On the 30th we received a phone call from eBay that our eBay listings were in violation of eBay policies. This is by no means an eBay bash. eBay accounts for about 50% of Seismic Audio's revenues. We love eBay. But I do disagree with this policy. Our violations were that we posted our phone number and follow us on Facebook and Twitter links. In about 90% of our listings we advertise for people to follow us on Facebook and Twitter. Now it looks like we are going to have to get our Facebook and Twitter followers from our website and other advertisements. If you follow us on Facebook and Twitter, you will see that we advertise a lot of what we are doing on eBay on these two websites. We advertise our scratch and dent items on Facebook. All of our scratch and dent is listed on eBay. We have some items we only sell on eBay. Usually new items, we try them on eBay before adding them to our website or Amazon. This is usually posted on Facebook and Twitter. In my opinion this is a bad move by eBay. Social media is the new "it" thing on the Internet and they should embrace it and not try and keep people from it. Okay, I understand eBay wants all sells to originate from them. This allows them to get their "cut" and make more money. But people are still going to Google "Seismic Audio", they are still going to find our website, they are still going to find us on Facebook, and they are still going to find us on twitter. My thought is that eBay should embrace the technology. We have all seen how MySpace did not embrace applications and open source and third party coding. It made MySpace less user friendly and people migrated to Facebook. Now MySpace is playing catch up. I think if eBay would embrace these websites and make things more user friendly for sellers and make information more easily available to the buyers, then they will stay dominate. If they try to control everything then they are poised to lose customers (the sellers) and in return lose the buyers. We also advertise our 800 phone number. This is frowned upon in eBay world as well. I can sort of understand why they do not want us to have the phone number in our listings. If some one calls in and we place the order over the phone, then eBay would not get their commissions. I am sure this happens a lot with some sellers, but we actual try to encourage people to buy from the marketplace they come from. Why would we encourage you to buy from the marketplace you come from and have to pay the fees? Because of our volume. By buying online, the only mistake we can really make is packing the wrong item. By buying online, it is all automated. When you place an order on any channel, eBay, Amazon, or our website, your order is automatically processed. The email address you enter is automatically sent a receipt and tracking when it ships. Your label is automatically printed. The only point at which we can make an error is packing the wrong item. Now don't get me wrong, we do not mind taking orders over the phone, but the possibility for errors increases. We do not usually have errors when doing phone orders, but the chance is always there. Since many of our items are similar, we have to be absolutely certain we are comparing apples to apples when we take orders over the phone. We then have to manually process orders and manually make sure you get an email receipt and tracking number. We usually do not forget to do this, but it has happened. When ordering online, things usually go smooth. For this reason I do not mind paying the eBay and Amazon fees. Why do we have the number? Two reasons.... Many of our items are $100 plus. The number gives us creditability. When you order online, you have to trust that the seller will ship. If you do not hear from us via email, you can always call. But we will email. Second reason is for tech support. A lot of times, people are not quite sure how to hook up their gear or are not really sure what they need. The number makes it easy to call in and make sure you are getting the right thing. What really ticks me off though and amazes me is that 100 or so of our listings were reported to eBay by another eBay user. This is how they found out we were in violation of their policy. This is also how we found out we were in violation. I had no clue. Who has the time to report 100 plus listings? Competitors I guess? I have an idea of who I think it is. And it turns out this person I think it is follows us on Facebook and Twitter. I could block them, but I do not run my business that way. I guess this person (or company) feels threatened by Seismic Audio. I'm flattered. Seismic Audio has made it! We have competitors who are scared of us! Sweet!!! Keep rockin,
Stevewww.seismicaudiospeakers.com
www.facebook.com/seismicaudio
http://twitter.com/seismicaudio
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