posted on November 5, 2007 06:43:38 PM
From ebay announcements:
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***Introducing: Guest Buying***
November 05, 2007 | 02:56PM PST/PT
Evan Liang
Hello...I'm Evan Liang with eBay's Buyer Experience team. With the busy holiday season rapidly approaching, I'm excited to announce that we're launching Guest Buying, a new feature that we believe will help increase the number of new buyers who purchase sellers' Fixed Price and Store Inventory listings.
Why Guest Buying?
We've done a lot of research about buying habits as the Internet has evolved, and have been told repeatedly that requiring new buyers to register before they have a chance to really interact with eBay is a barrier to them taking the plunge (this is the same reason we introduced My eBay for Guests awhile back).
Today many online buyers expect to be able to visit a site and simply purchase and pay for an item with minimum hassle. Introducing Guest Buying will help encourage more first purchases by new buyers.
Here's how it works:
Guest buyers will be able to use Buy It Now to purchase eligible Fixed Price and Store Inventory items.
Guest buyers need to complete their payment through PayPal before the item is theirs, similar to Immediate Payment.
Your current PayPal settings will apply – if you require buyers to pay with a confirmed address, your Guest Buyers will need to do so as well.
Which listings are eligible for Guest Buying?
Your listings will be eligible to be purchased by Guest Buyers if you meet the following criteria:
You must have a premier/business PayPal account in order to accept credit card payments.
Shipping costs must be specified on your listing.
You must qualify for the top tier of buyer protection of $2,000.
The item price must be less than $2,000.
You must use eBay's checkout system. Third-party checkout will not be supported at this time.
Can Guest Buyers leave feedback?
No – at least not until they register. eBay will encourage Guest Buyers to register once they make a purchase. Once they do, they'll be able to use all the same features and programs our current buyers do, such as Feedback, Buyer Protection, access to Customer Support, etc.
The Launch Plan
We're going to introduce Guest Buying slowly over the next few weeks. We're going to start by making it available in our Music, Books, DVDs & Movies, and Consumer Electronics categories in the next few days, and will add more categories shortly thereafter. Within a few weeks, Guest Buying should be available sitewide.
posted on November 5, 2007 08:52:02 PM
I registered with eBay 9 years ago. IIRC, the most difficult step was coming up with a catchy, clever username (n.b., mine is neither catchy nor clever). Has the sign-up process become so onerous that potential buyers are really put off by it? And can the "guest registration" process (and there must be some sort of tell-us-who-you-are process involved) be that different?
posted on November 5, 2007 11:02:04 PM
Well. Not only do guest buyers need to come up with the right user name, but they also need to be signed up with PayPal, right? Those are steps they might find onerous, too.
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posted on November 6, 2007 05:39:46 AM
They dont have to sign up with Paypal,all they need is a credit card.
Paypal will process their credit card and ask them to consider signing up in the future.
This is not new,it has been available in Yahoo shopping
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Lets all stop whining !
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posted on November 6, 2007 06:16:53 AM
I think it's also the same as eBay Express. We've been getting PayPal payments without a User ID - so to try and figure out what was going on, went over to My eBay and modified the display to show where the sales were coming from - and surprise, surprise - they were all coming from eBay Express.
Not complaining about eBay Express again - and this move might not be a bad thing either. From the buyer-side, it could be looked at as similar to getting payments from your own Web site (with some very big differences as well).
Wayne
Never explain -- Your friends do not need it and your enemies will not believe you anyway.
~ Elbert Hubbard
