Friday, October 30th, 2009
eBay Adds New Social Share Functionality to Marketplace
eBay Motors and eBay.com made a small but significant enhancement to the share functionality on listings this week. Until now, the only sharing capabilities provided on individual listings was via email. In an age of tweeting, online nudging, poking, digging and blogging it is nice to see that Facebook and Twitter have been added to the list.
I really believe that eBay’s (and any ecommerce platform’s for that matter) embrace, or lack thereof, of social media tools into its core marketplace will dictate its future relevancy. I wrote about it for the BBC Digital Revolution Blog back in August:
The advent of the social web has built upon that original eBay ideal – connecting people online – creating virtual villages that introduce individuals with similar likes and views to one another, regardless of geography. The ubiquitous aspects of the new social web, although perfectly positioned for the personality of the eBay community, actually currently goes directly against the existing makeup of the eBay Marketplace infrastructure (currently no external links or social media widgets are permitted on individual listings).
This new functionality is still very much one-way but it’s a significant step in beginning to realize the true capabilities of social sharing for ecommerce solutions.
Cheers,
RBH
Tagged: buyers, corporate blog, ebay, ebay auctions, ebay inc, eBay Ink, ebay ink blog, ebay marketplace, ebay motors, ebay platform, ebay portfolio, ebay roadmap, ebay.com, ecommerce, facebook, Marketplace, News, online marketplace, sellers, social media, twitter
John (ColderICE)On October 30, 2009 at 10:00 am Said:
At least you “GET IT”
john (ColderICE)
http://www.colderice.com
Tommy DayOn October 30, 2009 at 11:39 am Said:
Awesome news! This should greatly help with visits and traffic. I sell on another marketplace as well and can tell you for sure that this feature gets me A LOT of visits. Thanks RBH!
HenriettaOn October 30, 2009 at 10:03 pm Said:
You are preaching to the converted Brother Richard and I am not sure what is social about one way traffic, it is just broadcasting on another band.
As John said earlier, at least you get it, but unfortunately until the upper stratosphere loose the walled and besieged city mentality we are stuck in the “plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose” loop.
Let me repeat, advertising is not social.
Mr.BigfootOn October 31, 2009 at 3:58 am Said:
Great News! Just in time to recommend products for the holiday season. Here is a screenshot of the feature that I just tweeted http://budurl.com/hjnn
Frank AmmirataOn November 1, 2009 at 9:01 am Said:
Adding Twitter and Facebook is a good step for sure. I’d have to say though that the eBay selling feed on Facebook has only worked sporadically and has not worked at all since the most recent updates.
PolpravOn November 2, 2009 at 2:31 pm Said:
Hello from Russia!
Can I quote a post “No teme” in your blog with the link to you?
Consignment Pal Resale DirectoryOn November 3, 2009 at 7:00 pm Said:
Finally! Way to go eBay! This will boost sales!
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