Auctiva Hi-Jacks Sellers Wallets While InkFrog and Others Leap To The Rescue

Written by John Comments
Last Updated June 1, 2009

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Why oh why is the eBayosphere all up in arms? Well it is quite simple. Back in September 2008 eBay changed its policy for what is known as “round tripping” links. Ebay pays affiliates for driving traffic to eBay through ads, websites and keywords etc. Many of these affiliate will set up shops that contain eBay product ads and those ads drive buyers to the eBay site. When a buyer makes a purchase a portion of that is paid to the original sender of that traffic.

One of the techniques used by some of the “black hat” crowd was to take a buyer on eBay, off the eBay site via methods of showing more pictures, or extra descriptions or even via email in response to customer questions. When the buyer would visit this off eBay link, they would drop an affiliate cookie into the browser and then get paid from eBay as if this was a true referral, hence the name “round tripping”.

To combat this behavior eBay announce the “ART (Anti-Round Tripping) rule” to much HOOPLA in the ePN community. eBay has responded that …

“Our goal in making this change to our Terms and Conditions is to ensure that affiliates are getting compensated for bringing us traffic to eBay, not for taking traffic that is already on eBay through a link to another page deliberately and sending it back to us with a cookie to get credit for a subsequent transaction.” … “you can’t send buyers from an eBay page to another page that can set ePN (eBay Partner Network) cookie and bring them back.”

At issue for sites like Auctiva was many of their free tools and seller stores would post inside of auctions on eBay and drive buyers from one item to others offered by sellers using affiliate codes. Auctiva would be paid a fee for this “traffic” PRIOR to the changes in the terms of the ePN agreement. Once eBay made the change, Auctiva was a dolphin caught in a tuna net. Their major revenue model just got 3 flats and nail in the 4th tire. This puppy was on life support overnight!

So now after attempts to breath life into the model the CEO, Jeff Schlicht has revised his platform and announced a fee based platform beginning on July 1, 2009. Buy doing this move in such a stunning fashion BLOOD is in the waters now and the sharks are schooling. With the Monster Virus fiasco earlier this year, and now this MAJOR change, other service providers see an opportunity to take share and they are gearing up for a hoped Auctiva exodus by users.

Reports are saying that Vendio is making an offer of FREE service tools for 2009 for all former Auctiva users. However, I have not spoken with anyone from there to corroborate that report so right now it is just a rumor.

But I did speak with the new Marketing Director for InkFrog over the weekend. Deb Levitt (of AsWas) is now working at the marketing helm for InkFrog. She was very candid about what they have in place to assist users wanting to switch.

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mrsgeorgiapeach

One thing ALL EBAY USERS NEED TO BE AWARE OF...beginning in 2011...if you sell MORE than 200 items per year.....OR more than $10,000 worth of merchandise, you will get a 1099 from eBay.

This was published in the July 30, 2008 Wall Street Journal.

I, myself, a part-time seller, plan to be out of eBay by the end of this year.

I pay the IRS all of the tax I can stand at the moment and don't plan to give them any additional funds. I will take my little business to flea markets.

OUTER_BANKS_CHICK

I Have Switched Over To Inkfrog.Com From Auctiva And Am Pretty Happy So Far. I Only Have One Regret, And That Is That I Had No Idea That My Buyers Would Not Be Able To Checkout Anymore With Any Of My Transferred Listings That Still Have The Auctiva Images Still Showing That I Cannot Get To Be Removed.

Now I Am Frantically Trying To Find Another Credit Card Company To Try And Find A Way For My Buyers To Be Able To Pay Me And Checkout.

They Can’T Even Checkout From Paypal Directly And I’Ve Been Told It Is Because Auctiva Still Has A “Hold” On My Account And Now That I Am No Longer With Them, My Info. Is Invisible.

This Is Very Stressful For Me. I May Have To Cancel All Of My Items Over 225 Of Them And Start All Over, It Just Isn’T Worth It To Risk Negative Feedback At This Point.

I Hope That This Helps Someone To Look Into This Problem.

jr

I have just signed for inkfrog, I'm an ex-auctiva user. Very easy to use and very affordable.

For the moment I'm happy.

Although I'm a very low volumen seller (less than 150 list per month)

Debbie

inkFrog made an announcement last night:

http://community.inkfrog.com/showthread.php?p=1...

Locking in their current price for ALL of their users, not just ones who leave Auctiva.

Consignment Pal Business Direc

"Reports are saying that Vendio is making an offer of FREE service tools for 2009 for all former Auctiva users."

Hi John,

Vendio's rumored announcement is official. See Ina Steiner's AuctionBytes article called:

"Vendio Makes Platform Free for Auctiva's eBay Sellers" at

http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abn/y09/m06/i01... .

A ton of Consignment Pals use Auctiva to sell other people's stuff on eBay and Amazon, so this is BIG new!

Gitasan

I was kind of shocked when I got the email that we would have to pay for Auctiva. I had been very happy with most of the services that it offers and since they were free really could not complain when they were down.
I was not given the option as one of their top 250 sellers, they did write up a great article on my business, "Passion for Fashion". I do not intend to pay for their services and need to hustle to see where else I can get my listings done.
I feel that we are already paying too much for eBay and really do not think that this is another expense I am ready to take on.
So InkFrog I will be coming to see what you have to offer!
It is a shame that Auctiva sold out.

Deb Levitt

I am a moron, anything i said was clearly wrong and misguided. I have no idea what i mean or say and i am a terrible designer. Who would let me consult secret and behind the scenes when i have no clue. Please forgive Jon i actually drugged him to let me talk.

KatyDidsCards

Interestingly, in my email this morning was an offer from Auctiva for a flat-rate fee plan of $10 per month, with the caveat that you had to lock that rate in asap, and had to pay for 18 months up front (for a total of $180.)

This email was supposedly sent out to only 250 of Auctiva's "top users" (which I can't imagine I really am, I only have about 1,000 listings between my two accounts), but it was also publicized on their forums, as "first come first serve." At this point I don't know how many are left, but the offer is seemingly still open.

For me, it was a case of too little (or too much!) too late. As I said in a message on the Auctiva forums this morning:

Like others, I am wary of such an offer at this time. I think the way this whole pricing thing has been handled was very unprofessional (not to mention Jeff's tone in the various forums here and on eBay when discussing his competition.)

Had Jeff made this offer before announcing such an abrupt change, there wouldn't have been this firestorm of anger from users.

Had Jeff given us more time to make a decision, we wouldn't have felt so stampeded to do something right away.

Had Jeff consulted with some of his "Top 250 users" before springing this on us, we might have felt less betrayed, and he might have been able to develop a working business model, rather than something that feels hastily thrown together.

So I passed on the offer, and am happily ensconced at InkFrog (where I was able to convert all my listings within about 2.5 hours yesterday.)