Using RSS Feeds To Generate Income From Ebay

[Roo]

just updating a week into the new ebay Partner Network, seems people have already shortened this to ePN.

I have had a few people report that when generating rss feeds they get an invalid feed, this seems to be being caused by people not entering a custom id along with the campaign id. So a simple thing to fix.

Tracking reports from ePN seem to be showing clicks ok, almost in real time, but already I have noted that ebay are dragging their feet on reporting sales/commission. This isn't that unusual for anyone used to ebay affiliates as they used to be quite slow in reporting previously. It seems that the main issue is that people may click-thru, win an item, and then as payment isn't 'cleared' until later, earnings are credited until then. Though there is another theory that the delays are longer than this and only appear when positive feedback is left. I could go on with more theories, but if anyone has some definite facts on this it would be nice to read them!

[Mega B]

Originally Posted by Roo

Nice furniture store mega, great example of what can be done using ebay affiliates. I'm just curious as to how you drive traffic to it as it seems that it doesn't have a great deal of 'organic content' so I wouldn't imagine it would get much search engine traffic.

Cheers mate,adwords is the main driving force behind the site,craiglist and also looking to use Miva

[ev8321]

Hey guys, just curious as to the conversion rates that ebay pays.
Also, is there a difference between a referral when its a buyer compared to a seller.

Does a referral constitute a sale, a bid, or just simply a sign up?

Thanks in advance.

[Roo]

Originally Posted by ev8321

Does a referral constitute a sale, a bid, or just simply a sign up?

Thanks in advance.

You get nothing for a bid unless they then win the item, straight sales through buy-it-now also earn commission. Though getting a new user to sign up is a nice little earner, though they do then have to go and complete a 'purchase' before you earn. I think if they also sign up for a 'store' via a link, it earns you more.
'Sales' work as a percentage of the final value fees charged to the seller.

As for conversion rates, it will take a couple of months before the new ebay partner network beds down and can give accurate figures on this. The figures for CJ though were - £3.14 epc(3 months), £4.44 epc(7 days), for uk. Impression conversion rate is impossible to work out as so many users have links to ebay that have noimpression tracking.


*epc (earnings per 100clicks)

[Mega B]

Roo just opened the EPN account,how many id's did you have to make i have 13 sites running the CJ pid codes but have not set them up in EPN i reckon this is going to be a nightmare :-(

[Roo]

Originally Posted by Mega B

Roo just opened the EPN account,how many id's did you have to make i have 13 sites running the CJ pid codes but have not set them up in EPN i reckon this is going to be a nightmare :-(

it only takes a few minutes to set up a campaign, though I imagine 13 could take upto half an hour, though once done it;s easy. Alternative you could run them under the one campaign and rely totally on the custom-id for tracking info. Just use a prefix for each site "dolls-p1" "cars-p3" "books-pg4" or something similair

[Mega B]

2nd option is the one

[Roo]

I've just been messing around with ebay rss and widgets to display stuff, and am quite pleased with the results. I'm only just getting the site converted from what was supposed to be a local directory.
It's now a site showing niches on ebay in a local area. (well the directory was local!)
I've made a good start on the motors section so far, though would be interested in any comments or feedback!
The South Bristol Auction Directory - Used Cars In Bristol

[tb987]

You have a 404 on this page Roo http://www.southbristol.co.uk/Prices.html

I wonder how Joomla would deal with these ebay feeds - I'll have a play and let you know might be better than Spring Widgets.

[Roo]

Originally Posted by tb987

You have a 404 on this page Roo http://www.southbristol.co.uk/Prices.html

I wonder how Joomla would deal with these ebay feeds - I'll have a play and let you know might be better than Spring Widgets.

Will sort out the 404 later, the navigation needs a bit of an overhaul really since changing the site, a number of the pages need removing totally if I'm going to go in this new direction.

I've heard a lot about Joomla, mainly it's very popular! Though I've yet to play with it. I'm just playing around with this domain and webspace to see if itcan raise some revenue but I may have to indulge in some marketing to make it a success.

I think Joomla will have to go on the back burner as my next project is going to be wordpress based as I've come across a great tutorial on making a niche store using ebay feeds and WP plugins that I want to checkout. Currently I just want to see how ebay clicks convert here before doing that.