Facebook IPO is biggest successful “flop” ever

May 18, 2012

The much hyped Facebook IPO onto the Nasdaq is looking like a bit of a flop with shares initially rising to to $45 before dropping back towards the original $38 asking price and settling around $42 per share. Well it’s a flop for those hoping… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Social Media | 4 Comments 

Ecommerce: you can have too much packaging!

May 18, 2012

As parcels and packages move thorugh the postal service, or are handled by couriers, they don’t get treated with much respect. Ecommerce sellers should expect the despatches to be banged and bounced and dropped like a rugby ball on match day at… Read more

Written by Dan Wilson · Filed Under Ecommerce | 13 Comments 

Rakuten lead $100m investment in Pinterest

May 17, 2012

Rakuten are continuing their habit of swallowing up Western ecommerce properties and their latest investment is a cool $100 million in Pinterest. The investment is led by Rakuten in partnership with a number of other investors. Pinterest might be… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Ecommerce, Social Media | 1 Comment 

Live HMRC e-Marketplaces Tax Q&A on Twitter this evening

May 16, 2012

If you’re an online seller and have any tax questions then log on to Twitter between 7pm and 8pm this evening. HM Revenue and Customs are hosting a live Twitter Question and Answer session today and there will be a tax expert on hand to answer your… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Marketplaces, News | 10 Comments 

36% of SME use Facebook, 60% are digital dinosaurs

May 14, 2012

Over one third of UK small businesses say that they now use Facebook to drum up new customers – more than local directories such as Yellow Pages and Thomson and substantially more than print or online advertising. That’s the findings of a survey… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Social Media | 16 Comments 

iwoca to host panel of commercial eBay sellers at Catalyst

May 8, 2012

There are only a couple of weeks left until the biggest marketplaces/ecommerce conference in the UK this year. ChannelAdvisor Catalyst is on the 28th – 29th May in London and news is just in of a panel discussion where some of the fastest growing… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Marketplaces | 7 Comments 

Tamebay’s Guide to Social Media Commerce

May 5, 2012

We’ve had lot’s of people say that they can’t see the point of social media and how it fits in with ecommerce so here’s a helpful guide as to which social media site to use for what: Twitter I’m selling on #eBay Facebook I Like… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Ecommerce, Events, Social Media | 1 Comment 

ekmSiteBuilder.com – new and improved

May 3, 2012

There’s a big difference between a website and a ecommerce site and many businesses want an online presence without necessarily needing a shopping cart solution. ekmPowershop today told us that they’ve launched a new and improved version of their… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Ecommerce, Web Design | Leave a Comment 

New: PayPal Media Network adverts powered by Where

May 3, 2012

A year ago eBay acquired a company called Where, a location media company with a local discovery app for mobile phones. At the time they announced their intention to integrate Where with PayPal making PayPal the payment method of choice for… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Ecommerce, Marketing, Paypal | Leave a Comment 

Monsoon continue expansion plans to service EU clients

May 3, 2012

Following the Monsoon seller summit in London last month they’ve released some impressive growth stats. They’ve announced a 73% increase in first quarter merchant sales of general merchandise compared with the same period in 2011 – that’s not… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Ecommerce, Marketplaces | Leave a Comment 

High Court rules British ISPs must block The Pirate Bay

May 2, 2012

Shiver m’timbers. The British High Court has ruled that ISPs must ban UK users from accessing Swedish file sharing site The Pirate Bay. The site, which allows users to share media such as music, films and games freely and without payment… Read more

Written by Dan Wilson · Filed Under Ecommerce, News | 3 Comments 

32,500 eBay traders should expect an HMRC delivery

May 2, 2012

32,500 eBay and online traders will start receiving letters from HMRC today asking about their online selling activities. The letters are being sent to people who are trading on what HMRC call “e-marketplaces” but you can bet your life that mainly… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Ecommerce, Featured, Marketplaces, News | 20 Comments 

99p delivery charge… from Hong Kong!

April 30, 2012

I bought something on eBay yesterday. Not exactly an unusual occurrence, I buy lots on eBay, but this time I chose to make the purchase from a seller in Hong Kong. The item wasn’t particularly expensive, but it’s light in weight. eBay’s Best… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Customer Service, Ecommerce | 24 Comments 

eBid.net launch in Brazil and Malaysia

April 27, 2012

British based eBay wannabe, eBid.net, are continuing their global expansion by launching services in Brazil and Malaysia. Buyers and sellers will be able to trade in the Brazilian Real and the Malaysian Rigga for the first time. eBid claims to have… Read more

Written by Dan Wilson · Filed Under Ecommerce, Marketplaces | 8 Comments 

Alibaba.com Inspection Service $1 Promotion

April 26, 2012

Late in 2011 we reported that Alibaba.com had introduced an inspection service for merchants. Often, buyers on Alibaba are concerned that the stock they have bought is not as expected or of the appropriate quality. The accredited inspectors will… Read more

Written by Dan Wilson · Filed Under Ecommerce, News | 6 Comments 

Every little helps: Tesco to spend £150m improving online shopping

April 25, 2012

As part of a £1bn round of business investment to improve flagging results, retail giant Tesco is reported to be spending £150m on improving its online shopping experience. It is likely that some of that considerable sum will be spent on the new… Read more

Written by Dan Wilson · Filed Under Ecommerce, News | 2 Comments 

We’re back in recession! But ecommerce bucks the trends.

April 25, 2012

The Government announced today that the British economy is officially back in recession. That means that we’ve seen two consecutive quarters of negative growth. Britain was last in recession in 2009 and this is the first so called “double-dip”… Read more

Written by Dan Wilson · Filed Under Ecommerce, News | 3 Comments 

Enterprise Nation “Go Global” Event, Thursday

April 24, 2012

As part of its ongoing “Go Global” events, Enterprise Nation will be hosting an event in Central London on Thursday looking at trading internationally using Facebook and eBay. I’ll be talking eBay (which all of you will already know about) and… Read more

Written by Dan Wilson · Filed Under Ecommerce, Events | Leave a Comment 

Cross-border VAT registration: Timing is everything

April 23, 2012

At Tamebay we know that many ecommerce SMEs are concerned with tax matters and VAT comes quite high up the list of headaches. In this guest post, Andy Spencer, Head of Consulting at Accordance  looks at some of the concerns regarding VAT and the… Read more

Written by Dan Wilson · Filed Under Ecommerce | 35 Comments 

Internet Retailing #IRX2012 presentations now available online

April 18, 2012

Chris and I were pleased to attend the Internet Retailing Expo  back in March at the Birmingham NEC. We saw some of you there and plan to attend next year, as it is a very useful event. For those of you who didn’t attend, happily they recorded… Read more

Written by Dan Wilson · Filed Under Ecommerce, Events, News | Comments Off 

Gumtree launch three new UK TV ads

April 17, 2012

Gumtree are back in the TV ads market. They’ve launched three new ads yesterday plugging the three core areas of the classified ads site – Jobs, Motors and goods for sale. The ads are all about how easy it is to bring people together to trade on… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Ecommerce, Marketplaces | 7 Comments 

Before Facebook there was eBay….

April 16, 2012

Mark is a long time eBay trader, in fact I think he and I probably started trading on eBay about the same time some ten years or so ago. As well as a successful collectables business he also runs Business Photography and can shoot stunning… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under eBay, Facebook, Social Media | 12 Comments 

Tesco quietly launches online marketplace

April 15, 2012

Tesco is now officially a competitor to Amazon and eBay having opened up Tesco Direct to third party retailers. So far on Tesco I’ve spotted products from both Maplin and from online gardening retailer Crocus. You’ll also notice that every product… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Ecommerce, Featured, Marketplaces | 26 Comments 

5 million social media views in just one day!

April 13, 2012

We’ve just stumbled across a YouTube video that received over 5 million hits in less then 24 hours. It’s a class lesson in how social media can be used to get your message across and viewed by thousands or even millions of people in a short space of… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Social Media | 5 Comments 

iContact now integrates with LinkedIn

April 12, 2012

Social Media interests me and from my observations Facebook and Twitter are more “social” and LinkedIn is more “business”. That’s why it was good to hear that iContact have expanded their service by integrating their email and social media marketing… Read more

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Ecommerce, Social Media | Comments Off