Last Chance for Special Developer Offer -- Act by Friday, 10/9!

We had a great webinar with developers last Thursday outlining the Selling Manager Applications developer opportunity we're offering before the holiday shopping season. If you had to miss it, not to worry! You can still email us at developer-relations AT ebay.com to get the details and get in on our offer before our deadline Next Week.

As a recap, if you submit your Business Readiness Review and your Billing Plan by Friday, October 9th, then successfully complete your Application Review to launch your SM Application by Thursday, November 15th, you’ll get:

four hours of premium DTS Support Requests and LiveHelp (a $300 value)

premier marketing placement as a featured application for the month of December on the eBay Applications Directory (http://applications.ebay.com)

we'll waive our eBay cut of the rev share (20%) through March 2010 –- so you get to keep 100% of your application fees earned through March 31, 2010

We want you to join us, so don’t delay! Email us and get in on our special deal by Friday, October 9th, so that you’re ready to access new customers and make more money in time for the busiest selling and shopping season on eBay.com.

- Delyn

Bill Me Later Coming Soon to eBay

In the coming weeks we'll be introducing Bill Me Later on eBay, as well as on other merchant sites through PayPal, beginning with a launch for a limited number of buyers and sellers in the U.S.

Qualified PayPal customers will be able to use Bill Me Later during eBay checkout. For select sellers, PayPal will automatically add Bill Me Later as a way to pay. Sellers included in the initial rollout will be notified via email by PayPal.

Developers who currently support PayPal will not need to make any code changes to support Bill Me Later. In GetItemTransactions and related calls, items that are paid for using Bill Me Later will use the existing PayPal value in the BuyerPaymentMethodCodeType.

Third-party checkout (3PXO) providers must use Express Checkout for Bill Me Later purchases. Bill Me Later is not supported by CP Cart.

Find out more at https://www.billmelater.com/help/ebay_seller_faq.xhtml.

Video Interview with 2009 eBay Star Developer Award Winner WatchCount.com

"WatchCount.com shows how many watchers the most popular items on eBay have accumulated."

-- Jake Becker (helios825) of WatchCount.com on how eBay buyers and sellers use his tool

Becker joined us in June for the eBay Developers Conference 2009 at eBay's campus in San Jose to discuss his recent win in the Service to the Community category of the eBay Star Developer Awards. Sellers use WatchCount.com to know which items are popular to source/niches worth focusing on for research. Shoppers use WatchCount.com widgets to find that great deal they've been looking for. Check out his Success Story to learn more.

Becker talks about the core APIs that run his app, such as FindPopularItems from the Shopping API, GetMostWatchedItems from the Merchandising API, GetSingleItem, and GetCategoryInfo. As for his prolific posting of terrific answers in the developer forums behind his Star Developer Award? "I go to the developer forums often to look for information and news, but when I see someone ask a question, I feel compelled to help them out. I still feel like newbie myself sometimes."

Watch our interview with Jake filmed on location at eBay DevCon below (clip is 5:52 in length).

- Delyn

North America

• US/CA/CAFR: Significant changes in Computers, Sports Trading Cards, and Home & Garden. Minor changes elsewhere. 1675 changes total, including 82 new categories and 1407 removals. See detail below.
• Motors: Moving Golf Cars (Electric & Gas) from .com to Motors. Adding new models in Cars & Trucks. Adding new categories in Car & Truck Parts. 45 changes total.

Germany/Austria/Switzerland

• 915 category removals in DIY Materials & Tools; Tickets & Travel. 938 changes total.

UK/Ireland

• Creating new L1 for Events Tickets. Renaming L1 Tickets & Travel to Holidays & Travel and consolidating subcategories. 94 changes total.

Australia

• Significant category adds and removals across the site to improve alignment with US & UK structures. 4322 changes total.

Poland

• Adding 219 categories in Video Games. 249 changes total.

No SR2 category changes for Belgium, France, Hong Kong, India, Italy, Malaysia, Netherlands, Philippines, Singapore, Spain.

North America Detail

The full list of September US category changes by meta is posted here.

Verticals Initiatives

• Computers & Networking: Combining Apple and PC categories for components, accessories, monitors etc.; replacing many subcategories with Custom Item Specifics

Seller Tag Rollups
Custom Item Specifics (aka Seller Tags) are replacing categories in:

• Cameras & Photo: Binoculars
• Clothing, Shoes & Accessories: Men's Belt Buckles; Men's & Women's Sunglasses; Men's Ties; Men's Underwear; Bridal Veils, Tiaras & Headbands; Wedding-Boys' Attire; Women's Belts
• Computers: CPUs, Motherboards, Monitors, Keyboards, Laptop Batteries, Laptop AC Adapters, Networking Hubs
• Home & Garden: Furniture; Vacuum Cleaners; Refrigerators; Portable & Space Heaters
• Sports Mem, Cards & Fan Shop: Trading Cards

Improving Trust
Changes implemented in coordination with the Trust & Safety team for:

• Jewelry & Watches: Clarifying policy for vintage Native American jewelry by renaming category to: Native American (pre-1935)
• Sporting Goods: Electric- & gas-powered Golf Cars are moving to eBay Motors.
• Video Games: Removing Internet Games (Second Life, etc.)

Marketplaces Strategy Initiatives

• Everything Else: Creating a category for World of Good

Classification Initiatives

• Electronics: Dividing Stage Lighting & Effects from Pro Audio Equipment; Pro Audio Equipment moves to Musical Instruments
• Home & Garden: Dividing Wedding Supplies and Holidays, Cards & Party Supplies into separate L2s

Item Specifics

Significant updates

• Books: Antiquarian; Audiobooks; Children's; Fiction; Non-Fiction; Magazines
• Sports Mem, Cards & Fan Shop: Cards

Minor updates

• Electronics: Televisions

Adjustments to coordinate with new catalogs

• Cell Phones & PDAs: Cell Phones & Cell Phone Accessories
• Coins: US Coins
• Computers: PC Laptops; Apple Desktops; Apple Laptops
• Sporting Goods: Skis;Road Bikes; Mountain Bikes

Help us improve eBay.com - Send your suggestions for category and item specifics changes to taxonomy@ebay.com!

Thanks,
Categories Team

Special Developer Offer: New App Store for eBay Sellers

Greetings eBay API developers!

We’re introducing a special offer for developers who launch their applications on eBay.com for Selling Manager and Selling Manager Pro subscribers in time for the upcoming holiday season. Selling Manager Applications are useful to any growing small business with needs around merchandising, customer service, mobile alerts, returns/ resolutions, bulk editing of listings, accounting, shipping, and more. eBay sellers need these tools even more around high volume times like the holidays.

So here’s the deal:

If you submit your Business Readiness Review and your Billing Plan by Friday, October 9th, then successfully complete your Application Review to launch your SM Application by Thursday, November 15th, you’ll get:

• four hours of premium DTS Support Requests and LiveHelp (a $300 value)
• premier marketing placement as a featured application for the month of December on the eBay Applications Directory (http://applications.ebay.com)
• we'll waive our eBay cut of the rev share (20%) through March 2010 –- so you get to keep 100% of your application fees earned through March 31, 2010

In order to take advantage of these incentives, you’ll want to join us for an informational webinar scheduled on Thursday, September 24 at 9:30am PT that will help you bring your application live to site, so you can take advantage of these incentives. Email us at developer-relations AT ebay.com to get the details.

Don’t delay! Email us to RSVP to the webinar on Thursday, September 24th and get in on our special deal by Friday, October 9th, so that you’re ready to access new customers and make more money in time for the busiest selling and shopping season on eBay.com.

- Delyn

635 Trading, Shopping, Client Alerts, Merchant Data API Docs Now Available

Please remember to use a test environment when updating applications to use a new schema version.

To find out when a version of the API will be available, see the table at the top of the Release Notes for that API.

You can find the latest API documentation at the eBay Developer Documentation Center.

Excluding Locations to Where You Ship Items

Starting with version 635, you will be able to use My eBay to create a list of the locations to where you will not ship items. Once set up, all items that you list on eBay will, by default, use the Ship To Exclusion List. If a buyer's primary ship to location is a location which you have listed as an excluded ship to location (or if the buyer does not have a primary ship to location), they will receive an error message if they attempt to buy or place a bid on your item.

You can override the settings in your Ship To Exclusion List using ExcludeShipToLocation fields in your item-listing calls. Use the ExcludeShipToLocation field to specify individual locations to which you will not ship. Including ExcludeShipToLocation in any AddItem family of calls overrides the default Ship To Exclusion List you might have set up in My eBay--only the sites specifically specified with ExcludeShipToLocation will be excluded. Specify NONE in ExcludeShipToLocation to open up all areas for shipping.

Specify locations to exclude using ISO Country Codes. The ExcludeShippingLocationDetails node in the GeteBayDetails response lists the valid ISO Country Code values that you can exclude for a given eBay site.

Here is an example of using the ExcludeToShipLocation field within an AddItem call:

...

  <ShippingDetails>
    <ExcludeShipToLocation>FR</ExcludeShipToLocation>
    <ExcludeShipToLocation>IT</ExcludeShipToLocation>
  </ShippingDetails>

...

With this call, bidders in France (FR) and Italy (IT) will be unable to buy the associated item; buyers in all other locations are eligible to buy the item, regardless of any settings in your global Ship To Exclusion List.

Alternately, use a value of NONE in the ExcludeToShipLocation field to disable the Ship To Exclusion List and allow buyers from all locations to bid on or buy your item:

  <ShippingDetails>
    <ExcludeShipToLocation>NONE</ExcludeShipToLocation>
  </ShippingDetails>

Use GetUserPreferences to review the default set of ExcludeShipToLocations that you've set up in My eBay, and whether or not the default Ship To Exclusion List is in effect:

  <GetUserPreferencesRequest xmlns="urn:ebay:apis:eBLBaseComponents">
    <ShowSellerExcludeShipToLocationPreference> true </ShowSellerExcludeShipToLocationPreference>
  </GetUserPreferencesRequest>

Special $99 Offer for PayPal X Innovate 2009 -- Register by 9/15

Our friends over at the PayPal Developer Network are throwing their platform launch event, PayPal X Innovate 2009, over November 3 and 4 in San Francisco.

PayPal X Innovate 2009 is where you can learn how to leverage the new PayPal APIs to your advantage and easily monetize your ideas with more than 40 sessions, keynotes from technology leaders, hands-on labs, partner exhibits, and special networking events. Conference session descriptions and speakers now live on www.paypal.com/innovate2009.

Special offer to eBay Developers Program members that expires Tuesday, September 15th -- $99 conference registration for eBay API developers.  DON'T DELAY -- Use promo code 99EBAY915 and register now before this deal ends on September 15th.

For more information about the new open PayPal platform and the Innovate event – see the blog, news & announcements on www.x.com. 

- Delyn

Featured SM App Developer: My.ShipRush Ship Center

Another eBay Ink-featured SM App of the Day: My.ShipRush Ship Center -- a Selling Manager application that helps sellers centralize and optimize the post-sale process, including that DSR-buster -- shipping!

Richard's put together a fantastic and comprehensive look at this useful tool -- read his write-up.

- Delyn

NEW: eBay API Developer Success Stories

Here at the eBay Developers Program, we know that we're only successful when developers are successful. You may be wondering, especially if you are new to the eBay API platform -- what does success look like? So, we're launching a new series featuring developers of all sizes who are creating cool apps and making money with the eBay API platform. Our eBay API Developer Success Stories are now live on the developer.ebay.com website.

We're launching our eBay API Developer Success Stories series with four success stories, focusing on Selling Manager Applications developers: ahTEXT, HostedSupport, MyShipRush & Terapeak.

Are you an eBay API Developer Success Story? Share it with us! We'll be publishing the ones our team likes best, then providing easy access to social media tools, so that your success story can be dugg, tweeted, blogged, facebooked, bookmarked & stumbled by your customers, staff & general fanbase.

Video interviews, seller testimonial quotes, and print versions of the stories have also been built in.  Take a look, and if you have a suggestion or feedback, please let us know how we can make these even better.

Get acquainted to different business models and strategies developers have used to make money on the eBay API platform. Check out our Success Stories today.

- Delyn