eBay.com testing new view item page (still)
August 14, 2008
eBay.com have announced some changes to their proposed new “view item” page, and a further two months of testing. During that period, “a very small percentage of members will be randomly selected to see one of several new page variants” being tested.
Thanks to TameBay reader Seanie, we have a sneaky peek at one variant at least:
If you want to see how your own listings will appear, view one on eBay.com and click the link “switch to the new version of this page” at the top right. I’m pleased to say that my own slightly overcomplicated layouts don’t seem to be broken, but I’m extremely concerned that some essential elements are missing.
- No About Me page link eBay may have given in to pressure from sellers to allow website links from Me pages, but if they’re not linked from listings any more, the links are practically useless.
- No “listing frame” The current frame for eBay shop owners, with branding in the form of logo etc., and cross-promotion via list of category links down the left hand side, is gone. This is a great big blow to shop-owners, and for me, takes away one of the biggest points of having a shop in the first place.
- No red door The “red door” highlight for the shop/store link is gone. Instead, a text link to the store front is given equal prominance with a “view seller’s other items”: this is much less useful for buyers *and* for sellers, and should be removed. (Weirdly, the red door does appear before the item title. I don’t see the point of this.)
- Report item has moved to the top of the page I must admit, I’m ambivalent on this one. It will make reporting much easier, but it also slaps a great big “this might be dodgy” thought right under buyers’ noses. I don’t think I like it on such prime real estate.
- Related items and services is empty I’m hoping I’ll be able to choose cross-promotions to go in this area, but I’m perhaps being a little optimistic. eBay are also testing a new “merchandising module with seller opt-out”, with various positionings on the page, which will show related items from the seller of the item you’re looking at, plus other sellers. Sellers will be able to opt out of this altogether if they wish, which will mean that their items don’t show on other seller’s pages either.
- No button at the bottom The button to bid or buy from the bottom of the listing has been replaced with a not-very-visible text link. Buyers have to either click the button at the top without reading the whole listing, or scroll back up… did anyone usability-test this?
I think we can all see the way this one is going. The individual item page is no longer the seller’s sole domain: it’s slowly, and subtly, being de-branded back to a generic eBay page. Though sellers will still be able to do some branding within the description area, that no longer dominates the page. Instead, viewing an item is very much about eBay displaying the data that they want to present to buyers.
For sellers, I think this is a horrible step. The loss of the listing frame in particular is a massive blow to those who’ve built businesses upon selling multiple items to each buyer. And it’s a loss for buyers too: the variety of useful clicks-through to sellers’ shops have vanished, and that is only going to make shopping on eBay harder work. And that shouldn’t be what eBay want.
Asked if and when these changes will be coming to eBay UK, community manager James told the PS board that there is currently no date planned for changes in the UK: “I have been given assurances that any changes will be announced well in advance.” Let’s hope we can get through the spendy season without having to redo all our listings yet again.
What do you think? Love it or hate it? Leave us a comment.
eBay Motors’ price changes bad news for small business
August 14, 2008
Last night, eBay announced some major changes to pricing for North American Motors’ sites. The restructuring continues eBay’s current trend towards ’success-based fees’, moving more of the fee burden onto final value fees and away from insertion and other up-front fees. The changes are effective from September 2, 2008.
There’s great news for private sellers who might list just a couple of vehicles a year: on .com Motors, the first four listings in a 12 month period have no insertion fees at all, a saving of $40 per listing. The catch - and you knew there’d be a catch - is that the Successful Listing Fee (Motors’ fixed-price equivalent of FVFs) will increase from $50 to $125 (or $100 for motorcycles). Still, you’ll only have to pay this if you’ve sold your car, so it reduces the risk of listing on eBay Motors to pretty much nil.
Once you’ve sold four vehicles in a year, insertion fees are $20 and SLFs $100 ($15 and $80 respectively for motorcycles): the total fees payable on a sold vehicle thus increase from $90 to $120. I’d suggest that if you’re a business, you’re probably keeping a pretty close eye on your sell-through rate; you won’t want to pay $40 a time to list something that won’t sell, and you’ll list accordingly. So this new “you’re better off when you don’t sell your car” fee structure is going to hurt. Of course, the really huge dealerships like GM’s network have already negotiated their own fee structures with eBay, so the people who are really going to be squeezed are the small dealerships, who’ve just seen their fees jump by something like 33%.
If you think that’s bad, spare a thought for the poor Canadians: they’ve got the same new fee structure, but their old fee structure was much nicer. Insertion fees were only CA$4.25, so even for the four “free” listings, that’s an increase of $70.75 per sold vehicle.
Generally, I support eBay’s trend towards putting more of their fee onto sold items, and less upfront. But I can’t help feeling this hasn’t got the balance right. It seems rather to reward not selling your vehicle, because that’s where the big money savings are - and surely that can’t be what eBay want?
For the sake of clarity, these changes apply only to Motors’ sales on eBay.com and eBay.ca, and no announcement has been made for eBay UK or any other eBay site.
25% of listings hidden on eBay.com
August 5, 2008
I’ve been looking at how listings are presented in the new search results on eBay.com to check how they’ll affect sellers. Up to 25% of listings in some categories are hidden which leaves some current listing strategies no longer cost effective.
I searched for a “Laser Printer” with the brand “HP” in the “Computers & Networking > Printers” category and was presented with 813 printers to choose from, except I wasn’t shown 813 printers.
Closer examination shows that with the default 50 results per page and 12 pages there are a maximum of 600 items returned in the search - less than 75% of the available items. The remaining 25% plus items are hidden from view and can only be seen by clicking the “To view all identical listings” link.
Other searches produce similar results - searching for media such as writable “dvd disks” displays 923 items with less than 600 viewable.
Many large sellers have in the past relied on prominence in listing results to achieve sales. They’ve scheduled listings to ensure that they will always have items ending soonest, and the largest sellers literally have items ending every hour of the day in the categories they trade in, especially in consumable and commodity products.
Under Best Match, the default search on eBay.com sellers will no longer be able to rely purely on swamping their categories with listings. Buyers simply won’t see them, it’s time to use new tactics to ensure your items are presented to buyers.
One of the most important factors in Best Match will be listings with sales/bids. Multiple item listings with the most sales or auctions with the most bids will be considered better matched than those with few or none, so longer listing durations Shop/Store Inventory Format (SIF) could become more important and it’s not unthinkable that SIF in core will re-appear on eBay in the near future.
One thing is certain, flooding eBay with listings will no longer be a guarantee of success. New listing strategies will emerge but sellers need to be wary they don’t fall foul of the Search & Browse Manipulation policy. Listing items across multiple User IDs in order to gain more then 10 items per page of search results is likely to be considered manipulation.
Currently there is no indication that the choice and multiple item policies will be implemented in the UK. It’s been stated that eBay UK “don’t have the product solutions implemented in the UK” (PS log in required), to enable the policy changes to take place.
If anything these changes should benefit the smaller seller, as the dominance of larger sellers will be restrained compared to the past. How larger sellers adapt to maintain their market share is yet to be seen, but from now on it’s a whole new ball game on eBay.com
eBay limits items from a seller to 10 in search
August 1, 2008
There are two changes rolling out on eBay this week (or at least eBay.com, there’s been no announcement for the UK as of yet): the removal of the choice listing policy and the removal of the multiple item listing policy.
The reasoning behind this is that Finding 2.0, the technology that presents search results to buyers is now smart enough to remove duplicates from search results and limit the number of items from one seller shown to buyers.
This limitation will affect the listing strategies of many sellers who have in the past ensured their listings all finished at peak times, or who listed multiple identical items to ensure they were always at the top of search results.
If you list multiple identical listings only one will show in search results. It doesn’t matter how many identical listings you launch, buyers will only ever see one, although which of the identical listings they see will vary according to how they sort search results.
An important factor to bear in mind is that under Best Match auctions with bids or fixed price listings with sales will be considered better matched than those without. Once auction listings have bids and different prices they will no longer be considered identical.
There will also be a limit on how many different (not identical) listings will be shown in search results from a seller. No more than 10 items per page from a single seller will be displayed, if a seller has more than 10 items the remainder will appear on subsequent results page, still at no more than 10 per page. Removal of the choice policy allows sellers to offer more options than previously so that buyers can still access their full inventory.
One important change which has hitherto not been spelled out is that these policy changes apply to ALL sort orders, not just Best Match. Even on “Ending Soonest” no more than 10 items per seller and only one identical item will be presented to buyers. When listing products sellers will need to space out start times to ensure products aren’t removed from buyers view just as they’re about to end.
There are however still some questions which need addressing. The FAQs state “If you sell computers, you can offer a specific brand and model laptop with a choice in components such as hard-drive size, processor speed, etc.” This however doesn’t explain how sellers should allow for price differences if a buyer selects a larger hard drive, more memory or a faster processor. Whilst the choice policy goes some way towards more flexibility (e.g. for a choice of shoe size, colour) it doesn’t lend itself to products where there is a price differential.
Finally there is a new policy to be aware of - Search & Browse Manipulation Policy. This prohibits sellers from any activity which could be interpreted as gaming the system, including but not limited to keyword spamming, inappropriate titles and “any other activity that eBay deems as inappropriately diverting members to a listing or harming the finding experience for buyers.”. This should be interpreted to include listing identical products on multiple IDs as eBay have indicated their technology is capable of detecting it.
Overall these changes should benefit both buyers and sellers. Buyers will be ensured a choice of products from multiple sellers whilst sellers should be able to save fees by no longer needing to flood eBay with listings in order to compete with other sellers that do.
eBay.com abandon new links policy
August 1, 2008
The saga of eBay.com’s changes to the links policy has come full circle tonight, with an announcement that there will be no changes at all at this time. Email addresses are still allowed on listings; website links are still allowed on ME pages.
Whatever the reality behind the change of mind is, it’s being presented by eBay themselves as “listening to sellers”: John McDonald writes “we received questions and concerns from sellers about this change … we’ve been reviewing all the different types of situations that our sellers have brought to our attention”. eBay had previously said that the implementation of the new policy would be delayed by a month, and at Live, Brian Burke said that the original announcement had probably been made prematurely. Certainly those who have spent hours and days editing listings to comply with a policy that’s now been abandoned, will wish it had been given a little more consideration first.
Changes to item specifics for eBay.com media, jewelry categories
July 25, 2008
If you list on eBay.com in the media or jewelry categories, some major changes to item specifics are coming next month (on a date yet to be specified).
For media categories Books, DVDs & Movies, Music and Video Games, the current “new” and “used” item specifics are being replaced with “brand new”, “like new”, “very good”, “good” and “acceptable”. Sellers should note that when relisting, current “new” will default to “brand new”, and “used” to “acceptable”: make sure this doesn’t misdescribe your item!
In Jewelry, item specifics are being added to the new categories Fine Bracelets, Fine Earrings, Fine Necklaces & Pendants and Fine Rings, and “used” will be available as a condition alongside the current “new”.
More details of the changes are available from Seller Central.
eBay to ban email communications from August
July 13, 2008
At the Developer’s Conference, held just prior to eBay Live!, Adam Trachtenberg announced that emails between sellers and buyers prior to a sale would be anonymised. The latest API notes for developers reveal that this change will roll out across eBay sites in late August.
This means that buyers and sellers will no longer have access to each other’s email addresses prior to a sale. Only once a bidder has won an item will the buyer and seller be able to email each other off eBay.
How this will work is that when an email is sent by a buyer using Ask Seller a Question it will still be delivered to your email inbox, as well as to your My Messages on eBay. When replying to the email it will no longer send it directly to the buyers inbox and you won’t be able to see their private email address. Each message will have a unique identifier and the reply will be sent to them via eBay, using the identifier to redirect the message to their real email address as well as placing a copy in their My Messages.
This is great news as it also means buyers will no longer have the choice of hiding their email address which currently results in the dreaded UseTheYellowButton@ebay.com reply to address. For sellers who routinely use email for replies, rather than clicking through to My Messages, it’s all too easy to hit reply without noticing the email is not the user’s address. Replying to the email gives no warning that the buyer will never actually receive it.
Once anonymised emails are introduced sellers will be able to reply from their normal email program, safe in the knowledge that their answer will end up in the buyer’s My Messages on eBay as well as in their inbox.
Once all eBay communications are via My Messages it’s been announced that sellers will have to remove email addresses from their listings. Where this leaves sellers in the UK who make use of Business Seller Information inserts, which automatically inserts their email address into listings, is unclear - currently the UK Contact Information policy specifically allows for the inclusion of email addresses in listings.
Overall I’ll welcome this change, buyers and sellers will have more reliable communications ensuring all emails are routed through My Messages. Also hopefully my personal quota of eBay spam mail will decline as fraudsters will find it increasingly difficult to obtain email addresses.
eBay.com postpone new links policy
July 11, 2008
eBay.com are postponing implementation of their new policy banning links from About Me pages to sellers’ websites. According to the most recent Power Up! email newsletter, which is sent out to PowerSellers registered on .com,
the policy announced in May covering links in sellers’ listings or other eBay pages will not be enforced. Instead, we’ll be announcing a clearer and more comprehensive links policy in mid August.
No corresponding policy was ever announced for eBay UK, so it’s still not clear if there will be a change here, and if so, what it will be.
At eBay Live, Brian Burke stated that the new links policy had probably been announced prematurely: certainly there were many unanswered questions that even eBay staff I talked to seemed to need clarification on. It seems that eBay may have changed their minds, for example, on links to non-transactional pages.
Of course, none of this will be much comfort to sellers who spent hours last month changing their listings to comply with the new policy. eBay have now put out an announcement board post confirming that implementation of the policy is being delayed, and that once the new version goes live, sellers will have a four week grace period to amend their listings. Sellers will also not be required to specify shipping prices until August, when improved bulk editing tools will be available to make changes more easily.
Via Skip.
eBay.com tell buyers what to search for
July 11, 2008
eBay.com have made some changes to their New Search Experience following member feedback on recent trials. Preferences have been made ’sticky’, i.e. what you pick stays picked, and more options have been added to the advanced search. As of next week, more members are going to start seeing the new version of search, and those who aren’t included in the trial can still test things out in the Playground.
From what I’m hearing, the new search system has not so far won many friends. Even some pretty experienced users have had trouble figuring out just how it works. But if there was suspicion of Best Match and Finding 2.0, this is going to be ten times worse:
We have also added an Auto Complete feature, which provides search suggestions in real time right from the search box!
Of course, if yours is one of the keywords that pops up on the first letter, this will be superb for you - but if your words never show at all, then you’d better hope that eBay haven’t distracted your buyers before they’ve finished typing. Buyers really should be trusted at the very beginning of the search process to know what they’re looking for, and left to get on with finding it: this horrible new feature should go.
PayPal claims shown in eBay dispute console
July 10, 2008
eBay.com have just announced that PayPal disputes will now be shown in the dispute console on eBay. It will show the status of open disputes, as well as indicating when you need to take action. If you’re unfortunate enough to have a number of claims open, this should make dealing with them a little easier. The change on the eBay.com site will be made in the next few days.
eBay.com test new My eBay pages
June 25, 2008
eBay.com have announced testing on some new features on My eBay pages. There will initially be two test groups - one who can opt out, and one who can’t - and you’ll know if you’re seeing the new beta version because the page will be primarily yellow rather than blue.
As I’m not in the test group myself, I’m going by what other people are saying here.The major feature change appears to be the introduction of lists within the watch list: rather than everything being in one list as it is now, you can break it up into ‘items I’m going to snipe’, ‘items I might BIN’, ‘items I’m researching to sell myself’, ‘items I might get Biddy for her birthday’ and so on. A screenshot suggests that lists are not limited to individual items, but can also contain saved searches and favourite sellers too.
This is a great way for items that you’ll be looking for over a period of time. But in assuming that buyers are going to research and search and browse and make lists, I think eBay are really overestimating the amount of effort that the average eBayer wants to put in on the average purchase. What about the buyer who wants to hit the site with a very specific want in mind, buy the first decently-priced one they find, pay, and forget about it: because that’s how the majority of ecommerce transactions go, and if eBay is really going to survive, behaving in a way that people are used to is essential.
Making it easy for people to come back and find items they were looking at yesterday or last week is great. But what about items you’re looking at now? I need to buy a new laptop battery today, and I’m going to browse through half a dozen sellers trying to find one who looks reliable and is in the EU. I can’t be bothered adding things to my watch list and then clicking through to My eBay and finding the link for watch lists (it’s not a feature I use that much) and considering which battery I’m going to pick. The “flow”, as eBay refer to the process of doing things on-site, is just too cumbersome here. I want, in fact, a shopping cart, like every other ecommerce site has got. When are eBay going to roll this out beyond eBay India?
If you’re one of the lucky Beta testers, let us know what you think in the comments below.
Project Echo: 3rd Party tool integration into SMP
June 17, 2008
Kumar Kandaswamy, the Senior Director of the Developer Program and Innovation at eBay, gave TameBay the inside track on Project Echo, the new API tools available to allow developers to integrate their applications with Selling Manager Pro (SMP).
He told how back in 2000 his team opened up the eBay platform using the Application Programing Interface (API) to allow third parties to develop eBay tools. With millions of users although eBay provide some great tools, they’re not enough to meet the needs of all users world wide. Over the course of the last seven years over 70,000 developers have used the interface with some 12,000 live applications using the API today.
Over 28% of listings come through 3rd party applications or 1/2 billion listings. If you include TurboLister and SMP the figure rises to over 60% of listings launched by tools using the API.
Kumar explained how Project Echo will enable the 3rd parties to bring their expertise and bolt their applications directly onto the eBay platform. Instead of having to visit a third party site or use a desktop application the tools will be accessible directly through SMP on eBay.
We can expect to see the first five applications available in SMP on eBay.com in Q4 this year, with public Beta starting in Q1 2009. Full product release is scheduled for the middle of 2009, with worldwide rollout to follow.
The first five applications built into eBay will be Terapeak (eBay research) and Hosted Support (customer support automation), who have already built their applications with Sagefire, MyStoreCredit and ShipRush to follow.
On the left of SMP there are already links to eBay features, so applications such as Terapeak will be added into the menu as a consistant seamless user experience.
Kumar explained that eBay will not compromise on security, scaleability and seamless useability. They will ensure applications offer the same security as eBay itself and that the providers are able to scale up for the thousands of users Project Echo opens their application up to. Once implemented users will be able to seamlessly click from SMP into the application without leaving the eBay site.
3rd party providers will also make subscription costs clear and Kumar is insisting that they offer a 30 day free trial so that users are able to try before they buy.
This is a golden opportunity of developers to put their applications in front of thousands of new buyers and sellers. For eBay users in the future your favourite application will be available seamlessly on eBay without the need to visit the developers sites or download applications.
Kumar is very excited at the API applications being given access to the eBay core platform, and rightly so. I can’t wait until every third party tool I use is available through the one website interface and is available from any and every PC that I log into.
What’s your favourite application and what features would you like to see developers build into eBay?
Microsoft Live Search cash back live on eBay.com
June 14, 2008
Microsoft have revealed more of their Live Seach cashback initiative confirming that all fixed price listings on eBay.com are eligible for a rebate.
When a buyer clicks through from Live Search to eBay and goes on to make a purchase, when they check out they’ll be presented with a screen telling them exactly how much cashback they can expect. Payment for the purchase will have to be via PayPal to qualify.
The cashback offers are now live on eBay.com, but currently Live Search cashback is only available in the US. It marks a departure from Google’s stategy where advertisers pay for exposure, on Microsoft Live Search, merchants can offer cashback direct to the buyer with eBay paying rebates for products on their site.
If Live Search cashback proves popular in the US doubtless it will filter across to the UK in the future. One to keep an eye on and no doubt JD will be announcing it to US sellers at eBay Live! next week.
Stores shipping prices now editable even after sales
June 13, 2008
eBay.com have made a great change for Store owners: shipping details can now be edited on SIF listings which have already made sales.
Previously, neither shipping price nor shipping services could be edited on a multiple item SIF listing if an item had already been sold. If shipping prices changed or the seller switched shipping provider, the listing had to be ended and relisted. But not any longer: sellers can change shipping details relative to future purchases, though obviously the offered price and carrier will remain the same for purchases made prior to the change.
This should make Stores’ owners’ lives so much easier; lets hope it rolls out to other eBay sites very soon.
PowerSeller minimum DSR standards coming in July
June 9, 2008
Many eBay PowerSellers have noticed in their Seller Dashboard a note that from July 2008 a new criteria to determine PowerSeller eligibilty will be DSR scores.
Currently there is no indication of what minimum DSR score levels will be used to qualify as a PowerSeller in the UK but sharp eyed TameBay reader Suz, from designer_clothing_4_u might have found a clue - the US PowerSeller Portal sets a level of 4.5 minimum for all four DSR criteria. The scores are based on the last 12 months, not the trailing 30 days, so eBay are aiming for longstanding good service, not a short term improvement in standards.
To be honest I’m impressed that eBay have taken up the gauntlet to improve PowerSeller requirements and for introducing benefits that make the badge more meaningful than simply indicating a seller with a high turnover. Whilst there will probably be a few sellers that no longer qualify for PowerSeller status in the short term, when they regain their status it will be a signal that they really are an elite seller.
Reporting problem buyers now easier for UK sellers
May 31, 2008
There have been a couple of changes on eBay over the last few days which should make it a little easier for sellers to deal with bad bidders. Firstly on eBay UK, a new link to “report a problem you had with this transaction” has appeared on the page to leave feedback for buyers. The target of this link gives a list of problems which can be reported, including unpaid items, feedback abuses, unwelcome and malicious buying, and customs fraud (asking for items to be misrepresented on customs documentation). Sellers who have set their breach of policy buyer block will not have to deal with buyers with multiple reports; it appears that eBay is just taking sellers’ words for the accuracy of the reporting here.
Meanwhile in the US, there is a new buyer block available to block buyers who are not ID verified. As ID verification is not available on all eBay sites (not on eBay UK, for example), this won’t roll out everywhere just yet, but it should be very useful, for example, to US sellers of big ticket items who want to be certain that only those buyers who take eBay very seriously will be allowed to bid.
eBay.com seller dashboard now displays 1/100ths
May 27, 2008
Logging into the seller dashboard on eBay.com now reveals your DSR scores to the nearest 1/100th. It should now be clearer if your score is edging upwards or downwards over a shorter period of time.
For those who have seen their scores fluctuate between two decimal places you are likely to see your DSR score in the 1/100ths hovering around the x.x5 mark and being rounded up or down.
I would caution against giving your scores too much weight over a short period of time. Just one or two feedback DSR scores received could show large swings, especially over a 30 day period unless you receive vast amounts of feedback. However if you monitor the dashboard over an extended period of time you should be able to see if your scores are trending up or down.
The UK Seller Dashboard is expected to go live this week, and to display scores to 1/100ths by next week.
The new Seller Dashboard on eBay.com
May 23, 2008
The new expanded Seller Dashboard is live on eBay.com and I like it! Not only does it supply a lot more detailed information but it acts as a guide to the areas you need to improve in.
The dashboard covers five main areas - Search Standing, Discount Level, PowerSeller Status, Policy compliance and Account Status. For US users it also give an indication of Buyer Satisfaction not available if you log in with a UK account.
Detailed seller ratings now come with three viewing options: 12 month vs eBay 12 month average, 30 day vs eBay 30 day average, and 30 day vs your 12 month average.
Each rating has a hover over which tells you exactly what your rating is and how you’re performing, and if one of your ratings is slipping it’ll be highlighted in red.
Possibly the most useful part of the expanded DSR console is to be able to compare yourself with the eBay Average. You probably already know if your DSRs are slipping against a rolling 12 months, but if you’re above the eBay average you’re likely to be doing well in all areas including being advantaged in search.
Search Standing is calculated from a mix of Buyer Satisfaction and DSRs, if you have raised Search Standing your listings may receive higher placement in search when sorted by Best Match. Importantly there is a note “Even if you already have a raised search standing, continue to improve your detailed seller ratings to increase the visibility of your items.” so raised Search Standing isn’t a given, unless you have the highest DSRs on eBay.
Buyer Satisfation on my account is rated as “Good”, but that section of the Seller Dashboard isn’t available in detail to UK users.
The part of the expanded Seller Dashboard that deals with Seller Discounts will be most familiar to UK users. This was effectively the first part to be introduced to the UK and is currently the only part viewable from the UK site.
PowerSeller status has been included in the Seller Dashboard. Although this information is also available rom logging into the PowerSeller Portal it includes in addition a track of Policy Violations in the last 60 days and whether your account is in good standing.
The final two parts of the Seller Dashboard have already been covered above - Policy Violations indicates if you’re in danger of account restrictions and even if you’re rated as Good, it warns a violation could still result in your listings being removed. Account Status shows any over due amounts and if you’re account is past due, or on hold.
Overall the new Seller Dashboard appears well thought out, comprehensive with the ability to click into each section for much greater detail, and a useful addition to enable sellers to monitor themselves.
Until the expanded dashboard is available in the UK you can log into eBay.com to view it 
eBay.com ban ME page website links
May 20, 2008
As part of today’s policy changes, eBay.com have announced some major changes to the links policy. These will take effect from July, and have been announced for .com; when we know when and if they will affect sellers on other sites, we’ll let you know.
Likely to most affect sellers is the ban on About Me page links to a seller’s ecommerce website:
The new Links Policy prohibits linking from a seller’s listing or other content on eBay–including eBay Store pages, About Me pages, eBay Blogs, Reviews and Guides, and forums–to any site that offers a product or service for sale off eBay.
About Me pages have traditionally been the one place on eBay that sellers could legitimately link their website; eBay Blogs have - until now - been quite relaxed about the external links that were permitted.
Other links once permitted within listings have also been banned: pages which expand upon the item description or include terms and conditions not expressed on the listing page are no longer allowed. Sellers are permitted only the following links:
- to third parties supplying solutions and services directly related to the listing (e.g. listing tools, hit counters, etc.)
- up to five links to “eBay property” pages (i.e. eBay, PayPal, StubHub, Half.com etc.); quite where this leaves scrolling galleries of sellers’ other products, I wouldn’t like to guess
- embedded links to videos, so long as the videos comply with eBay’s policies themselves
- links to photos of the item for sale, “as long as the page displaying the photos doesn’t offer, or link to a site that offers a product or service for sale off eBay”.
Many sellers have, for years now, used eBay as a customer acquisition tool, directing prospective buyers to ecommerce websites by way of About Me pages and “further photographs” pages. This is going to be a very much more difficult process from now on, with eBay tightening up the opportunities for promoting off-eBay sales on-site. Sellers will perhaps have to accept that the first sale must be through eBay now, and work more on bringing returning happy customers back to their websites for subsequent purchases, rather than trying to funnel traffic from eBay to their own sites directly.
