News and Announcements
EBay's Seller Experience team announced several improvements to the way vendors list items on the auction site, and just in time for the holiday prep season. Starting with the Sell Your Item (SYI) form, eBay finally recognized that novice sellers can be rather confused by the options, and more experienced sellers just want the basics.

To address this, eBay will be offering a shorter listing form in the coming weeks. Once implemented, you will be able to choose to use the regular SYI or the simpler listing process, which shows only the most popular options and several pre-filled fields (editable of course) and fits it onto one page.

Other updates will include cosmetic changes of the Sell Hub and SYI form to remove the current bland look and feel. Jim Ambach, vice president of seller experience, says that sellers can expect to see other improvements to the shipping service selection process and will be able to add pictures to listings this fall as well.

This week eBay also started rolling out the previously announced changes to My eBay. To make message sorting easier, users will be able to better identify alerts, eBay messages and member messages. Alerts will be displayed at the top of the inbox in a separate section from other messages. Messages from eBay will be highlighted in green, while messages from other members will be in black.

In the next few months, members can also expect to see threading for member-to-member messages, so you can easily read entire conversations. The My eBay left-hand navigation has also been improved with common links being more visible in the new layout.

EBay has once again been named in a counterfeit-related suit, this time by cosmetics company L'Oreal. As with previous suits, the charge stems from the belief that eBay is not doing enough to combat fake goods being sold on the auction Web site. eBay France has said the two companies have been in talks but could not agree on a resolution. Reuters is reporting that L'Oreal has confirmed that legal action had been started in France, Germany, Britain, Spain and Belgium.

Social and Mobile Commerce Trends
Jumping on the Facebook bandwagon this week is Shop.com. The site launched a new application called Shop Companion that, according to the company, lets Facebook users search the site, add products to their wish lists, view their friends' wish lists and share product information through the popular social networking site.

When I added the Shop Companion application to Facebook, all I saw was a white screen after searching for products. Apparently, you have to link your Shop.com account to your Facebook account for full functionality, but you can check it out for yourself by typing "SHOP COMpanion" in your Facebook application search box, then adding it.

SilkSystem Solutions, the developers of the award-winning iPhoneMyeBay.com widget, (see eBay Watch: Feedback Changes, iPhone Shopping Application) announced a title change and introduced some new features. iPhoneMyeBay.com, intended to be a development title, is now officially iRibbit.com.

In a blog post the developers said that over the next week they will be updating both the application and corresponding Web sites to represent the new "Catch it on the fly" iRibbit.com branding. Moving right along with the new name are some new widget features, most notably changes that will benefit eBay sellers.

Version 2.1 of iRibbit includes views of both selling and bidding list, where previously only watch lists were available. Focusing on sellers in this update, a new selling tab provides eBay users with a snapshot of the items being sold, along with current prices and bids. This is definitely a handy option for iPhone-equipped sellers who want to check on their eBay listings but happen to be stuck in a traffic jam when their 'hot auction' is about to end. Those with an Apple iPhone can point their mobile browser to www.iRibbit.com to check out the new features.

In other mobile news, earlier this month, eBay unveiled its own mobile biding service for ebay.co.uk users. Those with an SMS-enabled mobile phone can opt to receive and respond to outbid alerts and track their My eBay. UK mobile subscribers can visit the UK mobile page to download the software compatible with their carrier.

Learn the Lingo: What is an eBay Insertion Fee?
The ECommerce Guide Glossary offers online sellers an easy way to search for definitions of general e-commerce, eBay and PayPal specific terms and acronyms. This week we take a look at what exactly defines an Insertion Fee.

On the eBay auction Web site, an Insertion Fee, also called a listing fee by some merchants, is the amount of money eBay charges to the seller for listing an item for sale. Insertion Fees vary depending on the starting price of the item and the category in which the seller chooses to list. Insertion Fees are nonrefundable and they are also charged, in most cases, even if an item does not sell.

For any eBay seller, learning the insertion fee table can help you determine your item starting prices when listing. For example, if you had planned to list an item for $50, you would pay a $2.40 listing fee to eBay. By dropping your start price by a penny to $49.99 the listing fee is halved to $1.20, so it really makes good business sense to become familiar with listing fees in order to save money when selling on eBay. Be sure to bookmark the fee page on the eBay Web site and check it often for changes. As we all know, fees do tend to go up over time on the auction site.

Only on eBay...
This week my favorite IT is all monkey business. Actually, its gorilla art, and something you have to see for yourself to believe. Up for grabs on eBay are three framed paintings by Okie, Franklin Park Zoo's 13-year-old-gorilla (painting #1, #2, and #3).

Aping Art: Paintings by a gorilla go on the auction block for a good cause. (Click for larger image.)

The starting bid for each painting is $1,500 and all proceeds from the auction will benefit the Commonwealth Zoological Corporation D/B/A Zoo New England. By Friday morning, one of the three paintings had a single bid, a second had two bids placed. All three of the Okie art auctions end today.

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