A question of ethics

That's kind of a hard question to answer. Each person is a little different.

As for me, I get them all the time. I like them. The majority of sellers that let know they are having a certain type of sale, new items, what have you, are sellers that I have done a lot of business with. I haven't been with eBay very long, but the other sites that I buy from, I get quite a few "updates."

I still get an update from a seller that I wouldn't do business with if she was the only seller in the world. When she sends me her updates, I put in a message that basically says that "You ripped me off once and I'm stupid enough to let you rip me off again." I then add the Case Number of the iffc complaint that was filed! I still get her letters at least once a week. Go figure.

Six inches Lord, that's all I need!

PatZ,

It can be a good idea; but it can also be a bad idea. I have a couple of sellers that I encourage letting me know about books that I'm interested in. But there are some sellers that I'd prefer not to deal with again. So email from the former is a service, while email from the later is spam.

I especially like it when the former gives me a "heads-up" for a BIN.

The downside: they know I'm willing to spend extra, so the BIN is probably more than the auction would have been. The upside: I don't have to wait 7 to 10 days to be out-bided/sniped by a competitor and I have the merchandise before the auction would have ended.

I'm not a seller. If a seller sent me a ship confirmation email, and included in that email they asked if I wanted to receive email about future auctions, I'd can't see how I could complain.

Every once in a long while I get such an e-mail from a seller I bought from. I don't object, so long as he gives me the option of getting off his mailing list. But the seller is in danger of running afoul of eBay's anti-spam rules if he goes through eBay with his solicitation. On the other hand, if he saved my e-mail address from the earlier transaction, there's no eBay conflict.

Why not try asking them when they buy from you? Then you'd know whether they want to get the notices or not, and won't need to worry about being accused of spamming them.
--Christine

Thanks y'all for some sound advice. I sure never meant to have a 'mailing list'. Way too soon for that. When I was in the garment business before, I built personal relationships with many of the customers. They depended on me to let them know what was new that I thought would look good on them. I would like to build that kind of rapport with my new customers. You know, making clothes for someone is kinda intimate -- you are discussing their body -- what they want to hide and what they want to show. That can get pretty intense.
PatZ