Ebay has been really good to me. I’ll admit, when I first discovered the Ebay affiliate program, I was hooked. Where else could you get such a wide assortment of products to sell to your visitors and make a little cash?
Before you get all excited and run over to Ebay to sign up if your not already, wait a second. Ebay has changed the game on everyone with a surprise announcement last month that they will change the way that affiliates are paid.
Affiliates are no longer paid a certain percentage on each sales transaction, which was basically half of what Ebay’s portion of the sales fees to the sellers. Affiliates are now paid based on the number of clicks that you drive to Ebay, and the amount you get per click is based on the “quality” of those clicks.
What constitutes quality? That’s the big question for everyone. If you look at the Ebay forum you’ll see that there are varying thoughts on the new program, some good, mostly bad. At least from the affiliate point of view.
So much for keeping it simple eh?
I can no longer apply any level of strategy to increase my earnings at Ebay now that some “quality” aspect of the calculation determines how much I am paid, so I’m sitting in a holding pattern until I’m able to determine exactly how much I can effect “quality”, when all I do is gather search traffic and direct them over to Ebay.
On top of all the changes, it becomes distressing when you see that for a single day, under the old pay structure you would have made $50, but the new QCP program is only paying you $2.50. The disparity is hardly motivating.
During the preview period over the last month and a half, I’ve seen days where I’m paid $0.01 per click, and the next day it jumps to $0.50, and the day after that, $1 per click, only to plummet to $0.05 the following day! If this was the only means of income I had, my heart would stop beating, or I’d wish it would.
However, not to be a complete slam against the new program, there were days where I would not have made a cent, yet came away with $50 under the new program. There are the up days, and it’s seemingly left to chance that the up days outnumber the down days.
Like I said, the actual calculation is a complete mystery, and I’ve been unable to make heads or tails of it so far.
So as I sit, watch and wait for days to pass while I analyze what the hell is going on, I’ll be getting my head in order and back to blogging more frequently.
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Wayne John is a web developer in Southern California that shares his 25+ years of programming and web development experience freely and happily to anyone willing to learn. He also loathes speaking in the third person. If you enjoyed this post, make sure you 
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ikaran (1)
Lindsay (1)
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I’m not a fan of the new QCP, I took a big earnings hit. However, I did notice that under QCP I get paid for bot traffic (at least so far). I setup a site in a very tiny niche and four days after it launched it got 84 clicks, the next day it got 91 clicks. I figured it was obviously bot traffic and my QCP would be close to 1 or 2 cents if not 0 due to it, however all clicks were paid out at average of my other site’s QCP price. Still, I would prefer to have the old payment scheme back.
Patrick´s last blog ..IHC 2-8-0 locomotive Denver & Rio Grande #1169
I hear ya. The old method was easier to understand, and you could see how to improve your earnings.
I get the feeling that Ebay is in trouble, and they’re trying to save money wherever they can. So who’s the first to take a hit? Affiliates.
Regardless of what they tell you, they’re trying to reduce their case outflow. Period.
You have a nice blog and the information you are providing is valuable to people looking to make money on their blogs/site through ebay. I like the way you write and present your articles in a simple and easy to read format.
Tom Bailey´s last blog ..Flyfishing charity?
Mmm I just thinking if ebay using paid per click type, then It should be must easier to get click conversion than if paid per per sale. But if E-bay change the policy, they maybe already calculate that the new system will benefit more for them.
Ruri @ Free article directory´s last blog ..Learn About Travel Trailers and RVs
WOW, that is extremely disappointing. I was going to integrate an ebay type “store” on my pet related blog.. Instead I went with amazon, which has been pretty good. Have you considered doing something like that? Searching for some good amazon products and doing basically the same thing?
The only other think that makes me decent money, about $300 a month, is reselling hosting through hostmonster at $90 per signup.
Lindsay´s last blog ..The PetRageous and All Pets Club Fashion show was a hit!
It isn’t so much disappointment as it is like having the rug pulled from under your feet. It’s their game, and a reminder to me that everything can change with a *snap* of someones fingers. Just not my fingers.
I’m going to make a few changes here on the blog. I’ve been doing alright with the hosting reselling as well. I think it’s time to push that a bit more.
I had another, non-ebay ad system running on my blog which I used to get $1 – $2.50 per click. Last week, I had a day where I got 5 clicks for—get this—ZERO cents. Can’t beat zero!
I don’t waste my ad space with such crap. It’s gone now.
DeadRooster´s last blog ..Dead Rooster Turns 100