Amazon drops eBay’s Bill Me Later
December 31, 2008
Amazon.com have announced they will no longer accept payments via BillMeLater, the credit service bought by eBay earlier this year. A notice on Seller Central says:
Effective December 31st, 2008, BillMeLater (BML) will no longer be accepted as a payment method on Amazon.com. All sales and orders processed with BillMeLater prior to this date will continue to be processed; no changes are needed for these existing orders. Buyers and sellers can continue to use the remaining payment methods available on Amazon.com for future orders.
When eBay bought BML, there was speculation on how long the service would remain on Amazon, but this removal has been announced with surprisingly short notice. As Ina speculates, presumably Amazon didn’t want eBay having access to their transaction data.
Thanks to Eddie for the heads up.
My 10 eBay New Year resolutions
December 31, 2008
List stock as soon as it arrives
I don’t mean the stuff that’s already buried at the back of the warehouse, that’s for a rainy day project and lets face it I no longer know what’s there anyway. I’ll just try not to add to the several racks of forgotten treasures and list everything that comes in before the next delivery arrives.
Keep accounts up to date
Daily, maybe weekly, well I’ll at least do them monthly. Ok ok, I promise to do them at least once a year! Accounts are best done little and often, I know this, so why is it so hard?
Ship promptly
Well as quickly as I can anyway, if it can go today it get’s shipped today. Why put it off until tomorrow (and yes the customer does appreciate it).
Premises
I’ve been meaning to sort them out for ages, I have had a tidy up and re-org and I can get across to the back of the warehouse again. This’ll be the year to move into bigger premises and get properly organised though. Not only will I know where everything is, I’ll be able to get to it as well!
Know what’s listed
I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve sold out of a listing without realising and not relisted a new batch. No excuse now with the new 30 day listings so I’ll try keep on top of it.
Stats & Fees
I’ll spend more time to understand what’s selling well for what price. I’ll no longer have stock hanging around because the average price has dropped or not selling because I’ve not used the best keywords in the title.
Credit Control
Ok ok, so it’s not a sale until it’s paid, but I honestly don’t have time to chase the odd Non paying bidder. I’ll make time.
Time Management
Look I know I can pack everything before the courier arrives and still spend half the day answering ASQs and generally being distracted on Skype or phone calls, but that’s just how it is, it’s all work. I aim to do an extra hour’s real work each day (if I can fit it in). Turning off Skype and all open chat programs/browser windows/email for an hour should do the trick.
Forums/Facebook/Scrabble/Reversi
Reading forums isn’t a priority. I’ll save my next Scrabble move on Facebook for lunch times only. I also promise not to play Reversi unless it’s lunch time (anyone want a game?).
Lunch Time
I’ll set at least 30 minutes aside for lunch to do all the stuff I used to spend all morning doing. After all if I work harder I’ll deserve a break. (Oh… and that does tend to imply I’ll get to work well before lunch time, no more 2pm starts to the day).
So that’s my New Year resolutions, what do you intend doing to give your business a boost this year?
Sellers should police 3rd party ad pirates, say eBay
December 30, 2008
Since eBay began running ads in search results, we’ve heard of a few eyebrow-raising things advertised there. There were the weed seeds. There are not-infrequently pirate music CDs, DVDs, knock-off designer clothing and handbags. This week, a poster on the UK PowerSeller Board spotted some Wii games advertised for just £4 each being sold by a Chinese website; he may just be right that these are dodgy.
And he got a response from James, eBay UK’s community manager, who said:
I presume then that after you posted here you reported the link you saw so that we can have it removed? I’m not sure if you’ve seen the previous posts on this (there have been a few though) that set out that we don’t actually provide the links that appear there and when we become aware of links that are unsuitable, we work to get them removed and make sure they don’t reappear.
That’s right: the responsibility for policing eBay’s third party ads for illegal content is not eBay’s, nor that of the company who supply the ads, but that of site users. Even by eBay’s standards, this is astonishingly crass.
eBay 2009 : a few thoughts
December 29, 2008
2008 has been a year of huge change on eBay. The one thing we can say for certain about 2009 is that there’ll be more of the same: the only constant is change*. Randy’s posted his predictions; so has Ina (the comments on both threads are particularly instructive). Here’re mine, and I should emphasise – this is what I expect, not necessarily what I’d like:
What eBay will not do
Despite rumour and some public wishful thinking:
- John Donahoe will not quit, or be fired, or get sued by a rabid pack of sellers.
- eBay will not get rid of classic feedback.
- eBay will not sell off PayPal, Skype or the auctions business.
- eBay will not get rid of auction listings.
eBay sellers may have a long list of what they think is wrong with eBay, but eBay themselves appear to think they are on the right track. Therefore we can expect most of the things that have begun in 2008 to be continued next year.
More big retailers will be enticed into listing on eBay.
With western economies in recession, and no listing fees to advertise on eBay, more big catalogue retailers will see an advantage in using eBay as an online channel alongside their existing websites. Household names will be uploading thousands of products to a category near you, with special deals on fees and also on DSRs and feedback: diamond PowerSellers will be given long “grace periods” to establish themselves on eBay where smaller sellers would have been suspended.
There will be some spectacular failures: more than one “diamond” will be unable to recover the shine from feedback that starts off in negative figures. Some retailers will withdraw from eBay as buyers are “too demanding” for them to deal with. But many will stay, so smaller sellers need to consider how they might play to their strengths: specialist knowledge of their niche, and the ability to offer a personalised and human service to buyers who will be increasingly frustrated that big eBay sellers ignore their communication.
Third-party software providers should be taking advantage of the complaints that will be generated from disadvantaged smaller sellers, and offering better products to tie in – for example – stock control between websites and eBay stores. Anything that can help small sellers operate like big sellers will be a hit in 2009.
Catalogue listings will be expanded
The “Amazonification” of eBay will continue as pre-filled item information expands to more categories. Media listings have long offered automatic inclusion of track and publication data, but we’ll see more of this in categories from electronics to branded clothing. It will become easier and easier for large retailers to integrate their product databases with eBay.
Smaller sellers need to consider how they can take advantage of this to save them time which could usefully be invested in other areas of their business, or whether they want to take steps to make themselves stand out on eBay.
More third-party advertising
Third-party ads on view item pages are here to stay. eBay will insist that these do not detract from sellers’ sales, but no one will believe them. More than one category will see a wholesaler advertising on a retailer’s listing. However, this scheme will not be an unmitgated success: some merchants will pull out of the advertising, as Shopping.com merchants did this year, complaining that the quality of traffic sent by eBay is low.
eBay will open up onsite advertising to sellers themselves (as Stephanie Tilenius suggested at Live). Canny sellers will use advertising + listings to ensure that they dominate their categories, rather than simply complaining that it’s a way for eBay to extract more fees from them.
More brand restrictions
More brands will follow L’Oreal’s example and sue eBay for allowing the sale of fakes and, increasingly, merchandise sold through unofficial channels. The presence of some official distributors on eBay will encourage all parties to restrict sales by smaller sellers. eBay, however, will continue to refuse to provide a public list of brands whose sale will be restricted, or whose rights’ owners they know are active in the misuse of the VeRO system to close down eBay listings.
Sellers, therefore, need to investigate the situation fully before commiting large amounts of capital to branded stock. At the very least, run a couple of dozen test listings and see if they survive.
So far, this has been a particular problem for cosmetics’ sellers, but expect to see it for clothing, electronics, toys and some branded craft items.
Changes to Checkout and payments policies
Checkout is changing: sellers will be able to integrate third-party merchant accounts through eBay’s checkout, so those who wish to take credit card payments on the site will be able to do so. So far, that’s not a prediction: eBay have said they’re going to do it.
My guess would be that at the same time, paper payments through the post (cheques/checks, money orders etc.) will be banned in every country where it is legal for eBay to do so. If eBay don’t go that far, there will at least be a carrot of a fee-incentive for PayPal only listings, which might, for example, nullify the PayPal per-transaction fixed fee.
This will all be presented as a security improvement measure. Few people will believe that.
It is – of course – the economy, stupid
Then there’s the bigger picture. There are undoubtedly those who do well in a recession. Online merchants may be some of them: there’s certainly a perception that online = cheaper, and we should all be looking to take advantage of that (actually *being* cheaper is a question for another day).
But the outlook that some eBay sellers are expressing at the moment – that hoardes of cash-strapped buyers are going to mean we’ve never had it so good – seems a little naive to me. The economy is about more than eBay + buyers. Recent weeks have already seen the DVD industry turned upside down by the failure of some huge wholesalers; all eBay sellers (and everyone else) needs to consider how they’d survive if a major supplier went under. Do you have alternative lines of supply? Moreover, without huge retailers buying, will the price of wholesale supply go up? Are you running a business based on catalogue returns or retail seconds? If your eBay business doesn’t have multiple sources of stock, frankly, you’re asking for trouble.
It’s not the death of the small seller…
though many people are saying it is. It might just be the death of the medium-sized eBay seller: eBay 2009 is going to be about being big enough that you can weather a recession, or small enough to sneak past it. If you’re a business with a set plan, fixed in what you do without built-in flexibility to adapt to constant change, then honestly you’re in for a hellish time. If you can stay lithe and nimble enough to deal with everything that’s going to be thrown at you, you might just end up on top.
So that’s what I’m expecting – over to you.
* Hat-tip to Heraclitus for that thought: rather a lot of his wisdom seems applicable to eBay somehow.
Private sellers get 5p listing weekend on eBay UK
December 26, 2008
Private sellers can list auctions for just 5p this weekend on eBay UK. On Saturday 27th and Sunday 28th December, auctions’ insertion fees are reduced to 5p. All other fees are charged as normal. Buy It Now items are not included, though sellers can add a buy it now price to their auctions for the normal upgrade fee. Some categories are also excluded, so do read the small print before you list.
PowerSellers and Business Sellers are not eligible for the promotion – so time to list your Christmas presents on your buying ID. And I can’t resist saying that this is *exactly* as predicted by Psychic Psue on the the PowerSeller Board last week 
“Free post” increases price and sell through rate
December 26, 2008
It’s almost the New Year and from the 27th January all DVD sellers will have to offer free postage and packing, but will it really increase sales? The guys at Terapeak have run some reports looking at eBay UK DVD listings and the effect a free postage offer has on sell through rates and final values:
| Title | Average Price |
No. of listings |
Success Rate |
| Contains “Free Post DVD” | £8.69 | 1056 | 54.17% |
| Contains “Free Postage DVD” | £8.75 | 2414 | 45.03% |
| Contains “DVD”, Does not contain “Free” | £6.90 | 1.3m | 30.76% |
Whilst the data only highlights listings which specify free shipping in the item title the results are staggering. Sell through rates increase by almost 15% just for including “Free Post” in titles. Not only that but final values are up to 25% higher for items calling out the free postage offer.
eBay have been offering incentives to sellers to offer free post, not only in the UK but around the world. 2009 is likely to see more categories move towards a free post model with listing promotions encouraging free post in categories where it’s optional. For the DVD category the sales data speaks for itself – buyers do appear to prefer listings with free shipping.
If you’d like to research eBay sales data, to celebrate the Christmas holiday, there is a 12 day free trial offer available until January 2nd. “The 12 Days of Terapeak” gives you the entire holiday period to explore Terapeak and research the categories of interest to you.
I’ve been using Terapeak to look at the effect of including “Free Post” on the computer products that I sell and the results are similar to those for DVDs. Check out your own categories and let us know the results.
Skype me a Christmas card
December 24, 2008
There’s gotta be someone out there that you meant to send a card to, that special person who’s card plopped onto your doormat this morning and you realise there’s no way you can get a card to them for tomorrow. (Well you might be better organised, but it’s happened to me on more than one occasion 
)
Well now there’s a solution, why not Skype someone a video card? Simply choose a card cover, record your message with a webcam and you’re ready to send to your friends. It’s even easier if you’re on Facebook as Skype have built a Facebook app for video cards as well.
I really like this idea for people who won’t be home this Christmas, and want to send a personal message to family or friends. Plus it’s a neat idea to get a few more people using Skype to communicate.
Royal Mail price increases for 6th April 2009
December 23, 2008
Royal Mail have announced their tariff changes to take place in April next year, with the cost of a 1st class stamp rising from 36p to 39p. The cost of a 2nd class letter rises from 27p to 30p.
What’s probably of more interest to eBay sellers is the cost of a typical packet, which for 251-500g rises from £1.94 to £2.14. If you use Recorded Delivery to qualify for PayPal seller protection, the additional cost rises from 72p to 75p. This means the cost of a typical eBay delivery rises by 23p, an increase of 8.65%.
This increase will doubtless be passed on to buyers, the big question is will sellers increase their postage costs or hide increases in the item price. With pressure from eBay to keep postage prices keen and doubtless next year incentives to offer free post it’s a hefty price increase. 23p might not sound much on an individual item, but multiply it by many thousand transactions over the course of a year and it’s a fair chunk of money.
Alternative solutions such as Royal Mail Tracked may become even more attractive for larger sellers as they look for ways to save on postage cost. Although the service is a 2 to 3 day delivery time savings may justify a slightly slower service, although in truth even 1st class doesn’t always guarantee a next day delivery.
The next year is likely to be one where eBay and sellers focus on postage and packaging costs. If you’re not reviewed your delivery methods the new year is a great time to take a long hard look at them and explore the most cost efficient methods for the year ahead.
You can view all of the Royal Mail tariffs from 6th April 2009 in this .pdf document.
Skype loses $2.3m in patent settlement
December 23, 2008
Skype has settled a court case for $2.3m with Mangosoft Inc for alleged patent infringement of their dynamic directory service.
The case was filed two years ago and closed last Thursday, Mangosoft will license its software to Skype for $2.3 million and drop all claims.
Mangosoft were one of the early Internet companies but today have shrunk to a one man operation. $2.3m is a nice payday for the New Hampshire company, and a drop in the ocean for Skype, but it won’t make much of a dent in the $90m that share holders invested in Mangosoft.
eBay India offers half-price listing upgrades 23rd-26th December
December 23, 2008
From 23rd to 26th December inclusive, eBay India are running a listing upgrades promotion. Sellers listing on eBay.in who have not used listing upgrades in the previous two months, may do so for half the normal rate. Most listing upgrades – from Home Page Featured to Scheduled – are included, and the promotion is valid for both auction and BIN listings (though not for shop inventory).
Sellers on other sites might expect to see similar promotions coming their way in the next few weeks, I suspect.
Is the long tail a market worth pursuing?
December 22, 2008
You probably know what your best sellers are on eBay, they may be the same as your top sellers on Amazon and your own website too, but The Long Tail, a book by Chris Anderson, suggested that there’s just as much (if not more) money to be made from rarer slow selling products.
The theory goes that as online selling is very low cost in comparison to bricks and mortar stores the cost of holding large inventories becomes affordable. This is none more so than when the product is digital with no warehousing required. Retailers could make money by offering obscure products via the Internet as there would always be someone who would buy.
An article in today’s Times turns that theory on it’s head – far from being an almost endless source of products that buyers are searching for, the long tail has been found to be a derelict back alley, full of junk that no one wants.
According to the Times there are around 13 million music tracks available online, but 10 million of them didn’t manage a single sale in the last year. It’s even worse for albums, from 1.23 million available only 173,000 were ever bought with 85% failing to get a sale.
The long tail was lauded as an untapped gold mine where collectors could source that long lost item. That’s not proving to be the case, at least not for music downloads, where 80% of all revenue came from the top 52,000 (top 0.4%) tracks.
Where does this leave online sellers? The 80/20 rule has traditionally been accepted, 80% of sales come from the top 20% most popular products. The long tail suggested that the remaining 80% obscure products could generate just as much if not more income, each individual product may not sell as often but everything would sell a few.
It’s important to realise that there is always a cost to inventory, whether it be the cost of uploading and cataloging 10 million music tracks that no one will ever buy, or whether it be physical warehousing for slow moving stock.
The are definitely sales to be won from holding a wide selection of inventory but there’s also a big risk that relying on an ever expanding range to increase sales will probably end in failure. Someone, somewhere might buy that long lost track some day, but is it worth the cost of several million more sitting on the shelf gathering dust that will never sell?
Whilst it’s certainly true that you can buy almost anything on eBay, the question has to be asked do you want to sell almost anything on eBay? Would you rather stock and sell fast moving popular lines, or do you want to hold 13 million items, 85% of which won’t sell even once a year, to take advantage of the long tail?
News on eBay fee credits
December 22, 2008
In December eBay ran a listing promotion offering free subtitle for sellers with a Featured or Anchor shop. Originally the promotion excluded items listed using the Good ‘Til Cancelled (GTC) format but sellers were offered free subtitle on GTC listings via the Sell Your Item form. Because these listing never end sellers would be billed for subtitle every 30 days for GTC items until they either sold out or were manually ended.
Normally once a listing has had a sale it’s not possible to remove a subtitle, but by the 8th January eBay will add the ability to remove subtitles even if the listing has had a sale. Sellers will need to remove subtitles from GTC listings by the 15th January as from this date they will be charged when the listing renews for another 30 day period.
Subtitle fees incurred between 1st – 15th January will be refunded for any sellers who who created a new GTC listing with subtitle feature enabled in December or added a subtitle to an existing GTC listing in December. Currently a date for refunds (if applicable) hasn’t been announced.
eBay have also announced on the PowerSeller forum (log in required) that they will be processing the refunds promised for sellers who ended and relaunched listings in order to make VAT rate changes. Credits should appear on users accounts by mid to end January.
January seems a long time to wait for credits incurred on the 1st December, but to be honest for most sellers with shops the fixed price listings concerned would only have costed 5p or 1p. (For myself the additional fees were only around £5.00). Sellers who use expensive listing enhancements such as Featured First will have a much larger credit due.
Whenever eBay run a listing promotion where the credits will be refunded in the future (rather than at the point of launching the listings) sellers should always ensure they have the cash flow to wait for credits. Invariably they won’t fall in the same month as the fees are incurred.
Skype moves Australia to Europe
December 22, 2008
We all know where Australia is right? The Antipodes, that’s the other side of the world. Down under. You know, where the wallabys and kangaroos hang out with Matilda.
Well not any more, Skype has moved it conveniently close to the UK, just South of Germany and the Czech Republic. Skype illustrate how Skype To Go works saying “Sam’s based in the US, so he’s got a US Skype To Go number. His family is back in Australia“, with an image of the call hopping across the Atlantic into Europe.
Not quite Australia, Sydney is about 10,000 miles away from Vienna in Austria, Skype need to get their geography books out.
Via IT Wire
Actress sells snot on eBay
December 19, 2008
So this would be where I write some comment about ‘if you need a gift for that difficult person…’ Actress Scarlett Johansson is is selling a snotty tissue on eBay. Johansson appeared on the Jay Leno show earlier in the week with a streaming cold which she blamed on co-star Samuel L Jackson. As the cold was passed from one celebrity to another, Johannson commented that it must have value, so she’s selling the tissue Leno gave her, complete with snot and lipstick, for hunger relief charity US Harvest. As of time of writing, the high bid is over $2,000 with four days left to run. Let’s hope it survives eBay’s Human Remains and Body Parts Policy
The yellow button returns to eBay My Messages
December 18, 2008
The yellow button has returned to eBay My Messages to allow users to click and reply from within eBay rather than using their email reader such as Outlook.
This disappeared when eBay annonymised email addresses in member to member communications but was promised to be restored by the New Year. It’s still possible to simply click reply in your email reader to respond, but there is now an option to reply through eBay, which has the advantage that messages will be marked as replied to in your My Messages inbox.
Email addresses will still be concealed between eBay users until a transaction has taken place.
eBay.com extend promotions on media and free shipping til March
December 18, 2008
eBay.com has announced the extension of two listing promotions until 31st March 2009.
Free shipping
- All sellers who offer free shipping will get free subtitle listing enhancement.
- PowerSellers who offer free shipping will get double FVF discounts.
- Sellers are reminded that listings with free shipping get a boost in Best Match.
Media Categories
All sellers get 5c insertion fees and free subtitle when they list using pre-filled item information.
These offers apply only on eBay.com. Other eBay sites have different fee structures.
Terapeak Value Track: Price trends on eBay
December 17, 2008
Terapeak are beta testing a new Value Track tool, which allows you to save your favourite eBay searches and weekly reports are then generated showing how these items are performing on eBay. The information is presented in a similar format to share prices highlighting rises and falls on the eBay marketplace.
Value Track reports the change in number of live listings, average price and sell through rates. Creating a list is easy – simply enter the keywords you’re interested in and select the eBay site, category and currency.
We ran the official top 12 Christmas toys for 2008 list (announced by the Toy Retailers Association) into Value Track and you can see the results by clicking the image to the left.
I can see two main benefits of using this tool – firstly for anyone researching a new category it allows them to watch it over a period of time. Value Track will reveal which products are selling well and warn of any items for which sales are slowing.
For existing sellers the changes in average prices will enable you to tweak prices according to availability – if prices are rising because a product is in short supply you want to know about it. Equally if prices are falling you may need to adjust your listings to stay competitive.
For toy sellers who want to track the hottest products in the run up to Christmas it’s a great tool. Any seller will be able to build a similar list of products they wish to track and Value Track will give a weekly breakdown of their performance on eBay highlighting where prices are rising or falling and for which products sell through rates are changing.
Existing Terapeak customers who sign up for the Beta test of Value Track and complete a feedback questionnaire will receive two months free access to the tool when it is officially launched.
Finally, for anyone that was wondering, the Toy Retailers Association top 12 toys this year (which are all available at less than RRP on eBay) are:
FurReal Biscuit, My Lovin’ Pup, Hasbro (RRP £149.99)
My Life, Flair Leisure Products (RRP £49.99)
Star Wars Clone Trooper Voice Changer, Hasbro (RRP £29.99)
High School Musical 3 Musical Dance Mat, Vivid Imaginations (RRP £22.99)
Rescue Pals Swim To Me Puppy, MGA Entertainment Ltd (RRP £29.99)
Bakugan™ Starter Pack, Spinmaster (RRP £12.99)
BABY born® with Magic Potty, Zapf Creation® (RRP £33.99)
Elmo Live, Mattel (RRP £59.99)
Catcha Beast, Bandai (RRP £19.99)
Ben 10 Deluxe Omnitrix, Bandai (RRP £15.99)
Cupcake Maker, Character Options (RRP £29.99)
In The Night Garden Upsy Daisy and Her Chase and Play Bed, Hasbro (RRP £34.99)
The Christmas Decorations are up in my eBay shop
December 17, 2008
I’ve been far too busy to put up the Christmas decorations at home and they’ll probably not go up until this weekend, but I’ve decorated my eBay shop .
The good news is that it didn’t take me any time at all – the guys at Frooition offer a service where they’ll decorate your eBay shop for you, and what’s even better when you’re ready to take them down they pack the decorations away and restore you shop back to it’s normal appearance in the New Year.
The Frootion Xmas graphics pack is just one of the options available for Frooition eBay shops, they’ve added in a whole suite of Frooition Extras to allow your buyers to shop by Size, Price or Brand. You can select extras you want to transform your eBay shop tailoring it to exactly suit the type of products you sell and the type of buyer you want to appeal to.
I quite like the seasonal changes that are possible with my eBay shop and yes “Sandwich Lady” is still there, but now she’s got a tree on her desk 
eBay Rewards, better late than never
December 16, 2008
Just in time for Christmas, some sellers have had a surprise windfall from eBay today. Those with long memories may recall 2007’s eBay Seller Rewards progamme, an eBay promotion mostly notable for being almost entirely incomprehensible to those taking part.
Sellers who inceased their sales last Christmas were supposed to be eligible to receive a percentage of the increase as a PayPal voucher, but as 2008 wore on, no one received anything at all. The website which was supposed to show how much sellers were going to get wasn’t updated, and eventually, most of us stopped caring.
Today, I am happy to reveal that I have just received a PayPal payment for £8. Even better (I’m sure he won’t mind me publishing this), Chris got £9. I hear of one seller who says they’ve received 46p. Has anyone done better? Or worse?
eBay is the most trusted ecommerce company
December 16, 2008
New research has just named eBay as the number one most trusted ecommerce site and second most trusted company overall after American Express.
A study by the Ponemon Institute and TRUSTe asked US consumers which companies they thought were most trustworthy and which did the best job safeguarding personal information. Out of 706 companies were named by consumers eBay was right at the top, up six places from last year jumping ahead of Amazon who are now in fourth place.
Google who were in the top 10 for two years running have now dropped out of the top 20, whilst Facebook, Yahoo! and Apple appear in the top 20 for the first time.
What’s most interesting to me is that eBay has been the number one target for phishing and fraud for many years, but have worked hard to improve user security. With steps such as concealing bidder IDs and anonymising email communications between buyers and sellers they are continually fighting to improve security and protect members privacy.
With Watchdog praising eBay in the UK and the accolade of most trusted ecommerce company in the US, the Trust and Safety team along with the Privacy team led by Scott Shipman, are reaping the rewards for their hard work.
eBay has always been the number one ecommerce destination for buyers. Now it’s also the number one ecommerce destination for protecting members privacy.
eBay invest in new Utah datacenter
December 16, 2008
eBay have purchased land to build a new data center in South Jordan, Utah which will cost an estimated $334 million to build. The State of Utah will in return give tax breaks worth $27.3 million over a 10 year period, but tax revenue flowing into the State from eBay’s coffers in the same period is still expected to be $109 million.
The new facility to be built in Daybreak Commerce Park, is expected to create around 50 jobs paying close to $50,000 a year (plus benefits), which is around 50% higher than the average wage in the area. With the recent news that eBay are laying off around 10% of their workforce worldwide it’s great to see that they’re still investing for the future and adding to the existing US and EU datacenters.
eBay have already invested in Utah and operate a customer support center in Salt Lake, Utah with around 1600 employees including the US Top Seller Account Manager (TSAM) teams.
eBay Australia MD quits
December 16, 2008
eBay Australia announced change at the top this morning, as managing director Simon Smith steps down. Mr Smith joined eBay in 2000 and has presided over eBay.com.au’s growth to five million visitors a month, though he’ll probably be best remembered by Australian eBay users for the PayPal-only fiasco earlier this year, when the company was forced to rescind its policy banning any other payment methods. Mr Smith is replaced by Deborah Sharkey, who has been with the company for five years and has worked in several areas of the business.
So far, a fairly typical “we changed MD” notification, except for the rather odd and grumpy little quote from Simon Smith in the middle of the AB post:
In a public statement today, Simon said: “I’ve enjoyed eight exciting years at eBay and, given that recent changes to the organisation are now complete, it seems an appropriate time for me to move on.”
Outgoing MDs are usually full of eloquent praise for their colleagues and the company, tinged with a little regret, so we have to wonder exactly what those changes at eBay Australia might be.
We’d like to wish Simon Smith the very best of luck in whatever he does next, and remind him to always finish on a song:
Amazon staff buy their Chrismas presents on eBay
December 15, 2008
Every one is busy doing their Christmas shopping, and ecommerce staff are no different to you and I.
In the past it’s been a standing joke that an enterprising post room employee based at eBay’s offices in San Jose made up some stickers reading “You could have got this cheaper on eBay” and attached it to every incoming parcel from Amazon.
It’s nice to see it’s not just eBay staff that shop on Amazon, this year Amazon employees are busily ordering their Christmas purchases on eBay and having them conveniently shipped to work… the Amazon.co.uk offices in Slough.
Interestingly this item was also spotted available on Amazon.co.uk for the exact same price…. looks like Amazon employees simply prefer to do their shopping on eBay
Why I don’t buy on eBay mobile
December 14, 2008
By clicking on the button below, you commit to buy this item from the seller if you're the winning bidder. The displayed total does not include shipping and handling costs.
Having an HP iPaq mobile handset it should be easy – whenever an idea for a present occurs to me – to fire up the mobile browser, tap in the keywords for the present and click to buy. It’s even better if I see something in a shop as I can instantly compare the retail price and often find I can source it cheaper on eBay.
The problem is I never actually buy on mobile eBay for one reason – I never know what the carriage charge will be as eBay mobile doesn’t reveal it.
It’s a frustration that on the main eBay site that Best Match doesn’t include carriage charges, there’s nothing I object to more than paying unreasonable shipping costs. It’s much worse on eBay Mobile which doesn’t even highlight items with free carriage.
At this time of year if I think of a great Christmas present idea I just want to buy it before I forget. It’s time eBay mobile was upgraded to let me see if what looks like a good price is going to disappoint me with high P&P costs, or if it comes with reasonable (or free) shipping and really is a great deal.
eBay close European national offices
December 13, 2008
eBay have confirmed that they are closing many European national offices, as Europe bears the brunt of their global cost-cutting exercise.
An eBay spokesman confirmed yesterday that European operations will now be centralised in just two offices: Richmond (UK) for marketplaces and Zurich (Switzerland) for marketing. Paris, Berlin and Milan will retain some PR and sales functions, as well as customer services; other national offices are being closed altogether except for their customer service desks.
eBay had announced in October that around 10% of their global workforce would be cut, with 1,000 permanent positions lost and many temporary contracts not renewed. They’re coy about exactly what percentage of this loss is being foisted on Europe, but we know that 77 out of 100 positions have gone from the eBay UK team based in Richmond. Assuming that similar losses are happening in Paris, Berlin and Milan, we can estimate that eBay Europe’s bigger national sites could easily account for 300 job losses, with perhaps another 100 or so from the smaller sites.
Morale amongst eBay staff – even those staying on – is reportedly the lowest it’s been for years. People who are being offered jobs in the new eBay Europe, are preferring to take the “generous” redundancy package. In the present economic climate, this speaks volumes.
eBay’s message is that these changes will not impact site users. Their announcements in October, translated into a dozen European languages, said as much, and they’re still saying it now. This is a company who thinks that the only way they impact their users is by the cut and paste answers their CS teams send out. Promises that national sites will not change aren’t likely to reassure eBay members who already complain that real support is impossible to get, that policies are made with no reference to the realities of trading on the site and that straight answers are rarely forthcoming from eBay staff. Fewer people and centralised management are not likely to improve any of these issues.
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