Thursday, April 24th, 2008
eCommerce Summit Q&A: Part 1
As promised, I will be posting Q&A sessions on Ink in multiple parts to make sure I cover all questions posed both here on the blog already, and at the eCommerce Summit. The following questions were asked immediately following Lorrie’s keynote yesterday.
Q. Based on a group study this morning, 2 out of 5 of the current PowerSellers with the best store listings on eBay Pulse will not qualify for PowerSeller status based on DSR ratings, when that goes into effect. How are you going to address this issue?
Lorrie Norrington, President of Marketplace Operations: It’s true that some sellers won’t make the grade with DSRs. When we put out the DSR requirements, we said you would need to have a 4.5 or above to qualify for PowerSeller status. We also gave sellers until July 1 to bring up their DSRs. Based on what we presented earlier, it’s obvious that a high percentage of PowerSellers are not only making the grade with DSRs but they’re qualifying for discounts. Sellers need to reach out to us and their TSAMs because clearly there are some best practices out there to ensure folks get the highest DSR possible; whether it’s over communicating or immediate feedback, for example.
Todd Lutwak, Sr. Director of Seller Development and Programs: The sellers have done an excellent job raising their DSRs. I think that sample that you took locally is definitely different from the metrics we’re seeing. Over 80% of PowerSellers have 4.5 DSR or above. We’re continuing to monitor as we progress to that July date.
Lorrie: I’d like to add that we really appreciate the work that PeSA is doing here. The educational work is going to be really important for sellers that want to get their high DSRs. To Todd’s point, 80% are doing it now and we want to have more.
Q. You said that there were some retaliatory remarks that prompted the change to Feedback? Can you elaborate on that?
Lorrie: I was referring to the fact that sellers were 8 times more likely to leave a retaliatory negative remark and that is why we changed the Feedback system.
Q. What was happening there? Can you talk more about this?
Matt Halprin, VP of Trust and Safety: The Feedback system was set up to make sure that both parties were accountable to each other. What has happened over time is that sellers have increasingly held off on leaving feedback until the buyer leaves feedback to make sure they don’t get a negative rating without being able to counter that. Sellers used to do this twice as much as buyers; now it is eight times as much. So basically buyers were no longer willing to hold sellers accountable for their performance; which is why 90% of sellers have positive feedback scores of 99% and above. As a result, buyers don’t trust the feedback system because they can’t discriminate between great sellers, average sellers or poor sellers. We needed to fix that because eBay is based on trust. If buyers don’t have trust they won’t send money or bid as much on an item (we’ve all talked about the notion of ASPs not being quite as high as they used to be). It is up to us to help your economics by making sure that buyers are more confident when they bid. Which is why we changed the system and with this more honest of a system we’ll be able to do things like elevate items in search and reward sellers for top performance with bigger discounts. All of which will create more of a race to the top than we’ve had before.
Lorrie: We announced this change back in January and it goes into effect in May. My advice is as soon as your buyers pay you, give them positive feedback.
Q. I was at the Catalyst Conference and I’m really excited to hear about some of things you’re introducing and to see you guys out here in force. You said it today, and it came up back at the Catalyst Conference about the .02 points discrepancy for non-domestic DSRs. There are some areas of this world that just don’t have the same postal service as we do here in the US. There is a distinct drag in Italy for example, really slow. Another is Slovakia. I shouldn’t have to tell the Canadian customer that his mail system is stinky – he already knows it – but it won’t stop him from dinging me on shipping. I know you look at it from the 50,000 foot level but it would be great if you could address it more granularly so maybe I could qualify for the 15% discount next time. [Applause]
Matt: Although this is the first time I’ve heard about Slovakia, it’s not the first time I’ve heard about Italy or Canada. We’re aware of it and there are a variety of ways we’re looking at addressing it. I don’t think right now that we have a tool that allows you to lock out a country like Italy for example (if you simply choose not to ship there) but that is one end of the spectrum. Just to share one bit of information, and I admit it is 50,000 foot information, but it is very telling for us. We thought that all Cross Border Trade DSRs were going to be a little bit lower than domestic DSRs because of shipping. Actually, around 50% of sellers have cross border trade DSRs that are equal to or higher than their domestic ones. So obviously there are some best practices in place that are helping address that possible situation. Now, I want to make sure I affirm what you said – we are looking directly at Italy and Canada to address that specific issue.
Q. Talking about shipping. Shipping & Handling cost seems to be the lowest DSR for most eBay sellers, I think we can all agree there. Shoppers love free-shipping. Can you talk about how eBay looks at free-shipping relative to DSR scores as well as free-shipping economic models that work for sellers in the eBay landscape?
Matt: Shipping and handling is the lowest DSR of the four but I do want to point out that 72% of all DSRs left for S&H are 5s. Frankly, I think that means the DSRs are working because we all know that S&H charges on eBay are higher than the Internet on the whole. So we have an online shopping environment that has set buyer expectations and we all need to find ways to address that together.
Dinesh Lathi, VP of Seller Experience: The fact of the matter is that free shipping is the standard for eCommerce now. Sellers who want to meet buyer expectations need to aspire to that. It is our job, the people here on stage, to help you do that. So, there are definite things in the works at eBay that will help you accomplish that. Look for that soon.
Lorrie: And, in the end, I think it’s pretty straightforward that you need to be very specific when you identify shipping costs and set that expectation and again, to Matt’s point, there are a lot of people out there getting 5s for S&H.
Q. I understand the retaliatory feedback concept. I don’t agree with it but I understand it. What I don’t understand is why DSRs are anonymous. If we have customers leaving valid DSRs we want to know who they are so we can make things right. If we can’t do anything to counter their feedback, we should be able to see what they’re leaving us. [Applause]
Matt: This is a tough issue and it’s one that we haven’t settled on inside eBay yet. I’ll explain why they are the way they are now but also talk about the fact that they may be changing. First of all, why wouldn’t we make it completely transparent? The answer is that we have seen sellers who send emails after receiving a negative, (for example, they have received a 3 or 4 from a buyer) and the seller begins to harass the buyer. I get examples of this sent to me from buyers all the time. The harassment is what we’re really trying to get away from. eBay really is the only place where a merchant can kick the buyer on their way out the door. This is the reason why we might keep it anonymous. The argument for making it completely transparent is very obvious. It will help sellers learn about what they’re doing right and what they’re doing wrong. So what I think you’ll see at a minimum is us moving to a place where we provide the information in different ways – whether it’s by geography or by category – or go all the way and provide complete transparency. We’re not sure yet, we want to monitor how the new feedback system works before making our final decision.
Lorrie: It is an important point though. I think it’s obvious that our intent is to put more trust back into the system. We think this new Feedback system does that. Like Matt said, we haven’t even rolled it out yet so we’re just going to have to see how it goes. I think it’s a great point of learning for us. I think this is a good time to emphasize what we’re trying to get across to sellers. First of all, we want an incredibly open dialogue with you and to listen to you and there will be places where we continue to roll out new initiatives or experiments that we’ll want your input on. There will also be places where we won’t change because we think it’s best for the marketplace. But the open and honest dialogue with each other can only help. So, in the case of the new feedback system, we haven’t rolled it out yet, and as we do roll it out we’ll learn from it.
Q. We have a shipping calculator on our system so that anyone that comes and makes a bid can calculate the shipping cost before they make a decision to buy and yet we still only have a 4.6 for shipping. We would like to be able to respond to them to find out why they’re not leaving a 5 even though they knew the cost was coming.
Matt: With the new system I think everyone in this room will get more specific information on a transaction that has not gone perfectly well. Buyers will now have 80 characters to provide feedback and detail all without the fear of a negative retaliatory feedback.
Lorrie: And I think this is exactly the kind of input we’re hoping to get here. Our intent is to make your experience better so it’s this kind of feedback that helps get us there.
At this point, the keynote Q&A was ended to allow for the first sessions to commence. Immediately following this initial Q&A session, all eBay representatives moved into the panel room for an hour of further questions and discussion. That one is coming next time.
Cheers,
RBH
Tagged: competitive, cross border trade, dinesh+lathi, dsr, ecommerce, ecommerce summit, feedback, lorrie+norrington, Marketplace, matt+halprin, online trade, pricing
MistyOn 04.26.2008 at 7:26 pm Said:
@ Richard
I ran across and article or comment along the lines of eBay was implementing fees on cross border trade access. I don’t know if this is something they are all ready doing or plan to do. Would you please find out for us because these will be additional fees to my understanding.
CrunchyPostingGoodnessOn 04.26.2008 at 7:49 pm Said:
Very good question, Implog:
“Richard - Can you explain this contradiction between the CEO’s message and what the company spokesperson said? Is there an internal disconnect in the organization’s goals?”
I realize that eBay is a very large corporation, but you would think that at least all of upper management would be on the same page. Even Norrington seemed to indicate, in the transcripts from the recent meeting, that eBay was eager to hear from the users and would take such comments into consideration.
This is only one example of the conflicting messages that eBay users are constantly receiving. Does eBay just send these people out to interviews without even bothering to brief them on what the latest “spin” is?
Which version of eBay’s attitude towards sellers are we supposed to believe?
TheBrewsNewsOn 04.26.2008 at 9:02 pm Said:
Misty, I think you are inquiring about a comment that I made on the Lorrie Norrington topic. To further explain the information, below is the official eBay announcement made on March 31, 2008:
***A Message from Stephanie Tilenius — The International Site Visibility listing upgrade for US, Canada, UK and Ireland sites***
March 31, 2008 | 08:01AM PST/PT
Stephanie Tilenius
Hello everyone…This is Stephanie Tilenius, General Manager for eBay North America. The ability to sell internationally is a key benefit of doing business on the eBay marketplace. I’m pleased to announce an exciting new listing feature upgrade that will give sellers in North America the option to get full visibility for their items on other eBay sites, initially eBay.co.uk, enabling them to reach many millions more buyers.
How International Selling Works Today
eBay’s global marketplace opens the door to international business for many sellers. Traditionally, US sellers who want to attract buyers in the UK and elsewhere have had two options:
1) They can list on eBay.com and choose World Wide Shipping or other international shipping options. In this scenario, their items only show up on another international site in the few cases when buyers specifically look for international items using Advanced Search features.
Or –
2) They can create a separate listing on another international eBay site (and pay all the same fees that other sellers pay to list there).
Coming Soon: International Site Visibility Listing Upgrade
In May, we’re giving sellers who list on US and Canada sites a better option for international exposure by introducing the International Site Visibility listing upgrade. With this listing upgrade, sellers will be able to list on their local site and pay a small upgrade fee so that their listing also shows up in the main default search results to buyers across the Atlantic on eBay.co.uk – two sites for a great price.
In the US, the fees to use this optional upgrade are as follows:
Start Price
$0.01 -9.99
International Site Visibility Listing Upgrade Fee
10 cents
Start Price
$10 - 49.99
International Site Visibility Listing Upgrade Fee
20 cents
Start Price
$50+
International Site Visibility Listing Upgrade Fee
40 cents
The International Site Visibility listing upgrade offers sellers who want to expand their international business a great value – items with this upgrade show up by default for international buyers in the market selected in addition to the buyers in the seller’s own market. This makes international listing economical and easier to manage than listing separately for international sites.
Data shows that depending on the category and start-price, it only takes one or two extra bids from international buyers to make up the cost of the International Site Visibility fee.
For PowerSellers, using this feature also ensures that these UK sales are counted towards their Final Value Fee discounts.
UK, Ireland, US and Canada International Support Only
At launch, the International Site Visibility listing upgrade will only be available for eBay UK, eBay Ireland, eBay Canada and eBay.com. US and Canada sellers have the upgrade option to list on eBay UK, and UK and Ireland sellers have the upgrade option to list on the North America sites. We’ll be adding support for more international markets in the near future, so stay tuned.
A word about testing – US-UK Collectibles
Over the past six months, we’ve been running tests in the collectibles-related categories on eBay.com and eBay.co.uk, looking for optimal ways to display international listings. These tests will be concluding as we introduce International Site Visibility as an upgrade available for almost all categories to US and UK sellers.
We’re excited about the new opportunities for the members in our communities to do even more trade together. International Site Visibility helps sellers reach international buyers – and helps increase the value and selection available to buyers! We’ll update you again once International Site Visibility is launched.
Sincerely,
Stephanie Tilenius
General Manager, eBay North America
TheBrewsNewsOn 04.26.2008 at 9:09 pm Said:
Approximately 1/3 of my eBay sales are international and I will NOT be paying for this extra insertion fee. Fortunately I have lots of repeat buyers, many of whom go straight to my eBay store. Of course, those international sales will no longer be eligible for FVF discounts even though I have the DSRs to be eligible for a 5% discount (would be 15% except for my Shipping Cost DSR). So, once again, I’ll be raising my international shipping rates just slightly in May in order to compensate for the loss of the 5% FVF that I should have earned but will not receive.
MistyOn 04.26.2008 at 9:55 pm Said:
@ TheBrewsNews
Yes that sounds like what I seen, I also seen the fee scale shown with it, I tried to re track my steps to find the fee scale I seen but I was in so many places Au, UK I am not sure where it was I came across it at but yes that is the same thing I was referring to Thank you.
MistyOn 04.26.2008 at 9:59 pm Said:
Geeez it is late here lol I see the scale is also shown above… time for sleep night all
HenriettaOn 04.27.2008 at 9:20 am Said:
@TheBrewsNews
Instant flashback to AC (no I am not supporting the AC anymore)
Yes you WILL be paying this additional fee if you choose to remain on eBay internationally. You should note that this is not a listing fee it is a VISIBILITY fee. The fact that you pay your listing fee has nothing to do with anyone actually being able to see your listing.
As I hear it Best Match is dynamic. If you default to ending soonest you do not get a static list. When you move to page 2 every listing has been shuffled around which is why you will often see something you have already visited.
If eBay is ‘demoting’ (their word) a seller, you might logically think you will find their item on the last page. When you go to the last page that item will be on the next to last page. Move to the next to last page and the item will be someplace else.
I am incorrect in referring to this as a fee, it is an upgrade option! Something you used to have has been seen as a revenue opportunity. Information here: http://pages.ebay.com/help/sell/international-site.html
Note:
1. Fees for international site visibility vary by country.
2. Each country you select has a separate fee.
3. Because these are optional feature fees, you’ll see them listed in the Fees section of the “Review your listing” page.
I will be blogging this next week.
MistyOn 04.27.2008 at 12:06 pm Said:
@ TheBrewsNews
I agree with you and will also NOT pay the extra insertion fee this is becoming so absurd.
@Richard
Can you please find out why I am not receiving mail notices of all these changes such as the last email Lorrie sent out… I still have never received this. and yes I checked my settings and should be receiving them. TIA
Patricia 1On 04.27.2008 at 1:17 pm Said:
When I first read about that fee I was happy I don’t possess any gold filling in my teeth 
I think the government can take lessons from ebay on how to nickel and dime their people to death….with still no sign of that one new buyer I’m patiently waiting for!
permacrisisOn 04.27.2008 at 5:48 pm Said:
“eBay really is the only place where a merchant can kick the buyer on their way out the door.”
No duh– Sellers can’t take it out on YOU guys, who rigged the system to kick us off, so naturally they are raging on the buyers. Thus you are goading them into looking bad, like Jim Carrey did to Matthew Broderick in The Cable Guy.
But of course you won’t fix it- because you want us gone. It’s like we are part of a zoo display that has 5 buttons under a window. The first 1 has a skull and cross bones. The other 4 are marked ‘feed me’. But the first four are really wired to poison. Only the 5th will allow us to live another day. Then you, the zookeepers laugh and feel smug and superior… after all, you didn’t push buttons 3 & 4 to kill us. The tourists did.
Do you know how sick and twisted that is? Most of the evicted sellers will have no clue what happened. But we who know the names, WILL stand vigilant if those names ever try working for other auction sites when this experiment tanks.
At this point even if you rolled back the changes, who would come back here knowing that the same guys as before are in charge?
You are in so deep, the only TV ad campaign that would bring people back now is…
UNDER NEW MANGEMENT
Kevin_TOn 04.27.2008 at 9:57 pm Said:
“eBay really is the only place where a merchant can kick the buyer on their way out the door.”
No, Ebay is really the only place where a merchant can be told we will no longer raise your rent annually, and that now further price increases could come at any time - but we expect you to ship for free.
Ebay is really the only place where a merchant can be told that you are now only allowed to use our subsidiary payment service, which you must pay for, but we expect you to ship for free.
Ebay is really the only place where an Australian merchant can be told that you will pay for our additional services on ALL transactions whether you or your buyer wish to use them or not, we expect you to absorb the costs, but you are not entitled to the discounts that merchants in other parts of the world are entitled to.
Ebay is really the only place where Australian, UK and European merchants can be told that you are no longer allowed to ship multiple items in a single parcel, that each parcel must be separately insured, or you lose your rights as a seller, but we expect you to offer goods that represent value to *our* buyers.
Ebay is really the only place where business tools are being designed to *interfere* with the rights and viability of the businesses that have utilised them.
Kevin
CAMOn 04.28.2008 at 4:12 am Said:
There’s a label at the top of this posting window that stays: POST YOUR THOUGHTS:, but if I did, you’d kick me off :).
Been selling on eBay since it was aucionweb, and my thoughts tend to run to the nostalgic, where it was easy to sell. Buyers and Sellers were buddies (not adversaries), when I could list 300 unique items in a day because the listing form was so easy and fast (however, the site often was down). Beanie Babies were on everyones lips (and cluttering up their display shelves) and there was a support board where you could get instant assistance.
Then eBay went corporate and its been a downhill slide and and uphill battle. Somewhat the victim of its own success, ebay drew battle lines and set up a constant state of buyer vs. seller. Because they couldn’t control the masses with technology, they combatted it with masses of rules that they couldn’t control.
From a place where eBay was not part of the transaction and it was person to person trading (and off ebay sales were permitted), eBay has morphed to the man behind the curtain..involved in every aspect of the transaction. We have went from how big a logo can be in your auction listing to stangling visiblity based upon mystical algorithms. Sellers are not happy..Buyers are not happy..
What can eBay do? Here’s my wish list..
1. Remove as many rules as possible. Go thru the volumes of eBay rules and get rid of the ones that don’t count or are not illegal (how big a logo can be, for example…a good seller wants an attractive ads). Make it easier for heavens sake. Have you looked at the Listing Rules for heavens sakes???
2. Create an eBay first marketing campaign. Shop eBay first. Sellers are buyers. Support your market place, etc. Instead of making it hard, make it easy to shop eBay first. Dump Victoriusly (who’s brain child was THAT?). Show examples of savings over other retailers, but also show the uniquenss. I’m pretty sure I can’t find a postcard of my hometown from 1919 anywhere else.
3. Discount fees for free shipping. You KNOW you are making more money in FVF when free shipping is used, as the seller is paying FVF on shipping where they don’t when its charged separately.
4. Encourage more proxy bids. This can be done simply by having an option to hide Buy It Now. (this seller has a hidden buy it now price, if you meet it, then the item is YOURS NOW).
5. Get rid of stuff clutting the site. eBay is a site to SELL and BUY. Just start by pages that are not viewed, and keep going until you elimiate a good 50% of the junk cluttering the site. You used to show auctions on your home page. Now..if you scroll all the way at the bottom in tiny print you can see 6 items for sale. Hello, McFly?? 
6. Dump insane categories. Jewelry comes to mind. Jewelry & Watches> Pins, Brooches> Silver, Solid (w/o Stone), and where is the distinction between new and used? Where the heck did that go??
7. Get the ads off the site. Sorry, esperian, netflix, wamu and so on. eBay is not an ad server, nor should you be..its conflict of interest. Don’t Buy Movies..Rent Them (grrr)
8. Where is the DSR question: Would you buy from this seller again? Thats the number one indicator of customer satisfaction for every other business on the planet.
I think I started rambling here :)..To sum up. Just walk a mile in your customer shoes. Make every exec forgo a paycheck for a month and earn only what they can sell on eBay. Boy, would we have some changes then!!
Cam
implogOn 04.28.2008 at 5:51 am Said:
@ Cam
You wrote:
“visiblity based upon mystical algorithms. Sellers are not happy..Buyers are not happy..”
You can learn more about the so called “Best Match” algorithms at the link below. Learn too that the creator believes it should NOT be called “Best Match” because it doesn’t return a best match, it returns items by “relevance”.
http://labs.ebay.com/raghavgupta/
you wrote:
“Just walk a mile in your customer shoes.”
I’d settle for them going out to get the mail in a seller’s shoes.
you wrote:
“Make every exec forgo a paycheck for a month and earn only what they can sell on eBay. Boy, would we have some changes then!!”
I like the idea posted by another here or on the discussion boards that eBay execs be required to become Power Sellers on their own — no staff help, no Kelly Girls and no bidding by eBay employees nor their families.
you wrote:
“There’s a label at the top of this posting window that stays: POST YOUR THOUGHTS:, but if I did, you’d kick me off :).”
There is an eBay exec post on the eBay Announcement board addressed to the community that says “I have been listening to your thoughts…”. That could explain why so many of them are “excited” all the time.
RichardCOn 04.28.2008 at 9:35 am Said:
I read Dinesh Lathi’s comment on Free Shipping being the standard for ecommerce sites. I think Dinesh may have been thinking of smaller manufacturer based sites, that can offer free shipping, because their profit margins are so high. Other e-commerce sites are able to offer free shipping, because the shipping could be subsidized by the product manufacturer to move product.
I would be happy to offer Free shipping, if eBay subsidized the shipping costs and sent us packaging supplies, and perhaps paid part of our mortgage.
RC
Patricia 1On 04.28.2008 at 10:25 am Said:
I’m thinking of adding a handling charge to my shipping to help defray my costs! Profit is the lowest ever because ebay is not keeping up with their end of this deal - to bring in new buyers! They want and want and want but there is NO give on their part. Yesterday I put up a feature plus auction - this costs me almost $20.00 for one listing. So far it has had only THREE views which is unheard of for a feature plus auction. It means traffic is low on the site and other sellers I’ve asked are saying the same thing. Frankly, I’m sick to death of what ebay wants! I want to see what I get for all this money I’m giving them and all the trouble they are putting us through!
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