Hello Ross Gordon,

We have identified an issue that may be inflating revenue data in eBay Partner Network reports. Due to an issue with one of our databases, some of the revenue fees for publishers were double-counted in our system. The issue appears to have affected publishers only from Sept 5th-Sept 9th, and only in the US, UK, Australia, and Canada programs. Although the impact varies by publisher, the revenue was overstated by as much as 20% or more for those 5 days.

We have been able to calculate down to the individual publisher level what the correct revenue should be for those days. Our team is in the process of correcting the associated data and tables but may take several more days to complete this task. In the meantime, please keep this information in mind as you run any reports that span the associated time periods.

That may explain why my earnings went down $25 already this month. But right now I’m at $407 for the month. I hope it doesn’t go down any more.

These days it seems like eBay and EPN are screwing up every way possible. They really need to start getting their act together or else they are gonna crash.

Anyone else get that email or notice their earnings go down?

What does it do? Like the name suggests, this plugin creates a new page or post on your site every time an item is searched, and then displays search results from eBay to the person searching.

The really cool thing about this plugin is the content randomization engine. It allows all the new posts this plugin creates to have unique content.

I installed this plugin a few days ago on my Apple Laptop Shop phpBay Pro site and i already have over 15 new pages of content. And i didn’t do an once of work.

Here’s how i recommend using this plugin:

I created a post category called “Recent Searches.” Set that category to show in your sidebar. In the plugin options in the widgets section of your wordpress admin, set the plugin to create posts out of all new searches (not pages). Then set them to go into the “Recent Searches” category. Follow the other basic instructions from the manual and you’re done!

This plugin only works as a sidebar widget. It does not work for search boxes outside of the sidebar. No big deal. Remove your other search bar and add the widget. That’s what i did.

Note that this plugin costs $15. All of Allan’s other plugins are free, but he put some real serious time into this one. I think the price is very fair (maybe even underpriced). Everyone with a phpBay Pro website should own have this plugin.

Make sure you read the manual so you know the best way to use the content generator.

Click here for more info or to buy this plugin.

By default, only the item title is clickable. But by using this javascript trick we will make the whole thing a link. That should help you get more clicks on your auctions and will help those confused people who click on images or other pats of your phpBay auctions that aren’t links.

(Note: The way this wordpress theme displays code is a little messed up. In order for the code below to your you need to paste it into Notepade, and to a replace all for quotation marks. That will get rid of the “curly” quotes).

Javascript code for column phpbay auctions

All you have to do is open the file called template.column.results.html (wp-content > plugins > phpbay > templates > template.column.results.html)

Replace the entire file with this:

<td style=”word-wrap: break-word;border: 1px solid #eeeeee;font-size:12px;” onclick=”window.open(’%%link_url%%’);” onmouseover=”this.style.cursor=’pointer’; this.style.cursor=’hand’; style.backgroundColor=’%%hover%%’;” onmouseout=”style.backgroundColor=’#ffffff’;” width=”300″ align=”center” bgcolor=”#ffffff”><noscript> <a rel=”nofollow” href=”%%link_url%%” target=”_blank”></a></noscript><a rel=”nofollow” href=”%%link_url%%” target=”_blank”> <img src=”%%image%%” border=”0″ alt=”%%alt_title%%” /> <strong>%%title%%</strong> </a><noscript></noscript> %%paypal%% %%currency%%%%price_or_bin%%</td> 

Javascript code for standard phpbay auctions

All you have to do is open the file called template.ebay.results.html (wp-content > plugins > phpbay > templates > template.ebay.results.html)

Replace the entire file with this:

<table style=”font-size:12px;” onclick=”window.open(’%%link_url%%’);” onmouseover=”this.style.cursor=’pointer’; this.style.cursor=’hand’; style.backgroundColor=’%%hover%%’;” onmouseout=”style.backgroundColor=’%%row%%’” border=”0″ cellspacing=”5″ cellpadding=”5″ width=”100%” bgcolor=”%%row%%”> <tbody> <tr> <td width=”100″ align=”left”><img src=”%%image%%” border=”0″ alt=”%%alt_title%%” /></td> <td style=”word-wrap: break-word;”>        <noscript><a rel=”nofollow” href=”%%link_url%%” target=”_blank”></a></noscript><a rel=”nofollow” href=”%%link_url%%” target=”_blank”>    <strong>%%title%%</strong>   </a>    <noscript></noscript> </td> <td width=”20″ align=”right”>%%paypal%%</td> <td width=”60″ align=”right”>%%bid_or_bin%%</td> <td width=”100″ align=”right”>%%currency%%%%price_or_bin%%</td> <td width=”80″ align=”right”>%%date%%</td> </tr> </tbody></table>   

 
Then just upload your changes and you’re done! Pretty easy, right?

Check out Radio’s blog: Rule One Blog!

Another bit of news: I deactivated phpBay Pro on my Golf Balls site early last month. This site was my worst performing site and the whole EPN stir made me nervous, so i decided to focus on my two best sites. I made about $4.00 from the golf ball site before I shut it down last month. One all the commotion with SPN goes down I will reevaluate the site and consider reactivating it.

Back to my phpBay earnings. I made a total 0f $690 from my phpBay sites in August. $611 was from EPN and another $80 came from CJ links on my Fender Amps site.

Here is a screenshot of my earnings breakdown between my two sites that are up (click it to enlarge):

Also, twice last month my earnings DROPPED $30. Must have been an eBay sale that got retracted. But that could have been another $60

Another also, I’m having ankle surgery this week on Tuesday. I know i’ve been pretty crappy about posting tips, I’ve been crazy busy. But with the surgery I’ll be off work for a week, so i should have some time to post. I’ll write about an amazing new plugin from Alan Lewis that automatically creates new pages of searches people do on your site. It’s really amazing. So that will be cool. I’ll also try to write another post, assuming the Vicodin doesn’t totally impair my typing.

Here is a great thread on EPN. My eBay name is scuttleSRVbuttin. I have a few comments on there.

Many people have been screwed. If you’re one of them, there may be a light at the end of the tunnel. I just talked to Wade(the phpBay developer) the other day and suggested that he start working on Amazon integration for phpBay. He told me he had actually started it the night before.

I don’t think the Amazon affiliate program is nearly as good as eBay, but there are people who do well with it. This is a great opportunity for people who already have sites with traffic. If you already use phpBay, then your set. But if you have BANS or a custom thing, you may want to switch to phpBay or get the API.

Anyone here been banned by eBay yet? Have you tried switching to pepperjam? did it work?

So is this change going to help phpBay Pro affiliates?

Well, according to EBay this change will encourage sellers to sell more items, which will mean more products for buyers to choose from and more sales, right?

Not so fast. In my experience “biddable” items get more clicks than buy it now because buyers to your site see the lower price and are intrigued to click. This will help you get more cookies on people’s computers.

On the other hand, how likely are those people to actually buy the item once they realize that wasn’t the selling price, but just the current bid.

I think with EBay’s upcoming changes to the ACRU payout system, the new fee changes will be positive for affiliates. Why? Because if someone sees an item for a fixed price on your site and then signs up to EBay, they are much more likely to buy that item after they sign up since it’s selling for the price “advertised”. And since EBay’s new lead system is based on quality (pay outs are $1-$50 per lead), I think that people’s lead quality should go up.

But will you get as many sales? I’m not sure. Your EPC should go up since more people who click will buy. But your overall sales may not go up since it’s likely less people will be clicking.

All-in-all I think the change will be good for affiliates. What do you guys think?

Back to my earnings…

The past two months have been great. My revenue has been going up each month. In June $457.99 from EPN and my Fender amps site made another $54 from Commission Junction. So my total June earnings were $511. Just about all that came from my used apple laptop site, and my Fender site. While my golf ball site is still my best looking phpBay site, it is the poorest performing site. My SEO rankings started to drop and the commissions weren’t great so I started to focus all my efforts on the two other sites.

July was even better. In July I made $518 from phpBay pro and my fender site made another $66 from CJ. So my total earnings from phpBay sites was $584.

Here is a screenshot of my payments from the last few months:

Here is a screenshot of the breakdown of my earnings by site over the past three months (not including August. “Default Campaign” is my fender site):

Note that a lot of that revenue from the Golf Ball site came when i was testing PPC. Most of that is not profit. But the other two sites are all from organic traffic.

August is off to a great start, too. I already earned $347 and the months is just half way through. I’ll keep you posten on how it turns out.

Also, if you didn’t get phpBay Pro yet, It’s time to buy, Wade sent me a 20% off phpBay coupon. So buy it already!

Still haven’t joined the phpBay Pro bandwagon? Well now’s the time. Wade (the developer behind phpBay Pro) just sent me an exclusive coupon code for a 20% discount on any phpBay Pro product.

You can’t find this phpBay coupon anywhere else and I don’t think it will stay valid for long. So if you’ve been thinking about buying the phpBay Pro wordpress plugin, do it now and save over $15.00 off the regular price.

Here’s how you get the 20% discount on phpBay Pro:
Sign up to my email list and i’ll email you a coupon for 20% off any phpBay Pro product. This exclusive coupon was sent to me directly from Wade Wells (the developer of phpBay Pro). The coupon is 100% legit and will save you at least $15, depending on what you buy.

Request your free coupon now:

Over the past 3 months I have made about $1500 from just 3 phpBay sites (see my earnings here). And most of my traffic is just to 2 sites. (I will post the last few months earnings screenshots in a few days). So stop putting it off and buy phpBay today while you can get $15 off. Then read this blog for tips on how to earn like me.

Ebay sellers do all sorts of crazy stuff to get their auctions to stand out. And unfortunately, there auctions show up as-is on your phpBay sites. Until now.

Allan Lewis of Handy Hints for New Webmasters created a plugin that converts all your wacky phpBay auction results titles in normal, title case results.

The plugin is super easy to use. Get the phpBay title fixing plugin.

Thanks Allan!

If you are still on 3.0 and you missed the last few small updates, there are a few other minor updates. First, you no longer need iconotube. You can delete it from your root folder when you install 3.0.5.

Also, you no longer need to create a license file and upload it. You just need to enter your license key from your phpBay admin account.

Read about all the additions to phpBay on the phpBay forums:

Read about updates in 3.0.5
Read about updates in 3.0.4 
Read about updates in 3.0.3
Read about updates in 3.0.2
Read about updates in 3.0.1