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?
.

 

[onlinedomains00]

Just a quick question, these ebay buyers that you refer, is there a cookie or are they your commission customer for life, once they go through your BANS or whatever site to make a purchase on ebay... so if ebay makes $1000 commission, and they offer me a 75% revenue share, ebay will pay me $750 because someone came ot my bans site, and made a winning bid for a car or something?

 

[bondjpf]

Just a quick question, these ebay buyers that you refer, is there a cookie or are they your commission customer for life, once they go through your BANS or whatever site to make a purchase on ebay... so if ebay makes $1000 commission, and they offer me a 75% revenue share, ebay will pay me $750 because someone came ot my bans site, and made a winning bid for a car or something?

Cookie last 7 days for auctions and 30 days for ACRUS(sign ups)

We get at least 50% of ebay commission.
That $1000 item would mean about $80 to ebay, so we get at least $40(50%).
As you get more sales the commission will increase to 60, 65%, etc.
For cars theres a maximum amount that they pay you , I think it's $45-$50, don't recall.

Just sold two more items on same site:

$115 collectors knife and a surf rod.

This is definitely turning out to be 100% increase over when the domain was parked. I had a slow period there but in the last days it has been hot.

BTW, how are you guys measuring traffic - third party, in-house server? I have not tackled that yet. I want to see if I am getting SE traffic.

Thanks.

Great!!
I normaly use google analytics and my stats at hostgator.
Remember to check those long tail keywords that user use to arrive to your site. Use them to optimize your site.

Here's the ebay US payment structure:

Total winning bid revenue generated % of Revenue
$0.00 - $99.99 50.00%
$100.00 - $4,999.99 55.00%
$5,000.00 - $199,999.99 60.00%
$200,000.00 - $699,999.99 65.00%
$700,000.00 - $2,999,999.99 70.00%
$3,000,000.00+ 75.00%


Total ACRUs recruited Compensation per ACRU
0 - 49 $25.00
50 - 1,999 $28.00
2,000 - 29,999 $31.00
30,000+ $35.00

 

[onlinedomains00]

Do you still need to setup a CJ.com account, as I heard ebay moved the program in house, so you would setup through ebay, your aff account, also can you add amazon widgets on bans pages?.............

 

[Traveler]

Do you still need to setup a CJ.com account, as I heard ebay moved the program in house, so you would setup through ebay, your aff account, also can you add amazon widgets on bans pages?.............

You need to sign up with EPN at eBay to use BANS now. You can add amazon widgets to your BANS site, but don't forget the Amazon cookie only last 24 hours where the eBay cookie last 7 days.

 

[bondjpf]

You need to sign up with EPN at eBay to use BANS now. You can add amazon widgets to your BANS site, but don't forget the Amazon cookie only last 24 hours where the eBay cookie last 7 days.

You can also use Pepperjam network now.

 

[Slick Domains]

Good to hear so many people are finding success with BANS

I've finished developing a bunch of my product domains into BANS sites (37 total). I've since been working on researching and buying new domains to build sites on.

I use Hostgator and run about 80 websites right now using their $10.00 package (with addon domains). Been with them for years and never had a single problem.

The best part is I have two BANS sites that get very little traffic (1-2 hits a day), but both have a eBay registration this month which was $25.00 each time. And I may get more before the year is up. So, because of BANS, they've already paid for their renewal the next 2 years plus the original registration costs. :bingo:

 

[mhdoc]

It makes an interesting contrast to read here about parking domainers excited with how much more they are making from EPN/BANS and then go over to the EPN discussion board and read about all the people looking for other affiliate programs because EPN has dropped their income tremendously.

 

[onlinedomains00]

EPN discussion board now commenting on the trend of dropping income, this is just a cat and mouse game, that is seriously depressing news to hear..... wish domainers would get a fair shake.

 

[Datalife]

A bit of logic applied....

I think if eBay had suddenly 1000,000 sites running their affiliate program.....as it seems now, can any good come out of this? All of them were formerly parked domains.

I'm not surprised by the dropping income, and with this being in-house, how can anyone argue it now?

I don't have a good feeling about this, cos it seems like flooding the net with BANS sites (in addition to good ole MFA sites)....but if it makes you some money now, well enjoy it...that's all I can say....

Been reading and following this whole BANS thing.... there's indications that Google is deindexing BANS sites .....and a few other side effects are appearing already.

 

[onlinedomains00]

Well the only way to get around this, is maybe limit the amount of listing you show on your BANS site, and add other content, that way it would be much more informative than a parked page, yet adding value to the site, not every single domain can have $xx,xxx development added to it, there has to be some fine line here... or is it just one sucker selling a domain with a promise to another of unlimited profits, hence an endless cycle..... what is a domainer to do?

 

[Seabass]

A bit of logic applied....

I think if eBay had suddenly 1000,000 sites running their affiliate program.....as it seems now, can any good come out of this? All of them were formerly parked domains.

I'm not surprised by the dropping income, and with this being in-house, how can anyone argue it now?

I don't have a good feeling about this, cos it seems like flooding the net with BANS sites (in addition to good ole MFA sites)....but if it makes you some money now, well enjoy it...that's all I can say....

Been reading and following this whole BANS thing.... there's indications that Google is deindexing BANS sites .....and a few other side effects are appearing already.

I personally think that the BANS sites or other eBay sites are much nicer and relevant to the surfer than MFA sites. Don't you think so? Especially if they are really on target. I'd rather see products related to my product search then a half page of garble-de-gook writing that nobody can understand. 1,000,000 product domains going to the exact corresponding product sounds pretty cool to me. It would seem that the customer would find what they want in a hurry, which is a good thing.

I would love to have G and Y traffic, but I don't count on it and I never have. That is why I don't pay much attention to it. I purchased my domains for type-in traffic and not expired traffic - so I control the traffic and I don't really have to have any G or Y traffic.

I have limited experience but initial tests are showing me that much more can be earned when you combine the eBay auction sales commission, Google Adsense commission, and eBay's new customer signups at $25 a pop (called ACRU's).

Also, can someone explain how or why the income is dropping at eBay? Are they paying less now per lower commission, shorter cookie duration, or something else? Or is it just the economy causing less purchases?
.

 

[onlinedomains00]

good points made Seabass. I agree with the books/ ebooks landing pages with grade 1 intro text... not helping anyone, and we all know where parking pages stand.. 2 - 10 cents per click....:-s

 

[Slick Domains]

It makes an interesting contrast to read here about parking domainers excited with how much more they are making from EPN/BANS and then go over to the EPN discussion board and read about all the people looking for other affiliate programs because EPN has dropped their income tremendously.

That is because they are different situations. Those people are comparing it to income made with Commission Junction (when they housed eBays affiliate network).

As domainers, we are comparing it to the income generated via parking domains.

If someone using CJ used to make $100.00 a day and now only make $70.00 a day, they have a right to complain. But, if my parked domain used to make $0.30 a day and now it makes $4.00 a day with BANS, what do I have to complain about?

 

[Seabass]

Oh.... that's right, I remember now someone complaining that eBay's in-house system was patchwork of software and it was remarkable it was even working, whereas CJ had better software. I don't know if that has merit, but that is what I had read.

I'm guessing eBay will be working this out if that is the case since it would be in their interest to keep all their affiliates from jumping over to another platform or other monetization methods. I'm sure they are aware of the grumbling as eBay underperformed in 2007 and they don't need an exodus of publishers.
.

 

[cantstop]

i am testing out

I've been using the free Phpbay lite for wordpress with some decent results. I have made some money already and I am getting clicks everyday. I also use Godaddy (shared hosting) with no problems. Godaddy (maybe hostgator does too?) will automaticly setup and configure a wordpress blog. Makes it very easy and quick. This week I'll be setting up a few more sites.

testing the free plug but I cant find the pub id for my new ebay affiliate acct.i have some developer kit codes at cj I know what that looks like but you would think it would be there right in the ebay dashboard...I am use to the cj ones..can someone tell me what it looks like.and what are you supposed to do when you get it... insert it in php code in the "edit plug ins"section "of wordpress?

 

[MaguirePhD]

BANS Store

In response to the original post, we don't even know what a BANS store is.
But we put up an electronic mall, so to speak with links through Commission Junction as a businss for my wife to keep her in spending money (which by the way is impossible).

6 weeks later, she has not hit me up for any money... hmnnn

www.SODhq.com

Doc

 

[bondjpf]

For me the switch from CJ to EPN as been good.
Now i'm earning 3 times much what i was earning with cj.
So i'm not complaining

 

[Seabass]

I never liked CJ.

The scenario has always been (unless you are a great affiliate marketer)..... you send them 25,000 uniques of primo traffic and they pay you something like $50.00. I never believed them..... and every other monetization method I have ever tried pays usually 10 fold over CJ

Edit: Hilarious, sold on that same fishing domain a copy :

CSI: Crime Scene Investigation - The Complete Sixth Season , for $15.25 and a commission of .72 cents .

Interesting how surfers "drift" away from the subject they entered in upon.

 

[r72gs]

testing the free plug but I cant find the pub id for my new ebay affiliate acct.i have some developer kit codes at cj I know what that looks like but you would think it would be there right in the ebay dashboard...I am use to the cj ones..can someone tell me what it looks like.and what are you supposed to do when you get it... insert it in php code in the "edit plug ins"section "of wordpress?

You make a "campain id" or use the default one. Then enter it at the bottom of the screen same place as with CJ. Chose EPN where it asks for affilate and insert the campain id code. You can track your different site's performance.

Made almost $2 so far today off my test site just using the free plugin. I'm still working on building traffic and adding content. I do agree that G will slam sites like they did with the MFA sites. You need decent content and it takes time.

 

[Nattydomain]

Maybe I missed it BUT is there anyone here who devlopes the BANS sits if I already have the software?

Meaning who can build one for me and I supply all the info?

Please PM me price and portfolio......thanx and sorry if I missed it if it was posted

 

[mhdoc]

For those like me who prefer to avoid the BANS "footprint", or those who don't want to spend anything, the EPN Editor Toolkit is really very easy to use. You tell it what colors to use, what to search for, etc., and it creates a script for you to copy onto your site.

I like to use a unique search for each page so visitors see different auctions.

 

[cdboard]

for those who've used both BANS and the EPN toolkit, which presents results faster? which has fresher results?

the EPN Editor Toolkit is really very easy to use. You tell it what colors to use, what to search for, etc., and it creates a script for you to copy onto your site.

I like to use a unique search for each page so visitors see different auctions.

care to share a site you've done this way? by PM if you prefer. thanks.

 

[Datalife]

I personally think that the BANS sites or other eBay sites are much nicer and relevant to the surfer than MFA sites. Don't you think so? Especially if they are really on target. I'd rather see products related to my product search then a half page of garble-de-gook writing that nobody can understand. 1,000,000 product domains going to the exact corresponding product sounds pretty cool to me. It would seem that the customer would find what they want in a hurry, which is a good thing.

I would love to have G and Y traffic, but I don't count on it and I never have. That is why I don't pay much attention to it. I purchased my domains for type-in traffic and not expired traffic - so I control the traffic and I don't really have to have any G or Y traffic.

I have limited experience but initial tests are showing me that much more can be earned when you combine the eBay auction sales commission, Google Adsense commission, and eBay's new customer signups at $25 a pop (called ACRU's).

Also, can someone explain how or why the income is dropping at eBay? Are they paying less now per lower commission, shorter cookie duration, or something else? Or is it just the economy causing less purchases?

I'd agree a BANS page looks nicer than an MFA. The drop in income could be because eBay just never expected millions of BANS sites popping up overnight, and now they have to pay them all...? There could be some "dirty" ...intrigue.... going on at eBay, you never know. Would be interesting to see how it turns out.

Maybe eBay's version of "Smart Pricing?"

BTW, here's an honest question, would eBay allow typo domains to sport BANS, or... have you used typos + BANS with success?

 

[Brands]

Yes. It is better than parking. Focus on a niche.

 

[metronome]

seems like if you have a domain name with some type ins per month but not making good enough money from parking, this BANS will be a good alternative.

I think I will start trying it too!:D