eBay News & Announcements
Gary Briggs, senior vice president and chief marketing officer, let everyone know that eBay is joining the seasonal marketing frenzy. In November eBay's holiday catalog was delivered to four million households, to be followed later this month by eBay's gift guide. eBay's "whatever IT is, you can get IT on eBay" commercials will be airing on all major networks, including FOX, NBC, CBS and ABC. Briggs rounded out the marketing announcement by saying that eBay expects its campaign to have reached 85 percent of their consumer audience an average of 13 times each by the end of the year.
Due to e-mail problems, eBay recently held a Canadian price promotion and, since some sellers missed the notice, eBay decided to offer it again. For today, Nov. 22, Canadian residents who sell on eBay.ca can list their items for 10 cents each (regardless of the starting or fixed price), and can also offer "Buy it Now" for free on auction listings as well.
eBay In The News
This past week's news and rumors swirled about Sony's PlayStation 3 hitting sale prices of $10,000 and more. According to PS3 News, which has been tracking PS3 auctions, those sales figures are some what exaggerated in that many are likely to fail to net any payments. In one high-price auction the winning bidder had a low feedback score and had not made an eBay purchase since 2004. In another, the winning bidder was already identified as "no longer a registered user."
Third Party eBay Services & E-commerce Tools Round-up
HighDesert Software just added version 2.0 of the Speedo Froogle Feed Generator to its Web site. The upgraded version is for merchants managing multiple stores. It offers a product wizard that outlines steps for adding products to Froogle. Other features include integrated Google Base listings, list creation for feed files, as well as bug fixes. Speedo Froogle Feed Generator Lite is also available for people with a single store. Both versions are free for 30 days, after which you will need to register the software. Pro v2.0 sells for $49.95 and Lite v2.0 costs $19.99.
eSeller Street is offering pay-per-search market research that uses the last 90 days of eBay sales for all U.S. categories, except Motors and Real Estate. According to eSeller Street, using sales research helps sellers get a better grasp on prices and keywords, and it also lets sellers check in to see how their competitors are doing. Pricing for the eSeller Street service is 35 cents per search, but there is a sign-up promotion that offers two free credits to get you going.
SingleFeed, an online self-service data feed management and submission system, just announced its Beta status. SingleFeed is designed to assist merchants in feeding their products to multiple shopping comparison engines. SingleFeed's submission process allows merchants to create a single feed that submits to Google Base, Shopzilla, Shopping.com, Yahoo! Shopping, PriceGrabber, NexTag and other popular comparison and shopping Web sites. The SingleFeed submission process also checks for errors and manually categorizes the products in the feed as well. SingleFeed offers a Google Base feed submission for $9.99 a month. For $129.99 a month (plus a one-time set-up fee of $29.99) you get the Google Base feed along with eight of the leading shopping comparison engines.
Research Says...
CyberSource Corporation predicts that the biggest online shopping day of 2006 will be Dec. 18th. This report is based on the company's analysis of six years' worth of historical transaction volumes and the number of shipping days remaining before Dec. 25th. According to CyberSource, peak holiday shopping days typically occur on the Monday closest to Christmas where there is at least a week available for shipping.
Only On eBay...
If you're celebrating Thanksgiving this weekend, but have yet to make any plans, eBay may be able to help you with some last minute activities and Thanksgiving goodies. Two VIP passes for the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade can be had for about $300, or you could pick up a couple of Dallas Cowboys versus Tampa Bay Buccaneers tickets. Also, if you can work out overnight shipping, seller 'curiousfare' is offering the perfect holiday table accessory: A large serving platter from the Johnson Brothers Holiday Wild Life Series. This discontinued Native American Wild Turkey platter, currently bid up to $299 with one day left, is sure to enhance any stuffed bird served this weekend.
Vangie Beal is a frequent contributor to Ecommerce-Guide.com. She is also the managing editor of Webopedia.
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