Recently in Partners Category

We recently came by an interesting charitable online venture based around the concept of a sustainable business that can deliver a broad, internet savvy audience to advertisers. Called onethirdeach, they were also using vzaar video to serve their message so we asked owner Paul Burke to tell us what he was up to.

Onethirdeach is a new business offering a unique way to deliver content and advertising to a growing national and international audience.

The aim has been to create a business suitable for the times, a business that gives two thirds of its generated revenue away, one third to the winner of a free prize draw, and another third to charity. The final third goes to the business to develop the website(s) and business model as well as sponsoring other draws throughout the year.

Income is generated by selling time-slots on the website to advertisers and other content providers who place their content on a large screen on the site. Time-slots are of multiples of 15 seconds, but this is just a start time. You can deliver longer content to the visitor. If they visit the site during your time-slot they will receive only your content.

Unsold slots fill with existing adverts, so early adopters are rewarded. Onethirdeach has a target of a charity donation of $1,000,000 by the end of 2010. It also aims to raise at least $333,000 by Christmas 2009 to be shared between three charities as voted for by visitors.

If you are a vzaar user with video content that you’d like to advertise to the visitors of onethirdeach then you can contact Paul here

From the minute we were given approval to build our application for the eBay SM Apps Programme, we turned to our good friends and Ruby specialists Applicake to help us turn our idea into something real. As a result its been a collaborative effort from day one and so we asked Lead Developer Matt from Applicake to pen us his thoughts on the build. Here is his take.

What are SM Apps?

My colleague Ela from Applicake has already written a few words about the launch of the vzaar Selling Manager App from a company perspective so I won’t spend too much time going into details. You can also read vzaar’s news of the release here.

In fact for me this project has always been known by its code name, Project Echo and I have to say it felt great to be involved with a super secret development in conjunction with a giant of the Internet like eBay!

What Have We Done & Why Are We So Proud?

In a nutshell my task was to integrate the vzaar application with the eBay API directly into the eBay Selling Manager platform. The end goal was to ensure that eBay sellers could then add video to their eBay listings, by using vzaar, directly at an eBay level. A Selling Manager user simply subscribes to the vzaar application and it will show up in their Applications tab in My eBay.

It’s a real distinction for us. Only a few applications have taken part in the initial launch so very few people have actually dealt with the eBay SM Apps API so far. eBay only launched the test API around six months ago and the test environment was only available something like two months ago. As you might imagine, the process was a bit of a challenge (almost no tutorials etc.) and the API itself was not perfect. Throughout the process we had to work closely with eBay technical support team to improve it and I have to say they were really supportive. The end result that we built the app on time and at Applicake we certainly take pride in being one of the first companies to work on the API.

eBay Development for Dummies

The great thing about eBay SM Apps API is that to integrate your application with eBay you can use your favorite programming language. I am a Ruby on Rails developer at Applicake which made the decision an easy one to make! To get stuff connected you only need to develop an interface that will allow eBay to subscribe and authenticate users to your app. eBay calls that Open eBay Participant Interface.

Last year we needed some extra development, and started looking for resources. We had no intention of looking outside the UK, although an outsourcer in China had contacted us so we thought we would follow up with them, and see if it was a possibility.

The Chinese outsourcer was very quick to get back to us. We set them some development tasks to do and sent it off.

We then posted a few job postings for developers on some of the jobs boards. Gumtree because it was cheap, and a few of the free rails boards.

And boy did the onset of emails begin. About 50 mails from individuals, outsources (USA, China and India mainly) and recruiters. I quickly developed a filter system of Yes/No/Maybe and started cutting down the mails. It soon started taking over my life.

Fortunately a small company based out in Cracow (or is that Kraków) with a affection for muffin logos dropped us a mail. We sent off the same home work task and got on with filtering the emails.

Applicake completed the homework within a day or two, and impressed our in house developer. A few skype chats and a phone call later we took them on as our development team.

2 Weeks later the Chinese outsourcer replied to us.

Our in house developer decided to move onto some work of a different technical nature leaving Applicake as our primary development team, and if I said we were happy with their work, I’d be lying.

We’re ecstatic with their work.

vzaar have partnered with SUSTUU to offer all registered vzaar members worldwide a fantastic 10% + Free Shipping saving on all orders for the 4GB Flip Video Mino Camcorder. This normally retails at £169.99

To start shooting your own videos in High Definition quality simply enter vzaar into the Offer Code box when ordering your 4GB Flip Video Mino here.

Features of the hand held camcorder include:

• Ultra thin, pocket-sized camcorder
• 4 GB of on-board flash memory records up to 60 minutes of video
• High 1280 x720 video resolution on a 1.5” diagonal screen
• Instant playback, pause, fast forward or rewind, zoom and delete features
• Video quality comparable to that of more expensive camcorders
• Built-in rechargeable battery (Lithium Ion), charges on computer through USB
• Built-in, easy to use software works on both PC and Mac

But don’t just take my word for it. You can watch the Flip Mino in action here:

Terms & Conditions

• This offer is open to vzaar registered users only. Click here to register for free.
• The offer is open to overseas buyers. International payments (non UK) must be made via PayPal.
• The vzaar promotional offer code must be used in the checkout flow.
• Offer includes multiple purchases of the same product.
• Offer is only valid for the 4GB Flip Mino HD Camcorder. All other Flip Video products are exempt from the 10% discount.
• Offer is open to purchases made up until midnight on the 20th May 2009.

Back in 2007 at an eBay University event in Manchester, vzaar and Frooition became acquainted with one another as we chatted over all things eBay. We both offer services to online merchants and provide, for lack of a better term, mechandising tools. Frooition offer custom made templates and shop designs and vzaar provide a simple method for adding video to online product listings.

At the start of 2008 I called Frooition and Grenville Wheelan, the then MD, took the call and said he was literally about to dial my number. We both had the same agenda and wanted to form a partnership on the basis that our services complimented each other. So we did just that and since then the synergy has been working.

We have now decided to take the partnership an exciting step further…

Myself and the entire vzaar team are extremely pleased to announce that Frooition will be using the vzaar API, which will enable their customers to seamlessly add video to their online product listings from within the Frooition application. This ultimately makes it much easier for Frooition users to create their listings with video.

Retailers are fast becoming aware of the benefits that video brings to their business. Most of the Frooition customer base sell products on eBay which is a highly competitive marketplace and we think that by using a combination of Frooition custom designed templates and vzaar video, sellers are setting themselves up for success. It is a true compliment of services.

Adrian Bausor, Head of Development at Frooition told us “Having a strong brand image is a major factor in being successful online. eBay is a highly competitive marketplace and so it’s absolutely vital that your business stands out. A good video will increase buyer confidence and generate more purchases.”

vzaar will be highlighting the integration between the two services with live demos at this year’s ChannelAdvisor UK Catalyst event today and tomorrow.

In the meantime you can watch the video demonstration on adding video to your Frooition template below.

Many of our vzaar customers have been asking for video editing applications that we’d recommend. There are many on the market today, some of which are pre-installed on your computers such as Imovie on the Mac or *Movie Maker *on the PC. vzaar provides and online video hosting service and we tend to prefer online applications as they are always current in terms of features and bug fixes and can be accessed through a browser which gives more freedom and accessibility. So when looking for a video editing solution we wanted it to follow the same principles. We found video editing experts Jaycut and thought you might want to hear more about them!

Jaycut is an intuitive browser based flash video editing program. It is very easy to use, and after much testing we decided that we wanted to endorse the service, as we think our users may find it useful. In terms of use, the video you want to edit is uploaded to Jaycut where it is converted to flash. So you are editing the video in its compressed form and the form in which the video will look like online. When you have made the edits you can then download the edited video to your PC and save a copy on Jaycut. vzaar users will then have to upload the video back to vzaar where they can then add the video to their websites or eBay listings.

To really sweeten the deal Jaycut have offered vzaar users a little bonus if you want to try their new video mixer here. When signing up enter the word vzaar2 and you will be guaranteed a funky new beta account.

Do let us know what you think.

vzaar were lucky enough to be invited onto the Savvy Seller’s Podcast Series and we thought you might like to listen in! If you are new to vzaar then you might find it a useful guide to how vzaar works but for the more experienced user, Marlene and I also cover:

• Video Types
• Benefits of Video to eBay Sellers
• Embedding Video on other websites
• vzaar versus YouTube
• vzaar Pricing
  
  click on the play button to listen

I have to say a big thanks to Marlene and point you in the direction of her fantastic blog on all things eBay, Intenert Marketing and Social Networking

Charities have for some years now been using eBay as a great venue for extending their brand profile and to also raise some much needed money along the way. It makes utter sense given the sheer number of buyers visiting eBay with money to spend.

For a while though I’ve had a bit of a bee in my bonnet about the quality of the attempts to sell on eBay by some of the bigger high street charity names. Many have taken eBay too lightly in my opinion and not paid due attention to the commercial opportunities that the site offers. Well, thanks to Good Cause Auctions we are starting to see some professionalism hitting our PC screens!

Run by eBay advocates Julie Dawson and Mark Buckingham, Good Cause Auctions offer services from consultancy and support, to a fully integrated service comprising PR, campaign planning, design, auction management and logistics. Aimed at increasing awareness of a cause and building an extended or new base of support they really are the go to people if you are a charity looking to sell on eBay but perhaps don’t have the full resource to support it or to bring the idea to life. What’s more the company are firm believers in the value of video, especially for charities that want to show bidders how monies are spent, so it was natural for vzaar to hook up with them!

As an example check out their Shelter Men Only Aloud Christmas auction on eBay for your chance to have the BBC award winning choir sing in your local community.

Hello there,

I'm Jamie and one of the newer folk here at vzaar. Since joining from eBay I've been focusing on working with PowerSellers to better understand how we can build a product that meets the needs of the selling community and then how to best market that. As a result we've taken a hammer to the vzaar piggy bank and signed up for a place at Catalyst 2008. But what exactly is Catalyst I hear you cry?

Well, between April 21st and 22nd, Channel Advisor are hosting their annual ecommerce shin dig called Catalyst in London and it promises to be quite an occasion.

The two-day event brings together retailers from across the UK to discuss their success stories and learn about upcoming industry trends that will help boost their online businesses and naturally we wanted to be there to share our story and fly the vzaar flag nice and high for all to see. If you are serious about selling on eBay and thinking about expanding the number of channels through which you sell then this really is the type of event you should be attending. There are guest speakers from eBay, Google, Play.com and Red Letter Days to name just a few and my friends at Channel Advisor HQ tell me that there are still a few places left if you wish to register.

If you currently use Channel Advisor to manage your inventory but are new to vzaar then don't be shy, come and say hello. I promise not to throw my arms around you in front of all the other delegates but will be only too happy to explain to you how easy it is to incorporate our video player into your current listing templates. Alternatively if you are already a vzaar convert then great, the first drink is on me!