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A QUESTION ABOUT LINKS IN LISTINGS

W westvatexanMember
Hi, first let me explain. According to ebay, you cannot link to a store website outside of ebay on your auction ad. Your only allowed to link to ebay stores. However, you can put 3 links to whatever you like ( except questionable content)outside of ebay on your about me page if you want to.

So anyway, I was linking my outside store directly on my auctions and have been getting away with it for some time now. I figured they would catch me sooner or later but they never did.

I am having a decent sized train items auction this week coming up and I decided to put my store banner on my auctions and link it to my about me page which in turn will give a link to my store (totally within the rules right?). I mean it might have my store name on the banner but it isnt linked to any outside website right?.

Anyway, after I got them all ready for scheduling I got to thinking maybe I better not put the banner on my ads for fear of them cancelling my ads after I have invested my time and money for listing fee's, so I went in and edited every single one and took the banner off. Now it just says visit my online store with a View My About Me Page link.

I really want the banner on there so my question is, would I be breaking ebays rules if I did put the banner on them? I mean technically Im not breaking the rules if it has my store name on the banner but is actually linked to my about me page, am I? I cant seem to find an answer to this on ebay and from everything I have read, It seems Im ok to do it.

Thanks in advance for your help. William
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W wayoutwestMember
dunno what the current links rule is (they change it fairly often) but at one point they said that a "soft link" was the same as a regular link in regards to their rules. (A soft link being the site name without it being a clickable link. ie: saying yoursite.com is still considered by ebay to be a link even though it's not clickable)

I dont know if they've reworded that or not, but they do pretty much prohibit any mention of a .com in your listing.

I know that doesnt totally answer your question, but i hope it helps some.

Personally, I tend to think they keep some of their rules confusing on purpose so that they can more easily pull a listing. I've even seen some rules in the past where in the text of the rule it said one thing, but the example contradicted it.
W westvatexanMember
Yes, I have noticed that too. It seems as though the rules are kind of iffy so that ebay can enforce them how they see fit. I dont think ebay will do anything about any violation unless someone actually reports it to them. They pulled 4 of my ads one time because it had the word "Jello" in the description. They were christmas jello molds, what was I supposed to do? list them as gelatin molds..lol whos gonna search that?.
Jello is a registered trademark name. But there were 100s of others with the word jello in their listings..and they even said someone had reported to them about mine...thats sad dont ya think?
W wayoutwestMember
yeah, sad that people have nothing better to do.

regarding your banner, the way i understand it, branding is okay on ebay to a degree, as long as the .com isnt on there and links to Me page or ebay store instead of to off-ebay site.

Their rules are clear as mud, but here's the way I read it: Me Page can have link to off-ebay as long as the site it goes to doesnt offer items from multiple sellers, cant directly offer items off-ebay (cant say "click here to get coffee mugs", etc), and cant offer same items off-ebay for less than what you sell it on ebay.

links in listings rules http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/listing-links.html

links on me page rules
http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/listing-aboutme.html
R rickbradfordMember
William, I assume your store banner has a URL on it? If you're talking about your Cheap Street logo (as it appears at your site) I'm pretty sure that wouldn't be a problem as long as you don't actually link it to your store. It doesn't include a URL and savvy customers will probably Google "Cheap Street Online" (if they don't just go to your ME page).

But I'm by no means an expert on this.

Another thing you can do, although it could be pretty time-consuming if you do it often, is to create a page at your site with more details about the listing's item. On that page you should include a nav bar that will take curious customers to the main part of your site -- but you can't make it obvious.

That's an idea I read about at this site: http://www.onlineauctiontrader.com/ebaylinking.htm
and there's more info about links, too.

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