What did eBay do wrong?

[Jozo]

I have used eBay in the past. Since I stopped using it I have not really followed anything regarding the website.

I am hearing all this about shops pulling out of eBay as it is no longer a place to sell.

Can you explain what has gone so wrong?

How come a massive business like eBay can screw up this badly?

 

[KidsBeeHappy]

It's not gone wrong, but the discontentment is because the primary group of people that they need to keep happy aren't infact ebay's own customers.

It's a difficult business model when the group of people that you need to keep happy aren't infact the ones paying the bill.

Conflicting priorities.

 

[Red Eye Media]

I have used eBay in the past. Since I stopped using it I have not really followed anything regarding the website.

I am hearing all this about shops pulling out of eBay as it is no longer a place to sell.

Can you explain what has gone so wrong?

How come a massive business like eBay can screw up this badly?

Ebay hasn't gone wrong so I'm not sure where you are hearing this as it is still the easiest place to place and item and sell it. That said though, their prices are getting higher which is upsetting lots of people and pushing them towards "going it alone".

Our take on this is if you have an existing business that is making sales on Ebay, you should not stop using them. What you should do is run a parallel online shop and try to pull people away with incentives. A leaflet offering a discount for buying direct should help push people towards your online shop. Hopefully over time, you may be able to completely stop using them but they do a fantastic job at finding you customers which you won't get unless you plough lots of money into marketing.

 

[garyk]

Yes hardly 'gone wrong' any disgruntled sellers are a tiny fraction of the satisified customers, wouldnt bet against them just yet!

 

[Dawg]

Article in Business section of The Times today suggests that they are going wrong, and badly.

The Skype debacle was too-big-for-yer-boots understandable, but switching emphasis to fixed price seems a bit like killing the golden goose.

 

[MH1]

Article in Business section of The Times today suggests that they are going wrong, and badly.

Well I sell and buy a fair bit on ebay, have three powerseller accounts and cannot recognise the ebay described in the Times article. Making a listing and payment are as about as easy as it will ever get, you certainly do not need to use html as suggested.

As for the idea selling large qtys of BIN listings is a bad move compared to auction style listings, having experimented with both for over three years auction listings are almost dead on ebay, we live in a world where people want things instantly, as proved by the guy who bought from myself last night at 11.50pm and emailed my at noon today asking when it would finally be delivered.

Ebay has plenty of problems, but most ebayer's problems are of their own making. If they spent one tenth the time sorting out the problems rather than expecting everyone else to do something things would be a lot smoother for them.

 

[greenwood-IT]

I believe eBay customer support has gone down the drain and since the merger with Paypal things have gotten worse.

I ordered something from someone who claimed to be in Manchester, the item spec and location was confirmed using the eBay 'ask the seller' process. The item duely arrived from Hong Kong(!) and was infact not as specified. Communications with the seller failed to resolve the issue, so the Paypal resolution centre process was used. Paypal then took over a month to determine that I was wrong! By which time the eBay system had automatically deleted my private emails with the seller regarding the exact product specifications!!!!

I'm now £120 down (but holding stock I can't sell!) and am not impressed with eBay or Paypal - what's the best alternative auction site?

I've also reported a number of 'very likely' stolen mobile phones that appear on ebay, but in 90% of the cases the auction completes without any visible action on the eBay Trust and Safety side.

Chat soon.

 

[Johnny77]

eBay have got it monumentaly wrong.

The new changes due in force on October 1st will utterly cock it up for many dedicated eBay sellers.

I have looked into the situation in depth, and spoken to numerous eBay reps and got the opinions from some people in the know.

What they are doing is moving away from the model they have, subtle changes here, subtle changes there, will eventually make it almost impossible sellers to make it work anymore using the standard platform.

The 2 main reasons for this are;

1. eBay will be massivly promoting their version of google adwords, "adcommerce". This will allow sellers to place an ad on ebay for relative searches, just like adwords.
Their revenue will rely on this instead of the 'featured first' options they have in place.
Another poor business decision along the same lines as Skype and Paypal, which are causing them major headaches.

2. eBay are subtly teaming up with some major high street retailers to promote their "end of season items" and overstock.
Littlewoods already being promoted through banner ads directly linked to their eBay stores.

All of this is an attempt to move away from the more 'messy' elements of their model and focus attentions on big accounts and adcommerce.

It all adds up to making it harder for the 'man on the street' to use there basic platform, you can still use it, but it isn't going to be as profitable as it used to be.
Basically they are sweeping out the cobwebs and re-filling the cupboards.
At the same time also sweeping out legitimate honest sellers who have based their business's around eBay.

 

[Alison Jones]

Hi

Think some sellers are disgruntled by the changes regarding making some category types free postage.

I have an online Amazon, online Ebay account where I sell second hand books. I have had considerably more sales through ebay then I have amazon. With second hand books there is still an element of ebayers happy to have these as auction rather then Buy it nows, in the last 2 weeks ending on the weekend of the bank holiday and the weekend just gone auction sales have made me so much more than previously when I was using buy it nows.

Alison

 

[davco]

I was an avid seller (and sometimes buyer) on eBay, though I hardly use it now.

The various changes always seem to favour the buyer and to me a sale should be to the mutual satisfaction of both parties.

Ian D

 

[office man]

Nothing at all has gone wrong with ebay, its now one of the top 3 mainstream websites in the world and shows no signs of letting up - i bet everyone on this forum either uses ebay, knows someone who's uses ebay or has looked into using ebay - that's selling power.

The reason soooooooooo many shops are pulling out of ebay is because they are failing, business is tough, business is ruthless - ebay sellers are now considered big competition to anyone who has a product to sell, that's why so many that try it fail.

I once heard the Richard Branson tried and failed at over 50 business ideas before he started to become a success!! (not sure how true that is but its a great example of not giving up) the trick is to see each failiure as a learning curve and a step closer to sucess.

 

[MH1]

Another poor business decision along the same lines as Skype and Paypal, which are causing them major headaches.

I won't argue about skype, but Paypal is ebays jewel in the crown, the real money spinner.