posted on September 2, 2000 01:39:28 PM EBay's Winning Bid/Hoaxes, fraud caseshaven't slowed 5-year-oldauctioneer's rapid rise
"'We´re going to stay focused on the person-to-person and small-business-to-person marketplace,´ Whitman said. `That´s what we do best and that´s what we´ll keep doing.´"
posted on September 2, 2000 02:31:12 PM
QUOTE From USA Today Article by D Kong - Indeed, the campaign could easily backfire. The company is determined to shake its image as the world's largest garage sale. EBay wants consumers to know that it has progressed beyond second-hand Beanie Babies and Barbies and become a destination for new and practical items, including electronics and computer hardware.
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So HUH??? On 30 Aug Meg says ebaY is going to dump its trailer trash person to person sellers - us - and on 31 Aug she says she is going to remain committed to PtoP and small business? Am I getting mixed messages here orr what!
I think it is well past time that ebaY has to WORK for its sellers - and the BEST way to make it do that is support the Million Auction March!!! -Rosalinda
TAGnotes - daily email synopsis about the Online Auction Industry
http://www.egroups.com/group/TheAuctionGuildnotes
Net auction powerhouse altering strategy, looks to TV campaign By Deborah Kong
USA TODAY
"...And as it faces tough new competitors, eBay has decided it must persuade a lot more people to sell and buy stuff on the site...
"The company is determined to shake its image as the world's largest garage sale. EBay wants consumers to know that it has progressed beyond second-hand Beanie Babies and Barbies and become a destination for new and practical items, including electronics and computer hardware. But if eBay comes across as tacky or tasteless, then it could destroy the charm it has for fanatics who consider it a trendy and close-knit club.
"...Whitman is undaunted by the marketing challenges...."
posted on September 2, 2000 03:39:59 PM
I think that the above article is absolutely SUPERB news.
I also believe that Swette and Whitman, together with the eBay marketing team can FIRMLY and proactively take charge of eBay's PUBLIC IMAGE by have eBay, itself, create television advertisements.
I predict that this is going to be a complete total $UCCE$$, and I believe that a whole new slew of bidders are gonna find, by year end, 2001 that they, too, have a "Net-addiction" to eBay.
I predict that these marketing experts will actually bring a significant percentage of the so-called Upscale Consumer --- something that NO previous e-AdCampagign has ever done, but since eBay is ONE-OF-A-KIND, unique & fun ~~~ not dull & boring & tedious & difficult to navigate like other websites, it should be pretty easy to sway 'em on over.
posted on September 2, 2000 04:05:18 PM
I agree that NOW is a great time to spend abit of money on decent advertisements. I haven't been happy with the job that Visa and ATT Wireless did portraying eBay in their ads.
Now, alotta that NOISE of dot-com this, dot-com that is finally abated.
I mean, geesH! All those dot-coms were, were a buncha online MAIL ORDER firms.
Ho hum.
aka: YAWN
eBay is exciting, and it should be FUN for a buncha creative marketers to create some STELLAR tv commercials about eBay.
posted on September 2, 2000 04:08:01 PM
In speaking of the previous ads, the journalist in the article referred to by ros mentioned that in the past, "EBay limits its full-page ads to niche magazines for collectors, such as Linn's Stamp News. It promotes itself at trade shows, such as Disneyana 2000 and the Long Beach Coin Expo, where members of the marketing team demonstrate how eBay works."
NOW, tell me HOW many collectors of ANYTHING do you know that do NOT know about eBay?????????????
EBay readies for airwave ad blitz
Net auction powerhouse altering strategy, looks to TV campaign
posted on September 2, 2000 04:59:11 PM
RADH - He is a Chocolate Lab and his name is Jack - a shame I had to ruin the picture I also have Mister - a White Lab, Lucre a golden labXgolden who looks like a Lab (and she was in EVERY pic but the one they used) and Sambuca a labXgolden who looks like a golden but is black. A lady walked into the vets office once when we had them in for their annuals, took one look and said - Whatsa matter - couldn't make up your mind what color you wanted???? Course I live in dog heaven - the pups have 100 acres and a 1/2 acre pond to play on.
I think ebaY is losing it's collective mind. They need to take every dollar they are spending on advertising and FIRST do what they should have done when Benchmark sent them that FIRST check - build an infrastructure that WORKS - not 90% of the time as this system does, but 99.9% - the online industry standard. Once they have an infrastructure that WORKS, then they can go out and expand and advertise to their hearts content. What they are doing now is screwing the sellers and screwing the sellers and screwing the sellers, and convincing us to not only take it and come back for more, but they have us buying our own KY jelly. When ebaY goes down, it is not EBAY who suffers, it is the seller who just lost the value their item would have sold for IF the system had been up. ebaY might (if the seller begs hard enough and I get enough nedia houndds after them) throw the seller the fees they were charged because the system didn't work, BUT they sure don't reimberse the seller for the lost value. They should offer the seller OUTAGE insurance. If the system is not 100% up in the last 3 hours of the auction the seller gets what the item is WORTH less what the high bidder buys it for. (This idea is hereby copyrighted 2000 all rights reserved RnRgroup- if you want to use it ebaY you will need to PAY me for it - call for my rates!)
They keep screwing the seller by going out in public and telling people that the sellers on ebaY are scam artists so the buyer BETTER use billpoint and iescrow in order to protect themselves from us villians.
They keep screwing the seller by selling us out to big corporations despite the once in a while claims that they support P to P. The Ken Griffey Ad sure proved that they speak with forked tongue.
Sorry RADH - the best thing that could happen to ALL us sellers would be for the Million Auction March to wildly succeed, and it would also be the best thing for ebaY if anyone at ebaY cares to have a long term future.
You think the folks at ebaY are right in what they do, I think they are absolutely wrong, and only time will tell.
it is very interesting how you and I both read eBoys and came away with diametrically opposite conclusions - but that is what makes life interesting. -Rosalinda
posted on September 2, 2000 05:59:21 PM
ros: I thought it was a stunning photo of you; I'd always imagined you in my mind's eye with lush thick long BLACK hair, though. And somehow I'd missed that PINEAPPLE fixation of yours - I'd luv to see a photo of how you display your collection. ANY chance of that occuring on your MyeBay Page, sometime, hint, hint?
So ya couldn't decide what COLOR lab to buy, lol, that's a great one. Jack is just gorgeous!
You mention in your post, "build an infrastructure that WORKS - not 90% of the time as this system does, but 99.9% - the online industry standard. Once they have an infrastructure that WORKS, then they can go out and expand and advertise to their hearts content."
~ ~ ~
I am very concerned about this latest set of down times, and particularly about the postings over at the geek site, wherein there was a link to an article alledging that the reason SUN had alla their customers sign strict non-disclosure agreements, was NOT to protect propietary info from competitors, but rather that SUN didn't want anyone to find out about their long term memory problem...
You might recall that back in Jan '99 I was ranting and raving about the ads running then -- as obviously the site & system was not ready for the exponential growth it experienced, so although I assure you that I share your logic, I am also very suspicious about how """QUIET""" this set of outages is, and therefore, I have to wonder if any hacking is involved, cuz I've read time and again, that when any such shennanigans are going on, that the FBI imposes a news BLACK OUT, due to the high incidence of copykat cybercrimes.
You propose, "They should offer the seller OUTAGE insurance. If the system is not 100% up in the last 3 hours of the auction the seller gets what the item is WORTH less what the high bidder buys it for. (This idea is hereby copyrighted 2000 all rights reserved RnRgroup- if you want to use it ebaY you will need to PAY me for it - call for my rates!)"
~ ~ ~
Well, I dunno if an IDEA can be copyrighted, ros, but I think your suggestion is excellent, and would luv to know what people in the insurance industry would think of such.
You close by saying, "it is very interesting how you and I both read eBoys and came away with diametrically opposite conclusions - but that is what makes life interesting."
~ ~ ~
Yeah, I LOVE that book, it would make a DYNAMITE movie, and really, it is pretty darn startling, cuz if I had hired the author to FIND OUT A FEW OF MY OWN MOST PERPLEXING QUANDARIES RE: EBAY --- he could not a done a better job; so help me, he focused on most of my questions, and then even answered a bunch I didn't have.
I have researched many many many online sales and auction venues, ever since I first came online back in '95, and I am NOT one liddle bit happy with the amount of time I spent researching online auction venues, as NOT ONE OF THEM IS COMPETITIVE TO EBAY.
Why?
It's NOT because they do NOT have the listings ---- THEY DO NOT HAVE THE LISTINGS, because they want eBay-type-PROFITS, without spending the money, time and resources mandated to create and maintain a worldclass online auction house.
And, ros, that is EGREGIOUS!
That there is a HUGE market for p2p sales, and people blame eBay for it, insteada looking at the jerks building these secondary mediocre sites, many of which have cost me TIME, and some of which seriously afflicted me financially.
Whadda waste.
Ya know, I've been offline most of the week; I'm very preoccupied with a tedious offline project, and what is really getting to me is something, although about eBay, it's a different subject.... to wit:
DO YOU BELIEVE THAT IT'S ONLY BEEN TWO YEARS SINCE THE IPO???
posted on September 2, 2000 09:09:33 PM
Say, here's a new article about SUN:
Sun prepares to debut UltraSPARC III
"Sun first confirmed memory problems involving its high-end servers last year. But following a highly publicized failure of Sun servers at eBay Inc. (eventually blamed on software) last summer, the company got customers experiencing server troubles to sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) that essentially prevented them from speaking out about their problems. The NDA move raises questions about how serious and widespread the server problems are..."
posted on September 2, 2000 11:11:42 PM
I read that sun article earlier today - and thought it said that the NDAs were ended this past spring - so why are they STILL being quiet?
I don't think Yahoo is doing a bad job, and Old and Sold has gotten quite a bit of attention even though it is a tiny site. There is definitely LOTS of work needed on many sites, and I do agree about the greed and easy money folks thought was going to flow into their coffers. There are always new folks with new ideas out there, and sooner or later someone will come along with a system that works better than ebaYs that is more user concerned and less exploitive. ebaY is not invincible, and I feel they are using up the things that made them great at a fabulous rate - they are just waiting for the better mousetrap to snap on their fingers. I for one hope to do my absolute best to insure that all the P to P sellers and buyers have viable options even if I have to drag some of those laggard companies along kicking and screaming At least I will try!!! -Rosalinda
I also have Mister - a White Lab, Lucre a golden labXgolden who looks like a Lab (and she was in EVERY pic but the one they used) and Sambuca a labXgolden who looks like a golden but is black. A lady walked into the vets office once when we had them in for their annuals, took one look and said - Whatsa matter - couldn't make up your mind what color you wanted???? Course I live in dog heaven - the pups have 100 acres and a 1/2 acre pond to play on.