posted on June 24, 2001 08:00:35 AM
A friend of mine believes it's just a matter of time before ebay becomes a closed house. Meaning, the only way you'd be able to sell anything on ebay is to use their image hosting, their auction formatting, their post-sale management, their stores, their billing companies, THEIR FEES.
Just the mere thought of it makes me cringe! Do you believe it's going that way? And is there any way to fight it?
I, for one, LOVE AUCTIONWATCH and have no plans to use any other listing or post-sale sites. But if we can't use AW for ebay, does any of it really matter?
Thanks for listening. All insights welcome!
~ Sharon
posted on June 24, 2001 08:06:57 AM
I believe that some of these auction management service providers and payment services should be courting some of these smaller niche sites.
If they're all counting on eBay consumers (buyers and sellers) for the bulk of their feast... places like AW and Andale etc. EVENTUALLY won't have anything to eat.
They'd be making the mistake that every single mom & pop seller continues to make... by not DIVERSIFYING, they've put all of their eggs in ONE BASKET....
posted on June 24, 2001 08:08:04 AM
and your friend is right on track....ebay is easing into that as we speak....its a comin friends and ebay had the idea long before it was spoke of here....as soon as aw and other sites/tools became popular they decided it was just a matter of time before they closed their shop
posted on June 24, 2001 08:48:44 AM
intrigueantiques: I've listed on eBay, SYI, ePier, (yahoo & amazon with different I.D.s) and we have 2 websites.
That's how **I** personally diversify.
I've been consistant in my own attempts to seek out and try other venues in addition to eBay... and I've been consistant in my attempts to educate my customers about the VARIETY of venues available to them!
I don't use third party services that I can provide for myself - such as image hosting, bulk loaders and fancy html for listings.
I offer a variety of payment options, including Paypal (and BillPoint upon request) as well as accept personal checks to encourage the benefits of one on one trading (directly between the buyer and seller)
I've offered feedback (upon request) for Co-ops so that those venues may have a better understanding of MY NEEDS as an individual seller during the development stages in their own efforts toward providing consumers with more options in Online trading.
If you have other ideas or suggestions about ways I can actively diversify, I'd be open to consider them. THANKS!
posted on June 24, 2001 09:34:44 AM
One solution ebay is expanding to deal with the pesky customers is to become it's own customer for venue services.
By purchasing , outright or in part, the actual marketing companies like ReturnBuy it is then able to deal with itself and profit no matter which company makes how much profit.
Without in any way being unfair to the great mass of us unwashed sellers it could, I imagine, still provide some guidance and insight to a company it is owner in, so that their marketing efforts are profitable.
Fear not for eBay for it seems quite able to take care of itself.
I believe, when it closes the loop, it will be the most effective automated electronic vending machine ever known to mam.
With little need for any "old fashioned" people except in the distant background.
Take one last good look at yourself as you fade into history.
posted on June 24, 2001 09:38:58 AMDo you believe it's going that way?
I don't see how anyone can view it differently. You have to make a deliberate effort not to have IPIX host your images now. New sellers are guided to using eBay's services with a strong hand. New sellers that sign up to sell on eBay are automatically signed up for BillPoint accounts now, and it is a default payment when they list. The links to your AW storefronts aren't kosker anymore, and in the meantime eBay is rolling out their storefronts.
I'd be interested in joining a pool to pick the date that email ID's will be banned.
posted on June 24, 2001 09:58:33 AM
interesting!
i was thinking about posting the same message this morning-that ebay will soon be an exclusive club,members only.
inhouse financial analysts employed by big corporation often study company statistics and find out what is the best way to deploy the assets,highest return for the capital investment and one area which is a constant source of manpower drain,bad press is the area of fraud and complaints and criticism from usps,fbi and other agencies.
it is nice to say ebay open the door to all entreprenuers to realise his dream of being self employed or if gainfully employed elsewhere,be able to strut his talents on ebay by being a seller.
but it is also an area any company would take note-the hours and stress upon its customer service,surveilance,law compliance staff to co-operate with legal authorities for those frauds committed on its site.
ebay is no longer a new company which needs any particular group of sellers to survive,it can afford to be selective,selective in reducing its operating cost,selective in deploying its financial and human resources to most promising areas of return,not just fraudulent sellers and goods but low priced goods also,how profitable is it to host ordinary items casted of resin in the millions,or baseball cards etc with starting bid of a few dollars,it costs the same bandwidth for an item of 3.95 as an item for 395.
if you were ebay,which would you choose to host?
if you were given a choice of making 15 dollars per day versus 500 dollars a day,which would you choose ??
may be someday only yahoo shops can sell on yahoo auction and only ebay shops can sell on ebay auction with some exceptions,the rest of the sellers will sell their goods somewhere else.
this is not really a problem,if you have an item which is machine made and is abundant,and ebay bidders are not interested,then it is better to sell it in a place where someone will show an interest and bid on it.
christie does not sell items walmart carries and vice versa which does not mean any thing at walmart is no good.
there will be niche markets for different items,we just have to find the right market for our products.
if someday we find ourselves no longer welcome at ebay or no longer can afford it or no longer produce results for us,we will forge another market.
posted on June 24, 2001 01:30:26 PM
Smart business, Dottie. Thanks for sharing. Sure looks like you've got your bases covered. I think I'll take a tip from a wise woman and do the same.
posted on June 24, 2001 01:44:47 PM
Bump is when someone places a post in a thread to get it back to the top, when they feel that the topic is important and don't want it to get lost in the mix. They are "bumping" it back to the top.
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[ edited by revvassago on Jun 24, 2001 01:45 PM ]
posted on June 24, 2001 02:47:45 PM
I use BUMP when I want to receive emails on the thread. You can only receive emails of the thread by posting a message to the thread.
posted on June 24, 2001 03:31:05 PM
zymo,
if more folks do the same,we will see nothing but bump on this message board.
you will be notified of new messages and they are nothing but bump!
posted on June 24, 2001 06:24:42 PM
Well, despite all the bumping, BURP was my personal favorite! But back to the thread...
I've been in marketing for 17 years now, and cannot count the times I've seen very successful companies fail ~ and fail big ~ when they diversified beyond their niche. Instead of trying to do it all, these comapanies would always have fared better if they had simply built strong relationships with those who handle their own separate pieces of the puzzle with consummate skill. It has as much to do with capability as it does with consumerism. And BUYING a company is not the same as BUILDING a relationship!
Ebay does auctions better than anyone else. They do not do photo hosting better than anyone else. They do not do credit card processing better than anyone else. They definitely do not do ad formatting or post-sale management better than anyone else. (I tried their Blackthorne software. It was helpful but much more limited than what I get here at AW.)
Anyway, I for one hope they "see the light" and remember the little folks ~ and great offshoot companies ~ that made 'em big along the way. There's plenty of business for everyone out there.
posted on June 24, 2001 07:22:09 PM
all the MBA courses tell you it is important to diversify-horizontal and vertical integration.
ebay is doing that,billpoint is an important part of diversification,i have no qualms with billpoint.
i always wonder why people bother to troop up to paypal and make auction payment when they can do it right on ebay with billpoint,it costs nothing to buyer either way.
i do not ask why,if they want to use paypal,i will take paypal,if they want to take billpoint i take billpoint.
yahoo paydirect is fine too.i remember in some parts of the world,they use postage stamps as a currency.
amzn diversifies into non books,because books are low margin commodity,so are dvd and videos.
u dont know until you try .
posted on June 24, 2001 08:06:21 PM
like I've said a dozen times or more over here diversification is the key, we have one web site and were ready to launch another when ebay pulled the no links stuff. Funny that there is still one seller with over 4500 auctions still with links straight back to their site, I wont turn them in no matter how big they are but a target that size you can't tell me eBay doesn't know.
anyway I've talked with several people that build auction management software, all say they have thought about adding yahoo, or amazon to the software but with the few number of people that list there it really is not worth the effort. I've brought up the fact that they need and should consider diversification even if it was opening their own auction site. you know if you had software that worked with ebay and you added free listing on a site for say 6 months and then eased into fees at say .10 close no matter the amount I would jump at that. also if they wanted to even charge as much as ebay in say two years I would go for that as well. if I had sales you bet I would keep listing. but many have dragged their feet so long it would now be hard with the new ebay rules to try to point people to the other sites
well someone finely did it!!!
bidville now has a bulk listing tool, not that they are the answer, after they grew out of the auxpal thing which I think was pretty bad business, but they are trying. If someone would write some management software for them we could be looking at a good alternative to eBay, or at least the first.....
posted on June 25, 2001 07:36:39 AM
A closed house sounds like a good idea to me. I'd really like to see Ebay offer a prepayment option where the buyer has to file either a credit card or checking account prior to placing a bid. When the auction ends, the buyer gets billed and the seller gets instant payment with shipping notice e-mail. No more deadbeats, no more back and forth e-mails begging people to pay.
It would be worth paying a little more in fees to have a system like this. Just think of the time savings you would have.
Just don't do the Half thing and hold the sellers money for weeks. Let the sellers withdraw their money when they want, daily or weekly would be good.
posted on June 25, 2001 08:21:23 AM
A couple of things.
Half.com is expensive for sellers if they are dealing with high $ items. In the trading card category, I can sell a trading card for $1.00 plus $.50 S/H 1st class mail - total fee is 23 cents. Just to LIST that card on Ebay is 30 cents, and I have to keep spending 30 cents every week to keep it up there is it doesn't sell.
This is why my trading cards from past series will be on half.com, my cards from current but not new series will be on an Ebay storefront (hopefully by the end of the week), and only cards from the newest sets or complete sets will go the auction route.
posted on June 25, 2001 10:41:03 AM
Ebay may have wished it had treated it's small sellers better! There is a new auction on the way with free listings,cute short name and logo,and from what they say they are willing to spend millions courting buyers. That's something we don't have now as most of the little auctions, we only hear about here and end up buying and selling to each other.
They are in beta testing now and I don't believe I can talk about it here but if you want more info you can email me at [email protected] Especially email me if you want to be in on the prelaunch testing!
posted on June 25, 2001 04:40:15 PM
Indeed, eBay has been concentrating on the volume sellers to keep up the growth numbers and appease Wall Street.
But the volume sellers are largely trying to get a free ride off the traffic and interest created by the small-time sellers selling unique items. Without those, eBay would get boring fast. It would morph into something like Onsale.com (now Egghead.com).
Ebay already has thrown up a bewildering array of options and other things in violation of the KISS principle (keep It Simple, Stupid) that might put off new sellers. This new policy of requiring an account raises serious privacy concerns.
posted on June 26, 2001 06:38:43 AM
Jake - You are a smart man, the idea you stated is in the works at this very moment. Look for the rollout in the not so distant future.
