Forum Home > Selling Goods Online > selling ebooks on ebay

[greens23]

i was looking into selling ebooks on ebay. after reading some posts here i got some good information. i go to list one on ebay tonight and get this:

Attention Seller!

Starting March 31st, listings that contain content that can be digitally downloaded or transferred must be listed in the Classified Ad Format in the Everything Else>Information Products category only. All listings for digital items outside of that category will be considered a policy violation."

does this pretty much make ebooks a waste of time now? thanks for any input...

[kickaball]

wow ebay is POS now

i guess they mean that you can sell an ebook directly off ebay, you have to have a link for another site where they can purchase it in the classified. ebay is just s***ing on its sellers

[jimmy_salehoo]

Yeah their trying to reduce the spam issues with some sellers listing several hundred of the same thing.

[SEstrella]

I just tried doing this..not into ebooks really but more of a way to drive traffic to a another site of mine and its totally confusing. I put it in information products for digital delivery and it told me it was a violation. i took off digital delivery and decided id just email the link since its just one ad. That went thru then i tried to revice it and it still gave me problems. I tried to do the contact ebay form to clarify but that didnt work told me to specify an email address when there is no email address form...every time i try to go back to ebay to sell again i feel frustrated and wantt o give up. maybe should just stick to my own websites! no stress there.

[fm1234]

The problem is that it doesn't just effect ebooks, but all digital delivery items - this includes music, video, websites, domains, graphic designs, etc. In its current form it's an idiotic move by eBay.


Frank

[compacter]

what the hell is an ebook anyways?

[grahamg]

ebays brains are in there their arse.

[gulfy13]

Well you don't have to give up on ebooks completely....If you don't want to sell through your website and use the "classified" listings on ebay,,then just burn your ebook on to a cd or dvd and sell it as a physical item...You should be able to burn a dvd for about 25 to 50 cents and you don't have to burn it until it sells so you don't have to worry about wasting disks...Also there are sites on the web that will burn disks in large quantities if you are selling large quantities and need a high quality job....

[wholesalelist101]

eBay has really screwed over a lot of people with this recent decision of theirs. There are many of us including me that have built a business around selling digital items on eBay. We now face the dilemma to either close our website or do a complete face lift to remove all the outdated information after the 31st. There have already been other websites similar to mine that have already announced they are shutting down April 1st. Thanks again eBay!

I can not wait until the day that you too eBay will have to shut down. That thought brings a big smile to my face!

[greens23]

yeah, from reading posts on salehoo i knew there were some people that had a good business with ebooks and digital items....i dont know, i may try the classified listing thing but to me this is just another in a series of bad decisions by ebay.

[Salesabration]

I was really getting into listing ebooks, setting up sales pages and download pages for instant delivery. I was having a real good time learning this new fun skill with big plans. Then some corporate executive guy at ebay decides to do something. Why in the world do they need a director of feedback anyway? He must have got real bored with his job and wanted to do something. This is strange, especially after the effort ebay made in the past to help people setup digital auctions?

This seems wrong, but try to see it from their angle. Feedback can be manipulated to someone's advantage, because all he or she has to do is bid on one cent auctions all day long and end up with a large amount of positive feedback real fast. They thought about making a minimum bid but...
But I think this is going to backfire for them because it isn't enhancing ebay's integrity, it is destroying it. What about the thousands of buyers? I love buying digital stuff. I also like it fast and inexpensive. I'll be the judge of the quality.

They say you can burn the info to a CD or DVD. That doesn't make sense, because if you have been selling on ebay for a while, you know that customers are only willing to pay so much for an item. They may be willing to pay $1.97 for a downloadable ebook, but are they willing to cough up another $5.00 for the cd? I doubt it, but this needs to be tested and not taken for granted.

By the way, to clarify, if you have digital listings on March 31, you are in violation of ebay policy. March 31 is the start day for the new policy.

P.S. To see what ebooks are all about, check out my website:

** Link Removed: Only Available to Registered Members**

[grahamg]

Unfortunatley, ebay don't give a monkey's F**k about people's rights.

I have found if you advertise on the classified ads, I save money because there is a "hidden" way not to pay any Final Value Fees, so ebay, has shot themsleves in the foot, they WILL lose revenue.

What I mean, is that I used to sell on ebay and my auction fees every month were between £1000 - £2,570, compared to my classified listings that cost me $9.99 for 30 days, I only had 5 products to sell, but I sold alot of them, so even with all the extra promotions, a single listing cost me $9.99 + $29.99 = $39.98 x 10 (relist after 14 days) $399 80 (£199.90) compared to $5,140 (£2,500.) Which would you rather pay?

To be fair, the sales do drop off after 17 days for the classified ads, but at the end of the day, I was saving money.

Yes, you can burn your information products to CD or DVD, but it's the shipping, I'm in the UK and to ship to the US is unrealistic. There are company's that offer the service of burning and shipping for you, however they charge $1.75 per CD.

So to sum up, I think it's a bad decision on ebays part, however it will stop people "killing" the products.

Think outside the box...

[brodineshoppe]

Ebay doesnt care what you think!

[grahamg]

If you are selling in the UK, I can burn your discs for you and ship them on, PM me.

[compacter]

if you have canadian enquires i can offer my services for the price of postage and $1.00 for each cd. PM if you ever need help. Postage by the way in canada is only $.54 CAD so for $1.54 each cd i can save you some money and time.