Ep 205 || August Look Back: Holiday Marketing & the eBay Partner Network

[podcast_team]

We take a look-back to August of 2020 when our then correspondent Liz Austin spoke with Sumip Patel about how sellers can leverage the eBay Partner Network as part of a holiday - or any - marketing plan. And Griff and Brian answer questions about buyer notifications for sellers who manually lower their prices and the policy around listing digital trading cards.

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Brian: I'm Brian.

Griff: I'm Griff. And this is the eBay for Business Podcast, your source for the information and inspiration to help you start manage and grow a business on the world's most powerful marketplace. And those words never get tired to me at least. And its episode 205.

Brian: Which words? The most powerful marketplace or episode 205.

Griff: Well, no, well episode 205. It's hard to believe, but you know, we start each show off with that little bit of boiler plate. I remember when I first wrote that.

Brian: Uh, it has legs. It hasn't left since you wrote it.

Griff: I haven't changed it much since I first did it. Yeah, you're right.

Brian: It is a good intro though. And accurate. I think that's what makes it good.

Griff: And we do try to help people start manage and grow their businesses.

Brian: We do.

Griff: That's the whole purpose of this. Well, okay. There's a little bit of a self-indulgent humor involved, but Hey, I need an outlet.

Brian: And we do it in many different ways, not just by providing a platform to buy and sell, but also via events, you know, like the upcoming, eBay Open in September.

Griff: Oh yes. eBay Open.

Brian: And then supporting others, seller events. Like there's The Boss Reseller remix in Las Vegas that Vikki,, Katie and Teresa are gonna put on in Vegas in October. We'll be there. We support in lots of ways.

Griff: Is that the Royal we, or is that me and you?

Brian: I think we there's lots of eBay folks gonna be there.

Griff: We are amused. So we will go anyway, Brian, I wanted to let everyone know it's a short show this week. These next two episodes in fact are gonna be our summer look back editions, where we'll feature some of the best segments from past episodes as a sort of summer break thing.

Brian: I kind of like that. What's our look back this week?

Griff: Well, our look back this week is a segment we recorded two years ago in August of 2020 in the midst of the pandemic with our good old colleague friend at the time, and still a friend of ours, Liz, Austin.

Brian: It'll be great to hear Liz's voice.

Griff: It'll be great to hear her voice. I don't know if Sumeet Patel is still with us at the company, but I think he, he was on the team for eBay Partner Network. And we're gonna talk about marketing for the holiday season, or he talked about marketing for the holiday season with a focus on how to leverage eBay Partner Network as a marketing and sales tool. And I still am always amazed at how many sellers don't know this thing exists. And I think it helps to spread the news about it.

Brian: I agree. And I think it's, uh, it's another opportunity for sellers to earn some income.

Griff: With no cost. There's no cost to you. You can get involved, you can promote your listings. And if people well we'll let Sumeet & Liz talk about it.

Brian: Cause they'll describe it much more accurately and better than we will.

Griff: Right. Hey, what's in the news this week, anything?

Brian: There are a couple things got two items this week. Our first item is about a recent mobile app enhancement for shipping. The eBay Mobile and the Shipping Team have been hard at work, improving the eBay app so that all domestic shipping services you are used to selecting when using the desktop are now available on the eBay app.

Griff: Finally.

Brian: Finally, I was gonna say, I think this has been an oft requested thing from our seller community. So starting with the latest app update, you can now purchase UPS and eBay Standard Envelope labels in the app. In addition to USPS and FedEx, and you can choose to print the label or print the label and receive a QR code. In addition, you can edit the buyer address for shipping and returns in the label, order details. And finally, you can pay for labels using your payment method on file. In addition to available funds and PayPal.

Griff: That's a lot!

Brian: It is. it makes it convenient for our sellers.

Griff: Now, all I have to do is in my iPhone is just set up so that I can wirelessly print to my label printer, cuz I can wirelessly print to my regular laser printer for packing slips. I need to buy a Rollie.

Brian: I bought one.

Griff: Did you?

Brian: Yes, I haven't used it yet.

Griff: Oh you gotta unpack it.

Brian: I unpacked it and it's set up. So now I just have to get a sale this weekend.

Griff: And then while I'm sitting, watching jeopardy each night with Rob.

Brian: Oh yeah. From you mobile.

Griff: I can just print my labels and stuff right there from my app.

Brian: Convenience, efficiency.

Griff: Yes. And what's our second news item this week?

Brian: You know that eBay Open 2022 is just around the corner.

Griff: I do.

Brian: You may be curious to know what's in store for eBay 2022.

Griff: I am.

Brian: The events team has a special sneak preview plan for all registrants. The eBay Opens Sneak Peek event takes place on September 8th from one o'clock to two o'clock Pacific time. All sellers who've registered for eBay Open 2022 are welcome to attend at the Sneak Peek, you'll get a glimpse of what to expect at the main event. As you hear from speakers who will give a preview of their upcoming sessions, you'll also get advice from experience sellers on how to plan your agenda for eBay Open. Plus you can try out the new virtual platform and get your hands on some pre-event swag.

Griff: Right? So if you missed any of that, I'm sure your ears opened up on that last sentence.

Brian: Tell your friends September 8th, the 1:00 PM Pacific time, come get a sneak peek of what's gonna be happening at Open.

Griff: Except you can't just do that without doing something first.

Brian: You cannot in order to attend the Sneak Peek, you have to first register for eBay Open 2022. So don't forget. Registration is open up to September 1st and invites for the Sneak Peek event will be sent out on September 2nd.

Griff: Brian, what is that direct URL to eBay Open?

Brian: Well, it's a simple one.

Griff: What is it?

Brian: It's nice. We have a simple one. ebay.com/.

Griff: Open, not closed.

Brian: Closed, not closed. Open. Just open. You don't have to do anything else.

Griff: Do it now. Do it before September 1st don't be left out.

Brian: And then open the registration.

Griff: Now it's time for us to take the way back for our look back two years ago, the following segment was recorded in August of 2020 when podcast correspondent, Liz Austin spoke with Sumeet Patel of the eBay Partner Network.

Liz: I'm Liz Austin and I'm Senior Manager of Seller Marketing and Engagement at eBay. So nice to be back on the podcast. So it's holiday kickoff month here at eBay where we're asking sellers to set their minds on the biggest retail moment coming up, holiday. Kind of feels way too early to start doing this, but the more prepared we are, the better we'll perform. So as we think about what to sell and the key moments of holiday, when buyers will be searching and buying, we should think about how we might capture as much of this incremental shopping that happens every year. But marketing strategies are not just a one and done that we can quickly cover in one single podcast. So this is something that we will continue to cover throughout the holiday, but stay tuned to the podcast and we'll keep giving you more advice along. But for today, we're gonna down the foundations for our seller to start thinking about ahead of holiday. And I've brought my colleagues, Sumeet who is running our eBay partner network program for sellers. Welcome Sumeet. How's the eBay Partner Network going?

Sumeet: The eBay Partner Network is our affiliate marketing program that allows almost anyone, including sellers like yourself to earn money for driving traffic to eBay. On June 15th, we introduced a pretty sweet incentive specifically for our seller community to encourage more sellers like yourself, to take advantage of this program. If you're a seller and you are responsible for driving a potential customer back to your eBay store or item, and that person ends up buying from you, you'll effectively pay 0% final value fee on that transaction. We launched this about two months ago and we've seen some really strong sign up rates. So there's definitely been a lot of interest here from our seller community. And I'm excited to further talk about it today.

Liz: So there are so many different ways that sellers can market their eBay business to buyers. But what I wanna clarify first for our sellers is that you have two choices when you sell on an eBay. The first choice is really to rely on 182 million buyers we have on the site, which is a huge amount of potential buyers for your listings. And number two, you can actively go and find more buyers who are searching, grow your brand off eBay, and then drive that traffic to your listings on eBay. Plus if you connect with buyers off eBay, by inspiring them to purchase your item, they're more likely to convert when they come to eBay because their purchase decision has already been made. They're coming to eBay to purchase directly from you. So you have two options. Find your buyers on eBay, or find your buyers on eBay and find you buyers off eBay and bring them to your eBay listing to convert. What do you think Sumeet?

Sumeet: I think that's spot on Liz. I think developing a sound marketing strategy is a very critical first step that is often overlooked because executing successful marketing campaigns do take a lot of time and effort. So if you take a very focused, thoughtful approach, your likelihood of being successful definitely increases. And especially when time is perhaps our most precious commodity.

Liz: With any good marketing strategy, you need to work out your four P's, your Product. That is what you're selling your Place, where you are selling your Price and then how you're going to Promote it. Presumably you know where you're going, sell because you're an eBay seller, but do you truly? Are you selling what you've always sold? Because you know it well. When was the last time you tested selling something else? We had a category manager on the podcast a couple of weeks go to talk about what we think will sell well over holiday. Go listen to the podcast and maybe try selling something else. So test some new products out and see if they sell. Price, We've got Terra Peak to use to work out the best price. Also check what has sold well by checking solid items on eBay. Note, what price your competitors are selling it at, and either go cheaper or offer more value through free shipping or multi packs. Now we need to talk about promotions. The way that you can promote yourself has evolved so incredibly over the past few years. But before we go into promotions, I really want us to talk about building your brand. So when we're talking about building a brand on eBay, what's your advice as it relates to sellers, why should sellers care about brand?

Sumeet: I think it's definitely important. And even on a large marketplace like eBay, building a brand is just as important for all our first sellers. First of all, it can help serve as a point of differentiation. In some cases, what you may be selling is truly unique in which case you're very fortunate, but in many cases you are competing against other sellers that have similar items. So having that brand connection can really be differentiating factor that delivers you the sale. Having a professional brand presence on eBay does serve as a quality signal and it is something buyers do take into consideration when choosing what to ultimately buy. The second big reason brand is important is to drive buyer loyalty. Acquiring a customer is perhaps the hardest thing to do in business. You want to be able to maximize the value of that customer relationship by driving repeat purchases from you and the underlying driver of that is your brand. So having a very strong brand is important in this regard.

Liz: What are some brand touchpoint sellers have access to on eBay?

Sumeet: You know, oftentimes when we think of a brand, we think of very tangible touch points, like a name or a logo. And these are all very important because this is what a customer sees and remembers in the more traditional eBay world. That means having a unique and easy to remember, and dare I say, easy to spell username. It means creating nice, clean, professional looking storefronts, potentially designing the logo, having clean descriptions, all of the best practices that we often talk about, but a brand goes way beyond the tangibles, right? How a buyer feels about you is also a critical part of your brand. So providing an exceptional end to end customer service, both pre-purchase like answering questions promptly and in a friendly manner and post purchase are things I wouldn't discount as well. eBay is a very human-centric marketplace. So I wouldn't discount the value of adding that human element wherever possible, even small things like a personalized thank you note can go a strong way in developing that emotional connection that buyers may have with your brand.

Liz: And then this very same brand can extend off eBay onto your social media channels and other marketing channels that you might choose to use. How you show up on eBay should also be how you show up off eBay. So the next step for seller to think about for their marketing strategy is who is their customer for those who sell sneakers, for example, who are sneaker fires, what do they care about? How can you establish a rapport with them? Well, we can easily deduct that. They care about quality fashion. They're inspired by the latest sneaker trends. They follow influences to get these insights. Where would it make sense to find these types of buyers to me and have a conversation with them?

Sumeet: eBay buyers are digital consumers. They are looking online for inspiration. They're looking at social media definitely makes sense to have that as one of the leading aspects of your off eBay marketing strategy. Think about this in the context of the buyer journey, the buyer's journey starts with a need or in many cases, inspiration, a spark that makes them want something that they may not have been thinking about earlier. And social media is one of the main places. Consumers go for inspiration, but definitely encourage thinking about how you can create content or postings that create that spark and inspire buyers to wanna come to your store and purchase from you.

Liz: I've also been seeing sellers lately, use social media marketing to take potential buyers to something of value like advice. For example, if you are selling makeup, you could write a blog on how best to do your makeup for zoom giving. Assuming we're all celebrating Thanksgiving on zoom this year, then the makeup you'd recommend on your blog is then hyperlinked directly to your eBay listings. That piece of value is what you promote or you pay for in your social media marketing. And then your actual eBay listings is contained within that value, peaceful content or that blog that you've created. So instead of using social media marketing to take buyers directly to your eBay listing, it takes them to a place where they learn something or are inspired by you and are more likely to want a transact. Anyway, Sameet, if sellers are thinking about using social media marketing to drive buyers to their listings, how can they create an EPN or an eBay Partner Network link at the same time and pay no final value fees?

Sumeet: First, you need to sign up for the eBay Partner Network. It's free. It's tied to your eBay account and it only takes a few minutes to apply. You can do this at partnernetwork.ebay.com. Once you're approved, you want to use the EPN tools that are available in the dashboard to create what we call affiliate links for the listings or for your store that you want to promote, whether it's on your blog or social media or whatever channels you choose to use. And this is important because this is how we can track everything. And this is how we can give you credit for bringing in the sale. There are a few and easy to use tools that you can find once you log into the eBay Partner Network dashboard, there's even some that will allow you to directly integrate your Facebook account and post to Facebook and Pinterest. So definitely check 'em out and they're really not too cumbersome by any means. Very easy, very intuitive to use pretty much as easy as copying the link to your item or store pasting it into the tool and clicking create link, and it'll pop out your trackable link. And then you just use that wherever you're creating or posting your content. And one of the things that is definitely important to know is that as a seller, you can choose to promote individual listings. You can choose to promote your store. It could be category pages within your store. So there's a lot of flexibility in what you can own and what you can ultimately use to generate traffic and earnings. But I will be remiss if I don't mention that whenever you do engage in social media marketing, you do want to make sure that you adhere to the specific platforms, affiliate marketing policies, as well as FTC disclosure requirements. But we obviously want you to promote your store outside of eBay, but we want you to do it in the right way so that you don't get unknowingly in trouble.

Liz: Well, that sounds a bit serious. Does that mean adding hashtag advertisement to your post or something like that? So followers know you're getting paid for the piece of content?

Sumeet: Each platform from time to time, you know, what they allow, what they recommend can change. So I, don't wanna get “too” prescriptive, but generally speaking, putting a hashtag ad or hashtag affiliate hashtag paid content, something like that generally gets the requirement.

Liz: Another great, super exciting channel for sellers to reach buyers is on YouTube. More and more people are searching YouTube for inspiration. YouTube actually allows wonderful instructional or ed entertainment content for sellers to show if their expertise take, for example, sellers who sell decor and we've got Halloween coming up. So maybe a great piece of content that a seller who sells decor could create for YouTube is a video about dressing your house up for Halloween on a budget. And then the buyer viewer can find all the items that you show in your video, in your eBay store. So Sumeet, presumably you just use the same EPN links for your YouTube videos to get your free final value fee if your items sell as well?

Sumeet: Well. That's absolutely right. The mechanics would be the same that I spoke about a few minutes ago. You just wanna make sure that you're using the affiliate links you've created through the eBay partner network tools so that we can track you and pay you out for your efforts.

Liz: Great. And you can totally do that same type of how to video on social media as well. So on Instagram stories, but really the biggest tip is to give your customers something of value, blogs, webinars, special events are all examples of other value that you can offer to buyers to walk them through what you have on offer, show off your expertise. And then once you've convinced them to, to purchase, take them straight to your eBay listing to purchase securely. And then the final thing I want us to talk about today is relationship building or other words, loyalty. Sam, why do you think creating loyal customers is super critical for our seller and a really strong marketing tactic. If you're thinking about a marketing strategy for holiday,

Sumeet: Once you've gotten someone to buy something from you, you've already done the heavy lifting. So to speak, a stranger has decided to give you their hard earned money. And if you follow through with the greater customer experience, that will start to build trust with that buyer. To convert that trust into loyalty, enhance repeat purchases you might need to give them a little bit of a nudge, a little bit of a reminder. And this is where our discussion around marketing strategies really fit in. Not to get two technical, but one last lesson from marketing 101, and that's the notion of CLV, Customer Lifetime Value. The lifetime value a customer brings to your business. Loyalty is a key driver of Customer Lifetime Value because the cost of driving a repeat purchase is usually less than the cost of acquiring the customer. So loyalty is definitely an important aspect of driving, a very healthy and hopefully very profitable business.

Liz: What are then the ways sellers can drive loyalty or repeat purchase with their buyers on eBay?

Sumeet: You know, I wouldn't discount the importance of delivering a great end to end customer experience, which starts even before the time of purchase post purchase, obviously delivering what the buyer wants and in the timeframe that they're expecting it is obviously important. But I would also think about the small things you can do to delight your buyers. These are little aha types of things. It may not seem like a big deal, but could really build that personal, emotional connection with your buyers. We're talking about holidays here. And while holidays have become very commercialized with all the black Friday frenzy and, and all the craziness, I would still argue that holidays are still about family. It's still all about connections. So this is definitely a good time to take advantage of that opportunity and something small, like adding a thank you note with your signature and eBay store name, very old school sounding concept but even to this day, time and time again, we hear stories about how meaningful those are some other holiday centric type of ideas, maybe throwing in an unexpected gift with purchase or a free sample with a makeup purchase. As an example. It's something your buyer's not expecting, but if you do it in a way that is pleasantly surprising to 'em, it can definitely go a long way in driving that loyalty that we've talked about. A few different things to think about email marketing of course, is, is an obvious one through socially. You can also give them inside scoops as an example, letting them know that you have a new item of interest that might be coming and getting them excited. So they can kind of get to the front of the proverbial e-commerce line, inserting Q codes or other type of promotional material in, in your packaging to get them to come back to your eBay store and make purchases is something to think about. I think there's some creative ways here to leverage the eBay Partner Network and some of our Promotions Manager capabilities in a way that could deliver a compelling discount to your buyer while at the same time lowering final value fees for yourself. So a lot of ideas I've thrown out thinking creatively about how you can build that connection with your buyer.

Liz: Today. We've talked at a very high level about what seller can think about as it relates to marketing strategies for holidays to get buyers onto. So just recap, it's product and brand, who is your customer, which is obviously supercritical to, and then sellers start executing all of these strategies. Where does EPN fit in Sumeet? One last little blurb there.

Sumeet: Make sure that you create the links while you're already doing it through post them. And if the sale converts you'll pay no final value fee on those transactions.

Liz: Thank you so much for joining me here today. Thank

Sumeet: Thank you for having me.

Liz: I'm Liz Austin. And thanks for joining us on the eBay for Business Podcast.

Griff: Podcast Correspondent, Liz Austin talked with Sumeet Patel of the eBay Partner Network. Back in August of 2020. We'll have updates about the eBay Partner Network in future episodes.

Brian: You got questions.

Griff: We got answers. And Brian, we only have two questions to answer this week, cuz it's the summer slow down for the podcast. You know, we're not getting a lot of questions. People are at the beach.

Brian: Getting their kids ready for school again.

Griff: They're very busy. So they're too busy to ask us questions and that's fine. That's okay. We're all right. We'll just sit here in the dark, surrounded by no questions. You never call. You never write. We'll get over it. I'm sure. This first question is from eBay seller Lee and they sent the following podcast@ebay.com. In fact, why don't you do the honors?

Brian: Okay. Lee wrote Griff. I was intrigued by your recent statement on the podcast episode 196, that you lower your price bit by bit on a daily basis on your active items with high numbers of Watchers. In order to stimulate sales. I initially assumed that you did this because Watchers would be notified of price drops in their watch items. But as I pondered doing the same, it occurred to me that I have never received an email disclosing a price drop for any of my watched items that I recall. I can't say it never happened since I started doing it in 1997, but at least not in the recent pass. I decided to test it by using my separate buying eBay ID to watch an item on my selling ID and then lowering the price on that item. I did not receive any notification. I have all my buying notification preferences checked to receive emails, including a line item called price reduced on item found by going to account settings, communication preferences, and clicking, edit for buying activity in the buying section. Is there something else I need to do to receive those emails or does that line item refer to something else? Mmm. And another question, how long does a buyer's eBay alias email address remain active after a sale? The one that looks like XX X X, 1, 1, 1 @members.ebay.com. I was thinking of emailing a coupon code to some of my buyers who had multiple purchases from me last year, but who have not been back? I was wondering if the email alias would still function. I appreciate your insights. My selling ID is Philly B1rd that's with Philly B!rd -bird is spelled B number one and then R D. Okay. And I'd love to get a mug. Sincerely Lee Hanford and Lee. We will send you 'em mug.

Griff: Yeah, we still got mugs to give out and hopefully the handle will not get broken in transit. Thanks for the question Lee. I checked with our Messages Team and there is indeed a process that sends an email alert to a buyer who has watched or viewed an item or who has the item in their shopping cart. If, and this is the crucial bit. If the seller of that item has lowered the price within a threshold discount and the actual percentage of that discount, we don't make public, but you can assume that 4% is probably not enough and perhaps six or 7% is enough, but I can't make public what the actual discount is. I can't believe I tried to get away with this stuff. So if you're a watcher or a viewer..

Brian: Or work for a corporation.

Griff: Right. I mean, I should try it someday. So if you're a watcher or a viewer have an item in your shopping cart and you haven't received any notifications, the sellers of said items either haven't lowered the price or if they did, they did not lower it by a percentage at or above the percentage necessary to trigger a notification. And as I mentioned, I do get them on occasions as a buyer, but not always, I don't know if the system is smart enough to know that you're using the same accounts. So maybe that would not trigger an alert, but we do send them. And there is that little setting that you found in communication preferences.

Brian: And I think all of our seller and all of our listeners could understand why there's a threshold there because otherwise, I mean, if someone lowers it a penny or lowers it, you know, percent. Yeah. And you know, the buyers would say, okay, I'm gonna turn this email notification off.

Griff: Right. Cuz it gets annoying. And also I think a lot of sellers, cuz I do get a lot of other notifications, but therefore coupons or discounts that are part of a promotion. I think a lot of sellers don't actually manually lower their prices that way I do. And I try to, especially now that I know it because I didn't before, you know, I want to stay at a discount that's gonna make sense. So I don't tend to lower it by, you know, 1%. Where is the incentive there?

Brian: And the goal really with dropping is to get a buyer to take action. So think about you as a buyer. What would it take you to change your mind from watching to purchase something that discount would have to be something, you know, substantial?

Griff: Yeah. I just got a notice for a discount. It just wasn't enough. You know? So I'm not interested you know, make it a little bit more. So I'll keep my eye on it. Now about those email aliases and how long they're available. Those email addresses that have and their alias, the eBay ones they were available legitimately for as long as a sold item is available in the orders page in Seller Hub, which is 90 days after that, the order disappears. And along with it, the order details, which has that special formatted alias email address. And it's not gonna show up. But if you have eBay messages sent to your own email address, those messages may still be functioning after 90 days, at least for replying to the buyer. And in fact I'm still believe it or not in correspondence with a seller in Ukraine for a sale that happened over 120 days ago. And I think I mentioned this in previous episodes, I bought a camera. It didn't arrive. It didn't arrive. eBay refunded me. It arrived. And now I'm trying to pay the poor seller by sending him my PayPal email address via messages. So he can invoice me big mess. Don't know how it's gonna play out, but I'm gonna get him his money. If I have to travel to Ukraine to give it to him.

Brian: Podcast from Ukraine coming up?

Griff: No, no I'm not young enough for that stuff. Also I would advise heavily against sending coupons by any format to people outside of buyer groups. We have it set up so that if buyers are interested in receiving coupons from you, they will follow you and then you can send them coupons. But I would strongly advise against indiscriminately sending buyers who have not followed you through those old messages, a coupon.

Brian: Yeah. Good advice.

Griff: If somebody complains your account could be in jeopardy and I wouldn't do that.

Brian: That's really good advice. And sellers can do things to try and encourage people to save them as a seller via like their, at the end of let's say a success, you know, or, uh, congratulations. You've, you know, I've just shipped this item should be getting it at the bottom. You can say, Hey, and if you really like me, save it, you can do things like that to encourage buyers, to follow you.

Griff: Yeah. And it's a little question about what the terminology is. In fact, I just had this conversation with David Bernstein about this because we say follow, but then..

Brian: On the site it saved.

Griff: It saves sellers. So we gotta get some consistency there. He seemed to think, he said, I think a year, a long time ago, it used to be followed.. And I can't remember if that's true or not. I said, well, regardless it should, it should be consistent today. Don't you think?

Brian: It should be. Well, and currently on the site, there's the little heart and it says saved.

Griff: It should say follow, follow your heart. You can't go wrong. so the answer is, I don't know when, if ever those formatted alias email addresses stop working. I just don't know.

Brian: Well, Lee, thank you for those questions. And this question was asked on our eBay for Business Facebook Group page by eBay seller. Matt, are there any rules regarding selling digital items on eBay that cannot be shipped because of their digital format? I have recently seen digital trading cards being sold on eBay. I wanted to make sure it is okay to sell digital trading cards before I attempt to sell some myself. Thank you. I actually don't know the answer.

Griff: Well, and I gotta confess, I hadn't looked at this policy for a long time. So I went and looked at the policy, but I think it's not so much the answer which Matt will like, but it's how to find that answer. And that's why I included this question from the Facebook Group, cuz it's always a good move. Whenever you have a question about policy or process, when it comes to selling to go to our Help and Contact Pages and then to search for an answer there 99% of the time, okay. Maybe that's a bit optimistic, but most of the time you'll find the answer you seek right there in the Help and Contact Pages. For example, if I go to the top of an eBay page and I click Help and Contact, and then I type in digital goods policy, because that's how I remember it. Right. I get a page called electronically delivered items, policy, which is basically the same thing with a different name. And on that page is a lot of helpful information, including an answer to Matt's question.

Brian: So yeah. Is it okay for him to list digital trading cards?

Griff: I'm pretty sure the answer is yes. Just let me read a few things from this page. It says electronically delivered goods can only be listed by eBay approved sellers and must follow our policy. So right then and there I thought, oh no, we can't then. Not, unless he's pre-approved. Due to the nature of electronically delivered goods, extra care needs to be taken to prevent intellectual property infringement and minimize risks for buyers. Okay. And then it says, what is the policy electronically delivered items that are not allowed include software keys? The seller is not authorized to sell digital copies or codes of movies that were included as part of purchasing a physical movie item. The seller needs to include the physical disc with the sale of the digital copier code and sellers need to be, eBay approved to list electronically delivered items outside of the everything else. Information products, category sellers, not approved by eBay to list electronically delivered items need to list their items in the everything else. Information products category in the classified ad format. Here's where it gets interesting. Exceptions to this policy include electronically delivered tickets..

Brian: Makes sense.

Griff: Domain names...

Brian: Also makes sense.

Griff: Drum roll please. Digital trading cards.

Brian: Yay for Matt.

Griff: Online gaming, virtual items and NFTs, which are non fungible tokens, which may be sold only when they follow a whole list of requirements, which I'm not gonna read. So according to the policy, I think he's okay.

Brian: I think he is. Yeah. So Matt can list his digital trading cards without having pre-approval.

Griff: According to the Policy Page. That is correct. And I went and looked for a few of these and they are listed in the trading cards. He's right. There are a lot of them and I don't imagine all these sellers are pre-approved. So Matt, knock yourself out!

Brian: That sounds great.

Griff: Yeah. And let us know how they go.

Brian: You know, I have not, uh, searched for an electronic trading card. I'm interested to actually to go take a look. Yeah.

Griff: Still curious to know what they are. I'm such a person who wants to handle.

Brian: Physical, something tangible in your hand. I hope Matt, you know, if you hear this, uh, you drop us also an email so that you too can get an eBay for business podcast mug.

Griff: Because I know you posted it on Facebook and we answered it there, but we've used it on the show. So technically you get a mug, but I'm gonna wait for you to send your address to podcast@ebay.com

Brian: Send Griff like four addresses and we'll send out four mugs.

Griff: You know, they're not an infinite supply.

Griff: I know they're not, but then, then we'll have to buy something else to hand out.

Brian: What will that be?

Griff: I don't know. We have a couple sweatshirts left.

Griff: Yeah. I'm gonna give those. These are hoodies from the olden days of Alan that we're gonna give out its contest in the fall. Cool. We haveXL and an L hoodie.

Brian: Do you know what? I really like what those double walled Tumblrs that, you know, you can put like in your car and you can either have hot drinks in cold drinks and a little plastic top. So nothing spills.

Griff: I know what we need to do. It just came to me, Brian.

Brian: What's that Griff?.

Griff: We need to hold a contest for choose what kind of swag you want

Brian: When we run out of the mugs.

Griff: Yeah. And we'll give some choices and you can go to the page and you can choose what kind of swag you would like to see us give out in the coming season and then we'll have that swag created. What do you think?

Brian: I like that idea.

Griff: Brainstorming, right on the air. (snapping fingers)

Brian: Yes. Meeting our seller's needs.

Griff: And wants! I don't think anyone needs swag.

Brian: Everyone needs eBay swag. And if you have a policy question like Matt did always check the help and contact pages for an answer save time and you'll become an eBay expert.

Griff: Impress your friends with your eBay seller expertise. Because take it from me showing off is always fun.

Brian: You can also go to the eBay Community under Community Info. There's an Ask a Mentor Section. And we've got a bunch of sellers who are very experienced to answer other sellers questions. So that's also a good resource. If you don't know the answer.

Griff: And those mentors can be a lot of fun.

Brian: They can be. If you wanna join the fun here on eBay for Business, call us on (888) 723-4630.

Griff: That's (888) 723-4630. Call that hotline anytime of the day, any day of the week, leave a question or comment and we might just put it on the air and you might just get a mug.

Brian: And if you're not a call on the phone person, you can always email us at podcast@ebay.com, that's podcast@ebay.com.

Griff: And now it's time for your Three Point Podcast Checklist.

Brian: Check the Announcement Board at ebay.com/announcements for up to date Seller News every day,

Griff: Always check the Help and Contact Pages on eBay for quick answers to many questions about selling.

Brian: Need to review anything in this episode? It's easy. Check the transcript for this and all episodes for follow up on what you've heard and to find the links we referenced during the episode.

Griff: On our next episode, it'll be the last one for August and officially it's kind of the end of summer. We'll look back on another interview from a previous episode. One that is definitely timely and contains relevant information for you as a seller.

Brian: Thank you to Lee and Matt for your questions, will we have more questions next week? Who knows it could be yours? Mm-hmm if you send it of course or call it, there's always a mug in it for you

Griff: And maybe even accurate responses. The eBay for Business Podcast is produced in distributed by Libsyn and podCast411.