posted on October 1, 2000 02:55:47 AM
Although eBay is great now that there are millions of auctions and millions of users, how did eBay keep the doors open in the first weeks, months and maybe first year that it was in operation? And I don't mean who paid the bills? I mean why did traffic increase? When you go to an auction site if there is nothing much on which to bid or if you post an item and there are few bids because there is no traffic, you don't come back. What kept eBay going in those early days? Why did users come back? Why did people post items if there were no users? Once eBay made the press, then traffic increased. But I'm talking about before that. Before eBay was a household word. Before eBay was a Wall Street darling. How did eBay get its first, say, 5000 users? In other words, how did eBay manage to reach critical mass?
If there is a "history of eBay" somewhere that covers this, I would appreciate the referral. "About eBay" on the site doesn't cover this.
posted on October 1, 2000 05:16:45 AM
eBay worked in the early days because it was a new concept and it was unique. It was run on a shoestring, out of Pierre's garage or whatever, and it wasn't intended to make money (he didn't charge anything at the beginning, the way I understand it). He created it to allow his girlfriend to sell and trade her Pez collection!
The site grew simply from word of mouth (I found it in the spring of 1997 from a posting in a newsgroup). Word spread about this great new site and it just kept growing and growing... and growing... and growing... into the monster it is today. New auction sites don't have the luxury of waiting long-term for their sites to grow. They have to be a hit IMMEDIATELY or they never will.
posted on October 1, 2000 05:20:12 AM
I would bet this is something that is not really documented. We need to hear from some of the early users. Who told you about eBay and what did you first list there and how did it sell? Did you buy something and why? Was it anything to do with personal interaction with the seller or site, or just that this was the item you wanted and a way to find it?
posted on October 1, 2000 05:28:56 AM
Exactly what Joanne said in that it was a new concept and unique. The reason other auction sites dont get the traffic is because they aren't operating on a new concept. They are working off of eBay's success. Just like television. Surivivor was a huge hit so the other networks "try" reality TV. Ditto with the game shows when Millionaire was a huge hit. You just gotta be the first new concept!
I discovered eBay in mid-1998 when I was collecting memorabilia about David Cassidy. Other fans mentioned eBay and how they found some great stuff. It's definitely word of mouth and again, something unique.
I would also like to hear from some beginners and get their stories!
posted on October 1, 2000 06:56:58 AM
I found Ebay in the summer of 1996 using a search engine. Typed in "auction" and Ebay popped up as the ONLY one!
Went to the site and was immediately impressed by the "community" feeling. Back in those days, Pierre posted regularly to the Ebay Cafe. If anyone had a complaint he was right there to try to help.
It grew because of word of mouth and subsequently the advertising Pierre did through banner ads. When AOL customers discovered Ebay, it was like opening the floodgates.
I am still amazed that Ebay has grown from a 486 in Pierre's basement to the monster it is today. Unbelievable!
posted on October 1, 2000 08:18:01 AM
My husband and I were referred to eBay by a
friend in December 1997. The friend was predominantly a buyer in a certain collectibles field, and thought we would enjoy that aspect of eBay as much as he did. Little did he realize that we saw eBay as a golden opportunity to get rid of a lot of the *stuff* sitting around our house that was too good to throw away or yard sale. It's been very interesting (and kind of sad) over the last 3 years to see eBay grow into the "thousand pound gorilla" it is now. We used to be able to sell almost everything we put up for incredible prices. Now there are several categories where competition is so severe that our items either don't get seen, or are in competition with so many similar items that bidding is 'way down. I think eBay worked better in the early days because a lot of collectors were going nuts buying on eBay to complete their collections. Now buyers are being less impulsive and more selective about what they purchase.
posted on October 1, 2000 08:46:42 AM
I too found Ebay in 1996 while searching 'auctions' Back then I could type 'jewelry' in the search page and get about 7 pages. Amazing huh?
posted on October 1, 2000 09:19:34 AM
I understand in the beginning users were on the honor system as far as paying FVFs. It wasn't automated; you had to mail your fees to Pierre. Incredibly, Auction Web was in the black almost from the very beginning.
When Pierre created that little site for the trade of Pez containers, he was tapping into a gargantuan market that, up til then, had gone undiscovered. In those early days, sellers were limited to 10 auctions at a time because the system was so small. As revenues increased (I seem to recall that they doubled every month), Pierre reinvested the $$ into better equipment, etc.
You might want to get the book eBoys. While not exclusively about ebay, there are plenty of interesting tidbits about Auction Web's early days.
And I'm sure radh will pop in shortly.
[ edited by fountainhouse on Oct 1, 2000 09:50 AM ]
posted on October 1, 2000 09:54:03 AM
I use to have Pierre's old e-mail address. I did a little searching at deja.com and I found some old newsgroup posts of his from the first year of ebay. He did a little spamming back in the early days!
posted on October 1, 2000 10:12:35 AM
THE EBAY LEGEND (AS I REMEMBER IT)
EBAY would do what it now forbids we users to do...
They would tell us (in the sell your item area) to go to AOL boards where
many of us were buying and selling to eachother and advertise Ebay and our items.
(Post messages with links)
We would list something on Ebay and then run over to AOL and post a link to as many boards in the collecting areas that we could find. Within minutes we had bids.
Ebay used AOL heavily for leads on buyers.
As luck would have it..word got out that AOL was shutting down the boards (as we knew them)
THUS EBAY capitalized on that and snatched AOL members as ongoing and repeat customers.
Without AOL... it might have been a slow building process. WITH AOL already established in the trading field...Ebay took off.
I have always said AOL management was off the mark. The boards had literally thousands of postings...they should have seized that opportunity..but did not. Instead they shut them down...tisk tisk.
Soon afterwards Pierre asked us what catagories should be listed, how ..why etc etc.
Oh yeah baby..we helped that little french guy so much in the early days.
And when he went public...we were not initially allowed to purchase stock. Such a crime ....since we built the city.
AND THATS THE WAY IT WAS
posted on October 1, 2000 10:40:36 AM
Zeenza is exactly correct. I was one of the first early registered users on ebay. Prior to that AOL had very active antique and collectible boards. When ebay came on the scene, the board listings turned into mostly links or "come see" this auction posts. AOL permitted it unlike other posts for personal or commercial websites. AOL's antique and collectible boards are not close to their original activity. AOL was used for free advertising not only for the individual auction but for ebay itself. AOL had a primary, active role in making eBay what it is today, intentional or not.
posted on October 1, 2000 11:05:22 AM
I came to ebay in November of 1997, I had a friend who was a big Frankoma collector, all he had was web based email and need ISP mail to register. I let him use my email for a few months before I started. Back then there was 2 pages listed in Frankoma, and everything went out of site. Same thing in the Coin and Currency categories, I used to collect Civil War Currency and it was the ebst fun. Seemed like everyone knew everyone else. Now, when I go through my earliest feedback most of those people are no longer selling or are NARU'd. I noticed they started dropping off about a year and a half ago. The new ebay is not nec. better, I would trade what I have now for what I had 3 years ago. Heather
posted on October 1, 2000 11:20:50 AM
I actually found out first about the now defunct Auction Universe. This was the first online auction site, and had way more advertising than eBay.
Why eBay beat AU, I don't know.
posted on October 1, 2000 11:34:25 AM
Here's an early (Jan 96) email from Pierre to the gang, mentioning perhaps his first price increase (it's only a dollar!):
posted on October 1, 2000 11:54:40 AM
Thanks to all who have posted so far. I actually posted this message first at eBay, but got only one response. I posted in it in Town Square; maybe that was the wrong place. I also chnaged the titled when I posted here. It was: "How Did eBay Reach Critical Mass."
Someone mentioned that Auction Universe predated eBay. If that's so, part and parcel of answering the question why eBay worked, would be why Auction Universe didn't. I appreciate all your responses.
You pose a great question and one that comes to me when I click on an auction site that has everything except listings.
In my case I collect a particular item, an item where 99% of what is available are of no interest. I used to do an occasional web search for my item and every now and then one would turn up on whatever the name was before ebay and then early ebay. The listings were always for the uninteresting 99% Then in 1998 a search brought up a great item that had sold at a bargain price. That is when I decided to rush over to ebay and register. I got picked up by the rolling snowball.
Can it happen again? Maybe at a niche site or maybe with a huge investment. Possibly someone with more imagination than me will think of a great new angle. I am unwilling to rule it out. I remember Ticketron in the 1970's. Everyone thought that getting in first and obtaining market dominance would guarantee the failure of upstart competitors. They may still be laughing at TicketMaster.
posted on October 1, 2000 09:24:39 PM
A dealer friend of mine told me about ebay in the summer of 1996, not long after I got a computer and logged on and started selling, I didn't have a camera or a scanner at the time, just described everything in great detail and got lots of email inquiries because of lack of photos, but I still sold just about everything I listed, I think it was called auction web or something then, the list of categories was extremely short, the list of featured auctions was only about 2 pages if I recall correctly compared to the thousands there are now. I too started out getting rid of everything that I had FOREVER and couldn't sell in my area of the country, the response was incredible because I think it was a great idea that was waiting to happen, it linked buyers and sellers as never before in history, all in the comfort of our own homes, what could be easier? I know I didn't have to register a credit card to pay ebay, I just sent them a check once a month with no questions asked. You also knew all the customer service reps by name, there were only about three of them, Andrew, Louise and Dale that I remember.
posted on October 1, 2000 09:29:16 PM
PS: Auction Universe came after ebay, it was affiliated with a huge newspaper chain that had a large paper in my area, they called me and a lot of other ebay sellers and offered us a deal to sell on Auction Universe, free listings for a year,free ads in our local paper, free listings in their dealer directory,etc, however they didn't offer any customer support and were extremely strict as to the amount of listings and when you could list them, they made a big mistake by not trying to work with the sellers
posted on October 2, 2000 01:27:28 AM
I started listing with eBay a couple of years ago and sales were great. The strong sales lasted for approximately 6 months and then fell off dramatically. I kept listing for another 6 months while sales and prices continued to decline and finally gave up on eBay and switched to Yahoo. Too many sellers on eBay trying to liquidate everything in 3 to 5 days.
posted on October 2, 2000 01:59:49 AM
I found a $2000 software package at Goodwill for $30. Alas, it was for Mac, not PC. I heard about eBay (it was called Auction Web then) that same week on C|NET's TV.com television show. I put the items up for sale and got $450 for them.
I wasn't one of the very first, but one of the early users. Featured auctions (all 50 of them) were right on the main page. There was a live support board, headed up by Malcolm and you could get a REAL answer to your question in about 15 minutes. I especially enjoyed chatting it up on "Late Night with Brigette" with the other regulars on the support board during the midnight shift.
I don't know about other categories, but I think one of the big draws was the $20 copies of Microsoft Office that could be had back then. Then it turned out there was some licensing issue and Microsoft stepped in big time.
Any time eBay went down, or even partially down, they would post a note on the Announcements Board stating, "if you feel your auctions were materially affected, you can write to [email protected] for a refund."
I think there were different types of sellers and buyers back then. Now there are a lot of "pros" and scam artists selling. And a lot of grandmas who think they're shopping at Macy's, and a lot of deadbeats. There was a lot more responsibility on the part of both sellers and buyers.
posted on October 2, 2000 04:53:28 AM
A couple of years ago you could sell anything and really as much as you wanted to transport to customers.
Now, business is more of a commercial nature - better sellers and inventory selections.
We now have a lot of third party service providers that are only in the market as a result of ebay... auctionwatch is a good example.
We also have paypal...nothing but an idea without ebay...
Ebay has a tremendous coat-tail with a lot of riders making money. Ebay is a great profit center but, it has changed to a commercial market and not a community.
It's like auction watch's article on their home page about costs of doing business on ebay. The remarks are a basic warmup for Aw fees and the continued effort to explain paypal from free to 1.9% + two bits.
These are coat-tail ideas and companies that cannot afford to operate within any advertising model - they have to charge if, they are too survive.
They cannot seem to isolate a simple idea into a profit center.
If, auction watch and paypal just said...
Sellers = $10.00 per year unlimited use.
They could stop staying up late worrying about I.PO's as they would take in a few million honest dollars.
greg
I too found eBay in the summer of 1996. Bought some memory for a PC I was building and instantly saw the potential.
If you've got Adobe Acrobat and want to read a bit about the early days, you might check out the ezine I published beginning in January 1997. There are four editions and they detail some of the community aspects. One of the more interesting is the third edition as it detailed growth from Nov. 1996 through March 1997.
The following links are to the Adobe Acrobat based zines. Most are in the 600-700kb range and the third (largest at 65 printable pages) is right at 1 MB. I would recommend right-clicking and downloading the zine and reading it from your hard drive. It is formatted to be viewed on your PC with internal links/etc. although you could print it out.
The folks at eBay liked it so much they were passing around my articles to potential investors. I know because that is how the newspaper folks found me. They also bonused me some of the $14.95 showcase auctions for my zine
Auctionland Online Report was the first online auction ezine and covered not only eBay, but the early days of OnSale and other emerging dynamic pricing models.
I do have to disagree with raglady a bit on the 'history' of auctionuniverse.com.
Auctionuniverse.com started in California by the folks who do coin grading and now do collectors universe. It was bought by the newspapers in the summer of 1997 and did not restrict listing times (In August 1997 eBay was restricting listings at that time because their system was strained to the max. They had some other issues and actually changed-over their system from Auctionweb to eBay that fall.)
Auctionuniverse charged roughly the same amount as eBay for listings and we had a lot of advertising. We gave users a $25 credit to list but we were requiring that users give us a credit card to list because we were trying to avoid the fraud issues we saw getting out of hand on eBay. (NPB's, shill bidding, etc.)
Anyway, because we transitioned from the software of the old (California) auctionuniverse in November 1997, we only had about 1500 listings when we launched. This compared to eBay's 40-50,000 going into Christmas 1997. Our adveritising helped popularize eBay and the net-savvy folks saw us, liked the idea and then went to yahoo and searched on 'auctions' ... eBay came up and they had a much better selection.
If we had a problem at the time, it was that one couldn't list as fast. With some streamlining, we were actually getting competitive in the summer and fall of 1998 when we first broke 20,000 auctions.
We then totally, in October 1998, overhauled our look to a more editorially-focused format along with 6000 categories (up from our initial 1250). It was just too much and auctionuniverse ... which morphed into auctions.com in October 1999, never recovered.
