For those who sell on ebay… advice on new rules.

[Graeme Dingwall]

Hi Hugh

As far as I can make out HTML links are fine, I think they are trying to do away with java script content.

I’ve not looked into it properly but that was my take on it. So links to you tube etc should be ok.

I may be wrong! 😆

[Hugh Potter]

Hi Graeme, I just don’t understand all the jargon, I think they’re getting at embedded videos, such as the one I use, I guess I’ll wait and see what content they block and I’ll know what to change!!

[Graeme Dingwall]

Hugh,

just found this give it a try and it tells you what’s right or wrong with your listing.

http://www.i-ways.net/mobile-friendly/en-uk//

Graeme

[Denise Goodfellow]

We use a template bought from eBay.
It had the ability to load several photos and when you hover over the small image the big images changed.

We’ve had to change to another template where there is only one image in the template, but you can still use up to 8 I think via eBay

[Peter Johnson]

Hi.

Ebay say you can still embed a video in an eBay listing, but it’s the method of how you embed it.

At the moment, most videos are stored on Youtube and the link that they supply to embed the video is what is going to be banned.

Currently, Youtube generates an embed code using the ‘iFrame’ coding. This is active content and will be banned in the future.
Ebay say that this can be replaced using pure HTML5 coding. The video needs to be in an MP4 format and then needs to be hosted on another site. This is the code they say that needs to be used;

<video width="320" height="240">
<source src="movie.mp4" type="video/mp4">
<p>Here is a video of the product</p>
</video>

Effectively, you need to replace the ‘movie.mp4’ bit with the link to your movie and the ‘Here is a video of the product’ with your own description.

As far as I can see, Youtube videos are not in MP4 format and so they cannot be linked using the HTML5 code

I’ve been looking into this quite a bit and at this moment in time, the only thing I can say is that embedding a video in the eBay listing is currently a no-no. You could add a link to direct people to the video, but it MUST open in a new tab, or a new window.
I can not emphasise strongly enough how important it is that you do not navigate an eBay user away from eBay in the same window, or else Ebay’s wrath will descend upon thee heavily if you navigate a potential buyer away from their site to another.

I’m still investigating this issue and if I find out any more on this, I will post back here. Unless someone else knows the solution? 😉

[Hugh Potter]

quote Peter Johnson:

Hi.

Ebay say you can still embed a video in an eBay listing, but it’s the method of how you embed it.

At the moment, most videos are stored on Youtube and the link that they supply to embed the video is what is going to be banned.

Currently, Youtube generates an embed code using the ‘iFrame’ coding. This is active content and will be banned in the future.
Ebay say that this can be replaced using pure HTML5 coding. The video needs to be in an MP4 format and then needs to be hosted on another site. This is the code they say that needs to be used;

<video width="320" height="240">
<source src="movie.mp4" type="video/mp4">
<p>Here is a video of the product</p>
</video>

Effectively, you need to replace the ‘movie.mp4’ bit with the link to your movie and the ‘Here is a video of the product’ with your own description.

As far as I can see, Youtube videos are not in MP4 format and so they cannot be linked using the HTML5 code

I’ve been looking into this quite a bit and at this moment in time, the only thing I can say is that embedding a video in the eBay listing is currently a no-no. You could add a link to direct people to the video, but it MUST open in a new tab, or a new window.
I can not emphasise strongly enough how important it is that you do not navigate an eBay user away from eBay in the same window, or else Ebay’s wrath will descend upon thee heavily if you navigate a potential buyer away from their site to another.

I’m still investigating this issue and if I find out any more on this, I will post back here. Unless someone else knows the solution? 😉

Thank you Peter, It’s certainly a bit of a minefield!!! the embedded videos are still currently there but I’ll have to reload it to my photobox account as I think they’re on youtube currently. You’d think that youtube would recognise this and just supply a link option to use!!!

Best
Hugh

[Peter Johnson]

I’ve been really busy recently, trying to get a workshop in order for me to move into (landlords are a bit useless – can’t find their own @sses with both hands – and can’t seem to organise anything), so I’ve had to do most of the work myself (in lieu of free rent for a couple of months).

Anyway, I finally got around to looking into this properly and actually embedded a video that passed all of the ‘active content’ rules/checks in one of my own listings.

So, how to do it?

1. First of all, your video has to be in .mp4 format. If your existing videos are .wmv, .avi or whatever, you’ll either have to remake them, or find a video converter and re-compile them as .mp4.

2. Find somewhere you can host the file. You need to make sure that the host will allow .mp4 files and that you can make a direct URL link to them e.g. http://yourhostservername/yourvideo.mp4

3. Copy and paste in the following HTML code into your eBay listing;

<video controls="" height="480" width="640" poster="XXXXXX">
&nbsp;<source src="XXXXXXXX" type="video/mp4">

4. Change the XXXXXX in poster= to a jpeg image you would like to display where the video screen will appear in your listing. Make this image 480pxl high and 640pxl wide to fit the video frame.
If you don’t change this, the video screen will display the first frame of your video (this could be a frame from the video, or a blank screen).
As with the video, this has to be a complete URL link to the image e.g. http://yourhostservername/yourimage.jpg

The link has to go in-between the " " (double quotation) marks.

5. Change the XXXXXXXX in src= to the URL link to your video. As with the poster image, the link has to go in-between the " " (double quotation) marks.

To test if your links work properly, before editing your eBay listing, just paste it into your browser address bar and see if either the image displays, or the video runs. If the links are correct, they should.

And finally, once you have added the code to your listing, you should see a small section in the live listing titled ‘In June 2017, eBay will turn off all active content in listings’

Click the ‘Preview’ link and see if the video is still there. If it is, all done.

Hope this works for you.

[Hugh Potter]

Thank you Peter, very comprehensive instructions! Hopefully I’ll get around to it before the changes!!