thanx for your site. found it today and has given me some ideas.

with regard to phpbay vs bans:

if you were starting a new site you say you would just go with phpbay all the way?
i like both but want to do what is in the best interest of making a little jingle if ya know what i mean.

so, you wouldn’t even really bother with phpbay in the root and bans in a “store” type subdir?

the site i added in this post is phpbay and i really like the flexibility of wordpress. i did find however that there were situations where phpbay didn’t show as many items as bans did when using the same category # and keyword qualifiers.

i’ve heard that phpbay filters out items with the same title which can be good or bad in my thinking. have you seen this?

also, if you were to do phpbay in root and bans in subdir would you put any content on the bans pages or would you do it all on the phpbay side and just link to the store pages?

thanx again for your site. i wish you much success!

jw

Bill

I have a number of sites running BANS with WordPress. Some have BANS on the roo, other WP is on the root. I’m also using phpBay. Now, on those sites with WP on the root things are ok.

HOWEVER, my sites with BANS on the root are giving me problems. The BANS ebay listings work fine (i.e. I click and I get taken to eBay), but the WordPress (phpBay) ones don’t work. I think that it’s something in the .htaccess file(s) that I have, but for the life of me I can’t see what it is. I am php, .htaccess myopic so that could be the problem! Can anybody help me?

Simon

Simons last blog post..Comedy DVDs for sale – Best season of Blackadder?

Thank you so much for your nice comment and I’m right there with you, my friend. I came into BANS just a week and a half after launch. I fell in love with it immediately. In fact, I still have several BANS sites which luckily have not been affected. And like you, I owe so much to BANS, but you are right. The current footprint has caused a large problem for users.

I made the move to adding a blog with phpBay about a year before everyone else caught on. I knew WordPress and could customize it so much easier than BANS sites. Not to mention, like you said, how much more SEO friendly phpBay sites are.

I made the full switch – building with phpBay only – when it became necessary to hack nearly all of the BANS files and change everything about what the program populated your pages with. I knew then if I was going to have to take all of those measures, I might as well build it from the ground up with phpBay.

Am glad you came upon it and enjoy it as well. By the way, love your site. It looks great!

I have been a BANS user since its introduction in 2006. It’s a great tool for beginners, since its “out of the box” design lets you create a website in a matter of minutes. The problem now is the BANS “footprint” that search engines see with this product.

To combat this, the user must modify and change the architecture to avoid the “footprint” effect. The BANS forums contain a wealth of information and advice to help the beginner to accomplish this.

Then I discovered phpbay. What a difference!

The best part about using WP and phpbay is the fact that WP themes and templates are so darn SEO friendly. There is little chance of “foot printing” especially if you use a premium or custom template.

In addition to uniqueness, there are limitless other plugins available to customize a site.

BANS taught me much about SEO, site development and many other things, however now I create sites only using phpbay, phpzon and wordpress templates.

BTW Melissa, great blog!

Tony Lees last blog post..Black Diamond Wedding Rings

Don’t you just love phpBay Pro?

One of the things I like most about it is handpicking the products for each post or page. To me, it’s just easier than throwing up a store with BANS and then having to go back and edit or delete most or all of those generated pages.

Sounds like you have the right idea with your blogs. Just wait another month or two and you will see just how much of a difference building this way adds to your income.

I already have phpZon and love it! I’ve been a member of the Amazon affiliate program since 2005 and never made a dime with it until I added phpZon to a couple of blogs. Surprisingly, earnings are coming in at a fairly steady pace with it only on a couple of blogs. I am waiting for the first stable release with all of the features enabled before adding it to every blog. I think you’ll end up liking it just as much as phpBay Pro.

I wish you much success with your sites and would love to hear how both plugins work out for you!