posted on September 24, 2001 06:34:32 PM
To our loyal customers,
I would like to update you on a new product we are releasing this week: Sales Manager Business Edition, built especially for sellers who list more than 300 items per month and/or have their own sales management systems. Sales Manager BE provides all of the features of Auction Manager plus a complete SKU based inventory management system, the ability to import and export data to your own sales management system, reporting functionality, an integrated HTML editor for faster listing creation, and more. Sales Manager BE may be used with your current pricing plan through October 1! Download BE and try it now.
In conjunction with this new offering, we will be implementing the following changes to our pricing on October 1, 2001. Complete pricing plan details can be found here.
· Business Plan will be offered for sellers utilizing our latest product, Sales Manager Business Edition. A discount will be offered for all current AuctionWatch registered sellers.
· Image Hosting fees have been reduced for the stand-alone image hosting service. The fee for the first image in each auction will remain at $0.10/image. Additional images in an auction will now be charged at a rate of $.04/image. For example, an auction with 1 image will cost $.10, an auction with 2 images will cost $.14, an auction with 3 images will cost $.18, etc. This fee is not incurred if you use auction manager, auction manager pro, or sales managerBE to list your item (see below for more details).
· Standard Plan will increase listing fees from $0.05/auction to $0.10/auction for first 50 listings per monthly payment period. Listing fee will remain $.05/auction for all listings after the initial 50 per month. The maximum cost increase any seller will experience is $2.50/month.
· Power Plan will not be offered to new users. All current power plan subscribers will receive full service for the duration of their agreement.
· Message Center will continue to be offered for free
posted on September 25, 2001 10:07:03 AM
I am more confused then ever with these new fees.
Since day one of charging I have been on the Power Plan. My goal is to list 200 auctions a week so I knew this was the best deal for me. NOW, is this plan still in effect for me until MARCH?????
Based on the 200 weekly auctions and the fact that I use Auction Manager mostly, sometimes Auction Manager Pro ( I could give up either one if needed), WHICH plan should I have to cost me the least amount? I do not use any post sales stuff.
Would I pay $29.95 a month plus 1% of FVF and NO listing fee?
It seems like the cost for me is going to be a 4 times what I was paying. That is a BIG INCREASE!
I simply do not understand the new fee chart. Please explain! But I am good to March RIGHT?
posted on September 25, 2001 10:19:52 AM
One more thing,
On the Standard Plan it states -
The maximum cost increase any seller will experience is $2.50/month.
In my case that would NOT be true because on the POWER PLAN I do not pay on FVF. So my fees will increase $2.50 PLUS 1% of my FVF, RIGHT? That could be $60 easy on a good month!
posted on September 25, 2001 02:38:04 PM
This sucks. Most of my auctions sell between .69 and 3.00 and a few might go $4-$10 but that doesn't seem to happen much (at least not in the last year). For the current plan let's say an auction of mine sells for $1 but then ya hafta subtract the .30 ebay listing fee and the .05 AW listing fee and the ebay FVF of .05 and the AW FVF of .01 and that only leaves me with .59 and I usually have .50-1.00 invested in the item. I'm in the red by about 200.00 this year, how am I supposed to pay more on fees? That is why I am not signed up for PayPal as a paid user because I can't afford it. I tried to raise the minimum bids but even raising them by .25 each causes a drastic reduction in bids. I end up relisting everything for up to 7 times just to get someone to bid and so I finally have to just stick with low minimums just to get stuff out of the house. Low minimums seem to work for other sellers by enticing bidders to bid but it doesn't seem to work for me. I keep getting nickled and dimed to death from every direction. I do sell stuff that is popular such as Hot Wheels/Matchbox (older ones as well) and other people get quite a bit for them but mine don't. Either I raise the bids and get nothing or lower them but end up selling cheap. Higher fees are gonna make me seriously consider just selling all my collectibles at local shows (or a yard sale) and certainly never entertain the idea of running auctions as a business. No wonder they say most businesses fail within the first year.
posted on September 26, 2001 08:21:49 AM
OUTSTANDING timing on your part AW. This one really takes the cake. Economy is headed for a recession , our country is engaging in a prolonged miltary campaign, people are getting laid off everywhere and you decide to "restructure" and raise you fees at this time. I do read it right that those of us on the power plan nothing will change correct unit the end of the contract ? that should be sufficient time to find a new service.
posted on September 26, 2001 03:16:17 PM
Sales are down fees go up,one more nickle one more dime and a FVF everyone seems to need a biger piece of the pie soon all that we sellers will have is an empty plate.I these times of economic downturn a reduction in fees instead of an increase would have been a plesant supprise but OH NO God bless Capitalism!While you sit in your air conditioned offices in your comfy exec chair dreaming of new fees to suport your lavish lifestyles we the little guys bend our backs in the field to produce a product to place food on our tables.God Bless you and GOD BLESS AMERICA!!!!
If you have questions about the fees, feel free to post them here. If you have some feedback about the fees, feel free to go post them in the feedback forum.
All other posts will be removed.
tomyou - That is correct, nothing will change for you until your current plan expires on 03/14/2002.
posted on September 26, 2001 08:35:22 PM
HEY I HAVE A STUPID QUESTION ABOUT THE NEW FEE SCAM. WILL WE BE ABLE TO KEEP THE POWER PLAN WHEN OUR CURRENT PLAN EXPIRES & WILL THE ANNOYING POP UNDER ADDS CONTINUE WITH YOUR INCREASED INCOME?
posted on September 27, 2001 06:50:26 AM
From what I've seen, if you owe AW less than $5 at the end of a billing period, they pass you over until the next month and by that time you will have $5 or more so that they can bill your credit card. I couldn't figure out why they would come up with such a crazy new restructuring of the billing until I realized that by raising the fees $2.50 per month would put even people that usually have less that $5 at the end of each cycle, into the category of $5 or more every month (or at least more often than they otherwise would have) so that everyone (or most) would be billed each month instead of sometimes every other month. It is the only thing that makes sense about it.
cdplanet, you probably shouldn't give them any ideas
posted on September 27, 2001 07:10:13 AM
Questions:
Does the new Business Plan (or other currently available plan) include access to the Ebay API in its fee structure? If not, will this be a premium priced feature or rolled into the plan when implemented?
Will the Business software eventually support the Macintosh and Linux platforms? Some of us run entire businesses on platforms other than Wintel...
Will the customer support parameters remain similar to those currently implemented? If not, please elaborate.
Kimlittle -- the Power Plan will not be available to new users. Current subscribers to the power plan will be able to finish out their subscriptions, however it will not be offered for renewal. The ads have and always will be a part of the site, and unfortunately will not go away with the new fee structures.
Camachinist -- the use of the API will not be an extra charge for our users. We are close to implementing it. I will need to double check on the availability of BE for Macintosh and Linux, but for now it is only available for the Windows platform. What were your questions regarding customer support?
posted on September 27, 2001 08:44:27 AM
Hi Sonya,
Re: Customer Service
Currently, my understanding is that customer support is via the Message Center from 8 am to 8 pm PS(D)T 7 days a week....
Will there be additional support, e.g. via private e-mail and/or with expanded hours for 24 hr and/or international sellers, with the new Business Program?
BE subscribers will receive priority email support during the regular customer support hours. We will continue to offer Message Center support. A new forum called Sales Manager Business Edition has been added to the Auction Watch Service Forums as well, for any questions that might arise regarding BE.
posted on September 27, 2001 11:32:55 PM
So, we sell about 4000 items per month for a total final value just over $500,000.00 per month. What exactly will our fees be per month under your new business plan after our power plan expires?
Please be detailed in your answer as our substantial business relies on the accuracy and candor of your response.
Thank you
eBay user id "hdoutlet", for any of those that do not think our numbers are real.
posted on September 28, 2001 12:04:05 AM
hdoasis - I had so see for myself what your payment would be. This is based on what they told me in another thread.
I hope you are sitting down!
4000/$500,000 - standard = $202.50 in listing fees, $5000 in final value fees. $5202.50 for the month. (only includes the use of the Auction Manager and Pro, not the Business application)
4000/$500,000 - Business = $7500 in final value fees. $49.95 in subscription fees. $7549.95 for the month. (includes the use of all tools, including the Business application)
Keep in mind that users that want to upgrade now will have lower fees for a period of time. (all of these details on the announcements page.)
On the power plan you paid $200 annual fee and $200 a month for a BIG total of $2600 FOR THE WHOLE YEAR. Now it would be a minium of $5,202.50 A MONTH!
Will we see our fees increase by $88,000 per year, or 3385%, if we choose your new business plan?
Please confirm exactly what our new fees will be if we continue to use your service after our current contract expires. Please also let me know the date our "hdoutlet" account contract expires.
I can not believe that AW is NOT going to contact you directly and work this out!
Although, if it is the billing department They are the slower the the programs here. Maybe your increased fees will go to light a fire under the hourly paid employees.
I am sure you business can easily give away another $88,000 a year! Paying $88,000 more a year for what! The exact same stuff you had before! It does not matter how BIG the business is NO business would stand for that kind of an increase.
At least you have til March (if you signed up when it started) to find someone else! But certainly AW will work out something with you. I do not thing they would want to lose you. Heck, you pay one employee if not MORE all by yourself. I would guess you are one of the biggest if not the BIGGEST client they have.
I hope you keep us posted. I am only a small fish 400 items - $5,000 monthly. I am a one man show.
posted on September 28, 2001 10:57:38 AM
Umm...you mean you folks don't already have access to the eBay API? I thought that it went into effect when eBay was yanked from the Universal Search? And destroyed that as a viable service.
I must assume that you have been getting private customer support from AW considering both the size of your account and the fact that you've only posted 5 times on the message center, all within the last couple days....and all concerning the new fee structure.
What brought you to the public forums to discuss this subject? Has AW been unresponsive privately?
You probably have more to offer to this discussion than most, considering your considerable experience in dealing with AW at all levels.
I hope you'll keep us posted with your progress, if not here then in the feedback forum. I am very curious to see how AW publicly treats what I would consider to be a very large customer....
posted on September 28, 2001 12:38:07 PM
We get no special treatment or support from AW regardless of our size. Any time we need support or to get questions answered we use the same email and online message center to get our answers as all other users.
At this point unfortunately we have been totally unable to get any answers on this vitally important question.
posted on September 28, 2001 12:53:35 PM
I find this amazing that you have yet to be answered in any way shape or form. Please keep us advised if they contact you directly as I would love to hear the explanation on this one !
posted on September 28, 2001 12:54:06 PM
Hi hdoasis,
I've been spending a large amount of my time reviewing all our sellers' activity and attempting to provide a pricing structure that supports the profitable activities of the most sellers. I'm of course familiar with your selling activity since you generally appear at or near the top of
the list of our sellers.
We've attempted to price our service such that the price paid increases with the value received. eBay pricing is very similar. In fact, it appears that your bill for eBay services is probably around $200,000/year, and starting with low opening bids and no reserves you are unlikely to find a sales strategy that reduces that bill. At your current power plan pricing, your AuctionWatch fees represent about 0.04% of your gross sales and about 1-1.5% of the fees you pay to eBay. We recognize, however, that our revised pricing method does create unacceptable situations for high volume sellers who sell relatively valuable items and are going to be addressing that.
I realize after reading your message and others that we've created some confusion about Business Plan pricing and our new Business Edition product. The Business Plan pricing only applies to sellers using this new software. We priced it at a premium to the Standard Plan given many of its additional time-saving features and functionality. We never intended for this pricing to be a general substitute for the old Power Plan.
In fact, my current priority project is to find a pricing plan that provides an opportunity to reward our larger sellers as current power plan subscriptions begin to expire in March--basically, a new power plan. I may call on your assistance and the help of other large sellers while creating that plan. We want to ensure we continue to assist your profitable and efficient selling activity. Rest assured that we will announce these prices with plenty of advanced notice so you can make an informed decision about the right auction management service for you when your power plans expire. We will also provide discounts to volume sellers using our Business Edition offering.
We'll only be successful if our sellers can continue to sell profitably. As we look at the fees charged both by competitors as well as others associated with your selling activity, from eBay fees to PayPal fees
(which I know you do not accept, but I believe you have merchant account fees instead), our analysis shows we are generally the least expensive service that supports sales activities. We hope to continue to be the service that offers the most value for the least possible cost.
I will continue to monitor this thread and others as I proceed with my pricing study. Thanks in advance for your frank feedback.
posted on September 28, 2001 04:24:46 PM
Boy I am certainly impressed with all of you big time sellers! I work myself to death and I can't come anywhere near you guys! So my question may seem silly to you, but important to me..........
On the Standard Plan will relists be charged at 10 cents each (for first 50 listings/ month)?
posted on September 30, 2001 03:26:52 PM
Hi all - I've been reading this with great interest. Not that it really affects me (I have about 50 more things to sell before basically getting out of the auction business) but it's obvious that big sellers will really be hurt when the new fees come into play. hdoasis - I'm in total shock at your fees.
But I had to laugh at a paragraph in AW's response. It is:
"We'll only be successful if our sellers can continue to sell profitably. As we look at the fees charged both by competitors as well as others associated with your selling activity, from eBay fees to PayPal fees
(which I know you do not accept, but I believe you have merchant account fees instead), our analysis shows we are generally the least expensive service that supports sales activities. We hope to continue to be the service that offers the most value for the least possible cost.
What they don't seem to realize is that AW's service is the least valuable and the most easily duplicated elsewhere. Ebay provides the forum at which we sell. PayPal (and/or a merchant account) provides a way to accept credit cards which (theoretically anyway) increases our average sales price (and we get our money faster). AW provides convenience - it provides nothing we can't get elsewhere or do ourselves.
posted on September 30, 2001 03:40:35 PM
Well, as a small time seller (mostly as a hobby) I've decided to use ebay for my 1 picture per auction. I run about 100 auctions a month, and I figure it's a better move, sales wise, to drop auctionwatch for paypal. My profits are way down, if I'm going to pay more, I'll spend it in a way that might entice more customers.
posted on September 30, 2001 06:28:18 PM
Well said Barbarake.
That is the point. We can't sell without ebay. The selling gets tougher if we don't accept paypal. So those 2 are necessities.
But AW - they provide convenience. I love being able to schedule my auctions and have them list when I am not here. I love the post sale management. But, when it starts cutting into my profits significantly, then maybe it is time to forgo the convenience and just do the posting myself. And actually there are free services that would do the listing. AW you are forgetting this very important point -- YOU ARE NOT A NECESSITY IN SELLING - YOU ARE A CONVENIENCE.
Please come out with another power plan, or I will be moving on. Luckily I have quite a few months left.
