phpBay vs BANS

1. Installation: With both, there is the installation hurdle, since with BANS you have to set up a mySQL database on your server. I know how to do this with cPanel, but it seldom seems to work seemlessly with me. After some tinkering, I was able to get BANS installed. Best to use a host with cPanel, IMO. With PHPBay, you simply upload and activate the plugin, but you have sime further steps to follow unlike some plugins. Nothing difficult, however.

2. Setup: With BANS, there was a steeper learning curve for me, since I have some solid familiarity with WordPress. With WP I already had a site up and running, so it was easier simply to plug everything into the theme. With BANS, while they will tell you it's really simple, if you want to get a better looking site than the generic template, and get the navigation right, you'll have some work to do.

3. The Biggest Differences: Speaking from my POV, the biggest difference between them is that with BANS you can't mask the eBay links and images so that you get a site that shows up as being saturated with eBay affiliate links and images. But, you can configure PHPBay to do the masking. I feel this is an important distinction, since your generic BANS site could be seen by Google as carrying a "thin affiliate site" footprint and tanked in rankings. Personally, the similar layout with the BANS template doesn't bother me, as I don't think Google pays a lot of attention to that.

In BANS' defense, you can pay on a per site basis to have your links masked ($30) and they are offering additional templates for a price. I don't know if this masks images as well.

Also, BANS has a forum and PHPBay does not, except there is good support, and much info about it available here at DP. Just do a search for "phpBay plugin".

Lastly, with BANS, there is a little more work involved to set up each store on your site, especially if you want to add some written content to each page which certainly should be done. You should do that with your PHPBay pages, as well, but with WP, it's somewhat simpler.