CQout unites with microformats

Thu, 24 Jun 2010 15:08:09 GMT

CQout, the international online marketplace and auction community site, has joined the microformat trend to help make CQout easier to find and understand for search engines and improve the user' experience.

Search engines like Google and Yahoo!, which CQout use to market and help users find their online auctions are able to read and understand microformats, which are small pieces of compound HTML that can be used to tag web pages with Metadata. The search engines with their new found knowledge of CQout auctions can then extract and display snippets of auction content within their search results next to listings. This should be able to then help the user to decide whether they want to take their search further or not by confirming that that this is the search they were looking for.

Siamak Bashi, Managing Director at CQout said: "Our Buyers and Sellers are the real power behind CQout. Without them, the website would be redundant. For this reason, we need to make sure we keep ahead of the game and by adopting microformats, I think we have made a step that achieves just that. We can only praise microformats.org, Google and Yahoo! for their great resources that made this happen."

The addition of microformats isn’t just for buyers though, as they also have an impact on the sellers too. Search engines power the internet; they drive users to web pages based on their needs. The increased exposure of the products on the online auction site should steer more fruitful buyers onto the seller's listings, leading to improved sales potential.

About CQout:
CQout is a UK-based, international auction company, with users in more than 57 countries around the world, conducting person-to-person and business-to-consumer auctions, at CQout.com, CQout.co.uk and CQout.ie.

CQout is committed to ensuring that its internet auction site is a secure, reliable and easy place to trade on the Internet and anyone selling an item through CQout must first register with the site and receive verification following a rigorous user validation procedure.

CQout's facilities enable buyers, once registered, to bid on a wide selection of merchandise in a selection of different auctions, including fancy dress and antiques auctions, online car auctions, video auctions and jewellery auctions.

CQout announces special deal for newly registered Sellers

Thu, 27 May 2010 16:31:56 GMT

CQout has announced that it is targeting disaffected Chinese Sellers following unpopular eBay rules changes.

In the wake of a raft of changes announced by eBay to its Marketplaces business, and a subsequent feeling of dissatisfaction amongst many of its Sellers at new fees and the new eBay Buyer Protection Plan, CQout has announced that it has these eBay refugees set firmly in its sights.

Siamak Bashi, managing director of CQout, commented: "CQout is aware that many Sellers, and those from China in particular operate at very competitive prices and narrow margins. The price changes at eBay hits those Sellers the hardest, wiping out any meager profits they are making, resulting in some Sellers giving up all together. CQout's lower fee structure and free listings gives these Sellers a real alternative".

CQout believes that because Sellers make a huge investment in terms of their time and effort to list a big inventory onto an online auction site, they also need the stability of knowing that the site will not be making policy and prices changes which would make their business unsustainable. The continuous alterations which eBay has made in recent months has lead to huge dissatisfaction amongst many of its Sellers, especially within the Chinese market and provided the ideal opportunity for CQout to highlight that eBay is not the only game in town.

With a track record of not making any changes to its fees over the last five years and a solid history of providing continuity and certainty for sellers who need to plan log term, CQout is in the perfect position to appeal to these disaffected eBay Marketplace customers.

To further entice new customers to add their inventories onto CQout's listings and take advantage of the various sales opportunities it provides like its Consumer Electronics Auctions, Photographic Equipment, Computer Auctions and Music Auctions, CQout is also offering a new joining bonus for Sellers. As a gesture of good CQout has announced it is offering a cash incentive of £20 credited to all new Sellers' accounts which are registered during June and who list their entire inventory with the auction service.

Siamak said, "This is because we are confident that once eBay Sellers have experienced the alternative we offer, they will wonder why they never tried the alternative sooner."

About CQout:
CQout is a UK-based, international auction company, with users in more than 57 countries around the world, conducting person-to-person and business to consumer auctions, at CQout.com, CQout.co.uk and CQout.ie.

CQout is committed to ensuring that its internet auction site is a secure, reliable and easy place to trade on the Internet, and anyone selling an item through CQout must first register with the site and receive verification following a rigorous user validation procedure.

CQout Hits New Milestone, over 0.5 million books and comics

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 15:18:04 GMT

CQout one of the largest UK online auction sites has announced that it has achieved an important milestone with listings of well over half a million books and comics.

CQout which recently broke into the US market to offer its services to disenfranchised eBay users has grown to become eBay's closest rival in the UK online auction market by establishing a reputation as a safe, secure and trusted auction site and now has almost 2 million current listings.

Despite new electronic gadgets such as the Amazon Kindle and internet downloads, demand for physical books and printed matter remains as strong as ever. The recent news that a first issue Super Man comic sold for over $1m at auction in USA is further testament to the strong if not growing demand in the book auctions sector.

A major factor in CQout's continued growth in a market that has seen online auctions sites come and go is the company's dedication to 'going the extra mile' to help its users. This has proved to be especially important for sellers of books and comics who often have difficulties cataloguing their sales inventories.

"We had discussions with two other leading online marketplaces about listing our inventory, but they just seemed too big to care: their attitude was that it was up to me to reformat my entire stock control system to match their very inflexible listing requirements," reported one major CQout bookseller. "What was so refreshing about CQout is that they obviously wanted my business and were prepared to work hard to get it. What we now have is the listing interface we wanted, with the added benefit that CQout doesn't charge for listing items- so I'm paying commission only on what I sell, which makes it a highly cost effective solution for us."

That 'no sale, no fee' policy on standard listings is one of the things that has always set CQout apart from its better-known rival, as is the one-off registration fee that CQout charges new users as part of their highly regarded security validation process.

"One of the reasons that we've survived so long is that we take a rigorous approach to security and the creation of a safe trading environment for all concerned," said CQout MD Siamak Bashi. "But above all we've recognised since day one that most small businesses and sole traders are busy people who want to make their online presence as simple and hassle free as possible- and that's why we're prepared to 'go the extra mile' rather than expecting them to work it all out themselves."

With online sales continuing to rise in the UK and USA, it seems that CQout will continue to be a page turner.

CQout's facilities enable buyers, once registered, to bid on a wide selection of merchandise in a selection of different auctions, including fancy dress and clothing auctions, antiques auctions, jewellery auctions, car auctions and online electronics auctions.

CQout introduce Auto-Sync to reduce auction administration burdens

Tue, 23 Mar 2010 10:59:42 GMT

CQout, the UK based international auction company, who recently announced the launch of its services to the USA, has now announced the introduction of its new Auto-Sync technology to help eliminate many of the administrative burdens often experienced by sellers.

Auto-Sync is a new technology introduced by CQout that aims to take away all the administrative chores experienced by sellers, allowing them to devote their time to servicing their sales and their customers.

As the economic gloom continues, many small to medium size businesses who sell on the internet are looking to expand their customer reach and grab every precious buyer they can market their goods to. Some businesses with their own web sites have already expanded into selling on other platforms such as ebay and Amazon. However, CQout has recognised the problems that can occur when using other selling platforms, namely the huge work load and administrative tasks, such as sellers having to list entire inventories manually on other sites even though it is already on their own web site. Sellers may also have to pay a charge for using such platforms.

With Auto-Sync, CQout simply takes data automatically from a seller's own website to create a professional-looking auction listing on CQout. As a seller updates their own web site with stock movements or price changes, their listings on CQout are updated as well, resulting in sellers now having an additional shop front that reaches a wider audience and doesn't require a huge amount of time or work to maintain.

Siamak Bashi, CQout co-founder and chief executive, said: "We always strive to help and support our sellers in any way we can. The Auto-Sync is a huge leap forward in eliminating the administrative burden of listings for our sellers and allowing them to reach a wider customer base."

About CQout:
CQout is a UK-based, international auction company, which has recently broken into the US market, with users in more than 57 countries around the world, conducting person-to-person and business to consumer online auctions at CQout.com, CQout.co.uk and CQout.ie.

CQout's facilities enable buyers, once registered, to bid in a selection of different auctions, including antique auctions, online books auction and online car auctions. CQout also provides buyers the opportunity to buy a wide selection of other merchandise such as computer software and hardware, consumer electronics, household appliances, collectibles, toys and sports equipment, which are sold by other individuals and merchants.

CQout sets sights on eBay crown

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 09:48:11 GMT

CQout, the international online market place and auction community, has announced that it is setting its sights on disaffected eBay sellers as part of its US expansion plans.

CQout managing director, Siamak Bashi said, "We have recently celebrated our 10 year anniversary of providing auction services to UK where our reputation for trust and security is second to none which has helped us to grow to become one of the largest auction service providers. Our plans are now to continue our growth by providing tailored services to our US customers. We believe auction users in the US deserve a better service than they are currently getting from eBay."

The decision to move into the US market and to take on eBay was made following customer demands for an auction service which responds to its customer needs rather than impose rule changes every few months, like the recent imposition of certain enforced 'Post Free' product offerings which have alienated many previously loyal users.

The general ethos at CQout has always been to be flexible and respond to what customers ask for. Siamak highlighted, "We recently had the owner of US movie poster website who wanted to run their own auction site. But rather than go through the expense of buying software and hassle of running an auction site they asked us if we would tailor our services for their site. Within days we had an auction service running on their site".

Siamak believes CQout is ideally positioned to take the fight to eBay as its pricing structure is lower than eBay and has proven particularly attractive to medium to large sellers with its no listing fee policy. This means a seller can list thousands or even tens of thousands of items on CQout at zero cost, which means additional exposure and marketing for their products for free.

While based in the UK, CQout has taken several important steps to ensure a safe, secure and seamless service is provided for all US customers.

CQout online auctions services for US customers will be provided on the CQout.com top level domain, but it will use exactly the same secure technologies which have been tried and test over the last 10 years in the UK market, and lead to it being the only auction site to be certified hacker proof to standards set by the FBI and audited independently by McAfee Secure, one of the biggest names in internet security.

The US auction service is also fully integrated with the rest of CQout auction operations, so when a seller lists their items on the US site, it can automatically be shown and made available to International buyers from any country the seller chooses via a simple tick box selection on the selling form. The sellers products are seamlessly displayed and sold in the seller's chosen currency, but prices are also displayed automatically in the buyers' home currency. This makes the buying decision much easier for customers and is therefore less prone to mistakes and abandoned sales. This is a big contrast to eBay where sellers who want to sell internationally have to list separately on other eBay sites and pay additional listings fees. The CQout in-house payment systems SecurePay and EasyPay are also available to all CQout buyers and sellers from any countries where Visa & MasterCards are available, which covers virtually the whole world.

CQout's facilities enable buyers, once registered, to bid on a wide selection of merchandise in a selection of different auctions, including fancy dress auctions, online car auctions, online auction sites. Most of the big names, such as Yahoo, Virgin, Freeserve and QXL, all had an auction sites but, unlike its competitors, CQout, insisted on validating all users, buyers and sellers alike. This was the foundation stone of CQout site security from the beginning and still is today. The company's aim was to create a secure environment in which buyers and sellers could trust that goods will be paid for and delivered and that frivolous bids would not be made. It also allowed CQout to identify "bad eggs" quickly and therefore effectively exclude them from future trading using the platform.

The building of a secure, trusted trading environment has meant CQout has not experienced the explosive growth seen by other auction sites but as history has now shown, the company did choose the right steady path to growth, as all the big names mentioned earlier are no longer operating auction sites in UK having found the business unsustainable, CQout continues to grow steadily and on a sound commercial basis. .

CQout's facilities enable buyers, once registered, to bid on a wide selection of merchandise in a selection of different auctions, including antiques online auction, jewellery online auction and music online auction.

Top Articles Tagged with online-auction

CQout unites with microformats

CQout announces special deal for newly registered Sellers

CQout Hits New Milestone, over 0.5 million books and comics

CQout introduce Auto-Sync to reduce auction administration burdens

CQout sets sights on eBay crown