eBay Sellers Access 3rd-Party Applications Within My eBay
Published September 13th, 2009
eBay today made it easy for sellers to find and subscribe to third-party applications that improve the efficiency and effectiveness of their eBay businesses. Available immediately through My eBay (my.ebay.com) for subscribers of Selling Manager and Selling Manager Pro are about a dozen applications that have been pre-approved by eBay to be embedded on eBay.com. eBay anticipates steady growth in the number of tools available through the Selling Manager Applications platform to address specific needs of eBay sellers including: shipping, inventory management, sales tracking and customer support.
Announcement Highlights/Key Facts:
All Selling Manager applications are free to try. An app store for eBay sellers, third-party applications are subscribed to at My eBay (my.ebay.com) with eBay managing billing on behalf of third-party developers.
In April, eBay announced that it would no longer charge sellers to subscribe to Selling Manager, turning it into an open platform where third-party developers could embed their applications into my.ebay.com, allowing them to connect with sellers directly.
More than 96,000 third-party developers have already built more than 13,000 live applications that consume eBay’s Web services. These developers – along with new applicants – form the base of a vibrant developer community and expanding application marketplace.
Today’s announcement is also the latest milestone in eBay’s commitment to making it easier for sellers of any size to start, grow and maintain their business on eBay. In July, eBay rolled out enhancements for search relevancy, the automation and speed of the resolution process for unpaid items, new bulk editing tools, and an update to its highly regarded Seller Dashboard. These changes were part of the launch of the company’s Top-rated seller status, which is awarded to sellers that are ranked highly by their buyers through eBay’s detailed seller-ratings feedback system.
Sellers can access the applications directory for Selling Manager and Selling Manager Pro by simply pointing their Web browsers to http://applications.ebay.com/. eBay’s Selling Manager and Selling Manager Pro currently have 270,000 active subscribers in the U.S. and the tools can be accessed at http://pages.ebay.com/selling_manager and http://pages.ebay.com/selling_manager_pro.
First Group of Applications Rolled Out
Over the course of this week, the first dozen embedded Selling Manager Applications will be rolled out. Users can easily find, subscribe and manage the applications they want and need with a single eBay sign-on. Some top solutions eBay users can try out for free in Selling Manager include:
Terapeak: Research before you sell. Research before you buy. Find the value of your items, discover new products to sell, and develop your selling strategy using Terapeak Marketplace Research.
HostedSupport: HostedSupport’s customer support tool helps you answer the questions customers ask about your listings. ezSupport for eBay is integrated directly with the “Ask a question” link on your listings, providing direct access to your searchable FAQ knowledge-base and/or intelligent auto-response messaging.
ahTEXT: Keeps you connected to your eBay account by sending you a text message the moment that a buyer asks a question, makes an offer, buys an item, leaves Feedback or files a dispute.
For more background on any of these developers, please visit the eBay API Success Stories page.
Quotes
Dinesh Lathi, VP of eBay Seller Experience
“eBay’s Selling Manager Applications Platform is an app store for eBay sellers that makes it easy to find and subscribe to tools that can help our customers increase the efficiency and velocity of their businesses on eBay.”
Kumar Kandaswamy, Senior Manager, eBay Platform
“eBay’s API platform already attracts 96,000 developers who have built more than 13,000 live applications. Selling Manager Applications addresses the need of developers to more readily connect eBay sellers who are seeking useful tools for their eBay businesses. Under the eBay Selling Manager Applications revenue sharing agreement, applications that pass eBay’s rigorous approval process will be put in front of an active audience of more than 270,000 professional eBay sellers. By managing the billing on behalf of developers, we are simplifying the process for both eBay sellers and third-party developers.”
Andrew E.R. Sukow, Co-Founder, CTO, Terapeak
“The ability to embed our application inside My eBay gives us an opportunity to both reach sellers in an entirely new, more personalized way and also capture revenue streams. We’ll also get a much better sense of the needs of sellers as we think about creating new applications.”
Video Overview
A video overview of the eBay Selling Manager Applications platform: http://www.businesswire.com/multimedia/home/20090401005446/en/1778299
About eBay
Founded in 1995, eBay Inc. connects hundreds of millions of people around the world every day, empowering them to explore new opportunities and innovate together. eBay Inc. does this by providing the Internet platforms of choice for global commerce, payments and communications. Since its inception, eBay Inc. has expanded to include some of the strongest brands in the world, including eBay, PayPal, Skype, StubHub, Shopping.com and others. eBay Inc. is headquartered in San Jose, California.
