Using Ebay Listings To Drive Traffic to Website?

5 replies
Hi,

I have a product as both an ebook and in physical form. My keywords will get me a lot of traffic on ebay - but because I'm on the move a lot (and because margin is higher) I'm wondering if I can effectively drive traffic to my website from the ebay listing and have people buy the electronic item.

As it stands, I sell the physical copy for twice the price of the electronic one. My idea is to create a bundle of products including my book on ebay - and then craft my listing to include the fact that the ebook version is available cheaper from mysite.com. The idea is that people won't actually buy the expensive ebay listing - but it will get views and drive traffic to my site.

How can I best do this without violating ebay policies?

I understand I can't put links to my site but can I write the full url - people won't be able to click it, but they can type it in themselves.

Otherwise I can put a link like - "You can read more about it at this link..."

Or "Get a free sample here" - leading to a squeeze page (but no purchase link for 3 clicks)

That last one especially is what I'm most interested in doing.

Any experience to share?

Thanks
#drive #ebay #listings #traffic #website
  • Profile picture of the author writeaway
    Are you sure they don't cover this in their TOS? I would think poaching traffic off them is a no no....
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  • Profile picture of the author MikeJeffs
    I realise that pushing traffic is to your site is probably not approved of, but I'm wondering how they enforce their TOS.

    E.g.: I could probably watermark my product images with my website name/url - that would drive some traffic by people seeing the url and typing it in.
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  • Profile picture of the author brittlesnc
    You can use an ebay classified ad. Last I checked (which wasn't too long ago) you could use the classified ad format to sell digital products and even have an opt-in form and/or a link back to your website.

    It will cost you $10 for a 30-day ad though and you'll have to post in the sub-category of 'Information Products' under the 'Everything Else' category but that shouldn't matter since people on ebay mostly search by keywords and not by category.

    The major disadvantage of a classified ad seems to be that they get a little less exposure than actual auctions on ebay but if you're keywords are good you should get a decent amount of exposure.
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  • Profile picture of the author brittlesnc
    Also, the following is a link to the updated rules about links in auctions on ebay but for more clarification you should probably contact a rep on ebay (better safe than sorry later on):

    eBay: 2011 Fall Seller Update - Updated policy preview: Links and logos policy
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  • Profile picture of the author Greedy
    I've done this before. It can work.

    Just don't be too aggressive about it, and stay up to date with their policies.
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