Anyone tried Build A Niche Store (BANS) for eBay instead of Parking ?

[Seabass]

http://www.buildanichestore.com/

I like the concept b/c it is not dependent on Google or Yahoo for success, otherwise I would probably heap it in with all the other MFA programs out there now. This is based mainly on ebay

Has anyone tried this yet? It builds a store for eBay, plus you can add content and adsense, etc... It seems it would be a good solution on carefully chosen domains. On some domains, I can't see it working at all since they don't fit in tightly with any eBay auctions, but others are a perfect match. Many sites look good and surprisingly seem to give some real value to the surfer unlike the millions of crappy automated MFA sites.

Here are some examples I found:

http://www.turboguides.com/
http://www.usgoldcoinauctions.com/
http://www.homegrownsushi.com/

And, after doing a little research it appears many folks are making money doing this. How much? It is hard to say since the info. out there seems limited since not everyone wants to disclose their income, but a few have showed their earnings on various sites and blogs. I could see this working, but all of the working sites I have seen are based on really lame domains.

I just wonder if anyone has tried it on a great generic domain yet, or an expired domain with big traffic, and what were the results - especially compared to parking?
.

 

[Mrans]

One of informations that requested in step 2 of Ebay registraion is "Primary business model". Now my qestion is, I should choose which item?

Ad network/sub-affiliates
Paid search
Natural Search/Website
Paid Placement
Other

I dont know that I must choosing which of them

 

[Zepia]

Natural Search/Website

 

[yandig]

I just got an email that says that EBAY's Partner Network will be changing the payout structure on those EBAY signups that come through your site. Previously, it was $25 per signup, but now, it looks like it will range from $1 to $50 depending on the perceived "quality" of the customer.
Those publishers who signed up before August 1st will stay on the old revenue structure until November.

Here's the full message:
http://www.ebaypartnernetworkblog.com/en/news/new-value-based-pricing-for-ebay-us-program/

 

[Seabass]

I just got an email that says that EBAY's Partner Network will be changing the payout structure on those EBAY signups that come through your site. Previously, it was $25 per signup, but now, it looks like it will range from $1 to $50 depending on the perceived "quality" of the customer.
Those publishers who signed up before August 1st will stay on the old revenue structure until November.

Here's the full message:
http://www.ebaypartnernetworkblog.com/en/news/new-value-based-pricing-for-ebay-us-program/

I can't see that as being anything but negative based on everything that Google and Yahoo have done in the last year or so - this just follows the same pattern.

..... sucks to hear this.

 

[mhdoc]

If the many posts on their EPN forum are at all correct, you will soon be booted from their system anyhow, so it won't make any difference

 

[metronome]

If the many posts on their EPN forum are at all correct, you will soon be booted from their system anyhow, so it won't make any difference

heh?? what??
we are going to be booted by EPN?
why?? oh no oh no>.<

 

[whitebark]

ebay riot in the making..

 

[KingDon]

"it will range from $1 to $50 depending on the perceived "quality" of the customer."

I can tell you right now, your new sign ups will all be in the $1-$2 category. This is what makes it hard to commit, and anyone who has already invested time and energy into this project, is feeling the knot growing in their stomach. I built a site, well actually Bru did 90% of the work, and it was fun to fiddle with.

www.CheapUsedTools.com

It gets some clicks, but not a real money maker for me. I'm glad I haven't been burning the midnight oil on this project, I would be livid.

 

[Seabass]

If the many posts on their EPN forum are at all correct, you will soon be booted from their system anyhow, so it won't make any difference

Your not kidding around. This is big news - many folks making thousands a month have been told their traffic is not "engaging" enough - even though they sold tons of product. Read this if you want to see the total devastation going on with eBay partners. Lives have been destroyed by this action.

Here comes another big-time ebay revolt. This is going to make the media and be nasty for eBay.

http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=520001583&tstart=0&mod=1219431795142

.

 

[domainsusi]

Wow - that does it for me.

I am going to cancel my account at eBay as well as EPN.

Guess I will be forfeiting my $3 and pennies from EPN that took me two months to accumulate.

Hopefully this will eliminate bogus eBay mails asking me pay for products I did not purchase or telling me that my account has just been charged $49.95 for something I did not order.

I have not been using BANS, but do have some sites using eBay RSS feeds with my EPN code. Needless to say - I will eliminate this stuff ASAP.

.

 

[Seabass]

I feel sorry for the BANS developers too as they busted their ass on a whole new redesign and now eBay wants to f**k with those that send them traffic. Not good news for new BANS signups. I hope they don't get marginalized as well. It's a great product.

I think we will all look back to this day and realize eBay just blew their brains out with a shotgun. I really think it is that big of a mistake they are making.

They closed accounts of some publishers that have been sending traffic for 5+ years, without warning, and without any time/guidelines to change their sites to placate eBay, and only seven days to move ALL their sites somewhere else. Remember these folks busted their ass to make sites to promote eBay. How do you think the remaining publishers will act? They will leave in droves or not lift a finger to do any more promotion.

The affiliate world will study this move for years to come as a "classroom example" of what not to do.

 

[mhdoc]

I wonder if this is big enough to successfully jump start an alternate auction platform?

I have looked at etsy.com, ecrater.com, and Craigs list as alternate venues, but none of them are auctions. How long would it take Amazon to reload their auction system from backup

 

[KingDon]

A few grand, a brandable domain name, and a good development manager could make that happen. E-Bay is not a rock, it is 1's and 0's that creates its gravity by viewers like you and me.

If I wasn't busy...,

I wrote that so Napoleon Hill would turn over.

Can you hear him kicking his coffin?

 

[trsills]

First off, as someone who's incredibly new to this scene and is trying to take it all in as quickly as he can...thanks to everyone for a very informative thread. Let alone an entertaining one with Seabass' buying habit reports.

But after making it to the last page it kind of reads like the last few jobs I've had where everyone would say 'oh man, you should've been here last year when we had free food, ping pong table...' or whatever other perk you could imagine.

Anyhow, I'm not so concerned about the use of BANs cause I'd suspect you should be able to rip out any references to them or any other embedded material so as to not set off any alarms. But after going through the ebay material and how people got cut off at the knees, it's not clear if any average Joe would be allowed to continue to participate in their program...am I reading this right?

TIA

 

[Seabass]

First off, as someone who's incredibly new to this scene and is trying to take it all in as quickly as he can...thanks to everyone for a very informative thread. Let alone an entertaining one with Seabass' buying habit reports.

But after making it to the last page it kind of reads like the last few jobs I've had where everyone would say 'oh man, you should've been here last year when we had free food, ping pong table...' or whatever other perk you could imagine.

Anyhow, I'm not so concerned about the use of BANs cause I'd suspect you should be able to rip out any references to them or any other embedded material so as to not set off any alarms. But after going through the ebay material and how people got cut off at the knees, it's not clear if any average Joe would be allowed to continue to participate in their program...am I reading this right?

TIA

It looks like the average Joe can continue, but with no guarantees.

I simply don't see any good reason for what they did (unless they purposefully want their affiliate program to die). If they were looking to get rid of some affiliates with "non-engaging traffic" as eBay put it, then I believe they may have done just that, but also demoralized the remaining affliates and future affiliates and thus just killed their affiliate program. I don't see much effort being put forward now by affiliates to "engage their traffic" or produce "engaging traffic" if they they have the chance of having their account closed. After all it is a lot of work to make sites. A developer would be better off developing regular sites that could adjust quickly to changes then one based around the eBay system.

I imagine most big eBay players will begin to immediately to diversify into other types of developed sites and let the current eBay sites ride until they die, make less money, or an account is closed.

Shutting down the affiliates they way they did is bad PR if only within the developer community. They just stifled their growth - and they may not even know it.

This eBay thing has got me thinking about Google and Yahoo too. Could G and Y shut down domainers with less than engaging traffic? It could be coming. Or, maybe it is already here with Smart Pricing.

 

[guarddragon]

Seabass, you give us a lot to think and worry about.

When I saw that my eBay sites were producing less revenue, I figured it was the general economy. Maybe, maybe not. So I tried Amazon Stores. But I am not having very much success. I am experimenting with the placement of Amazon ads.

Have any of you had success with Amazon?

 

[Seabass]

Seabass, you give us a lot to think and worry about.

When I saw that my eBay sites were producing less revenue, I figured it was the general economy. Maybe, maybe not. So I tried Amazon Stores. But I am not having very much success. I am experimenting with the placement of Amazon ads.

Have any of you had success with Amazon?

I have not even tried them, and honestly was just getting started with eBay. I'm definitely disappointed in how eBay acted.

I've read that many affliates marketers make a big chunk of their income from Amazon and some don't even use eBay, so..... there is an opportunity there. They Amazon cookie is set for only a lousy day as opposed to eBays seven days, but apparently Amazon buyers are more "instant buyers" than tire kickers like eBay has quite often, so...... once again maybe it is worth a try. I think it still takes skill in page development and layout as I have read many folks that have not had luck with Amazon. Everything in life takes skill to make money at.... even domaining....if you really want to make good money.

I have seriously considered Amazon in the past but the one day cookie scared me off..... but having now read more it looks more appealing. I imagine it is just trial and error until you hit on something, and then repeat, repeat, repeat and you then end up with a set of sites that each bring in a modest amount each, but enough altogether to be respectable.

I may give it a shot here soon. Good luck with your efforts.

 

[guarddragon]

Seabass,

I'll let you know what works best for me with Amazon. So far it seems to be a link to a page clearly identified as a store or shop. The shop at this site has done best of the nine I have set up: PolitiZilla.

 

[diddie]

since 2 weeks, i had hundreds of views and only 1 click on my EPN feeds ...

 

[srigopaldaliya]

Thank god i read through this before buying it... Ha Ha

 

[Seabass]

Thank god i read through this before buying it... Ha Ha

I'm hoping eBay does a reversal and apologizes for being shortsighted ...... but I'm not holding my breath.

 

[srigopaldaliya]

Lets hope, if it happens then may be i will think of buying the license

 

[enlytend]

No arguing that the way they did it was really bad, but they didn't terminate everyone. They claim it was "only" about 300 accounts (out of about 90,000) that were terminated (2nd post) -

http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=520002478&start=16

I don't know how many of those were BANS sites - I would be worried if I had a "thin" BANS site, especially one that didn't make it clear that the links went to eBay:

http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=520001583&start=148

Knock on wood my account's still active, but I use the editor kit, not BANS.

 

[metronome]

actually, I dont really know what this ebay guys really want.
so they want that all of the visitors that come to our ebay affiliate site know that what they are going to click, buy, etc are connected to ebay?

 

[yandig]

It sounds like (perhaps) the main reason for banning accounts was cyclical traffic. Some people were linking to an outside site and then bringing that traffic back to ebay via "cookie stuffing". EBAY obviously wants the traffic to its affiliates to be extraneous rather than cyclical.
They say they have been reinstating accounts on a case-by-case basis.