eBay today announced that they will be implementing a new pricing structured for Active Confirmed Registered User (ACRU) compensation. This new payment structure for ACRUs will take effect today for new publishers. For publishers who’ve signed up with the ebay partner program prior to today, the changes won’t take place for you until November 1.

In a nutshell, you won’t get the normal $25-35 you were used to getting for new users who signed up for an ebay account via you. You will still get paid for new users, but that amount won’t be set in stone anymore. It will vary from month to month depending on the quality of your new registered users. According to ebay:

Here’s how it will work. Each publisher will be placed in a quality tier at the end of each month based on that month’s and historical traffic. The tiers will range from $1 to $50, and the higher the expected lifetime value of the customers a publisher sends, the higher the tier the publisher will receive. We expect that most affiliates with a history of driving good, consistent traffic won’t see a lot of variability from month to month.

So you can expect to earn anywhere from $1.50 to $50 per new user now. $50 per user, that sounds sweet. I’m curious to know exactly how they calculate the quality of a new user. It’s probably going to be based on a user’s purchase history, visits, rating activity, and more.

I had a feeling that this was going to happen sooner or later. The previous tier system was great for affiliates, but simply dangerous for ebay. The possibility of fraud and abuse is high. I’m pretty sure that a lot of people pay others to sign up in order to get the ACRU credit. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a service out there that promised you x amount of new registered users for a low price.

Hopefully this new change in payment structure will allow me and others to pass that $28 per ACRU tier we’ve been stuck at ever since joining the program.

Here’s a copy of the letter I received in, its entirety.

Dear Jonathan Radande,

As part of our ongoing effort to reward our best marketing partners and promote trusted commerce on eBay, we are implementing a new pricing structure for Active Confirmed Registered User (ACRU) compensation. The new pricing scheme is based on quality, instead of just volume, and will reward top publishers with up to $50 per ACRU driven to eBay.

Starting today, August 1st, new publishers that join the eBay Partner Network will be placed in this new quality-based pricing structure for the US program.

All publishers that joined eBay Partner Network before August 1st will remain in the existing pricing tiers for a few more months so you can have time to look at the data and see how the change will affect you. As of November 1st, all publishers will be placed in the value based pricing structure for ACRUs.

Here’s how it will work. Each publisher will be placed in a quality tier at the end of each month based on that month’s and historical traffic. The tiers will range from $1 to $50, and the higher the expected lifetime value of the customers a publisher sends, the higher the tier the publisher will receive. We expect that most affiliates with a history of driving good, consistent traffic won’t see a lot of variability from month to month.

Publishers that join after August 1st will be able to see what tier they fall in by going to the programs tab and selecting payments structure for the US program. This tier will be updated on the 9th of each month and will reflect the score for the previous month. The tier will be 0 for the first month while we calculate your first score. Note that your ACRU earnings in your reports will reflect this tier.

If you joined before August 1st, you will continue to only see the same volume-based tiers for now. In September we will release a new separate report that will allow all publishers to break down, by campaign, the quality of the ACRUs you are driving to eBay. We will send more details about this report in a few weeks.

Please note that this change only affects compensation for new user registrations (ACRUs). Payouts for revenue share will continue on the same volume-based tiers for both new and old users. While the current change only affects the US eBay program on eBay Partner Network, we are evaluating this system on a country by country basis and will provide additional updates as they become available.

For more details on how the new pricing structure will work in the US please log into eBay Partner Network and visit the eBay US terms and conditions in the "Programs" tab on eBay Partner Network. There are also FAQs in the Help section of eBay Partner Network https://www.ebaypartnernetwork.com/files/hub/en-US/help.html and in the user guide in the advertisers and programs tab under "value-based pricing".

We want to continue to reward quality publishers and seek to continuously improve your experience in the program. This change will allow us to match payouts to the value of users and ensure we pay out our best affiliates the highest amounts. Thank you for your service and continued commitment to our relationship.
eBay Partner Network

Ebay acru, affiliate program, Ebay, partnet network

It’s time for me to optimize my ebay campaign. I have been testing it for a month, and I know that I can definitely make a lot of money from ebay. There are still millions of people out there who do not have ebay accounts, and at $25 per new user, it’s definitely worth pursuing.

The ebay affiliate program pays $25-$30 per new user who buys an item or simply bids on one. On top of new registrations, you are also paid half of what ebay charges its sellers to list an item. The more money an item sells for, the more you get as an affiliate.

The cool thing about ebay’s affiliate program is that they provide you with so many tools to help you make money.

The ebay API is the number one tool that they provide to their affiliates, or anyone. The ebay API allows you to retrieve listing data directly from ebay. The data is returned in xml format, instantly! I use the api to get listings of what ever I’m promoting.

At first, I was a little intimidated by the API; I’m not really a programmer. But with the help of google and some PHP related queries, I was able to understand the ebay API have it output the data I sought.

Optimizing My Ebay Campaigns

Although I didn’t make a lot of money with the program this month (advertising ate most of my profits), I’m determined to increase my earnings this month.

Last month, I had a 45% CTR and earned $4,796.78. My goal for this month is to increase my CTR to 75% or higher. With a higher CTR, I will be able keep more of that $4,796.78 :-).

I will do the following to increase my CTR:

1. I will get a domain name for each product I’m promoting and build a mini site around it. Right now, I have one general domain and simply create a page for each product that I’m promoting. For example, If I’m marketing Dyson Vacuums, I would create a Dyson Vacuum and place it at www.domainname.com/DysonVacuum.What I will do is create brand new sites revolving around the product. So instead of www.domainname.com/DysonVacuum, I will create www.DysonVacuumOnSale.Com (just an example, I don’t own that site if it does exist).
2. I will go over the keyword data that I’ve collected over the past month and eliminate the ones that didn’t convert so well. By eliminating the duds, I will increase my overall conversion rate.
3. I will redesign my landing pages. I’m not really much of a designer. I will probably get someone to design some pages for me.
4. I will expand to MSN Adcenter. I tried Adcenter before, but it seems like they simply take forever to get anything done over there. I don’t know, maybe I’m doing something wrong.

Next month I will post the outcomes! Enjoy the rest of your day. Peace out!

Affiliate Marketing, Ebay

Something is up with ebay’s tracking system. I signed into my CJ account today to see how my ebay campaign did over the weekend only to be shocked by the numbers. On a typical $400 sale, the commission is usually between $10-$20. For the past 2 days, I’ve been getting less than $1 on sales ranging from $250-$475. Something is definitely not right.

Has anyone else experienced this today? Does this happen often to ebay affiliates? The reason I ask is because I’ve only been an ebay affiliate for about 3 weeks. The last thing I want to do is keep spending money on PPC and not being properly compensated.

If you are experiencing the same thing, or have experienced this in the past, please drop me a line.

Ebay