Loading...
Symbols:
Get Seeking Alpha Free Stock Alerts by Email!
Get Free Stock Alerts by Email!
Transcripts
- American Vanguard Corporation Q3 2008 Earnings Call Transcript
- Oplink Communications, Inc. F1Q09 (Qtr End 09/30/08) Earnings Call Transcript
- Albany Molecular Research, Inc. Q3 2008 Earnings Call Transcript
- Alphatec Spine, Inc. Q3 2008 Earnings Call Transcript
- Avanex Corporation F1Q09 (Qtr End 09/30/08) Earnings Call Transcript
- Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Q3 2008 Earnings Call Transcript
- eHealth, Inc. Q3 2008 Earnings Call Transcript
- MIPS Technologies, Inc. F1Q09 (Qtr End 09/30/08) Earnings Call Transcript
- Alexza Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Q3 2008 Earnings Call Transcript
- Alkermes, Inc. F2Q09 (Qtr End 09/30/08) Earnings Call Transcript
-
Editors' Picks
-
Most Popular
- Throwing in the Towel on This Market?
- General Electric: Genuine Risk of Collapse?
- Food: Against Self-Sufficiency
- The Fed: Now the World's Largest Private Bank
- Key to the Global Equity Market: Trend and Cycle Analysis of U.S. Retail
- Can a Global Economy Be Managed One Nation at a Time?
- Full list of Editors' Picks »
- Jim Rogers on China »
- Memo to Warren: AmEx Preferred at 15%, Warrants at $12 »
- Should We Really Bail Out the Big Three Automakers with $73.20 Per Hour Labor? »
- Peak Oil's Bell Is Ringing »
- UltraShort ETFs: At a Tipping Point? »
- The Biggest Problem Detroit's Big Three Face »
- 11 Stocks Selling Below Cash »
- Tech May Be a Wreck, But This Isn't 2001 »
- General Electric: Genuine Risk of Collapse? »
- The Autos and Mentality That Ruined Detroit »
- Iceland: What It's Like to Live in a World Without Money »
Hedge Fund Jobs
Job Seekers: Search jobs by category, get job alerts by email or live feed, apply online See full list of jobs »
Employers: See all recruitment options, get applications online or by email Post a job »
Trading Center
- Free E-Newsletters
- About Seeking Alpha
- About Us
- Contact Us
- What's New
- Readers Feedback
- Advertise With Us
- Contributors
- Contribute an Article
- Feature Your Book
- Our Contributors
- Anonymous Contributions
- Dispute an Article?
- Legal
- Terms of Use
- Privacy
- Copyright
Henrietta
14 Comments
eBay: Getting Something for Nothing
Have you considered that there may be monopoly or anti trust issues with attendant litigation expenses with eBay Inc's purchase of Bill Me Later?
PayPal will not benefit from the eBay related hostility engendered from 'disgruntled' ex-sellers, quite the contrary, it is Google Checkout who benefits from that. Ask me how I know?
My MM funds are now in Vanguard and PP balance is kept at ZERO. I sweep the same day for the very few occasions I am compelled to use PayPal.
eBay Looks Cheap Even with All The Negatives
Although eBay likes to refer to 'our buyers' their customers are sellers and as more and more sellers pack it in the choices 'our buyers' will have get less and less.
Unless your assumptions are based solely on advertising & non-marketplace income they are probably not valid assumptions or even calculated projections. They are just guesses.
Changes to eBay’s Pricing Plan Could Whack Shares by 20%
I blogged this issue. tinyurl.com/65ll4t
Using a $9.99 fixed price item for a one time listing sale, with at cost S&H of $5, the combined actual eBay/PayPal take is 19.5%
If we loose the insertion fees and up the final value fee from 8.75% to 15% the combined eBay/PayPal take figure rises to 22.3%.
Note that this is on a single transaction and does not in any way take into account the catastrophic drop in sales directly attributable to the new unfinding eBay experience.
Given the how low can you go sell through rates on eBay today, maybe losing the listing insertion fees would be a fitting punishment for eBay management as they try to discover how to be Amazon without inventory or customer service.
EBay: Stock Swoons As Three Analysts Downgrade
I have never had a problem with PayPal but boycotting PayPal goes right along with boycotting eBay. Yes I do still offer it on my website. If my customers want to use it they can and I offer my customers choice, unlike eBay, but I prefer Google Checkout and encourage its use by giving discount coupons which pay for themselves because Google Checkout is free with AdWords.
eBay was a wonderful place once but any entity which confuses its customers, those who pay for service, with those who come to 'only a venue' to buy from their customers, deserves what it gets.
I sold my shares earlier this year and would advise anyone who still has them to dump them. They are non-productive, and the dance is over.
Innovate or Die: eBay at a Crossroads
Congratulations on learning how to use Google, you should be very proud of your achievement.
You are mistaken, Randy does not 'hate' eBay. He is a businessman who built an enterprise on a flawed platform.
Yes, Randy failed on eBay and then took what he had learned & clawed his way back up again. I am sure he learned more from the experience than someone who has never achieved anything in the first place.
What is more to the point is that he has been generous enough to share with those who are capable of learning from his experiences.
What have you built?
eBay's Death by a Thousand Cuts
eBay management is failing customer relations 101 because they do not see sellers as customers, their customers are market analysts, most of whom are as short sighted as eBay (easy to hoodwink).
All the talk about removing 'bad sellers' is making buyers very uneasy. When the trolls gather, literally salivating about teaching sellers a lesson, it is time for any seller with a dwindling bottom line to rethink their business plan.
The days of bunging an item up and seeing it sell in a mad bidding frenzy are over. GONE. Buyers are much more savvy now they know that no item is truly unique, wait a while and another will come along.
Sellers who want to remain in e-retail will have to learn SEO, branding and marketing. Customer service alone will not do it.
Promote and support the alternatives, with your buying and your selling.
Not Seeing a 'Better & Safer' eBay
Scott Wingo who still has a sore ego from the spanking he got on eBay Workshops the other week.
You can drink deep of his wisdom, imparted with his own inimitatable style on HIS blog - ebaystrategies.blogs.c.../
You will see he has been doing a little stylish whining of his own, it appears eBay will not allow Channel Advisor to access Seller Dashboard via any API, he would like us all to call our TSAM's.
It will work because his readers are all such important people.
Four out of his last five posts have been ever so slightly negative about eBay but that is OK because it is on his own blog and he is an Expert (who makes a very nice living off sellers)
Gee, I guess you will just have to invite Donohoe for another coffee at Starbucks and give him more advice on how to run his company. You did so well last time.
Oh and Scott? Its thIEf, not theif.
Leaving eBay: Not as Easy as It Sounds
Nobody has frozen my Paypal account.
Have you read ALL of your Paypal User Agreement?
I used to think people who opened up special bank accounts just for their Paypal related business were really obsessive. Then I read it. Then I pulled all my Money Market Funds out of Paypal and put them someplace else.
Who Wins in eBay's New Shipping Cost Requirements?
Shipping charge 5.95 for a #1.5 home dec hardback book Priority. Below cost.
If you persist you will be warned that your item will not be favorably treated in Best Match, and you know what? They ain't just a woofin! Seven days zero views. I couldn't even FIND my own listing searching by the exact title. Hmmm.
Leaving eBay: Not as Easy as It Sounds
In America we are presumed innocent until found guilty.
On eBay we are found guilty and can spend months or years trying to prove our innocence.
eBay has ruined people financially, with its unregulated monopoly payment system Paypal, it has frozen accounts for years. Paypal can & does change their Terms of Service at any time without notification. If you have a Paypal account they can not only freeze your funds in your Paypal account, they can fine you $2500 for violation of their Terms of Service, go into your bank account and credit card and help themselves to their fine. They have greater powers than the Courts who are bound by law.
screw-paypal.com will open your eyes.
Paypal changed the User Agreement March 5th 2008. Do you know what changed? PayPal is amending section 10.2 of the User Agreement to allow PayPal to take the actions described in that section if PayPal has reason to believe that you have engaged in any of the Restricted Activities. The prior language allowed PayPal to take the actions described in that section if you engaged in any of the Restricted Activities.
Are sellers afraid of eBay and Paypal? If not, they should be! If you think my real name is Henrietta I have a very nice bridge I would like to sell you, on eBay.
Learning Your Way Around eBay's New Seller Dashboard
I am going to ask you the same question that concerned Skip McGrath (so far as I know he isn't evil, the spawn of satan or even a communist)
If you are a low volume seller, one casual rating of 4 all around from a buyer who does not routinely employ superlatives, but is pleased with the transaction and has left positive feedback can put you in a world of hurt.
I believe Skip said he averaged around 80 sales a month, which puts his transaction volume 4 times higher than mine. Please note that I am not implying low ASP to either Skip's product or mine.
What are your thoughts on this?
Is Donahoe Trying to Destroy eBay?
After the SIS debacle we removed over 3K multi item listings from our eBay store and made our own website, check it out. We were joined by two other ex-eBay shops, soon to be three and a service business.
After the Donahoe announcement we opened accounts at eCRATER and Loudfrog. We like to run auctions as promotion for the website but with our low ASP we can no longer AFFORD eBay fees which currently suck up over 50% of gross. Sell through rates have been dropping on eBay for six months.
Both eCRATER and Loudfrog are run by honest people who want sellers, listen to them and respond factually to questions. Yep, real people read your mail and answer you, incredible. Lower overhead means we are able to list at lower prices giving better bargains to our customers.
Doug in Utah is absolutely right "common sense clearly identifies preservation of buyer experience as key" I am not sure he fully understands the concept or he would not have left out the word POSITIVE, it is "preservation of POSITIVE buyer experience IS key to retail success"
It is no longer possible to preserve positive buyer experience on eBay. The new search is frustrating for both buyers and sellers, the fee increases raise prices and the continued influx of hordes of China based sellers of cheap knockoffs and fakes debases the entire site.
eBay was good. eBay was built by small sellers most of whom are also buyers and most of whom will leave this year. RIP
eBay Bares Its Ugly New Face
Bruce H., thank you for catching the points I did not raise because my post was already way too long.
Regarding user ID, I have four, one to sell, one to buy, one for posting in AC and forums and one in reserve. I am fairly typical of most oldtimers on the bay. I know someone who has eight!
When I say enough, no more, I speak for four users, five if you include my husband who has his own ID. Every ID has buyer feedback, three have seller feedback. We honored the boycott and will be out of eBay lock, stock and the very last bookmark and greeting card by the end of April.
eBay Bares Its Ugly New Face
We saw the writing on the wall in 06 when store fees rose nearly 70% but stores inventory became visible in search to compensate. Sales took off and life was good. Two months later we were taken out of search again because "eBay needs to re-balance the marketplace and return to its core values" Translated this means big time sellers of imported junk were seeing declining sell through rates in their auctions due to buyers being able to find fixed price items in stores, and they were complaining, loudly. Management had an epiphany, eBay needed to re-balance, more auctions, less fixed price. Did store fees decline to previous rate, given that what we were paying for in the increase had been withdrawn? Don't be silly! Bait and switch anyone?
Back in 06 it was clear that we had too many eggs in one basket and we began to explore other channels. We explored alternative auction venues, none had the traffic to make the effort worthwhile. We built a website, we promoted it. We learned that if you are not paying 40% of your gross sales to eBay you can survive with less sales. Like most small sellers we were frequent buyers too. As our listing volume declined so did our purchasing volume on eBay. New and better auction venues appeared, we put merchandise in many of them.
We remained as eBay sellers through price increase after price increase, cutting overhead to the bone in order to remain competitive in our pricing because there was no viable alternative. This is not true anymore. Venues such as eCRATER.com, Loudfrog.com, Etsy.com for the hand-crafters and their suppliers and iOffer.com are much more viable for sellers and we have a presence on all of them.
The three straws that broke this camels back are:
1. Detailed Seller Ratings which are extremely important to the viability of the seller and framed deceptively to the buyer. For example Shipping Time, on a scale of 1 - 5, 4 is 'quickly' to the buyer who thinks this is a good score. eBay regards 4 as so poor that you are a risky seller, will loose your power seller status with the much hyped 'discounted fees', are restricted to Paypal for payment (who may hold the buyers funds for up to 21 days). eBay ignores the fact that to a buyer speed of shipping has everything to do with when they have their purchase in their hand and nothing to do with how fast the item was packed and taken to the Post Office. Sellers are being rated on UPS and USPS job performance.
Looking at the Shipping and Handling charges ratings raises even more questions. How can FREE SHIP rate less than 5?
2. Feedback. We agree that retaliatory feedback is a problem. Most retaliatory feedback is left by super high volume sellers who use automated like for like programs. When a buyer uses negative feedback to ask the seller a question "When are you going to ship my item?" you can see why the programs are popular. Fixing the problem by preventing use of these programs would make more sense than removing the only tool a seller has to evaluate the buyer. Buyer fraud is increasing and eBay ignores it. They get their fees regardless.
3. Disrespect for sellers or, as I prefer the word, CONTEMPT. eBay management & their PR department disparage sellers routinely. We are 'just noise', 'flea market sellers' and we must be stupid too. A nickel less up front and 3.5% increase up the rear is not a decrease and we are smart enough to figure that out.
As a seller of high quality American made greeting cards which I sell from $2 and up, fixed price, eBay & Paypal together take a minimum of 65c plus 14.9% or 30c (actually higher because Paypal's cut includes 2.9% of S & H) This leaves me with the choices of (a) selling below cost, (b) raising prices = declining sales, or, (c) leaving eBay.
So, here we are, two years down the road from "eBay needs to re-balance the marketplace and return to its core values, auction sales" and eBay seems to have turned around and be driving in the other direction. Now we want more fixed price, and will be getting away from auctions as soon as we can.
Hear me well eBay. I will not be bringing back the 3500 multiple quantity listings I had in my eBay store when you shafted me in 06, those listings I removed when you doubled my listing costs in 07, those fixed price listings you would like to charge me 12% final value fees on. I am a businesswoman. I can't run a viable business with my venue micromanaging it.