Common Sense eCommerce

Every year we go through this: eBay announces fee changes, sellers get mad, threaten in the online forums to quit. A week or so later, life returns to normal. But is that the case this time?

This article from CNN Money, discusses a few of the eBay alternatives and it seems they are suddenly picking up new sellers by the droves. Specifically they mention OnlineAuction.Com and eCrater.Com which picked up 7,500 and 1,400 new sellers respectively in the week after eBay made its announcements.

Perhaps the competitors are smelling blood here? Even Overstock.com which had nearly thrown in the towel on their auction business has put it back on their front page and placed it more prominently.

There’s a balance in there somewhere. The big question is: How many sellers will have to leave eBay to affect that balance to the tipping point? That’s the point where the lack of sellers degrades the buying experience and therefore the buyers begin to look elsewhere.

The buyers won’t necessarily follow the sellers off eBay except for those sellers that have established strong bonds with their customers (hint: that’s the way to do it, take your customers with you!). It won’t be until the buyer traffic drops significantly that eBay will begin to notice the pinch in the bottom line. I don’t know what effect those sellers who left in the last two weeks will have on eBay if any. For the 7,500 that went to OnlineAuction.Com, I’m betting 7,500 more sellers will join eBay.

eBay, eBay Sellers, eBay Markeplace

Trackback This Post | Subscribe to the comments through RSS Feed