[New Feature] Stores without Websites and Stores On Marketplace Websites

In the past month, there has been some backend development around the way we deal with two types of stores:

• Stores that don't have their own website but have a facebook page or Google+ page.
• Stores hosted on marketplace websites (e.g. ebay.com.au, itunes.apple.com)

Stores without Websites

Moderators are now able to create OzBargain stores for stores that don't have their own website but have a Facebook or Google+ presence. For example:

https://www.ozbargain.com.au/deals/facebook.com/CasulaFruitW…
https://www.ozbargain.com.au/deals/plus.google.com/107620528…

If you have posted a deal or a competition for such a store, the 'Related Store' page will correctly reflect the store name if it already exists in the OzBargain system. If it doesn't already exist, feel free to use the report link on the deal or comp to report the deal or competition so that moderators can create a new facebook/G+ store for it on OzBargain. From that point onwards, all the deals for that store will be grouped under their OzBargain Store page with the URL in the form of

https://www.ozbargain.com.au/deals/<facebook.com/plus.google… ID>

Marketplaces and Other Third-Party Sites

We had been parsing profile IDs for individual stores or sellers on these websites for a while now, mainly to impose posting limits:

• aliexpress.com
• blogspot.com, blogspot.com.au
• dhgate.com
• ebay.com, ebay.com.au, ebay.co.uk
• play.google.com (apps only)
• itunes.apple.com
• myshopify.com
• quicksales.com.au

The recent update allows users can to browse to individual stores hosted on these third party sites on OzBargain and subscribe to them. So the 'catchofthedayau' store on 'ebay.com.au' is accessible by going to

https://www.ozbargain.com.au/deals/ebay.com.au/catchoftheday…

Stores Under A Parent Domain

In terms of user functionality, stores without websites and stores on a marketplace website are very similar.

To see all deals on a parent domain, just go to https://www.ozbargain.com.au/deals/<domain>, e.g. https://www.ozbargain.com.au/deals/itunes.apple.com

Then to see a particular store under that parent domain, click on the Stores - change link. You will see a selection of seller IDs to choose from that start with the letter A.

Clicking on another character will allow you to select profile IDs starting with that character. Clicking on a profile ID will take you to that store page on OzBargain, listing the deals that were posted for that specific store. You can click on the 'Subscribe' button to subscribe to deals for this specific seller on the domain.

Note that the deals for all stores under the same domain are also listed on the parent domain's page. i.e. an eBay deal for the 'dicksmithonline' seller will be listed under both:

• https://www.ozbargain.com.au/deals/ebay.com.au
• https://www.ozbargain.com.au/deals/ebay.com.au/dicksmithonli…

If the alternative store domain was also set to 'dicksmith.com.au' for a deal, it will also appear under:

https://www.ozbargain.com.au/deals/dicksmith.com.au

A Note on Store Subscription Emails

At the moment, users can subscribe to normal stores (e.g. dicksmith.com.au), third-party stores (e.g. ebay.com.au) and also individual stores on third-party stores (e.g. ebay.com.au dicksmithonline).

Subscription emails are sent out at deal/comp submission time, and depends heavily on whether the correct URL and/or alt. domain is set at the time.

In general, an email will be sent out to at least the subscribers to the related store. The related store is either the store derived from the URL, or the alternative store domain if it is set at submission time.

Subscribers of individual sellers on third-party websites will be notified of any deals for that particular seller. Subscribers of the parent domain will be notified of any deals posted for that domain, regardlness of which seller the deals are for.

To illustrate, consider this example:

• User A subscribes to dicksmith.com.au
• User B subscribes to ebay.com.au - dicksmithonline
• User C subscribes to ebay.com.au
• User D subscribes to dicksmith.com.au, ebay.com.au - dicksmithonline and ebay.com.au

A deal posted for an eBay listing for dicksmithonline, where alt. domain is set to 'dicksmith.com.au'. All four users above will receive one email each.