october "ebay for business" newsletter

[lm-entertainment]

for those who don't get it, or may not have looked at it - there's not too much that was interesting in there .. most can be found on the spring seller release 2017 page @ https://sellercentre.ebay.com.au/content/spring-2017-seller-release

probably the biggest changes are that you can set new postage rate tables - so you can alter time differences and cost differences to specific locations domestically. this may have a little with the problems with estimated delivery times, but i guess time will tell? 

however, there was one thing that caught my eye at the very bottom of the email.. it says "Start removing watermarks, graffiti and borders from your images - these are not permitted and you may be subject to action from march 2018." 

so basically, recently we were told our images would be included as part of catalogues.. and so the only way to get around this really was to have some form of watermark. this has kind of infuriated me - because in the past, i've had people from overseas countries selling on ebay australia, who sells fakes of the products i sell steal my images and the only way i've been able to stop this is with branding / watermarking. i used to put an actual logo in the photographs i took, but then ebay told me that wasn't proof enough, despite the logo being over all of my material, store, listings etc. 

what are others' thoughts on this? am i being over-dramatic? 

[heihachi_73]

Don't bother with watermarks, if a seller is knocking off your photos and using identical listings you're better off reporting the knockoff seller so they end up with their listings removed. If they get reported too many times they will drop below standard and/or become suspended and it will be game over for them.

Alternatively, if you have a physical watermark as part of your background e.g. on a table or stuck to a wall, eBay cannot remove it. A lot of your photos seem to be generic images of the item with only the "lm" and Express Post logos placed on them, which is exactly what eBay is trying to remove.

(Don't save plain text images in the JPEG format, it's a pet hate of mine - use PNG files if you have to save a screenshot)

[the4masters2013]

What I find amusing is the total sales of over half a million dollars. If it is mine, where are the sales and the money??  Maybe the bean counter should learn to count. Or whoever is proofreading it (do they that??) should improve their skills.

You are not being over dramatic at all. It's all just an ebay glitch!!!! LOL

[chameleon54]

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@heihachi_73 wrote:
Don't bother with watermarks, if a seller is knocking off your photos and using identical listings you're better off reporting the knockoff seller so they end up with their listings removed. If they get reported too many times they will drop below standard and/or become suspended and it will be game over for them.

Alternatively, if you have a physical watermark as part of your background e.g. on a table or stuck to a wall, eBay cannot remove it. A lot of your photos seem to be generic images of the item with only the "lm" and Express Post logos placed on them, which is exactly what eBay is trying to remove.

(Don't save plain text images in the JPEG format, it's a pet hate of mine - use PNG files if you have to save a screenshot)

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I havnt heard that one before, but it is a great idea heihachi_73.

[lm-entertainment]

well that's what i did do. my photo which was stolen by many chinese sellers is attached below. it had my "lm" logo in it - and i reported all of their listings and put in a VeRO claim and all were denied. 

that is when i was given the advice by ebay to include a "watermark" with my username on it over the image. so if neither of those are now going to work, it'll be open slather for stealing other sellers images. 

funny you say that the4masters - i had the same thing, $500,000+ in sales! yeah right! 

[digital*ghost]

I knew it was coming, but watermarked the bulk of my images anyway. (I'm nothing if not a sucker for pointless busy work  ).

My main strategies from here will be gallery photos that include branded packaging, where appropriate (this will be easier for certain types of items, like my handmade jewellery. I really like my images right now, but if I change the gallery photo to show the pieces with their special little pouches that also happens to include a card with my logo on it, I'm sure I can make them look decent enough), and unique backgrounds (again, easier for my products because they are unbranded, but this will be a step in establishing my second brand name on eBay. My only worry is that the background I've been using elsewhere to uniquely identify my listings without using watermarks, is added digitally and has very faint writing visibe [it's a digitally created graphic of vintage / grungy paper, which I altered to my brand's colouring, I use it at 50% transparency, but I don't know if eBay will try to say the just visible but illegible cursive writing counts as a text / watermark 😕 )

[heihachi_73]

If someone is knocking off that type of photo I would definitely get eBay to step in.

[chameleon54]

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@lm-entertainment wrote:

well that's what i did do. my photo which was stolen by many chinese sellers is attached below. it had my "lm" logo in it - and i reported all of their listings and put in a VeRO claim and all were denied. 

that is when i was given the advice by ebay to include a "watermark" with my username on it over the image. so if neither of those are now going to work, it'll be open slather for stealing other sellers images. 

funny you say that the4masters - i had the same thing, $500,000+ in sales! yeah right! 

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The $500,000 in sales figure is since you started selling on ebay. I had a quick look at your account and if only half of your customers leave feedback and your average sale price is $70.00, you would come in at around half a mill. in sales. This is probably in U.S dollars, so allowing for the exchange rate, it makes it all the more possible. The figure is probably correct.

[lm-entertainment]

chameleon - i've gone back through all the previous ebay for business newsletters and the sales figures are only for that month. it says "total sales*" and the "*" footnote says that it's based on that month's data. this one is no different, but the amount is totally inflated. 

it comes nowhere even close to the number which shows in my actual total all-time sales which displays in ebay. the reason i openly mentioned it, was because someone previously in the thread said they also had the $500,000+ figure. which i found laughable. 

[everard6920]

I don't use watermarks but I do use photos of components on a white background with black text labels, identifying each component. For what it's worth, it's always the second photo - never the primary photo.

I'm wondering if eBay will flag this as a "watermark" . . . . probably.