posted on May 26, 2001 07:20:59 AM
How much per month would you be willing to pay for an eBay Storefront?
Yahoo charges $100 and Amazon charges $39.99.
Think eBay might offer a limited item Storefront for free to lure sellers? I figure if eBay prices the Storefront low enough there may be no reason to sell anywhere else. They could lock-up the market by giving everyone a Half.com style outlet. I'm hoping the Storefronts have no upfront cost and they simply take their 15% FVF as they do at Half. I could live with that.
posted on May 26, 2001 10:57:56 AM
I'm sure there are plenty of sellers who WOULD use the storefronts, especially if the storefronts are priced more attractively than eBay's current auction fee structure.
And dollars to donuts, eBay will allow sellers to link to their storefront from their auction pages.
posted on May 26, 2001 10:59:21 AM
I would pay no more for an eBay storefront than the ones hosted by the auction services cost. Commision for sold items only or flat monthly fee for unlimited items.
But, I would also want storefronts to be separate from auctions and have the ability to search storefronts separately, so that people can search auctions, storefronts, or both.
I think storefronts can be good. We all have a few items that are just waiting for the right buyer to come along. This way, we can "list" with no listing fee and they can sit there indefinitely.
posted on May 26, 2001 11:04:10 AM
Nothing nada zilch zero.
Slowly but surely I am moving to other places and other things on the net and getting away from using ebay so much. They are getting really heavy handed and the ego is getting pretty big. The changes are for the big companies that they have been making. That is fine if Ebay wants to go that way but I am tired of giving them so much money.
posted on May 26, 2001 11:17:23 AM
Hehe, well I dont think any small to medium seller will be able to afford one. Personally I think they are meant for big business to seperate them from the small sellers. I will guess and say a storefront will cost $1000.00
posted on May 26, 2001 11:17:59 AM
$99/mo. + 16% of sale price? These are the numbers that have been floated elsewhere. I don't know if they are correct.
How much would you pay if the items in your eBay Storefront are included in eBay Search (unlike items an any other storefront)?
What if eBay Storefronts are the ONLY fixed price marketplace (other than eBay-owned Half.com) that can be linked prominently in your auction listings? How much is it worth then?
If you're selling 10K/month, and paying about $900 in eBay fees already, is $99/mo for admission to the only fixed-priced storefront that is included in eBay Search too much?
I think this will be an option for the big sellers-- not the occasional hobby sellers. I don't like it, but that's the way eBay's going.
posted on May 26, 2001 12:41:45 PM
Half.com is one giant Storefront. Some sellers have thousands and probably tens of thousands of dollars worth of inventory (DVDs, VHS tapes, books, games, electronics, sporting goods, etc.) listed for Fixed Price sale on that site's database for free. The only time the seller pays Half any money for a transaction is when the transaction is completed and Half takes its ~15% cut.
An eBay Storefront would be nothing more than a segmented form of Half.com where a seller has a separate area to list their wares in Fixed Price format. Why they'd charge listing fees for this area and not Half where you could list many of the same things for free, is a little strange. Maybe they'll start charging listing fees for Half, or they may not charge listing fees at all for Storefronts. They'll definitely take ~15% for each completed transaction.
posted on May 26, 2001 12:46:35 PM
Those that are not big sellers are not necessarily occasional hobby sellers. It's certainly not an either/or.
I'm a small seller, but it's a business. I have a B&M antiques shop...do B&M auctions...AND do eBay. I have interesting, unique things. If eBay loses me and my like, they are stuck with stuff that's available anywhere...PLUS POSTAGE. They'll lose the reason buyers click on eBay to begin with.
posted on May 26, 2001 01:08:07 PM
Store Fronts would be absurd. Too much time spent on the sellers maintaining their investments already while paying through the nose. Corporations are jumping on board due to their lack of sales as well. Let's quit kidding ourselves. There are more sellers than buyers. Say goodbye to something that was good...
And, I would not pay for a storefront no matter where I am. I already have a B/M that want's money all the time!
[ edited by Empires on May 26, 2001 01:09 PM ]
posted on May 26, 2001 02:28:23 PM
Amazon charges either/or, not both a listing fee and a storefront fee.
I predict that "ME" pages will soon dissolve. That will be a tragedy as mine IS my storefront. Though it IS all auctions/or BIN's I spend a great deal of effort driving traffice directly to my ME Page. I don't give a hoot about a "storefront" but if they take my Me Page, I will scream!
posted on May 26, 2001 03:23:42 PM
I checked out AuctionWorks' storefronts and they looked pretty cool. Put your stuff up and just leave it, then pay a commission when it sells. I even signed up for a storefront.
However, AuctionWorks has one serious limitation. They do not process payments. They have a very nice shopping cart that tells you your total, then they refer you to Paypal. Oh my God, that is so lame!!
And now that any link to storefronts has been banned by eBay, it will be even more difficult to direct bidders there. Honestly, I can't see putting the effort into stocking a storefront. I've got my own web site where I list the items and it's as good as any storefront. I don't pay anybody a commission and I don't owe anyone anything.
posted on May 26, 2001 06:49:41 PM
You sure an integrated eBay Storefront would have no value?
When eBay rolls them out you can be sure that items found on a sellers Storefront will be integrated into eBay's Search function. That's an advantage no other Storefront software can provide. For example, take a look at how Amazon currently integrates products found in a user's ZShop into Amazon's Search function. I'm guessing eBay will eventually enhance their Search function in a similar manner to display all results for a keyword from eBay auctions, Half, and Storefronts. Just go to Amazon and search on anything and see what results show up. What you'll find is the query results are segmented into Auction results, ZShops results, and items found in various subcategories. Click on the ZShops link and you'll find every match within ZShops. For example, when I searched on 'Gladiator', I found 112 results in Auctions and 422 results in ZShops.
You can be sure eBay's Storefront will have better sell-through than Amazon ZShops since eBay will market it relentlessly the way they do Half and eBay. Seems Amazon has dropped the ball in marketing ZShops. Half and eBay have excellent sell-through, so why wouldn't eBay Storefronts, especially when you can link to it from all of your auction pages, the Search box will draw bidders in, and the fact eBay has many times the auction traffic Amazon has.
The real question is will it be cost effective for the small seller?
posted on May 27, 2001 03:49:44 PM
twinsoft, how many items do you have? I'm sure it can be done with 100 or less, but when you have more or inventory changes it gets harderd.
Why do I feel that half these threads are started by eBay? It's like they're doing secret research or something here.
posted on May 27, 2001 11:12:11 PM
Oh, so this thread is back. Yes, I have less than 100 items listed. (Actually, I'm in the process of redoing my site, so few items are listed.)
What does the number of items listed have to do with anything? Do the for-pay storefronts have some kind of magic that allows them to offer more items? Not that I can tell. They have links to categories, which anyone with a web site can do too.
A web site allows you to do much more. My site has a section for auction news, a freebies section, and I'll also be adding more freebies like web clip art. Before I started this site, my old Freeware for Windows page had 750,000 hits. Offer freebies or discussion to get people to the site, that's my suggestion.
Take the $1,000 bucks you pay to eBay each month and take out a big ad in your local newspaper.
posted on May 28, 2001 02:17:47 PM
I just think the more items you have the more a shopping cart comes in handy and features that pay places offer like search or integrated payments, etc. I would assume those sites also have more sales so a home brew method for managing all that may be more cumbersome. Then there's inventory, etc. Then there is just the issue of knowledge. You have much more than the average person. You have a web site already with lots of stuff and know what you're doing and even have some sort of software you've programmed. This is a step up from what the rest of know. I figure we can learn a lot of it, but that's a big investment in time and not a quick process.
I dont know if $1000 in a local newspaper would do all that good, but I bet if you were selling train stuff and put your ads in the probably dozen or so trade magazines for collectors it would do pretty well.
Sorry for resurrecting this thread, but I only read here every couple days so sometimes I'll bring things back that may have been dead a few days...
posted on May 28, 2001 04:14:11 PM
I've found the key to eBay is patience.
eBay is really doing what they must.
Sooner or later, another big player will enter. Say AOL & Time Warner: with the money, technology and built in user base, plus the media, eBay could have serious challenges.
The storefront makes sense. Yes, the smaller sellers could be left behind.
Also, remember all the new big retailers have yet to 'not only' make their presence known, but 'have not' any experience to review.
That will take time. eBay while planning ahead, has yet to build the infrastructure to keep up.
Just like all of us sellers, they want to make money also.
posted on May 28, 2001 04:19:20 PM
Are you kidding??????? Fee'd to almost death here, summer coming, and Ebay cares nothing about our concerns.....Zippo too
