Selling Management Services
| Even more popular than selling management programs are selling management services, offered by a variety of third-party websites. Although many of these sites offer similar features, there are a lot of important differences, so pay attention. And know that most of these sites cost real money to usein some cases, the kind of serious bucks that only big-volume sellers can afford. ÁndaleÁndale (www.andale.com) is a site that offers various services for eBay sellers. In fact, it's the only site that offers the full range of tools from pre-auction research to post-auction management. Note
Ándale's auction tools are first-rate, and they're extremely easy to use. Here's a short list of what's available:
You have the option of usingand paying foreach of these tools separately; you're not locked into the complete toolkit, unless that's what you want. Although some of these tools can be used free of charge, most carry either a per-month or a per-transaction charge. The individual fees might seem reasonable, but they can add up very quickly. In fact, the thing I like least about Ándale is the cost; depending on which services you subscribe to, you could end up spending more money here than at any other site. Auction HawkAuction Hawk (www.auctionhawk.com) is a web-based service with affordable pricing. The site offers various tools in its main service, including image hosting, bulk listing creation, end-of-auction checkout with automated winning-bidder email, bulk feedback posting, and profit-and-loss reporting. One nice aspect of Auction Hawk's services is that it doesn't charge any per-transaction or final value fees. In addition, all its services are included in a single price, so you're not nickel-and-dimed to death with a la carte pricing. The full-service monthly plans range in price from $12.99 (for 110 listings) to $89.99 (unlimited listings). At these prices, it's worth checking out. AuctivaAuctiva (www.auctiva.com) offers a variety of different services, including bulk listing, image hosting, auction tracking and management, and a showcase photo galleryall available at no charge whatsoever. Auctiva's services are first rate, and you get them for free! ChannelAdvisorChannelAdvisor (www.channeladvisor.com) offers a fairly affordable suite of auction management toolsas well as services for bigger online merchants. The service you want to look at is ChannelAdvisor Pro, which is actually HammerTap Manager in disguise. This service is a surprisingly easy-to-use collection of auction management tools, quite reasonably priced at a flat fee of just $29.95 per month. If you're doing more than 50 auctions a month, it's definitely worth consideringeven more so if you're a heavier lister. eBay Selling ManagerAs you learned in Chapter 22, "Managing Your Sales with eBay Selling Manager," Selling Manager (pages.ebay.com/selling_manager/) lets you manage your pending, in-process, and closed auctions right from within My eBay. It's a fairly complete service, equal to that offered by many third-party providers. It includes predefined email templates and automatic feedback forms, automatically tracks buyer checkout and payment, and lets you print shipping labels, invoices, and reports. At $4.99 per month, it's a pretty good dealdefinitely worth checking out if you have a lot of auctions to manage. eBay Selling Manager ProThe more robust Selling Manager Pro (pages.ebay.com/selling_manager_pro/) adds features of value to power sellers, including bulk listing and relisting, bulk email, inventory management, report generation, and the capability to create and print shipping labels. The subscription fee is $15.99 per month. HammerTapHammerTap (www.hammertap.com) offers various auction management software and services, all priced separately. Their primary web-based tool is HammerTap Manager, which offers auction posting and management. (In fact, HammerTap Manager is the same service as ChannelAdvisor Pro, just under a different name.) The basic HammerTap Manager service runs a flat $29.95 per month. inkFroginkFrog (www.inkfrog.com) is a cute name for some heavy-duty web-based auction management services. inkFrog offers auction listing, tracking, and management, along with image hosting and listing creation and design. Various plans are offered, starting at $7.95 per month. ManageAuctionsManageAuctions (www.manageauctions.com) offers web-based listing creation, auction tracking, email notification, shipping label printing, feedback generation, and other post-auction management. Pricing is on an a la carte basis; listings cost $0.06 each and post-sale management is $0.06 per auction. There's a minimum monthly charge of $5.95, and a maximum of $29.95; image hosting is extra. MarketworksMarketworks (www.marketworks.com), formerly known as Auctionworks, is one of the oldest and most established third-party auction management services. The site offers various professional auction tools, including inventory management, a bulk listing creator, traffic counters, image hosting, automatic end-of-auction emails, a checkout system, reciprocal feedback posting, web-based storefronts, and customizable reports. Marketworks charges no monthly fees for its service, instead opting for a 2% fee on each successful transaction, with a $0.20 minimum. The site caters to high-volume sellers, however; their minimum monthly fee is $29.95. SpareDollarSpareDollar (www.sparedollar.com) is low-priced auction service, ideal for small or occasional sellers. It's extremely affordable, with everything offered for a flat $8.95 per month price. SpareDollar's auction tools include the following:
While SpareDollar is attractively priced, its services might prove too limited for really high-volume sellers. That said, many high-volume sellers do use SpareDollar, and are quite happy with the results. Give it a try to see if it fits your particular eBay business. VendioVendio (www.vendio.com), formerly known as Auctionwatch, offers the Vendio Sales Manager set of listing creation and auction management tools. You can use Sales Manager not only to create new item listings, but also to manage all of your current and post-auction activity. Sales Manager will automatically generate end-of-auction emails, print invoices and packing slips, and upload customer feedback to eBay. Vendio offers Sales Manager in both Inventory and Merchandising Editions; the mix of features is a little different between the two, but the pricing is the same. The company tries to appeal to different types of sellers by offering a mix of fixed and variable priced monthly subscriptions. For example, the Sales Manager Pay as You Go Plan carries no fixed fee, although you'll pay $0.10 per transaction and a 1% final value fee. On the other hand, the Sales Manager Variable Rate Power Plan costs $29.95 a month, but with no listing fee and a 1.25% final value fee; and the Flat Rate Power Plan costs $39.95 a month, with a $0.10 per-transaction charge but no final value fee. Confusing? You betbut it does let you choose the type of payment (flat versus variable versus per-transaction) that best suits your needs. "Mike Sez"
I like Vendio's tools almost as much as Ándale'salthough the range of tools isn't quite as wide. (No research, for example.) The variable-rate pricing is actually a little more attractive to me, especially because my sales volume varies from month to month. And I like the fact that Vendio doesn't nickel-and-dime me to death. All in all, a service definitely worth your consideration.
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