September – The month of back to school, is-it-too-early-to-put-the-heating-on thoughts and the following not-to-be-missed eCommerce news:
eBay Puts Watermarks Under the Bridge
eBay has updated their photo policy putting a ban on all watermarked images . Those failing to comply by 01 March 2018 will have their listings removed. eBay believes that clear images help “intuitive browsing” and it also means that they can promote your listings on Google, Bing and other search engines – as well as on their own listing features (you might recall that back in August eBay announced new image searching). All in all, we think it’s a good move.
Read our ‘top five photography tips’ to find out how to make your product images stand out and how Expandly can help you quickly and easily update your photos across all multiple sales channel(s).
Shopify Gets Down with the Kids
This month Shopify launched an app enabling you to produce QR codes for your store and/or products for free. That’s just in time for Apple‘s new IOS11 addition, which enables iPhone users to scan QR codes automatically via the camera. For those not in the know, QR stands for ‘quick response’ and is a 2D barcode, which, when scanned by a smartphone, opens up a unique URL link (i.e. your website).
You’ve Got Mail x 2
Speaking of free additions, Royal Mail has added free email notifications to their International Tracked postage, when used by business accounts. Now, you’ll receive an email notification when the item:
– Leaves the UK;
– Arrives in the destination country;
– Clears customs; and
– Is delivered/attempted to be.
This information can then be forwarded to customers because updated customers = happy customers.
Google Respectfully Disagrees
Back in June you might recall us telling you all about Google’s €2.42 billion fine for tweaking shopping comparison results so to give “prominent placing” to Google Shopping and not so prominent placing to rival companies.
As expected, Google would much rather spend that money on something else and has appealed the European Commission’s decision, which could take several years to be finally ruled on. Rumour has it that Google will nonetheless make its shopping service standalone, requiring it to bid for ad space like anyone else but whatever happens our advice, as before, is that no matter what the final outcome is, you should all be multi-channel selling.
Many Happy (search) Returns
Yep, one of our favourite search engines will have to stop that naughty behaviour because it has entered the last year of its teens. Google started out in 1997 from a garage (something that sounds mighty familiar to the Expandly guys) and now boasts more than 4.5 billion users, across 160 countries and 123 languages. They grow up so fast