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Removing Photos After Auction Ends
 

Hi, quick question, after my listing ends, how do I remove my photos because sometimes other sellers(competitors) use your photos

You can't. But if you are concerned, you can use photobucket or some other online storage website to remove them when needed

Until a couple of months ago, if your photos were hosted in your own host and not on e B a y, you could remove them from your host and that made the trick. Now, even if you submit your own URL for your pics, they transfer them to their server so they will stick in your listing until the actual item doesn't show up anymore (usually 90 days after the item ends). If you are concerned about competitors, I suggest you to use a watermark with your ID.

does anyone know of any good free programs to watermark photos?

Imakemoney, you can use any free image editor, such as GIMP. For batch operations, check out free Light Image Resizer (formerly known as VSO Image Resizer).

I just ran a test to verify this and found that I can delete the photos from my website where ebay goes to get the photo, went to my temporary internet files folder and deleted the photo from there (because this is where the browser will go to get it if it's not in the listing) and went to my listing. I only deleted one of the photos and that one showed a box the size of the photo but only a red "x" instead of the photo.

I have often replaced photos in my listings if I thought I had a better view and since I may be leaving them soon thought that maybe I'd write my own "Feedback" on the buyer I'm having a problem with maybe including the actual user name and urging sellers to "put this one on your blocked list" if they sell the item I had a problem with. It would either be text placed over the original photo or anything I want and since I wouldn't be using the account again I wouldn't be concerned with repercussions. They'd probably jump to delete it rather than waiting the amount of days it takes for it to be too old to check.

The drawback to this method, though would be that any user can right click on the photo and see the web address (my site) of the photo. I have used this site for 5 different user accounts (not stealth) and nver had a problem but it would be easy for anyone looking to see they all come from the same site. I figured if I was ever challenged I would say that they all pay me for hosting the photos.

just go to paint and put ur user id on it..

I normally use Photobucket to host my pictures, thumbnails and gif banners. Each listing has its sub-album.
Once the listing ends I login in Photobucket and RENAME the sub-album containing the pictures adding "old" at the end.

For example the sub-album (or album, it doesn't matter) "mysuperdeal" will become "mysuperdealold". Click "save" then go and check the listing page, all pics have been replaced with "this picture is not longer available".

If next week I want to re-post the same listing using the same pictures I rename the sub-album making it "mysuperdeal" again and.. voila'... the images are back. If you prepare your listing pages in advance with a html editor like Frontpage this trick comes quite handy.

For watermarking I use Photoshop by the way, I made my logos and trasparencies then save them as PSD. When I want to add a logo to a batch of pics I open all pictures in Photoshop then drag the logo over and save them. If saved in PSD the logo will retain the transparency, the shadows and whatever else you wanted to add. Quite quick and flexible.

forgot to add, I noticed the gallery pictures (when you use the "self-hosting" option) even if deleted from Photobucked they will stay in eBay cache.