A1 Marketplace is one of many Half.com like media marketplaces out there. You can list books, music, movies, software and more there without listing fees and pay only when the item sells. The interface and listing process is very similar to Half but there are some key differences.

  • Firstly, more like Amazon Marketplace, A1 (as A1Books) itself also sells on its own items on the marketplace so you are competing with their new items on price if it is an item they also sell. That said, they don’t sell every item so there is no new item competition on many items.
  • Secondly, their fees are lower than many other places with the only fee being a 10% end of listing fee.
  • Unlike Half.com which limits you to items already in the catalog or Amazon which requires you to pay a monthly fee to be able to add to their catalog, adding a new product on A1 Marketplace is new which can be very helpful, I have found.

Side note: I used to use A1 Marketplace for many years but they recently changed their requirements for keeping your account active. I cannot find where these requirements are listed but my account seemed to be deleted or deactivated everytime I logged in to add a new item so I finally got fed up and gave up after having to reactivate and recreate a new account a few times. I only had under 5 items listed with them so this may not be an issue for larger Media sellers but they were annoying the snot out of me with this procedure so I no longer sell there.

But the biggest thing that sets this marketplace apart from the others out there is that they are now offering free storefronts for sellers. While these will obviously be for Media items, the announcement makes it seem like they will soon be expanding into non-media products in the future products.

From their FAQ:

What is a seller store?
A seller store is a free feature that we are offering for now to our sellers. They will be able to have a personalized URL in which they can display on social networking sites, marketing materials and more.

What is my personalized URL?
Your URL will be www.a1books.com/store/yoursellernickname. For example A1Promo would be www.a1books.com/store/a1promo

While many media stores let you link to the list of only your items, this might be a great opportunity for media sellers to get their own customizable e-store for free.

Here is the official announcement.

I no longer have an account there so I cannot try this out to review it but if you decide to play around with this free store option, please let us know what you think below.