Hello <$firstname$>

Well it may not have been the busiest of months in respect of sales but the backroom staff at eBay have certainly been busy. I don’t think I can remember a month when they have pushed out so many announcements.

Possibly the most important was issued on 20th July and this was a statement from Doug Macallum, the Managing Director of eBay.co.uk He started off by stating that after the test of including eBay store listings in the search results the company had come to the following conclusion:

“Over the past few months it has emerged that the change had two unintended consequences. Firstly, buyers found the greater abundance of items a bit bewildering. Buyers find it difficult to hone in on the item they want when presented with lots of choices (on average, search results doubled!). Secondly, because Shop Listings last longer than other formats, it has become apparent that the sales velocity for which eBay is rightly famous is under threat: your products have been selling, but not as quickly. This has obviously affected the vibrancy of the marketplace.

To rebalance the marketplace eBay is going to reduce the visibility of Shop Listings in Search and Browse. Shop items won’t disappear entirely from Search and Browse results: whenever a Search returns a small number of listings, we’ll present Shop Listings to the buyer. But when that does happen Shops Listings will have their Gallery image showing to help buyers – the poor experience offered by lack of images was another key piece of buyer feedback.” He then went on to say that ebay would continue to monitor the situation.

He also went on to announce that plans for introducing eBay Express into the UK were going ahead well. As I understand it eBay Express is a form of classified advertising intended for business sellers of new products. EBay Express should be up and running in time for the Christmas rush.

Other items addressed in the statement included excessive shipping charges which he promised was being actively addressed which I am sure will please the majority of readers. EBay motors are also introducing a classified ad format for vehicle sales. Finally he announced that over the last year eBay had trained over 1000 members of the UK police forces on how eBay works and is building a good relationship to counteract fraud. To read the full statement visit http://www2.ebay.com/aw/uk/200607.shtml

At the same time eBay announced changes in the fees for store items. Gon eis the 5p across the board charge and the following will apply from 21 st August.

Shops Listings Insertion Fees Insertion

price tranche 30 day listings 90 day listings Good 'Till Cancelled listings

£0.01 - £4.99 £0.03 £0.09 £0.03/ 30 days

£5.00 - £9.99 £0.05 £0.15 £0.05/ 30 days

£10.00 - £49.99 £0.07 £0.21 £0.07/ 30 days

£50.00 - £499.99 £0.09 £0.27 £0.09/30 days

Over £500 £0.11 £0.33 £0.11/30 days

Final Valuation fees have also been increased to:

First £4.99 10%

£5 to £9.99 10% for 1 st £4.99 then 8% for remainder

£10 to £49.99 10% for 1 st £4.99 then 8% for initial £5 to £9.99 + 6% for remainder

£50 to £499.99 as above plus 4% for balance between £50 and £499.99

Anything above £499.99 is as above +2% for £500+

There are also some other minor changes to Gallery prices and feature plus. Full details can be found at http://www2.ebay.com/aw/uk/200607.shtml

There are similar changes announced for eBay.ie. (The Irish eBay site)

I am sure that these changes are going to make some sellers question whether it is still going to be viable to continue with their eBay stores. I think for many it is going to be time to get the calculators out and start doing your sums.

I hope you enjoy this issue of UL Auctionline and if you have an issues relating to eBay you would like to tell us about we would love to hear from you.

Talk to you next month

If there's something you've got to keep an eye on on the internet, it's the big guys. Their movements have ripples that reach to every corner. When Amazon thought of the idea of having other sites reselling their products, they changed internet direct marketing forever. Some caught the wave and surfed to the top, others are still wondering what went wrong.

There are some ripples being made as we speak. eBay in planning to gobble up Shopping.com with classifieds becoming a strong point in the eBay strategy. And with this new acquisition, millions of customers will certainly buy or sell through eBay. If you buy or sell on the internet, you have to watch eBay... great for price reference; many websites owe their entire income to eBay. If you're not one of them, you should give this some consideration. It seems the "eBay way" is here to stay with their endless online promotion. Many people don't even own a website and thanks to this way of selling, they are making pretty good money from their homes.

Have you been tweaking and putting more and more gizmos onto your site? Well, sometimes you'll have a better response if you do exactly the opposite. Any marketing expert will tell you that your site must look professional but plain -- and this is what European mobile phone companies are doing and making big profits in the process! What's chic now is low-tech cellphones targeted for people who want to use their phones to... yes, you guessed it -- talk! That's right -- there are a lot of people who don't care about all the new features the new cellphones have and they're trading in their hi-tech toys for simple-to-use devices. This "just in" from Current Analysis Inc. And this is great news because I have a whole drawer filled with old brick cellphones... finally my ecological conscience will pay off -- maybe an auction on eBay... :)

Skype is also making quite a big of a hype, becoming the popular choice of millions. VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) is sure to be involved in a lot of online businesses. The visitors will now not only type questions, they will ask them verbally and listen to a human respond to their questions -- making the internet much warmer.

PayPal has reduced the the payment regulations; this will be big for all those web businesses that see the large opportunity of allowing visitors small payments. Ringtones, music downloads, articles with valuable content, greeting cards, pictures, donations, etc. You name it, it can now be sold. And who could refuse to give just some measly pennies? Micropayments can become a big source of income, especially if your website receives a lot of visitors that you have not figured out how to turn into buyers. If you think this is a good idea you can profit from, then why don't you chip in a couple of dollars after reading this article?

There are so many ways to start a home business online. One of the challenges most people who want to start a business from home face, is the lack of space to carry inventory. Fortunately, there are businesses that do not require sellers to store products. This is a "drop ship" type of business.

What is drop shipping?

Drop shipping is the method of retail merchandising which allows business owners to sell products without first purchasing and stocking the items they sell. This arrangement is made between the seller and the supplier. In other words, a seller would display a product, either on a website or on a mail-order catalog, without having it in their inventory.

How does it work?

The seller charges a certain price, which is over what the supplier is selling. The difference between those two prices is the seller's profit.

When a buyer purchases that product, the seller can go to his/her supplier's website or call the supplier and place the order which will be delivered directly to the customer's mailing address.

In this way, the seller is responsible for the promotion of the products and the supplier takes care of fulfillment.

As with any other business, one should do thorough research before starting. Probably the most important thing to consider is whether there is a market for the product. A mistake that many marketers make is to start with a product they think will sell, only to be disappointed down the road when they lose money.

How do you find a hot market?

The beautiful thing about the Internet is that all the research being done by multi-million dollar corporations is readily available. You just need to know where to look to simply take advantage of the online giants' technology.

Two great, free examples that can give one tons of niche ideas for products to sell are eBay and Overture.

eBay trends about what is selling can be observed by visiting eBay pulse at http://pulse.ebay.com. One can then drill down by categories and sub-categories and find niches of interest.

With Overture's tools you can establish demand and supply in an instant. Simply type in a phrase in their keyword suggestion tool: http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/ to see the demand.

If there are advertisers spending good money for products, then it's a good sign that the people in that market are spending money on the items. Overture's bid price tool shows this information: http://uv.bidtool.overture.com/d/USm/search/tools/bidtool/

Another important aspect of the drop shipping business, is to find reliable suppliers. Some things to look for are:

1. Are they charging a handling fee per item?
2. Are they using reliable shipping methods?
3. How are they handling returns?
4. How long have they been around for?

By using "drop shipping" + product of interest, in Google's search, one can locate many drop shippers.

In conclusion, drop shipping is a great business model for anyone who does not want to deal with carrying inventory and fulfillment. However, it is very important to identify a hot market where customers are already buying and to locate a reliable drop shipper before starting a drop shipping business.

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By Thomas Haselhorst

What kind of browser are you using for online surfing? Explorer, Netscape, Firefox, Opera?? Sure, all are good programs but I want to talk about an excellent program called Netscape. If you use Netscape, do you know that you also get an amazing WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) web design program called Netscape Composer for free? Basically you don’t need expensive HTML editors anymore. The list of commercially available HTML editors software is endless – and the price tags are enormous. Most people don’t want to spend a lot of money to get started with their eBay business. Fair enough, since the goal is to make money and not to spend money. So it makes perfect sense to use a program to design auction listings which is available for free. And such a program is Netscape Composer.

It has the same professional features like FrontPage or any other similar program. To design stunning and professional looking eBay auction sites with Netscape Composer you need to download Netscape first. If you start up the program, select File->New Composer Page and basically you can start immediately to design your auction listings. You can make you letters in any colour, bold, italics, use background colours (or even images) etc. The options are endless. You can save this file on your local hard drive as html file. I used to have one file for every listing I generate. The best thing is that once you have got a nice and professional looking eBay auction listing, you can use it for ever. Just open your last listing in Netscape Composer and edit according to your new item. Amazingly, this takes only a couple of minutes.

But how do you transfer your listing saved as a html file on your local hard drive to eBay? The answer is simple. Once you have logged in into your eBay account and selected your category and starting price you have to type in your “item description”. Did you see that eBay allows HTML format? Have a look when you launch your next listing. That’s the time where you go back to your new listing you just have created with Netscape Composer. Down the bottom of your Netscape Composer page you’ll see a button called: SOURCE - the source code of your listing. Click on that and highlight and copy the entire text. Select then the eBay site and paste this text into the “Item description box”. Make sure that all links are working and that all photos are uploaded to the internet.

When you have finalised your listing you will be surprised. A stunning and professional looking “DIY-listing”. You can always use “ready-to-go” auction templates and edit these according to your item. You’ll see that with an professional auction design you can easily attract more buyers and get higher bids. It’s worth the effort. Keep in mind that professional web design software is highly expensive and does the same job. Alternatively, you can choose from a huge variety of third party auction services doing the job for you. But hey, there are incredibly expensive too. Don’t you think that the eBay fees are high enough and you can easily do it yourself without spending any additional dollars. It’s really simple!

About the Author: Thomas Haselhorst is webmaster of http://www.auction-design-for-free

Most people are aware of the “Dummies” series of books. These are those yellow and black paperback books, which originally started life as easy read guide for various software programs. Now there seems to be a title for almost every aspect of our lives.

They have now introduced e-Bay.co.uk for Dummies and this is one of the most comprehensive primer books for anyone wishing to begin buying and selling on eBay. The authors, Power Seller Marsha Collier and journalist Jane Hoskyn have the standard “Dummies” format produced a fact filled 370+ page book which should be on the bookshelves of all UK eBayers.

What amazed me most about this book was the amount of information that was included. Much of it of course I knew but there was also a lot that I had known but had just forgotten so for me it was a great refresher.

It begins with an overview of eBay, which then runs logically into how to register and make a start. I particularly liked the way they demonstrate the various features that can be found on the eBay site. How many other books of this type for instance mention eBay Pulse?

There are separate sections about buying and selling on eBay and both of these contain more than enough information for anyone who is relatively new to eBay. And because it is targeted strictly towards ebay.co.uk all the information is relevant. Having said that it is no doubt based on the eBay for Dummies book produced in the USA although if this is so it has been adapted very well.

One of the peculiarities of the Internet is that a digital file somehow seems to have a higher perceived value than a physical product. I can see no real logic or reason behind this but it is true. If this were issued as an e-book I feel certain many people would happily pay $97 (£54 approx) and be happy to get it for that price. But as a physical printed paperback book it is only priced at £14.99.

As a reviewer one is always supposed to include something that you did not like about a book just to show that you are being fair. However, there is nothing I did not like, it does what it aims to do show people how to get the most out of eBay.co.uk. It does it in a most enjoyable and easy to follow manner and my only real complaint is that I did not write it.

It should be available from your local bookstore, WH Smith, Ottakers or from Amazon.co.uk were it is available for just £9.89.

Again this month I am pleased to be able to pass on to you a very special offer from Mike Enos. Mike has sold over $700,000 of product on eBay over the last few years and has become very well know as an eBay seller and teacher. He has now produced an AMAZING Training CD Teaches You eBay Profit Making SECRETS In Just (1) Hour!

You can listen To 8 Different Methods For Making eBay Profits. Have you ever wanted to sell on eBay but didn't know WHAT to sell? Don't worry, it's a very common problem. After you listen to this CD and learn the 8+ selling ways discussed, your problem will be deciding WHICH profit making method to TRY FIRST!

But because Mike wants to spread his teaching beyond the USA he is making a very special offer to you today.

To learn more visit: http://tinyurl.com/zt3mh

How to Find Bargain Online Auction Items

eBay sellers threaten UK strike

UK Librarian, Caught on eBay, Admits Major Book Thefts

Cash Flow Multiplier- Home Study Course

By By Chris Malta & Robin Cowie

You may have already discovered that selling on eBay can be fun and profitable. But after you’ve cleared out your garage and attic, and auctioned off everything your husband owns, where can you go to get new product ideas?

Tapping into EBay’s Resources

Most people don’t realize that eBay itself is actually a terrific place to find product sourcing ideas. Besides being an easy selling venue with built-in traffic, it also contains a goldmine of useful data about what that traffic wants to buy. One of eBay’s best-kept secrets is their Seller Central page (http://www.EBay.com/SellerCentral). Very few people, even PowerSellers, are aware of this valuable resource. Consequently, very few people are taking advantage of the tools available there:

• The merchandising calendar—this is a great spot to get sourcing leads because it shows you specifically what products eBay will be promoting over the next few months. It gives you dates and tells you which item categories you need to list your product in for it to be displayed on eBay’s homepage. When a user clicks on that item, your auction will pop right up.

• The hot items section—this is basically a monthly trend-watching report. It tells you what items are moving, producing more bids, and getting higher final prices. It lets you get a feel for where the demand is.

Whether you’re searching for products at a tradeshow or a rummage sale, Janelle Elms (http://JanelleElms.com), of eBay University, recommends, “Print this report and keep it with [you] at all times,” She explains, “People don’t know what to look for… This will really help direct and keep your mind focused to what’s moving on eBay.”

• The hot categories section—this resource takes the top categories and gives you tips on how to sell in those categories, insider secrets about your buyers, and trending info. For each category, there’s a section called ‘In Demand’ that tells you not only the top-selling items in that category, but also the top keywords that buyers are using to find these items. Use those keywords in your listing titles. If you have any left over, put them in your description. Basically, eBay tells you what to sell and then tells you how best to list it.

Catering to Your Customers

Advises Elms, “Don’t ever try to sell to the buyer what you think they need to own.” Users are already telling you what they want to buy—you just have to listen. These tools show you what consumers are saying they want and how they’re saying they want to find it. EBay users are ready to spend money with you—all you need to do is give them what they’re looking for.

About the Author: Chris Malta and Robin Cowie of WorldwideBrands.com are the Writers and Hosts of The Entrepreneur Magazine EBiz and Product Sourcing Radio Shows. Click Here for more FREE eBiz info from Entrepreneur Magazine Radio!

Next month I am going to have a chance to meet one of my ebay heros Sydney Johnston. Despite the christian name Sydney is a charming lady who is responsible for getting me involved in ebay.Some years ago she and Ken Evoy of Site Sell fame produced a fantastic book called "Make Your Auction Sell". This was the very first book I read about eBay and it so inspired me that I began my own eBay business and as a result launched UK Auctionline.

Sydney is one of the guest speakers at Yanik Silvers "Underground Seminar" which is being held in London between the 8th-10th September. It is sometime since I have been tempted to leave the wilds of Lincolnshire and travel to the BIG City for a seminar but when I saw the quality of the speakers, (mainly from the UK by the way) and the subjects covered I felt I had to go.

Now I am not an affiliate or anything for this event so I am not rtrying to sell you anything but if you are thinking of going to any seminar in the near future then this is one that is worth looking at. And if you are attending do come up and say hello. (Just look for a doddery white haired guy who looks as thought he should be on "Grumpy Old Men" For details of the seminar visit http://www.undergroundonlineseminaruk.com/early/

Finally on a personal note I would like to thank all those subscribers who sent messages of comfort and condolences on my recent sad loss. I assure you they were very much appreciated. Thank you.

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If you have not visited the website for a while there are plenty of new articles posted and I am sure you will find something to attract your attention. www.ukauctionline.co.uk

Have a good month

Dave