This Week's eBay/Online Marketplace News

Feedback Frenzy
Since eBay rolled out its changes to the Feedback system, which now prohibits sellers from leaving a buyer negative feedback, several Feedback options have been offered by third parties, picking up where eBay left off.  One site in the spotlight is AfterTheGavel.com, a free service that lets merchants search to see if a buyer has the potential to be a problem customer. Sellers are encouraged to leave feedback to warn other sellers about buyers who are unreasonable. Other sellers can search the listings and use the information available when creating or editing block lists.

Another organization, the Internet Merchants Association (IMA), launched a public Web site designed to help buyers and sellers understand eBay's new Feedback system. Calling it a "Feedback Initiative Website," it offers advice to sellers on what to include in their correspondence with eBay buyers. It also breaks down DSR ratings and offers tips to buyers on how to accurately score an eBay seller after a transaction has been completed.

iPhone Debuts eBay App
At the recent Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco, Apple CEO Steve Jobs announced a 3G version of the iPhone and new tools developed using the iPhone Software Developers Kit (SDK). In the mix was an eBay representative who showed a new eBay application that will let users access online auctions from the iPhone. The eBay app is expected to be available through the Apple iPhone App Store when the new iPhone launches.

Bidjit Adds New Flat-Rate Fee Plans
Bidjit.com, a new auction site that launched just last week, announced new pricing plans to better meet sellers' budgets. Bidjit's Plan 100 at $5 per month caters to those who list under 100 items per month and Bidjit's Plan 250 at $10 per month is for those who list up to 250 items per month. The unlimited listings plan will remain at $25 and sellers may upgrade their listings to Featured status at a cost of 10 cents per listing. The site is also offering a free 30-day trial.

A First Look at Classifieds Site Click2city.com
While Craigslist and Kijiji (see our Kijiji review here) hold the titles for most well-known classifieds sites, there are many places to buy and sell online for free. Click2city.com is a relatively new online classified ad site, or rather, a group of sites for finding jobs, buying or selling goods and more. This site differs from many others because, in addition to the classifieds service, it also provides the tools necessary for people to communicate with others, such as e-mail or instant messaging, with a live chat service expected to be offered in the near future.

To use Click2city you first will need to select your country and region. Once you are on your own city location, you can then do a search or peruse the site by category; Buy & Sell, Cars, Jobs, Community, Services, Pets, Real Estate, Personal and so on. You can also post a free ad.

By signing up as a member, you can access ad management features, participate in discussion forums, post pictures and video clips, and also choose multiple cities when placing an ad. The post to multiple cities feature is something classified sellers will appreciate, and its worth registering for.  Often buyers looking for more expensive items, such as cars or household appliances, will drive outside of their own city or town if the price is right, so being able to post to the cities nearest you is a benefit.

When you post a free ad on Click2city you will first choose your category, then a single form page loads at which you enter in the title, price, description and other details for your ad. The process is pretty standard as far as online classifieds go. 

I noticed right away that Click2city offers a full-featured, easy-to-use text editor, whereas other classified sites frequently offer only a basic text editor. You can use to change font styles, size and paste directly from a Microsoft Word document. You can also add hyperlinks to outside Web sites, a feature that's usually not available at other ad sites.

Click2city ads also let you upload up to three photos of your item for free, plus one video clip. After you have your description, ad title, price, and other details added you then  choose the cities you want to post the ad to. In the posting process, the one thing I did find lacking was a preview option. However, after designing your ad and submitting it to the site, you simply need to wait for an e-mail to confirm the listing and then you have the option to edit or publish your ad.  Visitors to your ad will have the option to view larger sizes of your images, send you an e-mail directly from the ad page, or leave feedback.  As a registered member of Click2city, you can also log in to your member dashboard at any time to access your posted ads, create and view your own watch list, create banner ads and see the feedback form.

Those wanting to add exposure to their ad can create a personal banner ad for the listing that will be displayed in boxes on the main site and category pages. To create one, you first choose one of five ad templates and enter in the product details including title, banner text and the contact details. The next step is to upload the image you want displayed in the ad and the URL the ad should link to. Next, customize the color and the banner itself. You can choose the date you want the ad to start running on as well as the duration of the ad.

The cost of running an ad is $10 for one week, $17 for two weeks, $23 for three weeks and $28 for four weeks. Other than personal banner ads, everything else on Click2city is completely free to use for both buyers and sellers.