eBay Seller's News, January 2006, Volume 6, Special Issue

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Musings ////

We have never been a "newsletter" in the sense of providing instant news. I leave that to others, such as my friend Ina at AuctionBytes who publishes daily. I also don't often do special issues, but sometimes news won't wait. Additionally we will be on vacation in early February and the next issue will be a little late, so I thought it would be a good idea to get this special issue out before we go.

The two big pieces of news we wanted to discuss are the recent eBay fee increase and a new exciting service from eBay they are calling eBay Express.

If you haven't read the January issue it is still posted HERE. You can also read back issues in the ARCHIVES.

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Every year about this time eBay releases their financial figures for the year and they take this same opportunity to announce new enhancements to the venue and, of course any fee increases. eBay botched the fee announcements last year and stirred up a lot of anger in the community. It seems they learned from their mistakes, and did a much better job this year.

eBay grew really well last year although they did miss their target for gross merchandise sales (GMS) slightly. Wall street was expecting GMS to exceed 45 Billion, but they came in at slightly under, $44.3 Billion. But total revenue exceeded expectations, growing 40% to 1.08 Billion! Most of the growth this year came from a rebound in US sales. Overseas sales are still growing but at a slower rate.

• Worldwide Registered Users: 180.6 million
• Active users: 71.8 million (The number of people who bid or bought during the year)
• Listings: 1.9 billion items were listed on eBay during 2005
• Active PayPal accounts: 96.2 million
• In 2005 $27.5 billion in transactions were completed using PayPal
• Cash on hand: $1.3 Billion

Last year eBay acquired VOIP provider Skype and Shopping.com. With $1.3 Billion cash on hand and practically no long-term debt, eBay could be in the market for additional acquisitions this year.

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A few nights ago I hosted a teleseminar with Tim Knox who is the absolute master of showing people how to create multiple streams on income on eBay and the internet. Tim has a great personal story and his material is first class. He is one of these guys who always overdelivers.

One of the problems people have to trying to do too many things at once. It's always best to focus. But, if your eBay business is up and running --you have your stores and About Me page set up, then you may want to learn some other ways to generate income from your eBay business.

If you missed the seminar, I will be putting up a recording once we receive it.. If you don't have the time to listen, Tim did make a special offer to my readers and you can still access it until the end of February by clicking here. I got Tim's package a couple of months ago. I haven't had time to implement all of the techniques and strategies he covers, but just three of the things I am doing have generated an extra $3000 plus in income over the past two months --and I did those with very little investment in time or money.

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I would also like to introduce my readers to my daughter-in-law, Lissa. Lissa is originally from the UK. She has her own eBay business and has worked with me off and on over the past four years in my business. In the past she has worked behind the scenes doing copyediting and formatting of my books and other special projects. I was so swamped this week that I asked her to write the first article on eBay's fee increase.

Lissa has just had her first book published, 20 Questions To Ask Before Selling on eBay, by Career Press, now available at Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.com and local bookstores.

In This Issue:

1. eBay Raises Some Fees
2. eBay Announces New Selling Portal - eBay Express
3. EZ Cube Photo Tent Techniques

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1. eBay Announces Fee Changes and New Features

By Lissa McGrath

As January 18th approached we waited with baited breath to see if eBay learned anything from their disastrous handling of fee increases last year. Well, it appears they did.

Very few fees have actually been increased. In fact a couple have been reduced. The biggest change is an increase in the final value fees for items priced between $20 and $1,000. The fee for this range will increase from 2.75% to 3.0%.

Here is a run down of the changes that will become effective on February 22, 2006:

Insertion Fee: The only change was in the lowest bracket ($0.01-$0.99), which was reduced from 25¢ to 20¢.

Final Value Fee:

This isn't a huge difference, but it becomes more significant the higher the final value of your item.

Picture Show (slide show): Was 25¢, now FREE.

Reserve Price: For reserve prices in the $200+ bracket, the fee was 1% with a cap of $100. The fee is still 1%, but the cap has been reduced to $50.

Feature Packs: eBay is now bundling optional listing features that are commonly used together.

The Value Pack consists of Listing Designer (10¢), Gallery (35¢) and Subtitle (50¢) which totals 95¢. The Value Pack will cost 65¢ when all three options are used together.

The Pro Pack consists of Bold ($1), Border ($3), Highlight ($5), FeaturedPlus! ($19.95) and GalleryFeatured ($19.95) which a la carte totals $48.90. The ProPack will cost $29.95.

Monthly Subscriptions(effective March 1, 2006)

Picture Manager: The amount of storage space has increased and the price has dropped in both tiers 2 and 3 (tier 1 is unchanged).

eBay Store Monthly Subscription Fees

Sales Reports Plus:Sales Reports is already free but, as of March 1, 2006, Sales Reports Plus will also be free. The current cost is $4.99 a month.

2. eBay Announces New Selling Portal - eBay Express

eBay Express is a new eBay shopping site that gives buyers a fast and easy way to shop from multiple eBay sellers at one time. Everything on eBay Express is available for immediate purchase at a fixed price so buyers can get the items they want now, with no bidding and no waiting for auctions to end.

With the introduction of eBay Express, all Buy It Now listings will still be shown on eBay.com— however a portion of Buy It Now and Stores Inventory Format Listings will also be shown on eBay Express. To be listed on eBay express the seller will have to have either a premier or business PayPal account. Buyers can shop on eBay express listings and add fixed price listings to their shopping cart and pay with one PayPal payment. PayPal will collect the funds and distribute the amounts, including shipping to each seller.

Although eBay Express will be a specialty site, it will still be part of the eBay marketplace, so Store and Fixed Price listings that qualify will automatically appear on both eBay.com and eBay Express - at no additional cost. 

Buy-it-now and fixed-price listing sellers will benefit from the additional exposure without having to list their inventory twice, or change the way they sell.  Your existing eBay listings will be automatically submitted for consideration for eBay Express, unless you choose to opt-out. Getting listed on eBay Express will be pretty much automatic if you follow the rules:

1. List an auction with a BIN price, a fixed-price listing or an eBay Store item on eBay in the normal way

2. You must have a feedback score of at least 100 with 98% positive

3. Make sure your PayPal account is upgraded to Premier or Business Merchant status and you have verified your account.

4. Fill in the item condition field (i.e. New, Used, Refurbished) in Item Specifics

5. Include shipping costs - flat, calculated or free Provide a picture or gallery

6. Use eBay checkout or the new checkout integration API ( for 3rd party order processing)

eBay will be promoting eBay Express on the internet and in their TV campaigns starting in the spring.

3. EZ Cube Photo Tent Techniques

As many of you know I have been selling the EZ Cube line of photo light tents for several months now. the EZ Cube is the easiest way I have found for a non-professional like me, to take great photos for their eBay auctions and web site. I sell them on eBay and from a web site I set up just for this product at EZauctiontools.com

One of my customers is Nina Cambron, an artist that works in Fused Glass. As you can guess, photographing glass works is pretty difficult. Nina bought one of our 30 inch EZ Cube sets and now does her own photography instead of using an expensive professional photographer. You can see examples of her work at her web site.

I get a lot of questions about using the EZ Cube, so I have placed a page of Digital Photo Tips and an article by David Steiner on using the EZ Cube on the web site. If you have bought an EZ Cube or are thinking of investing in one, be sure and read the tips and the articles first.

The EZ Cube is very easy to use, but if you have a problem with any of your photos, be sure and read the FAQs, as they will answer most of your questions.

You can print any pages out by highlighting the text, and when you hit the print button on your computer, click the print option that says "print selection." This way you can just print the text without printing all the web site surround and images.

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There are no wholesale sources in this special issue, but the regular January Issue has new sources for the month. A lot of people have really enjoyed our Top-20 Wholesale Sources for eBay Sellers and we still provide our FREE Wholesale Search Engine.

Well that is it for the special issue. Karen and I are going to our timeshare in Atlantis to rest, regroup, get some sun (not much of that in Seattle this time of year) and watch the Seattle Seahawks beat Pittsburgh in the Superbowl. The next issue of the newsletter will be out by February 15th.

Skip McGrath