New Ebay Website Design Launches

Story first appeared on usatoday.com

EBay is hurtling into the digital age with a new logo, major redesign and aggressive plans to wade deeper into daily deals, search and shipping.

The most striking change is the visual, Pinterest-like home page "Feed," which lists brands that users follow and makes suggestions based on their browsing history and past purchases.

Feed rolls out to U.S. customers over the next 100 days, with international launches beginning in early 2013.

EBay's decision to mothball its stodgy, stale old site in favor of larger photos and more white space is a reflection of the changing tastes of younger, mobile-savvy users. Some 105 million people actively use the site.

The moves underscore fundamental changes in eBay's business model. Today, more than 70% of 350 million items listed are new. "It's the evolution of our service and how customers use it," eBay President Devin Wenig said in a phone interview.

Industry watchers say the changes are necessary, as more consumers opt for smartphones and tablets instead of PCs. "We believe every online experience will become organized around individual users and their preferences," says Jon Ehrlich, co-founder of social-commerce company Copious.

The Feed announcement comes after eBay in August launched Lifestyle Deals, a Groupon-esque daily deals service in San Francisco, Chicago, New York and elsewhere.

On Wednesday, the company unveiled eBay Now, an app that offers "on-demand delivery service" of goods from local stores. The service is available only in San Francisco, but more cities are expected to be added soon.

Amazon offers "local express delivery" for some items in major cities.

EBay's search also underwent a makeover, with an autocomplete feature similar to Google's. Users can personalize their search results for particular items. Learn more about Google SEO.

The news sent eBay shares up 1.2%, to $46.76, in trading Wednesday.

Wenig hinted that more is to come. "We will continue to make shopping more intuitive, more convenient and more relevant," he said. "This is just the beginning."

Google Releases New Custom Search Business Edition For Small Business Websites .

New Tools are Cost-Effective and Powerful.

Google launched Google Custom Search Business Edition, a hosted service that lets small businesses quickly and easily add Google search to their Web sites.

A follow-up to the Custom Search Engine Google launched in 2006, Custom Search Business Edition includes site search hosted by Google so small business owners can skip installing and maintain their own costly site search technologies.

While the original Custom Search Engine and the new business version both offer search results customization, analytics, and site traffic reporting features about visitor behavior, the Custom Search Business Edition has some key differences. These include the option to turn off ads, e-mail and phone support from Google's Enterprise Search, and business integration features through an XML API.

The goal of Google Custom Search Business Edition is to alleviate the pains many small businesses face in trying to allow customers to search their Web sites to get information or buy products.

Many of these businesses are spending money on AdWords search advertising and google search engine optimization to help in-market customers find their websites, but once customers find them, navigating among the unfamiliar products or services can be a chore.

Google is positioning the Custom Search Business Edition as a salve for the navigation issues. Search rivals Microsoft and Yahoo are also targeting this dilemma. Nitin Mangtani, product manager for Google Enterprise Group, said the original free Custom Search Engine "doesn't completely appeal to every small business web site."

"There are a lot of legitimate businesses which spend money on bringing visitors to the web site and they want search results but no ads," Mangtani explained. "And they want support. They need somebody to talk to, especially companies with no IT."

Custom Search Business Edition starts at $100 a year for searching up to 5,000 pages, and extends to $500 for 50,000 pages. Google will support larger volumes of pages through its enterprise sales group for businesses that require it.

Mangtani also explained Google's cost-effective pricing scheme. "For us to go after the millions of sites with just 500 or a thousand pages, we needed a product with a very low total cost of ownership; $100 per year makes sense. You can only offer that price point with a hosted solution. That's why the need for creating a business solution which is in between the free and business appliance product line."

The appliance product line Mangtani referred to includes search offerings from the Google Enterprise group, including the Google Search Appliance and Google Mini, both of which offer more control over security, as well as search crawl depth and timing.

With Custom Search Engine, Custom Search Business Edition and the appliances, Google's enterprise search portfolio covers anything from mom-and-pop shops to small business sites and large companies.

Which is exactly what the search giant needs to better compete with Microsoft, which recently updated their small business hosted search program.

Microsoft said it has added Ask.com's Sponsored Listings to its adManager Beta search advertising service, which enables small businesses to purchase and manage search-based keyword advertising from the Microsoft Office Live platform.

Ask Sponsored Listings (ASL), an automated, auction system that allows search marketers to purchase, manage and optimize pay-per-click and contextual keyword advertising campaigns, will join the MSN network and Live Search as distribution sources for Microsoft Office Live customers' search ads. Ask.com claims they are reaching over 59 million monthly unique users.