ebaY has a plan, and Meg told me the plan herself. The plan is to sign advertising deals, giving big business name brands a higher level of exposure on ebaY. Then ebaY brings in millions of extra dollars and they can use that money to advertise and promote ebaY. This plan is geared to bring new people to ebaY because they will be so excited to find Disney and Topps and Auto Trader there that they'll come in droves and then start buying from the 'microbusinesses' as you call them. Their sales won't all be auction sales, they'll be selling exclusive retail goods onsite as well.
Now the only deal like this that's currently going is the one with Auto Trader. It's called ebaY Motors. During your reserach, I suggest you talk to the sellers at ebaY Motors about all of the great things that ebaY's association with AutoTrader has brought them.
Soon enough, you'll be able to ask Disney sellers the same thing. And of course, ESPN will be all over the Sports area.
So that's the plan they have for us. We created a market by offering millions of unique items that can't be easily found elsewhere and ebaY told us in press releases, etc... "Quit your jobs, close your stores, come sell with us! We'll be here for you!" and they told us all about the 'Level playing field, not for big business, but for small business and individuals'
So they have this giant market that exists because of unique items, and now they're selling it to big business, supposedly so they can 'help us' by bringing us even more customers.
Now if you buy that, then fine. If you think that's a good plan and that the focus of that plan is on their 'most precious asset', which is us, then I doubt there is much chance that you'll agree with MAM or the need for it or anything else I have to say. Which is fine...
But cutting through everything else, this is what's going on... and I don't believe it's 'for us' or 'for our own good' or anything else like that at all. I believe it will be disasterous for us in the short term, and disasterous for them in the long term.
Pierre didn't get eBay out of a business textbook, but Meg is putting it into one.
The TV ad campaign is focused on 'We're not just a flea market anymore', because that's when the Disney thing starts and eTopps and all that, at the first of the year, along with the start of those co-branding deals.
ebaY's 'most precious asset' is, as Magazine_guy says, being used as chum to bring in the sharks. This chum is jumping ship before we get into those shark infested waters.
posted on September 8, 2000 02:52:36 PM
The way eBay Motors was unleashed against the sellers, with NO forewarning, and built upon the recommendations of one vendor is absolutely egregious. I suspect that henceforth, eBay will attempt to receive community input from a SIZABLE portion of unique individual human beings who use their site.
eBay is a world class trading site, and the people who come to eBay due to a Disney ad are gonna have their sox knocked off when they see ALL the offerings, particularly the unique, one-of-a-kind items that eBay is best known for - this is similar to all of the business done every single day at the Mall of America, where people might be coming to check out Nordstroms and Macys or even Camp Snoopy or Legoland, but get caught up in the 100s of other stores, even the small Disney store; 0R, when there has been one bookstore for decades on a corner who is HORRIFIED that B&N is moving in across the street, and a couple months later relieved & surprised to see that their own sales doubled, -- and that wonder of wonders, when a couple more bookstores & a few coffee shops move in, that business becomes even more brisk.
eBay is a huge website, and has been competing against huge shopping portals filled with retail stores busily giving away free merchandise, funded by vulture capitalists who believe in branding.
eBay did not lose marketshare during the Big Phat Internet Freebie Giveaway -- but as many as 90% of those miserable websites have burned alla their cash and are slated by many analysts to go bankrupt.
Not eBay.
eBay remained not merely COMPETITIVE during The.Big.Phat.Internet.Giveaway, eBay was $ucce$$ful.
eBay Motors admittedly brings tears to my eyes, and I would hope that eBay has learned an unforgettable lesson.
~ ~ ~
"The plan is to sign advertising deals, giving big business name brands a higher level of exposure on ebaY. Then ebaY brings in millions of extra dollars and they can use that money to advertise and promote ebaY. This plan is geared to bring new people to ebaY because they will be so excited to find Disney and Topps..."
~ ~ ~
Neither Disney nor Topps will find it in their best interest to mess with the bottom lines of their most avid collectors and fans.
eBay MUST bring in new people - specifically people who are NOT interested in becoming sellers.
eBay has NEVER been a "garage sale" - eBay ALWAYS had all sorts of kewl retail items for sale, and original artwork, and never was strictly collectibles, except, maybe perhaps the first three weeks when I presume it was solely pez-focused.
eBay will be the online venue where individuals, families, microbusinesses, and small businesses all around the world will earn their incomes for DECADES to come.
Microbusiness is already here today, in small evidence, but it is the wave of the future. We ain't seen nuthin' yet!
I have stated repetitively that I will never purchase anything online ever again from ANY big FAT-CAT eBiz, not ever, and I assure you that I spend NO time surfing around the huge shopping portals -- they are BORING, they are TEDIOUS, they are SLOW to download, they are loaded with so-called FREEBIES, which are GIMMICKS, gimmicks are NOT business.
eBay is almost two years old from the date of its IPO, and I hope they continue to commit as few errors in the future as they have to date.
eBay is an idea whose time has come!
eBay is absolutely UNSTOPPABLE!!
Does that mean I will be a successful seller if I go and list books as eBay auctions, when I know that dozens of the same title already exist for sale online?
No!
Does this mean that I can have no future success as an itsy bitsy micro-eBiz?
No!
But it certainly implies that I must adjust to an ever-changing cyberlandscape, where ecommerce will evolve in many strange and remarkable ways.
We stand upon the END of the Industrial Revolution, and the ideas and logic of that age can no longer serve us. Ludditism is not an option, indeed is abhorrently passe. Holding grudges and deep rancor for any mistakes made this past 24 months will only hurt the bearer of these negative emotions. Trying to depict eBay as the Beast ain't gonna cut it, as that image is not based upon Truth. Truth will out!
posted on September 8, 2000 02:55:44 PM
"The TV ad campaign is focused on 'We're not just a flea market anymore', because that's when the Disney thing starts and eTopps and all that, at the first of the year, along with the start of those co-branding deals."
~ ~ ~
We NEVER were "just a flea market". LOLOLOL!
I consider ALL references to flea markets & online garage sales & trailer parks - alla it, to have been a PLANNED DISINFORMATION CAMPAIGN by eBay competitors who beieve in memes and viral marketing.
posted on September 8, 2000 03:01:26 PM
Well, I hate to tell you this, but when DISNEY started producing their own NEW collectibles, they gutted the vintage Disney market that was THRIVING before they started making all the new 'collectible' stuff.
Topps, through overproduction of series after series of cards likewise GUTTED the sports card market in the mid to late 80's.
And I challenge you to find a SINGLE small mom n pop bookstore across the street from Barnes and Noble ANYWHERE. They are out of business! I have friends who owned bookstores that were put out of business when Barnes and Noble moved in... and what was lost in that? I mean, Barnes & Noble have bigger selection and lower prices, right? What was lost was all of the little books that B&N DOESN'T carry because they are 'too controversial' or 'obscure' or 'artsy' or whatever. Those books aren't even published anymore because there aren't enough independent bookstores left to buy them and market them. If it ain't mainstream enough for B&N, it doesn't get published.
posted on September 8, 2000 03:44:46 PM
I've never really cared what eBay is/was "called." Rummage sale, flea market, collectibles source, person-to-person venue, mega-store, whatever. Sure, such terms can be descriptive at various times, or an easy handle, but they don't substitute for finding out what the actual experience is.
Personally, I saw eBay as two things: a place to find long out-of-production items, and a place to find in-production items that have very limited distribution.
If I had to describe what eBay was and still mostly is, this would be it: the place to discover hard-to-find items.
Nothing more, nothing less. This is still my reason for being on eBay, even now. I couldn't give an iota about the "bug guys" moving in, except for the fact that the way eBay has been paving their road has covered us with cookie crumbs, bugs, sometimes over-reaching VeROs (which has not affected me personally, but which I see discussed so often around AW), eBay Motors, competing ads, and DoubleClick.
I can still find the items I've always come to eBay for, but it's getting so much more annoying to do so. I can still find easier-to-find items at the local store or mall, so there's no draw to eBay for that stuff. I don't register at other ecommerce sites for that very reason (among others), and I'm fast losing interest in eBay too.
Call the eBay a combination flea market, rummage sale, antique shop, and auction house, if you will. I never found any of those terms prejorative (well, I never much cared for when my parents took us kids into antique stores, but that's ancient history), and don't know why eBay is seemingly fighting so hard to erase part of an image that actually attracted me to them, more from evidence than names such as the above.
I just thought of eBay as the place to discover hard-to-find items, where I could bid with ease, in and out without getting entangled in all sorts of unnecessary webs.
Of course, the marketers and direct marketers want to entangle you, but I don't work that way.
Speaking generally (i.e. not just eBay)... Earn my trust with good product and/or service, and I will keep returning of my own volition, faithful to a brand. Start bothering me too much with annoying hype, pushy salestalk, deceptive practices, and/or unnecessarily complicated processes, and I will soon flee, never to return.
eBay's fast transforming into the at least parts of the latter, and even if lots of good stuff remain, I am starting to reach a point where it is not worth wading through the junk eBay is throwing at me to get to the sellers who are putting out the stuff I came for in the first place.
Isn't there a saying, maybe related to love, about needing to set someone free before you can earn true faith?
Here, it's sort of the opposite. In the past, you register, but you were still free of all the nonsense, to come and go whenever you found great stuff (but keeping to rules when you did come to bid, of course). Now, they want to lock people in to "sticky" sites, but this form of stickiness only makes me feel like some sort of virtual prison is closing in on all sides. Okay, my metaphor is running beyond what I really feel, but the point is still there.
eBay was "sticky" to me before, by being such a clean interface to get bidding done with dispatch, I found it compelling to keep coming back every week and often even almost every day. Now, in trying to get "sticky" through all this new junk since, I find I don't even want to come visit much any more.
Now, with eBay getting so annoying, I'm finding it more enjoyable to root around "real life" antique stores, rummage sales, flea markets, and the like, to take little "day trips" or explore around when I'm already somewhere away from home.
I'm not "trailer trash" (whatever the heck that even means in the first place), but I love straight-forward antique shops, rummage sales, and flea markets. Come, stop by and browse, maybe you'll find some things you like, thank you, please come again.
The old eBay was all this with a national and international range. The range is still there, but it is losing the clean -- dare I even say "human" (well, at least welcoming and polite) -- feeling it used to have.
Maybe I'm finally realizing that there was something of "community" (or something resembling it). I got on board in late 1998, I think, but maybe that was long enough to get that sense.
I shop in other stores too, and get along just fine as a consumer (just don't push me too much, or you'll push me out the door ), but not online. In this age of ever intense direct marketing, and all the annoying stuff done in its name, eBay was a welcome online respite, and thus became the only place I registered to shop online at.
Well, now I'm fast losing interest. If they become truly successful with their new model, then kudos to them. I just won't care a whole lot by then, except perhaps from a distance.
I think I'm a successful consumer because I can sense when things are afoot that will cause me problems down the road, and perhaps that's why I've never been ripped off. I'm getting a lot of worrisome waves off eBay now, and I have to believe it's for good reason.
That's just my opinion, though.
----
What's being done in the name of direct marketing nowadays is crazy.
The above are all just my opinions, except where I cite facts as such.
Oh, I am not dc9a320 anywhere except AW. Any others are not me.
Is eBay is changing from a world bazaar into a bizarre world?
posted on September 8, 2000 04:12:00 PM a. when DISNEY started producing their own NEW collectibles, they gutted the vintage Disney market that was THRIVING before they started making all the new 'collectible' stuff.
b. Topps, through overproduction of series after series of cards likewise GUTTED the sports card market in the mid to late 80's.
c. And I am supposed to be infuriated with eBay????
Hey, if you are concerned about both a. and b. -- and if you believe that in the U.S.A., much less in the world at large, that COMPETITION will NOT be magnetically attracted to ANY popular sellable -- well, then we certainly view the world differently.
Neither Amazon NOT Barnes & Noble have ANY control over the future of bookselling -- all NEW kewl books will be self-published and available 24/7 on eBay.
posted on September 8, 2000 04:16:28 PM
I mean, really! eBay has already signed an agreement with a dot.com b2b to sell batches of liquidated mdse to eBay sellers who are interested in buying same - to re-sell on eBay individually.
I mean, really! Didcha ever think that sumthin' like amazon.com was gonna try to buy all the liquidated mdse SO THAT THEY COULD AUCTION IT OFF THEMSELVES????
And you are trying to convince me that going to a mediocre secondary substandard online """"auction"""" will be g00d for my microbusiness?
I mean, really! I spose you'd prefer that eBay just sat back and said something like, "oooH! ooooH! Look at that meanie amazon.com trying to undercut our sellers and HOG alla their mdse sources.
"Meanie!"
"Not Fair!"
eBay doesn't have time nor professional inclination to dwell in such maudlin sentimentality.
If you think that conditions ain't gonna get much more extreme and outre over the next few years, as the entire planet gets wired, then you are in for a shock.
I am gonna stay with the Premier Online Auction House - as that's the safe spot for a post-Modernday Non-Luddite to be.
Now..... if eBay would ONLY bring back Skippikins...
posted on September 8, 2000 04:25:51 PMRadh, you have spent weeks relentlessly bashing eBay, and now apparently you are carrying their banner and putting down anyone else who complains. Your formula for successful sales on eBay - to become "comfortably familiar with a state of organized CHAOS" - has put me in a coma. Please get your story straight.
posted on September 8, 2000 05:12:22 PM
twinsoft: LOL! I think I spent longer than a mere two weeks going *bonkers* over eBay!!
Indeed, I was distraught, as truly -- how can ya possibly ruin an idea like eBay??? LOL!
twinsoft, the rate of CHANGE is exponentially increasing, each & every nanosecond, and those individuals who comprise the owners of the successful microbusinesses earning lotsa money at eBay will be those who understand that adaptation to an ever increasingly changing set of selling conditions will be of paramount importance.
I seriously did NOT understand what eBay was doing with the co-brands, and in my online research was shocked to find no analyses of either the co-brands, nor really of MICROBUSINESS.
smw assisted me and gave me a great URL in another messagethread about how alla the big phat corporations don't stand a chance against alla the superb itsy bitsy micro-eBizzes.
Once I finally, at long last, figured out what it was that eBay was attempting to execute, then a whole buncha other stuff became obvious to me, too.
eBay is far and away many years in advance of all other ecommerce. They plan for the future, as they ARE the future, LOL
posted on September 10, 2000 10:26:15 AM
twinsoft: incidentally, that phrase, "organized chaos" is, I believe, from a book I examined briefly the other night entitled, "The End of Competition."
[ edited by radh on Sep 10, 2000 05:13 PM ]
posted on September 10, 2000 10:38:28 AM
It sure looks like yahoo is the place to park and sell items.. gettin bigger and ebay has had their fling. There just might be another to go to but wont know till november.
You know how many auction sites have gone goodbye since jan. 1st? I know of 5 so that means there must of been 10.
posted on September 10, 2000 01:44:30 PM
Somewhere some company is reading, learning and planning a great Auction House on the net. Could be anyone... can't wait to see who it is.
posted on September 10, 2000 05:17:34 PM
Yo, BeeeTLe!
Yours was a particularly nasty remarK, but truly par for the course for the EO at AW, which makes Usenet look like a formal Sunday Tea.
All sortsa people who used to post here, never do so any more, as they were, imo, run off the boards whenever they made ANY positive comment about eBay.
Indeed, this board does not resemble 99.9 percent of online chatboards, because it is 98% ALL negative and nasty.
Who wants to predict what MONTH there will be a full-fledged excellent REPUTABLE magazine article about eBay......with an analysis of WHY eBay succeeds, and that EVEN ALLA THE NEWSPAPER MONEY didn't make auctions.com, now defunct, successful?
dman3: here is an article which i think will really interest you. sorry it took me so long to find it again in my bookmarks.
i seriously believe that until eBay declares a TOTAL PRIVACY COMMITTMENT, that NO eBiz anywhere is gonna attract the Upscale Consumer - the individuals I know in RL who'd fit this moniker are appalled with the things they read about doubleclick, malicious viruses, cyberstalkers, online fraud, etc, etc - but particularly the PRIVACY FACTOR repels them.
posted on September 11, 2000 09:12:42 AM
rnr mused, "I also interpret the end of the Fortune article differently than you do. You see it as Wall Street affirming ebaYs current course, I see it as Wall Street being on to the next thing hence the basic stall in ebaYs srock price."
~ ~ ~
eBay's stock price is being discussed in another current messagethread, which I believe was started by Reston Ray, wherein he asked WHY eBay stock HAD GONE WAY UP IN SUCH A SHORT PERIOD OF WEEKS...
Wall Street is NOT concerned about a group of microbusinesses leaving eBay. I am. Simply because I do NOT want them being misled into believing that any of the secondary substandard online "auctions" have ANY concern or care about them, much less any money to provide decent services.
My experience at amazon auctions had a very deleterious effect upon my mini-microbusiness and my health, and I certainly do not want any people, especially with CHILDREN putting themselves into precarious circumstances or dangerous predicaments due either to Ros' stellar analysis of stock market trends, or Bobby's analysis of history.
This decade will make the first 30 years of the Industrial Revolution look like a bucolic romantic idyllic time for the families who were wrenched from agrarian conditions and turned into factory slaves who eventually brought modern conditions about.
Some venture capitalists believe that alla this Internet ecommerce looKs like Tulipomania, others claim that it parallels the railroads, and mE, I feel like I am looking in one of the windows of one of the very first factories powererd by steam, and saying omigawd, this is gonna be ROUGH - but since it leads to revolutions in science and medicine and technology which benefit the Community of Humanity at large, well then, lettuce get on with History.
posted on September 11, 2000 09:25:31 AM
Until ebonkers get their function and designs down, (as well as UP TIME UP), it's eforbes news will come to pass.....Who'll care if they are selling mega deals on their site if it's not helping those that made ebonkers famous and rich... ~Really, who'll care? Stock holders will simply be left holding the bag when sellers leave for greener pastures and the buyers follow. So long e-schlong!
posted on September 11, 2000 09:35:42 AM
This article foresees a WIRELESS future to the Net, and posits that dot.coms like amazon and eBay will not be competitive; however, it is my impression that the brains behind TPTB at eBay have been on top of such concerns as addressed here, for quite some long time, and consequently, I draw a different conclusion than the author.
America Offline
By Don Tapscott and David Ticoll
"If North America won the first round of the Internet innovation sweepstakes, Europe and Asia are winning the second round hands down."
posted on September 12, 2000 05:51:55 PM
from fortune: "It's these new revenue streams that analysts are nowfocused on. Wall Street has already marched on."
Rosalyn: The Fortune article
is now online. I have absolutely
NO idea how you interpreted
the final statements as you did. On teevee, CEO Whitman herself stated the "CORE Collectibles" are only a tiny liddle fraction of sales, (and thus resulting revenues) at eBay.
Beanie Baby Walkout: Rebel Sellers Yank Items From eBay
"eBay is unmoved. 'We realize that from time to time new services create conflict,' says a spokesman. 'Our attempt is to balance the best interests of the buyers and the sellers.' And the investors: In the past six months eBay has purchased fixed-price exchange Half.com, forged an alliance with used-car site AutoTrader.com, and moved into the business-to-business market. It's these new revenue streams that analysts are now focused on. Wall Street has already marched on."
=======>> "It's these new revenue streams that analysts are nowfocused on. Wall Street has already marched on."
posted on September 13, 2000 09:42:54 AM
toyranch counseled, "ebaY has a plan, and Meg told me the plan herself. The plan is to sign advertising deals, giving big business name brands a higher level of exposure on ebaY. Then ebaY brings in millions of extra dollars and they can use that money to advertise and promote ebaY."
~ ~ ~
From what I've personally observed of CEO Whitman's business plans, I suspect that it would be very safe to predict that this plan will be well executed.
eBay is an cyber-anomaly, nowadays, being the only group of Net-Billionaires who genuinely care about the vox populi and the horrendous competition which faces micro-eBiz, which constitutes the heart and soul of eBay.
Our Enemy is NOT eBay, but rather alla the BigFat eBiz and offline megacorporations who want OUR customers.
Our enermy will try anything to hurt eBay, because hurting eBay maims the ONE & ONLY ONLINE AUCTION HOUSE WHO CARES ABOUT US.
Just look at the BILLIONS of dollars of free merchandise being given away by the competition of eBay!
However, I still suspect that Bezos has a surprise in store, and that his comment that amazon.com would get together with Microsoft and Yahoo to crush eBay will not merely fail, but have consequences he did not ever foreseen when they looked upon alla us as trailer trash conducting a cybergarage sale.
eBay is unassailable.
eBay is UNSTOPPABLE.
eBay is US - and the brains that strategize and run eBay will be victorious, as they are genuinely concerned about US, the collective hoard of microbusinesses that threaten the tradition superiority of big fat American Korperations.
), but not online. In this age of ever intense direct marketing, and all the annoying stuff done in its name, eBay was a welcome online respite, and thus became the only place I registered to shop online at.