I was just wondering if anyone out there has, or are planning on having, a Yahoo store and is concerned about the sweeping changes that Yahoo just implemented. To me, anyway, it seems like nothing more than a steep price hike. In fact, it has discouraged me from building more Yahoo stores in addition to the two I already have, which I had certainly planned on doing. Why? Well, although I would now have the option of paying $39.95 per month with no per-product fees, I hear that this plan would NOT include what I feel are very basic elements of Yahoo Stores, such as the ability to create gift certificates and statistics such as click trails. Therefore, if I want a store with those basic elements, I now have to pay $99.95 per month. Unless a store has over 500 products (which most, I would say, do not), you will now be paying more money per month for the same exact thing that you had been getting AND a higher transaction fee (1% instead of .5%). Take a store with 100 products, for example. You would have paying $59.95 per month ($49.95 + 10.00), whereas you would now pay $99.95 for the same thing. And isn't $60 per month ($99.95 compared to $39.95) a lot to be paying for just gift certificates, click trails, coupons, and only a few other features? AND, as if that weren't enough, Yahoo Shopping, possibly the No.1 reason people choose Yahoo in the first place, is now on a pay per click system? Sure, the 3.5% revenue sharing fee is gone, but at least that way you only paid once you had already made the sale and had therefore already been paid. Now, though, you can end up spending a lot more money than you receive in sales, especially since I have seen the pay-per-click prices and they are NOT cheap for any category -- significantly more than Overture's or Adwords' minimum, for example. Unless I'm missing something (and that's what I'm trying to find out!), it seems to me like this a good deal for Yahoo and no one else. Anyone have any thoughts? Thanks in advance.
