John Donahoe Interviews Pierre Omidyar

Lisa sparkklejarOn 04.29.2008 at 10:38 pm Said:

sorry for all the spelling errors, it’s late.

but one more thing

I sell glass

I buy glass

over 2,000 glass transactions ive sold and have had ZERO breakage.

Ive bought glass, and about 50% actually arrives intact.

So, why am i being penalized again?

qqqqqOn 04.30.2008 at 12:21 am Said:

Do you have a direct url to youtube?
I can’t get your youtube videos to play on ebay.

Billy BuddOn 04.30.2008 at 1:00 am Said:

What I see happening to Bay is what’s common with a lot of big companies in that a large disconnect develops between those at the top and the actual producers at the bottom.

Some of the big picture changes ~ new concepts have some merit, IE., trying to discourage bad selling practices while encouraging good selling practices.

But the devil is in the details.

What makes (made) eBay unique is that it’s made up many small and larger sellers, part timers, full timers, pros, mom and pops. Something to appeal to everybody, both buyers and sellers alike.

Like an above poster mentioned, small volume sellers are going to have a tougher time with the DSR’s. People who sell large and hard to ship items are going to have hard time as well.

eBay is trying to standardize it’s commerce atmosphere by making all sellers jump though the eye of the same needle. While weeding out the bad guys they are in danger of weeding out what makes eBay unique and appealing.

Good concepts, but as is usual per eBay, poor implementation with very little understanding of the everyday experiences of their bread and butter soldiers operating on the battle ground.

Nobody at the top seems to have a handle on the nitty gritty or the nuances of the situations they create. The big picture is made up of many pieces. They can spew out philosophical concepts all day long but sooner or later the reality of the small details are what matters in the end.

IMO, while raising the standards for sellers, it would be in eBay’s best interesting to raise its own standards of support for such. It would certainly go along way towards developing some goodwill. There seems to be a growing adversarial relationship between sellers and eBay.

I personally feel coerced and unfairly manipulated. I’ve been a seller since 99. 6500 feedbacks, no negs. Now I need to be graded by ill informed ~ high expectation buyers using some strange subjective confusing algorithmic criteria.

Seller tech support is awful (clear your cache). System glitches go unfixed for long periods and worst yet, most of the time they go unannounced. Phone help seldom has a clue.

We get treated like children. The way the changes are “sold” to us is insulting (fee reductions - ha ha). The power seller discount is a basic behavior modification technique. However, it’s so basic that it doesn’t take one long to figure our you lose more on shipping vying for the discount than you’ll ever recoup in fees.

The way ebay’s views it’s sellers can be summed up as follows..

“Congratualions, you’ve earned a purple star! You’re awesome! Print out your purple star certificate and display it proudly.”

Hey eBay, keep the star certificates. I still have some from 3rd grade. I can hang those up. How about announcing and fixing the glitches, improving seller support, rolling out improvements when they are actually ready. And most importantly, start treating us like adults and can the artificially cheery but oh so phony manipulative propaganda.

If you want us to build you a strong house, give us some decent hammers. If you want us to act like adults, treat us like adults.

CAMOn 04.30.2008 at 3:54 am Said:

1. Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
2. Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
3. No animal shall wear clothes.
4. No animal shall sleep in a bed. ((with sheets))
5. No animal shall drink alcohol. ((to excess))
6. No animal shall kill any other animal. ((without cause))
7. All animals are equal. ((but some animals are more equal than others))

**************************************************

1. We beleive people are basically good ((but do need a LOT rules and buyers are better than sellers))

2. We are only a venue, not involved in the transaction ((but you cannot use google checkout, email your buyer, sell outside eBay, must use paypal, can’t be found in search unless you use free shipping, and 100 other things that clearly indicate we ARE a involved in the transaction, but shhhh..don’t tell anyone cause it would really mess with us legally)).

and now, my last shattered illusion….

1. eBay is a level playing field. ((unless you are a powerseller, special friend, don’t offer free shipping, have low DSRs or want to have your items appear in search and so on……))

Going to go cry now..

CAM

MartinOn 04.30.2008 at 4:41 am Said:

I have a different view on all this stuff. First of all regarding the clips, its pretty much what I had heard Pierre did , which was to support the general nature of the changes currently being made.

My thoughts are that in a nutshell the company is spending way too much time on DSRs, seller punishments, a near break neck speed of change that noone can keep up with and less focusing on things (even if concurrently) that are new and exciting and will energize the user base and stop the near collapse of active user growth.

Lets just look at some of the last few years… And what was the “direction” of eBay..

Bill Cobb announces he is excited about “cores in store search” in Jan of 2006. Three months later its yanked saying it didnt work, buyers were confused, some items were clutter etc. This is stage one of seller discontent.

In the fall of 2006 Store fees were raised dramatically. This resulted in the loss of 20 million store items from the site.

By 2007 “IT” was all about “winning” and returning to the auction roots, when most people knew fixed price was where the market was heading and had been heading.

Now Fixed price is the direction. In response to the traction other sites received from the loss of Ebayers moving when they raised store fees, Ebay now reduced store insertion fees to levels they were at before the exodus.

Now as to the DSRs, and feedback changes and “buyer experience”. I have no doubt that the intentions are all good in this area. Overall I always feel that Ebay is trying to do the best thing , and gets active input most of the time from the community.

The problem is the effects of changes are never accurately measured and all the things the site really needs to be doing have been buried under the sheer volume of changes coming forward in one area.

Here are some big things that need to be addressed.

1- The highest growth on the internet right now is for the so called “shop online - pickup in person” model. Walmart.com has 40% growth and fully 1/3 of the sales picking up in the stores to save shipping charges. Other retailers are taking the same model . Ebay announced a local initiative at Ebay Live in Boston but as of yet has not made any progress.

2- Foreign currencies have soared in relation to the US dollar. Based on my analysis this has masked Ebays true performance as converted into dollars 50% of eBays revenues looked higher than it would be if the dollar didnt collapse. Even so, U.S. items are generally not seen on foreign sites unless a buyer changes their default view to “See worldwide listings”. Some do, most do not. So in essence its not a global marketplace for items just at the time it should be to take advantage of foreigners feeling US items are cheaper.

3- Paypal still cannot print First Class Intl postage labels. This is the cheapest form of Intl shipping that there is. Other services offer this.

4- Ebay has lost touch with its community due to the velocity of change. Active user growth which was a net 3.5 million users during stores in core search in 2006 is barely 1/10 that now, and actually went negative in a recent quarter. Just like stores that stop opening new stores in the retail sales world cant grow as fast, not keeping people interested and staying here is going to hurt growth.

I do not think it is too late to really make this site the place to be, but we might be one or two major changes away from a meltdown.

I try to share my thoughts with anyone that will listen at Ebay and there are some great people there.
My experience (and that of my wife) with Ebay is documented here on my blog at http://www.worldofebay.blogspot.com and I have info on Ebay stores at http://squidoo.com/growyourebaystoresales

We are powersellers, store owners, Trading Assistants, my wife is an Educational Specialist and I am member of Ebays focus group.

We are involved in pretty much everything eBay does and my goal is keeping people ON the site as opposed ot migrating off the site.

Id love to talk to anyone that will listen LOL

Marty

KarenOn 04.30.2008 at 5:07 am Said:

THANKS for sharing Richard! Do you ever feel like an Oreo cookie with two dark sides closing in on you to sqwash you flat? Angry sellers on one side pushing hard for their concerns to be heard, an a determined and bone-headed eBay management on the other pushing even harder against them.

The only thing that came to mind when I watched the clips was Donahoe attempting some good ole CYA to support his policies in spite of all this “noise” out here in the seller community. Many of the changes we ask for are easy to make… as in simply ID verify buyers so they can’t have multiple user IDs to screw sellers out of money or merchandise. Yet eBay has this complex and overly complicated system which really doesn’t protect anyone but themselves.

I am still left with the feeling that eBay cares ONLY about the buyer and is willing to sacrifice ALL sellers for their profits.

EBAY REFUGEE!!On 04.30.2008 at 6:19 am Said:

The fact is this new feebay will NOT work. It is all smoke and mirrors designed for 1 thing only. MORE revenue! Ebay realizes they are NOT the only game in town and they are trying to squeeze every last penny out of the system before Donahoe does what his previous jobs were entailed to do and that is to breakdown major companies and sell them off in pieces!

Ebay’s numbers plummet every time they have a new “sale” and then they have to design some new “sale/scam” to get those numbers back in a hurry! Their numbers have fallen yet again after this last “powersellers only” sale (level playing field huh?) and with the huge international boycott 1 day away, it’s now time for ebay to take drastic measures again to fool their stockholders into believeing that they are running an honest business.

I see nowhere mentioned, the fake auction listings from the last boycott (of which there is TONS of proof) and no mention of plummeting numbers (hence all of the “sales already promoted this year along with the ridiculous “complainer coupons”) and no mention of the deleted or hidden ACTIVE boycott threads as well as the hidden forum page on the Australian site!

“The time was taken to edit an interview that was originally intended for employees only and I then shared it with you. That is why I started this blog. To share things with you that you wouldn’t have previously had access too”

Richard Brewer-Hay…my response this this ridiculous statement of yours is do you really think the population of ebay is really this ignorant? This video was a meeting that was FILMED with MULTIPLE cameras and you want us to believe that you are doing US a favor by posting this thinking this was an ebay employee meeting only? DO NOT INSULT OUR INTELLIGENCE. It shows you are already adopting ebays skewed views and that discredits you as an “unbiased blogger”.

Pierre Omidyar says that ebay “loves to hear from it’s “members”. Really? I have read thousands and thousands of posts of GREAT ideas as to how to help them solve their current fiascos. Not a single one of them has even been considered or discussed by any of the moderators.

The forum moderators do nothing….but ban posters (I for one am proof of this) and delete threads and censor serious concerns and comments and abuse their powers as a moderator. Yet they let the “ebay cheerleaders” run free and let them get with anything and any brutal antics they like!

Pierre also says that “sometimes members ask for things that are against their long-term goals”. Interesting that ebay is doing that to themselves as we speak.

Ebay is now sueing Craigslist for taking steps that are hurting poor little ebay’s profit margin from it’s stock shares in Craigslist. Intersting, ebay is crying foul for something when in fact they have done the same exact thing to MILLIONS OF SELLERS! Can you say HYPOCRITES??!!

Ebay there is a reason why there are tens of thousands of sellers and buyers alike fleeing from your site and for good reason may I say. It’s because your customer service is ranked among one of the all time worst in any major company in HISTORY!

John Donahoe……have you EVER bought ANYTHING on ebay? Have you ever tried to SELL anything on ebay? No you have NOT. So you have NO IDEA WHAT IS BEST FOR THE COMMUNITY! That’s like telling a football player what the next play should be when you have no idea how the game of football or the rules work!

This MAY 1st boycott WILL affect ebay much worse than they are downplaying it. And the reason is it’s your fault it has come to this ebay. When you KNOW about fraudulent sellers selling fake items, or sellers ripping off buyers, you do nothing…cuz you make money off those sales. When the non-paying and fraudulent bidders wreak havoc on sellers and a sellers honest reputation, once again you do nothing…and once again, because YOU STILL MAKE MONEY OFF THESE FRAUDULENT MEMBERS!

You have now given fraudulent buyers the ability to run about completely unchecked in this new system with NO recourse for the honest sellers that will become victim.

R.I.P. Ebay, your days are numbered and you know it. You have nobody to blame but yourself!

I have dedicated myself to educating people about this new ebay. And educating them on all of it’s new flaws. And to educating people on this May 1st boycott. I will not rest until this company falls. Thankfully, they helped this along tremendously with the steps they are taking. And for that and only that I thank you ebay…..for making my job of showing how fraudulent and one-sided and untrustworthy you are that much easier!!

P.S. I am sure that the manager of this blog post will not allow this post, just as he has blocked dozens of posts from me in the past. But this post WILL be copied and pasted to many forums.

TiggypooOn 04.30.2008 at 7:49 am Said:

Good sellers - Bad sellers

My take is that the DSRs are getting rid of good sellers - Not the bad. I have not seen this addressed before. The April 21st issue of AntiqueNews had a very interesting write-up on the selling of stolen military items on eBay which eBay apparently was not seeing, possibly not deliberately but probably because it was bringing in a huge amount of money. The items being sold were and are very detrimental to the troops serving in Iraq. These items that would protect our soldiers are now helping kill them. The sellers doing this are the BAD sellers. I’ll bet the stars of these sellers were not getting dinged! So, eBay ignored this illegal situation! I encourage everyone - including all eBay personell - to read this article. If you don’t have a copy you can pick one up for free at most any antiques mall. You can also wrie to Antique News for a back issue.

MichaelOn 04.30.2008 at 8:19 am Said:

Wow, eBay really does need to wake up. Everything they do and everything they say should really match up better if they expect sellers OR buyers to buy into their eBay-Speak.

But first off, I’d really like to hear an end to people complaining about PowerSeller favoritism. Folks, I’ve been a PowerSeller for many years (was even a Platinum PowerSeller for a while), and nothing could be further from the truth re: favoritism. In fact, there SHOULD be some recognition for established sellers. If you’ve been selling for years and have many hundreds or thousands of satisfied customers, why shouldn’t you get some amount of higher visibility over newbies who have yet to prove they can run a business or service their customers? If eBay wants a FAIR level playing field, then the issue should be time as a user, not volume of sales.

This entire DSR system has hurt long established PowerSellers every bit as much as small sellers. As an example, if just 1 of your DSR’s falls below a 4.6, your listings are moved to the back of the pack in Best Match listings. We have DSR’s of 4.8, 4.8, 4.7, and 4.5. That 1 single 4.5 has caused our business to drop by more than half over a period of about 1 month!!! And with thousands of feedbacks and DSR’s already logged, it will take MANY dozens of 5 star ratings to bring up this average.

On other fronts, another proof for eBay favoring buyers to the detriment of their sellers AND the site as a whole is their complete and utter failure to police their listings. For every item that they tell you you’re not allowed to sell, you’ll find 20 other sellers selling that exact same item…even months after the fact!!! This only hurts sellers (since they lose sales to the sellers still selling that which the were told they couldn’t sell)…but it’s great for eBay since they still make profit from these sales which shouldn’t even exist by their own rules.

Another joke is the sheer amount of counterfeit items on eBay. It’s nearly impossible to buy a legitimate brand-name fashion brand…for every seller of these goods they kick off, there are dozens still doing it. Pirated software is another issue, but they haven’t been able to nip that in the bud, either. So they’ll nail sellers, but they won’t do anything to police their own service.

As a result, I haven’t purchased anything on eBay in many, MANY years. I buy from Amazon or individual stores, NOT eBay. Sorry, but they get enough of my money!

Shaking My HeadOn 04.30.2008 at 9:58 am Said:

Interesting interview. I agree with Michelle that I tend to dismiss anything that I can’t see in entirety.
From the videos I better understand today’s Ebay. This does explain all the poor decisions that have come down since 2006. Apex management at Ebay makes one big mistake- their belief they understand their marketplace better than their users. In their determination to manipulate and drive their own site they lost the battle. The rest of the marketplace is telling Ebay (declining new user base, declining page views, declining traffic etc). and today’s Ebay arrogantly ignores that advice.
Ebay’s job is to make this site easy to surf, safe, and an enjoyable experience. It is NOT Ebay’s job to dictate what gets to be shown, how I grade my transactions, or how I use the site. Ebay didn’t learn that lesson when I left as a seller so I am about to show them again as a buyer.

Patricia1On 04.30.2008 at 10:24 am Said:

“But first off, I’d really like to hear an end to people complaining about PowerSeller favoritism. Folks, I’ve been a PowerSeller for many years (was even a Platinum PowerSeller for a while), and nothing could be further from the truth re: favoritism. In fact, there SHOULD be some recognition for established sellers. If you’ve been selling for years and have many hundreds or thousands of satisfied customers, why shouldn’t you get some amount of higher visibility over newbies who have yet to prove they can run a business or service their customers? If eBay wants a FAIR level playing field, then the issue should be time as a user, not volume of sales.”

HuH? I’m not a powerseller but I’ve been selling 10 years on ebay with several thousand feedbacks at 100 percent, DSR’s 5.0, 5.0, 5.0, 4.9. I wasn’t offered the recent reduced fee sale, I wasn’t offered the 5 or 15 percent discount for keeping up my rating, I wasn’t told that I could ship to any unconfirmed address and still have paypal protection. Just the opposite, I’m being treated like a criminal and told that if my rating drops because some nutcase buyer is having a bad day I’ll be buried in the listings! That’s all I’m getting for 10 years of constant selling here - its what a LOT of small sellers are getting for being good sellers. There is no difference between us and the newby who started yesterday!

I do agree with you on time spent selling on ebay - seniority should count as it does in every other job in this country and, yes, we should be noticed for time spent selling because if you added up what I spent on ebay fees for 10 years I outspent many many powersellers!

Oh….I have one more thing to say about Pierre and this youtube interview. 10 years ago he didn’t know what to do with Ebay and couldn’t handle its success - which is why he took Whitman on board. What makes everyone think he knows what’s best now? Everyone respects Pierre for starting ebay - but that really should be as far as it goes.

Patricia1On 04.30.2008 at 10:40 am Said:

@ Marty - great post and shows how successful we all could be if ebay stopped trying to put fees on everything (such as international exposure) instead of simply taking its FVF’s. We could sell so much more if they’d just go back to being a venue - BUT also supply us with the quality service we pay for!

By the way, I noticed they are down some 3 million listings and falling. Time for another “gimmick” to pick up listings.

themadmuskratOn 04.30.2008 at 11:08 am Said:

Thanks to so many for posting intelligent, spot-on assessments of the current situation at eBAy. I agree there are many problems inherent in the DSR ratings, as well as most of the changes eBay has made in these last 2-3 years.

The problem lies in what to do about it. How many sellers are actually going to stop selling - or exposing their items to the millions of buyers - on eBay because of this? Unfortunately, it’s simple economics…there are always a supply of new sellers willing to try their hand at ebay to make a little extra cash. By the time these and other, more established sellers grow frustrated and unhappy, there are more new sellers who are already taking their place. Maybe not the same quality, but, nevertheless, they are there.

For all the reasons so aptly stated in the responses, I have long since looked at eBAy as more of an advertising tool rather than a marketplace. You can believe any customers I have are going to be transferred over to my own ecommerce site, and I will continue to list only that number of items necessary to give me some exposure.

Most of my buyers here on Ebay are great people - I’ve been blessed with very few problems. However, with the changes being made, particularly in the latest feedback mess, like many other sellers, I can see the writing on the wall! I’ve already had one buyer email me saying “I was getting ready to leave you positive feedback, but I saw you hadn’t left me any. When I receive positive feedback from you, I will leave feedback for you.” It just so happens that this buyer was wonderful, we were a tad bit behind in our feedback (like, a week!) and would not have given her anything BUT positive feedback. However, with the new “positive feedback only” deal in place…this whole situation could have been very very different, and we all know it!

No thanks, Ebay!

MistyOn 04.30.2008 at 1:34 pm Said:

QUOTE “The items being sold were and are very detrimental to the troops serving in Iraq. These items that would protect our soldiers are now helping kill them.”

AND I AM THE MOTHER OF ONE OF THOSE SOLDIERS WHO HAS BEEN AND VERY SOON TO BE REDEPLOYED OVER THERE FIGHTING.

kimbersOn 04.30.2008 at 1:39 pm Said:

Muskrat, you said:

Unfortunately, it’s simple economics…there are always a supply of new sellers willing to try their hand at ebay to make a little extra cash. By the time these and other, more established sellers grow frustrated and unhappy, there are more new sellers who are already taking their place. Maybe not the same quality, but, nevertheless, they are there.

While what you say is true, I think you have forgotten a piece of the picture.

All those sellers who leave eBay whether it’s now or in the future are in some way are going to let people know why. They don’t even have to bad mouth eBay either.

I am (well, right now was) a small but steady seller here who has been here since the start. I provided exactly the kind of service eBay claims to be striving for. My DSR’s are 4.9,5.0,5.0,5.0. (Yep, an actual 5.0 for shipping!).

I was proud not only of what I was doing but for a long time I was proud to be doing it here.

I was an eBay ‘cheerleader’, I promoted the site constantly, recommending it as the place to look first if you wanted to buy anything as well as teaching several others the ins and outs of being a good seller.

Last night, I went out to dinner with a friend I haven’t seen for a while. As the evening progressed, she finally mentioned that she was shocked we had been talking for 2 hours and I hadn’t mentioned eBay once.

At that moment, I realized that I didn’t even care enough to explain how I feel about the changes eBay has made. I just said that I was changing my business plan and was still sorting out the details.

She responded by telling me that she had heard a few things about various changes at eBay that weren’t really positive but that my silence while deafening was very telling.