EBay Is Fighting For It’s Life
I recently got a call from an EBay representative. They were trying to help Power sellers grow sales by offering a few best practices. The person who called me had been at EBay for 7 years and told me that the most changes have been in the last year under the new CEO.
As a background, I have been an EBay member since 2002. Buying and selling a few items here and there. I have to admit, is was a fun process, winning auctions was exhilarating. Selling things that I didn’t really need was also useful.
For the most part, I’ve had good experiences. Except my wife did purchase a fake hand bag from a seller who had good feedback scores. That seller delisted themselves shortly after we made our purchase.
A few years later I started selling product on EBay and acheived Platinum Power Seller status. EBay was not somewhere we were trying very hard at, but wanted to learn the EBay market and happened to do well. However, in selling at EBay, we noticed many counterfeit sellers selling product for low prices. As an authorized seller for our brands, we know what legitimate product is.
Despite reports submitted about these sellers, EBay continues to allow these sellers to operate and dupe buyers. This can’t leave a good impression for buyers. Buyers are precious to any business and must be given the best experience, this is not happening at EBay. This has been going on for years and I think is part of the reason for EBay’s decline. I wonder if EBay looks the other way as they continue to generate fees from these sellers, while buyers think they are getting a great deal.
Buyers not only get a poor taste but legitimate sellers do too. Even with sharply priced items, we still can’t beat counterfeit sellers. This forces us and others to lower our prices to compete, unfairly, thus reducing our margins and profit. It is barely worthwhile to sell there anymore.
EBay’s fees coupled with their other company Paypal are also high, further reducing margins. If you look on the Power Seller discussion boards, there is no shortage of people griping about this.
The new CEO has made many changes, including feedback rules and pricing, and I can see what he is trying to do. In my opinion, things have just been rearranged with a focus on driving buyers, not in favor of sellers. If sellers don’t get a favorable environment, they will find elsewhere to go.
Apparently many sellers have left EBay, reducing selection and appeal to buyers. Our sales have dropped over the last year 3 to 1. I mentioned this to the representative who called me, who pointed to the economy, but our sales outside EBay are growing so this doesn’t make sense to me. I see Craigslist and Amazon taking away much of their business.
EBay is still a great place offering hard to find items but has many problems to overcome. With the changes so far, I just don’t see this happening. EBay is on the decline and is in the fight for it’s life.