posted on December 16, 2000 08:16:07 PM new
OK, NOW they've pissed me off. EBay now is running ads for BMG Direct Music club as banner ads on pretty much any eBay search using the word 'CD' in it. The ad reads 'Free CDs!' A click of the banner brings you off eBay's site and over to BMG's site, where you are invited to join a club and get your music CDs for 'Free'.
This type of advertising seems completely contrary to eBay's previously stated policy of not advertising through banner bads competing products. This type of ad is MUCH worse, IMO, then the Ken Griffey advertising banners used several months ago that caused a ruckus here on Auction Watch.
Yes, I realize I sell CDs on eBay and I have a vested interest in this argument, but JEEZES this is crummy! I'm interested in seeing how eBay explains this one.
posted on December 17, 2000 08:22:31 AM new
FWIW....I can understand the frustration (and eBay betrayal) with the banners tied to searches....BUT, I was shopping eBay last night for CD's, saw the "FREE CD's" banner....after the 6th or 7th search where the banner popped up each time, I actually clicked on it.....Once there I couldn't believe that it was one of those 12 CDs for 1 penny (or whatever) deals!...Geez, I'm a middle aged woman (sigh) and those clubs have been around since I was too young to even join!....I have/will never join one of those clubs....when I want CD's, I'll make my selections on my own & I'll buy them in my own time ....NOT a selection a month!...EEK!.....I ROFLMAO'd, then returned to eBay shopping!..
posted on December 17, 2000 01:43:49 PM new
Personally, I ignore all banner ads. They hardly bother me and I pretend they aren't there. Very rarely do I ever click on one.
I think that having banner ads on Ebay is a total conflict of interest. You are trying to sell on there, and yet someone else is trying to sell to you. Ebay ends up profiting from both venues. It's not fair. I can see where the ads would be applicable if the Ebay service was free, but it's not...they make millions in aution fees. I wonder how much revenue they make from the ads. The industry trend shows that the clicks and impressions are going down slowly, so they should just do away with them now...actually a long time ago...IMHO.
posted on December 17, 2000 03:55:02 PM new
I to can understand the upset about this type of add comeing up in searches of ebay if they want to deal with these companys they should run the bannrs and the ads right on there front page like yahoo and other sites and not compete with the auction sales.
rancher24
These clubs have indeed been around for ever I remember them from when I was young too when I was a teen I Went for one of these deals when they offered like 12 to 20
8 tracks records or tape for a penny to a dime and then sent you a seclection monthly if you didnt order your required Item.
But the news is these clubs no longer work this way they dont send you anything you dont order they simply give you up to 4 years to buy 4 more cds or tapes at there price in between that time they send you specail offers to buy at special prices I have seen offers of CDs and tapes for as little as .99 each you can order unlimted number of these great deal but you have to watch which clubs you buy from one give great prices on there cds like this but charge you upwords of $32 shipping for the 12 CDs so you really pay $32.01 This averages out to just a bit over $3 per CD these CDs are not from this year but cds released from 1995 to 1998 and can be bought at walmarts for $2.50 to $3.50 all you really save is the sales tax if you dont live in there state.
posted on December 17, 2000 06:47:25 PM new
amalgamated, it's actually eerie (and disheartening, in a way) how little we hear from eBay. Yes, I am told we are eBay's largest volume sellers (number of completed transactions), and it does appear, when we have a problem, that the people we 'talk' to are aware of us or recognize our name.
Still, for example, I see our feedback has locked up again all weekend. You see, we receive and give so many feedbacks that we are constantly being 'locked up' on ebay. We can't give, we can't receive and, most importantly, potential customers cannot review our feedback history, which we are quite proud of. It has been 48 hours since we contact eBay's powerseller group (who forwarded our request to their 'engineers'), but nothing has happened as of a couple of hours ago when I last checked. (By the way, the suggestion we had several months ago to prevent this problem was to 'post less feedback', or post it 'more slowly'. This is similar in tone to the response to our complaints re: slow and inoperative Mr. Lister postings a couple of months back. Then we were told we were using it too much and that the program was not designed for very large volume sellers.)
FYI, I emailed my outrage to the powerseller group at ebay re: the banner ads. They said they would forward my complaint to the 'development department', but that all banner ads were being used with reciprocal arrangements of some kind: the sites you were drawn off ebay to visit were in-turn advertising eBay on their sites.
I pointed out in a follow-up email that I found no banner ad or suggestion on the BMG Direct site suggesting potential customers should visit eBay to buy their CDs there instead. This email was acknowledged without response.
I could KINDA understand the half.com banner ads on eBay, but the BMG Direct banners perplex me. Doesn't BMG Direct's enrollment contract forbid you from selling CDs on eBay that you buy from BMG? I wonder if this is tied into it somehow.
posted on December 17, 2000 08:56:22 PM new
Interesting the amount of outcry the banner ad fiasco originally generated here. Spaz's thread about half.com only modest response. This thread, still the same topic of targeted banner adverstising, is largely ignored. 'Guess eBay has finally gotten us to swallow the nasty medicine.
posted on December 17, 2000 10:09:48 PM new
Actually it becomes a lesson on futility. ebaY is going to do what ebaY wants to do, and no matter what promises we wring from them, we KNOW they are not going to honor them. It is always just a matter of time until they go back on thier word. The difference is that folks have really started to acknowledge it and that is why ebaYs listings have been slowly but steadily decreasing, and Yahoos have been slowly but steadily increasing (despite their credit card requirements and listings limits). It is why tools like those provided by SmoothSale.Com will eventually replace much of ebaYs business. ebaY had it ALL and appear to be bent on self destruction or at least a short term take the money and run philosophy. The wise seller adapts and moves on. Using a tool like SmoothSale's can help you move your buyers with you and get them to start looking elsewhere. -Rosalinda
TAGnotes - daily email synopsis about the Online Auction Industry http://www.topica.com/lists/tagnotes
posted on December 18, 2000 02:26:53 AM new
Please... Smoothsale stinks. I have used Smoothsale and was not at all impressed. It solves nothing. Primarily it does not solve the problem of getting customers, which is what draws us all to eBay. eBay has the buyers. And lately Yahoo. If there is anything as a seller you can do right now to level the auction playing field it would be to list to Yahoo, and maybe then Amazon.
I just did a search for "Sting CD" and up came the BMG ad. It's just wrong. They would have never got to where they are today without us sellers. And if they had done something like this in the early days they would have driven many of us elsewhere. Maybe Yahoo would be the big boy now if they'd done that.
eBay has enough money to buy any ads they need, anywhere they want.
OneCentCds. You wanna get results. Take and put 1/2 of your listings on Yahoo for the next week. Put your money where your mouth is and you'll see eBay with their tail between their legs in now time flat! If anyone can do it, it's you.
posted on December 18, 2000 04:07:11 AM new
Hmmm. I used to belong to BMG but I quit because I could get CD's cheaper on eBay and not be charged the ridiculous shipping fees places like BMG charges! After I quit, they called constantly asking us to join again. I would usually hang up before they got into their "why did you quit" speech. Finally before hanging up I told them I quit because I could get CD's cheaper on eBay than I can through their club. I hung up before giving them a chance to reply (then realized I should have waited to hear their response) NOW their banners are showing up on eBay's site.
Jereth: I feel bad for you and for us all that these banners are taking away potential bids. I hope you can get something done to stop it. May not be any consolation, but I would bid on a CD from you ANYDAY than from one of those clubs.
posted on December 18, 2000 04:26:36 AM new
Get used to the competition folks, because the only way eBay can meet its revenue projections is by bringing in huge retailers.
If eBay's revenue growth stalls or the large retailers don't create a huge boost to revenue, eBay will be $8 a share in a year.
posted on December 18, 2000 05:44:22 AM new
I'm sure that the main topic of discussion at eBay board meetings is how to better serve the buyers and sellers that use the site.
Now and then, though, the subject of making more money must inevitably arise. I'll bet some young MBA type took a look at the numbers and noticed the huge number of CD listings.
Could eBay afford to buy BMG? Would they, if it meant a bigger bottom line? You bet!
posted on December 18, 2000 06:08:16 AM new
reamond - To modify what you said - The investment bankers are only interested in eBay if it can meet those revenue projections. The big retailers are the only way management sees of reaching those goals but they will not. The stock will be under $10 in 6 months. The minute they had to meet outside expectations instead of serving their customer base they sealed their doom as an investment vehicle. I can see them hitting dead bottom reorganizing and coming back on a growth curve that will follow the globalization of the internet if anyone is smart enough to direct the company along those lines after it goes bust. If it's assets are toatlly broken up and dispersed it will not happen and Yahoo will be #1.
posted on December 18, 2000 07:02:20 AM new
gravid- we're on the same page, but I would disagree that "serving their customer base" even in a most exemplary manner would accomplish their revenue projections. eBay is a garage sale and it has just about peaked in growth for a garage sale. I would say that its present size is about as big as a garage sale can get and maintain a sustainable sales base for the millions of sellers. I would also presently estimate that eBay loses as many sellers per day as it might gain, that is, there seems to be new sellers, but no new products. For this reason I believe that growth in sellers will remain nuetral or begin to fall off.
posted on December 18, 2000 09:01:42 AM newOneCentCds. You wanna get results. Take and put 1/2 of your listings on Yahoo for the next week.
I'm a big fan of Yahoo, but I just don't think this will work. Clearly, Marie's business model is based on multiple bidders. If she moved auctions to Yahoo, many would actually end up selling for 1 cent. Not good business.
And even if you did featured auctions, I'm not sure it would work, at least on a very large scale.
But just in case, I hope Marie took advantage of Yahoo's deal to convert Ebay feedback to featured dollars. 30 grand or so in featured fees would go a long way.
posted on December 18, 2000 09:36:16 AM new
Has anyone even seen an exchange ad? Meaning, I thought eBay was bringing in DoubleClick partially so eBay ads could be served up at other sites. Anyone see an eBay ad at other sites, especially the "competitive" ones?
If so, they are spending at least some of the incoming revenue of ads on eBay pages on outgoing expenses for eBay ads on other sites. If not, well, what happened to their "oh, we're just trying to bring in more buyers" type of argument (paraphrased, because I no longer have their actual words on hand)?
I just got finished observing, in another thread (http://www.auctionwatch.com/mesg/read.html?num=2&thread=302041), that the "window of ignorance" of eBay's existence seems very small to start with, meaning that once someone gets online, it isn't long before they're aware of eBay by means other than banner ads -- if they aren't already aware of eBay before getting online. This is something many dying dot-coms would desperately want. I really don't understand how banner ads are supposed to enhance eBay's presence in any significant way, if the "window" I mentioned is already so small.
All that said, regardless of that aspect of the banner ads, I think the competing banner ads are the worst, and seem like a conflict of interest to me. eBay's customer base is still largely its sellers, and the more buyers those sellers could attract, the happier everyone was. Now, eBay seems to be going in several directions at once, some seemingly at odds. Yes, banner ads as a whole get poor clickthrough, but even then, there is some assumption of them actually being used by enough people to make them "worth it."
There are lots of other ads that could be used in the place of competing ads. Stuff that you can't buy on eBay (plane tickets, house hunting, mortgage, etc. ), for example, but that can be shown to eBay's immense audience.
The fact that Marie, apparently one of eBay's biggest "traditional" (so to speak) customers, gets poor responses to inquiries doesn't seem to bode well for "traditional" customers, IMO.
----
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 December 18, 2000 10:08:22 AM new
FWIW BMG charges shipping fees for all the FREE CDs and you do have to buy so many CDs at a regular price complete with the shipping fees and sales tax. The selection is not very broad or current.
I have bought a lot of CDs from many sources; you have to know your prices and what's out there. I find eBay a good source for CDs.
I wouldn't worry about BMG stealing away customers from Marie, but I agree that you really don't want to have bidders being whisked off eBay.
A subsidiary of eBay entered into a service contract with a related party
whereby the subsidiary agreed to provide services with respect to the design of
the related party's system. The related party remitted payment totaling $1.5
million to the subsidiary of which $35,000 was treated as a cost reimbursement
for product development expenses, and the remainder was accounted for as income.
Both amounts are included in the accompanying consolidated statement of income.
eBay purchased shares representing a beneficial interest of less than five
percent of a company affiliated with a director of eBay. In connection with the
transaction, eBay received a warrant that would, if exercised, increase eBay's
beneficial interest to less than ten percent of the company. eBay recorded the
investment at cost. Separately, eBay entered into a commercial agreement whereby
eBay provided approximately $510,000 of advertising services to the related
party. The amount is included in the accompanying consolidated statement of income
eBay had also entered into an agreement whereby eBay purchased shares
representing a beneficial interest of less than five percent of a company
affiliated with a director of eBay. Additionally, eBay received a warrant that,
if exercised, eBay's beneficial interest would remain at less than five percent.
eBay recorded the investment at cost. Separately, eBay entered into a commercial
agreement whereby eBay provided approximately $600,000 of advertising services
to the related party. The amount is included in the accompanying consolidated
statement of income.
In a commercial agreement entered into with a company that is affiliated
with a director of eBay, eBay recorded approximately $2.6 million in income
relating to advertising services. eBay also entered into an agreement whereby
eBay purchased shares representing less than one percent of the related party's
total shares outstanding. Additionally, eBay received a warrant that, if
exercised, its beneficial interest would remain at less than one percent."
END QUOTE
I especially like the part in the second paragraph about the reciprocal services provided to the companies that have appointed eBay execs to their Board Of Directors (with compensation) and in return get the advantage of using the eBay site for their advertising. Isn't there a name for this practice?
I think it's obvious where eBay's priorities lay. You just can't ignore the money
posted on December 18, 2000 11:37:14 AM new
And I think SmoothSale is great! Since you can put your SmoothSale chat button on all your ebaY (and other) auctions you can convert your bidders and lookers into buyers on your SmoothMarket Shop. According to USA Today the sell/chat is the movement of the future - the direction future etailing will take. I agree - and SmoothSale brings that sell/chat feature to us person to person sellers. It may not be for everyone, but it is an effective tool.
I also agree wholeheartedly that what ebaY is doing stinks. It might make them more money in the short term, but if they cared about having a long term business with regular growth - no matter how slow - they would not have abandoned their person to person model. It was what made them unique online - made them THE online profitable company. It is discouraging that we have no influence on ebaY, but we DO have ways to insure our online trading future.
posted on December 18, 2000 12:18:28 PM new
Another irony is that eBay has been one of the small minority of profitable dot-coms out there, yet seems bent on trying to eventually become all things to all people, something even Amazon hasn't made profitable yet, while all sorts of other dot-coms, who among them had a variety of models, are falling out of the sky left and right. Okay, I'm comparing apples to oranges to 747s while perhaps sounding like Chicken Little, but I still find it ironic, and wonder whether eBay should be cautious at this point or try mopping up the floor.
Blanche (bhearsch): Interesting filing, though I have to admit that such thick economist-speak sails about a thousand feet over my head, but besides the point you mentioned, am I correct in understanding that, at least with what is itemized by that filing, that eBay spent ~$1.1 million ($500,000 + 600,000) on advertising but had an advertising income of ~$4.1 million ($1.5M + 2.6M), minus whatever cost there was buying that less than 1% of the other company's shares thing mentioned at the very end? Any idea how complete is such a filing supposed to be (i.e. does this represent the majority of the third-party advertising income and costs for eBay)?
[ edited by dc9a320 on Dec 18, 2000 12:19 PM ]
posted on December 18, 2000 02:05:59 PM newIt might make them more money in the short term, but if they cared about having a long term business with regular growth...
Okay, let's get serious. Let's drop the notion of "what are they doing?" and "don't they realize?"
eBay has taken their top sellers, and placed a link at the top of the search to BMG, and a link at the bottom of the page to Half.com, after promising not to do so. eBay KNOWS very well no seller is going to accept that. eBay KNOWS they are DRIVING sellers away.
It's time we all picked our jaws up off the floor and realize that eBay simply doesn't want us any more. eBay has gone beyond seller-unfriendly and seems to be actively discouraging its customers. This latest banner policy is not an accident or a misunderstanding on eBay's part. It is intentional. The question remains, "why?"
posted on December 18, 2000 02:28:28 PM new
I think a careful reading of this thread and others does suggest a logical conclusion.
That being: eBay wants to eliminate the middleman and get into direct marketing. They have name recognition, a customer base, and the necessary predisposition to corporate greed. A casual search in almost any category will reveal a preponderance of everyday consumer items for sale. Losing the "garage sale" people is an inconsequential step along the way to becoming the Sears of the 21st Century.
All of this has been said before in bits and pieces but it does seem to make more sense the more it is examined in depth.
posted on December 18, 2000 03:16:22 PM new
I'll offer a somewhat different angle here. Meg "promised" Wall Street that Ebay would maintain 50% annual growth. Everybody working at Ebay stands to make more and more obscene amounts of money the longer its stock price can be kept up anywhere near where it is... tho I don't know the details, I'd bet most of their employees are vested with stock options and make serious money as a group every 6 months or year or so now as those securities are unlocked for them to cash in.
My guess, additionally: somebody looked halfway sanely at the prospects for Ebay to grow like that from "average Ebayers" and their featured auction fees, etc, and told Meg she was flippin off her nut. Oh oh sez Meg, what do I tell to all those analysts whose big investment houses and mutual funds have a PILE of our stock and will not be pleased if we don't give THEM time to get their clients out? First biggie like Fidelity or whoever really watches Ebay who feeds their stock OUT and can then offer sage investment advice like "This is a dog with fleas" will do so, and there go all those options.
Soooo.... they have to come up with "pretend" strategies so all the bag holders with a few thousand shares of Ebay stock will hold on thinking Ebay KNOWS how to make all that money Meg's promised. Then, when some of those sleazy Street analysts figure they'd buy Ebay stock at, oh, $5 a share when it's dropped to maybe $15 of its own weight, the parade of sage downgrades will come. I'll guess that'll be in a year or so.
posted on December 18, 2000 04:09:01 PM newthe parade of sage downgrades will come. I'll guess that'll be in a year or so.
I think there's a lot of great insight in this thread...
The sad thing is that if Ebay hadn't set out to conquer the world, they could easily have developed a fantastic, though smaller site that would still be one of the few dot coms actually making money. That would be a very enviable position right now.
posted on December 18, 2000 09:03:41 PM new
amalgamated2000 wrote: "I'm a big fan of Yahoo, but I just don't think this will work. Clearly, Marie's business model is based on multiple bidders. If she moved auctions to Yahoo, many would actually end up selling for 1 cent. Not good business."
Yes, so she should set up an Auctiva Showcase. www.auctiva.com/showcase
That's part of what makes it great. She could consistently list items on both eBay and Yahoo, and the search feature goes across all her items on both sites. And if she included the link in EOA's to buyers reminding them they can do a search of just her items there, and combine on shipping she could probably do ok. Perhaps the 50 cents per listing she pays to eBay could be used instead for featured fees on Yahoo. I dont know but I think of it as a good step. And some of the people on Yahoo even would end up buying things on eBay. It's really about getting more eyeballs on your auctions.
And yes, the featured fees would go a long ways. She could feature all of the items there for that week and a lot longer with her rating and build up a client base there.
I dont think the week would be about profit though. It would be about proving a point.
posted on December 18, 2000 09:24:31 PM new
Marie,
I bet that even if you haven't claimed the credit, if you talked to Yahoo they would grant it and probably help you publicize the move, even if it's just partial. Could be an interesting experiment...
