eBay: Donahoe May Kill the Kijiji Brand 12 comments
June 12, 2009
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There are two articles out Thursday, both from WSJ/DJ that had some interesting snippets - plus a little bonus contest/joke to get you through the end of the week.
Donahoe Update - (or what is 'buy-bye' in Swahili?)
In the first ($ub required), Donahoe echoes what we've been seeing at ChannelAdvisor - that the ecommerce market has stabilized. (not down, not up, but more sideways since Feb).
The most interesting part of this is that JD slips in there they may get rid of the Kijijijiji brand. As much as I LOVE to type kijiji, I do think it should go and they should call it eBay Local. This was one of the top points of my eBay 2.0 diatribe and it's great to see eBay following my advice. Here's the snippet:
He also said the company is weighing whether to scrap its separate Kajiji online-classifieds brand in the U.S. The company might merge Kijiji into the eBay brand as e-commerce formats -- such as auctions, fixed-price and classifieds -- begin to merge in a world where consumers use search engines to find what they are looking for regardless of format.
If they are following my eBay 2.0 business plan, next they will sell the corporate jets (on eBay of course - but they HAVE to use free shipping).
IntegrateMeLater
I've been getting lots of calls from Wall St. analysts asking why eBay hasn't integrated BillMeLater (BML) in PayPal yet. My answer is - "beats me". Retailers are able to integrate BML in 30-60 days and here we are closing in on a year after the M+A and it's still not integrated. PayPal President, Scott Thompson, was speaking earlier in the week and gave this update:
Thompson said BML this summer will become a payment option available to shoppers who have PayPal accounts. It will also become a checkout option for shoppers who use eBay's marketplace. He added that by the first quarter of next year, BML will be embedded as a payment option side-by-side with PayPal on merchant sites around the Internet.
It will be interesting to see if eBay passes any of the great BML economics on to lowly eBay sellers as they do to their retail partners or if they pocket all those gains for themselves (I think we can all guess how this is going to go).
What is the eBay Seller's Challenge?
(wait for it)
The eBay Seller's challenge is.... To stay in business these days! (har har har)
But seriously folks, some eBay PR flacks sent me a very detailed email about this competition eBay has sponsored by the Kauffman foundation. Spend hours on a business plan and upload a video and you could win $25,000 to help grow your business. $25k is nothing to sneeze at, but my sense is this thing is going to take a lot of time and it's not really clear that it is geared towards existing eBay sellers with that being only one of four categories - the others are:
- Member of armed forces
- Never sold on eBay
- Part-time seller
For a kick, watch the video where the lady says she is going to use the $25k to buy a new camera and take better pictures. Hmmm, that's going to be one helluva camera!
I've embedded the video because that's just fun to do and proves I am a HTML WILD MAN:
eBay Strategies contest - I've got a box full of ChannelAdvisor goodies for anyone that uploads the best spoof video or silliest use of the $25k. Post a link to it in comments.
Disclosure: I am long Google, Amazon and eBay is a minority investor in ChannelAdvisor
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This article has 12 comments:
“Donahoe May Kill the Kijiji Brand”. Who cares? If Donahoe kills anything it would be better for all of us all if it was himself.
If that MBA taught Donahoe anything he should be negotiating with “the banks” to take PayPal and integrate it into the their online payments system, in exchange for an appropriate interest in the consolidated business, of course. Because, the more successful PayPal is, the more likely it is that the banks will finally get off their butts and add a like system to their portals; if and when that happens the banks will do it properly, and the banks will then squash PayPal in about five minutes flat: the “clunky” PayPal will then have to rely on eBay’s mandating of the offering of PayPal on the eBay marketplace to survive; unfortunately, as implied by Christa Quarles’ earlier joking remark, if things keep going as they are, there probably won’t be much left of the eBay marketplace by then.
In the meantime, if he is good enough for a directorship at Intel, could we hope that they might offer him an executive position too. They seem to be the only ones (apart from the dopey market analysts) who think that he has any ability.
And they don't need an ebay local. We already have one. It's called Craig's List and it works just fine.
I'm curious as to why you've only recently begun adding "eBay is a minority investor in ChannelAdvisor" to your disclosure. You've been writing on Seeking Alpha since January of 2008. eBay has been a minority investor in ChannelAdvisor since 2002.
David Steiner
President
AuctionBytes.com
Actually, any SANE person knows how to Right Ebay.
And why is it EVERYONE who's paid to write about Ebay GLOSSES OVER the Fact the Ebay (Donahoe) is in DIRECT VIOLATION of the Sherman Act, that guarantees us the Right to collect Checks and Money Orders ? hhmmMMMMM ?
I'd like an answer !
You're Volley......
David Steiner
President
AuctionBytes.com"
Scot Wingo apparently made the latest changes due to his Seeking Alpha articles being a violation of 1975-1980 FTC regulations.
www.ftc.gov/bcp/guides...
FTC GUIDES CONCERNING USE OF
ENDORSEMENTS AND TESTIMONIALS IN ADVERTISING
That is, Seeking Alpha is holding Mr. Wingo to their high legal standards.
Still this is not a particularly full disclosure, since for example '§255.5 Disclosure of material connections' states "such connection must be fully disclosed." And interestingly there is no statement made that 'Scott Wingo is CEO of ChannelAdvisor', i.e. the casual reader would not know the significance of "eBay is a minority investor in ChannelAdvisor." Ergo all of his Seeking Alpha articles (seekingalpha.com/autho...) remain in highly probable violation of these FTC Guides.
Although "eBay is a minority investor in ChannelAdvisor" and 'Scot Wingo CEO of ChannelAdvisor' remains an interesting read.
"I've found that when you want to know the truth about someone that someone is probably the last person you should ask."
Gregory House MD, House
FTC Complaint Assistant
https://ftccomplaintassistant.gov/
Not a problem for JD. He has already killed one of the strongest brands in history... eBay Itself!
The man is nothing but a destroyer, and he doesn't have an original thought in that tiny little scrap of flesh he thinks of as a brain.
The only thing that needs to be killed here is his career, permanently. After what he has done to eBay, no one in their right mind would hire him.
His incredible arrogance is astounding. In a years time, JD has made more dedicated business enemies than anyone, ever.
Down with Donahoe!!!