Lorrie Norrington Keynote at eCommerce Summit

TheBrewsNewsOn 04.23.2008 at 7:17 pm Said:

QUOTE from LORRIE:

“1. Back in January, eBay said that the goal was to have 60% of PowerSellers qualify for at least a 5% discount and in Q1, 63% did qualify for at least the 5%.”

MY QUESTION / COMMENTS:

Of those 63%, how many would have qualified for the 15% discount if the Last DSR (shipping) qualification would have been 4.6 instead of a flat 4.8 across the board? If the median powerseller has 4.8 in Item as Described, Communication, and Shipping Time and then 4.6 in S&H charge (statistics from eBay) then why was the decision made to give the 5% discount for Powersellers who have 4.8 across the board?

What eBay is REALLY doing then is simply making the majority of the reward based solely on the one DSR criterion. Just one criterion makes the difference between a 5% versus a 15% discount. And there has been much debate about the true accuracy of that one criterion.

Lorrie says “30% of all PowerSellers qualified for the 15% discount.” Another statistics question that I would love to have Lorrie answer for us — of those 30%, how many are bronze Powersellers, how many are gold, etc? I would guess that the vast marjority of those 30% are not high-volume Powersellers.

Powersellers who actually depend on eBay to make a living cannot lose money on shipping (unlike Richard who listed an item for priority mail shipping and was charging $4 for priority mail and, when asked, he said that he didn’t change it because he could afford to pay the 60 cents out of his pocket).

Powersellers who make a living on eBay (most of the higher volume Powersellers) soon realized that their S&H DSR would never be good enough to earn the 15% discount since they couldn’t afford to pay for shipping out of their pocket. On the three eBay seller IDs we manage, we actually ended up raising shipping rates to compensate for the 10% discount we were not going to receive. For item as Described we range from 4.9 to 5.0 on all accounts, for Communication we range from 4.8 to 5.0 on all accounts, on Shipping time we range from 4.8 to 4.9 on all accounts, but on S&H charges we range from 4.6 to 4.7 on all accounts.

We ship internationally on two of the three selling IDs. And so that means if we do not pay the EXTRA INTERNATIONAL insertion fee (coming soon!) to have our items appear on the Canadian, U.K. and Australian site BUT then we sell the item internationally through our own efforts, we wouldn’t receive the final value discount fee anyway no matter how hard we worked on our DSR rating.

So, it only made sense for us to raise our shipping rates in response to these two factors. eBay should really think carefully about their incentives because with the 4.8 DSR across the board requirement and the extra international insertion fee requirement to get a FVF credit for int’l transactions, eBay is actually providing a DISINCENTIVE for large Powersellers to lower shipping rates charged to buyers.

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Lorrie states:

“3 goals for eBay:

1. We are going to make eBay easier and safer to use — for buyers and sellers.

2. We are going to improve the value and selection on eBay.

3. We are going to extend Paypal’s leadership position in online payments to creatae a safer buyer experience.”

QUESTION (1st goal): Just exactly how safe can eBay be for a seller when eBay does not prevent a problem buyer from creating a new ID time and time again without linking the new ID to the old ID?

QUESTION (2nd goal): Please explain how the “selection” of eBay improved when eBay removed all digitally delivered items? On one of my eBay selling IDs, I sold about $20,000 of physical goods a month that are delivered through carriers and only a few dollars a month of digitally delivered items. However, I awoke one morning to find that my few digitally delivered items had all been removed. I was in violation of a FUTURE policy that had not yet been announced. Three hours AFTER my items were removed, an announcement was made indicating that the new policy would be implemented in 7 days but, of course, my items were removed in advance of that policy announcement because they violated the FUTURE policy.

QUESTION (3rd goal): How do you think the buyers and sellers of eBay Australia are feeling right now about a safe eBay environment that will be offering Paypal only?

SandiOn 04.23.2008 at 7:54 pm Said:

@TheBrewsNews said:

“However, I awoke one morning to find that my few digitally delivered items had all been removed. I was in violation of a FUTURE policy that had not yet been announced. ”

Oh come on, that’s ebay at its finest. They have always had the one hand does this while the other hand does that. Someone needs to bring in some communication & teamwork consultants.

Like last year when they rolled out the restriction for non performance sellers while they were running specials to “bring us a new seller, we’ll pay you 5 bucks for intorducing yours friend to the fun of selling on ebay”

Or my personal favorite, cancelling and restricting designer purse listings randomly, but plastering designer purses on the front page telling people what great buys were inside on designer purses.

And to convince me the practice of non-communication, I got my invitation to the Annual Developer’s Conference being held in June in my email April 10th (you know 10 days after digital files and services were no longer allowed on ebay core) and one of the awards we all are suppose to be vying for is:

DSR Rockstar (improving customer service)

I guess Lorrie and team forgot to tell the developer team, or the developer team never explained what developers created to sell?

Patricia 1On 04.23.2008 at 8:18 pm Said:

Brews - I don’t suppose you got a refund since they took down your auctions before the new ruling was supposed to go into effect? Did they do this to everyone?

TheBrewsNewsOn 04.23.2008 at 9:42 pm Said:

Patricia, I don’t know about everyone else’s experience but when I called Powerseller Support as soon as I read the email notifying me of my policy violation, I spoke with a representative who was stunned because he knew nothing about the future unannounced policy. He then put me on hold for 32 minutes while he spoke with Trust and Safety. Evidently, no one had told Powerseller Customer Support about the new policy. What the representative finally told me was that other sellers items were being removed in advance of the new policy announcement but at the time I called, I was the first seller who called who sold primarily physical goods. Most sellers whose digitally delivered items were removed were sellers who sold ONLY digitally delivered items. My biggest complaint about the entire experience… as an eBay seller, it is difficult enough to keep pace with eBay’s constantly changing environment but to be asked to follow rules that have

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Lorrie stated that one of eBay’s goals is to see that there is more of a selection of goods offered on eBay. She didn’t give specifics so I’ll have to make an assumption. I am assuming eBay intends on trying to achieve that goal by increasing the number of new sellers on the site. When I started selling on eBay 10 years ago, the eBay system was simple. Today, however, learning to sell on eBay for the first time can be overwhelming and it would be very difficult for a new seller to compete with existing Powersellers.

And since Lorrie relies heavily on reporting the numbers to make her points, I have reviewed one of Richard’s recent auctions (since he is a new eBay seller) to make my point:

Auction 320237308384 - SOLD for $1.50

eBay insertion fee - 35 cents
eBay final value fee - 13 cents
Paypal fee - 35 cents
Loss on shipping - 60 cents (charged $4.00 when the postage alone cost $4.60)
TOTAL costs $1.43

Net amount after fees 7 cents

Assuming Richard was given these items for free, he earned 7 cents for taking a picture, listing, and shipping the item as well as answering any emails related to the sale. Assuming Richard was able to quickly list and ship the item in a total of 30 minutes, he “earned” 14 cents an hour (again assuming the product was given to him for free).

Richard has not received DSR ratings for 10 items so we cannot see the kind of stars his buyers are leaving for him. Without good DSR ratings, Richard’s listings (if he had any up) would not earn “points” in the Best Match scoring system.

Given the effort it took for Richard to make a total of 7 cents (and 7 cents profit assumed the product was free to you), I wonder if Lorrie would really think it is worth it for a new seller to learn how to sell on eBay? If not, how does eBay intend on getting a greater selection of goods on the eBay site in the future? The devil is in the details.

CrunchyPostingGoodnessOn 04.23.2008 at 10:19 pm Said:

Actualy, DSR Watch shows the ratings even if 10 has not been achieved yet. This is Richard’s current status:

5.0 Item as described
4.8 Communication
4.8 Shipping Time
5.0 Shipping & Handling

CrunchyPostingGoodnessOn 04.23.2008 at 10:27 pm Said:

… and not to pick on Richard, but mainly to help illustrate a point.

The trucker’s hat which did not sell recently cost him $0.55 in listing fees. So technically in the past 15 days, Richard actually lost $0.48 to eBay.

Of course that is just the numbers, it doesn’t take into consideration the time he spent taking pictures and creating listings for both items.

This is what I meant before when I said that users are actually paying eBay more in fees than they are getting for the items sold.

Patricia 1On 04.23.2008 at 11:14 pm Said:

So, they simply pulled the rug out from under you and any other sellers selling digital downloads….instead of having a regular starting date when you could no longer list such items. Is it any wonder nobody trusts ebay? …and since sellers are also buyers - there’s the drop in sales. Disillusioned sellers don’t list and they don’t buy either. Come on now, you don’t have to be a mental giant to realize we’re being kicked around at will. As for new sellers, they won’t last long. When they see the horrific amount of work, the cuckoo policies against sellers and the total lack of respect I think they’ll find other sites or other ways to make a dollar. I’m completely disillusioned after 10 long years.

Patricia 1On 04.23.2008 at 11:18 pm Said:

crunchy - you gotta feel sorry for them. They just don’t realize the fees. I won’t list anything less then 7.95 - I can’t make a profit for less what with all the fees and the shipping rates and the time I put into making the item. Most of my small baseball card sized paintings used to cost me 73 cents to ship and now cost 1.48! If you don’t figure all the fees in you can well end up paying ebay and the post office all your profit. New sellers don’t realize this until they get a good taste of it.

mi2highOn 04.23.2008 at 11:41 pm Said:

3. We’ve already talked about this on Ink, but Lorrie confirmed that PowerSellers’ shipping cost DSRs for cross-border trades are only .02 points lower than domestic.

Does this mean that ebay will allow sellers that DO cross-border trading will get a handicap?

It would be best to compare sellers peer-peer as designed.

To me it shows that those of us that do the cross-border trading are the actual cream of the crop.
Those numbers prove it, yet we are punished and do not receive the higher discount.

I would appreciate it if this would get some further consideration to make it peer-peer, fair is fair.

PermacrisisOn 04.24.2008 at 3:58 am Said:

A few comments about this new, improved ‘eBain’.

You’ve got sellers hopping mad with Norrington’s “our buyers” verbiage. Remember, knicknacks and rare items brought the buyers here in the first place, and here ebay is now prying those buyers away with the DSR crowbar.

One of a kind items cannot be funneled into a product flow like dropshipped or cataloged items, as they must be carefully packed (and oftentimes economically shipped, due to weight constraints). So naturally those items will achieve lower DSR’s, in diametric opposition to ebay’s original purpose. A large chunk of the population still believes you go to ebay for those items. That is becoming less and less the case… all you hear during downturns is niche, niche niche but these folks are fervently dismantling the biggest niche in Western civilization. Sad…

The fact is, ebay couldn’t source unique / rare / unusual items on its own if it tried… not even if it threw several hundred thousand dollars at the problem. Ebay execs harp on the ‘long tail’ items in press releases, but in reality can’t even properly categorize let alone source them. That puts those items squarely in the province of the small seller, who’s presently being stomped like a grape.

In Donahoe’s 2002 paper entitled “The Last Legacy of the Dotcom Era” he describes the corporate venturing strategy he is currently employing on ebay for what it is: a huge gamble, requiring an exit strategy should it fail. This paper is very prescient– it even names Ebay as one especially low-hanging fruit.

So far, JD has followed his map chapter and verse. It would appear wrecking ebay’s auction functionality is his lifetime ambition.

Unfortunately Donahoe has yet to outline the exit strategy he himself was a proponent of. He had better hope Dimitar Slavov doesn’t write it for him, in the form of Auction Functionality added to eCrater. If that happens, ebay needn’t bother spinning auctions off. “Their buyers” will instantly vaporize.

It’s the ITEMS, stupid.

oh_puhl_eezeOn 04.24.2008 at 6:32 am Said:

What Permacrisis said!

I am one of those small volume sellers of hard to find and high value antiques and collectibles. I registered with eBay in 1999. Now I am leaving; I will not come back. It’s not just me; the majority of all the dealers in my area (Upstate NY, which is prime hunting ground for good antiques) have not one good thing to say about eBay. We’re now selling at local auction houses, other websites and Craigslist.

And not only will I never sell here again; I will never buy here again either. I have no idea how much I’ve spent over the years, but eBay was the first place I shopped for anything I needed: baby clothes, plants, jewelry, gifts, and so on. No more. eBay doesn’t deserve my money.

CrunchyPostingGoodnessOn 04.24.2008 at 7:41 am Said:

Patricia, your right. Some people sell on eBay as a virtual garage sale, some sell things to help pay for daycare costs, or to save up for the family vacation. How can they accomplish any of those goals when they are actually paying more money to eBay and PayPal than they take home in profit? Not to mention all the effort in taking pictures, writing descriptions, answering potential buyer questions quickly, and charging shipping costs equal to professional sellers, who have access to discount shipping supplies

eBay is definitely changing into average joe unfriendly.

The funny thing is that I occasionally go to garage sales - not to resell findings on eBay, but just personal pleasure. I see countless garage sales pricing their items according to completed listings on eBay.

It takes a lot of effort to not go up to the owner and say, “do you have any idea what is involved with selling on eBay to justify the price those sellers charge there?” Of course, I never do this. I simply smile, shake my head, and walk away.

Patricia 1On 04.24.2008 at 8:19 am Said:

Yes crunchy people just do not know what’s involved and when they find out, most say “oh, I don’t want to bother with all that.” The reality of what we go thru quickly takes the “fun” quotient right out of it. With the new policies all aimed at even more obstacles in a sellers path future sellers won’t be all that easy to come by. I have no idea what ebay’s ultimate goal is but if it encompasses small sellers in any way - then I suggest they soften up some because right now they are a definite turn-off for anyone who may be thinking of selling on ebay. Even now in the past few days I’ve noticed a sharp increase in listings due to the 10 cent listing fees for powersellers only - and now the sharp fall in listings as listings end and are not being relisted. Sellers are definitely disgusted to the point where ebay can’t keep listings up without specials and gimmicks. That’s tells me there’s big trouble dead ahead! There’s no real traffic on the site either. I have a 20.00 feature plus listing that got maybe 5 views all day yesterday! Others are reporting the same. (shrug)

MistyOn 04.24.2008 at 8:32 am Said:

@ Crunchy
Not to get off topic but I can not help but chuckle to myself at your garage sale analogy, I remember before eBay existed going to such garage sales where you would hear them discussing antique shop prices and on a few occasions when I inquired about an item their reply was ohhhh no as a dealer will be along any time and snap it up for a good price. I like you would smile and walk away shaking my head… on a few occasions I would hand them my business card to my antique shop before walking away just in case that dealer never showed up.

Patricia 1On 04.24.2008 at 8:42 am Said:

Sorry, I meant @crunchy and not

“Yes crunchy people just do not know what’s involved “