EBay Blackthorne - The Official Guide

eBay Blackthorne - The Official Guide
iii
Table Of Contents
eBay Blackthorne - Seller's Assistant Migration Guide ..................................................... 1
Preparing for Migration .................................................................................................. 1
Deciding Whether to Transfer Data from SA to Blackthorne .................................... 1
How to Transfer Data from SA to Blackthorne.......................................................... 1
To run the database repair:...................................................................................... 1
To backup your SA database: ................................................................................. 2
To remove old data: ................................................................................................ 2
Downloading and Installing............................................................................................ 2
To download and install eB: ................................................................................... 2
Already have Blackthorne Installed?.......................................................................... 3
Importing SA Data and Setting Your Preferences.......................................................... 3
To start Blackthorne:............................................................................................... 3
Changes from Seller's Assistant...................................................................................... 3
Submit from Items ...................................................................................................... 4
User Profiles vs. Field Presets .................................................................................... 4
The Servant ................................................................................................................. 4
Ad Template Studio.................................................................................................... 4
Combined Sales .......................................................................................................... 5
Listing Your First Item................................................................................................... 5
To List an Item:....................................................................................................... 6
Post Migration Recommendations................................................................................ 11
"Not Specified" Fields .............................................................................................. 12
Emails ....................................................................................................................... 12
To review your emails: ......................................................................................... 12
Packing Lists and Labels .......................................................................................... 12
To customize your printing templates: ................................................................. 12
Getting Help.................................................................................................................. 12
Thank You! ................................................................................................................... 13
eBay Blackthorne - The Official Guide............................................................................ 15
Introduction................................................................................................................... 15
Welcome to eBay Blackthorne! ................................................................................ 15
Overview............................................................................................................... 15
Thank You! ........................................................................................................... 16
System Requirements............................................................................................ 16
Conventions Used in this Guide ........................................................................... 16
Printing this Guide ................................................................................................ 17
Changes From Seller's Assistant Pro ........................................................................ 18
For Sellers Assistant Pro Users............................................................................. 18
Submit from Items ................................................................................................ 18
User Profiles vs. Field Presets .............................................................................. 18
The Servant ........................................................................................................... 18
Ad Template Studio.............................................................................................. 19
Combined Sales .................................................................................................... 19
Setting Up eBay Blackthorne........................................................................................ 20
iv
Setting Up eBay Blackthorne.................................................................................... 20
Subscribing ........................................................................................................... 20
Downloading the Software ................................................................................... 20
Installing the Software .......................................................................................... 21
Launching the Software ........................................................................................ 21
Testing Your Connection to eBay......................................................................... 21
Using the Setup Assistant ......................................................................................... 23
Using the Setup Assistant ..................................................................................... 23
Setting Options and Preferences ............................................................................... 28
Setting Options and Preferences ........................................................................... 28
Accounts ............................................................................................................... 30
Business Setup ...................................................................................................... 38
Presets ................................................................................................................... 41
Templates.............................................................................................................. 44
Connections........................................................................................................... 47
Getting Started .............................................................................................................. 50
Getting Started .......................................................................................................... 50
A Tour of the Main Window .................................................................................... 51
Importing Data.......................................................................................................... 52
Importing Data...................................................................................................... 52
Quick Start - Listing Your First Item........................................................................ 56
To List Your First Item: ........................................................................................ 56
Closing eBay Blackthorne ........................................................................................ 62
Overview of eBay Blackthorne..................................................................................... 63
Creating and Managing Items....................................................................................... 66
Creating and Managing Items................................................................................... 66
How do I keep all my items organized?................................................................ 67
Creating and Submitting Items ................................................................................. 69
Adding a New Item Record .................................................................................. 70
Entering Item Details ............................................................................................ 74
Previewing the Item Description ........................................................................ 113
Checking an Item for Fees and Errors ................................................................ 114
Submitting an Item.............................................................................................. 116
Fixing and Resubmitting Items with Submission Errors .................................... 119
Organizing Items..................................................................................................... 120
Organizing Items................................................................................................. 120
Using Folders to Organize Your Items ............................................................... 121
Using Lists to Organize Your Items ................................................................... 124
Using Filters to Organize Your Items................................................................. 127
Searching for a Record........................................................................................ 131
Archiving Items .................................................................................................. 133
Printing Items...................................................................................................... 134
Monitoring Listings .................................................................................................... 137
Monitoring Listings Overview................................................................................ 137
The Lifespan of a Listing........................................................................................ 138
Viewing Listings..................................................................................................... 142
Table Of Contents
v
Viewing Listings................................................................................................. 142
Modifying Listings.................................................................................................. 146
Modifying Listings.............................................................................................. 146
Resubmitting Listings ............................................................................................. 151
Resubmitting Listings ......................................................................................... 151
Printing Listings...................................................................................................... 156
Printing Listings.................................................................................................. 156
Viewing Related Pages on eBay............................................................................. 159
Responding to Questions ........................................................................................ 161
Processing Sales and Shipping.................................................................................... 162
Processing Sales and Shipping Overview............................................................... 162
The Lifespan of a Sale ............................................................................................ 163
Viewing Sales ......................................................................................................... 167
Viewing Sales ..................................................................................................... 167
Requesting Payments and Invoicing....................................................................... 171
Requesting Payments and Invoicing................................................................... 171
Receiving Payments................................................................................................ 189
Receiving Payments............................................................................................ 189
Shipping Items ........................................................................................................ 194
Shipping Items .................................................................................................... 194
Completing Sales .................................................................................................... 204
Completing Sales ................................................................................................ 204
Reporting on Sales .................................................................................................. 209
Reporting on Sales .............................................................................................. 209
Printing Sales .......................................................................................................... 215
Print Grid Setup .................................................................................................. 215
Printing the Sales Grid........................................................................................ 216
Printing Sales Details.......................................................................................... 217
Managing Contact Information................................................................................... 218
Managing Contact Information............................................................................... 218
Managing Buyers .................................................................................................... 220
Creating a New Buyer......................................................................................... 220
Viewing Buyer Filters......................................................................................... 220
Searching for a Buyer ......................................................................................... 221
Viewing the Buyers Feedback ............................................................................ 221
Copying Addresses to the Clipboard .................................................................. 221
Managing Suppliers ................................................................................................ 222
Creating a New Supplier..................................................................................... 222
Viewing Supplier Filters ..................................................................................... 223
Searching for a Supplier...................................................................................... 223
Managing Consignors ............................................................................................. 224
Creating a New Consignor.................................................................................. 224
Viewing Consignor Filters.................................................................................. 225
Searching for a Consignor .................................................................................. 225
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Navigating Modes....................................................................................................... 227
Navigating Modes................................................................................................... 227
Previous View..................................................................................................... 227
View History....................................................................................................... 227
QuickLinks.......................................................................................................... 228
Customizing Ad Templates......................................................................................... 231
Customizing Ad Templates..................................................................................... 231
Editing an Ad Template...................................................................................... 231
Viewing an Ad Template.................................................................................... 232
Formatting Text .................................................................................................. 233
Adding Item Field Tags ...................................................................................... 234
Adding Global AutoText .................................................................................... 237
Setting Ad Template Options.............................................................................. 239
Alternate Methods of Displaying Pictures.......................................................... 243
Using JavaScript in Ad Templates...................................................................... 245
Using Stylesheets in Ad Templates .................................................................... 245
Customizing Emails.................................................................................................... 246
Customizing Emails................................................................................................ 246
Editing an Email Template ................................................................................. 246
Viewing an Email Template ............................................................................... 247
Formatting Text .................................................................................................. 248
Adding Field Tags............................................................................................... 249
Adding Global AutoText .................................................................................... 250
Using Math Functions......................................................................................... 252
Building Combined Emails with Repeat Block.................................................. 253
Adding Combined Totals with RepeatTotal ....................................................... 254
Editing Pictures........................................................................................................... 255
Editing Pictures....................................................................................................... 255
Overview of the Picture Studio........................................................................... 255
Rotating............................................................................................................... 257
Cropping ............................................................................................................. 257
Zooming.............................................................................................................. 257
Scaling................................................................................................................. 258
Brightness and Contrast ...................................................................................... 258
Compression and Sizing ..................................................................................... 258
Undoing Changes................................................................................................ 260
Managing Multiple Seller Accounts ........................................................................... 262
Managing Multiple Seller Accounts ....................................................................... 262
Creating Seller Accounts .................................................................................... 262
Associating an Item with a Seller Account......................................................... 264
Viewing Information by Seller Account............................................................. 265
Managing Multiple Users ........................................................................................... 266
Managing Multiple Users ....................................................................................... 266
Administering Users ........................................................................................... 266
Networking ......................................................................................................... 272
Customizing a View.................................................................................................... 284
Table Of Contents
vii
Customizing the View............................................................................................. 284
Selecting the Records to be Included in Your View........................................... 285
Modifying the Column Display in Your View................................................... 287
Advanced Display Options for Your View......................................................... 289
Database Management ................................................................................................ 292
Database Management ............................................................................................ 292
Database Administration..................................................................................... 292
Repairing a Database .......................................................................................... 297
Creating a New Database.................................................................................... 297
Switching Databases ........................................................................................... 297
Spell Checking............................................................................................................ 299
Spell Checking........................................................................................................ 299
Correcting a Misspelled Word............................................................................ 299
Adding to Your Custom Dictionary.................................................................... 300
Ignoring Words ................................................................................................... 301
Enabling and Disabling Spell Checking ............................................................. 301
Consigning.................................................................................................................. 303
Consigning.............................................................................................................. 303
Entering a Consignor .......................................................................................... 303
Managing Consignment Plans ............................................................................ 305
Base Fees ............................................................................................................ 306
Commission ........................................................................................................ 308
Adding a Consigned Item................................................................................... 308
Viewing the Consignment Equation on a Completed Sale................................. 309
Assigning a Consignor After the Sale................................................................. 310
Paying Consignors with the Consignor Payout Report....................................... 312
Synchronizing Data with eBay ................................................................................... 315
Synchronizing Data with eBay ............................................................................... 315
Automatic Synchronization Using the Servant................................................... 315
Manually Refreshing and Updating.................................................................... 316
Synchronization with Selling Manager and my eBay......................................... 319
Troubleshooting.......................................................................................................... 321
Troubleshooting...................................................................................................... 321
The Support Troubleshooter ............................................................................... 321
The Activity Log................................................................................................. 327
Appendices.................................................................................................................. 329
Getting Mail Settings From Outlook ...................................................................... 329
Supercharging the Listing Process - An Extended Example .................................. 331
Step 1: Research.................................................................................................. 331
Step 2: Plan of Attack ......................................................................................... 331
Step 3: Setting up Templates/Presets.................................................................. 332
Preparing for Photos ........................................................................................... 334
Format and Pricing.............................................................................................. 334
Custom Fields ..................................................................................................... 335
The Fun Part........................................................................................................ 335
Private Registry Files.............................................................................................. 339
viii
Adding Pictures to Print Templates ........................................................................ 340
Pic1Loc Field...................................................................................................... 340
ItemPicture Control............................................................................................. 340
txtPic1Loc Field.................................................................................................. 341
Print Template Script .......................................................................................... 342
Glossary .......................................................................................................................... 345
Index ............................................................................................................................... 351

1
eBay Blackthorne - Seller's Assistant
Migration Guide
Welcome to eBay Blackthorne (eB)! If you are an existing Seller's Assistant (SA) user,
this guide will walk you through the steps needed to get you listing with Blackthorne in
no time.

When you install Blackthorne, you will have the option to migrate your data from
Sellers Assistant to Blackthorne. You do not need to uninstall Sellers Assistant, and
can continue to use it while you learn Blackthorne.

An online version of this document with working links is available at
http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/eBay_Blackthorne_
-_Seller_s_Assistant_Migration_Guide.htm
Preparing for Migration
Deciding Whether to Transfer Data from SA to Blackthorne
Before migrating your data, the first question you must answer is if you want your
Seller's Assistant data migrated to Blackthorne.

! If you sell thousands of items, or you sell the same items over and over, then you
will probably want your inventory imported into eB.
! f you only sell unique items occasionally, then you may opt to just finish any
existing listings with SA and start only new items in eB.

If you choose to import your database to Blackthorne, you should prepare your SA
database before downloading, installing and importing it into Blackthorne. By preparing
your database, you will be ensuring that any invalid or outdated data is removed.

If you decide not to import your database, go to the Downloading and Installing section.
How to Transfer Data from SA to Blackthorne
Step 1: Run the SA Pro Database Repair Utility

The database repair will clean and compact your SA data.
To run the database repair:
1. Make sure you have exited from SA
2
2. Run Start|Programs|eBay|SA Pro Database Repair Utility.
3. Follow the prompts to complete the database repair.

Step 2: Make a backup of your SA database

By making a backup of your database you will always have a snapshot of your data that
you can reference and return to if necessary.
To backup your SA database:
1. Start Seller's Assistant.
2. Select File|Maintenance from the menu.
3. On the Backup tab, select "Backup Now".
4. When prompted, enter the path and name of the backup file. Be sure to give it a
meaningful name like "saproPreMigration.mdb".

Step 3: Remove any old data that you no longer need

By cleaning up unused data before importing it to Blackthorne, your import will be faster
and more efficient.
To remove old data:
1. Start Seller's Assistant.
2. From the Multiview tab, select any records that you no longer need to track.
3. Choose File|Delete Listing(s) from the menu.
4. Repeat for any other unused records.
Downloading and Installing
If you have not already done so, then you should now download and install the latest
version of eBay Blackthorne. Both the Basic and the Pro versions use the same
installation process. When you run Blackthorne, it will automatically show you the
features that are available based on your subscription level

To get the biggest benefit from the migration, do NOT uninstall SA first. eB
will use settings and data from SA when running through the Setup Assistant.

To download and install eB:
1. Go to http://www.blackthornesw.com/bthome/InstalleBayBlackthorne.exe.
2. When prompted, Save the file to your hard drive. This is recommended over
running the installation directly from the server.
3. Save the file in a location where you can easily locate it later.
4. When the download finishes, use Windows Explorer to locate the folder that it
was saved in.
eBay Blackthorne - Seller's Assistant Migration Guide
3
5. Double-click the file to start the installation process.
6. Follow the on-screen instructions.

Already have Blackthorne Installed?
If you already have Blackthorne installed, check to make sure you have the latest updates.
Select Help|Check for Updates and Messages then follow the instructions.
Importing SA Data and Setting Your Preferences
Once Blackthorne is installed, you are ready to import your data and set up your
preferences. The easiest way to perform both tasks is by following the Setup Assistant.
The Setup Assistant will run the first time you start Blackthorne.
To start Blackthorne:
1. Double-click the eBay Blackthorne icon on the desktop or select Start|Program
Files|eBay|Blackthorne Software|eBay Blackthorne from the Windows Start
button.
2. Follow all prompts to import your existing data and set your preferences. A Help
button is available for many of the preferences if you need further assistance.

You can also refer to the following topics in the User's Guide if you have any difficulty.

Using the Setup Assistant -
(http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Part_1/Using_the_Setup_
Assistant.htm)
Setting Options and Preferences -
(http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Setting_Options_and_Pref
erences.htm)
Changes from Seller's Assistant
4
Before you begin, there are some changes in the way eB works compared to SA. You
should take a moment to familiarize yourself with these changes.
Submit from Items
In the past, listing records were created from item records and then the listing records
were submitted. We have streamlined this process. You now will submit listings
directly from items thereby reducing the number of steps. The one exception is
scheduled listings: if you schedule a listing to be submitted by Blackthorne, a listing
record is created to be submitted by the Servant (see below). This means that there are
no longer listings in "Ready to List" status since all Items are in effect, ready to list.
After importing SA data, any listings that were in the Ready to List status will not be
imported. Before or after importing, you may want to list any items that are "Ready to
List" from SA.
User Profiles vs. Field Presets
In Sellers Assistant, we stored default input data in the User Profile. Unfortunately a
number of things including FTP (File Transfer Protocol) settings, shipping defaults,
payment info, etc., were all stored in the same profile. Changing any single value
required a completely new profile and led to an explosion of User Profiles. In
Blackthorne, we have broken the User Profiles out into multiple Field Presets. Now there
are separate Field Presets for shipping, payment info, FTP settings, etc. This makes it
much easier to store individual preferences and easily select them when creating items.
We have carried over information from the old User Profiles whenever possible, but
after importing your data, you should double check the new Field Presets. Any Field
Preset dropdowns that contain "Not Specified" should have their values properly set.
The Servant
In previous versions, Sellers Assistant was manually triggered to get or send information
to eBay. In Blackthorne, we have implemented a background feature we call the
Servant. The Servant automatically interacts with eBay for you. It can keep your
categories, item specifics and all other information from eBay up to date. It also will
refresh listings and sales automatically on a schedule. It also automatically submits your
scheduled listings. With the Servant running, your intervention should not be necessary
any longer to keep your data up to date. However, you still have the ability to force
updates at any time.

Because of these new features, you might consider leaving Blackthorne running 24 hours
a day. That way, whenever you want to work with the program, you will know that you
are working with relatively current information.
Ad Template Studio
5
We have also made some major improvements to the Ad Template Studio. In previous
versions, you would create a Listing Template. This template included the general
appearance of your listing along with boilerplate text that went along with it. The
problem was that if you wanted to change your boilerplate text, you had to change it in all
your templates. In the new version, we have broken out the text and graphical parts of
the template. You can now create Ad Templates that identify the text you want in the ad,
and then apply a Theme which provides the graphical elements. Ad Templates are now
much more powerful because you can edit them in a pseudo-WYSIWYG (What You See
Is What You Get) fashion. With an HTML editor, you can add highlighting, lists, font
color and size changes, even tables. In addition, you have access to the fields in your
Item record (including the new custom fields) for use in your listing. In other words,
you can write one ad template, apply it to 100 items, and the text will automatically
change for each item.

You can also create standard text messages (called Global AutoText messages) and use
them over and over in your Ad Templates. An obvious use would be to create one that
contains your warranty and return policies.

Finally, if you have some particular item that needs special treatment, you can bypass
Themes and create a special Ad Template using all the power of HTML to create
virtually any style of listing.

Unfortunately, it was not possible to import existing SA listing templates into eB. These
new changes require you to recreate the listing templates you use. Although it will take a
little effort up front, it will save you time in the long run by allowing you to make
changes to all your listing templates at once.
Combined Sales
In previous versions, combining sales was implemented in the Email Studio. This
allowed you to combine shipping and insurance amounts when sending out notification
emails. Later, eBay implemented Combined Sales, so we ended up with two methods of
combining sales. We have simplified this by returning to one method. The Combine
Sales feature lets you combine and distribute the cost of shipping over all selected sales.
If you want emails to be combined for a seller, use the Combine Sales feature. When
you send emails later, they display data based on how you combined the sales.
Listing Your First Item
Now that you have imported your SA database, we recommend testing it out by listing
one of your items.

If you did not import a database, and want to start by listing a new item, please follow the
Quick Start - Listing Your First Item.
6
(http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Part_1/Quick_Start_-
_Listing_Your_First_Item.htm).
To List an Item:
1. Make sure you have run the Setup Assistant and have created your Seller
Account.
2. Click on the Create Items tab.

3. From the grid at the top of the page, select the item that you would like to list.

4. The details for the selected item will appear below the grid. Or, double-click the
item in the grid to view the entire item.
5. In the Item Details group, you will see the Title and SubTitle. You can change
them now if you wish.

7
When your data was imported, eB created Seller and Email Accounts for you. You
should ensure that the Seller and Contact Email dropdowns are filled in. If you
would like to change the name of the automatically generated accounts, select
"Manage .... Accounts" from the dropdown and use the Rename button on the
resulting window.

6. In the Categories group, you will see the category for the item. Use the Select
button to choose a category from the Category Selector if you want to change it.

7. The Description group contains your items description. If you would like to give
your listing a finished look, select a theme from the Theme dropdown. After
choosing a Theme, you can use the Preview button to see what it looks like. You
will notice that with the Simple Ad Template chosen, the only text in the listing
will be the text in your Description box. If you choose the Enhanced Ad
Template, some standard messages will appear. You can customize the standard
messages and the rest of the Ad Template by clicking the Edit button next to the
Ad Template dropdown. Ad Templates are very powerful and can be used to
easily include blocks of text and formatting in your listings. To learn more about
the power of Ad Templates, we recommend you read Customizing Ad Templates
(http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Customizing_Ad_
Templates.htm).

8. The Pictures group will contain the pictures for your item. If you would like to
modify or add more pictures, enter them in the Pictures group. Simply click the
Browse button or one of the Picture Wells to navigate to and select your images.
To identify where your pictures are loaded, make sure a Picture Host is chosen.
You can use eBay Picture Services , an eBay Picture Manager account or any
8
other web space that you have available to you. If you host your own pictures,
then you must set up a Picture Host account for it first. You may have done this
during setup. If not, you can set one up now by choosing "Manage Picture
Hosts" from the Picture Host dropdown.

9. Verify the Format and Pricing information.

The next few steps involve using Presets to enter data. A preset is a group of
settings that you can define and use over and over. Presets speed up data entry
and prevent errors. When your data was imported, eB could not create all of
your presets. Instead, it assigned a Custom value to each preset. You can keep
the custom value, or create your reusable presets now. When you are more
comfortable with item creation, you can learn more about using presets in the
Creating Items Faster with Field Presets topic.
(http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Part_2/Creating_
Items_Faster_with_Field_Presets.htm)

9
10. If you would like your listing to stand out, you may want to select one of the
preset Listing Upgrades. Otherwise, leave it set to Custom. Listing Upgrades
incur additional listing fees. If you would like to know more right now, see
Listing Upgrades under Entering Item Details
(http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Part_2/Entering_Ite
m_Details.htm).

11. If you are familiar with setting your shipping information on eBay, then you
shouldn't have a problem setting it from the Shipping group. If you would like to
change the shipping options, choose Custom from the shipping dropdown and it
will open the Shipping Preset form. Enter your shipping options on that form.
If you have difficulty, you should consult the topic Entering Item Details
(http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Part_2/Entering_Ite
m_Details.htm).

12. From the Payments group, you can specify what type of payments you accept.
Click Edit if you would like to make changes.

10

13. This completes the item entry. Next, you will check your item for errors, and then
submit it. To check for errors, select Items Actions | Preview and Check Errors
from the main menu. The Preview window will open, showing a summary of
fees and errors. If there are no errors, click the Submit button to submit it to
eBay. If there are errors, click Close to return to the main screen and select Tools
| Activity Log. The errors are listed under the Listing History tab.

14. This will bring up one final form, giving you choices for scheduling the auction
start. Select Submit to eBay and start immediately then click OK. From this
window, you can also choose to create multiple, identical listings and have the
auction starts staggered so that they don't all start at the same time.

11

15. Once the item is submitted, the status of the item changes to Listing Created and
a listing record is created. To view the listing record, click on the Monitor
Listings tab and select Listings by Status | Running filter from the Views sidebar
on the left. The listing will appear in the grid.

Congratulations! You've now listed your first item with eBay Blackthorne.

Once the item is submitted, a listing record is created. To view the listing record, click
on the Monitor Listings view and select Listings by Status | Running filter from the
Views sidebar on the left. The listing will appear in the grid to the right.

To understand the item creation process in greater detail, we recommend you continue by
reading Creating and Managing Items
(http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Part_2/Creating_and_Man
aging_Items.htm).
Post Migration Recommendations
Because we added new features to Blackthorne, you will need to review your newly
imported data and to identify any missing information as a result of the differences in the
two products.
12
"Not Specified" Fields
When creating your new Blackthorne database, Blackthorne will create and assign most
presets based on your SA data, but some of the presets cannot be created because there
isn't enough information in the SA database to accurately assign a preset.

When a preset could not be assigned to an Item record, the dropdown will contain "Not
Specified". This most often occurs in the Contact Email, Payment and Shipping presets.
When you come across a field with "Not Specified", all you need to do is select a value
from the dropdown, or create a new entry from the dropdown to complete the data record.

Emails
In eB, HTML emails are supported. In addition, emails are much more flexible and even
allow for math calculations. Unfortunately this means that your existing email templates
will not work. eB is shipped with new email templates that are equivalent to the email
templates shipped with SA. Before sending any emails, you should review the email
templates and make any changes you'd like.
To review your emails:
1. Select Tools|Options from the main menu.
2. In the Options sidebar, select Email Templates under Templates.
3. Click on each Email Template and click the Edit button to view and modify the
email.

You should consult the Customizing Emails
(http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Customizing_Emails.htm)
topic in the User's Guide when you are ready to review your emails.
Packing Lists and Labels
Packing Lists and Labels have also been simplified in eB. If you customized your
packing list or labels in SA, you will want to make the same customizations in eB.
To customize your printing templates:
2. In the Options sidebar, select Printing Templates under Templates.
3. Click on each Printing Template and click the Edit button to view and modify the
template.
Getting Help
13
You should now be well on your way to learning all the features that can help save you
time.

To learn more about how to use Blackthorne, you can view the following topics:

! Monitoring Listings
(http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Part_2/While_Your
_Listing_is_Running.htm)
! Processing Sales and Shipping
(http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Part_2/Processing_
Sales_and_Shipping.htm)
! Navigating Modes
(http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Navigating_Modes
.htm)

In addition, there are several ways you can get help:

! Common Troubleshooting tips For common troubleshooting tips, view the
Support Troubleshooter under Help|Support from the main Blackthorne menu. Its
a good idea to check the common causes before submitting your issue to our
support teams.
! Users Guide Review the User's Guide, an invaluable resource when you have
questions about how the software works. Select Help|User's Guide from the main
Blackthorne menu.
! If you are having problems with your connection to eBay or your FTP space,
consult the Connections topic in the Knowledge Base in the Users Guide:
http://www.blackthornesw.com/robo/projects/blackthornepro/Connection.htm.
! Discussion Boards Many of our most savvy users and Blackthorne Tech
Support can be found at the Blackthorne Discussion Boards:
http://www.blackthornesw.com/cgi-bin/discus/discus.cgi. The Discussion Boards
are often the quickest way to get an answer to your problem.
! Contact Us To contact our support team select Help|Support|Contact Support
from the main Blackthorne menu.
Thank You!
We thank you for your continued support and are committed to putting in as much effort
into eBay Blackthorne as we have with Seller's Assistant so that we remain the premiere
offline listing tool for eBay sellers.

15
Introduction
Welcome to eBay Blackthorne!
eBay Blackthorne is the premier desktop tool for managing your eBay business. This
guide will teach you all you need to know to get started down the path to increased sales
and a more efficient business.

Overview
This guide has been designed to take advantage of online capabilities while still allowing
you to print topics you'd like to read on paper. If you prefer to read a guide from front to
back, then start at this topic and continue to click through all the topics. Hyperlinks in
the document will take you to other sections that offer more detailed information, but you
can always use the back button to return to your original topic.

This guide is broken down into several major sections.

In the "Introduction" section, we provide an overview of the document, discuss system
requirements and publish the release notes. We also discuss how to use this document.

In "Setting Up eBay Blackthorne", we discuss what you need to know to download and
launch the software. We also cover differences and information on migrating from
Seller's Assistant. Finally, we walk you through the Setup Assistant to help you set your
preferences.

In "Getting Started", we'll take a quick tour of the main window. We also include a
Quick Start to help you list your first item as well as discussing important information
you need to know when importing data.

In "Creating and Managing Items", we cover all the tasks involved with adding and
organizing your item information.

"Monitoring Listings", will guide you through the basics of watching and modifying your
listings while they are running.

The "Processing Sales and Shipping" topic will discuss all post sale functions like
invoicing and shipping.

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And finally, in Advanced Topics, we cover all the finer points of the program. A good
understanding of these topics will make you much more efficient.
Thank You!
We at Blackthorne have been in the online auction management business longer than
anyone else and we strive to provide you with the best auction management tool
available. We hope your business reaches its full potential using eBay Blackthorne, and
whether you are a new user, or have been part of our legacy, we want to thank you for
being part of the Blackthorne community.
System Requirements
The following are minimum requirements. If your business is high-volume, we
recommend you improve upon these minimum requirements.

! 1.5 GHz microprocessor (AMD, Intel)
! 512 MB RAM minimum (768 MB or more recommended)
! 50 MB free hard drive space
! Windows NT, Windows 2000, or Windows XP (SP2)

Some convenient form of backup is also highly recommended, whether it be a tape drive,
CD/DVD burner, or (simplest and quickest of all) an extra hard drive. If you have a fast
internet connection, an online backup facility would be a viable alternative.
Conventions Used in this Guide
The following conventions are used throughout this guide.

Many features are called from cascading menus. The simplest example is exiting the
program from the File menu. In this guide, we will indicate cascading menu options
separated by a vertical bar like this: File|Exit.

Frequently, we reference different buttons, modes or input boxes. We will highlight
those buttons like this: the New Item Action Button, the Seller Dropdown Menu, the
Monitor Listings mode.

All acronyms are explained in the glossary. In the print version of the guide, each
acronym is also spelled out when it is used in a topic for the first time, like: "Upload the
images using FTP (File Transfer Protocol)." In the online version of the manual, each
acronym is also a "push-out" link that expands in place with an explanation of the
acronym, like FTP. To remove the extra text, click the link again.

Another type of link is a pop-up. When you click on the link, a small window will pop up
with explanatory text or an image. To get rid of the pop-up, click anywhere on the pop-up
or main window.

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Whenever a real life example is used, it looks like this.

Things that are really important and shouldn't be missed look like this

Tips are little tidbits of information to help you work faster or better. Tips are
highlighted in yellow like this paragraph.

Notes provide additional important information and are highlighted like this
paragraph.

Printing this Guide
Although this guide is primarily written for electronic delivery, a printable version is
available in PDF format. PDF files are viewable using Adobe Reader. You can
download Adobe Reader from http://www.adobe.com.

The Pro version of the documentation is available at
http://www.blackthornesw.com/bthome/Pro/eBay_Blackthorne_-
_The_Official_Guide.pdf, and the Basic version is available at
http://www.blackthornesw.com/bthome/Basic/eBay_Blackthorne_-
_The_Official_Guide.pdf.

We HIGHLY RECOMMEND you use the electronic version whenever possible.
Hyperlinks and other electronic conventions do not always translate well to the
printed page. In addition, the documentation is changed on a very regular basis,
and it will be outdated shortly after you print it. If that isn't enough to convince
you, then you should only print the pages that you are interested in as the
complete document is over 300 pages long.

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Changes From Seller's Assistant Pro
Since 1998, Blackthorne Software has been providing auction management software to
the eBay community. Our previous product, Seller's Assistant, has been redesigned and
rewritten from the ground up to take advantage of more recent technology. With its new
face comes a new name: eBay Blackthorne.
For Sellers Assistant Pro Users
Many of the concepts from Sellers Assistant are carried over into eBay Blackthorne, but
most have been significantly improved upon. Because of the improvements, existing
users of Sellers Assistant may have to do things a little differently. Let's discuss some of
those changes. If you are not a previous user of Sellers Assistant, you can skip this topic.
Submit from Items
In the past, you created listing records from item records and then submitted the listing
records. We have streamlined this process. You now will submit listings directly from
items thereby reducing the number of steps. The one exception is scheduled listings: if
you schedule a listing to be submitted by Blackthorne, a listing record is created to be
submitted by the Servant (see below).
User Profiles vs. Field Presets
In Sellers Assistant, we stored default input data in the User Profile. Unfortunately a
number of things including FTP (File Transfer Protocol) settings, shipping defaults,
payment info, etc., were all stored in the same profile. Changing any single value
required a completely new profile and led to an explosion of User Profiles. In
Blackthorne, we have broken the User Profiles out into multiple Field Presets. Now there
are separate Field Presets for shipping, payment info, FTP settings, etc. This makes it
much easier to store individual preferences and easily select them when creating items.
We have carried over information from the old User Profiles whenever possible, but
after importing your data, you should double check the new Field Presets. Any Field
Preset dropdowns that contain "Not Specified" should have there values properly set.
The Servant
In previous versions, Sellers Assistant was manually triggered to get or send information
to eBay. In Blackthorne, we have implemented a background feature we call the
Servant. The Servant automatically interacts with eBay for you. It can keep your
categories, item specifics and all other information from eBay up to date. It also will
refresh listings and sales automatically on a schedule. It automatically submits your
scheduled listings. With the Servant running, your intervention should not be necessary
any longer to keep your data up to date. However, you still have the ability to force
updates at any time.

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Because of these new features, you might consider leaving Blackthorne running 24 hours
a day. That way, whenever you want to work with the program, you will know that you
are working with relatively current information.
Ad Template Studio
We have also made some major improvements to the Ad Template Studio. In previous
versions, you would create a Listing Template. This template included the general
appearance of your listing along with boilerplate text that went along with it. The
problem was that if you wanted to change your boilerplate text, you had to change it in all
your templates. In the new version, we have broken out the text and graphical parts of
the template. You can now create Ad Templates that identify the text you want in the ad,
and then apply a Theme which provides the graphical elements. Ad Templates are now
much more powerful because you can edit them in a pseudo-WYSIWYG (What You See
Is What You Get) fashion. With an HTML editor, you can add highlighting, lists, font
color and size changes, even tables. In addition, you have access to the fields in your
Item record (including the new custom fields) for use in your listing. In other words,
you can write one ad template, apply it to 100 items, and the text will automatically
change for each item.

You can also create standard text messages (called AutoText messages) and use them
over and over in your Ad Templates. An obvious use would be to create one that
contains your warranty and return policies.

Finally, if you have some particular item that needs special treatment, you can bypass
Themes and create a special Ad Template using all the power of HTML to create
virtually any style of listing.

These new changes require you to rework your existing listing templates.
Combined Sales
In previous versions, combining sales was implemented in the Email Studio. This
allowed you to combine shipping and insurance amounts when sending out notification
emails. Later, eBay implemented Combined Sales, so we ended up with two methods of
combining sales. We have simplified this by returning to one method. The Combine
Sales feature lets you combine and distribute the cost of shipping over all selected sales.
If you want emails to be combined for a seller, use the Combine Sales feature. When it
sends emails, it displays data based on how you combined the sales.
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Setting Up eBay Blackthorne
Setting Up eBay Blackthorne
Before you can run eBay Blackthorne, you must subscribe, download it and install it on
your computer. The first time you launch the program, you will be presented with the
Setup Assistant. The Setup Assistant will help you migrate from Seller's Assistant if you
are an existing user or import your listings from eBay if you are a new user.
Subscribing
eB is offered on a subscription basis. You subscribe to either the Basic or the Pro version
on eBay. When you run eB, it checks your subscription level and shows you the version
of the program that you have subscribed to.
To subscribe/unsubscribe to the software:
1. Go to the Blackthorne Basic or Blackthorne Pro home page on eBay.
2. Click the Subscribe Now button.
3. If you are not currently subscribed, you will be prompted to choose the
subscription level and click Continue. If you are already subscribed, you will be
given the option to unsubscribe instead of choosing a subscription level.
4. Read the terms and conditions and click the "I agree to these terms" if you agree.
5. Click the Subscribe button.
Downloading the Software
eBay Blackthorne is available for download from:
http://www.blackthornesw.com/bthome/InstalleBayBlackthorne.exe
To download the software:
1. Click on the above link to start the download.
2. When prompted, click [Save] to save the file to your hard drive. This is
recommended over running the installation directly from the server.

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3. Save the file in a location where you can locate it later.

If your internet connection is by dial-up modem, the 24 Megabyte (approx)
download might take an hour or more. If your connection is broadband (cable,
DSL, etc), it will take just a few minutes.
Installing the Software
When the download finishes, use Windows Explorer to navigate to the folder that it was
saved in. Double-click on the file to start the installation process. Follow the on-screen
instructions.
Launching the Software
To launch eBay Blackthorne:
1. Double-click the eBay Blackthorne icon on the desktop.

OR

1. Select Start | Program Files | eBay | Blackthorne Software | eBay Blackthorne
from the Windows Start button.
2. When eBay Blackthorne starts for the first time, the Setup Assistant will step you
through configuring the software for your business, and importing data from the
previous version of the program.
Testing Your Connection to eBay
eB performs many interactions with eBay. Therefore, it must be able to communicate
with the internet. If you are running a firewall or other security software, it may be
blocking eB from reaching the internet by default. The first thing you should do after
launching is to test eB to see if you can get to the internet.
To test your connection to eBay:
1. Select Help|Support from the main menu.
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2. Select the 2. Connection tab.
3. Click the Test Connection to eBay button.

If the test is not successful, then verify you are online by opening your browser (Internet
Explorer, Netscape, etc. ) and making sure you can view web pages. If you can view web
pages, but eB cannot connect, then the problem is most likely a firewall or some other
program on your computer blocking access. The following topics should help you
troubleshoot the problem.

KCON001 - Common firewall settings
KCON002 - DirecWay Satellite user connection problems
KCON003 - Blackthorne Cannot Send or Receive Data to/from eBay

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Using the Setup Assistant
Using the Setup Assistant
The Setup Assistant automatically runs when you first start eBay Blackthorne. It will
walk you through getting the program configured correctly with your business and eBay
account information. It helps you import data and set your important options. If you
later need to add to or change any of your option preferences, you can do so by selecting
Tools|Options from the main menu.

Part of the setup procedure requires communicating with eBay, so make sure that you are
currently connected to the Internet before proceeding.

You can choose to skip some of the steps, but it is highly recommended that
you enter as much information as you can, especially your eBay seller
account(s) and the E-mail addresses that your business uses. Blackthorne cannot
operate properly without this information, so it will close if you choose to not
enter it.

If a problem arises, and you wish to run the Setup Assistant again, close
Blackthorne. Then use Windows Explorer to open the folder that the program is
installed in (usually C:\Program Files\eBay\Blackthorne\bin) and delete the file
System.pvt. When you restart Blackthorne, the Setup Assistant will run.

The first screen to appear will be the Welcome screen. When it appears, click Next to
continue.

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Importing Seller's Assistant (Pro and Basic) Data
eBay Seller's Assistant (SA) is the predecessor to eBay Blackthorne. The Setup Assistant
automatically searches your computer for an existing SA (Pro or Basic) database.

If it finds one, you are asked if you wish to import data from it. You can choose yes or no
or you can guide the program to a specific SA database to import from. You can also
choose to import data at a later date, see Importing Data.

The SA database file is called sapro.mdb or sabasic.mdb. By default, it is installed in the
C:\Program Files\eBay\Seller's Assistant Pro\sapro.mdb or C:\Program
Files\eBay\Seller's Assistant Basic\sabasic.mdb.

If it did not find one, it asks if you have one you would like to import from.

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If you select Yes, then you will be allowed to browse for your existing database. The
following page will import your data and then you will move on to setting your
preferences. For more information, see Migrating From Seller's Assistant to eBay
Blackthorne and Importing Data.

If you select No, then you will begin entering your preferences.
Setting Preferences
Next, the Setup Assistant asks you to set your preferences:

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We strongly advise that you take the time to set up your preferences now, with the help of
the Setup Assistant. As you click Next, you will pass through the following input forms.
Seller Accounts
The first thing to set up is your seller account(s). If you imported an SA database, your
seller account information may already be entered.

See Accounts - Seller_Accounts for help creating your first account.
Picture Hosts
Next to be configured is Picture Hosts. If you always use eBay Picture Services to host
your pictures, you can skip this step. If you use your own web space or Picture Manager
to host your pictures, see Accounts - Picture_Hosts for help creating your picture hosts.
E-Mail
Next, you will be asked to set up your email accounts. See Accounts - Email_Accounts
for assistance in creating email accounts.
Inventory Management
To specify how your business manages inventory, see Business Setup - Inventory
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Tax Table
If you collect tax, see Business Setup - Tax_Table for information on specifying the
states in which you collect tax.
Business Settings
By indicating whether or not you consign items or track suppliers, eB will customize the
item entry process and the user interface to hide or show the appropriate features. See
Business Setup - Settings for a description of these fields.
Importing Other Data
Finally, if you did not import an SA database, you are asked if you want to import any
other data. If you choose to import from eBay, remember that eBay only keeps
information about listings posted in the last 30 days.

And that's all there is to it. If you later need to make changes to your settings, click
Tools|Options.

If you want to import data at any time, click File|Import.
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Setting Options and Preferences
Setting Options and Preferences
eBay Blackthorne is designed to be very flexible and efficient. We strive to adapt to the
way you do business and to help you do it faster. As a result, we collect a lot of
information about your business and allow you to predefine many settings and templates.
We collect the following information on the Options window.

! To allow us to interact with other providers, we must collect information about
your accounts at eBay, your mail provider and your picture host if applicable.
! We also need to know about your business and whether you track inventory,
collect taxes, etc.
! To help you enter data more quickly, we allow you to create Presets which
contain a collection of fields with values already filled in.
! You can also create custom email templates, printing templates and ad templates.
! You can also specify connection information including whether you synchronize
your time with eBay and whether you want to receive beta notices.
! Finally, you can modify the appearance of the user interface.

If you ran through the Setup Assistant, many of these settings will be familiar,
and possibly already filled in. The Setup Assistant walked through the
important Options. This section covers all possible options and preferences.

To modify your options:
1. Select Tools|Options from the main menu. The Options window will appear.

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2. The Options tree on the left contains the different groups of options you can
change. Select a node on the left and the available options will appear on the
right. A description of the options will appear at the top.
3. The Restore Defaults button will return all settings to their original default. This
will not remove any accounts, templates or presets you have added.
4. Click on Done when you are finished.
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Accounts
eBay Blackthorne works with other parties on a day to day basis. It must interact with
eBay, your mail provider, and your picture host provider. Before eB can interact with the
other providers, you must provide information about the different accounts you have at
those providers.
Seller Accounts
For each eBay User Account you want to list with, you must create a Seller Account in
eBay Blackthorne.
To create a Seller Account:
1. From Tools|Options, select Seller Accounts under Accounts in the Options tree.
2. Click the New button. The New Seller Account window will appear.

3. Enter the eBay User ID. This is the id on eBay that you want to list to.
4. Enter your Subscribed User ID. To use eB, you must be subscribed to use it on
eBay. With each eBay User ID that is subscribed, you can list with up to five
eBay Seller Accounts that you own. Enter the eBay User ID that is paying for the
subscription in this box. If it is the same as the eBay User ID, then leave the
same as eBay User ID box checked.
5. Enter the name of your Business. This is the name that will appear on shipping
labels and in reports.
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6. Enter your Return Mailing Address. This also will appear on shipping labels and
in reports.
7. Click OK when you are finished.
8. eB does not store your eBay Password. In lieu of that, you must authorize eB to
post listings to eBay on your behalf. The Blackthorne Authorization window will
appear next.

9. After a few moments, your eBay User ID will appear. Enter the password for that
eBay User ID and click Sign in Securely. You may have to scroll down to see
this button. The Agree and Continue form will appear.

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10. Read the authorization form and then click the Agree and Continue button if you
agree. The confirmation window will appear.

11. Click Close to complete.
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eBay Blackthorne allows you to work with only one seller account at a time, or with all
accounts visible. See Managing Multiple Seller Accounts for more information.
Email Accounts
For each Email Account you want to send emails with, you must create an Email Account
in eBay Blackthorne. You can also create different email accounts for the same email
provider using different email addresses. This lets you easily associate different email
address contacts with different listed items.
To create an Email Account:
1. From Tools|Options, select Email Accounts under Accounts in the Options tree.
2. Click the New button. The New Email Account window will appear.

3. If your existing mail program supports the MAPI interface, then eB can use your
existing mail program to send email. By using your existing mail program, you
will get a copy of all emails sent in your "Sent" folder. However, if using
Microsoft Outlook, you will also be required to approve each email before it is
sent.

If your email provider supports SMTP and can provide you with the SMTP settings
for sending emails, then you can set eB to send your emails. This is the faster
method of sending emails, but you will have to include yourself in the CC field if you
want a copy of any emails that you send.

As a general rule, you should choose Use Blackthorne to send emails without the
need of another program if your email provider has an SMTP server setting.
Otherwise, use your existing mail program.

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If you choose the SMTP method, then enter the Outgoing Mail Server provided by
your email provider and click the Test Mail Connection button to make sure it is
valid. You can get this from other mail programs you use with the same Email
account (here's how to get the information from Outlook, for example), or by asking
your mail provider.

A list of Email Account settings for different email providers is maintained on
our Discussion Board. If you are having trouble with your settings, you may
want to consult the Email and Picture Host Settings thread. Also, if you
successfully enter your settings and they have not already been added to the
thread, then we appreciate it if you could post those settings for other users.

4. Click the Addressing tab and fill in the requested fields as follows:
! From: The email address that you will use to send messages.
! Reply-To: The address that you want customers to reply to. This will
usually be the same as the one you send from.
! CC (Carbon-Copy): An address that you want a copy of your messages
sent to. This address will be visible to all recipients of the message.
! BCC (Blind Carbon-Copy): An address that you want a copy of your
messages sent to. This address will be invisible to all other recipients of
the message.

5. Click the Advanced tab. The settings on Advanced tab will be different
depending upon whether you selected to use a MAPI or SMTP connection. Fill in
the fields as follows:

MAPI

! Send HTML vs. Text Emails Only - MAPI does not support the ability to
send HTML emails. When sending through MAPI, the text version of the
email is sent, and the HTML version is sent as an attachment. If you do not
want the attachment sent, then select Send Text-Only Emails, otherwise select
Send HTML Emails.

SMTP

! Secure Password Authentication - If your mail server requires Secure
Password Authentication, then enter your email user name and password
provided by your email provider.
! Outgoing Mail Server Port Number - Most mail servers work on port 25.
If your email provider uses a port other than 25, enter it here.
! Delay between emails - If you send a large number of emails simultaneously,
your server may think they are spam and will block them. If that happens, try
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setting the delay to five seconds, or ask your ISP what an acceptable figure
would be (be sure to tell them you're running a legitimate business).

6. After you have correctly entered all the Email Account settings and clicked OK,
the final form asks you to name the Email Account. Give it a descriptive name
that describes what you will use it for. You may also want to include the email
address associated with it in the name.
Picture Hosts
Pictures can be hosted by eBay using eBay Picture Services (ePS) or with a Picture
Manager account. You can also host pictures on your own web space if you have it. If
you use ePS, then you do not need to set up a picture host. If using Picture Manager
and/or your own web space, you will need to set up a picture host for each location you
upload pictures to. When creating an item, it is then very easy to identify where you
would like the pictures for that item uploaded.
To create a Picture Host:
1. From Tools|Options, select Picture Hosts under Accounts in the Options tree.
2. Click the New button. The New Picture Host window will appear.

3. Start by selecting whether you will Create new FTP Picture Host, or a Create
new Picture Manager Host. To create a Picture Manager Host, one of your Seller
Accounts must have a Picture Manager subscription on eBay. If not, this Picture
Manager option will be disabled. Depending upon the option selected, the rest of
the process will be different.
Creating a New FTP Picture Host
1. Fill in the File Transfer Protocol (FTP) settings as follows (your web space
provider can help with any settings you don't know):
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! Username/Password - The user name and password you use to access
your picture hosting server.
! Host Address - The FTP (File Transfer Protocol) address of the server
you use to host your pictures. This is usually something like
ftp.myserver.com or www.myserver.com.
! Test Connection - Click this button to verify that your username,
password and host address settings are correct.
! Host Subdirectory - The subdirectory (sub-folder) that you upload the
pictures to. The most reliable way to set this option is to use the "Browse"
button to connect to your FTP site and select the subdirectory. This will
help accurately set the Host Subdirectory and the Path is relative box.
! Path is relative - This option is checked by default. If the Host
Subdirectory path you entered is relative to the default directory you log
in to, then keep this box checked. If you entered an absolute path from the
root of your FTP site, then uncheck this box. If you use the "Browse"
button to select your subdirectory, this box will be correctly set for you.
! Pictures Web Address -This is the HTTP (Hyper-Text Transfer
Protocol) version of the host address, with the relevant subdirectory tacked
on the end. It is the URL that points to files that have been uploaded to
your FTP space. Your ISP can help you with the first part, but if you
organize your space on the server by creating your own subdirectories,
you might have to supply the last part of the address yourself. In short, it
is the internet URL path to your images minus the image name itself.

A list of Picture Host settings for different web space providers is maintained
on our Discussion Board. If you are having trouble with your settings, you may
want to consult the Email and Picture Host Settings thread. Also, if you
successfully enter your settings and they have not already been added to the
thread, then we appreciate it if you could post those settings for other users.

2. Click the Advanced tab and enter the settings as follows:

! FTP Port - Most ftp servers work on port 25. If your web space provider
uses a port other than 21, enter it here.
! Use a passive data connection - Most ftp servers use a passive
connection. Leave this box checked unless your web space provider tells
you otherwise. Also, if you are having trouble uploading through a
firewall, try unchecking this box to see if it solves your problem.
! Automatically Upload/Do not Upload - When submitting listings, eB will
ensure your images are uploaded. If you upload your images manually
and do not want eB to upload your images automatically, check the Do not
upload... option.

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3. Click OK to save your settings and enter a name for your Picture Host in the
window that appears.
Creating a New eBay Picture Manager Host
1. From the dropdown, select the eBay Userid that has the Picture Manager
subscription you want to use.
2. Enter the Folder Name of the folder the pictures should be uploaded to. You can
use the Browse button to view your folders on Picture Manager and choose from
the available list.
3. Click OK to save your settings and enter a name for your Picture Host in the
window that appears.

Carol uses Picture Manager to host her pictures. Some of her items are always
listed. She doesn't want to accidentally delete those pictures, so she created a
folder called Permanent for those pictures. All the others she puts in a folder
called Scratch. She then created two Picture Manager Picture Hosts. One
points to her Permanent folder and one to the Scratch folder. She can now
easily assign the location of her uploaded images when creating an item.
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Business Setup
If you are running a business on eBay, you will also have to provide some information
about your business including how you track inventory, where/if you collect taxes, and
whether you track your consignors and suppliers.
Inventory
Some users track inventory while others do not. If you do not track inventory, then you
do not want inventory information cluttering up your user interface. If you do track
inventory, then you may have specific rules about what you want to do when eB senses
you are low on inventory. This information can be provided in the Inventory settings.
To set your inventory preferences:
1. From Tools|Options, select Inventory under Business Setup in the Options tree.
The following settings will appear.

2. Fill in the settings as follows:

! I use the Inventory Management feature - Turn this on or off to hide or
show the inventory fields in the interface.
! When creating a listing...
! Do not create the listing - This prevents you from listing more
than you have.
! Create the listing with the available inventory - This lets you
still list, but won't list more than you have.
! Create the listing regardless... - This will not check the available
inventory when submitting items. Use this if you have an easily
replenishable supply.
! Show a warning... - In the case where eB submits more
items than you have on hand, you can choose to see a
popup warning or simply have the warning written to the
log file.
Tax Table
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Depending upon the laws in your state/country, you may be required to collect taxes.
Much of the tax collection process is handled by eBay's Checkout process. In the cases
where Checkout is used, eB will store the tax that was calculated at eBay. If Checkout is
not used, tax is calculated based on the information entered into the Tax Table.
To fill in your tax table:
1. From Tools|Options, select Tax Table under Business Setup in the Options tree.

2. Fill in the table columns as follows:

! Sales Tax Authority Type - There are different taxing authorities that
you may have to collect taxes for. Select the State, City, Zip or Country
that you must collect taxes for. When a sale is recorded, if the State, City,
Zip or Country field in the buyers information is exactly the same as the
value provided here, the tax will get calculated.
! Sales Tax Authority State - Enter the state, city, country or zip that you
charge tax for. This must match exactly the value in the buyer record for
the tax to be calculated.
! Tax Percent - Enter the tax percent to collect to the nearest thousandths.
! Include tax on shipping? - Depending upon the laws in your state (taxing
authority) you may or may not be required to collect tax on the shipping
portion of the sale. Please consult local codes.

Much of our tax implementation is collected in anticipation of future tax
requirements and eBay features. Currently, eBay supports charging taxes in
multiple states, but not by city or country. If they implement this in the future,
then it will already be in eB. Also, the Simplified Sales Tax plan being
considered in many states will require sellers to charge tax based on the zip
code of the buyer. When/if this is implemented, you may be required to store
the taxes that are charged by zip code. At that time, eB will support the ability
to do that.
Settings
To fill in the business settings:
1. From Tools|Options, select Settings under Business Setup in the Options tree.

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2. Fill in the settings as follows:

! Do you consign items? - Answer yes or no to show or hide the
consignment functions.
! Do you track suppliers? - Answer yes or no to show or hide the supplier
functions.
! Work week - Set the day your work week begins on. This will be used
when generating filters for the Last Week.
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Presets
Presets allow you to predefine sets of values that are used later in the program. Upgrade
Presets, Payment Presets, Shipping Presets, and Destination Presets are all used to make
the entry of items faster. Positive Feedback Messages are used to quickly send feedbacks
without typing them in each time, and Consignment Plans are the rules that you use to
calculate consignment fees.
Item Entry Presets
Upgrade Presets, Payment Presets, Shipping Presets, and Destination Presets are all item
entry presets. They are used to make the item entry process faster. Each preset
corresponds to a set of values that must be sent to eBay when submitting a listing. The
details of what each preset value is used for can be more aptly described from the eBay
Sell Your Item form. Please consult the SYI form for any item entry preset values you
are unfamiliar with. All item entry presets can be created, duplicated, deleted, edited and
renamed in the same manner.

For more information on using presets to create an item, see Creating Items Faster with
Field Presets.
Creating an Item Entry Preset
You can create any number of new presets.
To create an item entry preset:
1. From Tools|Options choose Presets|(Upgrades Presets/Payments
Presets/Shipping Presets/Destination Presets).
2. Click the New button. The Preset entry form for you type of preset will appear.
3. Enter the values for your preset. See Shipping, Listing Upgrades, Payment and
Shipping To/From for information on the specific fields in a preset.
4. An input form will open asking you for a name. Provide a short, detailed name
for your preset and click OK.
Duplicating an Item Entry Preset
You can create a item entry preset using an existing preset as a baseline also.
To duplicate an item entry preset:
2. Select the preset you would like to duplicate from the list and click the Duplicate
button.
for your preset and click OK.
4. The new preset will now be in your Presets list. Click on the preset and click the
Edit button to edit the new preset.
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5. Modify the values for your preset accordingly. See Shipping, Listing Upgrades,
Payment and Shipping To/From for information on the specific fields in a preset.
Deleting an Item Entry Preset
When you no longer need a preset, you can delete it. Deleting a preset will revert each
item using the preset to being a <Custom> preset. It will not harm your data to delete a
preset.
To delete an item entry preset:
2. Select the preset you would like to delete from the list and click the Delete button.
Renaming an Item Entry Preset
You can also rename a preset at any time.
To rename an item entry preset:
2. Select the preset you would like to rename from the list and click the Rename
button.
3. An input form will open asking you for the new name. Provide a short, detailed
name for your preset and click OK.
Editing an Item Entry Preset
To edit an item entry preset:
2. Select the preset you would like to edit from the list and click the Edit button.
Positive Feedback Messages
If you have several different feedback messages you tend to leave, you can enter them
only once and then be used over and over again. Every feedback message created will
appear in the list of feedback messages that can be left from the Finalize Sales mode. See
Completing Sales - Leaving_Feedback for information on leaving feedbacks. When
leaving Random Feedbacks, all feedback messages in the list will be used in random
order.

Since leaving negative and neutral feedbacks should not be taken lightly, you cannot
leave them in bulk. You can also not store negative or neutral feedback messages for use
later. You must manual write the negative/neutral feedback when leaving it.
To manage feedback messages:
1. From Tools|Options choose Presets|Positive Feedback Messages. The Positive
Feedback Messages list will appear.
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2. Click the New button to create a new feedback message. When the prompt
appears, enter the text of your message and click OK. You could also create a new
message using the Duplicate button.
3. If you want to modify one of your messages, choose it from the list and click the
Edit button. Make your modifications and click OK to save.
4. To delete a feedback message, choose it from the list and click the Delete button.
5. If you would like, you can make leaving feedbacks automatically change the
status of the sale. To set a status change, enter a status in the When Submitting
to eBay Change the Sale Status dropdown.

If leaving feedback is the last step in your process, it is a good idea to have
feedbacks set the sale status to Successful. This will help you identify which
sales have had feedback left for them.
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Templates
Templates are pre-formatted layouts for your Ad, emails, or printable reports. Templates
let you customize the look of an ad, email or report. The Ad Template Studio, Email
Studio and Print Studio are custom interfaces used to edit templates. Templates can be
created, duplicated, deleted, edited and renamed.
Working with Templates
To view your templates, select Tools|Options from the main menu and then select
Ad/Email/Printing Templates under the Templates header in the Options tree on the
left. You will see a list of your templates.

Creating a New Template
You can create any number of new templates.
To create a new template:
1. From Tools|Options choose Templates|(Ad Templates/Email
Templates/Printing Templates).
2. Click the New button.
for your template and click OK.
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4. The appropriate studio will open to your new empty template. See Customizing
Ad Templates, Customizing Emails, or Customizing Reports and Labels for
information on using the studios.

Ben sells custom signs. At the end of one of his sign auctions, he must contact
the buyer to find out what font and text the buyer would like on their sign. He
created a custom email called Request Details. He sends this email to all
buyers of signs in the Ready for Payment Request filter each day.
Duplicating a Template
You can create a template using an existing template as a baseline also.
To duplicate a template:
2. Select the template you would like to duplicate from the list and click the
Duplicate button.
for your template and click OK.
4. The new template will now be in your Templates list. Click on the template and
click the Edit button to edit the new template. The appropriate studio will open
showing your new template. See Customizing Ad Templates, Customizing
Emails, or Customizing Reports and Labels for information on using the studios.

A template called Basic Email Template is provided as a starting point for new
email templates. You can duplicate this template so you don't have to create
your email templates from scratch.
Deleting a Template
When you no longer need a template, you can delete it.
To delete a template:
2. Select the template you would like to delete from the list and click the Delete
button.
Renaming a Template
You can also rename a template at any time.
To rename a template:
2. Select the template you would like to rename from the list and click the Rename
button.
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name for your template and click OK.

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Connections
Connections lets you specify parameters to different connections that eB makes.
Updates
At any given time, there is a finalized version of eB and a beta version of eB available.
Finalized versions have completed testing and have been released to the general public.
Beta versions are versions that have newer fixes and enhancements that are still being
tested. You can choose which type of update notifications you will get.

Beta versions are likely to contain bugs and may not work as you expect. Only
experienced users or users who have been specifically instructed by support
should get beta versions. A good beta tester understands that things will go
wrong and will have adequate database backups.
Network Role
If you have multiple computers sharing data on a network, then you can assign the role of
each computer. Each computer on a network will be either the server or a client. The
server is the computer that hosts the database for the clients and will also perform other
automatic background tasks like scheduling listings and downloading the latest
categories. The clients will get the data from the server and can optionally assist with the
automated tasks.

By setting the role of each computer on your network, you can optimize your network
performance.

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For each computer on your network, set the network role as follows.

! This computer is the Server
Each network must have a server. The server is the computer that will host the
database. The server also will perform synchronizations with eBay.

! This computer is an Intelligent Client
A client is any other computer on the network that is not the server. The client will
access the database from the server. The server will interact with eBay to perform
actions like submitting scheduled listings and refresh categories. An Intelligent
Client can also help the server with the automated tasks. Updates on the server will
be performed faster since the data doesn't have to be accessed across the network. If
you have a server that is being used for other tasks, or doesn't have a lot of RAM,
you can use Intelligent Clients to help with the automatic updates.

! This computer is a Dumb Client
A Dumb Client will access the data from the server, but will not perform any
automated tasks. If your server is powerful enough to handle the autmoted tasks on
its own, or if it is a computer dedicated to eB, you will get better performance by
using Dumb Clients.

! This is a standalone computer
If you do not run on a network at all use this option.

For more information about configuring your network, please see HOWTO: Optimal
Network Configurations.
Endicia
Postage can be automatically printed using Endicia's Dazzle. When printing postage for
different shipping methods, Dazzle allows you to specify different label layouts. Please
consult the Dazzle documentation for more information on label layouts and how you can
customize your own postage.

Because eB automatically loads and prints postage, it must know what label layout to use
for each type of postage. Use this screen to enter all the layout files that you would like
associated with each shipping method. You can specify defaults for both Domestic and
International labels.

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50
Getting Started
Getting Started
If you are reading this, you've probably just downloaded eBay Blackthorne and are eager
to get started. We hope that you will take the time later to read about all the time-saving
features we have to offer, but for now let's get you up and running.

In this section, we will give you a tour of the interface, and then walk you through a
Quick Start so you can create your first item and list it on eBay. When your auction ends,
you will also need our Quick Finish to help you through your first sale.
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A Tour of the Main Window
Let's take a look at the different areas of the main window. Click on each labelled area to
see a short explanation of its function.

Take the Tour

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Importing Data
Importing Data
The fastest way to get up and running is to import your existing auction data. You can
import from Seller's Assistant Basic or Pro, Turbo Lister or directly from eBay. You
probably imported your data when you first ran the Setup Assistant. If you did not, you
can import it now from File|Import on the main menu.

Different programs will contain different amounts of useful data for eB. Depending upon
how you imported your data, you may need to perform some more tasks to get your
database in shape.
Importing from Seller's Assistant Basic
In order to extract as much information as possible from Seller's Assistant Basic, it must
still be installed. Seller's Assistant Basic stores a lot of information in the Windows
System Registry, and that information is removed when the program is uninstalled.

To import from Seller's Assistant Basic, choose File|Import|Import from SA Basic. It
can also be imported as part of the Setup Assistant which is run the first time you run eB.

If you have already uninstalled Seller's Assistant Basic, then simply re-
installing SA will not restore the lost information. The data would have to be
re-entered into SA just as it was originally. Instead, it would be better to enter
the data directly into eBay Blackthorne.

! E-mail Templates: You could not create custom email templates in SA Basic, so
no email templates are imported.
! Ad Templates: Not imported. Ad Template is set to "Simple."
! Themes: eBay themes are correctly imported.
! Categories: Are imported correctly.
! Inventory: Since there is no inventory in SA Basic, inventory info is not
imported. For inventory to be tracked for specific items in eB, it needs to be
turned on individually for each one.
! Part Number: Does not exist in SA Basic so it is not imported.
! Picture Host: Set to EPS. You will need to create your Picture Hosts and use
Bulk Change to add it to your items.
! Cost: Not imported.
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Items, listings and sales records are created. The status of each item is set as best can be
determined (if there is a currently-running auction, for example, the status will be set to
"First Run," even though the item may have been run before).
Importing from Seller's Assistant Pro
Seller's Assistant Pro does not need to be currently installed in order for data to be
imported from it.

To import from Seller's Assistant Pro, choose File|Import|Import from SA Pro 2.X. It
can also be imported as part of the Setup Assistant which is run the first time you run eB.

! E-mail Templates: Not imported. You must create new email templates in eB.
! Packing Lists: Not imported. You must modify the stock packing list if you
want it customized.
! Labels: Not imported.
! Ad Templates: Not imported. Ad Template is set to "Simple." You will need to
create new Ad Templates and use Bulk Change to assign the templates to your
items.
! Theme ID: Is imported correctly.
! Categories: Are imported correctly.
! Feedback: Only positive feedback messages are imported. Because negative and
neutral feedback is rare, and will not be done in bulk, you must enter negative and
neutral feedbacks manually.
! Status: Is imported correctly, with the exception of "Ready to List" and
"Pending" statuses, which have no equivalent in Blackthorne.
Importing from Turbo Lister
Turbo Lister doesn't export its entire database all at once. Instead, it exports one folder at
a time. The best way to import from Turbo Lister is to create same-named folders, one at
a time, importing data into each of them separately.

To import from Turbo Lister, select File|Import|Import Turbo Lister CSV File.

! Images: Images are lost, except for images that reside on the local
hard drive with the same letter and folder (e.g.: "C:\Images") as that
used by Turbo Lister.
! States (Status): Turbo Lister doesn't use the concept of states (or
status) of items, so when Blackthorne imports, it tries to estimate and
assign a rough status (if the item has a currently-running auction, for
example).
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! Inventory/Part Numbers: Turbo Lister also doesn't handle inventory,
so when items are imported into Blackthorne, the inventory section is
set to: "Don't track inventory for this item." The Part Number field is
not set.
! Seller/E-Mail Contact: The E-mail contact field is not available.
Neither is the Seller field, so Blackthorne assigns the current seller (if
the "current seller" is set to "All Sellers", then the seller field is not
assigned).
! Shipping: International shipping details are not importable from
Turbo Lister.
! Item Specifics: Item Specifics are imported correctly.
! Templates: E-mail and Ad templates are lost. Ad template is set to
"Simple."
! Picture Host: Is set to EPS by default.
Importing from eBay
In the very best-case scenario, if the listing was created using Blackthorne, just about
every piece of information, including information that is completely independent of eBay
(e.g.: part numbers) will be imported.

To import from eBay, choose File|Import|Import from eBay.

When importing eBay listings that were created with other programs, more information
will be lost:

! Images: Not imported.
! Inventory: Not imported. When the listing is created, inventory is turned off by
default and needs to be turned on individually for each item.
! Part Number: If the listing was created by Selling Manager or Blackthorne, part
numbers are imported, otherwise they are not.
! Dispute Status and ID: These are both imported.
! Templates: Not imported.
Archiving While Importing
Archiving reduces clutter and speeds up operation of the program, while keeping all
information still available if needed.

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With this in mind, the import program automatically archives data, subject to the
following criteria:

! Sales older than 6 months are archived.
! Listings that ended more than 6 months ago are archived.
! Items that were last used to create listings more than 6 months ago are archived.
! Store listings that haven't been used in more than 6 months are archived.

In addition to the six-month boundary, incomplete items (no listings ever created from
them; missing user information and option settings) are also archived.

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Quick Start - Listing Your First Item

eBay Blackthorne is a very powerful application. This tutorial is designed to get
your first auction up and running as quickly as possible. It just tells you what to
do without taking any time to explain what you are doing or why. All of the
functions are described in much more detail later in the documentation.
To List Your First Item:
1. Before beginning this tutorial, you should have completed the Setup Assistant
with as much information as possible.
2. Click on the Create Items Mode tab to switch the program into Create Items
Mode.

3. Make sure you are viewing only the grid by clicking the Grid Only button on the
Layouts toolbar.

4. To create an empty item record, select (Untitled) from the New Item dropdown.
When asked how many items to create, enter "1" and click OK.

A new item record will appear in the item entry window.

5. In the Item Details group, highlight (Untitled) and replace it with your title.
57

Also, from the dropdowns, enter a Seller and Contact Email from the accounts you
created during the Setup Assistant.

6. From the Categories group, use the Select button to choose a category from the
Category Selector.

7. From the Description group, enter your description. If you would like to give
your listing a finished look, select a theme from the Theme dropdown. After
choosing a Theme, you can use the Preview button to see what it looks like. Ad
Templates will help you minimize duplicated text in all your descriptions, but we
will save that for another day. For now, leave it set to Simple.

8. If you have pictures on your computer that you would like in your listing, enter
them in the Pictures group. Simply click the Browse button or one of the Picture
Wells to navigate to and select your images. For this tutorial, we will use the
easiest picture hosting, so leave the Picture Host dropdown set to eBay Picture
Services.
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9. Enter the Format and Pricing information.

The next few steps involve using Presets to enter data. A preset is a group
of settings that you can define and use over and over. They speed up data
entry considerably, and reduce errors. For this demonstration, just enter the
data directly, without creating any presets. When you are more comfortable
with item creation, you can learn more about using presets in the Creating
Items Faster with Field Presets topic.

10. If you would like your listing to stand out, you may want to select one of the
preset Listing Upgrades. Otherwise, leave it set to None. Listing Upgrades incur
additional listing fees. If you would like to know more right now, see Listing
Upgrades under Entering Item Details.
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11. If you are familiar with setting your shipping information on eBay, then you
shouldn't have a problem setting it from the Shipping group. Choose Custom
from the shipping dropdown and it will open the Shipping Preset form. Enter
your shipping options on that form. If you have difficulty, you should consult the
topic Entering Item Details.

12. From the Payments group, specify what type of payments you accept. Choose
Custom from the payment dropdown and it will open the Payment Preset form.
Also leave Payment as unspecified, or take a few minutes to read up on Payment.

13. This completes the item entry. Check your item for errors, and then submit it. To
check for errors, select Items Actions | Preview and Check Errors from the
main menu. The Preview window will open, showing a summary of fees and
errors. If there are no errors, click the Submit button to submit it to eBay. If
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there are errors, click Close to return to the main screen and select Tools |
Activity Log. The errors are listed under the Listing History tab.

14. This will bring up one final form, giving you choices for scheduling the auction
start. Select Submit to eBay and start immediately then click OK. From this
window, you can also choose to create multiple, identical listings and have the
auction starts staggered so that they don't all start at the same time.

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15. Once the item is submitted, the status of the item changes to Listing Created and
a listing record is created. To view the listing record, click on the Monitor
Listings tab and select Listings by Status | Running filter from the Views
sidebar. The listing will appear in the grid.

Congratulations! You've now listed your first item with eBay Blackthorne. When your
auction has ended, you will need to close out your sale. To understand the item creation
process in greater detail, we recommend you continue by reading Creating and Managing
Items.
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Closing eBay Blackthorne
When you are finished, you can close eBay Blackthorne using File | Exit from the Main
menu. You can also use Alt-F4 or click the Windows close window button in the upper
right hand corner of the eBay Blackthorne window.
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Overview of eBay Blackthorne
eBay Blackthorne is an automation tool for eBay Sellers. It helps automate all steps in
the sales process from a single application with an easy to use interface.

There are 3 major stages in the lifespan of an eBay sale. You will Create Items, Monitor
Listings and Finalize Sales. Those three stages are managed by the 3 primary mode tabs
on the main window.

The following diagram illustrates these stages.

64

You will start the process by creating an item record in the Create Items mode. The item
record contains all the information about an item to be listed on eBay. You will enter
65
your description, pictures and all the auction settings in the item record. You can even
enter the number you have and track inventory from your item record. Once you have an
item created, you can quickly and easily submit a listing to eBay. If you have more than
one copy of the item, you can use the same item record to create another listing as many
times as you'd like. In the topic Creating and Managing Items you will find all you need
to know to create items quickly and keep them organized.

While a listing is running you monitor it from the Monitor Listings mode. In Monitor
Listings, you can keep track of the current bid price and the high bidder. You can also
add to your description, end a listing early, submit second chance offers and relist closed
listings. The topic Monitoring Listings describes all the ways you can keep track of your
listings while they are running.

Once your listing sells, it generates a sale. The sale will be saved and finalized along
with the buyer information from the Finalize Sales mode. In Finalize Sales, you will
perform all of the tasks that occur after the sale is completed including, emailing buyers,
receiving payments, leaving feedback, etc. You can even run reports from Finalize Sales
to help you keep track of your profit and loss. The Processing Sales and Shipping topic
contains all the information on what to do after the sale.

There are many more functions of eBay Blackthorne, but once you have an understanding
of these three primary stages, the rest will fall into place. Mastering the content in the
three topics described here is the best place to start.
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Creating and Managing Items
Creating and Managing Items
Before you can create an eBay listing, you must first create an Item in your inventory.
Your Items will be displayed on the Create Items mode. Your item will pass through
different statuses as you fill in all the information for your item, check the item for
errors, submit it, and organize the item so it is easy to get to later. Statuses help you keep
track of what stage your items are at in the creation and submission process. You can
easily see all the items in a particular status from the Filters Tree in the Views sidebar.

The following diagram shows the actions that you will perform over the lifespan of an
item in the light blue boxes. It identifies the status of the item as it progresses through
the process in the purple boxes.

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The first step in the process is to create an item record. A brand new item record has a
status of In Process. The item record contains all the information about the item you
want to list. You will enter...

! the information that you need to send to eBay (Title, Description, Starting Price,
Shipping Options, etc.)
! any pictures that you have taken of the item
! inventory information if you track inventory
! information about the supplier if you track the suppliers of your items
! consignment information if you are a Trading Assistant or selling the item on
consignment

If your pictures are hosted on your own web space, then you may want to upload your
pictures during the creation process so you don't have to wait for them to upload at
submission time.

After entering your data, you will move your items into the Entry Completed status.
Once entry is completed, you may want to preview your formatted description, check
your listing for any errors or review the fees for submitting your listing.

The Entry Completed status is most useful when there are different users who
create and submit items. By moving items into the Entry Completed status, the
data entry person is signalling to the submitter that the items are ready. If the
same person creates and lists the items, then you do not need to move items into
the Entry Completed status. You can simply review them while they are In
Process.

When you have reviewed your item, you are ready to submit your listing. If you item
failed submission for any reason, it will be moved into the Submission Errors status.
You will need to fix it and resubmit it. If your item submission was successful, then
your item will be placed in the Listed status and a Listing record will be created. See the
Monitoring Listings topic for details on tracking a listing through its process.

If you have more than one of each item, you now have an efficient way to enter item
information and submit it all from one screen. If you are a commodity seller (someone
who has many copies of an item to sell), you can use this same item record to submit the
item over and over again while it remains in the Listed status.

After you have sold the last copy of your item, and you have been paid for it, you will
archive your item. This will make it easier for you to navigate through your items and it
will make the program run faster.
How do I keep all my items organized?
As you list more and more items on eBay, it will become important for you to organize
these items so that you can easily find them and list them again in the future. Folders,
lists, and filters are all different methods for you to easily view and manage your items.
68

The most common way to organize your items is to create and name folders to place your
items in. You can then create lists of items without having to remove them from their
folder. Finally, there are predefined filters that will show you groups of items based on
something they have in common.

For instance, if you sell electronics, you may want to create folders for DVD
players, and VCR's. You could then create a list that includes some DVD
players and some VCR's to be submitted next Sunday. The items would still
exist in their original folder, but they would also be referenced by the list. A
filter called "New and Unlisted" could also be used to show you all the items
you have created, but have not listed yet.

If you sell under multiple eBay User ID's or if multiple people list under the same User
ID, you can create Seller Accounts in Blackthorne to help separate your information.

If all else fails, you can use the good ol' Search function to find the items you are looking
for.

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Creating and Submitting Items
70
Adding a New Item Record
Adding a New Item Record
Before listing an item, you have to create an item record that contains all the needed
information for the item. Entering information about an item tends to be one of the most
time consuming tasks that eBay sellers are faced with. This is why we have spent a lot of
time streamlining the item entry process. If most of the fields are already entered when
you create a new item record, it will save you a lot of time. There are three different
ways you can create new item records.

If you are creating your first item, or an item that isn't like any other you've listed before,
you can create a blank item. If you have a similar item already in your database, you can
create a new item from an existing item. Finally, you can also create an item from an
item template. An item template is a special type of item record that you can create
and fill out in advance. Later, you can generate new item records from that template.
The topic "Creating Items Faster with Item Templates" later in this section describes this
in more detail.
Creating an Item from Scratch
If you don't have any items yet, or you don't have any items that are similar to the new
item you are going to list, you may want to create an item from scratch.
To create an item from scratch:
1. From the Create Items tab, Select Items Actions|New Item| (Untitled) from the
main menu.

You can also use the New Item button on the Actions toolbar to create an (Untitled)
item.

71
Depending upon the current layout, the new item record will display in the details
pane, or in a popup window. Proceed to "Entering Item Details" for information on
filling in the new item record.

Carlos is a brand new user of eB and has never created an item before. He uses
Items Actions|New Item|(Untitled) to get his first item record.

Creating an Item from an Existing Item
If you have a similiar item record already created, you can create a new one by
duplicating the first.
To create a new item from an existing item:
1. From the Create Items mode, select the item you would like to duplicate from the
Grid and click the Duplicate Action Button.

A new record will appear in the Grid and the Details Panel if it is shown. Also,
depending upon your set preferences, the new Item may instead appear in a popup
window.

2. Modify the new record to make any changes for the new item.

Camille sells football jerseys. She just created an item for a Philadelphia
Eagles jersey and now wants to create a Pittsburgh Steelers jersey. She selects
the Eagles jersey and clicks on Duplicate. It gives her another Eagles jersey.
She clicks on the new item and modifies the description to say "Pittsburgh
Steelers" everywhere it said "Philadelphia Eagles". She now has an item record
for each.
Creating an Item from an Item Template
If you find yourself creating the same types of items over and over, you can simply create
an Item Template for the item. You can then easily create items just like it from the Item
Templates folder. The topic "Creating Items Faster with Item Templates" later in this
section describes this in more detail.
To create an item from an item template:
1. From the Create Items mode, click the dropdown menu arrow on the New Item
Action button and select the desired item template from the dropdown menu.

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You can also create an Item from an Item Template by choosing File|Items
Actions|New Item and choose the desired item template from the dropdown menu.

A new record will appear in the Grid and the Details Panel (depending on your
display settings). Also, depending upon your set preferences, the new Item may
instead appear in a popup window.

2. Modify the new record to make any changes for the new item.

After a while Camille realizes that she will be selling a lot of jerseys over the
next several months so she should make an Item Template. She selects an
existing jersey, right clicks it and chooses "Save as Item Template". She then
changes the title of the Item Template to "Jersey". Later she goes to the New
button and chooses "Jersey" to get a new item record.

An astute user will notice that all three of these methods are really just different
ways of duplicating an existing item record. When you are creating an item
from scratch, you are simply duplicating an empty item record that was
provided. When using an Item Template, you are simply duplicating a special
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type of item record.

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Entering Item Details
Entering Item Details
There are many pieces of information that must be entered when creating an item. This
topic assumes a good understanding of the eBay listing process and listing features. If
you don't understand what a field is for, please consult the eBay online documentation for
the Sell Your Item page.

Item information can be entered directly in the Grid, or in the Details Pane of the Create
Items mode.

Item information is entered on two different tabs in the Details Pane or the New Item
pop-up. The Item tab contains all the fields that are necessary for listing an item on
eBay. The Inventory tab contains all other information about the item.

If you would prefer to scroll rather than tab within the Details Pane, you can
make the Details Pane one long scrollable entry panel from
Tools|Options|Appearance|Entering Data.

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Item Details
The Item Details group contains general information about the item.

Enter the Title and optionally, the Subtitle. Then select a Seller Account for the item
from the Seller dropdown menu. By assigning Seller Accounts to your items, you can
separate your items by eBay User ID or by the person listing the item. The Seller
dropdown menu will only be visible if you have more than one Seller Account created.
You can learn more on using Seller Accounts in the topic "Using Seller Accounts to
Organize Your Items". You can also assign an Email Account under the Contact Email
dropdown menu. By assigning an Email Account to your item, you can identify which
email address will be used for any contacts relating to this item.

If you track your items by Part Number, you can also enter it optionally. The part
number field is used to identify the unique inventory item this item record is for. If
multiple items share the same part number, then the inventory will be shared by all those
items. If you leave the part number blank, it will be assumed to be its own unique
inventory item.

Sonia has 20 leather wallets to sell. She wants to sell some of them as auctions,
some in her store, and some at fixed price. She starts by creating an item record
for the auction. She sets all the properties she needs to sell it as an auction and
then assigns a part number of LW001. Then, she sets her inventory at 20. To
create the store and fixed price items, she duplicates the original auction item
and changes the listing format and other necessary fields to list as a store and
fixed price auction. She makes sure that all three have the same part number of
LW001.

When she lists one of the items as an auction, the Qty Listed for all three item
records changes to 19. When she then adds 5 to her store, the Qty Listed drops
to 14 for all three item records and when she lists 2 as fixed price, the inventory
drops to 12 for all three.

By sharing part numbers, she can now easily create an auction, fixed price
auction or sale record while maintaining proper inventory counts.

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Geoffrey sells unique items and only gets one of each so he doesn't need to
track inventory. He simply leaves the Part Number field blank.

The Title and SubTitle fields are spell checked in real time. See "Spell Checking" for
information on using the spell checker.
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Description
The Description group allows you to enter your description and select how it will appear
in the listing.

Enter all text of your description in the Description box.

You can enter plain text or HTML in the description box. When using HTML
however, you must ensure it adheres to eBay guidelines for HTML and
Javascript.

If you would like to edit your Description in a larger window, click the Edit button to
open the full screen Description Editor. The Description Editor contains a WYSIWYG
(What You See Is What You Get) HTML editor to allow you to add custom formatting
such as bold or highlighting. To learn more about the Description Editor, please see
"Using_the_Description_Editor". The Description field is spell checked in real time.
See "Spell Checking" for information on using the spell checker.

Next, enter the Theme you want to use for your description. The Theme is a graphical
layout for your item that can make it more attractive. There are literally hundreds to
choose from, with more being added all the time. Themes are the equivalent of eBay's
Listing Designer templates. To help you select a theme, there is a Preview button to see
what your listing will look like. Simply choose a Theme and then click the Preview
button to view a formatted version of your listing.

Themes are free when you are listing using the same eBay userid that is
subscribed to eB. When using another userid, using themes will incur the
Listing Designer fee on your auctions.

There are different themes for the regular site versus the eBay Motors site. Use
the themes marked with a checkered flag on the eBay Motors site and any other
theme when listing on the non-Motors eBay site.
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Finally, select an Ad Template. Whereas the Theme assigned the graphical appearance
for your listing, an Ad Template can assign default text for your description. Initially,
there are two Ad Templates. The Simple template provides no additional text. Only the
text entered in your description box is included in your listing. The Enhanced template
will add standard messages for shipping, tax, payment etc., but requires you to edit the
template before you can use it.

Ad Templates are very powerful. Using a WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You
Get) editor, you can enter text once in an Ad Template, and have it included in all your
listings. To find out more, see "Customizing Ad Templates".

Ad Templates allow you to include the text from your description using an Item Fields
variable. However, it doesn't allow you to change the font style or color within the
description itself. It also doesn't allow you to enter other HTML formatting like tables
and lists into the description. If you want more control over the appearance of the
description itself, then click the Edit button to open the Description Editor. The topic
"Description - Using_the_Description_Editor" discusses this in more depth.

By using the Description and Ad Templates properly, you can greatly reduce the amount
of text you must enter. Whenever possible, the Description field should just contain
information that makes a particular item different from other items. Any text that is
repeated in multiple listings should be in an Ad Template. For example, if you are selling
a Fenton Vase, then you should include information about this particular vase in the
Description. This includes color, style, scratches, chips, etc. Information that appears in
all your glassware listings like shipping messages, payment messages, how you grade
glassware, and the history of your company should be part of an Ad Template called
"Glassware". This allows you to use the "Glassware" template anytime you list a piece
of glass, leaving you to simply enter the specifics of that piece of glass.
Using the Description Editor
If you have a simple Description, then you can simply enter it in the Description box on
the Item Details form. When used with an Ad Template, the Description you enter in
the Description box will be included in your listing when it is created. The Description
box allows you to include simple text or you can enter HTML if you desire. If you are
unfamiliar with HTML, yet you still want more advanced formatting in your Description,
then you can use the Description Editor. The Description Editor is a WYSIWYG (What
You See Is What You Get) editor that allows you to easily create formatted text. When
included in your Ad Template all the formatting created in the Description Editor will
appear along with the other elements from the Ad Template.

By using the Description and Ad Templates properly, you can greatly reduce the amount
of text you must enter. Whenever possible, the Description field should just contain
information that makes a particular item different from other items. Any text that is
repeated in multiple listings should be in an Ad Template. For example, if you are selling
a Fenton Vase, then you should include information about this particular vase in the
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Description. This includes color, style, scratches, chips, etc. Information that appears in
all your glassware listings like shipping messages, payment messages, how you grade
glassware, and the history of your company should be part of an Ad Template called
"Glassware". This allows you to use the "Glassware" template anytime you list a piece
of glass, leaving you to simply enter the specifics of that piece of glass.

To open the Description Editor, simply click on the "Edit" button in the Description
group, or double-click the Description input box.

Enter the text of your description in the main Description input box.

You can enter plain text or HTML in the description box. When using HTML
Javascript. You can also enter any of the Item Fields available in the Ad
Template Studio, however you must manually enter the names of the Item Field
tags.

You can use the Design View and HTML View tabs to swap back and forth between
seeing the formatted appearance and the source HTML. Spell checking is not enabled in
the Design View since the Design View is supposed to show exactly what will be
displayed and the red wavy lines violate that rule. However, you can spell check in the
HTML View. HTML tags will be ignored by the spell checker. See "Spell Checking"
for information on using the spell checker.

You can add formatting by placing your cursor or selecting text and then clicking on one
of the format buttons on the toolbar. The buttons perform the following formatting:

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Icon Description

Cut the selected text

Copy the selected text

Paste the selected text

Undo the last action

Redo the last action

Make the selected text bold

Italicize the selected text

Underscore the selected text

Set the font

Remove all formatting from the selected text

Set the color of the selected text

Increase the size of the selected text

Decrease the size of the selected text

Left align the selected text

Center the selected text

Right align the selected text

Indent

Outdent

Start/Stop an numbered list

Start/Stop a bulleted list

Insert a horizontal line

Insert a table

Insert a hyperlink

Perform a search and replace
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Categories
Categories
The Category group allows you to enter one or two categories to list your item under. If
you have a store, it will also allow you to enter the store categories.
There are three ways to enter a category:
! Type the category number directly into the category number box. If the category
number is valid, the category description will automatically fill in.
! If available, you can choose a favorite category from the category dropdown
menu.
! Click the Select button to bring up the Category Selector.

Some categories have Item Specifics or may be selected from a catalog. By specifying
the Item Specifics information or choosing the item from a catalog, the item is more
accurately identified for your buyers. If the chosen category has Item Specifics or
Catalog information available, the Edit Item Specifics window will appear after the
selection of the category. Follow the instructions in
"Entering_Item_Specifics_and_Catalog_Info" to complete this information. Once
specified, the Item Specifics/Catalog information is displayed below the category
selection. You can use the Edit button to change Item Specifics or Catalog information in
the future.

If you have a store, you can also enter one or two Store Categories that you want your
item listed under.

If you have more than one Seller Account, the store category dropdowns will
only appear when a seller account with a store is selected in the "Seller"
dropdown in the sidebar.

If you recently modified your categories on eBay, or if you don't see the store
category dropdown in the Category group, then select Refresh|eBay Store
Categories from the main menu. This will refresh your list of store categories.

The Category Selector
Items are listed on eBay by category. There are over 100,000 categories on eBay.
Placing your item in the proper category is important because it helps buyers more easily
find your items. If desired, you can even list your item in two different categories. The
Category Selector helps you quickly find and select categories using:
! a hierarchical category tree
! a list of your favorite categories
! by searching through category names.

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To open the Category Selector, simply click the "Select" button next to the category
input fields.

The Category Selector will appear. By choosing the Category 1 or Category 2 radio
button at the top, you can specify which category you are entering. Use the "Clear"
buttons to remove any categories you don't want to list in anymore.

Choosing a Category from the Tree
From the Browse tab, you can select your category from a hierarchical tree. Simply
choose the highest level category in the input box on the left, and lower levels will appear
on the right. Continue to drill down until you reach the leaf category you wish to list in.

Some categories may have associated Item Specifics. Item Specifics are additional
pieces of information to further categorize your item. For instance, the Women's Shoes
category may have color and size as Item Specifics. Additionally, you may be able to fill
in some of the Item Specifics for a category using Pre-Filled Item Information. Pre-
Filled Item Information is Item Specific information that can be automatically entered for
you from a catalog. For instance, eBay maintains a catalog of information on DVD's and
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can automatically fill in a description of the DVD for you. Any categories that contain
Item Specifics or Pre-Filled Item Information will be marked with small icons as
described in the lower left corner of the Category Selector.

If you would like to view the category on eBay to see what other types of items are in
that category, then click the "View on eBay" button.

If you would like to add this category to your favorites list, then click on "Add to
Favorites". All categories in your favorites list will be available from the Category
Name dropdown on the Item Details page and will save you from having to load the
Category Selector the next time you want to use this category.
Choosing a Category from Your Favorites
The Favorites tab contains a list of all categories that you have added to your Favorites
list.

The easiest way to select a favorite is from the Category Name dropdown on the Item
Details. That dropdown contains the same list as shown here. You can also select the
category simply by clicking it here.

If you would like to remove a category from your favorites list, then simply select it and
click the "Remove" button.
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Choosing a Category from the Category Search
The Search tab allows you to search for categories that have a particular word in the
name.

Simply enter your search word(s) into the search field and click the "Search" button. A
list of possible categories will appear. Simply click the category you desire.

To add the found category to your favorites list, click the "Add to Favorites" button.

Single clicking a category on any tab will enter it into the category field at the
top. Double-clicking a category will enter it as the category and exit the
Category Selector.
Entering Item Specifics and Catalog Information
Some categories may have associated Item Specifics. Item Specifics are additional
pieces of information to further categorize your item. For instance, the Women's Shoes
category may have color and size as Item Specifics. Additionally, you may be able to fill
in some of the Item Specifics for a category using Pre-Filled Item Information. Pre-
Filled Item Information is Item Specific information that can be automatically entered for
you from a catalog. For instance, eBay maintains a catalog of information on DVD's and
can automatically fill in a description of the DVD for you.

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When selecting a category from the Category Selector, any categories with Item Specifics
and/or Pre-Filled Item Information will automatically display an input form for you to fill
in more data. The fields that appear on that form will be different depending upon the
category selected.

Item Specifics can be entered for both categories, but catalog information can
only be entered for the first category.
Entering Item Specifics
The Item Specifics input form will look something like this form for the Women's Shoes
category.

Simply fill in as much data as you can and click the "OK" button.

A summary of the information you entered will appear under the Category input fields.

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Entering Pre-Filled Catalog Information
When a category also has Pre-Filled Item Information, it will give you the option of
entering the Item Specifics yourself or using the catalog information.

If you want to just enter the Item Specifics yourself, choose "Manually enter Item
Specifics" at the top of the screen. You will then see a typical Item Specifics screen and
can enter the values manually.

To search for information within a catalog, select "Search for pre-filled catalog
information" at the top, and then enter values under the "Product Search" header to help
locate the catalog information. Click the "Search" button when you have entered your
search criteria, and a list of matching catalog entries will appear at the right.

To see the details of any of the matches, click the "Show Details" link. The link will
show you all the catalog information for that entry to ensure you have selected the correct
entry.

When you have found the entry that matches your item, click it to select it. This will
show you the Item Specifics input form with much of the data already filled in. You
should continue to fill in any other data that you have available.

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Select "Include Stock Photo in this Listing" if you would like the photo from the catalog
to be used in your listing.

Select "Include Additional Information" if you would like the description from the
catalog added to your description. You may even decide to include this information in
lieu of your own description. This saves you time by not having to add your own
description.

Select "Use Stock Image as Gallery Image" if you would like the photo from the catalog
to be used as your gallery image (if you have chosen to list with a gallery image).

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If you would like to use all three stock photo settings specified as your default for future
catalog listings, click the Set as Default button.

When finished, click "OK". A summary of your catalog information and a thumbnail will
appear under the Category input fields.

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Pictures
Pictures
The Pictures group allows you to enter up to 12 pictures for your item.

These pictures are included in your formatted listing based on the Layout chosen in your
Ad Template.

You can enter images in any of the following ways:

! drag and drop images from any open Windows folder directly onto an image well
. Dragging multiple images is allowed. The images will be added in the order they
were selected.
! drag and drop images from any open Windows folder directly onto the picture
path text fields. Dragging multiple images is allowed. The images will be added
in the order they were selected.
! click an image well to navigate to your image folder and select one or more
images. The order of the images when placed in the image wells cannot be
guaranteed.
! use the browse button (the button with the three dots on it) to navigate to your
image folder and select one or more images. The order of the images when
placed in the image wells cannot be guaranteed.
! manually enter the path to the image directly into the picture path fields. You can
include pictures that are on your hard drive, or you can use pictures on the internet
by entering the URL in the picture path text field.

You can either use eBay Picture Services to host your pictures, or you can host your
pictures on your own web space. Choose your hosting preference from the Picture Host
dropdown menu.
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If you have chosen to list with eBay Picture Services, you can also choose additional
picture options from the EPS Picture Options dropdown menu.

Your listings will load into your potential buyer's browser much faster if they are
properly compressed and formatted. The Picture Studio allows you to compress, crop,
scale and rotate your images so they are more efficient. You can access the Picture
Studio by clicking the Edit button in the Pictures Group, or by clicking Items
Actions|Edit Pictures... from the main menu. You can learn more about the Picture
Studio in the topic "Editing Pictures".
Uploading Your Pictures
One of the best ways to ensure a better price for your items is to list them with pictures.
Earlier, you learned how to identify which pictures were associated with your item. For
your pictures to appear in your listing, however, they must be uploaded and available on
the web. There are basically three ways you can host images on the Web: eBay Picture
Services, eBay Picture Manager or you can use your own Web space.

Uploading pictures to eBay Picture Services is fast and easy, however you will incur a fee
after the first picture on each item. Using eBay Picture Manager will allow you to use
eBay's image hosting feature to store your images. Picture Manager provides you will a
specified amount of web space for a set fee, and you manage what images are available at
any given time. If you have your own web space on your ISP or through another
provider, you can use that to host your images also.

When using eBay Picture Manager, or your own web host, you will need to first set up a
Picture Host account.
Uploading Pictures to eBay Picture Services (ePS)
The simplest way to include pictures is to use eBay Picture Services (ePS). eBay
currently charges a fee for every picture after the first one, but if you are not comfortable
with managing images on your own web space, it could be well worth the cost. To use
ePS, all you have to do is select eBay Picture Services from the Picture Host dropdown
menu in the Pictures group.

If you choose ePS, you can also select other eBay features such as Picture Show, Super
Size and Picture Pack from the EPS Picture Options dropdown menu in the Pictures
group.
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When you submit your item, Blackthorne sends your pictures to eBay along with your
listing. You don't need to do anything else.
Uploading Pictures to Picture Manager or Your Own Web Space
Picture Manager and hosting on your own web space are very similar. Both provide you
with space that allow you to upload images. Both must have a Picture Host account set
up to use, and both will have images uploaded the same way. The main difference is in
the setup. When using Picture Manager, you simply have to identify the eBay Userid that
is subscribed to Picture Manager. When hosting your own images, you will need to set
up your FTP settings with information provided by your web space provider.

To use your own web host or Picture Manager for any given listing, simply select the
Picture Host account you want to use in the Picture Host dropdown on the Item Details
Pane.

If you host pictures on your own web space or use Picture Manager, then you need to
make sure your images have been uploaded to your web space before your listing starts.
By default, Blackthorne will upload any missing pictures for you, or you can do this
manually if you prefer. You don't have to remember so much if you let Blackthorne
upload the images when it submits the item, but the time it takes to check for missing
pictures and then upload them could greatly increase the time it will take to submit items.
If you want your items to be submitted quickly, then you may want to upload your
pictures manually in advance.

Deleting images from Picture Manager is not currently supported by the eBay
API Interface. You will need to delete images from Picture Manager on eBay.

Uploading Pictures Manually
To upload pictures manually:

1. From the Create Items Grid, select the item(s) to have the pictures uploaded.
(How to select multiple items.)
2. Select Items Actions - Manually Upload Pictures from the menu or click the
Upload Pictures Action Button.
3. You can view the status of pictures as they are uploaded in the status bar.

If you use your own FTP tool to upload your images, and you do not want eBay
Blackthorne to do anything with your images, you can set it to not upload your
pictures during submission from the Advanced tab of your Picture Host
account setup.

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Format and Pricing
The Format and Pricing group contains various fields that eBay requires for your listing.

Enter the Listing Format, Duration, Starting Price, Reserve Price, Buy It Now Price,
Fixed Price, whether the listing is Private or allows Best Offer, Quantity and the Lot
Size.

If the Listing Format is Auction, the Buy It Now Price is listed. If the Listing
Format is Fixed Price or Store, the Fixed Price displays instead of the Buy It
Now Price. These prices are saved separately. If however, one of the prices is
set to 0, it will default to the other price. For example, if you enter a Buy It
Now Price of $9.99 and have never entered a Fixed Price, then if you change
the Listing Format of the listing to Store, the Fixed Price will be $9.99 also. If
you then change the Fixed Price to $14.99, and switch the Listing Format back
to Auction, the Buy It Now price will still be $9.99.

The Quantity is the number of items you can sell to different bidders. If the quantity is
greater than 1, the auction is a Dutch Auction. Lot size is the number of items that are
all being sold together to the same buyer.

Joe purchased 10 identical pairs of wooden shoes at an auction. He listed all 10
in a single auction with a quantity of 10. Eight different people bid on and won
8 of the pairs of shoes. This is a Dutch Auction that used the Quantity field.

Sarah bought a collection of 300 Mercury dimes, and wants to sell them all at
once to a single bidder. She started an auction with a quantity of 1, and a lot
size of 300. They were all won by the single high bidder.

Marilyn bought out a video stores remaining stock when they went out of
business. The video store had 11 sets of Apollo Mission DVD's. Each set had
6 DVD's in it. She listed a Dutch auction as "Apollo Mission DVD's" with a
quantity of 11 and a lot size of 6. Each of the Dutch winners received 6 DVD's.
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Listing Upgrades
The Listing Upgrade group allows you to choose the upgrades you would like for your
listing.

Upgrades make your listing more noticeable and incur additional fees at eBay. You can
choose one of the Preset groups of listing upgrades, or use the Edit button to select
custom upgrades for this listing. See "Creating Items Faster with Field Presets" for more
information on using Field Presets.

The Edit button displays the Edit Listing Upgrades window. Simply check any upgrades
you would like to use for your listing. To set the Listing Upgrades for this item only,
leave the radio button set to "Change this item only". If you want to modify a preset or
create a new preset, please consult "Creating Items Faster with Field Presets" for more
information.

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Payment
The Payment group allows you to choose the payment information you would like for
your listing.

If any payment Presets are defined, you can choose one from the dropdown menu, or
you can use the Edit button to bring up the Edit Payment form. See "Creating Items
Faster with Field Presets" for more information on creating and using Field Presets.

The Edit button opens the Edit Payment Preset window.

Navigate the form using the various tabs to enter your Payment Methods, Payment
Instructions, whether you accept Returns, whether you offer any Finance Offers, and if
you accept eBay Motors Deposits items.
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Shipping
The Shipping group allows you to choose the shipping charges and weights.

Shipping Preset
If any shipping presets are defined, you can choose one from the dropdown menu, or you
can use the Edit button to bring up the Edit Shipping form. See "Creating Items Faster
with Field Presets" for more information on using Field Presets.

The Edit button next to the Shipping dropdown displays the Edit Shipping Preset
window.

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You can choose from three different types of shipping for your listing. Calculated, Flat,
or Self Managed.
Calculated Rate Shipping
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When using calculated shipping, tell eBay what shipping services you provide for
domestic and/or international shipments. Also specify any packaging and handling fees
you may charge and the Package Size. When your auction is complete, eBay will use
this information along with the buyer's location to automatically calculate the shipping
costs.

Changing the Package Size will change the list of available Shipping Services.
If you have previously chosen a Shipping Service that isn't valid for the
Package Size you choose, you will have to re-enter the Shipping Service.

You can also specify your Domestic Handling Time and whether or not you offer Get it
Fast. Get it Fast is an eBay option that lets your users know that you ship quickly. In
order to use get it fast, you must offer a domestic expedited shipping service and a 1 day
handling time. It also only applies to Fixed Price and Buy it Now auctions.

If you have checked the "Apply a shipping discount when buyer purchases multiple
items" box, then eBay will use your shipping discount settings in My eBay to calculate
the discount.

Entering international shipping is similar to domestic shipping except you must also
specify what destinations you ship to for each shipping service.

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Flat Rate Shipping

When using Flat Rate shipping, specify a specific rate that you charge for up to 3
shipping services. Also specify the shipping cost for each additional item purchased.
When your auction is complete, eBay will use this information to calculate the shipping
costs for the buyer.

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You can also specify a Package Size. Package Size is optional with Flat Rate shipping.
It is not sent to eBay and is only used if you are used to send to 3rd party postage
programs.

Changing the Package Size will change the list of available Shipping Services.
If you have previously chosen a Shipping Service that isn't valid for the
Package Size you choose, you will have to re-enter the Shipping Service.

You can also specify your Domestic Handling Time and whether or not you offer Get it
Fast. Get it Fast is an eBay option that lets your users know that you ship quickly. In
order to use get it fast, you must offer a domestic expedited shipping service and a 1 day
handling time. It also only applies to Fixed Price and Buy it Now auctions.
Self-Managed Shipping
With Self-Managed shipping, the input fields look just like Flat Rate Shipping, except no
information is sent to eBay. The seller will include any shipping information in the
listings itself. It is left to the seller and the buyer to decide upon the shipping amount at
the end of the auction. By entering shipping information in this Preset, you can later use
variables in your Ad Templates to have the shipping charges automatically included in
your listings. Please see "Using Ad Templates" for more information.
Weight and Dimensions
You can also enter the weight and dimensions of your item.

When using calculated shipping, eBay will use the supplied weights and dimensions to
calculate the shipping weight. If you are using any shipping type, the weight and
dimensions are not used, they are merely for your reference when shipping later.
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Shipping To/From
The Shipping group also allows you to choose the destinations and origin.

Ship to/from is a separate group with its own customizable presets. If you have defined
any Ship to/from Presets , you can choose one from the dropdown menu.

Clicking the Edit button next to the Ship to/from dropdown menu allows you to provide
your location(s) and the locations you ship to.

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Enter the locations that you ship to, and the Ship from Location. The Location field is
the field that shows on your eBay listing as the location.
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Inventory Details
In addition to the information that you will send to eBay (as specified on the Item tab in
Items Details), you may want to track other related information. The Inventory tab
allows you to track additional information such as:

! the source of the item (either your supplier or a consignor)
! inventory information
! custom fields
! the item status
! any notes you would like to keep

Source
You can keep track of where you received the item in the Source group. Usually, you get
the item from either a supplier or a consignor. A supplier can be someone you always
purchase from, or it could simply be someone who had a garage sale. A consignor is
someone who gives the item to you to sell for them.

If the item is consigned, then click the "Consigned" box. This will allow you to enter the
Consignor and the Consignment Plan. See Consigning for information on tracking
consignments.

If your item is not consigned, then you can enter the supplier. Simply choose a supplier
from the Supplier dropdown list. If you would like to view or edit the information for a
supplier, then click the "Edit" button next to the Supplier dropdown. If this is a new
supplier, then choose "New Supplier" from the dropdown list. A Supplier input screen
will appear and you can enter the information for the supplier.

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If you want to keep track of how much you make on this item, you should enter what you
paid for the item in the Cost field. eBay Blackthorne will use this value later when
calculating your profit and loss.

Finally, you can record the date you acquired the item for your records.
Inventory
The Inventory group helps you keep track of how many items you have in inventory.
Since you may track inventory on some items, and not others, with each item, you can
specify whether you "Track Inventory for this Item". If checked, you then specify your
Qty on Hand. Quantity on Hand is the physical number that you have in your possession.
The number that you currently have Scheduled or are Active (Running) will be
displayed as well as the number that you have Sold Waiting to Ship. The Qty on Hand -
Scheduled - Active - Sold Waiting to Ship is the Qty Available to List without running
out of inventory. With these calculations, you will always know where your inventory is
committed and how many you have left to sell.

If you would like to be notified when your inventory is low, then enter a value in the Low
Inventory Level dropdown. You may consider to be low on DVD's when you have 10
or fewer, and low on DVD Players when you have only 2 left. Whenever the Quantity
On Hand is less than the Low Inventory Level, the item will appear in the Low Inventory
filter.

If you store your items in numerous locations or a warehouse, you can save the location
in the Storage Location field.

You can customize how your inventory system operates from
Tools|Options|Business|Inventory. See Using the Setup Assistant - Inventory
Management for more information.
Custom
The Custom group lets you enter your own custom information for an Item. This
information can then later be used in Ad Templates and Email Templates. For instance,
if you sell T-Shirts, you can use the Custom 1 field for the size, and Custom 2 for color.
As you enter a new item, you might put XL in Custom 1 and Heather Gray in Custom 2.
You can then have these values dynamically entered into your listing by using the
[[ItemsCustom1]] and [[ItemsCustom2]] variables in your Ad Templates.
Item Status
The Item Status group lets you manually specify the status and shows you some
important dates including the date the item was created on, the date of the first listing, the
date of the last listing and the date the item was last modified on.
Notes
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The Notes group is for you to record any notes about an item. It can be used for any
purpose you want to use it for.

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Creating Items Faster with Field Presets
Entering information about your item can be one of the most time consuming tasks faced
by eBay sellers. By using field presets, you can make the job of entering items much
faster.

When you list a lot of items, many of your settings tend to be the same. For instance, the
types of payments you receive are often the same no matter what type of item you are
listing.

While some settings are almost always the same, some other settings may change
depending upon the type of item you are listing. You may have several different
common settings you use. Your baseball cards may offer one set of shipping options,
while your more valuable signed photographs have another set of shipping options. Field
presets allow you to store these common settings for frequent use.

There are field presets for Listing Upgrades, Payment, Shipping Charges and Shipping
Locations. We will use Listing Upgrades as an example, but all field presets work the
same.

You can select existing presets, use a custom preset, create new presets, modify existing
presets, or manage all your presets.
Selecting Existing Field Presets
The Listing Upgrades, Payment, and Shipping groups have dropdown menus for
selecting a field preset. To use an existing preset, simply choose one from the dropdown
menu. All the values saved in that preset will be sent to eBay when the item is submitted.
Creating a New Field Preset
If you have a set of input values that you enter frequently, you should create a field preset
so they are easily selectable.
To create a field preset:
1. Click the "Edit" button next to the preset dropdown.
2. When the preset values appear, set your desired values.
3. Ensure the "Create New ... Preset" option is selected in the lower left of the
preset window.
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4. Click "OK" to exit. You will be asked for a name. Specify a name that helps you
remember what you will use that preset for.
5. Click "OK", and your new preset will be created and available to be used on any
future item.

Karen doesn't usually use any listing upgrades, but on expensive glassware, she
likes to use Gallery and Bold. She uses the predefined None Listing Upgrade
preset for everything but the expensive glassware. She then created a Listing
Upgrade field preset called "Expensive Glassware" with Bold and Gallery
turned on. Whenever she lists expensive glassware, she quickly chooses this
preset.
Customizing a Preset
If you have a preset that is close to the settings you want, but isn't exactly what you want
AND you will only be using this setting once, so there is no need to save it, you can use a
custom preset. A custom preset is simply a set of preset values that you won't be saving
for future use.
To specify a custom preset:
1. Select an existing preset.
2. Click the "Edit" button next to the preset.
3. When the preset values appear, make any desired changes.
4. Ensure the "Change this item only" option is selected in the lower left of the
preset window.
5. Click "OK" to exit. Your preset dropdown will say <Custom> and the summary
of your selections will appear under the dropdown.

James normally lists all of his paper ephemera (postcards, baseball cards, etc.)
with Bold and Border. He has a signed baseball card that he would like to also
add Highlight to, but he doesn't expect to do this very often. He selected his
Paper Ephemera listing upgrade, edited it and added Highlight. He specified
that he would Change this item only, and exited. This one listing will use Bold,
Border and Highlight when listed.
Modifying an Existing Field Preset
If desired, you can change an existing Field Preset at any time.

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Changing a Field Preset will in effect change all items that use the Field Preset.
You should be sure this is what you want to do before changing a Field Preset.
If you really only want to modify it for the current item, then you should simply
use a custom preset.
To modify an existing preset:
1. Select the preset to be modified.
2. Click the "Edit" button next to the preset.
3. When the preset values appear, make any desired changes.
4. Ensure the "Update ... Preset" option is selected in the lower left of the preset
window.

5. Click "OK" to exit. You will be required to confirm that you are replacing the
existing preset. Click "OK" again and your preset will be updated.

Harold accepts Visa and Mastercard, which is what his "My Payments"
Payment preset is set up for. He now will also accept Discover. He wants this
to affect all future items he lists. He does this by updating his "My Payments"
preset to also accept Discover. Any item that uses this preset will now accept
Discover also.
Managing Field Presets
Editing and adding Field Presets as well as duplicating, deleting and renaming them can
also be done from the Presets feature of the Options panel. To open the Presets Options,
select Tools|Options|Presets.

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Select the preset type that you would like to work with from tree on the left. Then select
the preset from the preset list and choose New..., Duplicate..., Delete..., Edit..., or
Rename... to perform the desired action.

If you delete a preset, all records that used that preset will be set to <Custom>,
and the values from the preset will be maintained. It won't harm your data to
delete a preset.

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Creating Items Faster with Item Templates
As discussed before, entering information about your item can be one of the most time
consuming tasks faced by eBay sellers. Item Templates are another way you can reduce
time when creating items.

Field Presets allow you to group several item record fields together to save repetitive
entry. Item Templates carry that concept one level higher and allow you to store an
entire item record to be used for creating item records.
Creating and Managing Item Templates
To use Item Templates, create a separate template for the different types of items you
sell. Generally, you only need to create different Item Templates if a significant number
of fields are different from other templates. Item Templates are just a special type of
item record. They look just like an item record, but they are only visible in the Item
Templates folder. The Title field of any Item Template that is created will also show up
in the list of templates you can use to create a new item record from an Item Template.

Thomas sells mugs and glow in the dark lightsticks. Mugs are sold one at a
time at auction, and lightsticks are sold by bulk in his eBay Store. In addition,
the shipping costs and methods are different for mugs vs. lightsticks. Thomas
created two Item Templates. One called "Mug" and one called "Lightstick".
The "Mug" template has a listing format of "auction", a starting price of $3.99
and the shipping costs for a mug entered in the Shipping Preset. The
"Lightstick" template has the listing type set to "store", the quantity set to 10,
and the starting price set to $99. He also sets the lightstick shipping costs in the
Shipping Preset. Now, whenever Thomas wants to create a new item record
for a mug, he clicks the New Item dropdown menu and selects "Mug". He
would select "Lightstick" to create a new lightstick item.
To create an Item Template:
1. From the Create Items Grid, you simply select an existing item record that you
want to use as a starting point.
2. Right-click the item record and select Save as Item Template. The new item
template is created.
3. If you want to view or modify the template, you can find it by selecting the Item
Templates folder in the Views Sidebar.
Customizing the <Untitled> Item
By default, eBay Blackthorne ships with an Item Template called "<Untitled>" . You
can use this whenever you want to create a new item record that has no default values
filled in yet. This is probably only useful for the first item record you create. No matter
what type of item you are going to create, there will most likely be some fields that will
always be the same for you. For instance, you may only ship within the US, or you
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always accept PayPal, etc. It makes sense for you to modify the "<Untitled>" template
to include any values that are always the same for you. When you come across an item in
the future that you don't have an Item Template for you can at least use your modified
"<Untitled>" template to get some of the information filled in.
To customize the Untitled template:
1. From the Create Items mode, select the Item Templates folder in the Views
Sidebar.
2. Your Item Templates will appear in the Grid. Select the <Untitled> template.
It will then appear in the Details Pane. If the Details Pane is hidden, then double-
click the <Untitled> template row to open the template in the full screen editor.
3. Modify any settings that are the same for all your items.
4. If using the full screen editor, click Ok to exit.

Your template is now updated and ready to be used.

You can even change the value in the Title field if you want to rename
<Untitled> to something else like "My Blank Item".

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Previewing the Item Description
Before submitting an item, you may wish to preview the description to make sure the text
is correct, your images are uploaded, and that you have used the proper Theme and Ad
Template.
To preview item descriptions:
1. From the Create Items Grid, select the item(s) to preview.
2. Select Items Actions - Preview Listing from the menu or click the Preview
Action Button. The Preview Listing window will appear:

3. Use the Navigation Arrows in the upper right corner to move between all selected
items.
4. If you have uploaded your pictures and want to ensure that they will display
correctly, then choose "Preview using images from the Internet" in the lower
left. If you haven't uploaded your images yet, or you want the previews to load
faster than choose "Preview using images from the Hard Drive".
5. Click Close when finished.
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Checking an Item for Fees and Errors
Once your items have been created, you are ready to submit them. You can either submit
them immediately, or you can check them for any errors and get an idea of what the fees
will be first.
To check an item for fees and errors:
1. From the Create Items Grid, select the item(s) to be checked.
2. Select Items Actions - Preview and Check Errors from the menu. The Preview
and Check for Errors and Fees window will appear.

3. When it is first loaded, the window will send your items to eBay to have them
checked for any errors and to retrieve the fees. It will take a little while to check
all your listings, and you will see the grid at the top fill in with information as
each item is checked. When complete you will see a grid that contains a row for
each item record you are checking. The ItemID and the Title identify each item.
If there were any errors in any of the items, they will be indicated by an error
icon in the Status column. The description of the error will appear in the
Errors column. If there were no errors, then the Total Fees column will contain
the fees for each listing and will be totalled at the bottom of the grid. A
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breakdown of each fee is also on each row, and can be viewed by scrolling the
column to the right.
4. You can now preview and check each item by clicking on its row or by using the
navigation arrows in the upper right corner of the window. If you have uploaded
your pictures and want to ensure that they will display correctly, then choose
"Preview using images from the Internet" in the lower left. If you haven't
uploaded your images yet, or you want the previews to load faster than choose
"Preview using images from the Hard Drive".
5. If any of your items have errors, then you can fix the error without having to exit
the preview. Simply click the icon, and the item will appear in a popup
window.

6. The Error Description will appear at the top to assist you in fixing the error. In this
case, the user forgot to add a Starting Price. The error is fixed by adding the Starting
Price and clicking OK. When exiting, the item will be sent to eBay once again, and you
will be returned to the Preview and Check for Errors and Fees window. If your fix
was successful, then the status icon will change and you will see the fees for the listing.
If another error exists, then you may need to repeat the process.
7. Continue through all items until all errors have been fixed. If you'd like, you can submit
your items after you preview each one using the Submit button, or you can wait until
you have previewed all the items and use the Submit All button to submit them all at
the same time. If you want to save the changes you made, but do not want to submit
the items at this time, then click the Close button.
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Submitting an Item
After you've entered all the data for your item, you are finally ready to submit it to eBay.
Submitting an item is a simple process. In fact, once the item record is created, you can
return to it and submit another listing from it in just a few seconds.

When you submit a listing you can either submit it to start running immediately, or you
can schedule it to run later. There are two methods of scheduling that we will discuss:
scheduling with eBay, and scheduling with Blackthorne.

Scheduled listings have been built into the eBay process for a while now. You can
submit an item to eBay and tell eBay when you want it to start. This method has a small
fee, but it is very reliable and worry-free. You can also use Blackthorne to submit your
listings at a scheduled time. While Blackthorne is running, it will continuously check to
see if it has items scheduled to be submitted now. When the time comes, Blackthorne
will submit the item in the background for you. Scheduling listings with Blackthorne is
free, but you must ensure that Blackthorne is running and that you have a valid internet
connection when the scheduled time arrives.

Another advantage to scheduling submissions is that you can specify an interval between
listings. This is useful if you have a lot of repeat buyers.

Each time an item is submitted, a listing record is created in the Monitor Listings mode.
You can track the progress of your listings from the Monitor Listings mode. For more
information on what can to do while your listing is running, start with the topic
"Monitoring Listings".

Abigail sells baseball cards. Every Monday, she submits 200 auctions. She
tends to have a lot of repeat buyers, and her buyers like to watch her listings as
they close and bid at the last second (in other words, they like to snipe). When
she submits her listings, she schedules them using Blackthorne. She sets them
to start at 7:00PM and places a one minute interval between them. When she
leaves her shop, she leaves her computer on. At 7:00PM, Blackthorne starts
submitting her items 1 minute apart and is finished 3 hours and 20 minutes
later. She didn't have to pay anything for this type of scheduling, and as long as
her electricity didn't go off, or her internet connection didn't go down, her
listings were successfully started.

Next week, starting on Sunday, Abigail is going on vacation. She doesn't want
to leave her computer on all week, and she doesn't want to miss a weeks worth
of listings. On Saturday she will submit her 200 listings, and use eBay to
schedule them. eBay gets the listings on Saturday and holds them til Monday
night. Abby had to pay a little extra, but was able to enjoy her vacation because
she knew her items would be listed.
To submit items:
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1. From the Create Items Grid, select the item(s) to be submitted. They will be
submitted in the same order they are sorted in the grid.
2. Select Items Actions|Submit Listing from the menu or click the Submit Action
Button. The Submit Listings window will appear.

3. Select the number of copies of each item you would like submitted.

If you submit multiple copies and combine that with a scheduled interval,
you can have eBay Blackthorne submit an item multiple times in the future.
For instance, to submit a T-Shirt once a day for the next week, you submit
it with 7 copies and an interval of 1 day.

4. Next choose the submission method as described above. If you chose one of the
scheduled methods, then set a Start time and an Interval between listings. You
can manually type a date and time, or you can use the dropdown menu and time
selector to set the date and time. You can also move your cursor to any area of
the Start time and Interval input boxes and use the arrows to change the values.
The interval allows you to space your listings out up to 99 days 23 hours and 59
minutes apart. Set the Listings per interval to the number of listings that should
be submitted for each interval.

On Fridays, Abigail receives new shipments of baseball cards. She
receives about 1000 unique cards. She would like all of them listed
between 6:00PM and 8:00PM Friday night. At one minute apiece, that
would take 1000 minutes or about 16 hours and 40 minutes. If she sets the
start time to 6:00PM, the interval to 1 minute, and the listings per interval
to 10, it will list 10 cards per minute and only take her about 100 minutes (1
hour and 40 minutes) to list.

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5. Click OK to submit your listings. A status window will inform you about the
progress of your submissions. If you had errors, a message box will appear
telling you how many submissions failed. Proceed to Fixing and Resubmitting
Items with Submission Errors to learn how to fix them.
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Fixing and Resubmitting Items with Submission Errors
When you attempt to Submit items, or perform a Preview and Check for Errors on an
item that has incomplete or incorrect information, then the listing may fail. If the listing
fails, then the item will have an error description associated with it. eBay Blackthorne
makes it easy to find the items that failed, fix them and then resubmit them.
To fix and resubmit items with submission errors:
1. First, locate the items that you would like to resubmit. If you know where they
are, you can select them from the Items grid. You can also load the Submission
failed filter under the New and Unlisted filter to see all items that have failed
submission.
2. As you select each item, the description of the error will appear in a yellow box at
the top of the Item Details pane. Make the appropriate changes to the item and
then submit the item again.
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Organizing Items
Organizing Items
If you list hundreds of items on eBay, then you know how important it is to keep track of
those items and to be able to quickly find an item again when you need it. Blackthorne
understands how important it is to keep your items organized, so we provide many
different methods to allow you to organize your information.

You can create a folder structure to organize your items much like you would organize
files on your computer. You can also use lists to organize your items very much like a
playlist in your favorite music software. In addition to folders and lists, eBay
Blackthorne provides filters to show you items that match a predetermined criteria such
as items that are low on inventory.

For users who have more than one seller account on eBay, we also offer the ability to
view and manage your items based on seller.

Finally, if all else fails, we offer a sophisticated Search tool to help you locate your items.

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Using Folders to Organize Your Items
You can use folders to organize your items in much the same way that Windows Folders
can be used to organize files. Folders can contain items, and they can also contain other
folders (sub-folders). If organized and named with a little care, the folder structure can
exactly mirror the way that your items are organized.

If you are already familiar with Windows Folders, you should be quite at home
here. You should still read this section because there are a few significant
differences. Please also note that Blackthorne does not use actual Windows
Folders to organize items - all items are kept in a single, large database file.

Folders are shown at the top of the sidebar on the Create Items mode. Each folder can
contain items and/or other folders. All folders display a count of the items in the folder in
parenthesis after the folder name. The folder count will include all items in the folder
plus all items in all subfolders. In the example below, the Media folder count is 20
because the two subfolders under Media each contain 10 items. Ultimately, at the top of
the tree is the All Items folder which contains everything.

Folders work a lot like eBay Categories, helping you drill down to find an item based on
how they are hierarchically stored.

There is a special folder called Item Templates. Item Templates does not contain actual
item records, but instead contains templates to be used to create item records easily. See
Creating Items Faster with Item Templates for more information.
The All Items Folder
The All Items folder can be thought of as the root of the folder tree. All other folders are
sub-folders of it. It has several unique characteristics:
! It can not be deleted.
! It can not be renamed.
! Items cannot be explicitly moved into it.
! When you delete a folder that contains items, the items themselves are not deleted
but are instead moved to the All Items folder.
There are many features that help you manage your folders. You can view the contents
of a folder, insert items into a folder, move items between folders, create new folders,
delete existing folders, rename folders and move folders.
Viewing the Contents of a Folder
To view the contents of a folder, click once on the name or the folder icon. All items in
the folder are displayed in the Items grid. The number in parentheses to the right of the
folder name is the number of items contained in the folder and all subfolders. This
allows you to view information in a hierarchical grouping. For instance, you may have a
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folder called Jewelry that has 3 subfolders called Watches, Pins and Rings. You can see
all your Watches, Pins and Rings individually, or you can click Jewelry to see all of your
jewelry (watches, pins and rings) together.

If the folder being viewed has a "+" sign to its left, it contains hidden sub-folders. To
display them, click once on the "+" sign to open the folder and display the sub-folders. A
click on the "-" sign will close the folder.
Inserting New Items in Folders
When a new item is created, it is automatically inserted into the current folder. If the
current view is a List or a Filter, then the new item will be created in the All Items folder.

When an item is duplicated, the copy is inserted into the same folder as the original item.

Moving Items Between Folders
To move items to a folder, select the items to be moved and drag them over the name of
the folder they are to be moved to. When you release the mouse, the items will be moved
into the folder and the folder counts should change accordingly.
Creating Folders
To create a new folder, simply right-click the folder you want to be the parent of the new
folder and select Create New Folder. A new folder will be created as a child of the
selected folder. It will be called My Folder[X] where X is a unique number. You can
then rename the folder to anything you'd like.
Deleting Folders
To delete a folder, right-click the folder and select Delete Folder. All child folders of the
folder will also be deleted. A popup will ask you what you want to do with the items in
the folder and its subfolders. You can delete them also or move them to the All Items
folder.
Renaming Folders
To rename a folder, right-click on the folder and select Rename Folder. The name will
change into an editable format allowing you to make the desired changes.
Moving Folders
To move a folder, you can simply drag and drop it to the new location. When moving
between folders that are open, a horizontal bar between folders will indicate where the
folder is being moved to. To move a folder into another folder, place the cursor directly
over the folder until no horizontal bar is showing.

Folders, Lists and Filters are all considered Views. Views can be customized,
allowing you to choose which columns are showing, or whether a Total row
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should appear at the top. See Customize View for more information.

Back to Top

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Using Lists to Organize Your Items
If folders are best thought of as a way to group related items together, lists are perhaps
best thought of as a way to group otherwise unrelated items together because of a single
characteristic that they have in common. Lists can be found in the sidebar on the left side
in Create Items mode directly under folders.

Items reside in folders, and are referenced in lists. You would use folders to organize
and catalog your individual items, and you would use lists to group them together for any
other purpose. A typical use of a list would be to make a record of all the items that are
going to be submitted on a particular day. The number to the right of the list name is the
count of items in the list. Items can exist in more than one list.

Cassandra sells jewelry. She has created a folder structure to help her organize
her jewelry. She has a Jewelry folder, and under it she has a Watches folder, a
Pins/Brooches folder and a Rings folder. In the Pins/Brooches folder she has a
Butterfly Pin. Cassandra finds that jewelry sells best when it is listed on
Sundays, so she created a list called Sunday. She places the Butterfly Pin and
other jewelry in this list. Each Sunday, she clicks on the Sunday list to display
all the items in the list. She then uses Ctrl-A to select all the items in the list
and submits them.

Cassandra also wants to be prepared for free listing days when they occur so
she created a list called Free Listing Day. She adds the Butterfly Pin and any
other items that she always has on hand to the the Free Listing Day list. The
Butterfly Pin is now in two different lists, but still resides in the Pins/Brooches
folder.

There are many features that help you manage lists. You can view a list, create a new
list, add items to a list, remove items from a list, duplicate a list, delete a list, rename a
list or move a list.
Viewing a List
To view a list, click on the list name to select it. The items in the list will display in the
main grid. The main grid title will change to the name of the list.
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Creating a List
Right-click on Item Lists to bring up the List Actions Menu. Select Create New List.

An empty list is created and given the name "My List[n]". You can rename it to anything
you'd like.

Adding Items to a List
Select the items in the grid pane and then drag and drop them onto the list name. The
counter to the right of the list name will increment to confirm insertion. These items will
still reside in their folder and will still be referenced in any other lists that they were
previously a part of.
Removing Items from a List
To remove items from a list, first ensure that the list is displayed in the grid by clicking
the list name in the sidebar. Once the contents of the list are shown, you can select any
items you want removed from the list, then right-click and choose Remove from List.

Do not select the items in the list and press "Delete" - that will bring up the
Delete Item confirmation dialog box, which is not the same as removing items
from a list.

Duplicating a List
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To duplicate a list, right click the list name and select Duplicate List. The new list will
have the same name as the original list followed by [X], where X is an incrementing
number. The new list will contain all the same items as the original list.
Deleting a List
To delete a list, right click the list name and select Delete List. The list itself will be
deleted, but all items in the list still reside in their original folder and are still referenced
by any other list they are included in.
Renaming a List
To rename a list, right click the list name and select Rename List. The list name will
change into an editable format.
Moving a List
To move a list, click on the list and drag it to within the Item Lists section of the sidebar.
You cannot move a list outside of the Item Lists section. You also cannot have nested
lists.

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Using Filters to Organize Your Items
Another useful way to view your items is by using Filters. Filters can be thought of as
smart lists. Instead of manually adding items to a filter, you can simply specify some
criteria that identifies items you want in a list. For example, you can create a filter of all
items that have the word "ring" in the title. Whenever you view the "ring" filter, a list of
current items that match your criteria will be displayed in the grid. As you add or delete
items with "ring" in the title, your filter contents will dynamically change. That's what
makes them smart, the ability to continually update their contents based on the criteria
you specified.

Because filters create their contents based on a predefined set of criteria, you cannot
manually add or remove items from a filter.

Filters, Lists and Folders are located in the Items Views Pane. You may have
to scroll down in order to see the list of Filters.

eBay Blackthorne ships with many different filters. Some of the filters are for reporting
purposes and some are for tracking statuses of Items, Listings and Sales. The filters that
are for status tracking are special for several reasons. First, they always appear at the top
of the list of filters. Second, they are organized into status families. Status families are
hierarchical groupings of statuses. For instance, the status family New and Unlisted
includes all items in the In Process and Entry Completed statuses since the items you are
current working on (In Process) and the ones you've completed (Entry Completed) are
both New and Unlisted. This hierarchical grouping helps you view records at different
levels of status.

With eBay Blackthorne, you can view filters, create filters, duplicate filters, delete filters,
rename filters, move filters, edit filters, and hide and show filters.
Viewing a Filter
To view a filter, click on the filter name to select it. The items in the filter will display in
the main grid. The main grid title will change to the name of the filter.
Creating a Filter
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To create a filter, right-click anywhere in the Filters area of the sidebar and select Create
New Filter. Since creating a filter is the same thing as modifying the rows in a view, the
Customize View window will open to the Rows tab.

Add any conditions for your filter as described in Customizing the View - Selecting the
Records to be Included.

Creating a filter is just like performing an Advanced Search is just like creating
a filter, except when you create a filter, you give the filter a name and it is
saved.
Duplicating a Filter
To duplicate a filter, right click the filter name and select Duplicate Filter. The new
filter will be named Copy of YourFilterName[1]. The new filter will contain all the same
criteria as the original filter. You can rename the filter to anything you'd like. You
cannot duplicate the filters that come shipped with eBay Blackthorne.
Deleting a Filter
To delete a filter, right click the filter name and select Delete Filter. The filter itself will
be deleted, but all records in the filter still reside in their original folder and are still
referenced by any other filter they are included in. You cannot delete the filters that
come shipped with eBay Blackthorne.
Renaming a Filter
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To rename a filter, right-click the filter name and select Rename Filter. The filter name
will change into an editable format. You cannot rename the filters that come shipped
with eBay Blackthorne.
Moving a Filter
To move a filter, click on the filter and drag it to within the Filters section of the sidebar.
You cannot move a filter outside of the Filters section.
Editing a Filter
To edit a filter, right-click the filter and select Edit Filter. Since editing a filter is the
same thing as modifying a view, the Customize View window will open to the Rows tab.
You can make any condition changes, column layouts changes or advanced option
changes you would like. See Customizing the View for more information. You cannot
edit the row criteria in the filters that come shipped with eBay Blackthorne, but you can
modify the column layouts and advanced options.

Hiding and Showing Filters
The filters that are shipped with eBay Blackthorne try to accommodate many different
users. You may find that there are some filters that we provide that you do not use. To
make your program less cluttered, you can hide any filters that you do not use.

To hide or show filters, right-click any filter and select Hide/Show Filters. The
Hide/Show Filters window will open.

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Leave a check next to any filter you want shown and uncheck any filter you want hidden.
Click OK when you are finished.
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Searching for a Record
Even though folders, lists and filters help you organize your information, sometimes a
search can help you find a particular record faster. eBay Blackthorne provides a search
tool for each of the major modes. You can find it in the sidebar, and it works virtually
the same in all major modes.

To perform a search:
1. Select the field you want to search on from the first input box. The most common
fields are listed near the top of the dropdown and all other fields are listed in
alphabetical order under them. The list of fields will change depending upon the
mode you are in. If you have a text string that you want to search on, but aren't
sure what field it may be in, you can choose Any Text Field.
2. In the second dropdown, choose your comparison operator. The comparison
operator values will change based on the data type of the field chosen in the first
dropdown.
3. Enter the value you want to search for in the last box. Depending upon the data
type of the field the last entry may be a checkbox, a numeric editing field or a text
editing field. If you are searching for a text string, you do not need to add quotes
around it.
4. Finally, click the Go button to perform the search. All records that match your
search will appear in the grid, and the grid title will change to identify the search.

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When you perform a search, a special filter called Search Results is created.
You can use this filter to return to your latest search results at any time.
Advanced Search
If you want to perform a more complex search where you are searching on more than one
field at a time, then you can use the Advanced Search.
To perform an Advanced Search:
1. Click the Advanced Search link in the Search pane.
2. The Customize View window will open to the Rows tab.

Performing an Advanced Search is just like creating a filter, except in the case
of the Advanced Search, you are creating a special reusable filter called Search
Results. If you decide that you want to keep your search, you can simply
rename it and it will become a filter that you can run at any time in the future.

3. Add any conditions you want for your search as described in Customizing the
View - Selecting the Records to be Included.
4. Click the OK button. All records that match your search will appear in the grid,
and the grid title will change to identify the search.
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Archiving Items
Once you have sold the last copy of an item you have, and you have been paid for it, you
no longer need immediate access to the item. By archiving the item, you can make it
easier to find your active items because there will be fewer items to sift through.
Archiving items also has the added advantage of making the program perform better
because there is less data loaded into memory.

Archived items remain in your database, they are simply flagged as inactive so they are
not kept in memory. You can always get to your archived items to reference them or
even restore them.

You can even modify your folders, lists and filters to hide or show archived records,
though you will see slower performance when showing archived records.

To archive, select all the items that you would like archived and select File|Archive
Selected Items from the main menu. You can also right-click on the grid and select
Archive Selected Items from the context menu. Since items can have listing records
associated to them, and listing records have sales records associated to them, archiving
items will also archive all the associated listings and sales records. If they were not
archived then you could have listing and sales records in memory that had no
corresponding item record. Likewise, archiving listings will archive the associated sales.
Because the inventory counts rely on the listings and sales records to exist, you cannot
archive sales records. You should archive the listing record instead which will also
archive all the sales for that listing and keep the inventory counts straight.
Restoring Archived Items
To restore archived items, select the Archived Items filter to display all the archived
items. You can also select any other view that has been customized to show archived
items. Archived items will be identifed by the archive icon ( ) in the Archived column
of the grid. Then select all the items that you would like restored choose File|Restore
Selected Items from the main menu. You can also right-click the grid and select Restore
Selected Items from the context menu.
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Printing Items
Printing Items
Although much of your work can be done directly within eB, sometimes it becomes
necessary to print information about your items to help with other tasks. Any view that is
displayed in any grid can be printed to your printer. You can setup your printer to choose
the paper size and orientation beforehand. If you'd like, you can also print a detailed
sheet for each item.
Print Grid Setup
Before printing the grid, you can set it up how it will print. Any settings you specify will
stay set until you make changes.
To setup the way your grid prints:
1. From the main menu, select File|Print Grid Setup... to display the Print Grid
Setup window.

2. Select the Printer that you will be printing to using the Printer... button.
3. In the Paper group box, select the Size of your paper and the Source.
4. Select the Orientation to use for printing. The sample page at the top will change
to reflect your setting.
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5. Specify the Margins. The sample page at the top will change to reflect your
settings.
6. Click OK when finished.
Printing the Item Grid
Any grid can be printed. The printed grid will look just like the grid on the screen. To
save paper, you should adjust the column widths and not include any more columns than
necessary.
To print the grid:
1. From the main menu, select File|Print Grid... to load the Print preview window.

2. From the Print preview window, you can print the grid , zoom in ,
display multiple pages , go to a specific page
, or close without printing .
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3. When you click the Print button, it will be printed to the printer specified on the
Print Grid Setup window.

Every month or so, James likes to double check his inventory numbers with his
actual inventory. He first loads the Inventory Items filter on the Create Items
mode. This shows him all the items he tracks inventory for. A long time ago,
he created a special column set called "Printing Inventory " for printing his
inventory. It includes just the title, part number and the quantity on hand fields.
His Inventory Items filter is set to use the Printing Inventory column set. By
combining a filter with a custom column set, James has created his own report
that he can print using File|Print Grid...

Printing Item Details
All of the details about a specific item can also be printed out on a single page.
To print the item details:
1. Select all the items you would like detailed pages printed for from the Create
Items grid.
2. Sort the grid in the order you would like the items printed. You can sort by
clicking on the column header.
3. From the main menu, select File|Print Details. The Report Studio will open with
the Item Details report loaded.
4. Click the Print button.
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Monitoring Listings
Monitoring Listings Overview
Once your item has been submitted to eBay, it will now be tracked as a Listing. Your
Listings will be displayed on the Monitor Listings mode. The listing record is created
when you submit an item, and it will exist until you delete or archive it. During its
lifespan, a listing will be running, and then at some point be over. It may have ended
with a sale or not. If it did not sell because the reserve price was not met, or if it didn't
get any bids, you can relist it on eBay which qualifies you to get the listing fees back if
the item sells the second time. If it does sell, a sale record and a buyer record are created
and the listing record becomes a permanent record of the listing on eBay. All of the steps
in the lifespan of a listing are identified by statuses. A status is assigned to a listing
depending upon where it is in this overall process and it helps you keep track of what is
selling, what sold, and what is eligible to be relisted. You can easily see all the listings in
a particular status from the Filters Tree in the Views sidebar.

Clicking on any status in the Views sidebar will load all listings with that status into the
Listings grid. For example, to see all listings that are running for the first time (not a
relist) click the First Run filter as shown above. The Relisted filter would show all
running listings that have been relisted, and the Second Chance Offered filter shows all
running listings that are second chance offers.

Statuses are grouped into status families. A status family is shown by the hierarchical
structure in the Views sidebar. In the example above, the First Run, Relisted and Second
Chance Offered statuses are in the Running status family. A running listing can be either
a listing that is being run for the first time, a relist or a second chance offer. With status
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families, you can view all the running listings no matter what type they are, or you can
view the types of running listings separately.
The Lifespan of a Listing
The following diagram shows all the details of a listings lifespan. In this diagram, a
listing record is identified by a yellow round cornered rectangle. Statuses are identified
by light purple boxes and status families are the darker purple boxes that surround them.
Actions and events are represented by pink ovals.

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Let's walk through this process together. Listings are first submitted from the Create
Items mode. When submitting an item, it can be scheduled or started immediately. If it
is started immediately, it is placed in the First Run status of the Running status family.
First run indicates that it is not a relisting of a failed auction. If the listing is scheduled,
it will be placed in either the On eBay or By Blackthorne status of the Scheduled status
family depending upon how it was scheduled. See "Submitting an Item" for more
information on the different types of scheduling.

When the time for a scheduled listing occurs, the listing will be submitted by the Servant,
and the status of the listing will change to either First Run or Relisted depending upon
whether it was a scheduled relisting or not.

While your listing is running, you can view any of the filters in the Running family to
monitor your listing information like who is bidding on it and what the bid has reached.
In addition to viewing your listings, you may occasionally find that something has
changed, and you need to modify your listings description. If your listing has received
bids, you can add to your listings description. If it hasn't received any bids yet, then you
can revise the description. If necessary, you can even end your listing early.

Once your listing ends, a Sale record will be created. If the listing was successful, then a
Buyer record will also be created for the buyer of the auction (if he/she doesn't already
exist in your buyers database). If your listing was not sold, then an Unsold Sale record
will be created. An Unsold Sale record records the fees associated with unsuccessful
sales. This is used when generating profit and loss reports to ensure that all your costs
are being tracked. The Unsold Sale record also helps you keep a history of how many
times an item sells successfully which can be useful in deciding which items to continue
selling. You will read more about tracking Sale records in the "Processing Sales and
Shipping" topic.

All successful listings are moved into one of the statuses in the Completed Sales status
family depending upon whether it was a relisting, second chance offer, or neither. The
status that an unsuccessful moves into is based on whether it was a relist or not. If it was
a relist, then it is not eligible for relisting on eBay and it will move into the Relist Unsold
status. If it was not a relist, then it is relistable and will be placed in the No Bids or
Reserve Not Met status based on the reason it was not successful.

Any listing in the Relistable status family can now be relisted again and will qualify for
listing fee reimbursements if sold. When it is relisted, it moves into the Relisted status of
the Running status family.

At any time after a listing has ended, regardless of whether it sold or not, you can make a
second chance offer to another bidder of your listing. Making a second chance offer in
essence creates a new listing on eBay that only one person can bid on. In eBay
Blackthorne, we create a new listing record for this listing and set it to the Second
Chance Offered status.
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An additional status of Unsold in the Completed Sales status family is provided for you
to identify listings that initially sold on eBay, but for some reason the transaction never
concluded (i.e. you lost the item, the buyer backed out, etc.). When situations like this
occur you can manually set the listing status to Unsold from the Listing Status dropdown
on the grid.

If a listing is no longer eligible to be relisted, but you want to submit another listing just
like it, you have two choices. You can either return to the Create Items mode and submit
another listing for the same item record, or you can choose to submit the listing to eBay
again from the Monitor Listings mode.
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Viewing Listings
Viewing Listings
The Monitor Listings mode contains a listing record for every listing you have ever
created. This is great for historical recording and reporting purposes, but would be very
hard to find information you are looking for without some way of choosing the listings
you want to view. Fortunately, eBay Blackthorne provides many ways to choose which
listings you are viewing.
Viewing Listings by Status
As illustrated in The_Lifespan_of_a_Listing, each listing is assigned a status. All of the
steps in the lifespan of a listing are identified by statuses. You can easily see all the
listings in a particular status from the Filters Tree in the Views sidebar.

Clicking on any status in the Views sidebar will load all listings with that status into the
Listings grid. For example, to see all listings that are running for the first time (not a
relist) click the First Run filter as shown above. The Relisted filter would show all
running listings that have been relisted, and the Second Chance Offered filter shows all
running listings that are second chance offers.

structure in the Views sidebar. In the example above, the First Run, Relisted and Second
Chance Offered statuses are in the Running status family. A running listing can be either
a listing that is being run for the first time, a relist or a second chance offer. With status
families, you can view all the running listings no matter what type they are, or you can
view the types of running listings separately.

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At the beginning of every day, Sharon has a ritual she likes to go through. First
she likes to see what her current bids are, so in the Monitor Listings mode, she
clicks on the Running status family in the sidebar. This shows her all her
currently running listings where she can view all the current bids in the grid.
Next, she wants to make sure that she has the right listings scheduled, so she
clicks on the Scheduled status family and quickly verifies the listing records
that are waiting to be listed. Finally, she wants to relist any listings that are
relistable so she clicks on the Relistable status family, hits Ctrl-A to select all
listings in the Relistable filter and then selects the Relist button from the
Actions toolbar. In just a few minutes she is updated on what has happened
overnight and has relisted her eligible listings.
Viewing Recent Bidding Activity
In addition to being able to view listings by their status, a special filter has been created
to let you view all listings that have received bids today. It can be found under the My
Listing Filters section of the Views sidebar.

Throughout the day, Sharon will also occasionally select the Listings that
received bids today filter to keep track of her bids. She often clicks the
column headers to sort them by their End Date and Current Price, Bid Count
and the number of Watchers.
Viewing Listings by Format
Listings can be run on eBay in several different formats. They can be run as auctions,
fixed price, or as store items. By default, the Monitor Listings mode shows you all
listings regardless of their status, but if desired, you can use the Show dropdown to
change the formats that are included in your views.

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From the Show dropdown, you can view either all formats, or selected subsets of
formats.

When you change the formats shown, the filters will only include listings with
those formats. You will see the listing counts change at the end of any affected
filters. If you saw your store items yesterday, but they are gone today, don't
panic. The most likely cause will be that you forgot to change your Show
dropdown back to All Formats.
Viewing Listings by Seller Account
eBay Blackthorne allows you to set up and run listings for multiple seller accounts. This
process is described thoroughly in Using Multiple Seller Accounts. The Seller dropdown
on the Views sidebar allows you to choose which sellers listings you are viewing.

From the Seller dropdown, you can view either all sellers at once, or a selected seller.

When you change the seller shown, the filters will only include listings for that
seller. You will see the listing counts change at the end of any affected filters.
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Searching for Listings
Like all other modes, you can perform a search from the Monitor Listings mode using the
Search area of the Views sidebar. See the topic Searching for a Record for details on
how to perform the search.
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Modifying Listings
Modifying Listings
From time to time, it becomes necessary to modify some of your listings. You may want
to add more information to your listing, correct an error, or cancel the listing altogether.
If the listing was scheduled, you may even want to modify the time that it is supposed to
start.
Revising a Listing
Making changes to an item's listing using is subject to a few restrictions, depending on
whether any bids have been placed on the item and whether the change is being
attempted within twelve hours of the end of the auction. A complete list of the restrictions
can be found in the Listing Modification Rules. In general, you can make most changes
if your item has not received any bids. If your item has received bids, or is near the end,
there are more restrictions on the modifications you can make. The simplest way to
approach it is to try to make the modifications. If they are not allowed, then an error will
appear. If you still want to identify changes in your listing, then you can add to your
listings description.
To revise a listing:
1. Select all the listing records you would like to revise from the Monitor Listings
grid.
2. Select Listing Actions|Revise Listing or click the Revise button on the Actions
toolbar. The Revise Listing window will appear.

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3. Make any modifications that you would like to the listings. The X of Y message
in the upper right corner identifies the listing record that you are modifying. Use
the navigation arrows next to it to navigate between the selected listings. You can
view the listing on eBay by clicking the eBay ID link in the upper left corner.
4. After you have made your modifications, choose whether to "Apply changes only
for this item", or "Apply changes to all future listings for this item" from the
options in the lower left. If you choose "Apply changes only for this item", then
only the listing record will be modified. The original item record that was used to
create the listing will remain unchanged. If you choose "Apply changes to all
future listings for this item", then both the listing and the original item record will
be changed. All future listings created from the item will have the same
modification.

Howard listed a pair of tennis shoes for 7 days. Before his item received any
bids, he decided to extend it to a 10 day auction since he was going to be out of
town when the 7 day auction would have closed. He only wants to change this
one listing and not all future listings of these tennis shoes, so he chooses
"Apply changes only for this item". Later, Howard discovers that he spelled
tennis wrong. He goes back to revise his listing, only this time he chooses
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"Apply changes to all future listings for this item" because he wants it to be
spelled correctly on all future listings.

5. Click Revise to send the changes to eBay for the listing that is currently displayed
in the Revise Listing window. If you want to send all the changes at once, click
Revise All. If you want to exit without saving any changes since the last time you
clicked the Revise or Revise Listing button, then click Close.
Adding to a Listing Description
If you item has received bids, then the only way to modify your description is by adding
to your description. When you add to your description, the original description remains
in the listing and any text you add appears at the bottom of the listing.

You cannot modify your listings after it has received bids because it really isn't
fair to the bidder. Changing a description from "mint condition" to "nearly
mint condition" could lead to a lot of problems.

To add to a listings description:
1. Select all the listing records you would like to add text to from the Monitor
Listings grid. All selected listings will have the same message added. If you
would like to add different messages to different listings, you must select them
and add to your description one at a time.
2. Select Listings Actions|Add to Description from the menu. The Add to Item
Description window will appear.

3. Enter the message that you would like to add and click OK. The message may
include HTML if you desire. A status message will appear in the status bar to let
you know if it was successful or not. Additional details will be added to the
Activity Log if there was a problem.
Ending a Listing Early
You can also end your listing early if you need to after providing a reason for ending the
listing early. If your listing has at least one valid bidder, then ending the listing early will
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sell it to the highest bidder. If you do not want the item to sell, you must go to eBay first
and cancel all bidders before ending the item.
To end a listing early:
1. Select all the listing records you would like to end early from the Monitor Listings
grid. All selected listings will be ended for the same reason. If you would like to
end listings for different reasons, you must select them and end them one at a
time.
2. Select Listings Actions|End Listing Early from the menu. The End Listing Early
window will appear.

3. Select the reason for ending the listing early and click OK. A status message will
appear in the status bar to let you know if it was successful or not. Additional
details will be added to the Activity Log if there was a problem.

You can use End Listing Early to end "Good til Cancelled" store items also.
Simply choose "The item is no longer available for sale" as the reason.
Rescheduling Listings
Scheduled listings are listings that have not yet been submitted. To make a modification
to a scheduled listing, you would simply use the same procedure you used for revising a
listing.

Scheduled listings frequently have staggered start times to give buyers time to bid on
multiple items. Changing the start times of a lot of scheduled listings could be very time
consuming without the ability to reschedule in a batch.
To reschedule listings:
1. Select all the listing records you would like to reschedule from the Monitor
Listings grid.
2. Select Listings Actions|Reschedule from the menu. The Reschedule Listings
window will appear.

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3. Enter the Start time of the first listing to be rescheduled. You can use the arrow
keys on each date component or type the date manually.
4. Specify the Interval between listings if you want the listings to be staggered.
You can use the arrow keys on each time component or type the time interval
manually.
5. Click OK when finished. All selected listings will now have new scheduled
dates/times.
Bulk Changing Listings
You can also make changes to many listing records at once using Bulk Change Fields
under Listings Actions on the main menu. To learn more, Making Bulk Changes.

Any listings that are Scheduled or Running can be bulk changed. Any listings that are
Relistable or Completed cannot be bulk changed. When Running listings are bulk
changed, the changes will be made immediately in your running listings on eBay. It may
take some time to perform all the changes on eBay, so please be patient.

Since Relistable listings must maintain the information of the original listing, you cannot
make bulk changes to a Relistable listing. There is a way to modify your relistable
listings before you submit them again though. To make bulk changes before relisting a
listing, you can simply use the Relist feature and schedule them with Blackthorne for 10
minutes in the future. You will then have relist records in the Scheduled by Blackthorne
filter. You can then bulk change those records and let the scheduler submit them.
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Resubmitting Listings
Resubmitting Listings
Although Create Items is the primary mode for submitting listings, it can often be
convenient to resubmit a listing while you are in the Monitor Listings mode. There are
several types of resubmissions that you may want to perform. If your listing ended
without any bids or the reserve was not met, and it is within 90 days of closing, then you
qualify for free relisting on eBay. This means you can list the item again, and you will
not be charged the listing fees if the item sells the second time around. If your item sold,
or it is past the 90 days, you may simply want to just submit another copy of the item.
Finally, whether your item sold or not, you can make second chance offers to other
bidders.

For the purposes of our documentation, we will use the term relist only for those items
that are being sent to eBay again and qualify for free relisting. We will use the terms
resubmit or submit again to refer to any other means of sending a listing to eBay again.
Relisting
Any listing that ended without any bids or the reserve was not met, and is within 90 days
of closing, qualifies for free relisting on eBay. If a relisting is sold, the listing fees on the
relist are refunded.
To relist a listing:
1. Select all the listing records you would like to relist from the Monitor Listings
grid.

The Relistable filter will contain all listings that are relistable. You can easily
select all relistable listings by clicking on the Relistable filter and selecting
Ctrl-A. For more information on the Listing filters, see
The_Lifespan_of_a_Listing.

2. Select Listing Actions|Relist Item... or click the Relist button on the Actions
toolbar. The Relist Listing window will appear.

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3. Make any modifications that you would like to the listings before relisting. The X
of Y message in the upper right corner identifies the listing record that you are
modifying. Use the navigation arrows next to it to navigate between the selected
listings.
4. Click Relist to send the changes to eBay for the listing that is currently displayed
in the Relist Listing window. If you want to send all the changes at once, click
Relist All. If you want to exit and save any changes that you have made without
relisting now, click OK, and if you want to exit without saving any changes since
the last time you clicked the Relist or Relist Listing button, then click Cancel.
Submitting to eBay Again
If your listing does not qualify for free relisting, but you want to submit it anyway use the
Submit Again feature. Submitting a listing again will perform the same steps as
submitting a listing from the Create Items mode, but it saves you time by not having to
go to the Create Items mode.
To submit a listing to eBay again:
1. Select all the listing records you would like to submit again from the Monitor
Listings grid.
2. Select Listing Actions|Submit to eBay Again... or click the Submit Again button
on the Actions toolbar. The Submit Again window will appear.

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3. Make any modifications that you would like to the listings before submitting them
again. The X of Y message in the upper right corner identifies the listing record
that you are modifying. Use the navigation arrows next to it to navigate between
the selected listings.
4. After you have made your modifications, choose whether to "Apply changes only
for this item", or "Apply changes to all future listings for this item" from the
options in the lower left. If you choose "Apply changes only for this item", then
only the listing record will be modified. The original item record that was used to
create the listing will remain unchanged. If you choose "Apply changes to all
future listings for this item", then both the listing and the original item record will
be changed. All future listings created from the item will have the same
modification.
5. Click Submit Again to submit the listing that is currently displayed in the Submit
Again window. If you want to submit all the listings at once, click Submit All. If
you want to exit without saving any changes since the last time you clicked the
Submit or Submit All Again button, then click Close.

Submit Again will start another listing based on the values in the current listing.
The original listing will remain as a historical record of the original listing. A
new listing record will be created to allow you to track the new listing.

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6. If you clicked Submit or Submit Again, then the Submit window will appear. Fill
out this window as you would when submitting listings from items. For more
info see Submitting an Item.

Making Second Chance Offers
Regardless of whether your listing sold or not, if you have additional copies of an item,
and the item had other bidders, you can make a second chance offer to those other
bidders. A Second Chance Offer is simply an offer to your bidder to purchase another
copy of your item at their highest bid. Making a Second Chance Offer to a bidder will
start a new listing at eBay just for that bidder. No other bidders will be able to see the
second chance offer. The Buy It Now Price will be set to the highest bid that bidder
placed on your previous auction.
To submit a listing to eBay again:
1. Select the listing record that you would like to send a second chance offer to from
the Monitor Listings grid.
2. Select Listing Actions|Send Second Chance Offer... or click the Second Chance
button on the Actions toolbar. The Second Chance Offers window will appear.

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3. The grid in the Second Chance Offers window shows all the non-winning bidders
and their highest bids. Select a bidder that you would like to send a second
chance offer to.
4. Choose whether "The original buyer completed their purchase" or "The original
buyer FAILED to complete their purchase".
5. Set the number of days that the second chance offer is valid for from the Duration
dropdown.
6. If you would like a copy of the email sent to the bidder, check the Send me a
copy of the Second Chance email box.
7. Click OK to send the offer, or Cancel to exit. You can continue to select bidders
and click OK to submit multiple offers.
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Printing Listings
Printing Listings
necessary to print information about your listings to help with other tasks. Any view that
is displayed in any grid can be printed to your printer. You can setup your printer to
choose the paper size and orientation beforehand. If you'd like, you can also print a
detailed sheet for each listing.
Print Grid Setup
Setup window.

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settings.
Printing the Listings Grid
necessary.
To print the grid:

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Printing Listing Details
All of the details about a specific listing can also be printed out on a single page.
To print the listing details:
1. Select all the listings you would like detailed pages printed for from the Monitor
Listings grid.
2. Sort the grid in the order you would like the listings printed. You can sort by
the Listing Details report loaded.

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Viewing Related Pages on eBay
To help make you more efficient, many of the common eBay pages can be accessed
directly from the Main menu under the eBay menu. Following is a list of those pages and
what modes they are available in.

eBay Page Description Modes
Listing Loads the eBay listing for the active
record.
Listing/Sales
Bid History Loads the bid history page for the active
record.
Listing/Sales
Respond to
Questions
Loads the interface that allows you to
respond to outstanding bidder questions.
All
High
Bidder/Buyer
About Me
Loads the About Me page for the buyer
of the active record.
Listing/Sales/Buyer
High
Bidder/Buyer
Feedback
Loads the Feedback page for the buyer of
the active record.
Listing/Sales/Buyer
Running
Listings
Loads the running listings for the seller
of the active record.
Items/Listings/Sales
Pending
Listings
Loads the scheduled pending listings at
eBay for the seller of the active record.
Items/Listings/Sales

Counters Loads the counter page on My eBay. All
Dispute
Console
Loads the dispute console. All
Buyer/Bidder
Mgmt
Loads the buyer/bidder management
page.
All

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Responding to Questions
While your listing is running, buyers can submit questions to you through the eBay site.
These questions can be managed and answered through the my eBay pages on eBay, but
you are also notified of them in Blackthorne and can answer them without leaving the
program.

When you have questions waiting to be answered, you will see a message on the status
bar of the main panel.

Your count of messages may not be the same as the count on eBay. They may
differ for any of the following reasons.
! The Blackthorne count will only include messages for the seller chosen
in the Seller dropdown.
! If All Sellers is chosen in the Seller dropdown, it will total the messages
for all sellers.
! Messages for archived listings will not appear in the eBay Blackthorne
count.
! Only messages for listings that are tracked in eBay Blackthorne will
appear.
! Only messages for the last 7 days will appear in the Blackthorne count.

To answer the questions, simply click the link or select eBay|Respond to Questions...
from the main menu. The, and the Respond to Questions window will appear.

Insert image here

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Processing Sales and Shipping
Processing Sales and Shipping Overview
In Create Items mode, you enter your inventory information and submit listings. In
Monitor Listings mode, you track and manage those listings. Once a listing has ended,
you will perform all post processing of the sale in the Finalize Sales mode. If the listing
was successful, then the Servant will automatically create a Successful Sale record for the
listing. It will also create a buyer record (if you don't have one already for the winning
bidder) and link that buyer to the sale. If the sale was unsuccessful, then the Servant
creates an Unsold Sale record. An Unsold Sale record sets the quantity sold to 0 and
records all of the fees associated with the listing so all profit and loss reporting will
remain accurate.

During the lifespan of a sale, you will perform many operations on the sale. You will
contact the buyer, record payments, pack and ship items, etc.. All of the steps in the
lifespan of a listing are identified by statuses. A status is assigned to a sale based on
where it is in the overall process and it helps you keep track of who you have to email,
what items you need to pack and who hasn't paid you yet. You can easily see all the sales
in a particular status from the Filters Tree in the Views sidebar.

Clicking on any status in the Views sidebar will load all sales with that status into the
Sales grid. For example, to see all sales that have just been created, click the Ready for
payment request filter as shown above. The Payment received filter would show all
sales that you have been paid for but not yet shipped, the Payment Cleared folder shows
payments that have been received and cleared, and the Shipped filter shows all sales that
have just been shipped.

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structure in the Views sidebar. In the example above, the Payment Received, and
Shipped statuses are in the Paid status family. Sales that have been paid may or may not
have been shipped yet. With status families, you can view all the sales no matter what
type they are, or you can view the types of sales separately.
The Lifespan of a Sale
The following diagram shows all the details of a sales lifespan. You have a lot of
flexibility in managing your sales. This diagram is only one of many possible work
processes. Whenever possible, alternative paths will be pointed out. In this diagram, a
sale record is identified by a rose colored round cornered rectangle. Statuses are
identified by light purple boxes and status families are the darker purple boxes that
surround them. Actions and events are represented by pink ovals.

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Let's walk through this process together. Sales are initially created automatically when a
listing ends. All newly created sales are added to the Ready for Payment Request status
family.

If you have a lot of repeat buyers, you will probably want to combine your sales into
orders. Combining sales into orders will group your sales in eBay Blackthorne and on
eBay to allow combining shipping charges and correspondence.Next, you will send an
email notification to the buyer. Emails can be customized to set the status of any sales
records included in the email, and in this case, sending the First Notification to High
Bidder sets the status of the sale to Payment Request Sent in the Awaiting Payment
status family.

If you specified all your shipping fees when you submitted the listing and you
have requested eBay to notify your bidder when the auction is over, then
sending the First Notification to High Bidder is optional. Instead, you would
simply use Sales Actions|Update Sales Status to... to change the status of the
selected sales to Payment Request Sent. Since you can highly customize your
First Notification to High Bidder and sending the email will automatically set
the status for you, we recommend you take advantage of the notification email
in eBay Blackthorne. It really isn't any more work, and you can give your
customers a personal touch.

After sending your first notification and while you are waiting for a response, you can
choose to send one or more follow up notifications. At any time while you are waiting
for payment, you can choose to manually move set the status of a sale to Past Due.
When you feel that you have given a buyer ample time to pay, but have not yet received
payment, you can open a dispute. Eventually the buyer will pay, or you will move the
sale into the Unpaid status of the Completed Sale family.

Once a buyer has paid for an item, you will record the payment and set the status of the
sale to Payment Received in the Paid status family. If at any time, the buyer paid using
eBay Checkout and PayPal, the Servant will automatically record the payment, save the
buyer address and set the sale status to Payment Received.

By accepting PayPal payments, you can greatly reduce the amount of work
involved with each sale. If a buyer goes immediately to PayPal to pay once the
auction is over, your sale will bypass all other steps up to this point and appear
in the Payment Received status.

Once you have received payment, you can optionally send a Received Payment email.
You can then print a packing list, shipping labels, and postage if you use a supported 3rd
party postage solution.

Next, you will retrieve the items from the packing list, pack them with the packing list,
slap the shipping label and postage on the box and ship the item. Sorry, we have no
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automation that will package an item or deliver it to the post office. You have to do this
step manually.

Printing packing lists, shipping labels and postage are all optional. You can
ignore any of these steps if they are not part of your normal process.

Once shipped you will record the sale as being shipped by changing the status yourself,
or sending the Item Shipped email which will set the status for you. Once again, since it
takes about the same amount of time to change the statuses as it does to send the emails,
we recommend you send the email. It can provide your buyer with an update on when it
was shipped as well as including the tracking number if you have it.

There are only a few things left to do after you have shipped the item. You will probably
want to leave feedback, and delete any pictures that you have uploaded to your web
space.

Leaving feedback is a very flexible feature. In the diagram above, we show the seller
waiting until feedback is received before leaving feedback, but the seller is free to leave
feedback at any time. The same is true of deleting pictures. You can do it anytime you'd
like, or go through once a year and manually delete them if you'd like.

At any time in the future, you can easily submit another copy of the item to eBay. You
can also look at various grid and printable sales reports at any time.

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Viewing Sales
Viewing Sales
The Finalize Sales mode contains a sale record for every listing that has ever closed.
This is great for historical recording and reporting purposes, but would be very hard to
find information you are looking for without some way of choosing the sales you want to
view. Fortunately, eBay Blackthorne provides many ways to choose which sales you are
viewing.
Viewing Sales by Status
As illustrated in The_Lifespan_of_a Sale, each sale is assigned a status. All of the steps
in the lifespan of a sale are identified by statuses. You can easily see all the sales in a
particular status from the Filters Tree in the Views sidebar.

Clicking on any status in the Views sidebar will load all sales with that status into the
Sales grid. For example, to see all sales that have just been created, click the Ready for
payment request filter as shown above. The Payment received filter would show all
sales that you have been paid for but not yet shipped, and the Shipped filter shows all
sales that have just been shipped.

structure in the Views sidebar. In the example above, the Payment Received, and
Shipped statuses are in the Paid status family. Sales that have been paid may or may not
have been shipped yet. With status families, you can view all the sales no matter what
type they are, or you can view the types of sales separately.

After checking on her listings each morning, Sharon likes to process her sales.
First, she selects the Ready for Payment Request status family, hits Ctrl-A to
select all, and sends the First Notification to High Bidder email. Next, she
clicks on the Awaiting Payment filter and sorts them by the date the payment
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was requested (oldest dates first). She then evaluates the oldest requests to see
if she needs to send out follow up emails or file disputes. She continues to use
filters to record payments and show her sales that need to be shipped.
Viewing Sales by Format
Items can be sold on eBay in several different formats. They can be sold as auctions,
fixed price, or as store items. By default, the Finalize Sales mode shows you all sales
regardless of their status, but if desired, you can use the Show dropdown to change the
formats that are included in your views.

From the Show dropdown, you can view either all formats, or selected subsets of
formats.

When you change the formats shown, the filters will only include listings with
those formats. You will see the listing counts change at the end of any affected
filters. If you saw your store items yesterday, but they are gone today, don't
panic. The most likely cause will be that you forgot to change your Show
dropdown back to All Formats.
Viewing Sales by Seller Account
eBay Blackthorne allows you to set up and sell under multiple seller accounts. This
process is described thoroughly in Using Multiple Seller Accounts. The Seller dropdown
on the Views sidebar allows you to choose which sellers sales you are viewing.

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From the Seller dropdown, you can view either all sellers at once, or a selected seller.

When you change the seller shown, the filters will only include listings for that
seller. You will see the listing counts change at the end of any affected filters.
Viewing Sales that are Ready for Feedback

In addition to being able to view sales by their status, format or account, some special
filters have been created to help find sales that have outstanding feedback tasks. The
Ready for feedback reminder and Ready to send feedback filters can be found under the
Sales Reports section of the Views sidebar.

The Ready for feedback reminder filter will show you all sales that have a status of
Successful, but have not yet left feedback for you. The Ready to send feedback filter
will show you all the sales where you have received positive feedback, but have not yet
left feedback.

The last thing Sharon does each day is to take care of her feedbacks. She first
loads the Ready for feedback reminder filter, hits Ctrl-A to select all, and
sends the Feedback Reminder email from the Email Buyer dropdown on the
Actions toolbar. Hopefully this will trigger a few more people to leave her
feedbacks. Then she loads the Ready to send feedback filter, hits Ctrl-A and
leaves feedback from the Feedback dropdown button on the Actions toolbar.
In just a few minutes, she has left all of her feedbacks and sent out all of her
reminders.

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Most sellers wait until they receive feedback before they leave feedback. If you
don't want to wait, you can modify the Ready to send feedback filter to
remove the conditional check to see if you have received feedback yet.
Searching for Sales
Like all other modes, you can perform a search from the Finalize Sales mode using the
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Requesting Payments and Invoicing
Requesting Payments and Invoicing
After a listing is sold, it is up to the seller and the buyer to complete the transaction. The
buyer needs to know exactly how much to pay, what his shipping options are, and where
to send the money. The seller needs to know where the item is being shipped, and what
method the buyer prefers to be able to calculate postage. There are many ways this
information can be exchanged. They range from using the fully automated checkout
process on eBay to the more manual process of contacting the buyer and requesting
payment. The method that you use depends upon many factors including whether or not
you know the shipping charges when you list the item, whether you package items
together for a discount, and whether or not the buyer chooses to use the automated
checkout.

If a buyer has purchased multiple items, then both the buyer and the seller have the
option to combine the sales into a single order before the sale is paid for. This makes it
easier to track and ship for the seller and often makes shipping less expensive for the
buyer.

In some circumstances, it must be necessary to create an over the counter sale and
combine it with existing eBay sales.

Occasionally, you will have an unresponsive buyer and may have to send follow up
notifications. In the worst possible scenario, your buyer never pays and you have to
submit a dispute to get your fees returned.
Automating the Payment Process
Automating the payment process is one of the biggest time savers that a seller can
implement. As mentioned earlier, the buyer needs to know exactly how much to pay,
what his shipping options are, and where to send the money. The seller needs to know
where the item is being shipped, and what method the buyer prefers to be able to
calculate postage. If this information is exchanged in an efficient manner it can save
both buyer and seller a lot of extra work.

To automate the process, the seller must provide all the information that the buyer needs
at the start of the auction. This information is provided in the Shipping Preset when
creating an item.

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By choosing either Calculated or Flat rate shipping, and specifying all the shipping
options in your listing, eBay will have enough information to total the sale for the buyer.
See Entering Item Details - Shipping for more information on the differences between
the two methods.

If you do not know what your shipping will be and have chosen the Self-
Managed shipping method, then eBay will not have enough information to total
the fees for the buyer and you will have to contact the buyer yourself.

In addition to sending the information with your item, you will also need to tell eBay that
you want them to provide the checkout pages. You can do this from Preferences under
My eBay. Edit the Payment from buyers and turn Use Checkout on.

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When you have turned on Checkout, your Buyers will have the option to checkout
immediately after the auction is over. This will allow them to choose their preferred
shipping method, provide their shipping address and indicate how they will pay for the
item. If the user indicates they will pay with a check or money order, then your sale
record in Blackthorne will have its status set to Payment Request Sent, indicating that
you are still waiting for payment. The Type of Payment field in your sale record will be
set to the payment type specified by the buyer in checkout.

If you accept PayPal, then the user can pay you immediately. If the user pays with a
PayPal eCheck, then the sale status is set to Payment Received. Once the check clears
the status will be set to Payment Cleared. If the user pays with a credit card through
PayPal, then the status of the sale is set to Payment Cleared.

Jonathan lists all of his auctions with a Calculated shipping method and has
turned on Checkout. He had 12 auctions close last night and needs to process
them this morning. From Sales, he takes a look at his Payment Cleared filter.
He sees that 7 of his buyers paid with a credit card through PayPal. These
sales are ready to be shipped.

He then checks the Payment Received filter and finds that 2 more buyers chose
to pay with a PayPal eCheck. He will leave these sales alone until the checks
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clear and the sales move into the Payment Cleared filter.

A check of the Payment Request Sent folder shows that 2 of his buyers used
checkout and indicated that they will be sending payment. One of the buyers
specified they are sending a money order (as seen in the Type of Payment field
on the sales record), and the other buyer indicated they would be paying with a
personal check.

Finally, he checks the Ready for Payment Request filter to find that the last
buyer has not performed Checkout yet. Since the auction closed late last night,
he decides to wait until the afternoon to see if the buyer will use Checkout. If
after refreshing that sale in the afternoon, the buyer still has not checked out, he
will send him a First Notification to High Bidder email.
Notifying the Buyer
If you do not use Checkout, or if some of your buyers do not choose to use Checkout,
then those sales records will have their status set to Ready for Payment Request.
Buyers who don't use checkout will either email you or wait for you to contact them to
work out the details of payment. For these sales, you may want to send a First
Notification to High Bidder email to each buyer.

When an item is sold, eBay will automatically send a notification to your
winning bidder. For many sellers, this notification is adequate. If you prefer a
more personal touch or want to provide more details, then you should send your
own First Notification to High Bidder email.

If you have buyers that have won more than one of your auctions, then you will
want to combine your sales into an order before sending your emails.
Combining sales lets you work with multiple sales together. You can combine
the shipping costs and send only one email for all sales in the order.
To send a First Notification to High Bidder email:
1. Select all the sales records you would like to send the email to.
2. From the Email Buyer dropdown button on the Actions toolbar, choose First
Notification to High Bidder. The Email Buyer window will appear.

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3. The Email Buyer window contains a composed email for each buyer of the
selected sales. The X of Y message in the upper right corner indicates which email
you are viewing. You can use the navigation arrows next to it to browse through
the emails. The To, CC, BCC, From, and Reply To fields along with the Subject
and Text of your email will be filled in. You may want to take a moment to view
each email for accuracy.
4. By default, the From and Reply To information will be the values from the Email
Account that was associated with the item when it was listed. If you would like to
change the Email Account that is sending the email, you can choose one of your
existing Email Accounts from the Account dropdown.
5. The text of the email is created from the First Notification to High Bidder email
template. If you would like, you can edit the note text on this Email Buyer form
before sending the email. Any changes made will not apply to the email template
or any other future email. For more information on creating and modifying email
templates, see the E-Mail Templates topic.
6. If you would like a copy of the email printed on your printer when you send it,
check the Print copy of email box.
7. You can make any changes to the body or subject of an email before sending it.
Changes made on this screen will not be saved in the template and will only be
sent with the current email.
8. When you are ready to send your email, click the Send button to send them one at
a time, or click Send All to send them all in a batch. The act of sending an email
can be customized to automatically change the status of the sale when the email is
sent. A note on the status bar identifies what status changes will occur when
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sending the email. By default, this email will set the status to Payment request
sent.
9. When all emails are sent, the window will close, or you can hit Cancel at any time
to return to the main window.

Leslie does not use Checkout on her auctions. When the auction is over, she
prefers to contact the buyer directly to develop a relationship with the buyer.
For each sale that ends, she sends a customized First Notification to High
Bidder email. This email includes a little bit about her and her company as well
as the important information about shipping and payment. She can send out all
of her emails very quickly by viewing the Ready for payment request filter,
hitting Ctrl-A to select all sales and then choosing First Notification... from the
Email Buyer button. After a quick check of the emails, she hits Send All.
Sending Follow Up Notifications
Unfortunately, not all buyers are as quick to respond as sellers might like. If buyers do
not respond to the first notification, then you may need to send a second or even a final
notification. Each notification may be worded more strongly than the last. eBay
Blackthorne provides two additional emails and statuses to help you manage this process.

If you do not receive a response to your first notification, you may want to send a Second
Notification to High Bidder email. Sending a second notification will set the sale status
to Second payment request sent. If you still do not get a response or a payment after
the second request was sent, you may choose to send a Final Notification to High Bidder
email before beginning the dispute process.

By default, the filters for Second payment request and Final payment request
are hidden. You can show them by right-clicking on the Sales by Status area
of the sidebar and choosing Hide/Show Filters... Check any filters you want
shown and uncheck any that you want hidden.

To send a Second or Final Notification to High Bidder email:
2. From the Email Buyer dropdown button on the Actions toolbar, choose Second
Notification to High Bidder, or Final Notification to High Bidder. The Email
Buyer window will appear.

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5. The text of the email is created from the Second or Final Notification to High
Bidder email template. If you would like, you can edit the note text on this Email
Buyer form before sending the email. Any changes made will not apply to the
email template or any other future email. For more information on creating and
modifying email templates, see the E-Mail Templates topic.
7. You can make any changes to the body or subject of an email before sending it.
Changes made on this screen will not be saved in the template and will only be
sent with the current email.
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sending the email. By default, this email will set the status to Final Payment
request sent or Final Payment request sent.

Each day, Leslie checks to see if there are any unresponsive bidders. First, she
loads the Payment request sent filter and sorts by the Date Status Changed in
descending order to see who hasn't responded for the longest period of time.
She selects all sales that had the status changed more than 3 days ago and
sends the Second Notification to High Bidder from the Email Buyer button on
the Actions toolbar. She then loads the Second payment request filter and
looks for anyone who hasn't responded in 3 more days since the second
notification was sent, and sends them the final notification.
Combining Sales
When a buyer purchases more than one item from a seller, it is usually in both of their
best interests to combine the sales into an order. By combining the sales into an order, all
of the sales will be treated together as a single transaction. There will be a single
payment, a single shipping charge and frequently the items will even be packaged in the
same box. When combining sales, the buyer can save on shipping, the seller can save
time packaging, and they both save time in communications by dealing with all the items
at once.
Combining on eBay versus Combining Locally
A combine feature has been available on eBay for several years now. Regardless of
whether you use eB or not, sellers and buyers can combine sales into orders using the
eBay interface. Any items combined on eBay will be automatically combined in eB.
Likewise, when items are combined in eB, the information may be sent to eBay to
combine the items on eBay as well. When items are combined on eBay, the buyer can
see and in some cases modify the information about the order.

There are several rules that dictate which items can be combined on eBay. If you try to
combine items that do not meet these criteria, then eB will not be able to combine them
on eBay, however, you will be given the option to combine the items locally. When
combining locally, eB will treat the items as an order and will ensure they are all included
together in emails, but the information will not be sent to eBay, and your buyer will not
be able to see the order. You can also force an order to not use eBay Checkout and create
a local order instead.

The following requirements must be met to combine sales on eBay:

! The sale cannot be part of another order if the order was buyer-created and the
item has been paid for already.
! The seller in the sale must be the same user as the seller in all other sales in the
same order.
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! The buyer in the sale must be the same user as the buyer in all other sales in the
same order.

Sales combined into an order may come from different types of item listings. For
instance, one sale might have come from a Chinese auction, one from a Dutch auction,
and two from a Stores fixed-price item. So long as all of the sales meet the conditions
described above, they can be combined into the same order.

Sales resulting from the following types of item listings cannot be combined into an
order:
! Over the counter sales generated in eB
! Live Auctions items
! Seller auto-pay items
! Real estate items
! Ad-format items (special non-auction, real estate advertisement listings)

Sales combined into an order must all originate from the same eBay site. For instance,
sales on the US site cannot be combined with sales on the UK site. Also, since eBay
Motors is considered a different eBay site, eBay Motors sales cannot be combined with
non eBay Motors sales.
To combine sales into an order:
1. Select all sales that you would like to combine into orders. The selected sales do
not have be for the same buyer. Any selected sales for a buyer that has only one
sale record will be ignored.
2. Select Sales Actions|Combine Sales from the main menu, or click the Combine
button on the Actions toolbar. The Combine Sales window will appear.

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3. The Combine Sales window contains an order candidate for each buyer of the
selected sales. The X of Y message in the upper right corner indicates which order
the orders. The header bar and the yellow information pane provide information
about the buyer of the order.
4. Below the information pane is a grid that contains all the selected sales for the
buyer of the current order. Check the Selected box next to any sales you wanted
included in the order. This will most frequently be all the displayed sales.
5. Choose how you want the shipping costs to be calculated in the Shipping Details
group.
! To have the shipping costs for all items totalled and included in full
choose "Calculate shipping cost and options in full". The buyer will
receive no discount in this case.
! Select "Calculate shipping cost and options applying discount of:" to
apply an across the board percentage discount on the shipping.
! If you would like to customize the shipping methods and costs, select
"Edit shipping cost and options". The fields in the Checkout Details
group will be enabled when selecting this option.
! If you would like to use the existing shipping amounts in the sales records
choose, "Combine shipping costs using values specified in the sale
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records". This is useful when you want to specify the shipping for each
individual item separately.
! If you would like to assign a shipping cost to the first item and an cost for
each additional item, then select "Calculate shipping cost based on cost
of first item.... and cost of each additional item."

When the shipping costs are divided among multiple sales, the handling costs
are included in the shipping costs and the handling cost is set to 0.

6. If you chose "Edit shipping cost and options" then continue to fill in the
Checkout Details. The insurance and shipping information will be filled in as
follows:

Use eBay Checkout: If you want to use eBay Checkout and have this order
combined on eBay also, check this box. If you do not check this option, then the
order will be combined locally. When unchecked, you will only be have to enter
one of the shipping methods.

Insurance:

! If all sales had required insurance, the insurance will be set to
"Insurance Required" and the value will be the total of all sale
insurances.
! If at least one sale had optional insurance, the insurance will be set
to "Insurance Optional" and the value will be the total of all sale
insurances.
! If all sales did not offer insurance, the insurance will be set to
"Insurance Not Offered" and the value will be $0.00.

Shipping Methods:

! Any shipping methods that are present in all sales will be included
in one of the shipping dropdowns. The value will be the total from
all sales.

Enter the insurance option and amount that you want to apply to the entire order,
then enter the shipping methods and totals that you want to apply to the entire
order.

7. Click the Combine button when you are ready to combine the sales.
8. Navigate to each subsequent order and combine in the same way. Click Close
when you are completed.

Lester sells baseball cards and tends to get a lot of repeat buyers. Each day,
before sending out email notifications, he selects the Ready for Payment
Request filter and uses Ctrl-A to select all the sales in the filter. Then he
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selects Combine from the Actions toolbar. The Combine Sales window opens
and he navigates through each order making sure the right shipping and
insurance discounts get applied. He combines each order and clicks Close
when finished. He then sends his First Notfification to High Bidder email, and
all the sales to the same buyer are included in the same email.
Viewing an Order
All sales in the same order will have the same Order ID. The Order ID field can be added
to any column set by customizing the column set. By sorting or grouping on the Order
ID, you can see all the sales for an order together in the grid. The Order link on the
Details pane header identifies sales that are in an order. The Order link specifies how
many sales are in the order, which sale you are looking at, and the Order ID of the sale.

To verify or view an order:
1. Click the Order link (Order C20 in the example below) on the Details pane
header. The Verify Order window will appear.

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The Verify Order window contains a grid with each sale in the order and all of the
details of the order, including the total sale, costs and shipping information.
Recombining an Order
If after combining an order, you find that the same buyer has purchased another item,
then you can recombine the order.
To recombine an order:
1. Select all the sales from the previous order AND the new sale.
2. Select Sales Actions|Combine Sales from the main menu, or click the Combine
button on the Actions toolbar. The Combine Sales window will appear.
3. Enter all the order information just as you would for a new order and click the
Combine button. All the sales will now be in the same order.
Recording an Over the Counter Sale
An Over the Counter (OTC) sale is a sale that occurs off the eBay site. eB is primarily a
tool for managing eBay sales. It is not intended to manage off-site or OTC sales,
however, sometimes there are cases where you have sold an item on eBay to a buyer who
purchased another item from you that was not listed on eBay. To allow you to manage
the eBay sales with their associated OTC sales, we allow limited recording of OTC sales.
To record an over the counter sale:
1. Select the items that you would like to generate a sale for. All selected items
must be for the same buyer and will included in the same order.
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2. Select Items Actions|Generate Sale from the main menu. The Generate Sale
window will appear.

3. The grid at the top will show all the selected items. Enter the Price that you
agreed to sell the item at, and Qty sold in the grid for each item. The Quantity
and Sale Price in the Sale Total group below will be updated with the information
from the grid.
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4. Select the buyer in the Sold To field. You can choose from existing buyers using
the dropdown, or you can enter a new buyer by clicking the Edit button. When
clicking the Edit button a new buyer record will be created. You fill it in exactly
as you would when adding a new buyer in the Buyers mode.
5. Choose the status that the generated sale records should be set to. If you have
been in contact with the buyer via email, and he is waiting for you to send him a
notfication, set the status to Ready for Payment Request. If the buyer is in your
store, is paying you now in cash, and will be taking the items with him, set the
status to Successful. There are many various scenarios that require you to
generate a sale. Set the status properly for your particular scenario.
6. Under the Payment group, select the Billing Address of the buyer from the
dropdown list. If the address does not yet exist, click the Edit button to create
one. If you have received payment already, specify the Type of Payment,
otherwise, leave it set to None.
7. Under the Shipping group, select the Shipping Address of the buyer from the
dropdown list. If the address does not yet exist, click the Edit button to create
one. If you know how you will ship it, enter the Shipping Company. If you have
a Tracking Number already, you can add it as well. If the buyer would like
insurance, check Insurance Requested.
8. In the Sale Total group, enter the Shipping, Handling, Insurance, Sales Tax and
Other adjustment if you know their values. The values entered should be the total
for all items in the grid.
9. In the Costs group, enter the Actual Shipping and Other adjustment if you know
the values. The values entered should be the total for all items in the grid.
10. If desired, you can also fill in the Custom fields and any Sale Notes. These
values will apply to all sales records created.
11. When completed, click the Add button. A sale record for each item will be
created. All sales records will be grouped into an order.
12. If you are selling the OTC items with existing eBay sales, you can select all of the
OTC sales and the eBay sales on the Finalize Sales window and combine them
into an order like any other sales. Once combined, you can easily invoice, track
and ship the items together.
Dealing with Disputes
Occasionally, you may have a dispute with a buyer. Either they never contacted you or
they simply refuse to pay for the item. It's always best to try to resolve the dispute
between the buyer and seller before resorting to leaving negative feedbacks. eBay has a
built in dispute resolution process to help solve these issues. Using eBay Blackthorne,
you can manage these disputes.

If you are not satisfied with your interaction with a buyer, the first step is to report a
dispute. Reporting a dispute is like logging a formal complaint at eBay. It identifies why
you are unhappy and what has happened so far in the dispute. When you file a dispute,
the sale status is changed to In Dispute. While the dispute is open, both you and the
buyer may exchange messages to try to resolve the dispute. These messages are logged
by eBay. Finally, when you come to an agreement, (or even if you don't), you will close
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the dispute. If the buyer never paid at the conclusion of the dispute, your sale record will
get a status of Unpaid in the Completed Sales status family. If you were eligible for a
refund on your final values fees, then eBay Blackthorne will automatically update the
fees when they are updated at eBay.
Reporting a Dispute
To report a dispute:
1. Select all the sales records you would like to dispute.
2. Select Sales Actions|Report Unpaid Item Dispute... from the main menu. The
Report Dispute window will appear.

3. The Report Dispute window contains a dispute form for each sale selected. The X
of Y message in the upper right corner indicates which dispute you are viewing.
You can use the navigation arrows next to it to browse through the disputes. The
yellow box at the top provides the details of the disputed sale.
4. Enter a value for Why are you reporting this unpaid item dispute?
5. Enter a value for What has happened so far in the dispute?
6. Click Add Dispute to add the current dispute, or click Submit All to add all
disputes.
7. When all disputes are added, the window will close, or you can exit at any time by
clicking Cancel.

After sending out second and final notices each day, Leslie looks to see if she
wants to submit any unpaid item disputes. She loads the Final Payment
request sent filter and sorts by the Date Status Changed in descending order
to see who hasn't responded for the longest period of time. She then selects all
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sales where the final request was sent more than 3 days ago and calls Report
Unpaid Item Dispute from Sales Actions on the main menu. When the form
appears, she enters the reasons for each dispute using the navigation arrows to
view all the disputes and clicks Submit All.
Managing a Dispute
While a dispute is open, you and the buyer can leave and read messages for each other.
To manage a dispute:
1. Select the sale record for the dispute you would like to manage. You can only
manage one dispute at a time.
2. Select Sales Actions|Manage Disputes... from the main menu. The Manage
Dispute window will appear.

3. The details of the dispute will appear in the yellow box at the top. A history of
messages between you and the buyer will appear below it. To add a message,
enter it in the message box, select Add Information from the Action dropdown,
and click OK.
Closing a Dispute
A dispute can be closed...

! if the buyer does not respond within 8 days
! when the buyer pays for the item
! when the seller and buyer mutually agree to close the dispute
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! when the seller no longer wishes to wait for communication from the buyer

Depending upon how the dispute was closed, the seller may be eligible for a refund of the
final value fees, and the buyer may receive an Unpaid Item Strike. For the complete rules
on how eBay handles disputes, read eBay's Unpaid Item Policy and the Unpaid Item
Process.
To close a dispute:
1. Select the sale record for the dispute you would like to close. You can only close
one dispute at a time.
2. Select Sales Actions|Manage Disputes... from the main menu. The Manage
Dispute window will appear.

3. The details of the dispute will appear in the yellow box at the top. A history of
messages between you and the buyer will appear below it. To close the dispute,
select either Close - We've completed the transaction and we're both satisfied,
Close - We've agreed not to complete the transaction, or Close - I no longer
wish to communicate with or wait for the buyer from the Action dropdown, and
click OK.

You cannot close a dispute until the buyer responds. If the buyer does not
respond within 8 days, eBay will close the dispute. A complete description of
this process can be found on eBay's Unpaid Item Process page.

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Receiving Payments
Receiving Payments
Depending upon the payment methods that you allow, there are different ways that you
can receive payments. If you accept PayPal, your payments may be made electronically.
If you accept credit cards, the buyer may call you on the phone with their credit card
information. If you accept checks or money orders, your payments will come in the mail.

No matter how you accept payments, it is very important that you record them accurately.
Recording payments allows you to track your profit and loss and helps you keep track of
which items need to be shipped. Any sales that have their status set to Payment Cleared
will indicate that payment was received and is ready to be shipped. Any sale with a
status of Payment Received means the payment has been received by has not cleared
(checks and eChecks) and shouldn't be shipped until you verify the payment has cleared
with your bank.
Automatic Payments
If you accept PayPal, then your buyers may choose to pay with an electronic check,
directly from their bank account, or by using a credit card through PayPal. When paying
from their bank account or using a credit card, the funds will show up immediately in
your account. The next time eBay Blackthorne refreshes sales, it will automatically
record that payment for you and set the status of those sales to Payment cleared. If your
buyer uses an electronic check, then the money will show up in a few days when the
check clears. When the buyer first specifies they will use an electronic check,
Blackthorne will set the status of the sale to Payment received. Later, when the check
clears, the status will get set to Payment cleared. Any sale with a status of Payment
cleared means the money is in your account and you can ship the item.

The Type of Payment on the sale record will get set to either Check or PayPal
accordingly. In addition, the Shipping Address of the buyer will be retrieved from
PayPal and saved in the sale record.

For information on how to set up your listings to accept electronic payments, see the
topic Requesting Payments and Invoicing - Automating_the_Payment_Process.
Credit Card Payments
If you accept credit cards, then you will have to modify the sale record manually to
record the payments.
To record a credit card payment:
1. Gather the information from the buyer that you need to process a credit card
transaction and process the transaction through your credit card service. This
information includes the credit card number, expiration, billing and shipping
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address. If the credit card transaction was successful, then you can continue to
record the payment in the sale record.
2. Locate and select the sale record for the payment. You can find it by looking in
the Awaiting payments filter, or by performing a search for the buyer, sale id,
eBay ID, etc.
3. From the Details area of the sale record, choose an existing Shipping Address
from the dropdown or add a new one using the Edit button.

4. The Default Billing Address will be set to the Shipping Address if it did not
previously exist. You can change it or click Edit if the Billing Address is
different than the Shipping Address.
5. In the Type of Payment field, choose Credit Card. The Default Credit Card input
box will appear.
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6. If the credit card info is not already entered, then click the Edit button to enter it.
Click OK to save and exit.

7. Finally, change the status of the sale to Payment Cleared in the status dropdown.

Receiving Checks and Money Orders
If you accept checks or money orders, then you will have to modify the sale record
manually to record the payments.
To record a check or money order payment:
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1. Locate and select the sale record for the payment. You can find it by looking in
the Awaiting payments filter, or by performing a search for the buyer, sale id,
eBay ID, etc.
2. From the Details area of the sale record, choose an existing Shipping Address
from the dropdown or add a new one using the Edit button.

3. In the Type of Payment field, choose Check or Money Order.
4. If the payment was a money order, change the status of the sale to Payment
Cleared in the status dropdown.

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5. If the payment was a check, you may want to send the buyer a Received Payment
email to let them know that you have received the payment and you will ship once
the payment has cleared. You can send the email by choosing Received
Payment from the Email Buyer button on the Actions toolbar. then wait until the
check clears. Sending this email will automatically set the sale status to Payment
Received. If you do not send the email, you will have to set the Sale Status to
Payment Received manually.
6. For payments by check, wait several days until the check clears. When it clears,
you can set the Sale Status to Payment Cleared.
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Shipping Items
Shipping Items
Perhaps the most labor intensive task of selling on eBay is packaging and shipping the
items once they have sold.

After receiving payments, you need to ship your items. Whether you store your
inventory in a warehouse, or on a shelf in your family room, you will need to print a
packing list to help you retrieve all the items and organize them by buyer. All items to
the same buyer can then be packaged in the same box (or multiple boxes if necessary).
Depending upon your business, you may have to wait for delivery or for an item to be
completed before you are ready to pack it. After packing the boxes you need to put the
shipping address and return address on the package. You can do this by hand or you can
print shipping labels and apply them to the packages. The last thing to do before
shipping the items is to place postage on the package. You can take the packages to the
Post Office, FedEx, UPS or any other shipper an they will put the proper postage on it for
you, or you can print the postage yourself using a 3rd party program. Finally, you will
ship the items and then return to eBay Blackthorne to update the sales records to reflect
they have been shipped either manually or by sending an Item Shipped email.
Waiting for Delivery or Fabrication
Some sellers obtain their inventory from a readily available supply. They often wait until
an auction is over before ordering the item. Other sellers take custom orders in their
auctions. They may need monograms for a shirt, or a choice of ring size before they can
build or make the item. Usually an item that has been paid for is ready to ship, but in
these cases the item must wait for something else to be done before it can be shipped. A
status called Ready to Ship in the Paid status family can help keep track of these types of
items.

The Ready to Ship status is hidden by default. To show it, you must right-click
the Sales by Status area in the Views sidebar and select Hide/Show Filters.
Check the Ready to Ship filter and click OK.

When using the Ready to Ship status, you do not ship sales until they are placed in the
Ready to Ship status.

Dennis and Clare sell custom made jewelry. Dennis handles the listing and
sales end of the business, and Clare makes the jewelry. Clare doesn't start
making the jewelry until payment has arrived. Clare created a custom filter
called Ready for Production to show her all the sales with a status of Payment
Received or Payment Cleared. Each day, Clare checks the Ready for
Production filter to see what items she has to make. As she completes an item,
she places it in the Out box on her desk and changes the status of the sale to
Ready to Ship. At the end of every day, Dennis gathers all the jewelry from the
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Out box, and looks in the Ready to Ship filter to find all the sales that he needs
to ship items for. He can easily print his packing lists and labels from this filter
also.
Printing Packing Lists
To help you retrieve items from your inventory, you can print a packing list. A packing
list contains a list of all items that a buyer has recently purchased. The list can be carried
to your inventory to collect all of the items that are to be shipped together to a buyer.
You can then include the packing list with your shipment so your buyer can clearly see
what has been shipped. The upper left corner of the packing list contains the shipping
and return address. It can be folded and placed into a clear plastic shipping label to act as
your shipping label, or you can print separate shipping and return address labels if
desired.
To print packing lists:
1. Select all the sales records you would like to print packing lists for. They will be
automatically grouped by buyer and printed with one page for each different
shipping address.
2. From the Print dropdown button on the Actions toolbar, choose Packing List.
The Print Packing List window will appear.

3. Select the type of packing list you would like to print. There are 3 different types
of packing lists you can print.
! The Friendly method is the most trusting method. When printing Friendly
packing lists, all items for a buyer that have been paid for, and all items
that have been sold and not paid for yet will be included in the packing
list. Use this when you trust the buyer and are willing to ship items before
they have paid for all of them or when you want to package all items
before they have been paid for.
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! The Safe method is the most common method. The packing list will only
include items that have already been paid for. Use this when you want to
make sure you don't ship anything before you have received payment.
! The Conservative method can save you extra work. When printing
conservative packing lists, if a buyer has an item that hasn't been paid for
yet, then no packing list will be printed. This helps prevent you from
sending a shipment today and finding out that the same buyer just paid for
another item and you have to ship another package.
! The Order Based method can be used if you process your shipments by
order. When printing order based packing lists a separate packing list will
be printed for each unique order. PayPal users who must ship all items in
the same order together should use this option.
4. If you don't need to see the packing list before you print it, then uncheck the
Preview before printing box and click OK. The print dialog will appear. Select
the printer and click OK.
5. If you would like to see a preview, then check the Preview before printing box
and click OK. The Print Studio will open with the Packing List loaded.

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6. Use the arrow keys on the toolbar to scroll up and down through a preview of all
available packing lists. See the topic The Print Studio -
Previewing_a_Print_Template for more information. Usually, any changes to a
printing template are performed by editing the Printing Template from the
Options window, but if you want to make a quick change, you can click the
Design tab and make the modifications. See The Print Studio -
Modifying_a_Print_Template for more information. Any changes you make will
be saved with the template when you click the Print button.
7. Click Print to print the packing lists, or Cancel to exit without printing. The print
dialog will appear. Select a printer and click OK.
8. After printing packing lists, you will be asked whether or not the packing lists
printed correctly. If you select Yes, then the Packing List Printed value on the
selected sales record will be set to True. This will prevent them from appearing in
future packing lists. If you select No, then the Packing List Printed flag on the
sales will remain False.
Printing Shipping Labels
Printing shipping labels can save a lot of time over manually writing addresses on your
packages. You can print shipping labels to any printer using one of several different label
types. If you use some of the larger labels, the return address can also be included on the
label.
To print shipping labels:
1. Select all the sales records you would like to print shipping labels for.
2. From the Print dropdown button on the Actions toolbar, choose Shipping Labels.
The Print Shipping Label window will appear.

3. Select the shipping label format that you would like to print from Print the
following Shipping Label. Each format has been designed to fit on the specified
label.
4. Select the printer to print to from Select the printer for this label. If you chose a
Dymo label style, then you should choose the Dymo printer.

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Owning a label printer like the Dymo Label printer can be an incredible
timesaver. With a label printer, you are always ready to quickly print any label
without having to swap out paper for label sheets. If you send a lot of
packages, a label printer could quickly pay for its modest cost.

5. If you have already used some of the labels on your current label sheet and would
like to skip over the used labels, then provide the Number of labels to skip.
6. If you would like multiple copies of the label printed, then select the number of
Copies.
7. If you don't need to see the shipping labels before you print them, then uncheck
the Preview before printing box and click OK. The labels will then print to your
printer.
and click OK. The Print Studio will open with the Shipping Label loaded. It will
be contain one label for each unique buyer of the selected sales records.

8. Use the arrow keys on the toolbar to scroll up and down through a preview of all
available labels. See the topic The Print Studio - Previewing_a_Print_Template
for more information. Usually, any changes to a printing template are performed
by editing the Printing Template from the Options window, but if you want to
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make a quick change, you can click the Design tab and make the modifications.
See The Print Studio - Modifying_a_Print_Template for more information. Any
changes you make will be saved with the template when you click the Print
button.
9. Click Print to print the labels, or Cancel to exit without printing. The print dialog
will appear. Select a printer and click OK.
Printing Postage
There are many companies that provide solutions for printing your own postage. Some
companies provide you with PC based software, and possibly a scale and/or printer to
help you print the exact postage you need right from your desk. Other solutions are web
based and are just as convenient for printing postage on your own. In fact, PayPal has
integrated the ability to print postage online and then return the information to eBay.

Currently, eBay Blackthorne has integrated with Endicia's Dazzle product for printing
USPS postage. In the future, we will be integrating with the PayPal solution and possibly
other third parties. By integrating with a postage printing solution, the process of printing
postage becomes faster. eBay Blackthorne can send all the information necessary for
printing postage (like shipping method, weight, package size, etc.) directly to the third
party program to be printed. Once printed, the final cost and tracking numbers can be
retrieved back into Blackthorne to keep the sales records accurate.
Printing Postage with Endicia's Dazzle
Dazzle is a PC based software program from a company called Endicia. For a fee, it
allows users to print USPS postage from their desktop. eBay Blackthorne's sales records
already contain all the information necessary to print postage. Blackthorne can send this
information to Dazzle, and then load Dazzle with it ready to print the postage. After
reviewing the postage and printing it in Dazzle, information about the postage including
the cost and tracking information will be imported back into eB.

When printing postage with Dazzle, you can either preview the postage first and make
changes before printing, or you can batch print all postage without intervention.
To print postage through Dazzle with Preview:
1. Select all the sales records you would like to print postage for.
2. From the Print dropdown button on the Actions toolbar, choose Print Shipping
Postage|Endicia|Dazzle with Preview. The Endicia Preview window will open.

If you do not have Dazzle loaded on your computer then the Print Shipping
Postage|Endicia option will not be available under the Print button.

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3. Choose how you would like the weight entered into Dazzle. If you have the
weight correctly entered on your Item record, choose "Use weight from Item
when printing postage." If you want to weigh the item when Dazzle opens,
choose "Enter weight in Dazzle when printing postage".
4. Select how you would like the insurance filled in. To use the insurane value from
the sales records, choose "Use insurance option form the Sale Record'. If you
always use the same insurance option, you can select it from the "Use "
dropdown. If you would like to manually enter the insurance for each item when
Dazzle opens, then select "Enter insurance option and value in Dazzle"
5. After printing a label, you have the option to "Automatically close Dazzle after
printing postage" and move to the next label. If you need to print Customs forms
or want to change other Endicia settings after printing, then you should leave this
option unchecked.
6. Click Start to begin printing the labels. Each label will be loaded into Endicia
one at a time. You can then make any modifications before printing the label.
Once you print the label and exit Dazzle, eB will load the next label. Between
each printing, eB will retrieve the cost of postage and tracking information.
To print postage through Dazzle with No Preview:
1. Select all the sales records you would like to print postage for.
2. From the Print dropdown button on the Actions toolbar, choose Print Shipping
Postage|Endicia|Dazzle (no preview). The Print Endicia Batch window will
open.

If you do not have Dazzle loaded on your computer then the Print Shipping
Postage|Endicia option will not be available under the Print button.

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3. Select the Dazzle label layout that you would like to use for all labels in the batch.
The default layouts for each type of shipping method are specified on the Options
window.
4. Click OK to print the labels.
5. When completed, the shipping cost and tracking information will be imported into
eB.

If you use a shipping method that provides tracking numbers, you can modify
your Item Shipped email to include the tracking number returned from Dazzle.
Recording Sales as Having Been Shipped
After shipping your items, the sales records should have their status changed to Shipped.
You can do this manually, simply by changing the status in the Sale Status dropdown, or
you can send an Item Shipped email which will set the status for you automatically.

Unless you have a reason not to, you should send the Item Shipped email. It is
an easy way to update the status of your sale while letting your buyer know the
item was shipped and the tracking number if applicable.

There is one more way a sale record can be marked as shipped. If you are a
Selling Manager Pro user on eBay, and you have marked the sales as being
shipped in Selling Manager Pro, the Blackthorne sales will be marked as
shipped the next time the servant refreshes the sale records.
To send an Item Shipped email:
2. From the Email Buyer dropdown button on the Actions toolbar, choose Item
Shipped. The Email Buyer window will appear.

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5. The text of the email is created from the Item Shipped email template. If you
would like, you can edit the note text on this Email Buyer form before sending the
email. Any changes made will not apply to the email template or any other future
email. For more information on creating and modifying email templates, see the
E-Mail Templates topic.
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sending the email. By default, this email will set the status to Shipped.
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Completing Sales
Completing Sales
After an item is shipped, there are still a few housekeeping tasks that need to be taken
care of before the sale is complete. It's a good idea to leave feedback for your buyers.
Not only does it help the buyer, but it helps you build a relationship with your buyers
which may make them more likely to return. If you host your own pictures, you might
also want to remove them from your computer and/or web space to make room for more
pictures. You can also choose to submit another item to eBay. Since you just sold the
item, you may want to list another one.
Leaving Feedback
With eBay Blackthorne you can automate the task of leaving feedbacks. After creating a
library of feedback messages, you can leave a single message or randomized messages to
all your buyers. Since leaving negative or neutral feedbacks should be carefully
considered, you cannot leave neutral or negative feedback in bulk. They must be left one
at a time.
Creating Feedback Messages
Before you can leave a new feedback message, you must add it to your list of Positive
Feedback Messages.
To create feedback messages:
1. From the Finalize Sales mode, right click the Feedback button on the Actions
toolbar and select Edit Feedback Messages... You can also get to the Feedback
Message list from Tools|Options then choose Presets|Positive Feedback
Messages. The Positive Feedback Messages list will appear.

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2. Click the New button to create a new feedback message. When the prompt
appears, enter the text of your message and click OK. You could also create a new
message using the Duplicate button.
3. If you want to modify one of your messages, choose it from the list and click the
Edit button. Make your modifications and click OK to save.
4. To delete a feedback message, choose it from the list and click the Delete button.
5. If you would like, you can make leaving feedbacks automatically change the
status of the sale. To set a status change, enter a status in the When Submitting
to eBay Change the Sale Status dropdown.

If leaving feedback is the last step in your process, it is a good idea to have
feedbacks set the sale status to Successful. This will help you identify which
sales have had feedback left for them.
Sending Feedback
You can send either a specific feedback message, a random message or a negative/neutral
message.
To send a feedback:
1. Select all the sales records you would like to send feedback for. If you will be
sending a negative or neutral feedback, then you must only select one at a time.
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2. To leave a specific message... From the Feedback dropdown button on the
Actions toolbar, choose the feedback message that you want to leave. A message
will appear asking you if you want to leave the feedbacks. Click Yes. The same
feedback message will be left for the buyer of each selected sale.
3. To leave a randomized message... From the Feedback dropdown button on the
Actions toolbar, choose Random Positive. A message will appear asking you if
you want to leave the feedbacks. Click Yes. Each buyer selected will receive a
random feedback message from your Feedback Message list.
4. To leave a negative or neutral message... From the Feedback dropdown button on
the Actions toolbar, choose Negative/Neutral. A prompt will appear allowing
you to choose the type of feedback (negative or neutral) and the message itself.
Click OK to submit the feedback.
Deleting Pictures
Once your sale is complete, you no longer need the pictures, unless you have multiple
copies of the item and you will be selling more in the future. Pictures take up space on
your computer's hard drive and on your web site if you host your own pictures. A little
bit of housecleaning at the end of your sale can keep you from getting overrun with
unneeded pictures. Pictures can be removed manually, or you can set your preferences to
remove the pictures automatically when your sale is completed.
To manually delete pictures:
1. Select all the sales records you would like to remove pictures for.
2. Select Sales Actions|Manually Remove Pictures... from the main menu. The
Delete Pictures from Web/Computer window will appear.

3. Use the checkboxes to choose whether you will remove pictures from the web,
your computer or both. Click OK to delete. The status bar on the main window
will display a message informing you how many pictures were deleted.
To have pictures automatically deleted:
2. Select Pictures under Appearance from the Options tree.

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3. Check the Automatically delete pictures when Sale Status is set to Complete?
box.
4. Check Remove the pictures from the web and/or Remove the pictures from my
computer to indicate which pictures should be deleted.
5. Anytime a sale is moved into a status in the Completed status family, the pictures
for the sale will be deleted.

Martina sells unique one of a kind items. She hosts the pictures for those items
on the 10 megs of space that her ISP gives her with her internet connection. To
make her process more automatic, she customized her Item Shipped email to
set the status to Successful in the Completed status family. She then
customized her pictures so they would delete whenever the status of a sale was
set to Completed. Now, when she ships an item, she sends an Item Shipped
email. The email changes the status to Successful which in turn triggers the
deletion of her pictures, so just by sending the email, all of her cleanup tasks are
done automatically.
Submitting the Item to eBay Again
If you have multiple copies of an item, you may want to list another copy each time one
sells. From the Finalize Sales mode, you can easily submit another copy of an item.
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To submit an item again:
1. Select all the sales records you would like to submit again from the Finalize Sales
grid.
2. Select Sales Actions|Submit to eBay Again... or click the Submit Again button
on the Actions toolbar. Fill out this window as you would when submitting
listings from items. For more info see Submitting an Item.

3. Click OK to submit the items again.

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Reporting on Sales
Reporting on Sales
There are a couple of different ways you can view reports on your business. There are
printed reports, grid reports and screen reports.

Printed reports are pre-defined reports that you print from the Print Studio. Printed
reports can be modified in the Print Studio, but new printed reports cannot be created.
There are two printable sales reports, a Profit and Loss Report and a Sales Tax Report.

Grid reports are created using custom column sets and filters. In fact, every filter
provided is really a grid report. It shows a specific set of data with a specific layout.
Grid reports can be modified or created from scratch using Customize View.

Screen reports collect data and display it on the screen. The Sales History report is
currently the only screen report.
Profit and Loss Report
The Profit and Loss report prints a summation of your income and expenses.
To print a profit and loss report:
1. From the Finalize Sales mode, select Profit and Loss Report from the Print
button on the Actions toolbar. The Print Profit and Loss dialog will appear.

2. Select the records to be included in the report. The profit and loss report can
summarize the selected records in the current grid, all records in the current grid,
or all sales records including those that aren't in the current grid.
4. If you don't need to see the report before you print it, then uncheck the Preview
before printing box and click OK. The print dialog will appear. Select the printer
and click OK.
and click OK. The Print Studio will open with the Profit and Loss Report loaded.

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6. Click Print to print the report, or Cancel to exit without printing. The print dialog

Using reports in conjunction with custom views give you many customization
options for your reports. To get a profit and loss for last year, you can
customize your view to show all sales for last year and then print the report
including all sales in the grid.

Sales Tax Report
The Sales Tax Report prints a summary of the amount of sales tax you have collected by
state over a period of time.
To print a sales tax report:
1. From the Finalize Sales mode, select Sales Tax Report from the Print button on
the Actions toolbar. The Print Sales Tax Report dialog will appear.

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2. Select the records to be included in the report. The sales tax report can
summarize the selected records in the current grid, all records in the current grid,
or all sales records including those that aren't in the current grid.
3. If you don't need to see the report before you print it, then uncheck the Preview
before printing box and click OK. The print dialog will appear. Select the printer
and click OK.
and click OK. The Print Studio will open with the Sales Tax Report loaded.
5. Click Print to print the report, or Cancel to exit without printing. The print dialog

Using reports in conjunction with custom views give you many customization
options for your reports. To get a sales tax report for the last three months, you
can customize your view to show all sales for the last three months and then
print the report including all sales in the grid.
Grid Reports
A grid report is simply a customized view that includes a selection of records and a
column set. To view a grid report, you simply select it from the Views Sidebar under the
Sales Reports heading. There are several grid reports provided for sales.

Sales Report Description
Profit and Loss
Report
Contains all sales in the Paid status family or those with a status
of Successful or Unpaid in the Completed status family. The date
period dropdown, and totals row is shown. The column set
includes sale, cost and profit columns.
Sales Tax Report Contains all sales in the Paid status family or those with a status
of Successful or Unpaid in the Completed status family. The date
period dropdown, and totals row is shown. The column set
includes sale tax, cost and profit columns.
Consignments
ready to payout
Contains all consignment sales where the consignor has not yet
been paid and the status is in the Paid status family or Successful.
The column set includes the consignment related fields.
Unsold
consignments
Contains all consignment sales where the status is unsold. The
column set includes the consignment related fields.
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Ready for
feedback reminder
Contains all sales with a status of Successful or Shipped and have
not left feedback yet. It contains the date period dropdown
showing all sales closed in the last 31 days. The column set
includes feedback related fields.
Ready to send
feedback
Contains all sales that have received feedback but feedback has
not been sent yet.
Sales History Report
The Sales History Report will provide you with an overview of how many times an item
has been listed, and how well it has sold in the past. You can view a Sales History
Report for a single item or multiple items.
To view the Sales History Report:
1. From the Create Items mode, select all the item records you would like to view
the Sales History for.
2. From the Items Actions menu, select Sales History to open the Sales History
window.
Auction/Fixed Price Tab
The Auction/Fixed Price tab shows statistics for all the times you have listed the
item(s) as an auction or fixed price listing.

Listings:
Number of times listed: This totals the number of times you have listed the item. If
you list 5 items in a single Dutch listing, that will count as a single listing.
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Number of listings ending in a sale: This is the total number of items that ended with
a sale. For Dutch Auctions, if at least one item was sold, it will be included in this
count.
Listing Success Ratio: The percentage of listings that ended in a sale.

Sales:
Qty Listed: The total quantity listed. All quantities in Dutch Auctions will be
included in this count. For example, a Dutch Auction with 5 items will result in a
Qty Listed of 5.
Quantity Sold: The total quantity sold. A Dutch Auction with 5 items that ended with
3 sales will result in a Quantity Sold of 3.
Sales Success Ratio: The percentage of the quantity listed that ended in a sale.
Store Tab
The Store tab shows statistics for all the times you have listed the item(s) as a store.

Quantity Sold in Store: The total quantity sold from the store.
Average Sale Price: The average sale price of items sold in the store.
Include Archive
Check the Include Archive box to include all archived listing and sales records in
your statistics.

Holly sells riding boots. Every once in a while she wants to re-evaluate which
boots she is selling so she spends a little time with the Sales History report.
First, she selects a single size of a boot and runs a Sales History report to see
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how many times she has listed and sold the boot to see how well it has been
selling. She uses the statistics to decide if she wants to order more in that size.

She sometimes wants to know how well a style of boot is doing, so instead of
selecting just a single size of a boot, she selects all the item records for all sizes
of the boot and runs a Sales History on all at once. The Sales History report
then gives her compiled information for all the items selected. This will help
her decide if it is a style of boot that she wants to continue selling.

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Printing Sales
necessary to print information about your listings to help with other tasks. Any view that
is displayed in any grid can be printed to your printer. You can setup your printer to
choose the paper size and orientation beforehand. If you'd like, you can also print a
detailed sheet for each listing.
Print Grid Setup
Setup window.

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settings.
Printing the Sales Grid
necessary.
To print the grid:

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Printing Sales Details
All of the details about a specific sale can also be printed out on a single page.
To print the sale details:
1. Select all the sales you would like detailed pages printed for from the Finalize
Sales grid.
2. Sort the grid in the order you would like the sales printed. You can sort by
the Sales Details report loaded.
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Managing Contact Information
Managing Contact Information
When running a business on eBay, you must deal with a lot of different people.There are
people who buy your items, people you get your supplies from, and maybe even people
you consign items for. With eB, you can easily keep track of all these different people
using the Buyers, Suppliers and Consignors modes (known collectively as the Contact
Modes).

The Contact Modes are accessible from the tabs on the Main window. There is a tab for
your Buyers, Suppliers and Consignors.

If you indicated during the Setup Assistant that you do not track Suppliers or
Consignors, then you may not see all three tabs. Your system administrator can
turn them back on from the Data Access tab under Tools|User
Administration...

Each contact mode is very much like the Create Items/Monitor Listings/Finalize Sales
modes. Each has a grid view showing a list of the contacts, a details area showing the
details for the selected contact and a sidebar allowing you to choose a set of contacts.

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Managing Buyers
Each successful sale will end with a buyer. It may be a new buyer or it may be a buyer
who has purchased from you before. When the sale ends and eB retrieves the sale
information, it will automatically create a buyer record for the buyer if one does not
already exist. If the buyer did not use eBay's Checkout then the buyer record will only
contain the buyer's eBay User ID and their zip code. When a buyer uses eBay's
Checkout, eB will know a lot about the buyer, including their name and address.

Most of the buyer information that is used on a daily basis is shown on the Finalize Sales
mode making the buyer mode necessary only when you want to analyze more detailed
buyer information.

Since buyers might by from you again sometime in the future, buyer records are never
archived.
Creating a New Buyer
Most buyer records are created automatically. If you are recording an over the counter
sale, you may need to create a new buyer.
To create a new buyer:
1. Select Buyers Actions|New Buyer from the main menu or click the New Buyer
button on the Actions toolbar. If the Details Pane is shown, the new buyer will be
created and selected in the grid. You can enter the buyer information in the
Details pane. If the Details Pane is not shown, then the new buyer record will
appear in the Buyer Edit window.

2. Enter the buyer information.
Viewing Buyer Filters
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The Views sidebar contains several filters. Selecting a filter will limit the buyers shown
in the grid. The following table identifies which buyers are shown for each view.

Filter Displays...
All Buyers All buyers.
Buyers with
Pending Sales
All buyers for sales in the status families Ready for Payment
Request, Awaiting Payment or In Dispute.
Repeat Buyers All buyers who have more than one sale record attached to them.
Search Results The search results from the latest buyer search performed. This may
not be present.
All Buyers for
....
All buyers that from the last QuickLink performed on the Buyers
mode. See Finding Related Info with QuickLinks for more
information.
Searching for a Buyer
Like all other modes, you can perform a search from the Buyers mode using the Search
area of the Views sidebar. See the topic Searching for a Record for details on how to
perform the search.
Viewing the Buyers Feedback
To view a buyers feedback:
1. Select the buyer from the buyers grid.
2. Select Buyers Actions|View Feedback from the main menu or click the View
Feedback button on the Actions toolbar. The eBay page with the buyers feedback
will appear.
Copying Addresses to the Clipboard
If you need addresses in other applications like 3rd party shipping apps, then you can
easily get them from eB.
To copy buyer addresses to the clipboard:
1. Select all the buyer records you whose address you would like to copy.
2. Select Buyers Actions|Copy Shipping Address Fields or Buyers Actions|Copy
Billing Address Fields from the main menu. You can also copy shipping
addresses from the Copy Shipping button on the Actions toolbar. All selected
addresses will be placed on the clipboard with a blank line between them.
3. Paste (Ctrl-V) the addresses into any other application.
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Managing Suppliers
Items you sell on eBay usually come from someone else. Whether you get every item
from a different supplier, or all of your items from the same supplier, you may want to
record who you obtained an item from and some information about that supplier.

When creating items, you can specify the supplier of the item from a dropdown list. If
the supplier does not exist, you can create it as you enter your item information. If you
need more access to your supplier information, you can use the Suppliers mode.

Creating a New Supplier
Creating a new supplier is usually performed from the Create Items mode, but it can also
be performed from the Suppliers mode.
To create a new supplier:
1. Select Suppliers Actions|New Supplier from the main menu or click the New
Supplier button on the Actions toolbar. If the Details Pane is shown, the new
supplier will be created and selected in the grid. You can enter the supplier
information in the Details pane. If the Details Pane is not shown, then the new
supplier record will appear in the Supplier Edit window.

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2. Enter the suppliers information.
Viewing Supplier Filters
The Views sidebar contains several filters. Selecting a filter will limit the suppliers
shown in the grid. The following table identifies which suppliers are shown for each
view.

Filter Displays...
All Suppliers All suppliers.
Active
Suppliers
All suppliers for items with a quantity on hand > 1.
Search Results The search results from the latest supplier search performed. This
may not be present.
All Suppliers
for ....
All suppliers from the last QuickLink performed on the Suppliers
information.
Searching for a Supplier
Like all other modes, you can perform a search from the Suppliers mode using the
To copy addresses to the clipboard:
1. Select all the supplier records you whose address you would like to copy.
2. Select Suppliers Actions|Copy Address Fields from the main menu. All selected
addresses will be placed on the clipboard with a blank line between them.
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Managing Consignors
When you accept items from another person and sell them for a commission, it is known
as consigning an item. You are the consignee, and the person you are selling the item for
is the consignor. You can learn more about consigning items in the Consigning section.

If you sell on consignment, then you will deal with many consignors. For each
consignor, you need to keep track of their contact information and details about the
business arrangement you have with them.

When creating consignment items, you can specify the consignor of the item from a
dropdown list. If the consignor does not exist, you can create it as you enter your item
information. If you need more access to your consignor information, you can use the
Consignors mode.

Creating a New Consignor
Creating a new consignor is usually performed from the Create Items mode, but it can
also be performed from the Consignors mode.
To create a new consignor:
1. Select Consignors Actions|New Consignor from the main menu or click the New
Consignor button on the Actions toolbar. If the Details Pane is shown, the new
consignor will be created and selected in the grid. You can enter the consignor
information in the Details pane. If the Details Pane is not shown, then the new
consignor record will appear in the Consignor Edit window.
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2. Enter the consignors information.
Viewing Consignor Filters
The Views sidebar contains several filters. Selecting a filter will limit the consignors
shown in the grid. The following table identifies which consignors are shown for each
view.

Filter Displays...
All Consignors All consignors.
Active
Consignors
All consignors for items sold within the last 90 days.
Search Results The search results from the latest consignor search performed. This
may not be present.
All Consignors
for ....
All consignors from the last QuickLink performed on the Consignors
information.
Searching for a Consignor
Like all other modes, you can perform a search from the Consignors mode using the
To copy addresses to the clipboard:
1. Select all the consignor records you whose address you would like to copy.
2. Select Consignors Actions|Copy Address Fields from the main menu. All
selected addresses will be placed on the clipboard with a blank line between them.
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Navigating Modes
Navigating Modes
During your daily chores, you will find yourself switching modes and looking for data
frequently. In addition to using the mode tabs to switch between modes, you can use the
Previous View button, the View History and QuickLinks to switch from mode to mode
and view to view.
Previous View
Each time you change modes, filters, folders or lists, you are loading a new view. The
Previous View button will return you to the last view. You can click it repeatedly to go
further back in your view history.

View History
You can also use the Previous View button to display and choose from your last 10
views. Simply click the down arrow next to the Previous View button to display the list.

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QuickLinks
Depending upon your business and subscription level, you may have up to 6 primary
modes (Create Items, Monitor Listings, Finalize Sales, Buyers, Suppliers, Consignors)
that all display different types of data. Although the data is different, it is often related to
data in other modes. Listing and Sale records were created from an Item record, Sale
records are associated with a buyer record, Item records can be associated with a Supplier
or Consignor and so on. QuickLinks will allow you to get to this related data easily.
To QuickLink to related data:
1. From any mode, select the records that you would like more information about.
2. From the Actions menu for the current mode, select Go To. A list of available
QuickLinks will appear. Alternatively, you can right click the grid selections and
choose Go To from the context menu that appears. Select the cross reference
information you would like to see.

3. You can QuickLink using icons on the Details pane also. For each mode with
related data, an icon will appear in the Details pane header. Simply click the icon
for the mode you want to view.

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4. After executing the QuickLink, you will be shown all related records in the linked
mode. For instance, selecting item records and clicking the Listings Quicklink
will load the Monitor Listings mode and show you all the listings ever listed for
the selected items. The sidebar will now contain an additional filter for the
QuickLink.

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This temporary filter will exist until you perform another QuickLink to the same
mode. You can switch filters and return to the QuickLink filter as long as it still
exists.

5. Once the QuickLink view is displayed, you can customize the view or sort to
further refine the data you are looking for.

QuickLinking to Sales from Items, is similar to looking at a Sales History
report. It shows all sales for the selected items and can include total
information in the Totals row. It doesn't show the average sale price and other
stats that a Sales History report run from the Item would show.

QuickLinks are very powerful. With a little creativity, you will be able to find just the
right data you are looking for.

Samuel sells caps with football and baseball team logos. He stores his hat items
in a folder called Caps. He would like to see all the running listings for his
football caps. To do this, he opens the Caps folder and selects all of the
football caps. He then QuickLinks to the Listings. This shows him all football
cap listings he has ever submitted. He then clicks the Listing Status column to
sort by status, and can easily find all the football caps with a status family of
Running.

Debbie sells DVD's which she can get from her supplier on one days notice.
She does not order her DVD's until an auction is over and the DVD is actually
sold. She needs a way to see all the items that she needs to order, broken down
by supplier. To do this, she loads the Ready for Payment Request filter in
Finalize Sales. This shows her all her recently completed successful auctions.
She QuickLinks to Items to see all the items for those sales and then sorts the
items by Supplier ID. She exports to Excel and now has a list of all items she
needs to order from each supplier.

Other uses for QuickLinks include:

! Finding all sales for an item
! Finding all sales for a Dutch listing
! Finding the items for all relistable listings to ensure there is adequate inventory
remaining
! Finding all items you get from a particular supplier or consignor
! Finding all running listings for a consignor
! and anything else you can think of...

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Customizing Ad Templates
Customizing Ad Templates
When creating an eBay listing, much of the text of the listing is usually the same for
every listing. There will be some part of the description that is different for each item,
but the shipping message, payment message, tax message and many other components
are repeated in every listing. Ad Templates are designed to minimize the amount of data
entry you do entering these duplicate messages.

With an Ad Template, you specify all the common text in the template and intersperse
tags where the unique data should be placed. By creating an Ad Template and applying it
to your item, you will simply need to enter the unique description and not all of the other
text.

eBay Blackthorne comes with two pre-made Ad Templates that you can use to generate
your listing layout. The Simple Ad Template provides no additional text. It simply has a
[[Description]] tag that gets replaced with whatever you enter in the Description field in
your item record. The Enhanced Ad Template contains the [[Title]], [[SubTitle]] and
several other messages that you can customize.

One of the first things you will want to do to customize eB for your business is to create
your own Ad Template. It will give your listings a personal touch. From the Options
window, you can create new ad templates, duplicate existing templates, delete templates
or rename templates. See Templates for more information on managing your templates.
The Ad Template Studio is where you will edit your Ad Templates.

Within the Ad Template Studio, you can customize the text that is included in your
template using a WYSIWYG editor. Interspersed with your text, you can insert field tags
to act as a placeholder for information that comes from your database. When the listings
are generated, your text is merged with the data from your database to create a complete
listing. You can also maintain and use common strings known as Global AutoText.
Inserting Global AutoText is an easy way to get a common string or paragraph into an
Ad Template.

If you are familiar with HTML, you can view and edit the source HTML if you desire.
You can also modify some of the layout options including the image placement, image
width and the counter to use.
Editing an Ad Template
Editing an Ad Template is performed in the Ad Template Studio. The Ad Template
Studio is a WYSIWYG editor that allows you to create the custom text for your listing
Ad.
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To edit an Ad Template:
1. From Tools|Options choose Templates|Ad Templates.
2. Select the template you would like to edit from the list and click the Edit button.
3. You could also edit the Ad Template by clicking the Edit button next to the Ad
Template input box on the Item Entry pane.
4. The Ad Template Studio will open with your template loaded.

Viewing an Ad Template
By changing the tab at the bottom, you can view your Ad Template in a number of
different formats.

The Design View is a WYSIWYG HTML Editor that lets you view your text in a semi-
formatted layout. This mode is used to create your template. The HTML View will show
you the raw HTML source of the Ad Template. It is available as a reference or if you
want to add your own custom HTML to the template. The Preview will show you what
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your formatted listing will look like when it is submitted. If you are editing your Ad
Template from the Options window, all Field tags will be resolved using a sample record
from your database.

Spell checking is not enabled in the Design View since the Design View is supposed to
show exactly what will be displayed and the red wavy lines violate that rule. However,
you can spell check in the HTML View. HTML tags will be ignored by the spell
checker. See "Spell Checking" for information on using the spell checker.

You can enter plain text or HTML on the HTML View tab. When using HTML
Javascript.
Formatting Text
In the Ad Template Studio, you create the text for your listing in the Design View editor.
You can add text anywhere in the editor. You can add formatting by placing your cursor
or selecting text and then clicking on one of the format buttons on the toolbar. The
buttons perform the following formatting:

Icon Description









Set the font








Indent

Outdent


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Insert a table

Insert a hyperlink


In addition to the toolbar, all of these common functions as well as several other common
functions can be accessed from a context menu by right-clicking anywhere in the Design
View editor. Some of the additional features under the menu include:

Edit|Find and Replace - Performs a search and replace.
Formatting|(Normal/Heading1-Heading5/Formatted) - Sets the heading level for
hierarchical titling.
Document|Properties|Background Color - Sets the background color of the document.
Document|Open - Opens an HTML file in the Design View editor.
Document|Save As - Saves the current file being edited.
Document|Print - Prints the current HTML file being edited.
Document|Toolbar - Toggles the display of the toolbar.

In the Design View, the Enter key will start a new paragraph which performs
double spacing. To get a single line break, use Shift-Enter.

You can also drag any text file (with or without HTML in it) directly onto the
Design View to load it.

Robert has been conversing with Sylvia on the eBay Blackthorne Discussion
board about the great new Ad Template he has created. Sylvia asks Robert if
she can use it to. Robert opens the Ad Template, right clicks the Design View
and selects Document|Save As to save his template. He calls the file
ForSylvia.htm and sends it to her. When she receives the file, she creates a
new, empty Ad Template and drags the ForSylvia.htm file onto the Design
View and the new template is there.
Adding Item Field Tags
Item Field Tags allow you to create a placeholder in your Ad Template for information
that will be filled in from your database when the listing is created. Item Field Tags
appear with double brackets ([[ ]]) around them.

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In this example, [[Title]] and [[Description]] are Item Field Tags. When the listing is
created, the Title and Description from the item record will replace the item field tags.
The result will look like something like this:

Notice the Item Field Tags were replaced, and the "Shoe Size Conversion Table" text and
table remained as specified in the template.
To enter an Item Field Tag into an Ad Template:
1. Place your cursor at the location where the tag is to be entered.
2. Select the field you would like to enter from the Item Fields list and click the
Insert Field button. Your tag will appear in the editor. You can also simply
double-click the field to enter it at the cursor location.

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When applying any formatting to an Item Field Tag such as bold or font
changes, make sure the entire tag is selected before applying the formatting. If
only a portion of the tag is selected, then the HTML will split the tag and cause
it to not resolve properly.

By using Custom Fields from the items record, you can make your Ad Templates even
more intelligent. For instance, if you sell T-Shirts, you might create an Item with the
following Item Details.

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Notice there is no description, and it uses an Ad Template called Hanes T-Shirts. You
can then use the Custom 1 field for the size, and Custom 2 for color. As you enter a new
item, you might put XL in Custom 1 and Heather Gray in Custom 2.

You can then have these values dynamically entered into your listing by using the
[[ItemsCustom1]] and [[ItemsCustom2]] variables in your Ad Templates. The following
template...

... would look like this when formatted.

If there are only a few different variations in your listings, you could replace your
Description with just a few Custom fields.
Adding Global AutoText
There are often large chunks of text that you tend to include repeatedly in your
communications and listings. You may have a paragraph describing how and when you
ship that you include in several different emails and your listings. By placing that text
into a Global AutoText variable, you can easily add this text to any email or listing.

Global AutoTexts can also be used to add commonly used scripts to your listings. A
Global AutoText called "Countdown" has been provided so you can include a countdown
message in your listings. i.e. "Only 21 more days until Christmas!!!". It is easily
modifiable to other special days by following the inline comments.
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To enter Global AutoText into an Ad Template:
1. Place your cursor at the location where the Global AutoText is to be entered.
2. Select the Global AutoText you would like to enter from the Global AutoText list
then click the Insert AutoText button. Your tag will appear in the editor. You
can also simply double-click the Global AutoText to enter it at the cursor location.

When applying any formatting to a Global AutoText such as bold or font

You can also edit existing Global AutoTexts or even add new ones.
To edit a Global AutoText:
1. Select the Global AutoText you would like to edit from the Global AutoText list.
2. Click the Edit AutoText button. The Edit AutoText window will appear.

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3. The requested AutoText will be selected from the list on the left, and the text will
appear in the edit box. Make any modifications you desire.
4. You can also select any other AutoText from the list on the left and edit it at this
time.
5. If desired, use the New button to create a new AutoText, the Rename button to
rename an existing one, or the Delete button to remove an AutoText.

If you want to use HTML formatting in your GAT, you can double click the
text entry box to open an HTML editor.

You can nest Global AutoTexts. In other words, GAT's can contain other
GAT's. You can also include Item Field Tags in a Global AutoText.

The same set of Global AutoTexts are shared between Email Templates and Ad
Templates.

If you change the name of a Global AutoText, all occurrences of it in the Ad
and Email templates will be changed automatically.
JavaScript Global AutoTexts
Most of the GAT's are simply string replacements, but some JavaScript GAT's have been
included. A JavaScript GAT can add special formatting to your listings using JavaScript
code. You can often easily change some of the parameters of its behavior by modifying
the GAT as described in the comments at the top of each GAT. They are described in the
following table.

Name Description
Countdown Displays a countdown to a special day. You can set the special
day and the colors of the messages.
Prohibit Picture
Copying
Prohibits other users from copying the pictures in your listing.
No method is foolproof, but this should discourage most
attempts.
Falling Snow This will display falling snow over your listing. The amount of
snow can be modified.

You are also free to create any other JavaScript GAT's you can think of. If you create
one and would like us to consider including it in future versions, just send it to us.
Setting Ad Template Options
There are several options you can set for your Ad Template. These can be changed from
the Options tab at the bottom of the Ad Template Studio.

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Image Layout
The image layout setting lets you determine where your images will be located. The
sample images show how the layout will appear. The Standard, Right, Bottom, Left and
Top placements are straightforward. The Manual placement requires a little bit of
explanation.

If one of the provided image placements does not meet your needs and you want a more
customized location for your images, then you will use the Manual Image Layout. When
using Manual, eBay Blackthorne will not place any images into your listing
automatically. Instead, you must add [[Picture1]] - [[Picture12]] tags where you would
like the images to be placed.

Emily wants her listing to have the Title, SubTitle and Description at the top. She
would then like her first image to appear followed by a shoe size chart and the rest
of her shipping and payment info. Since there is no image layout that supports
this, she chooses the manual layout and modifies her Ad Template to contain a
[[Picture1]] tag like this:

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When formatted, the picture appears where she requested it.

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Image Width
When displayed, images can be set to show in their original width, or a custom width in
pixels. Pixels are units of screen measurement. An 800x600 monitor is 800 pixels wide
and 600 pixels high. If you set a custom image width, then all your images will be the
same width. This can be used to give your listing a more uniform look, or if you want to
simulate thumbnails and fit more pictures on the screen at once.

When the image width is set to a custom image, the viewer can get an actual sized image
by clicking on the image.
Counter
There are four options for including a counter in your listing. Counters are provided by
Andale, through an agreement they have with eBay. Since eBay does not have the
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counter values, they cannot return them to eB. You must view the counter totals on
Andale.
Alternate Methods of Displaying Pictures
In addition to using the Image Layout to specify how you want your pictures displayed,
there are a few other methods that can be used.
Adding a Link to a Picture
If you would prefer to display a link to your picture instead of the picture itself, use the
[[Picture1Link]] - [[Picture12Link]] tags instead of the [[Picture1]] -[[Picture12]] tags.

This template example:

looks like this when formatted:

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Building Your Own Link to a Picture
The [[PictureX]] tags and [[PictureXLink]] tags resolve to an HTML string that is an
IMG or HREF tag. There is not a tag that resolves to just the path of an image. If you
need to use just the path of an image, then you can apply the TrimHTML() function to
either the [[PictureX]] or [[PictureXLink]] tags. Using the function would look like this.

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When formatted, the function will resolve to the value specified in the PictureX input box
on the item record.

This is most useful when you are building your own HTML or Javascript to
perform special functions such as a picture swapper.
Using JavaScript in Ad Templates
You can use JavaScript in Ad Templates, but it must be used in a Global AutoText
variable. The WYSIWYG editor does not understand JavaScript and will strip it out, but
if placed into a Global AutoText the editor will not modify it. There are several sample
Global AutoTexts provided that use JavaScript. The "Countdown", "Prohibit Picture
Copying", and "Falling Snow" GAT's all use JavaScript. Here is an example of what it
looks like.

Wherever you place the GAT in your Ad Template, the associated JavaScript will be
placed.
Using Stylesheets in Ad Templates
The Design View editor does not support the inclusion of stylesheet information.
Stylesheet information will be stripped out of the template when you view the template
in Design View. With a little creativity, you can still use stylesheets.

To use stylesheets in your templates, simply create the stylesheet in a separate file and
include a link to the stylesheet in a Global AutoText. Therefore, you may have a Global
AutoText called LinkToStyleSheet that contains text similar to < link href="style.css"
rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" > . When it is included at the top of your template, it
will not get removed.

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Customizing Emails
Customizing Emails
eBay Blackthorne comes with several pre-made email templates that you can use to
quickly send emails to your buyers. You can create new email templates, duplicate
existing templates, delete templates or rename templates. See Templates for more
information on managing your templates. Using the Email Studio, you can even edit
your email templates to fully customize the emails you send your buyers.

Within an email template, you can customize the subject and text of your message using a
WYSIWYG editor. Interspersed with your text, you can insert field tags to act as a
placeholder for information that comes from your database. When the emails are
generated, your text is merged with the data from your database to create a complete
email. You can also maintain and use common strings known as Global AutoText.
Inserting Global AutoText is an easy way to get a common string or paragraph into an
email. Custom calculations can even be performed on different database fields using the
Math functions provided.

To minimize the number of emails you send, the Email Studio has been designed to
create combined emails when your buyers have purchased more than one item. The
RepeatBlock and RepeatTotal constructs let you specify what information should be
included for each sale in a buyers order.
Editing an Email Template
Editing an email template is performed in the Email Studio. The Email Studio is a
WYSIWYG editor that allows you to create the custom text for your email.
To edit an email template:
1. From Tools|Options choose Templates|Email Templates.
2. Select the template you would like to edit from the list and click the Edit button.
3. The Email Studio will open with your template loaded.

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Viewing an Email Template
By changing the tab at the bottom, you can view your email template in a number of
different formats.

The Design View is a WYSIWYG HTML Editor that lets you view your text in a semi-
formatted layout. This mode is used to create your template. The HTML View will show
you the raw HTML source of the email. It is available as a reference or if you want to
add your own custom HTML to the template. The Preview will show you what your
formatted email will look like when it is sent. All Field tags will be resolved using a
sample record from your database. The Text Only Preview will show you what your text
will look like when it is sent as text only.

Spell checking is not enabled in the Design View since the Design View is supposed to
show exactly what will be displayed and the red wavy lines violate that rule. However,
you can spell check in the HTML View. HTML tags will be ignored by the spell
checker. See "Spell Checking" for information on using the spell checker.

By default, eB sends HTML emails. HTML emails can be formatted more
attractively than plain text emails and are supported by all major email
programs today. If however, you have set up your email account to use your
existing mail program (using the MAPI interface), you cannot send HTML
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emails as the primary format. When using MAPI, you must send text emails
with the HTML email as an optional attachment. The Text Only Preview will
show you what the text email will look like. Tables and other formatting will
not appear as expected in the Text Only Preview, so if you are using MAPI to
send emails, you should verify your email format in the Text Only Preview.
Formatting Text
In the Email Studio, you can add the text of the subject and body of your email. The
subject is entered in the Subject text box, and the body of the email is entered in the
Design View editor. You can add text anywhere in the editor. You can add formatting
by placing your cursor or selecting text and then clicking on one of the format buttons on
the toolbar. The buttons perform the following formatting:

Icon Description









Set the font








Indent

Outdent




Insert a table

Insert a hyperlink

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In addition to the toolbar, all of these common functions as well as several other common
functions can be accessed from a context menu by right-clicking anywhere in the Design
View editor. Some of the additional features under the menu include:

Edit|Find and Replace - Performs a search and replace.
Formatting|(Normal/Heading1-Heading5/Formatted) - Sets the heading level for
hierarchical titling.
Document|Properties|Background Color - Sets the background color of the document.
Document|Open - Opens an HTML file in the Design View editor.
Document|Save As - Saves the current file being edited.
Document|Print - Prints the current HTML file being edited.
Document|Toolbar - Toggles the display of the toolbar.

In the Design View, the Enter key will start a new paragraph which performs
double spacing. To get a single line break, use Shift-Enter.
Adding Field Tags
Most emails require some details about the item you have sold or the buyer that you are
sending it to. Field Tags allow you to create a placeholder in your email for information
that will be filled in from your database when the email is sent. Field Tags appear with
double brackets ([[ ]]) around them.

In this example, [[BuyereBayUserid]] is a Field Tag. When the email is sent, the buyer's
eBay userid from the sales record will replace the field tag. The result will look like this:

To enter a Field Tag into an email:
1. Place your cursor at the location where the tag is to be entered.
2. Select the field you would like to enter from the Fields list and click the Insert
Field button. Your tag will appear in the editor. You can also simply double-
click the field to enter it at the cursor location.
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When applying any formatting to a Field Tag such as bold or font changes,
make sure the entire tag is selected before applying the formatting. If only a
portion of the tag is selected, then the HTML will split the tag and cause it to not
resolve properly.

Adding Global AutoText
There are often large chunks of text that you tend to include repeatedly in your
communications and listings. You may have a paragraph describing how and when you
ship that you include in several different emails and your listings. By placing that text
into a Global AutoText variable, you can easily add this text to any email.
To enter Global AutoText into an email:
1. Place your cursor at the location where the Global AutoText is to be entered.
2. Select the Global AutoText you would like to enter from the Global AutoText list
then click the Insert AutoText button. Your tag will appear in the editor. You
can also simply double-click the Global AutoText to enter it at the cursor location.

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To get a link in your email that sends your buyer to the eBay checkout page
where they can pay for the item, use the Pay Now AutoText.

When applying any formatting to a Global AutoText such as bold or font

You can also edit existing Global AutoText or even add new ones.
To edit a Global AutoText:
1. Select the Global AutoText you would like to edit from the Global AutoText list.
2. Click the Edit AutoText button. The Edit AutoText window will appear.

3. The requested AutoText will be selected from the list on the left, and the text will
appear in the edit box. Make any modifications you desire.
4. You can also select any other AutoText from the list on the left and edit it at this
time.
5. If desired, use the New button to create a new AutoText, the Rename button to
rename an existing one, or the Delete button to remove an AutoText.

You can nest Global AutoTexts. In other words, GAT's can contain other
GAT's. You can also include Field Tags in a Global AutoText.

The same set of Global AutoTexts are shared between Email Templates and Ad
Templates.

If you change the name of a Global AutoText, all occurrences of it in the Ad
and Email templates will be changed automatically.
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Using Math Functions
When sending emails that request payments, it is handy to have fields from the database
totalled automatically to let your buyers know what is due without having to calculate it
themselves. The Math() Function in the Email Studio makes this possible.

Math() is a function that prints the result of whatever basic arithmetic (addition,
subtraction, multiplication and division) operation is passed to it. It can handle integers
and decimals, and it will automatically format the results properly.

Template
(Design View)
Preview
Math( 3 + 5 ) 8
Math( 3 - 5 ) -2
Math( 3.0 * 5.0
)
15
Math( 3 / 5 ) 0.6
Math( 3 + 4 + 5) 12
Math(1.4142135
* 1.4142135)
2.0000001064249604

Math() can also handle currency. If at least one of the terms given it is currency, the
output will be in currency.

Template (Design
View)
Preview
Math($3 + $5) $8.00
Math($3 - $5) ($2.00)
Math($3/5) $0.60
Math($3 * 5) $15.00

Any Field Tags that resolve to numbers can also be used.

Template (Design View) Preview
Math([[SalePrice]] + [[Shipping]]) $12.00
Math([[SalePrice]]*[[QtySold]] ) $20.00
Math([[SalePrice]]*[[QtySold]]+[[Shipping]]) $22.00

Multiplication and division operators will always take precedence over addition and
subtraction. Therefore...

Math(3+[[SalePrice]]*2) will resolve to the same thing as Math([[SalePrice]]*2+3)

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To force your own precedence, you can use nested Math() functions like this:

Math(Math(3+[[SalePrice]])*2)

In this example, 3 will be added to the sale price and the result will be multiplied by 2.

Math() can handle any parameters that are numeric. You can even add the sale price to a
part number (Math([[SalePrice]] + [[PartNum]])) though that would make little sense. If
the contents of Math() does not contain all numbers, then it will show as a blank when it
is resolved in the email.

When using Math(), do not place a space between Math and the first parenthesis
or your equation will not resolve properly.

Math() can be used in the both the Body and the Subject of the Email Template.
Building Combined Emails with Repeat Block
Frequently buyers purchase more than one item from a seller. When this occurs, it is
convenient to send a single email to a buyer that contains information about all of his
purchases. Combined emails need to show information about multiple sales. The Repeat
Block allows users to specify which tags should be repeated for each sale.

A Repeat Block looks like:

Begin Repeat For Each Item
Item Title: [[Title]]
Item Number: [[eBayItem]]
Quantity: [[QtySold]]
Winning Bid: [[SalePrice]]
End Repeat For Each Item

It prints out everything in between Begin Repeat For Each Item and End Repeat For Each
Item, and it repeats this for each item in a combined sale. If there is only one item in the
sale, it doesn't do any repeating at all.

The Repeat Block above will resolve to something like this:

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To insert a Repeat Block in the Description:
1. Highlight all the text and tags that you would like repeated.
2. Right-click and select Insert|Repeat Block.

The template editor allows only one Repeat Block per message template. If you attempt
to add a second block, the first block will be removed and the second one added in its
place.

The right-click menu also duplicates most of the standard text-editing functions that are
available on the toolbar directly above the editing window.

You can also get the same RepeatBlock functionality in the message subject, but you
must manually enter the RepeatBlock tags in the subject line. To get a subject that says
"You've won! eBay Item(s) (12345678901 09876543210)" enter the RepeatBlock as
shown below.

Adding Combined Totals with RepeatTotal
In addition to displaying information about multiple sales, you may also want the total of
some fields for all sales included in the email. RepeatTotal() is a function that will sum
up the total value of whatever field is fed to it inside the parentheses.

RepeatTotal([[SalePrice]]) adds the sale prices of all the items in a combined sale. If
there's only one item in the sale, RepeatTotal([[SalePrice]]) simply prints out the value of
the field it is given.

If you pass an non numeric field to RepeatTotal(), it will resolve to nothing.
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Editing Pictures
Editing Pictures
A picture is worth a thousand words, but to an eBay seller, it could make the difference
between an item that sells and one that doesn't. Good quality, small images will make
your listings look better and load faster. eBay Blackthorne's Picture Studio can help you
custom tailor your images for an eBay listing, and it can do it to multiple images at the
same time.

The Picture Studio provides functions for rotating, cropping, zooming, scaling, adjusting
the brightness and contrast, compressing and sizing of pictures. Rotating and scaling can
be performed on multiple pictures at the same time. Auto-compressing and Auto-Sizing
can be performed automatically just by loading the pictures in to the Picture Studio.
Overview of the Picture Studio
To load the Picture Studio:
1. From the Create Items mode, select all the items that you would like to edit the
pictures for and choose Items Actions|Edit Pictures from main menu. You can
also click the Edit button in the Pictures group on the Item Entry pane. The
Picture Studio will appear with all pictures from all selected items loaded.

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Across the top of the Picture Studio is the Item Record Grid. It contains a row for each
item that was selected and loaded into the Picture Studio. You can click on an individual
row or select multiple rows to work with only the pictures in the selected rows.

On the left side is the Picture Selection Pane. It displays a thumbnail for every picture in
all of the selected rows in the Item Record Grid. It allows you to further narrow down
the selection of items to work with. Click on a picture to select it. Rotating and scaling
will work on multiple pictures at the same time. To select multiple pictures, you can hold
down the Ctrl key and click on each additional picture you want selected. Holding down
the Shift key while selecting two pictures will select all pictures between the two clicked
pictures. You can even drag and drop an imaginary box to surround the pictures you want
selected.

To the right of the Picture Selection pane is the Picture Editor. The Picture Editor
displays the last picture selected. It will show the effects of rotating, scaling and
changing the brightness and contrast, and it is used to set the bounds for cropping.

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Immediately below the Picture Editor is the Picture Editor Dashboard. It contains the
controls used to modify the pictures.

At the bottom is the message bar. It contains information on how many items are
selected from the total, which item the selected picture is used in, the size of the picture,
width and height of the picture and the scaling percentage.
Rotating
If you rotated your camera when taking a picture, you will need to rotate the picture to
make it display upright.
To rotate pictures:
1. Select the pictures that you want to rotate.
2. Click one of the rotation buttons on the Picture Editor Dashboard. You
will see all selected pictures rotating in the direction of the arrow.
Cropping
Cropping a picture will remove unnecessary parts of the picture. Cropping is a good way
to reduce the size of a picture without losing any important information.
To crop a picture:
1. Select the picture to be cropped from the Picture Selection Pane.
2. Use your cursor to drag and drop a selection box around the area to be saved.
3. Click the crop button to remove everything outside of the selection box.
Cropping cannot be performed on multiple pictures at the same time, so if when
multiple pictures are selected, the crop button is disabled.
Zooming
Zooming a picture will let you view more or less of your picture without actually
changing its physical stored size.
To zoom a picture:
1. Select the picture to be zoomed from the Picture Selection Pane.
2. Select a value from the Zoom dropdown, or enter a zoom percentage directly into
the dropdown. The values behave as follows:

! values below 100% show a smaller version of the picture. This is useful if
you have a large image and want to see it all so you can crop it.
! 100% (Actual size) will display the image in the same size that it will appear
in your listing.
! values > 100% will zoom in on your picture. You can use the scrollbars to
move to different areas of your picture.
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! Fit to Window will size the image so that it fits perfectly in the current
window size.

Zooming only changes your view while you are editing it. It does not change
the size of the picture as it appears on eBay. You need to use scaling to change
the actual size of the picture.
Scaling
Scaling an image will reduce its size and still keep all the original content. When scaling,
you may lose some resolution quality but the image will load faster.
To scale pictures:
1. Select the pictures that you want to scale.
2. Move the Scaling slider on the Picture Editor Dashboard to the desired picture
width. The slider ranges from 1 to the width of the selected picture in pixels. All
selected pictures will be scaled to the specified width.

If you will be scaling and cropping a picture, it is better to crop it first, then
scale it. The result will have a higher resolution.
Brightness and Contrast
Adjusting the brightness and contrast can make your image look better.

To adjust the brightness and contrast of a picture:
1. Select the picture to be adjusted from the Picture Selection Pane.
2. Move the Brightness and Contrast sliders to the desired settings. The relative
change will appear as a number on the right.

Compression and Sizing
A compressed image will appear to be the same size on the screen, but will be a smaller
file. Depending upon how aggressive or mild the compression is, you may or may not
see any noticeable difference in the pictures appearance after a compression. Most
pictures taken with digital cameras today can be greatly compressed without a noticeable
difference. Pictures as large as 3-5 megs can frequently be reduced to 100-200k. All
pictures taken with a digital camera should be compressed before posting on eBay.

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Pictures from digital cameras also tend to be very large. Usually the smallest setting on a
camera is 800x600 and goes up from there. Many computer users still use an 800x600
monitor, so any pictures larger than that will require those users to scroll to see your
image. Therefore any pictures posted on eBay should always be scaled to less than 800
pixels, and preferably down to 700 or less.

eBay Blackthorne makes compression and sizing easy. You can turn on automatic
compression and sizing, and every time a picture is loaded into the Picture Studio, it will
be automatically processed or you can manage compression and sizing manually.
To turn on automatic compression:
1. From Tools|Options, select Pictures under Appearance in the Options tree. The
following options will appear.

2. Check the Auto-compress pictures when opening the Picture Studio box.
3. Set the Quality after compression slider. Smaller images load faster but will be
of lower quality. Adjust this setting based on how much detail you need to show
in your pictures. To test this value, make a copy of an image that has come from
your camera and load it into the Picture Studio. If it is still of acceptable quality,
lower the slider value, make another copy of the master image and load it into the
Picture Studio. Repeat this process to find the setting that gives you acceptable
results with the smallest file size.
4. Check the Automatically size my pictures to box and set a value. Any image
larger than this value will be automatically reduced to this size when it is loaded
into the Picture Studio.
To manually compress or size pictures:
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1. From Tools|Options, select Pictures under Appearance in the Options tree. The
following options will appear.

2. Make sure the auto-compression and auto-sizing are turned of by unchecking the
Auto-compress pictures when opening the Picture Studio box and the
Automatically size my pictures to box.
3. When you open the Picture Studio, the Compress button will now be available.
After making any modifications to your pictures, click the Compress button.
4. Sizing can be performed using the Scaling feature.

Joe sells cars and wants to include a picture of the odometer reading in his
listings. He takes a high-res picture of the instrument panel for each car and
loads them into eB. If Joe had auto-compression and auto-scaling on, then the
pictures would be resize and compressed when he loaded the Picture Studio.
When he then cropped the odometer, he would not get a very good picture,
because it was already resized and he has lost most of the resolution.

To get the best possible picture, Joe turns off the auto-compression and auto-
sizing. When he loads a picture of the instrument panel, he uses a Zoom of "Fit
to Window" and then crops the odometer. Once it is cropped, he uses the
"Compress" button to compress the image and still maintains the high quality.
Undoing Changes
While working with pictures, you may find at some point that you need to undo some
changes you have made. You can use the Revert button on the Picture Editor Dashboard
or the Cancel button on the Picture Studio window.

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The Revert button will revert the picture in the Picture Editor to what it was before the
Picture Studio was opened. The Cancel button will revert all pictures in the Picture
Studio to what they were when the Picture Studio was loaded.
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Managing Multiple Seller Accounts
Managing Multiple Seller Accounts
Many users organize their business using separate eBay Seller Accounts to sell different
types of goods. Support for managing multiple accounts is built in to eBay Blackthorne
Pro. You can have as many eBay Seller Accounts as you need and manage them all with
eBay Blackthorne.

Although you can manage as many seller accounts as you'd like, you will need
to have a different subscription to eBay Blackthorne for every 5 accounts. For
instance, if you manage 5 seller accounts, then you will need only one
subscription. If you have 6 accounts, you need two subscriptions, and at 11,
you would need three subscriptions.

To organize your information by seller account, you will first create an eBay Blackthorne
seller account for every eBay Seller Account that you have. You will give each seller
account a name. This name may be the same as the eBay userid or it can be something
different. You will also specify the eBay userid that is subscribed to eBay Blackthorne.
Since you can use up to 5 seller accounts with one subscription, the first 5 seller accounts
you create should have the same Subscribed Userid.

Once you have created your accounts, you simply need to identify which seller account
an item is being created for. You will normally do this as you create new items.

As listing and sales records are created from the items, you will be able to use the Seller
dropdown in each of those modes to view just the information for an individual seller or
all sellers.

When importing items from eBay or Seller's Assistant Pro, the proper Seller Accounts
will be created and associated with the item records.

You cannot create more than one seller account for a single eBay UserID.
Creating Seller Accounts
Before you were allowed to use eBay Blackthorne, you were required to add your first
seller account. You can add and manage seller accounts from Tools - Options - Seller
Accounts.

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Use the corresponding buttons to add a New account, Duplicate an existing account,
Delete an account, Edit an account, or Rename an account. You can also select an
account and click the Subscription button to check on the status of the accounts
subscription on eBay.

To create a new account, simply click the New button to open the New Seller Account
window.

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eBay User ID
The eBay User ID of the new seller account.
Subscribed User ID
The eBay User ID that is subscribed to use eBay Blackthorne. You may create up to 5
seller accounts with the same subscribed userid. When the eBay User ID and Subscribe
User ID are the same, you can save time by clicking the "same as eBay User ID" option.
Business Name
The full name of your business. This will appear in reports, email templates and ad
templates.
Return Mailing Address
Your complete return mailing address. This will appear in reports, email templates and
ad templates.
Associating an Item with a Seller Account
When creating an item, you must associate it with the seller account that you want to list
it with. The Seller dropdown in the Item Details group provides a list of all seller
accounts for you to use.

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Viewing Information by Seller Account
To view the Items, Listings, or Sales for a particular seller account, simply choose the
account from the Seller dropdown in the sidebar. Choose "All Sellers" if you want to
view all your data together.

When you change seller accounts, all folders, lists and filters will include data
for the selected seller account only. You will see the counts in sidebar change
as you change seller accounts.

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Managing Multiple Users
Managing Multiple Users
Even though eB can automate many tasks and save you lots of time, it may still take more
than one person to manage everything. As a business grows, taking pictures, listing,
emailing, shipping, etc. may have to be split across multiple users on multiple computers.
Each person may have a specialized task, and all users need to have access to the same
data. eBay Blackthorne is designed to handle the growth of your business.
Administering Users
With eB, you can create multiple user logins. Each person in your organization can have
their own login id and password to access eB. Logins are managed by an administrator.
The administrator can customize the data and features that a user has access to as well as
what user interface customizations they can make. This will allow different users to see
the features and data that they need to perform their job, but nothing else.

Endless Mountains Enterprises is a small business that sells items on eBay.
The owner, Rob, has two employees, Brendan and Emily. Brendan, lists all of
the items, and Emily performs all the after sale processing. To keep his
customer data confidential, he has set up a user account for each employee and
turned off the ability to see reports and buyers credit card info for those
accounts. Also, since Brendan only lists the items, he is not allowed to see the
Finalize Sales tab, send email or leave feedback. Since Emily only handles the
shipping, she is not allowed to submit items or edit pictures. By creating user
accounts, each employee has a user interface tailored to their job, and can't
accidentally harm or view sensitive data.

Logging In
Initially, there is a single user called Admin with no password. As long as there is only
one user without a password, you will not be required to log in to eBay Blackthorne.
Once a second user is created or a password is created for the Admin account, then a
login box will appear when starting the program. You must enter a valid User ID and
Password to gain access to eB.

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If you added a new user before you fully understood the User Administration
feature, you will be presented with the login screen the next time you run eB. If
you get to this point, enter a User ID of Admin, and leave the password blank to
get in. Then open the User Administration window and set the passwords and
accounts properly.

Logging Out

If you want to use a computer that someone else is logged into, you will need to logout
and then re-login.
To logout:
1. Select File|Logout from the main menu. The eBay Blackthorne User Login
window will appear.
2. Enter your User ID and Password to log in under your own account.
To administer users:
1. From the main menu, select Tools|User Administration. The User
Administration window will appear.

The User Administration option on the main menu is only visible if you are a
user administrator or if there is only one user.

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Creating multiple user accounts will only limit the access users have to data
from within eB. If you want to lock your database file so users cannot see the
data through Microsoft Access, you must password protect your database.

DO NOT FORGET THE USER ADMINISTRATORS PASSWORD.
Without it, you will be unable to modify the permissions for all users including
yourself. If you do forget it, you must open the data file in Microsoft Access
and modify the UserLogins table to reset the Administrators password. You
will need to know the database password to do this on a password protected
database.

Creating a New User
For each employee that will have access to eB, you will create a User Account.
To create a user account:
1. Click the New button in the lower left corner of the User Administration window.
A New User(X) will be added to the Users list.

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2. Enter the Name of the new user. This is usually their full name.
3. Enter the User ID of the new user. This can be a nickname or shortened version
of their full name. This is what the user will enter to login.
4. Enter a Password for user. When you tab out of the Password field, you will be
required to enter the Password again.
5. If the new user is an administrator and is allowed access to the User
Administration window, then check the Administrator box.
Deleting a User
To remove an employees access, you can delete their user login.
To delete a user:
1. Select the user to be deleted from the Users list.
2. Click the Delete button under the Users list.
Managing a User's Data Access
The Administrator can control what types of data a user has access to.
To manage the data a user has access to:
1. Select the Data Access tab on the User Administration window.

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2. Uncheck any data the user should not have access to. The following table
describes the options.

Option When turned off...
Allow user to Create
Items
the user cannot view the Create Items mode.
Allow user to Monitor
Listings
the user cannot view the Monitor Listings mode.
Allow user to Finalize
Sales
the user cannot view the Finalize Sales mode.
Allow user to edit
Buyers
the user cannot view the Buyers mode.
Allow user to edit
Suppliers
the user cannot view the Suppliers mode. The user also
cannot set the Supplier on the item record.
Allow user to edit
Consignors
the user cannot view the Consignors mode. The user also
cannot set the Consignor on the item record.
Allow user to view
reports
the user cannot view the Profit and Loss Report, Sales
Tax Report or Consignor Payout Report.
Allow user to view
credit card numbers
the user cannot view the buyers credit card information on
the sale or buyer records.

Managing a User's Access to Features
The Administrator can also control what features a user has access to.
To manage the features a user has access to:
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1. Select the Allowed Actions tab on the User Administration window.

2. Uncheck any features the user should not have access to. The following table

Allow user to submit
listings
the user cannot submit listings. The Submit and Submit
Again functions in all modes will not be available.
Allow user to change
fields in bulk
the user cannot access the Bulk Change Fields commands
in any mode.
Allow user to send
emails
the user cannot send emails to buyers. The Email Buyer
functions will not be available.
Allow user to edit
emails
the user cannot edit emails. The Options window will not
display the email templates.
Allow user to leave
feedback
the user cannot leave feedback. The Leave Feedback
functions will not be available and the Options window
will not display the Positive Feedback Messages.
Allow user to delete
records
the user cannot delete records in any mode. The Delete
function will not be available in the menus.
Allow user to edit
pictures
the user cannot edit pictures in the Picture Studio.
Managing the Customizations a User Can Perform
The Administrator can also control what customizations a user can perform.
To manage the customizations a user can perform:
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1. Select the Appearance tab on the User Administration window.

2. Uncheck any features the user should not have access to. The following table

Allow user to create and
modify filters
the user will not have access to the right-click menu
that allows modifying, filters, folders and lists.
Allow user to create and
modify Ad Templates
the user cannot modify Ad Templates. The Options
window will not show the Ad Templates and the Edit
button next to the Ad Template selector will not be
available.

Networking
When multiple users want to share data on multiple computers, it is called networking.
Networking involves physically connecting the computers via a Local Area Network
(LAN). Setting up a network is beyond the scope of this document. If you are not
familiar with setting up a network, you can reference the Microsoft documentation,
search the internet for advice, or visit a local consultant.

Once all of your computers are on the same network, they will be able to share files and
your data across the network. Each computer on the LAN can share different files or
resources (like printers). Any computer on the network that is sharing a file is referred to
as the Server of that file. Any computer retrieving a file is referred to as a Client. In
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practice, one computer is usually chosen as the computer that holds all the common data
and shares it with the others.
Sharing Data
Sharing eB data is as simple as placing the database file (BTData.mdb) somewhere on the
network and allowing all the other computers to have access to it. We recommend you
designate one of the computers as the eB Server. The eB Server should be the most
powerful computer, with the most RAM memory on your network. Once the data is
shared, all the clients can open eB and point to the shared database.

When sharing data, there are two ways you can access it from another
computer. One way is by explicitly pointing to the networked computer using
the UNC (Universal Naming Convention) path. A UNC would look something
like \\OurServer\data\BTData.mdb. The other way is by creating a Mapped
Network Drive to the shared folder. By mapping the K: drive to the
\\OurServer\data folder, you can then access the data using K:\BTData.mdb.

We recommend you use a mapped network drive because you can easily
change the location of your data and image files without having to make
massive changes to your image paths in the eB database. In addition, Microsoft
recommends you use mapped network drives when using Access databases.

To share a database:
1. Place your data file (BTData.mdb) into a folder on your server. The easiest way
to do this is to install eB on the server itself. This allows you to easily update the
database when future versions come out. Once installed, the database will be in
the C:\Program Files\eBay\Blackthorne\data folder. You can leave it there, or
you can move it to another folder on the server. If you move it, you should run
eB on the server, and then go to File/Switch Database and switch to the database
in the new location.

For Windows XP Users:

2. Share the folder containing the database file by right-clicking the folder and
choosing or Sharing and Security. The Folder Properties window will appear.

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3. Click on the Sharing tab.
4. Under Network sharing and security, check Share this folder on the network.
5. Provide the Share name. This is what other computers will see when they want
to view your data.
6. Check Allow network users to change my files. This will allow other computers
to make updates to the database.
7. Click OK, and your database will be accessible to other computers on the network.
8. To access the data from the clients, you will create a mapped network drive to the
database location on the server. From each client computer open the My
Computer folder, and select Tools|Map Network Drives... from the menu.

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9. On the Map Network Drive window, choose an unused Drive letter.
10. Then, select the Folder on the server that contains the database you want to share.
You can use the Browse button to navigate to it if you don't know the full UNC
path.
11. Make sure Reconnect at logon is checked.
12. Click Finish.

For Windows 2000 Users:

2. Share the folder containing the database file by right-clicking the folder and
choosing or Sharing. The Folder Properties window will appear.

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3. Click on the Sharing tab.
4. Select Share this folder.
5. Provide the Share name. This is what other computers will see when they want
to view your data.
6. Click the Permissions button. This will open the Permissions window.

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7. In the top box, choose the group of users you will be granting access to.
8. In the bottom box, check Allow for all permissions (Full Control, Change, Read).
This will allow other computers to make updates to the database.
9. Click OK, to return to the Folder Properties window, then click OK again and
your database will be accessible to other computers on the network.
10. To access the data from the clients, you will create a mapped network drive to the
database location on the server. From each client computer open the My
Computer folder, and select Tools|Map Network Drives... from the menu.

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7.
11. On the Map Network Drive window, choose an unused Drive letter.
12. Then, select the Folder on the server that contains the database you want to share.
path.
14. Click Finish.
To open a shared database:
1. Run eB, and select File/Switch Database from the main menu. The Switch
Database dialog will appear.

2. Navigate to the database on the your mapped drive using the Browse button.
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3. If the database is password protected, uncheck the Blank Password box and enter
the Password.
4. Click OK, and you will be using the shared database.
Sharing the Servant
The Servant is a process that performs automated tasks in the background. See Keeping
Data Synchronized with eBay - The_Servant for more information. When multiple
computers are sharing the same database, each computer will independently run servant
functions to keep the database up to date. Some servant functions are always on, and
some of the more time consuming functions can be turned on and off.

All computers running eB at any given time will share the load for any servant functions.
If you have 100 listings scheduled to submit one a minute, they will be submitted by the
first computer to get to them at any given scheduled time. This helps the performance on
all computers.

Some of the more time consuming servant functions can be turned on and off on each
computer by unchecking Refresh|Refresh Automatically from the main menu. By
controlling which computers have these extra functions on and off, you can also improve
your performance. Since all servant functions interact with the database, it makes sense
that the server would perform the functions the fastest since it doesn't have to go across
the network to access the data. Therefore, the server is a good computer to leave the
servant on at all times. Other older computers with slow connections to the network
should leave the servant off when someone is using it.

Kyle runs an eBay business with 10 employees. The employees share 6
different computers. The computers range in age from almost new to 4 years
old. In addition to the employee computers, he also has a server. The server
has the fastest processor and 2 gigs of RAM. eB is installed on the server, but
no one uses it on a day to day basis. On the server, the automatic refresh is left
on at all times. All other computers leave automatic refresh off while they are
in use. When a computer is not being used, or when everyone goes home at
night, automatic refreshes are turned back on.

Sharing Pictures
Pictures can also be shared across a network. They can be hosted on the same server as
the database, or a different server.

When sharing pictures, there are two ways you can access them from another
computer. One way is by explicitly pointing to the networked computer using
the UNC (Universal Naming Convention) path. A UNC would look something
like \\OurServer\photos\glassware\FentonPitcher\Image001.jpg. The other way
is by creating a Mapped Network Drive to the shared folder. By mapping the
K: drive to the \\OurServer folder, you can then access the data using
K:\photos\glassware\FentonPitcher\Image001.jpg.
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We recommend you use a mapped network drive because you can easily
change the location of your data and image files without having to make
massive changes to your image paths in the eB database. In addition, some
users have reported better performance using mapped network drives over
UNC. The tutorials below show how to set up mapped network drives.

When associating pictures with an item on a network, you must point to the UNC or
mapped network drive, and not the local path to the images. For example, if you store
pictures on your server on the K:\pics folder, and then place K:\pics\mypicture1.jpg in the
picture path on the item record, then the server will be able to see the pictures, but none
of the clients will. They will be looking for pictures on their K:\pics folder and will not
find them. If you create a mapped K: drive on each client and point it to the K: drive on
the server then all computers on the network will be able to see the pictures equally.
To create a mapped network drive:
1. From each client computer open the My Computer folder, and select Tools|Map
Network Drives... from the menu.

9. On the Map Network Drive window, choose the Drive letter that the photos are
stored on the server.
10. Then, select the Folder on the server that contains the pictures you want to share.
path.
12. Click Finish.

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When you have the Thumbnails column displayed in a grid, then the images are loaded
into the grid just like they are loaded into a browser. The grid data may load first, and the
thumbnails will appear as they are retrieved from the server. If your network is slow, or
your network traffic is heavy, the thumbnails may take a while to load. Since thumbnails
are loaded in a background process and you can still use the program while they are
loading, this is not a big deal, but if you find that it is affecting your performance or it is
annoying, you can remove the thumbnail column from your column set by right-clicking
the Thumbnail column header and selecting Remove Column.

Tammy works for Kyle. Her primary responsibility is to take all the pictures
for the listings. Two other employees create the listings and submit them.
Tammy has created a folder structure on the server to host all the pictures. All
pictures are in a folder called Pics. The Pics folder has subfolders for each type
of item (Glassware, Books, Clothing, etc.). Each subfolder has a folder for
each item. The folder is given the same name as the Part Number of the item.
She places anywhere from 3 to 12 pics in each folder for each item. At any
time after the pictures have been taken, the 2 listers can look in the Pics folder
on the server and find the pictures for the listings they are creating.
Sharing Settings
When running on multiple computers, you will most likely want many of the options on
the computers to be the same. There are several files you can copy between computers to
make them all behave the same. All of those files are stored in the data folder, so they
can all be easily copied at once. The files in the data folder are described in the table
below.

File(s) Location Purpose
Settings.pvt root This file holds all options set on the Options window.
This file can be shared between computers to easily
transfer option settings to another computer. See
Private Registry Files for more information.
BTCustomEN.dic root This is the custom spell check dictionary. It contains
all the custom words added to your dictionary. It is
simply a text file listing all the words that have been
added. You can combine dictionaries into one by
copying the words from one to the end of another.
BTData.mdb root This is the default database that is shipped with eB. If
you are using a database on a network, this database
will not be used on the clients.
Reports Reports
folder
All reports are in this folder. Each report is in a
separate file. You can copy reports between
computers.
Sounds Sounds
folder
All sounds are in this folder. Sounds can be copied
between computers.
Baseline Baseline This is an empty database exactly as it was shipped
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BTData.mdb folder with eB. It is used to create a new database if you want
to run with one or more databases. See Database
Management - Creating_a_New_Database for more
information.
Backing Up on a Network
eB provides an automatic daily backup. See Database Management - Backing Up and
Restoring a Database for more information. When running on a network, the it is not
necessary that all computers perform the daily backup. The automatic backup should be
turned off on all the clients and left on for the server.

As an added precaution, you can have one of the clients make automatic
backups as well as the server. This will give you backups on two different
computers in case something happens to one.
Upgrading a Network
Frequently, a new upgrade will introduce a new field into the database. When this
happens, the upgrade will automatically add the field the first time it is run on a database.
There are some guidelines you should follow when upgrading a network installation to a
new version.
To upgrade on a network:
1. Close eB on all client computers. The server should be the only computer
accessing the database during the upgrade.
2. Install the upgrade on the server by going to Help|Check for Updates and
Messages and following the prompts.
3. If you were required to exit the program, then run eB again to ensure the updates
to the database are applied.
4. Start eB and perform the upgrades on each of the clients from Help|Check for
Updates and Messages.
Refreshing Data
Each user may be changing data at the same time. Because of the nature of a database,
changes to a record are not saved to the database in real time and changes by other users
are not retrieved in real time either. This means that you may not have the most up to
date data at any given time. The good news is that you will probably never notice this
since the updates and retrievals are performed frequently enough.

Any changes you make to the data will be saved to the database when:
! changing records
! changing filters
! changing modes

Information is retrieved from the database when:
! changing filters
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! changing modes
! every 5 minutes by the servant
! when using Refresh|Refresh Database from the menu. See "Keeping Data
Synchronized with eBay - Manually_Refreshing_and_Updating" for more
information.
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Customizing a View
Customizing the View
There are many different ways you view data in the grid pane. You may be looking at a
folder, a list, a filter, search results or QuickLink results. For each of these different
views, you may want to see data in a different format. The fields that are visible, the
order of the fields as well as the sort order are all very dependent upon what data you are
viewing. There are many different aspects of a view that you might want to change in
different circumstances.

Fortunately, eBay Blackthorne provides you many different ways to modify any view of
data. When defining filters, it allows you to customize which rows you are viewing. It
also allows you to choose which fields are visible and their order. In addition, you can...

! choose the sort order of a view
! display a totals row at the top of the view
! save and load custom column sets that define fields to display and their order
! allow for quickly changing column sets from a visible dropdown
! choose whether you will include archived records in your view
! specify a date range of data to include
! choose to group rows by a particular field

To customize a view, you simply select the Customize link in the grid pane header.

This will open the Customize View window.

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If the view you are editing allows you to change the name, then the Name field will be
enabled. The Customize View window has 3 tabs. The Rows tab will allow you to
specify which records are to be included in your results. The Columns tab allows you to
choose a saved column set or manually modify which columns are displayed. The
Advanced tab allows you to add additional information to your view like Totals and
specific date ranges.

Let's look at each tab function in more depth.
Selecting the Records to be Included in Your View
When customizing a view, the first thing we will look at is how to customize which
records (or rows) are included. By limiting the number of rows you are viewing, you will
be able to find the data you are looking for much more quickly. This is performed on the
Rows tab of the Customize View window.

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The task of limiting the rows that you are looking at is called filtering. In fact, when you
change the rows that are included in a view, you are really modifying the Filter that was
used to create the view. You will modify the included rows by adding conditions. A
condition is a rule that limits what is shown. It might be something like "Quantity on
Hand < 5" or "Title contains 'Print'". You can add as many conditions as you'd like to a
filter.

Since filtering is only allowed on Filters, all other views including Folders and
Lists will not allow you to modify the rows included. In addition, there are
pre-defined filters provided with the program that are hard-coded and do not
allow you to modify the Rows tab. When either of these cases is true, you will
see a message that says "The conditions for this folder/filter/list cannot be
modified."

Matching 'All' or 'Any' Conditions
Before adding your conditions, you should specify whether you will "Show items that
match Any/All of the following conditions:". If you choose All from the dropdown, then
all of the conditions you specify must be true for a row to be included in the results. If
you choose Any, then only one of the conditions must be true for a row to be included in
the results.
Adding Conditions
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To add a condition, click the Add Condition button. A new condition row will appear. In
the first dropdown, select the field that you want to compare. This will be one of the
fields from the current mode. In the second dropdown, choose a comparison operator.
The comparison operator choices will change depending upon the data type of the field
you are comparing. For instance, text fields will have a "contains" comparison operator,
and numeric fields will have an "is greater than" operator. Finally, in the last field enter
the value that you are comparing to. The type of input box will change based on the type
of data you are comparing.
Removing Conditions
To remove a condition, click the Remove Condition button. This will remove the last
condition entered.

When naming a filter, you should choose a name that will help you easily
understand what rows are included in your filter.
Modifying the Column Display in Your View
The next task we will look at when customizing a view is how to customize the field
columns that are shown. This is performed on the Columns tab of the Customize View
window.

eBay Blackthorne comes installed with several default column sets for each mode. A
column set is a subset of columns from the current grid that have been grouped together
for display purposes. The width of the columns and their order are also part of the
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column set. For example, the "Inventory Management" column set will have columns
that you would use when managing inventory like Qty On Hand, Qty Available, etc.

For each view, you can choose the column set that you would like to use from the
Column Set dropdown. Once chosen, you can then modify the column set if you desire.
Adding or Removing Columns from a Column Set
To add columns, select one or more fields from the Available Fields list. You can use
Ctrl-Click to select individual fields or Shift-Click to select a range of fields. Once
selected, click the Add button. To remove columns, reverse the process by selecting one
or more fields in the Columns list and clicking the Remove button.

When viewing the grid, you can quickly Add or Remove fields by right-
clicking a grid column header and selecting Add Columns, or Remove Column.
Reordering Columns in a Column Set
To reorder columns, select the columns that you would like to move from the Columns
list, and click the Move Up or Move Down buttons. You can also select a column and
drag and drop it within the Columns list.

When viewing the grid, you can easily reorder columns by dragging and
dropping the column headers on the grid.
Changing the Width of a Column in a Column Set
You cannot change the width of a column from the Customize View window. You must
change it on the grid itself. When viewing the grid, move your cursor over the line
between grid column headers until the resize cursor appears.

Then drag and drop the column edge to change the width. All width changes will be
saved with the currently loaded column set.
Sorting Columns in a Column Set
You cannot change the sort order of a column set from the Customize View window.
You must change it on the grid itself. When viewing the grid, single click a column
header to sort on the column. A small arrow as shown in the Item Status field below will
indicate the sort column and the direction of the sort (ascending or descending).

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Click the column again to toggle the sort direction. To sort on more than one field, hold
the shift key and click on multiple column headers. The last header clicked will be the
primary sort, the previous one clicked will be the secondary sort, etc.

All sort changes will be saved with the currently loaded column set.
Resetting a Column Set
There may come a time when you simply want to start over and reset a column set to its
original settings as shipped. To reset a column set, right-click the grid header and select
Reset Column Set.
Creating a New Column Set
To create a new column set, choose a column set that you would like to use as a starting
point for your new column set from the Column Set dropdown. Then click the Save
Column Set As button and you will be prompted for a name for your new column set.
Enter a name and click OK. Your new column set will be created and available in the
column set dropdown list. You can now select it and modify it as you wish.
Advanced Display Options for Your View
The Advanced tab provides several additional customizations you can make to your view.

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Adding a Totals Row to Your View
If you would like to use a view for reporting purposes, you may want to see some of the
numeric fields totalled. To display a Totals row on your view, check the Display Totals
box. This will add an extra row to the top of your view that will contain totals for all
relevant numeric fields.
Adding the Column Set Dropdown to Your View
If you would like to easily change the column set on a view, then you can check the
Display Column Sets menu above Grid box. When checked, the Column Sets menu will
be available on the main grid, and you will not have to open the Customize View window
to change column sets.
Including Archived Items in Your View
By default, your view will not show archived records. If you would like archived records
to be displayed in a view, then check the Include Archived Items/Listings/Sales box.

Showing archived records in a view will slow down the time it takes to load and
display the view. You should only include archived items if you have a good
reason.
Specifying a Date Range for Your View
Another useful tool to add reporting capabilities to a view is to add a date range. To add
a date range, choose the date that you would like to compare from the Date Field
dropdown. This dropdown will include all available date fields for the current mode.
You can then choose the period over which to display from the Date Period dropdown.
The Date Period dropdown lets you choose pre-defined ranges like the last 24 hours or
the past year. If you would like a custom date range, choose custom at the bottom of the
Date Period dropdown and then add the starting and ending dates. The starting and
ending dates are inclusive.

If the Date Range is set to anything other than "All", then the Date Range selection boxes
will appear above the grid whenever the column set is loaded.

When specifying a date range, you are limiting the number of records in a filter,
folder or list that you are seeing. The count next to the filter, folder or list on
the sidebar will always be the number of records in that folder, filter or list
without the date range applied. Therefore, you may see that you have 36
listings in your Running filter, but when you view the Running filter with the
Date Range of Date Last Bid in the last 24 hours applied, you only see 4
listings. To see all 36, you would have to set the Date Range to All.

Grouping Your View
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If you would like to see your view grouped by a particular field, check the Group Rows
by box and add the field to group by afterward. This is useful if you want to see a cross-
reference on any other field. It allows you to see how many items you have in each
category or how many are consigned versus unconsigned, etc.

If you would like to be able to change the grouping on the fly for comparison purposes,
then you can add it to your view by checking the Display Group menu above Grid box.
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Database Management
Database Management
All of the information stored in your program is in a file called a database. The file is
named BTData.mdb and is located in the Blackthorne\data folder. It is a very important
file. It contains all of hard work, so you want to ensure its safety. It is common practice
to backup important information like a database on a daily basis. This can be done
automatically or manually with eB. You may also need to restore a backed up database
at some point if your existing data is corrupted.

The database is in Microsoft Access format and is not locked in any way initially. You
are free to open it in Access and perform any operations on it that are allowed by Access
including writing your own queries, reports, macros and input forms. With the full power
of Access, you can import and export to almost any format.

If you manipulate your data directly in Access, then be sure to not change the
structure of the data. You can add tables, but do not delete any tables or fields
or it may no longer work in eB. Also, you should backup your database before
performing any manipulations directly in Access just in case something goes
wrong.

The information in your database can be private also, so if you don't want anyone else
opening your database, you should password protect it.

Because all of your data is in a single file, it becomes very easy to manage multiple
businesses with different databases. You can create a new database for each business and
switch between the databases with just a few key clicks.

Businesses with more than one computer can share the database file across a Local Area
Network. See Managing Multiple Users - Networking for more information.
Database Administration
You can manage your database tasks in the Database Administration window.
To open the Database Administration window:
1. Select Tools|Database Administration from the main menu. The Database
Administration window will appear.

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Backing Up and Restoring a Database
Backing up your data is essential to ensure your businesses safety. By default, eB will
make automatic daily backups for you and keep the last 3 days worth of backups. It
stores these backups in a folder called "Blackthorne Backups" in your "My Documents"
folder. By storing them in "My Documents", it prevents them from accidentally being
deleted on an uninstall. If your data becomes corrupt, you can restore one of your
existing backups.

You can also force a manual backup from eB at any time, or even backup your data using
your own process. If you have an existing tape backup system or automated backup of
any sort that backs up your data on a regular basis, all you need to do is add the
BTData.mdb file to your automated process. In fact, you may want to back up the entire
data folder to save your settings, reports and custom dictionary as well.
To set the automatic backup options:
1. If you would like daily backups made, check Make Automatic Daily Backups.
We HIGHLY recommend you leave this checked on at least one computer that is
sharing the database.
2. Set the Number of Automatic Backups to keep. Databases can be large files, so
the more backups you keep the more space you will need. They are also very
important files, so the more backups you can keep, the better off you will be.
Choose a number that is a balance between the amount of disk space you have
available on your computer and the size of the safety net you want.
To manually backup a database:
1. Click the Backup Now button. The Backup Database window will appear.

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2. A unique file path will be generated by default. It will be in the path to your "My
Documents\Blackthorne Backups" folder, and will be given a unique name.
You can leave this name, modify it in the text box, or select a new path with the
Browse button (...).
3. Click OK and the backup will be saved.
To restore a backup:
1. Click the Restore Now button. The Restore Database window will appear.

2. Use the Browse button (...) to locate and select the file you would like to restore,
or you can type it directly into the input box.
3. Click OK and your currently loaded database will be replaced with the specified
database.

Although, the previously loaded database has been replaced, it is not lost. It has
been placed in the My Documents\Blackthorne Backups folder and given a
new name. The new name is in the format
OldName_Unrestore_MM_DD_YYYY_HHMMSS. If you did not mean to
perform the initial restore you can rename the unrestored database and load it
again. Also, if the database is corrupt, support may request you send the
unrestore database to them.
Password Protecting a Database
There are two ways an intruder can get to your data. They can open eB and look at it, or
they can open your database file in Access and look at it. You can prevent them from
looking at your data in eB by implementing user logins. See Managing Multiple Users
for information on creating password protected user accounts. When the database is
initially shipped, it is not password protected. To prevent someone from opening your
database in Access, you must password protect the database.

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If you password protect your database, DO NOT FORGET THE
PASSWORD. If you forget the password, there is nothing we can do to
unlock your database. You will have to go to a 3rd party and pay to get your
password back. If you have forgotten your password, you may want to do an
internet search on "forgot Microsoft Access password" to find a list of
companies that provide this service.
To password protect your database:
1. Select the Password tab on the Database Administration window.

2. If you have an existing password, enter it in the Old Password field. If the
database is not currently password protected, then this field will be disabled.
3. Enter the New Password.
4. Enter it again exactly in the Repeat Password field.
5. Click the Set Password button. Your database will now be password protected.
The icon in the lower left corner will change from an unlock icon to a locked
icon to signify the database is password protected.
To remove password protection on your database:

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2. Enter the Old Password.
3. Click the Remove Protection button. Your database will no longer be password
protected. The icon in the lower left corner will change from a lock icon to an
unlocked icon to signify the database is password protected.

To change the database password:

2. Enter the Old Password.
3. Enter the New Password.
4. Enter the new password again exactly as before in the Repeat Password field.
5. Click the Change Password button. Your database password will be changed.
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Repairing a Database
From time to time, data in your database may become corrupt for various reasons.
Therefore, it may become necessary to occasionally repair your database. The database
repair can be performed while running eB, or with eB closed. Also, if eB identifies a
problem and attempts to close the program, it will prompt you to repair the database in an
attempt to solve the problem.
To repair a database while running eB:
1. From the main menu, go to Help|Support to load the Support Troubleshooter.
2. In the Support Troubleshooter, select the 3. Fix Database tab.
3. Click the "Repair the Database" button and follow the prompts.
To repair a database while eB is closed:
1. From Windows, choose Start|All Programs|eBay|Blackthorne Software|eBay
Blackthorne Database Repair.
2. Follow the prompts.
Creating a New Database
If you run multiple businesses on eBay, you may want to store each business in a separate
database. When installed, eB provides an empty database that can be used to start a new
database.
To create a new database:
1. From C:\Program Files\eBay\Blackthorne or the location where you installed
the program, open the data\Baseline folder. Make a copy of the BTData.mdb
file and place it wherever you want your new database to be. To differentiate it
from the other databases, you might want to rename it to something meaningful.
You now have an empty database you can start using. Open eB and switch
databases as described below.
Switching Databases
If you have multiple databases, you can easily switch between the databases without
exiting the program.
To switch databases:
1. Select File|Switch Database... from the main menu. The Switch Database
window will appear.

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2. Enter the path to the database you would like to open, or navigate to it using the
Browse button.
3. If you have set up User and Group Permissions in Access, then enter your
Windows User ID. Otherwise leave this field blank.
4. If you have password protected your database, then uncheck the Blank Password
box and enter the Password.
5. Click OK to open the database.

Casey works from home for a local antique dealer placing listings on eBay. At
night, she also sells her kids old clothing. Casey copied the blank BTData.mdb
file and renamed it Caseystuff.mdb. During the day, she switches to her bosses
database, and at night she switches to her Caseystuff.mdb database. This helps
her keep all of her listings separated and organized.
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Spell Checking
Spell Checking
The path to any professional listing or email starts with ensuring that everything is
spelled correctly. The text input boxes for entering listing information and emails have
real time spell checking built in. This includes the Title, Subtitle, and Description fields
in Create Items, and the HTML View tabs in the Description Editor, Email Studio and Ad
Template Studio (the HTML tags will be ignored and not flagged as incorrectly spelled).
All words will be checked against an English dictionary file that is built into the
program. When a word is spelled incorrectly, it will immediately be flagged with a wavy
red line underneath it. You can correct the word from a list of suggested spellings, add
the word to the dictionary or choose to ignore the misspellings. You can also turn off
spell checking completely.

Correcting a Misspelled Word
When a word is misspelled, you can correct it from a list of suggested spellings.
To correct a misspelled word:
1. Right click the misspelled word. A list of suggested spellings will appear.

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2. Click on the correct spelling from the list. The misspelled word will be replaced
with the correct spelling.
Adding to Your Custom Dictionary
If you come across a word that you know is correctly spelled, but is flagged as
misspelled, you can add it to your custom dictionary. Once it is added to your custom
dictionary, it will be considered a valid word for all future listings.
To add a word to your custom dictionary:
1. Right click the word you would like to add. A context menu will appear.

2. Choose Add. The red wavy line under your word will disappear.
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The custom dictionary is a readable text file called BTCustomEN.dic. It is
stored in your Blackthorne\data folder. You can edit this file if you want to
add a lot of words from another source (like another users BTCustomEN.dic
folder. Just ensure that you place just one word on each line of the file.

Ignoring Words
If you come across a word that you know is incorrectly spelled, but you don't want to add
it to your dictionary and you don't want to be bothered with the red wavy lines, you can
choose to ignore it. Ignored words will be ignored only for the current text box you are
entering data into.
To ignore a word:
1. Right click the word you would like to ignore. A context menu will appear.
2. Choose Ignore All. The red wavy line under your word will disappear for all
occurrences of the word.
Enabling and Disabling Spell Checking
Spell checking can be turned on or off.
To turn off spell checking:
1. From Tools|Options choose Appearance|Data Entry from the Options tree. The
Data Entry options will appear.

2. Set the Enable spell checking box.

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Add links from Item entry, email studio, ad templ studio.

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Consigning
Consigning
When a seller sells an item for another person and keeps a portion of the proceeds, this is
called a consignment. The Consignor is the person who provides the item and the
consignee is the person who sells the item. eBay also refers to Consignees as Trading
Assistants.

eB provides some of the fundamental features required to track consignments. With eB,
you can create and maintain information on all your consignors. You can also set up
multiple consignment plans. A consignment plan is a formula for how you charge your
consignors. Each consignor will have a default consignment plan, but you are always
free to associate any consignment plan to any items from a consignor.

When you create item records for consigned items, you will simply associate a consignor
and a consignment plan to the item. This will allow eB to calculate the fees and
consignor payout when the item sells.

Once a consigned item sells, eB will calculate the fees and display them in the
consignment equation.

If your item was imported from eBay, then it will not have any consignor information
assigned to it. In these cases, you will have to assign the consignor and consignment plan
in the sales record, after the sale.

When you are ready to pay a consignor, you can print a Consignor Payout Report. The
Consignor Payout Report will breakdown all the items sold for a consignor since the last
time the consignor was paid and tell you how much you owe the consignor.
Entering a Consignor
Consignors are managed from the Consignor tab on the main window.

If you do not see the consignor tab, then there are a few possible reasons. First,
you may have specified that you do not track consignors. To turn consignment
functions on, go to Tools|Options|Business Setup|Settings and select "Yes" to
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the question "Do you consign items?".

The other possibility is that your eB User login has not been given permission
to view consignors. If this is the case, your eB Administrator must go to
Tools|User Administration and check "Allow user to edit Consignors" on the
Data Access tab for your user settings.

For each unique consignor that you sell for, you will maintain a contact record in the
Consignors mode. This will allow you to easily retrieve contact information for your
consignors. In addition, for each consignor you will assign a default consignment plan.
Whenever you create a new item record to sell for this consignor, your default
consignment plan will be assigned to the item. You may change it after it is initially
assigned if you wish. Please see Adding a Consigned Item below for more information.
To add a new consignor:
1. From the Consignors mode, select Consignors Actions|New Consignor, or click
the New Consignor button on the Actions toolbar.
2. If you are viewing the grid only, the new consignor window will appear as shown
below. If you are viewing the grid and details area, then the new item will be
created and you can enter the details in the Details area. In either case, the entry
fields are the same.

3. Enter all available contact information for the consignor, including name, eBay
ID, email address, company information, address and a default consignment plan
(see Creating a Consignment Plan for information on creating consignment
plans).
4. Two custom fields are present that allow you to store any custom information that
you would like. For instance, you may want to keep track of which consignors
you send holiday cards to. You can do this by entering "yes" or "no" in one of the
Custom Fields.
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5. Click "OK" when you are finished.
Managing Consignment Plans
A consignment plan is a formula for calculating how you charge fees on your
consignments. You can have a different plan for each consignor or each type of item you
sell, a plan for different values of consigned items, or anything else you can think of.
Once you create and define the consignment plans you can use them whenever you
create a new consigned item.

You can create, duplicate, delete, edit and rename consignment plans.
Creating a Consignment Plan
You can create any number of new consignment plans.
To create a consignment plan:
1. From Tools|Options choose Presets|Consignment Plans.
2. Click the New button. The New Consignment Plan window will appear.
3. Follow the instructions for "Editing a Consignment Plan" below.
Duplicating a Consignment Plan
You can create a consignment plan using an existing consignment plan as a baseline also.
To duplicate a consignment plan:
2. Select the consignment plan you would like to duplicate from the list and click the
Duplicate button.
for your consignment plan and click OK.
4. The new consignment plan will now be in your Consignment Plans list. Click on
the consignment plan and click the Edit button to edit the new plan.
5. Modify the plan accordingly.
Deleting a Consignment Plan
When you no longer need a consignment plan, you can delete it. Deleting a consignment
plan will revert the associated consignment plan for existing items using that plan to "Not
Specified". You will need to assign a new plan to each of those items.
To delete a consignment plan:
2. Select the consignment plan you would like to delete from the list and click the
Delete button.
Renaming a Consignment Plan
You can also rename a consignment plan at any time.
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To rename a consignment plan:
2. Select the consignment plan you would like to rename from the list and click the
Rename button.
name for your plan and click OK.
Editing a Consignment Plan
To edit a consignment plan:
2. Select the consignment plan you would like to edit from the list and click the Edit
button. The Edit Consignment Plan window will appear.

3. The fees you collect are broken down into 2 types. Base fees are what you collect
to cover costs of your operation, and the commission is what you collect as a
reward/payment when the item sells. Enter the values as described below.
Base Fees
Consignor Reimburses
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Check all fees that the consignor should reimburse you for. If you pass on all eBay
fees, then select the "All" checkbox.
Consignor Pays
Base Fee: - Enter the base fee that the consignor will pay. This is usually the
minimum fee that you collect for attempting to sell an item.
Charged
If you charge the Base Fee in addition to any commissions you collect, then select
"Base fee charged in addition to Commission". If you do not charge the base fee if
the item doesn't sell, then select "Base Fee only charged if item doesn't sell". This
allows you to treat the Base Fee as a minimum fee that you will collect if the item
doesn't sell, or as a fee that always gets tacked on to any commission on items that do
sell.
Collected
Specify when you collect the Base Fee. If you collect when the item is dropped off,
then the consignment calculations will assume you already have the Base Fee and
will not add it into the amount due from consignor. If you do not collect it before the
sale, then it will add it in as an amount due.

Joanne likes to reduce confusion, so she includes all eBay fees in her "Gold
Plan" and charges a Base Fee of $20. She just wants to make sure she gets
some payment if the item doesn't sell. If the item does sell, she simply
collects the commission, so she sets Base Fee charged only if item sells.
She collects the $20 as a deposit so she sets Base Fee collected when item
is dropped off.

When a piece of art sells using her Gold Plan, she collects only the
commission minus the $20 deposit that she already has collected. If the
piece of art does not sell, she keeps the $20.

Sonia wants to keep very close track of her expenses and profit. In her
"Standard Plan", she passes on all of the eBay fees to the consignor. She
pays her daughter $10 to place a listing. She wants to make sure she covers
that cost and an additional $5 for her trouble, regardless of whether or not
the item sells, so she has a Base Fee of $15, and she sets Base Fee charged
in addition to Commission. She wants to handle money all at once, so she
specifies that the Base Fee is collected after the sale.

She sells a set of dinnerware using her Standard Plan, and collects the $15
Base Fee plus $3.50 in eBay fees plus the commission after the items sells.
If it did not sell, she would have collected the $15 Base Fee plus the $3.50
in eBay fees.
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Commission
Consignor Pays
Specify the commision you collect when an item sells. This can be a flat amount or a
percentage of the sale price. If it is a percentage of the sale price, then enter your
sliding scale in the table. The scale table allows you to charge a higher percentage on
the initial amount and a lower percentage as the price increases. In the example
above, the commission would be %25 of the first $99.99, PLUS %20 of the amount
between $100.00 and $499.99, PLUS %15 of the amount above $500.00.
Minimum Commission
To ensure that your commission is at least a certain amount specify it in this field.
This is useful if there is a chance your item only sells for a few dollars. It ensures
that you make more than just a few cents for the trouble of listing the item.
Maximum Commission
To ensure that your commission is at least a certain amount specify it in this field.
This is useful if you are selling a high ticket item for someone. For instance, you
may collect up to $500 for selling a car instead of the $1200 that would be collected
if you collect a percentage.
Consignor Reimburses
If your item sells, there are additional fees that you may want to pass on to the
consignor. Check The eBay Final Value Fees or PayPal fees to pass along these fees
to the consignor. If you have other fees such as costs for cleaning or fixing an item
before it is listed, you can pass that along in the Other field.

Ajay sells extra stock of the older iPod Minis (now replaced by iPod
Nanos) for a local electronics store. He worked out a deal with the store to
collect $20 for each iPod sold, and all eBay fees for any listings sold or
unsold. He created a consignment plan called "iPods". This consignment
plan charges no Base Fee, but does pass on All eBay Fees to the consignor.
If also charges a Flat Commission of $20 that gets charged when an iPod
sells.

For all iPods that sell, he gets $20, plus the eBay fees. For any iPod that
doesn't sell, he just gets reimbursed for the listing fees.
Adding a Consigned Item
Adding a consigned item is very much like adding any other item. You create a new item
record, enter all the listing parameters and in addition must specify the consignment
information on the item.
To specify consignment information on an item:
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1. From the Create Items Detail area or the New Item window, click on the
Inventory tab.
2. In the Source group, check the Consigned box.

3. Select an available Consignor, or click the Edit button to create a new consignor.
4. Select a Consignment Plan, or click the Edit button to create a new consignment
plan.
Viewing the Consignment Equation on a Completed Sale
Once a sale is completed, the amount Due Consignor will appear in the Sales record
Activity Area.

To view the Consignment Equation:
1. Click on the underscored amount due to the consignor. The Consignment
Equation window will appear.

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2. It shows a breakdown of fees for the Consignment Plan selected. You can
change the consignment plan for this sale by selecting another Consignment Plan,
or you can modify the existing plan by clicking the Edit button.
3. Click Done when you have finished reviewing the plan.
Assigning a Consignor After the Sale
Occasionally it may be necessary to modify the consignor or consignment plan on a sale
after the sale has been made. For instance, if you imported a sold item from eBay, it
would never have had a consignor and you will need to add the consignor to the sale
record.
To assign a consignor after the sale:
1. From the Finalize Sales window, select the sale record and click on the
Consigned checkbox to identify the sale as a consigned sale. The Consignor
dropdown will appear.

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2. Enter the Consignor or select New Consignor... from the dropdown to create a
new consignor. You can also Edit the existing consignor info if necessary. The
default consignment plan for the consignor will be used for the sale. To change it,
see the instructions immediately following.
To assign a consignment plan after the sale:
1. From the Finalize Sales window, select the sale record and click on the
underscored Due Consignor amount. The Consignment Equation window will
appear.

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3. Select the Consignment Plan from the dropdown. You can use a custom plan by
selecting <Custom> from the dropdown, or you can Edit an existing one.
4. Click Done when finished and the new consignment plan will be applied to the
sale.
Paying Consignors with the Consignor Payout Report
After selling items for a consignor and receiving payment, you will need to pay the
consignor the sale price minus your commission and fees. The Consignor Payout Report
is designed to compile all the sales for a particular consignor that have not yet been paid
and provide you with a total to pay the consignor.
To print a Consignor Payout Report:
1. From the Finalize Sales mode, select Sales Actions|Print|Consignor Payout
Report... or use the Print button on the Actions toolbar and select Consignor
Payout Report... . The Print Consignor Payout Report window will appear.

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2. Choose whether you want to include just the sales that you have selected in the
sales grid, all the sales in the sales grid, or all sales in your database. This allows
you to choose the scope of the sales included in your report.
3. Check the box if you would like to Preview before printing. This will allow you
to view the report before it is sent to the printer.
4. Click OK to print. If the Preview before printing box was checked, the Print
Studio will appear with the Consignor Payout Report loaded.

5. Use the arrow keys at the top to view each page, and click the Print button when
you are ready to send it to the printer.
6. Select a printer and settings on the Print Dialog page that appears and click OK.
The Consignor Payout validation form will appear.

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7. Once you print out a Consignor Payout Report to give to your consignor with
payment, you do not want the same items included on any future reports, so eB
will check the Consignor Paid box on the sale record when you select Yes. If you
are only printing the report for your own uses, or if the report did not print
correctly and you do not want the sales flagged as having been paid, then select
No.

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Synchronizing Data with eBay
Synchronizing Data with eBay
eBay Blackthorne is different than most auction management solutions since it runs on
your local computer, and not on the internet. Because it interacts with eBay which is an
internet application, there must be a lot of communication between the two applications.
The most obvious interaction is when you click the Submit button to send listings to
eBay, but there are many more times when the two programs must talk. eBay
Blackthorne needs to get bidding info, lists of categories, buyer message info, and much
more from eBay. There are also several housecleaning functions that must occur like
making automated backups, and getting shipping information from 3rd party shipping
programs. It would be very annoying if these tasks were manual and required user
intervention so we created the Servant to perform these tasks for you.
Automatic Synchronization Using the Servant
The Servant performs all the tasks necessary to keep your data in synch with eBay and
other housekeeping tasks so you don't have to. The functions performed by the Servant
include:

! performing automatic backups
! refreshing your listings, sales, buyers, feedback, fees and dispute info
incrementally
! submitting scheduled listings
! checking for new updates and messages to eB
! getting your buyer messages from eBay
! making sure your list of store categories is in synch with eBay
! saving your work to the master database
! auto retrieving shipping info from Endicia after sending Endicia mail
! making sure you have the latest categories and item specifics
! making sure the list of finance offers is current

The Servant is always running. If you are not connected to the internet, then it simply
doesn't perform any internet actions, but it will continue to run until you are connected.

The Servant is a pretty intelligent tool. It will perform each task at different intervals so
you only update data as needed. For instance, it checks to list scheduled items every
minute, and checks for new versions of the program only every 4 hours. It also
prioritizes its tasks. Scheduled listings will always override any other tasks, and tasks
like refreshing the finance offers are very low and only occur if nothing else is pending.
The Servant can also wait until your computer is idle for a period of time before
performing some tasks. Since downloading categories can take several minutes, the
Servant waits until your program has been idle for 10 minutes, and then it assumes you
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are away from your desk and will perform the category update for you (if there are new
categories available).

Most of these functions are very quick, and are hardly noticeable in the interface. Some
of those that take longer, like getting categories are scheduled for times when your
computer is not in use. There are a few important tasks that can be time consuming and
reduce your performance while they are occurring. Refreshing listings, sales, buyers,
feedback and disputes are all very important tasks, yet can slow your computer down
while they are working. To improve performance of users with very large databases, we
have added the option to turn off these automatic tasks. To turn off the processor
intensive tasks, toggle Refresh|Automatically Refresh from the main menu. When these
tasks are turned off, it is up to the user to perform them manually from the Refresh
Activity window.
Manually Refreshing and Updating
Although the Servant is keeping your data relatively up to date, it may not have
performed some tasks for several hours. The Refresh Activity window allows you to
force immediate updates to some of the data normally maintained by the Servant. In
addition, there are some Servant tasks that can be turned off and will need to be refreshed
manually. The Refresh Activity window also allows you to perform those manual
refreshes.

eBay Blackthorne is designed to take care of all these tasks for you. Ideally,
you should simply leave all functions of the Servant on, and only perform a
particular refresh when there is a valid reason.
To refresh activity manually:
1. From the main menu, select Refresh|Refresh Activity... or click F5. The Refresh
Activity window will appear.

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2. Select the type of information that you would like refreshed in the Data to
Refresh group.

The following table describes what each refresh option will do.

Refresh Menu
Item
Action performed
All Checks all types of refreshes to be performed all at once.
Listings Performs a refresh of your listing data. Any new bidder
information as well as any changes you make to your listing
on eBay will be updated and saved in your listing record. If
a listing ends, then a sale record will be created for the
listing. If the listing was successful, a buyer record will be
created also. When retrieving information for the new sale
record, all activity for other running sales will be retrieved
and stored at the same time. You can choose to update all
Running and Completed listings or just the Completed
listings. If you run many listings, and you do not care to see
bids as they change, you should choose to only update
Completed listings. This will make the refresh faster.
Sales Performs a refresh of the sales data. All new activity on
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sales will be retrieved and saved in your sales records.
Listing Fees Performs a refresh to update listing fees for listings. Listing
fees will automatically be retrieved when the listing is over
and a sale record is created. If you would like to have them
updated before then, use this refresh.
Feedback Performs a refresh of any feedbacks you have received.
Combined Sales

Performs a refresh of combined sale information. Any sales
combined on eBay will be downloaded and recorded as
combined orders in eB.
Disputes Performs a refresh of dispute information. Any activity that
has taken place on eBay regarding disputes will be
downloaded and updated in your database.

3. Select the Period to be refreshed. By default, you should always refresh Since
last refresh. This will get you all the data since the last time you refreshed. If
however, you are missing some data, you may want to force the refresh between
certain dates using the From/To option and selecting a past date range.
4. Click Start to begin the refresh.

Steve has a very large database and a slow computer and internet connection.
When "Automatically Refresh" is turned on, his computers performance gets
much slower. Since Steve only needs a refresh of his data in the morning, he
sets "Automatically Refresh" off. Each morning, he selects Refresh|Refresh
Activity. He chooses to refresh only his completed listings, sales, and
combined sale information since this is all he needs to perform his shipping
tasks. He does this while he goes for his morning coffee. When he returns, his
listings, sales, buyers, and orders are updated.

You can also perform a refresh on selected listings or sales as well as refreshing category
and other types of information.
To refresh other information:
1. From the Refresh menu, choose the type of refresh to perform.

The following table describes what each refresh option will do.

Refresh Menu
Item
Action performed
Refresh Selected
Listings
Refreshes all listings that are selected in the Listings grid. It
will perform a separate call to eBay for each selected listing.
If refreshing a large number of listings, it will be faster to
Refresh All Listings. The break even point will depend upon
your connection and computer speed. Any changes to the
listing performed manually on eBay will be recorded in eB.
Refresh Selected Refreshes all sales that are selected in the Sales grid. It will
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Sales perform a separate call to eBay for each selected sale. If
refreshing a large number of sales, it will be faster to Refresh
All Sales. The break even point will depend upon your
connection and computer speed.
Refresh Endicia This menu item will only be available if you are running
Endicia Dazzle on your computer. eB will retrieve tracking
and shipping cost info from Endicia every 5 minutes. If you
need it more frequently, you can force a refresh with this
menu option.
Update eBay
Categories
Retrieves the latest categories from eBay. This is performed
by the Servant no more than once a day after your computer
has been idle for 10 minutes. If you are having trouble with
finding a category, you can manually force this check. The
update will occur in the background and may take several
minutes to complete. You can still use the program while the
update is being performed.
Update Item
Specifics
Retrieves the latest Item Specifics information from eBay.
This is performed by the Servant daily and you should only
need to manually force the update if you are having problems
with Item Specifics or if asked to by support.
Update Store
Categories
Retrieves the list of your store categories daily. If you just
changed your store categories on eBay and want them
reflected in eB immediately, you can use this feature.
Refresh Database Forces all of your changes to the database and receives any
changes made by other network users. This only applies to
users who share a database with other users. Data is
normally added/retrieved from the database each time you
move records, change filters, change views, or go 5 minutes
without a refresh. Only in very rare circumstances should
you need this function to populate your data immediately to
other users or get data from other users.
Synchronization with Selling Manager and my eBay
eB, Selling Manager, and my eBay are all eBay Selling Tools. eB is primarily PC based
while Selling Manager and my eBay are web based. While there is a lot of duplication of
features between the solutions, some users will still use more than one solution to manage
their business. When using multiple solutions, it is important to understand how changes
in one affect the other.
Invoicing Status
From my eBay, sellers can indicate whether or not they would like eBay to send an
invoice automatically at the end of a sale. eB also allows users to send invoices in
batches. In eB, invoices are performed using the First Notification to High Bidder email.
In my eBay, the invoices are set to be included in all sales or none. In eB, sellers can
choose which sales to send invoices to. Since my eBay performs this action as an all or
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nothing feature and since many sellers like to send both the eBay invoice and the more
customized eB emails, we do not record the invoices as being sent in eB when they are
sent from my eBay.

When sending invoices through eB, the sale records will automatically move from the
Ready for Payment Request status to the Awaiting Payment status. Users who do not
want to send invoices using eB, should simply change the sale status manually.
Shipping Status
Sellers can record the date an item was shipped in Selling Manager. When eB performs a
refresh to the sales record, it will retrieve the date the item was shipped and update the
status of the sale to Shipped.

Likewise, when sellers change the status of a sale in eB to Shipped, the date the item
shipped will be sent to Selling Manager.
Payment Status
Sellers can record the date an item was paid for in Selling Manager. When eB performs a
refresh to the sales record, it will retrieve the date the item was paid for and update the
status of the sale to Payment Cleared.

Likewise, when sellers change the status of a sale in eB to Payment Received, Payment
Cleared, or Ready to Ship, the paid flag will be sent to Selling Manager.
Modifying Listings
Although not directly related to my eBay or Selling Manager, users can manually change
the content of their listings on eBay. The next time the listing is refreshed in eB, either
manually or from the Servant, the changes made on eBay will be made to the listing
record.
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Troubleshooting
Troubleshooting
When you experience problems or have questions, it is important that you get the help
you need as quickly as possible. The Support Troubleshooter is provided to help solve
your problem as soon as possible. In addition, many of the functions performed by eB
are recorded in the Activity Log. By viewing the Activity Log, you may be able to
identify any problem you might be having.
The Support Troubleshooter
When you experience problems or have questions, it is important that you get the help
you need as quickly as possible. The Support Troubleshooter is designed to do just that.
Ideally, the Support Troubleshooter will be able to solve your problem before you ever
have to contact email support. If it can't, then by performing all the steps in the
troubleshooter before contacting support, you can reduce the time it takes to solve your
problem. Traditionally, a user will contact support with a problem and support will
respond with several suggestions or questions to narrow down the problem. The Support
Troubleshooter replaces these initial emails by helping you run through the suggestions
before sending a support email.

The Support Troubleshooter performs the following tasks:

! verifies your computer hardware to make sure you have enough resources to run
eB.
! helps you download the latest operating system updates to ensure you have the
necessary software pre-requisites.
! checks to see if you are running the latest version of eB and helps you download
the new version if not.
! checks your eB subscription and connection to eBay.
! repairs your database
! helps you search the documentation and discussion boards for an existing answer
to your question.
! gives you the option of trying the latest beta to see if it solves your problem.
! if all else fails, it collects the necessary information about your problem and sends
it to customer support.
To run the Support Troubleshooter:
1. From the main menu, select Help|Support. The Support Troubleshooter will
appear.

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2. Starting with the first tab, you will check your Prerequisites. This is to verify
that you have the proper hardware and software for running eB. The Hardware
group will check to see if you have a fast enough processor and enough memory
to run eB. Ideally, you should have at least a 1.5GHz processor and 512 MB of
RAM. If you do not, then you may experience slow response times. Upgrading
to more RAM will help reduce this if the performance is unacceptable.

Many problems can occur if you are not running the latest Windows updates. These
problems include failing to start, slow responses, and program crashing. Clicking the
Run Windows Update button in the Operating System group will take you to
Windows Update. You should regularly verify that you are running the latest updates
available. We recommend you check the "Turn on Automatic Windows Updates"
box. When checked, your copy of Windows will automatically download the latest
updates when you aren't using your computer.

If you are not running the latest version of eB, then your problem may already be
fixed. The Latest Version group will check to see if you are running the latest
version of eB. If not, click the Download Update button.

You should always verify you are running the latest Windows updates and the
latest version of eB before contacting support. If you are not, then the first thing
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support will recommend is to perform these updates.

3. To use eB, you must have a valid subscription, and eB must be able to
communicate with eBay over your internet connection. Click on the Connection
tab to validate your subscription and connection.

Click the Check Your Subscription button to verify that you are subscribed. If you
are not subscribed, you will be provided with a "Subscription check unsuccessful.
Click here to subscribe" link.

Click the Test Connection to eBay button to see if eB can contact eBay. Even
though you may have a working internet connection, this test may fail if you have a
firewall that has not given eB permission to use. If your connection fails, click the
link at the bottom to view the Connections KnowledgeBase to troubleshoot your
connection.

4. From time to time, your database may be corrupted in some way. The Fix
Database tab allows you to run a repair on your database.

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Simply click the Repair the Database button to repair the database. A message will
appear when it is complete. Repairing your database performs the following
operations:

! performs a compaction and a Microsoft Access database repair
! fixes any missing indexes, primary keys or errors in the table structure
! validates data relationships and removes dead links
! fixes any missing default field values
! rebuilds the sidebar tree views for all the modes, removing any incorrect
nodes

5. Most common errors and questions will already have an answer in the
documentation or on the Discussion Board. You can check for an answer to your
problem on the Get a Quick Answer tab.

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We are constantly adding more information to the documentation as we identify
trouble spots to users. Click the Search the Documentation button to load the
documentation. You can enter keywords or a question into the documentation search
and it will provide you a list of related topics.

The most knowledgeable eB users hang out at the eB Discussion Boards. The
Discussion Boards can be a great place to get a quick answer. Click the Go to the
Discussion Board button to view the boards.

6. In addition to the released version that is available, most of the time, the next
version is available in Beta test. The latest beta can be downloaded from the Try
the Latest Beta tab.

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A Beta test version of the software is a version that has not been fully tested, but may
contain a solution to your problem. When downloading a beta version, you should
be aware of the possibility that it may contain bugs and you may need to revert to a
previous version if you have problems. You should also always backup your data
before loading a beta version.

The Try the Latest Beta tab displays the latest release notes for eB. If you see the
word "Beta" next to the Version as in the above example, then it means a beta
version of the product is available. The bullets below indicate fixes made in that
version. You may be able to determine if your problem is already fixed. If so, use
the Install the Latest Beta button to upgrade to the beta version.

7. If none of the previous actions fixed your problem, then you should send an email
to support. Please make sure you have checked everything on tabs 1-5 before
emailing support since that is the first thing they will recommend if you haven't
performed the checks. You can email support from the Contact Support tab.

327

Enter one of your existing email accounts in the From dropdown. This email account
must be correctly setup and able to send emails.

Select an appropriate message Subject or enter your own.

Enter a Detailed description of question or problem. The more accurate anc
complete the information, the better we'll be able to help you.

Enter your Firewall software, Internet Connection type, and Network
Environment.

If you check Include saved settings and logged information in email, then your
settings files and activity log will be sent with the email. This can be very valuable
to us in helping identify your problem.

Click the Send button when the form is complete.

If your email account is not properly set up, then you will not be able to send a
request this way. Instead, you should use the "submit a support request from eBay
Help" link to submit your request directly through eBay.
The Activity Log
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Appendices
Getting Mail Settings From Outlook
1) On the top-level menu, select Tools | E-Mail Accounts.

2) On the E-Mail Accounts form that comes up, select "View or change existing e-mail
accounts" and click "Next."

3) Select the relevant E-mail account by clicking on it, then click "Change...

4) The outgoing SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) mail server is listed
330

331

Supercharging the Listing Process - An Extended Example
(Scenario: Robert Northrop, proprietor of Endless Mountain Enterprises, acquired a large
collection of rubber stamps, which he knew nothing about. This example takes you
through the whole process of how he learned about them, then listed them en masse. The
example shows how various advanced eBay Blackthorne features can greatly speed up
the process.)

! Step 1: Research
! Step 2: Plan of Attack.
! Step 3: Setting up Templates/Presets.
Step 1: Research
To gain some familiarity with rubber stamps, Robert logged on to eBay, clicked on
"Advanced Search" and searched for closed auctions of the same items he had received.
This quickly gave him an idea of what these items are currently fetching (as opposed to
what some sellers fancifully believe they might fetch), so that he could price his
accordingly. He read the descriptions to find out what people consider important about
this type of item. In the case of rubber stamps, it seems that some of the important things
are:
! Brand name - there is one enormous manufacturer (Stampin' Up!), a few major
manufacturers, and hundreds of one-person boutiques.
! Is it a set, or just an individual stamp?
! How many stamps are in the set, and is it a complete set?
! Is the set/stamp still available new, or is it retired?
! What is its overall condition?
Step 2: Plan of Attack
Robert's goal was to enter these items into his database, spending as little time as possible
in the process, then place all of them up for auction without investing any more time at
all. He wanted each ad to explain all the unique characteristics of each item, but he
wanted it done completely automatically.

To do this, he wanted to use several Item Fields to store extra, unique information about
each item. He knew that he could use Custom Field 1 and Custom Field 2, but if he was
going to totally automate the listing process, he would need more.

So he "borrowed" some fields that he didn't normally use. When creating each listing, he
planned to store the following into these fields (all of which accept text input):

Item Field Contents
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Description Condition of item
Custom Field 1 "set of stamps"/"stamp"
Custom Field 2 Brand Name
Part Number Name of item or set
Storage Location Retired/Still available
Lot Size Count of items in set

In the next release of eBay Blackthorne, users will have the ability to create and
name their own custom fields. This will obviously streamline the process described here.

He checked to see if eBay could supply Item Specifics for rubber stamps, but they
weren't available. Robert experimented with photographing the stamps, but then settled
on simply scanning in the "business end" of each one.
Step 3: Setting up Templates/Presets
With the plan of attack in place, Robert started by creating a new template. Templates
are listed by whatever is in the Title field, so Robert typed in "Rubber Stamp." He wants
the actual item titles to describe the unique characteristics of each stamp, but he also
wants to enter each piece of information exactly once.

When he got to the "Seller" field, Robert further refined his plan. His research had shown
him that rubber stamps are quite a hot ticket, so he was seriously thinking of adding them
to his regular inventory. He went to eBay and registered "StampTillUCramp" as a new
Seller Account. He likes to keep the different sections of his business distinct, and using
different eBay account names is a handy way to accomplish that without any added
overhead. He added "StampTillUCramp" as a new seller account in Blackthorne, giving
his normal eBay account as the "Subscribed UserID."

In the Part Number field, he typed: "Enter Item Name" as a placeholder to remind
himself that this field was going to be holding the item name.

For category, Robert brought up the Category Selector, and searched for "Stamp":

In the search results, he double-clicked on Crafts > Stamping > Stamps >
This automatically switches the display to the Browse tab, and fills in the category tree:
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Crafts > Stamping > Stamps > is not a fully-resolved category, so Robert clicked on
Mounted> in the next column, and then Other Themes.

His intention here was to pre-select a general stamp category for the template, so that
when he was entering actual items, selection of the specific category for that item would
be very quick.

in the "Description" field, he entered "CONDITION OF ITEM" to remind himself what
was going to be stored there.

Q: "But doesn't the "Description" field need to contain the full description of the
item?"
A: "Not at all, little grasshopper - watch and learn."

Even though he planned to use a theme, he skipped the "Theme" selector, knowing that
there's a better way to select a theme. He moved on to the "Ad Template" field, and
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selected "Manage Ad Templates..." He highlighted "Enhanced," clicked "Duplicate,"
named the duplicate template "Rubber Stamps," then clicked "OK" followed by "Done."

Preparing for Photos
Using Windows Explorer, Robert created a new folder for rubber stamps, then a
subfolder for images. Using an image-editing program, he created a sample rubber stamp
image, and inserted it into the template. Later, when entering individual stamps, he'd be
able to quickly find their images because the image finder would automatically start in
that folder.

Format and Pricing
His research having told him that rubber stamps are very popular, he set the template up
as a 3-day auction, with a $0.99 starting price and no reserve. He thought it best to risk
occasionally having to "give one away" in return for the added interest that people bring
to auctions with low opening bids and no reserve.
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Custom Fields
He chose "Gallery Only" as the default listing upgrade, and entered "SET/SINGLE" and
"BRAND NAME" in the two custom fields to remind himself what he planned to store in
them.

(Later, when he realized that 90% of the stamps in circulation come from the company
Stampin' Up, Robert went back to the template and replaced "BRAND NAME" with
"Stampin' Up!" - thus even further reducing the amount of typing he needed to do.)

He likewise entered "RETIRED/STILL AVAILABLE" in the Storage Location field.

He set up shipping and payment to match his normal business practices. That takes care
of the last of the dull details. Now we get to the fun part.
The Fun Part
On the Ad Template menu, he selected "Rubber Stamps" and clicked "Edit."

First thing he wanted to do was set up the item title exactly the way he wanted it, without
needing to write in the details of each item himself. He clicked on "Edit AutoText..."
followed by "New..." He named the new AutoText "TitleText":
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For the actual title text, he entered: [[Custom2]] "[[PartNum]]": [[StorageLocation]]
[[Custom1]]

Next, at the top of the template body, he inserted [[TitleText]] on a line by itself, then
clicked "Preview." The actual text that appeared was: "BRAND NAME "ENTER ITEM
NAME": RETIRED/STILL AVAILABLE STAMP/SET OF STAMPS," which was
exactly what he wanted.

While he had the preview window open, he used the on-the-fly theme picker at the top of
the window to select a theme. This is a convenient way to select a theme because the
actual themes immediately display in the preview window.

He quickly set up the template body by inserting mostly item fields and AutoText:
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Then checked his work by clicking the Preview tab once more:

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With the template in place, Robert settled down to a short day of data entry, made
significantly more efficient by his preparatory work. When he got into his stride, he
found that he could enter all the information about an item in about one minute.

To generate the title for the ad, he clicked "Preview." What came up typically looked
like:

Before closing the preview, he copied the title, then pasted it directly into the Title field,
checking carefully that it didn't get truncated in the process (the Title field only accepts
the first 55 characters, then ignores the rest - this is because eBay only allows 55-
character titles).
In a little over an hour, Robert submitted 100 sets of rubber stamps to eBay, using the
Blackthorne scheduling feature to start a new auction every five minutes.

The advertising copy here is not Shakespearean (it's difficult to come up with consistently
correct syntax when some items might be singular and others plural), but it gets all the
relevant information across efficiently.

339
Private Registry Files
eB stores a lot of information related to how you use the program. It keeps track of your
option settings, preferred window sizes, default options, database paths, and internet
paths to different functions. Some programs (like our predecessor Seller's Assistant)
store this information in the Windows registry. We have chosen to store them in our own
private registry files. This makes it easier for users to interchange settings between
computers and it also helps with program support. Private registry files have an
extension of .pvt. They are text files and are readable in a text editor. We do not
recommend you modify them in any way.

The following table describes the private registry files created by eB.

Name Location Purpose
Settings.pvt data
folder
Holds all options set on the Options window. This file can be
shared between computers to easily transfer option settings to
another computer.
System.pvt bin
folder
Holds all state information related to the local computer. This
includes information on window sizes and locations, default
directories, and operational settings (like "Don't show this
window again"). This file should not be shared with another
computer.
bt.pvt bin
folder
Holds encoded information about the database currently
loaded. This file should not be shared with another computer.
Deleting this file will reset eB to using the BTData.mdb
database in the data folder.
daily.pvt bin
folder
Holds paths to internet web sites. Each day it is rebuilt by the
servant with the latest internet paths.
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Adding Pictures to Print Templates
By default, the Packing List contains a picture of each item included in the list. If you
have chosen to remove this, or you are running with an older packing list and now want
to include it, you can follow the steps below.

There are four components necessary to get pictures to show up in your print template.
Pic1Loc Field
First, the list of available fields must include the Pic1Loc field. This is not customizable
by the user. The print template will either include this field or it will not. Any print
template that includes this field can have a picture displayed.
ItemPicture Control
A picture box control must be placed on the form where you would like the picture to
appear. You can place it anywhere in the Details group, and size it to your liking. The
example below is taken from the Packing List.

The (Name) must be set to ItemPicture, and the SizeMode should be set to Zoom to get
the largest available image without losing the aspect ratio. You can set these properties
by selecting the ItemPicture and filling in the properties in the lower right hand corner of
the Print Studio. An example is shown below.

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In addition, you can also choose a LineColor, LineStyle and LineWeight to get a box
around your image. You should not need to change any of the other properties.
txtPic1Loc Field
You must also place an invisible text box called txtPic1Loc in the Details group. The
txtPic1Loc text box will contain the path to the picture and is used by the Script to fill in
the ItemPicture control. The control does not have to be visible since it is only used by
the script. It can also be any size, but its best to make it small so it doesn't get in the way.

You must also set several of the txtPic1Loc properties in the lower left. To set the
properties, select the txtPic1Loc text box and set the (Name) property to txtPic1Loc, the
Visible property to False, and the DataField property to Pic1Loc. You should not need to
change any of the other properties.

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Print Template Script
To make this all work together, the Print Template must contain some internal script
coding. All current versions of the print templates that support pictures contain this script
already. If you happen to have an older print template and want to add the scripting, you
can open the rpx file and include the following code.

<Script><![CDATA[public void Detail_BeforePrint()
{
try {
string u = @" " +
((TextBox)rpt.Sections["Detail"].Controls["txtPic1Loc"]).Text.ToString();
System.Net.WebClient clientAHB = new System.Net.WebClient();
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System.IO.Stream dataAHB = clientAHB.OpenRead(u);
System.IO.StreamReader readerAHB = new System.IO.StreamReader(dataAHB);
((DataDynamics.ActiveReports.Picture)rpt.Sections["Detail"].Controls["ItemPicture"]).I
mage = System.Drawing.Image.FromStream(readerAHB.BaseStream);
}
catch {}
}
]]></Script>

As shown in this example:

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Glossary
#
<Blank Item>: The special item template that ships with this program. It contains no
information, just blank fields.
A
Activity Log: A text log that Blackthorne keeps, showing all program activity, including
communication with eBay and any picture hosting sites.
Ad Template: A pre-formatted ad description that can be reused.
Automation: a Blackthorne utility that schedules and executes tasks automatically.
B
Back Button: A button at the top left of the Blackthorne application window. The back
button "remembers" the most recent views and can instantly return the user to any
of them.
BCC: Blind-Carbon-Copy: An e-mail address (other than the main addressee) that is sent
a copy of outgoing mail. The BCC address is INVISIBLE to all other recipients of
the message.
Bid History: A record of all bids made in an auction, showing who made the bids, how
much they were for, and exactly when they were placed.
Browse Buttons: Small buttons on the Help window that allow the user to browse back
and forward between related help topics.
Bulk Editing: The ability to make the same changes in multiple auction items
simultaneously.
C
Categories: Everything on eBay is assigned to one or two categories - descriptors that
start with the most general term and become increasingly more specific. Example:
Antiques > Asian Antiques > Chinese > Statues > Buddha.
CC: Carbon-Copy: An e-mail address (other than the main addressee) that is sent a copy
of outgoing mail. The CC address is visible to all recipients of the message.
Combining Sales: Combining shipping expenses for a buyer who bid on (and won)
multiple auctions.
Consignment: A quantity of items belonging to a third party, given to you for auction
under the terms of a Consignment Plan.
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Consignment Plan: A specific agreement between an auctioner and a consignor, spelling
out the financial and other terms between the two parties.
Consignor: A person who gives you items to sell at auction for him.
Counters: a Javascript applet that shows how many page views have been requested
CSV: Comma-Separated Values: A popular way for unrelated programs to exchange data
with each other - each piece of exported data is separated by a comma. Each row
and column is labelled so the importing program (usually, not always!) knows
how to interpret the data.
Custom Fields: Each item has two custom fields that you can use to store arbitrary
information about that kind of item: shoe size; country of origin; year of
manufacture...
D
Description Editor: A "pseudo-WSYIWIG" editor for ad descriptions that includes a
Preview feature.
Directory: Another name for a folder or sub-folder, either on your hard drive on on your
FTP server. The terms "folder," "directory," "sub-folder," and "sub-directory" are
used interchangably.
DPI: Dots Per Inch: A measure of the fineness of output of a printer or computer
monitor. Sometimes used to describe the amount of detail in an image.
Dutch Auction: A special type of auction where identical items are offered to separate
bidders.
E
eB: eBay Blackthorne
eBay Time: eBay Time is the same as Pacific Zone time (the time of day at eBay
headquarters in San Jose, California in the United States). Starting and ending
times for all auctions are listed in eBay time.
ePS: eBay Picture Services
F
Field Presets: Pre-filled out information, ready to be inserted in some of the fields of a
form.
Filters: Pre-defined or customized views that display only items that match a set of
criteria. Filters automatically update their display when any changes are made to
the database.
FTP: File Transfer Protocol: Another Internet protocol similar to TCP/IP, but specially
suited to large file transfer. Blackthorne uses FTP to upload photographs to
servers.
Glossary
347
fully-resolved category: eBay categories are of the form "Antiques > Furniture > Desks
> Post 1900" Starting with a very general category, it gets more and more
specific, ending with the most precise sub-category available. Any category that
ends with ">" is not fully resolved.
FVF: Final Value Fee: an eBay fee that is a percentage of the selling price.
G
Grid: The grid pane shows information about auction items in a compact, tabular format.
Click on any item in the grid to get an expanded listing of that item in the Details
pane.
H
Hiding Fields: Fields that you don't use can be removed from the display area, reducing
the amount of clutter onscreen.
Hosting Pictures: See Picture Hosts
HTTP: Hyper-Text Transfer Protocol: the file-transfer protocol that allows the World
Wide Web to exist. Invented in its entirety by a character named Al Gore (played
by Tim Berners-Lee).
I
Image Well: An input box (titled: "Click to Insert Picture") that also allows for insertion
of an image by dragging and dropping it onto the well. Once dropped, the image
appears in the well.
ISP: Internet Service Provider - a company that provides internet access and space on
their web server to upload pictures, etc.
Item Record: All of the information about a particular auction item.
Item Specifics: An eBay service that automatically supplies most of the information
about common items like DVDs
L
Lot Size: The number of items being sold to a single bidder, in a single auction. See also
"Dutch Auction."
Low Inventory Level: A number you can set for each inventory item. The item will
appear in the Low Inventory Filter when the quantity on hand drops below this
amount.
M
Multiview: See Grid
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N
NPBA: Non-Paying Bidder Alert
NYI: Not Implemented Yet: A program feature that is intended for a future release.
P
Part Number: A field provided for part numbers you many use in your business to track
inventory.
PCMCIA: An industry-standard peripheral hardware interface for laptop computers.
Also the Founding Father of the too-cute acronym Movement: People Can't
Memorize Computer Industry Acronyms. (Almost lost in the mists of time is the
original derivation: Personal Computer Memory Card International Association.)
PDF: Portable Document Format - used by Adobe Corp for documents that can be read
using their free Acrobat reader.
Pending Listings: Items that are ready and scheduled for listing at some future time.
Items can be scheduled using eBay's (for fee) service, or scheduled using
Blackthorne.
Picture Hosts: Web servers that allow photographs to be uploaded to public directories.
the "address" of the photograph in the public directory can then be sent to eBay.
This is sometimes a cheaper option than uploading the photograph to eBay
directly.
Preset: A named set of field values that can be block-assigned.
Push-out: A special link that, when clicked on, inserts extra explanatory text into the
page, pushing the existing text out of the way. A second click on the link removes
the extra text.
Q
QuickLinks: Small icons at the top of the Details Panel that link to more information
about the current item.
R
Radio Buttons: A group of option buttons that are mutually exclusive - only one can be
selected at a time. Named after the station-selector buttons on older car radios.
Relistable auction: An auction that received no bids, or no bids that matched the reserve
price. eBay allows a one-time free re-listing in such cases.
Right-Click: Clicking the lesser-used button on the mouse. For right-handed people, this
is the right mouse button. Right-clicking often brings up a context-sensitive menu
that varies depending on where the mouse cursor is on the screen.
S
Glossary
349
SA: Seller's Assistant, either Pro or Basic
Scheduled Submissions: Auctions that have been scheduled to begin at some point in
the future.
Screenshot: An image of a running computer program that is taken directly from the
computer display.
Second Chance Offer: Offering the auction item to a losing bidder. A second chance
offer is unlikely to be accepted if the asking price is more than the amount bid by
that bidder.
Seller Assistant: The previous version of eBay Blackthorne.
Servant: The Servant is a Blackthorne utility that allows you to precisely schedule (e.g.)
auction starts without any need for you to be present.
Shill: In the context of auctions, a shill is a acquaintance of the seller who bids on an
item for the sole purpose of raising the price. Sometimes it is the seller himself,
using a separate eBay account. Sometimes, multiple shills will bid on the same
auction. Shill bids are illegal, and if uncovered will result in eBay sanctions
and/or prosecution. eBay uses sophisticated software to uncover suspicious
bidding patterns.
SMTP: Simple Mail Transfer Protocol: A common E-mail protocol.
Stage: For an item, its current point in the sales process.
Stage family: A group of stages (in the lifespan of an item) that share certain
characteristics. For example, "Listed" and "Relisted" both belong to the same
stage family.
Status: For an item, the current stage in the sales process (used interchangably with
"stage")
T
TCP/IP: Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol: The unwieldy name given to
the set of protocols that unrelated computers use to communicate with each other.
Without TCP/IP, there would be no Internet.
Template: A named document with a preset format, used as a starting point for an
auction item so that the format does not have to be recreated each time it is used.
You can create as many different templates as you need.
TWAIN: A standard protocol that allows computer programs to communicate with
imaging devices like scanners and cameras. Popularly thought to be the too-cute
acronym: Technology Without An Interesting Name. In fact, it's not an acronym
at all. A reference to how difficult it previously was to connect imaging devices to
computers, It was taken from Rudyard Kipling's "The Ballad of East and West" :
"...and never the twain shall meet..."
W
350
WYSIWYG: What You See Is What You Get: an editor that shows what the final copy
will look like while you are in the process of creating it. Before WYSIWYG came
along, editors were WYGIAG: What You Get Is Anybody's Guess

351
Index
A
Ad Template.............................. 107, 342
Advanced Search .............. 132, 294, 342
All-Items Folder................................ 126
Assigning
Email Account ................................ 76
Seller Accounts ............................... 76
Assigning ............................................ 76
AutoText ........................................... 342
B
Back button............. 15, 23, 76, 126, 132
Blackthorne Pro ................................ 272
Blank Item........................................... 72
C
Column Set................................ 126, 294
Consignment Plans............................ 107
Context-sensitive menu............. 126, 129
Conventions Used............................... 15
Creating Filters.................................. 132
Custom Field..................................... 107
Customize View................ 126, 132, 294
D
Description Editor............................... 76
Display
Column Picker .............................. 294
Display.............................................. 294
Duplicating
Lists............................................... 129
Duplicating........................................ 129
Dutch Auction..................................... 76
E
EBay Seller Accounts ....................... 272
E-mail templates ....................... 107, 255
Endless Mountain Enterprises........... 342
Exit...................................................... 63
Extended Example ............................ 342
F
Field Presets
Managing ...................................... 110
Field Presets ...................................... 110
Field Presets ...................................... 114
Filter
Deleting......................................... 132
Duplicating.................................... 132
Moving.......................................... 132
Renaming...................................... 132
Viewing......................................... 132
Filter.................................................. 126
Filter.................................................. 132
Filter.................................................. 136
Filter Actions Menu .......................... 132
Folders............................................... 126
Format Selector................................... 52
Free Relists........................................ 157
FTP site ............................................... 23
G
Getting Started .............................. 15, 51
Group By menu................................. 294
H
Hide/Show Filters ............................. 132
Hide/Show Sidebar ............................. 52
Hotmail ............................................... 23
I
Importing
Data................................................. 53
Other Data....................................... 23
Importing............................................. 23
Importing............................................. 53
Installing ............................................. 23
Introduction......................................... 15
Invoicing ........................................... 177
Item
Lifespan......................................... 132
Item................................................... 132
Item Templates............................ 72, 114
Items
Creating................................. 110, 114
Submitting..................................... 121
Items.................................................. 121
Items Views Pane.............................. 132
L
Lifespan............................................. 132
List
Creating......................................... 129
352
Deleting......................................... 129
Duplicating.................................... 129
Moving.......................................... 129
Renaming...................................... 129
Viewing......................................... 129
List .................................................... 129
Listing Upgrade .................................. 76
Listing Your First Item....................... 57
Listings
Monitoring .................................... 148
Viewing......................................... 148
Listings.............................................. 148
Low Inventory filter.................. 107, 294
Low Inventory Level......................... 107
M
Main Window..................................... 52
Manage Ad Templates ...................... 342
Manage Presets ................................. 110
Manage Seller Accounts ................... 272
Math() ............................................... 255
Mode Tabs .......................................... 52
Monitor Listings........................ 121, 143
Multiview Grid.................................... 72
Multiview Panel .................................. 52
N
Navigation Toolbar ............................. 52
New Item Action button...................... 72
O
Organize Items
Using Filters.................................. 132
Using Folders ................................ 126
Using Lists .................................... 129
Using Seller Accounts................... 272
Organize Items .................................. 125
P
Payments
Receiving ...................................... 196
Payments ........................................... 196
Picture Studio.................................... 342
Preset................................................. 110
Previewing
Item Description............................ 116
Previewing ........................................ 116
Previous Version
Changes From................................. 18
Previous Version................................. 18
Printing
Address Labels.............................. 201
Items.............................................. 140
Listings.......................................... 162
Packing Slips................................. 201
Profit ............................................. 216
Sales .............................................. 216
Sales Tax Report ........................... 216
Printing.............................................. 140
Printing.............................................. 162
Printing.............................................. 201
Printing.............................................. 216
Q
Quick Finish........................................ 51
Quick Start .................................... 51, 57
QuickLinks.......................................... 52
R
Repeat Blocks
Inserting ........................................ 255
Repeat Blocks ................................... 255
RepeatTotal ....................................... 255
Resubmitting Items ........................... 124
S
Sales Tax Report
Printing.......................................... 216
Sales Tax Report ............................... 216
Searching........................................... 136
Second Chance Offers....................... 157
Seller Accounts ........................... 67, 272
Seller's Assistant
Importing......................................... 23
Seller's Assistant ................................. 23
Setup Assistant
Using............................................... 23
Setup Assistant.................................... 23
Setup Assistant.................................... 51
Simple Mail Transfer Protocol.......... 340
Submission Errors............................. 124
Submitting
Item............................................... 121
Second Chance Offers................... 157
Submitting......................................... 121
Submitting......................................... 157
T
TCP/IP................................................. 23
Templates.................................. 114, 255
Index
353
Theme
choosing.......................................... 57
Theme ................................................. 57
U
Using Folders .................................... 126
Using Seller Accounts............... 125, 272
Using the Setup Assistant ................... 23
V
Viewing
Completed..................................... 173
Disputed........................................ 173
Filter.............................................. 132
List ................................................ 129
Listings.......................................... 148
Recent Bidding Activity ............... 148
Related Pages on eBay.................. 165
Relistable Listings......................... 148
Running Listings........................... 148
Scheduled Listings ........................ 148
Viewing............................................. 129
Viewing............................................. 132
Viewing............................................. 148
Viewing............................................. 173
Views Pane........................................ 126
Views Sidebar ..................................... 52
W
Windows Folders .............................. 126
WYSIWYG......................................... 76

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