This past year many long time Ebay sellers moved the bulk of their business to Amazon, and became multi-channel sellers. During the testing of “best match”, and “finding 2.0″, there were many sellers with a huge drop in sell through rates that lasted for a week or more. The only way to continue to sell on Ebay was to find another avenue to make sales. The avenue of choice for many was Amazon.

An odd thing happened this holiday season on Ebay. I had an buyer that decided the Amazon return policy was much better than my return policy. I have to admit that having 30 days (Amazon’s policy) to return an item is much better than 7 days (my policy), and I did refund my customers money when the item arrived 30 days after we agreed she would return the item. But the incident got me thinking.

Is Amazon setting the standard now for internet buying customer service? Other Ebay sellers have reported that buyers are asking to return items up to 60 days after a sale. Some Amazon sellers are reporting packages being returned from Amazon buyers more than 30 days after the buyer received it.

I have to admit that a year ago I would never have dreamed of asking this question. Is the Amazon return policy going to become the default policy in the internet buyers subconscious? Will buyers hesitate to purchase unless they can expect to get a 30 day return policy?

I think a year ago many Ebay sellers believed Ebay was the only place to sell, and would remain the “main” selling venue. Times have obviously changed. Now Amazon may be setting trends in internet buying that affect sellers who don’t even sell on Amazon.

If you have any stories of how Amazon has affected your sales on Ebay, please post them. I would like to know if other sellers have noticed the same trends I have.

Jennie

One day my curiousity got the better of my common sense. I decided to find out if running only Ebay auctions with low shipping would put me higher in the ebay search, and increase my sales. So I started a brand new Ebay selling account, and tweaked some things.

The new account has core auction listings only. I lowered my shipping from $4.00 to $2.75, and offered free shipping with the purchase of two items. I ship items the day after they are paid for instead of my normal two days a week. Otherwise, the level of communication is the same, and the auction format is the same. In other words, I made sure I was doing everything in the recommended Ebay 5 star way of thinking.

I found out that my placement in search is not better. My Detailed Sellers Ratings (DSRs) are lower on the new selling ID even though I am offering better service and lower shipping. And Ebay needs to work on the tools available to new sellers.

Why isn’t selling manager free! The only way a new seller can send a free automated shipping notification through Ebay is if postage is purchased through Ebay???? It seems pretty clear that selling tools should be free especially if DSRs, and buyer happiness are important. Why not make every selling tool free to new sellers, so they can increase buyer ecstasy?

And what is with the DSR ratings????? They can’t have any validity if the incredible service I am giving combined with super cheap shipping gets 4’s more often than 5’s. What gives?? I have to laugh when significantly lower shipping charges result in a lower DSR rating for shipping and handling charges.

The sell through rate is about 35-40% which is the exact same sell through rate for vintage jewelry on my old selling ID. I have had my new selling ID for a little over a month, and it is very obvious to me that I need to find a new product line that I can sell on Amazon. The new ID keeps the numbers right in my face. I calculated my costs, and found that I am making a whopping $2.50 per hour selling vintage jewelry on my new selling ID. So, unless the profit increases with my feedback, Amazon here I come!

I have to admit though that I got a thrill when I received my first star, and I felt a tingle up my spine when I got the e-mail from Ebay congratulating me for passing 25 feedback rating. So the magic in selling on Ebay for the first time is still there. I estimate that I will be getting a coveted “Meg Whitman” signed bronze powerseller certificate in the next month or so. I think I will have this one framed since it is sure to become a collectible.

Overall, I found this experience to be liberating. I have found out that tweaking the small things like shipping charges, and shipping time make no difference to buyers. And it makes no difference to placement in search. It does however create repeat buyers which has become the key to core auction success on Ebay in my opinion.

Jennie

I recently discovered that the Walmart employee who developed the statistical analysis packages that put Walmart at the top of the discount retailer heap, is working on the same type of statistical analysis for Ebay. This started me thinking about comparisons that can be made between Walmart business policy and Ebay business policy. What is the same about both corporations, and what is not?

For starters, both corporations are concerned with profit above all else, and bringing products to the consumer at the cheapest possible price. Both have a reputation for offering products at rock bottom prices. Walmart is known for taking advantage of manufacturers to get the best deal.

I got that far, and an interesting comparision came to mind. Suppose Ebay saw all the sellers on their platform as manufacturers? Say we Ebay sellers were considered the same commodity to corporate Ebay as the manufacturers of goods are to Walmart? Walmart is known to have broken many a manufacturer by refusing to sell their product until they lowered their price. Walmart can get away with this because they have gained control over so many small town retail markets. It hurts not to have your product sold at Walmart.

So how can Ebay break us unruly sellers to make us lower our prices? By implementing a new search that puts the cheapest product, being shipped at the cheapest rate, ahead of everyone else in search? By creating a secret algorithm that allows them to place any seller above all others in search? Will the sellers with the cheapest priced products always be first in search after Finding 2.0 is implemented? I don’t know the answer to any of those questions, but I do know that Ebay goes out of their way to encourage me to lower my opening auction bids.

I get e-mails telling me that if I start my auctions at a lower opening bid, I will get higher overall auction sales. I have buyers who don’t bid the first time I list an item waiting for me to relist my items at a lower price. Ebay allows sniping of auctions at the last minute which lowers final sale prices. And there are many more examples.

Why do both Walmart and Ebay believe that offering products at the cheapest price is a good business practice? Wouldn’t it be wiser to offer quality products at a price that keeps your manufacturers/sellers in business? Ebay could try to raise their profits and reputation by implementing practices that raise buyer awareness of realistic pricing and shipping costs. It would be an interesting Ebay world where they spent more time teaching buyers why products are worth more, rather than training sellers to expect less.

Jennie

One of the most interesting aspects of internet selling is anonymity.  The mild mannered insurance salesman sells hardline harley motorcycle gear on the internet.  The shy Ohio housewife sells racy red silk lingerie as Mimi an immigrant from Paris France.  Because the buyer on the internet can’t see a balding head, or mousy dress, and make any assumptions.  This type of anonymity has positive and negative consequences to an internet business.

The positive consequence of anonymity is that discrimination, or generalization due to a sellers appearance is all but eliminated, but it also creates a problem.  It is difficult to create buyer trust for an internet product, or seller.  In a typical brick and mortar store a wary customer can converse freely, and develop a bond with a seller leading to a purchase.  On the internet, there are very few opportunities for conversation and/or communication of any kind before purchasing.  So, for an internet seller, the buyer will trust you as much as they trust the venue you sell in.  In other words, we internet sellers are at the mercy of the reputation of the venue we sell in.

Take eBay selling as an example.  Mention that you sell on eBay, and the common comment is “I have bought things on eBay, and I haven’t been taken yet”.  Ebay is seen as the arena for stolen goods, the fence for crap from dumpsters, the lying description that suckers you into paying too much for that “gotta have” one of a kind item.   The consequence is what many sellers call the eBay “discount”.  You have to sell cheap on eBay to overcome the buyers distrust of eBay sellers.  Buyers are only willing to risk so much money buying items from sellers they don’t trust.

On the other hand, Amazon sellers are pretty non-existent as individuals.  But it doesn’t seem to matter.  Buyers are flocking to Amazon to purchase the same products sold on eBay, and paying more for them.  Sometimes, Amazon buyers are purchasing from an eBay seller who is selling the same product on Amazon and eBay, and the Amazon buyers are paying more.  Why?  Is it because Amazon has a better reputation, and creates more trust in the buyer?

Perhaps a combination of individual and corporate anonymity are working against eBay, and for Amazon?  When a problem with a purchase arises, eBay tends to put the blame on the seller when communicating with buyers, and Amazon just fixes the problem by offering unconditional returns.  Can the problem with buyer trust in eBay be changed for the better?  Will the changes eBay is making to the venue increase buyer trust?  It will be interesting to see the numbers a year from now.

But for now, anonymity on the internet can be fun, but might also be working against eBay sellers bottom line .

Jennie

Written by Steve Grossberg, IMA President

If you listened to the BSC/IMA conference call on eBay you would have heard us talk about finding 2.0 on ebay. This will be a huge change for buyers and sellers on eBay. Ebay is still doing a lot of A-B testing and now is the time for us to do our own testing and make some noise on the good and the bad we see so far.

If you have not tested this find 2.0 for your own items, I encourage you to do so as soon as possible. You can get to the ebay playground by clicking here.

The playground is finding 2.0. The finding 2.0 experience is getting rolled out to ebay.com now. In my category 20% of buyers see the new search and this is true in 3 other categories as well (not sure which ones).  In other categories it is only seen by a very small percentage of buyers, but all categories will eventually have increased exposure to finding 2.0.

Let me walk you through a search I just did in my category.

First have 2 browsers open with one at
http://www.ebay.com and one at
http://playground.ebay.com/

In the search box type or copy and paste for both sites

xenosaga 2 ps2

Notice the huge difference in search results. On ebay.com it pulls up 100 results for me. On the playground or finding 2.0 I see 3 different Xenosaga games presented to me titled “best match” - all with photo images.

As you can see the second item down is Xenosaga 2 or actually Xenosaga II. It has only 37 items listed total as indicated there on the search results. So again on ebay.com we had 110 items appear and on the playground 37 items. So finding 2.0 eliminated the 73 items that were not actually the item buyer was searching for Xenosaga 2.

This is extremely positive in my view as it cleans up the clutter.

You will notice under the 3 items presented for best match are listings combined for all 3 best match items or sort of like the view buyer sees on ebay.com, except this search eliminated items that were not the actual video games, like action figures and strategy guides.

Now click on the Xenosaga 2 under best match

You will see some information regarding the game like platform, publisher, release date etc. Again very good information and presentation IMO.

Now you also see this.

What is it Worth?
Just Sold on eBay: $0.01 - $19.95
Suggested List Price: $13.89

This is horrible in my opinion. First off where does ebay come up with the suggested list price of $13.89. This is misinformation and totally wrong. No video game on the market today has a MSRP of $13.89, but notice ebay does not say manufacturers suggested list price and only says suggested list price.

What is suggested list price, eBay’s suggested list price? Where do they get this information because again it is not the MSRP. Then eBay’s says it sold for between .01 and $19.95. So what is this telling buyer? If they pay more then 1 cent they are paying too much? Was the 1 cent item new or used, was it damaged etc?

Again this is not relevant information to represent to buyers because,  first, the MSRP is wrong, and second, what it sold for on ebay is not enough information for buyer to make an informed decision.

Ebay get rid of this section completely. This is like having a DSR for shipping and handling

Next you will notice under the information section ebay presents 5 of these items to buyers. I ask why only 5 when we know there are 37 listed. Would it not be better to present 9 or 12 or 15? What happens if all 5 presented happen to be used items and consumer is looking for new or vice versa. Does buyer think those are only 5 available and leave ebay? Does buyer know enough to click on button “buy one like this” to see all items?

Also keep in mind this is not always presented in ending soonest and I have personally seen it change from ending soonest items appearing, to newly listed, to simply what ebay determined best match. So this will surely affect seller and buyer behavior.

Also notice not all of the 5 items have gallery images, which in my opinion creates an ugly presentation to buyer. Even if seller chose to not list item with gallery, ebay can still have the stock photo shown in best match appearing next to the 5 items presented, but better yet should make gallery free in all listings. Ebay is very hypocritical here saying they want to improve the buyer experience and not include gallery for free which makes for an ugly presentation to consumer.

But it would not surprise me with eBay’s thinking, they will have a weighting for those who use gallery in the algorithms for the 5 items that appear. Thus favoring items listed with gallery is a means to get sellers to pay for gallery. But guess who pays for gallery? Ultimately it will be passed on to consumers raising prices once again on the eBay buyer.

If eBay thinks every time they improve the buying experience someone must pay, it is flawed thinking and high time ebay started giving to improve their own site.

Okay now click on “buy one like this” button. You see the same information header as before and all 37 listings. Notice there is no tab for buy it now only but instead on the left navigation bar is a link. Also notice there is no link to review completed items.

One other observation I noticed on finding 2.0. One cannot search by UPC or ISBN number. For Xenosaga 2 the upc code is 722674100175. If you put this upc code in a search on ebay.com the item will appear. On find 2.0 it will not and it thinks it is a keyword. On Amazon the UPC is searchable as well.

Please tell us what your findings are! We would love to hear your comments.