Review: ChannelAdvisor Pro utility software

There have been plenty of products which claim to take the pain out of eBay management, but what makes ChannelAdvisor Pro different is that it’s a scaled down commercial package rather than a jumped up piece of shareware.

There is no installation to worry about, as the whole package is managed online, using a secure website. The benefits of this are that any computer with internet access can be used to manage your account and auctions.

The biggest problem to ChannelAdvisor Pro that needs to be overcome is the desperately daunting interface. The professional underpinnings are never far from the surface, and while it all looks pretty enough, it takes a lot of exploring to work out what the various forms relate to and how to get them working.

Once done though, it does give a good degree of automation to your eBay business. If you want to schedule auctions to start at specific times of day, store images and descriptions of items you sell in larger quantities to save repeatedly typing in descriptions and uploading, it makes sense.

It also takes over dull behind the scenes stuff too, updating stock lists, generating delivery notes, invoices and leaving predetermined feedback.

At £3.90 per month for the basic package, the costs are very reasonable but that’s not the end of the spend. Five pence per listing at the start of each auction and a final value fee is levied if and when the auction is won.

The fee is 0.95% of the total, including your delivery charges and this should be factored in when weighing up the value of ChannelAdvisor Pro to your eBay business. Happily, a maximum fee is set at £1.95, but there is a minimum final value fee of 10 pence for very low value items.

Bearing in the mind that the standard eBay listing fees still apply, you need to be really taking advantage of the extra features the package offers to justify the costs.

The billing is managed through your Paypal account to keep things simple.

If it all sounds a bit serious, that’s because it is. If eBay is your bit of fun and occasional source of extra pin money, you’ll manage just fine without the extra help this powerful package provides.

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