hey guys, even though we are getting customers, have some brilliant promotional work being published and big companys like the woodland trust onboard we have still decided to put some special offers of our hosting on ebay to try and generate a bit of fast income to boost the business at the start, just wondered what you guys thought about this, i no ebay is full of crap and bull but its got to be worth a go hasnt it

I don't think that eBay is full of crap, but there's certanly a lot of crap sold through it. None the less, when I go looking for replacement parts for my personal computer or motorbike, I usually end up on eBay at some point.

Selling a service through it I've never tried. You'll probably do well to offer a packaged deal of sorts - but hosting on it's own MAY sell. Never tried it.

Craigs List on the other hand - there are plenty of reviews about how well that does. Also, never used it, but there's lots of people who have and have done well.

eBay does provide a category for this, but I've never personally tried it. From looking through the category though I've noticed a lot of what appears to be junk, but I could be wrong. Wonder what the conversion rate is like. Let us know the results if you attempt this, I'd surely be interested

Tried it, seems to not work to well unless you offer your service at $0.01.

Agreed, ebay is full of oversellers promising the moon on a stick for next to nothing, and for the type of people who generally search for hosting on ebay, they will be unlikely to differentiate between your offerings and these fantastical ones. Hence you will lose out to them every time.

It is possible, I've seen HostGator doing it for years. I use ebay for a few digital products and scripts (include hosting), but I have never tried to sell hosting alone.

We've never considered advertising on eBay, but I'm guessing, what could it hurt? Might be worth a test trial.

It definately is, Steve.

Exactly. How do you compete with someone that is selling hosting for only $5 for 5 years? Someone that is looking for a deal and doesn't know any better is going to go for that, not realizing what they are buying is complete rubbish and the company probably won't be around in a month or two to honor the 5 years.

You can't compete on price, but you can compete on a perception of value. Trying it once with less than desirable results doesn't mean your approach can't be tweaked for better results. If it's not a good fit, drop it and move on to another strategy.

This is interesting, we never tried to sell Hosting on eBay either but it could be a quick start and boost.

Never looked into it, but definitely something to consider.

I knew a friend who went the eBay/oversell route and quickly gained customers and managed to sustain hosting pretty well a few years back.

ebay is great, but I don't know how people can offer hosting for pence on ebay and actually make that a viable business!

we actually do it with a coupon code, as opposed to FREE FREE FREEE service for 8907 YEARS!

Coupon code for 99% first month on any plan discount.

Turnover has been decent..