Power Sellers Unite

jjjcollectibles · Joined: 22 Apr 2008 Posts: 389

I wasn't sure where to put this topic, hope I picked a good place.

I'm astonished that no one seems to have realized something that will affect MANY of us, whether or not we're still using eFee. Many of us started on eFee, imported our listings to another site..... and then left eFee. Fine.

But..... if those listings were originally created with Auctiva.... the photos are still being hosted on Auctiva's servers. This has never been a problem until now.

Starting July 1, Auctiva will be charging to host photos. They will allow 1 meg of free photo hosting. That is not one meg per photo. That is ONE MEG of photo hosting, period. That is about 10 100k photos.

If you don't pay, the photos go away.

This means that ALL listings imported everywhere.... Bonanzle.... Atomic Mall... eCrater.... eBid..... Auctions8.... wherever we imported them.... will suddenly be photo-less.

I've been reading the Auctiva community forum. People are leaving at a rate that makes the eFee defection look like nothing.

We currently have over 4,000 listings active, and another 1400 inactive. They will all have to be edited. Then I will have to edit all of the listings at our other venues. Maybe I could just re-import them..... might save time and effort.

Does anyone know of a tool that can "find and replace" image URLs in listings? A reliable photo host? (Photobucket comes to mind, but don't they have a bandwidth limit? Or is that a thing of the past nowadays? Haven't used them since I discovered the limit, several years ago.)

I'm trying hard not to panic here. We can't afford the man-hours required to do this, let alone within the timeframe we have.

*****************

ADDED: Inkfrog has just announced that they will be creating a tool that will be able to import the images, including the URLS, and **change** the URLS. Here is a quote from their page:

http://www.inkfrog.com/welcome_auctiva.php

"We are also working on making it easier for you to make the transfer to us. We are creating an Auctiva importer which will import your live, unsold, and sold listings images into our system - and update the URL's on your listings. We hope to have this ready very shortly and should help make the transition easier for you to our system."

I may do this, then will have to delete items from my other selling venues and re-import everything once they have the Inkfrog URLS in them. Am a bit concerned about the Google rankings from my feeds, though - will I lose them if I start over with all-new listings?

hotnana · Joined: 02 Feb 2008 Posts: 875

I use SellerSourceBook for my hosting so I understand your concern. But I will never rely on them for keeping my photos safe! I store all my pics on a flashdrive...well a couple of them. Your pics at eCrater should be fine because they are hosting those, the other sites will host the thumbnail but the pics within the body of the templates will need to be saved.

That seems like a rather drastic move by Auctiva...I wonder if they are struggling?

jjjcollectibles · Joined: 22 Apr 2008 Posts: 389

Yes.... comments from the Auctiva CEO include little revealing hints such as:

"the corporate monster must be fed"
and (paraphrase)
"eBay kicked third-party listers Auctiva and Inkfrog out of their affiliate program"

Inkfrog was charging a monthly fee all along, so they still had funds and needed to make no changes. But Auctiva, always free, has gone to an incredibly complex and unreasonable fee structure, especially where photos are concerned. They even want final value fees!

Looks like the imported Bonanzle listings' photos were saved on AmazonS3, so they'll stay up at least.

I don't think that pics within the body of the template ever made it over to any of my other venues. Even when I had multiple photos in a listing, I only ever saw the first one when imported. So I'm not worried about photos that never copied over anyway. :-D

We don't need to keep our pix after something sells, as our items are one of a kind for the most part. We do have most pix backed up on CDs though, just in case our listings get canceled or something.

It's not the photos themselves so much, it's the editing all of those URLs that I can't face. There simply is not enough time to do it in.

Inkfrog is looking good right about now.

hotnana · Joined: 02 Feb 2008 Posts: 875

I really don't know very much about Inkfrog other than they own BISI. Maybe they could help you out?
I hope you get it take care of quickly...I know I would freak out if I lost all my listings! Even with the saved pics...redoing the ads is very time consuming. Good Luck

jjjcollectibles · Joined: 22 Apr 2008 Posts: 389

Thanks hotnana, much appreciated. I haven't lost my listings, it's that Auctiva is going to make it impossible to use their service after July 1, and regardless, I will have to get all of my 5,000 photos moved to another host and all of the listings edited to have the new URL in them.

Looks like Inkfrog will make this task relatively painless, so that alone makes them a serious contender. They seem to have all of the other features we need as well.

kmlocker · Joined: 19 May 2008 Posts: 71

I know of a few people that already started migrating to inkfrog today after the announcement from auctiva. It looks like they are trying to do everything they can to accommodate the displaced users.

hotandvintage · Joined: 09 Feb 2008 Posts: 1705

Well it is back to photobucket for us, I think the yearly fee is only about twenty five dollars, which is nothing for being able to host images.

For those bigger sellers though with all those linked images inkfrog does sound like the option.

I think Vendio are also offering something you may want to take a look at. Some form of free store or something. It was listed on a thread in the ebay forum, if you want more info.

DaLizardsLair · Joined: 15 Feb 2009 Posts: 4780

Quote: › docWrite("quote")That seems like a rather drastic move by Auctiva...I wonder if they are struggling?

Shortly after announcing that sellers could set up stores on their site, for a fee, eBay kicked them out of their affiliate program.

Did they actually think eBay would pay them to become a competitor? The person in charge there must be dumber than JD.

Bonuskid40 · Joined: 03 Feb 2008 Posts: 165

It's such a shame Auctiva is going to be charging those fees now. We have used their service for a long while now, and just really love it, but with eBay fees, Paypal fees, and lowering returns on eBay listings, we can't afford any more fees. We'll be canceling our account probably around mid June. It's back to the eBay SYI and Photobucket for us when we list on eBay. Most of our stuff is on Bonanzle now.

mysteryrider56 · Joined: 22 Jul 2008 Posts: 129

SellersSourceBook will also be accomodating former Auctiva users with a 10% dicount on membership which is currently $8 a month. You can also join for 3, 6 or 12 months at lower rates if I'm not mistaken. They are also working on an importer like InkFrog is and they schedule your listings for free. They also have some beautiful templates. If you go to their site you will find currently posted info for Auctiva users.

Right now I'm leaning toward either SellersSourcebook or InkFrog. Either way this transfer will be taking up precious time. I wish every one of us the best of luck dealing with this blind-side by Auctiva.

pjrcoffee · Joined: 23 Apr 2006 Posts: 634

JJJ I hear you.

If you have your listings on a spreadsheet which a venue will accept you can search and replace the URL to point the photos to a new host. Of course the photos will have to move to the new host first.

hotandvintage · Joined: 09 Feb 2008 Posts: 1705

DaLizardsLair wrote (View Post): › docWrite("quote")
Quote: › docWrite("quote")That seems like a rather drastic move by Auctiva...I wonder if they are struggling?

Shortly after announcing that sellers could set up stores on their site, for a fee, eBay kicked them out of their affiliate program.

Did they actually think eBay would pay them to become a competitor? The person in charge there must be dumber than JD.

I am still wondering which came first, as they have seemed to rush out, what runs like a BETA for their store thing. It is as if they had to jump to the changes of the store format before they were ready.

Even the way it came out seemed rushed.

hotnana · Joined: 02 Feb 2008 Posts: 875

mysteryrider56 wrote (View Post): › docWrite("quote")SellersSourceBook will also be accomodating former Auctiva users with a 10% dicount on membership which is currently $8 a month. You can also join for 3, 6 or 12 months at lower rates if I'm not mistaken. They are also working on an importer like InkFrog is and they schedule your listings for free. They also have some beautiful templates. If you go to their site you will find currently posted info for Auctiva users.

Right now I'm leaning toward either SellersSourcebook or InkFrog. Either way this transfer will be taking up precious time. I wish every one of us the best of luck dealing with this blind-side by Auctiva.

As I mentioned earlier, I use SSB and have been using their service for 2 years now. You can use the templates pretty much any where that allows html, they will work on Bonz also but you lose the borders...but still look nice.

hotandvintage · Joined: 09 Feb 2008 Posts: 1705

Anyone tried Listing factory?

http://www.auctionlistingcreator.com/

LibertyBelle · Joined: 22 Jul 2008 Posts: 10

Hi, I just signed up on Sellersourcebook and am trying to list, but find no place for item pricing. Anyone here know where to put your price? Thx