Author: Ina Steiner

Ina Steiner is co-founder and Editor of EcommerceBytes and has been reporting on ecommerce since 1999. She's a widely cited authority on marketplace selling and is author of "Turn eBay Data Into Dollars" (McGraw-Hill 2006). Her blog was featured in the book, "Blogging Heroes" (Wiley 2008). She is a member of the Online News Association (Sep 2005 - present) and Investigative Reporters and Editors (Mar 2006 - present). Follow her on Twitter at @ecommercebytes and send news tips to ina@ecommercebytes.com. See disclosure at EcommerceBytes.com/disclosure/.

Set It and Forget It: Etsy Launches Auto Renew Feature

March 23, 2015August 22, 2017 Ina Steiner

Now that Etsy has revamped its listing infrastructure, it’s able to offer new functionality, and one that sellers appear to be welcoming is auto-renew. “You’ve told us that manually renewing listings after the four-month listing period ends is time consuming. Read more

Amazon Proves One-hour Delivery Is a Day at the Beach

March 20, 2015August 22, 2017 Ina Steiner

Amazon.com expanded its Prime Now same-day delivery service to Baltimore and Miami. The service is free for 2-hour delivery and costs $7.99 for one-hour delivery. Amazons spokesperson Kelly Cheeseman told the Miami Herald many of the items available through the Prime Now Read more

Amazon Gets Permission to Test Drones in US Airspace

March 20, 2015August 22, 2017 Ina Steiner

The FAA will allow Amazon to test its drones, the agency revealed on Thursday. The Federal Aviation Administration issued an “experimental airworthiness certificate” to an Amazon Logistics, Inc. unmanned aircraft (UAS) design that the company will use for research and Read more

Etsy Bans Popular Third-Party Listing Tool BETSI

March 20, 2015August 22, 2017 Ina Steiner

Etsy is pulling a popular listing-management tool from its API program. In a surprise email to users on Thursday, the marketplace told sellers the third-party applications BETSI and BETSI lite will no longer have access to the Etsy Application Programming Read more

eBay Explains How Royal Mail Rate Changes Impact Sellers

March 19, 2015August 22, 2017 Ina Steiner

eBay issued a notice to sellers in the UK, informing them of the Royal Mail rate changes for 2015. “We want to explain how this affects you,” eBay UK stated. Announced at the end of February, the changes take effect Read more

USPS Ends Support for Click-N-Ship for Business App

March 19, 2015August 22, 2017 Ina Steiner

The U.S. Postal Service is ending standalone support for its Click-N-Ship for Business App (CNSB), formerly called Shipping Assistant, which launched in 2003. USPS spokesperson Darleen Reid confirmed that the organization had sent an email blast to customers this week Read more

Amazon Shutting Webstore Ecommerce-Hosting Service

March 19, 2015August 22, 2017 Ina Steiner

Rumors surfaced at the IRCE Focus: Digital Design conference on Wednesday that Amazon will close its web-hosting service. Kevin Richards, CEO of Ventura Web Design, was speaking on a panel about the basics of ecommerce site design. He confirmed the news Read more

eBay Compensates Shoppers for Slow Delivery and SNADs

March 19, 2015August 22, 2017 Ina Steiner

Several threads on its discussion boards reveal that eBay is giving away $5 in coupons to shoppers who experience delays in receiving their package, or experienced other problems with their orders. One user who said she mostly sells on eBay Read more

eBay UK Promotion Gives Sellers a Break on Commission Fee

March 18, 2015August 22, 2017 Ina Steiner

eBay UK is running a promotion in which it gives sellers a break on commission fees. However, the sale applies only to one item, with plenty of restrictions. The promotion is by invitation only and applies only to private (casual) Read more

Will Online Sellers Use Facebook’s New Payments Service?

March 18, 2015August 22, 2017 Ina Steiner

Facebook’s brand new payment service has several things going for it that might sound appealing to online sellers – first of all, it’s free. Secondly, there’s no risk of chargebacks since senders cannot use credit cards to fund payments. But Read more