pictures: eBay Christmas Boutique

X.commerce’s Matthew Mengerink Looks at Four Trends Commerce Trends
In a GigaOm guest post by X.commerce‘s Matthew Mengerink, he writes that mobile, local, social and digital are the four mega trends shaping the future of commerce. Merchants of all types—from brick-and-mortar retail outlets to non-profits, to manufacturers and even those selling online, need to ensure they’re ahead of the commerce curve. [via GigaOm]

Further News
+ Is social e-commerce in Facebook’s future? Mark Zuckerberg explained at the f8 conference this week.
+ Simple steps to building a strong mobile commerce foundation and generate success for your brand.
+ Is advertising on social media good for small business?
+ Retailers are looking for job candidates with e-commerce skills.

Looking Back on eBay Ink
September 22, 2010: eBay introduces the eBay tech blog – @ebaytechblog. The eBay Tech Blog was launched earlier this week and I for one am very excited at the possibilities. Partner this with our eBay Developer Blog and I think we’ve got some pretty cool information on cutting edge innovation coming out of our company.

eBay Ink Weekend Roundup is a summary of news and updates around eBay, PayPal, Social Media, Technology and E-commerce. Let us know what interests you.

eBay Acquires The Gifts Project
This week eBay acquired the technology and team behind The Gifts Project, a social commerce platform that enables multiple friends to pitch in towards an item for a birthday or other event. In January this year, The Gifts Project signed a cooperation agreement with eBay, under which eBay offered group gift buying through the company’s technology. The Gifts Project will report to eBay’s new VP of social commerce, Don Bradford, who joined eBay in May after working at both Microsoft and Yahoo. [via All Things D]

Further News
+ Charity stores are increasing their use of the internet to sell second hand goods
+ Mobile users in the UK now see m-commerce less as an experiment and more as a convenient way to shop
+ 45% of adults in the UK prefer to shop for fashion items online, rather than in-store

Looking Back on eBay Ink
September 14, 2010: eBay CEO, John Donahoe, joined Michel Gelobter, the founder of Cooler and Eileen Claussen, president of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, on a panel discussion at the National Press Club earlier today. The topic of discussion? A report released by Michel Gelobter of carbon-footprint consulting firm, Cooler. Commissioned by eBay, the report highlights the environmental value of enabling consumer-to-consumer online selling and supporting online entrepreneurs and small businesses to compete globally against larger retailers. It’s pretty incredible when one breaks down the numbers. For example, compared to a single big box retail store grossing $100 million per year, new data reveals that the day-to-day operations of $100 million in sales through small, Web-based businesses generate approximately 1,400 tons fewer CO2-equivalent emissions per year than their offline counterparts: that’s the same amount of energy it takes to power 108 homes for a year.

You can download a full PDF of the Cooler Research – 2010: The Small Business Advantage.

eBay Ink Weekend Roundup is a summary of news and updates around eBay, PayPal, Social Media, Technology and E-commerce. Let us know what interests you.

Further News
+ iPad has driven more revenues for retail clients than smartphones.
+ Chinese commuters use m-commerce and QR codes while waiting for subway.
+ How effective is ‘Facebook shopping’ for small businesses?

Looking Back on eBay Ink
September 1, 2010: Internal video celebrating 15 years of eBay #eBay15 #eBayOL. eBay: On Location kicks off today, in conjunction with our celebration of 15 years of eBay. I managed to get my hands on a celebratory video we’ll be showing at eBayOL – San Jose tonight and to our employees around the world.

eBay Ink Weekend Roundup is a summary of news and updates around eBay, PayPal, Social Media, Technology and E-commerce. Let us know what interests you.

PayPal Exec Comments on Competition
In an interview with CNET, PayPal’s Sam Shrauger, vice president of global product and design, commented that services seeking to mimic or compete with PayPal, will face a slew of challenges, “Being in the payments business is harder than saying you’re in the payments business.” As most of the industry is focusing on a technology called near-field communications, PayPal PayPal isn’t going to mandate the use of any specific technology. [via CNET]

Further News
+ A new study finds, social media can be as addictive as drugs
+ Econsultancy.com rounds up ten new e-commerce infographics
+ Over half of tablet owners say that they use it for shopping

Looking Back on eBay Ink
August 3, 2010: eBay Announces First-Ever Free Rewards Program with eBay Bucks. The program is free and open to all US eBay users. In a nutshell, eBay Bucks offers consumers 2% back on most items purchased through the eBay Marketplace with PayPal. I sat down with Marc Steffens, Sr. Manager of eBay Bucks Rewards Program, to discuss the launch and what it means for buyers and sellers. (You can also read more in his eBay Announcement Board post).

eBay Ink Weekend Roundup is a summary of news and updates around eBay, PayPal, Social Media, Technology and E-commerce. Let us know what interests you.