Sellers must meet certain eligibility requirements before eBay approves them for access to the Promoted Listings Advanced (PLA) and Promoted Listings Standard (PLS) programs. These eligibility requirements, as well as how to use the eBay Account API to check seller eligibility status and how to request access to the various Promoted Listings programs, are outlined in the sections below.

Tip: Please note, additional error codes can be found on the bottom of all the pages on the specific API calls.

General eligibility requirements

In order for a seller to leverage the Promoted Listings program, they must have enough account activity on eBay and be an Above Standard or Top Rated seller. This means that sellers who are new to Promoted Listings and do not meet these criteria will not be able to access Promoted Listings to create and/or edit campaigns.

Additionally, the following requirements apply to the Promoted Listings program: 

  • The listings to be promoted must be fixed-price listings. PLS and PLA campaigns do not support auction listings.
  • The listings to be promoted must be listed in the country for which they will be promoted.
  • The currency for the listings to be promoted must match the country for which they will be promoted.
  • The Promoted Listings program is supported only in eligible eBay marketplaces, and only for eligible categories. Refer to Promoted Listings supported categories to view a full list of eBay marketplaces and categories supported for PLA and PLS campaigns.

Account API verification

The getAdvertisingEligibility method of the eBay Account API provides developers with a way to check the seller eligibility status for eBay advertising programs (for both PLA and PLS programs). The response from this method returns a SellerEligibilityEnum, which indicates whether the specified seller is eligible or ineligible.

If a seller is determined to be ineligible for the specified Promoted Listings program, the following reasons may be returned by by SellerIneligibleReasonEnum type.

  • NOT_ENOUGH_ACTIVITY: This enum value indicates that the seller is ineligible for the eBay advertising program due to lack of activity. New accounts take a few weeks to become eligible for eBay Promoted Listings Advanced. If the seller account is in good standing (Above Standard or Top Rated), the account should become eligible within a few weeks.
  • NOT_IN_GOOD_STANDING: This enum value indicates that the seller is ineligible for the eBay advertising program because their account is not currently in good standing. Below Standard sellers cannot use eBay advertising programs to create new campaigns or edit their existing campaigns. Existing campaigns will be paused by the system.
  • RESTRICTED: This enum value indicates that the seller is ineligible for the eBay advertising program because their account is not currently approved for the restricted program. eBay is currently testing an advanced ads program with a small invite-only group. More information will be shared when the program is ready for expansion.

Promoted Listings Advanced Access Requests

Once sellers understand and have been determined to meet the general eligibility requirements, as outlined in the General Eligibility Requirements section above, they can request access to the Promoted Listings Advanced (PLA) advertising program.

To request access to the PLA program, sellers must complete and submit an Application Growth Check. This is a free service that the eBay Developers Program provides to its members. During the Application Growth Check process, eBay will critically review all applications for compliance with the Application Growth Check requirements, at no cost to sellers.