How Amazon and Google are taking eBay's Business 289
prostoalex writes "Wall Street Journal says many online sellers who started on eBay are now going solo, being helped out by 'name-your-own-price' Amazon Marketplace and Google's and Yahoo's advertising programs, which allow small businesses to direct their ads to search engine users interested in specific items. The article discusses several companies where online sellers, being disappointed with eBay's falling profit margins, increasing fees, disruptions coming from PayPal account freezes and high fraud rate, are leaving eBay. Many start with setting up their own sites, continuing to do business on eBay, but then switching to solo e-commerce entirely after looking at profit margins."
Re:eBay will fail unless it... (Score:5, Informative)
I'm sick and tired of searching for items in the UK and having to sort through pages and pages of crap from Hong Kong (which seem cheap until you look at the shipping costs).
Re:I don't know about other people... (Score:2, Informative)
Sign in, type in what item you want to sell...
..."Welcome to eBay! List the item you would like to sell!"
name a price, and that's that.
"Use our Buy It Now option to set an item at a desired price!"
Buyer pays Amazon, Amazon tells you to ship, you ship to buyer, Amazon pays you.
"Make payments easy using Paypal, Bidpay, or any other method of payment you deem appropriate!"
A.ca takes 15% off the top
"eBay fees depend on the starting and ending price of the item. See Table A..."
Re:What's wrong with PayPal? (Score:5, Informative)
My brother fits this to a "T" (Score:3, Informative)
The content network is really what makes it work. More than half of hits come from the content network, and more than half the sales. The click-through rates are about the same, which surprised me quite a bit.
So, without RTFA, I can support the WSJ's premise. Google does threaten eBay-- it allows small sellers to get their own customer base independent of eBay. eBay may not see a drop in sales, but long-term I think this hurts their growth.
Free Yahoo Auctions.. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:What's wrong with PayPal? (Score:1, Informative)
I had a buyer purchase something from me, and they demanded a full refund, but refused to send the product back. So what did they do? They filed a dispute, and the same day the funds were withdrawn from my account to be placed on hold. Great. I ended up winning the dispute (thankfully) after a month of deliberations, but I spoke with several Paypal represenatives, and all expressed the simple fact: as a seller, you have no securities unless you purchase protection policies. For buyers, they can get their money back without purchasing any policies. Unfair, yes, but just something you learn the hard way...
Otherwise, Paypal has been a great system for me. Could be better, could be worse, but it's not much different than a typical financial institution in that respect.
Re:Maybe eBay will finally start policing it's own (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Why doesn't Google index eBay? (Score:3, Informative)
The names of the companies will usually say something other than E-Bay, but if you click on enough, you'll find them for sure.
agree.. (Score:3, Informative)
Have to agree.. just as a buyer I have found their customer support to be second to none. Any time I have had a problem they have fixed it instantly - even if they lose money as a result, for example by sending replacement products out (internationally) which they have done for me several times.
They are the only online retailer that I really trust.. they've earned it.
What?! Ebay is pricey... (Score:4, Informative)
Me? I'll bone up the extra $25 and buy a new one.
A sellers perspective... (Score:1, Informative)
All a buyer had to do was claim they never recieved the item and they'd get their money back, regardless of whether we provided paypal with a tracking number or not! Why wouldn't you swear at that?
Paypal seems fine if you're just selling some used items that has no appeal to human scum, but if you sell anything some scumass wants, you're going to take it in the shorts.
Things I would feel comfortable accepting payments for via paypal... ham radio equipment, old game consoles/cartridges, martha stewart type things. Things I would not accept payment for... CDs, anything associated with rap music or hiphop culture, jewelry, brand name clothes, etc...
Basically, if you would be worried about some ghetto ass punk robbing you for it, don't accept paypal as a payment for it. It's true it didn't happen all the time, but it got so bad that the fraud against us with paypal reached over 8 percent of our transactions. NEVER AGAIN. You want to buy from us, you come to our website and use your credit card. CC companies are much easier to deal with and far more fair in our experience.
Re:eBay will fail unless it... (Score:2, Informative)
Also... (Score:3, Informative)
Missed Quarter? No problem, increase fees! (Score:2, Informative)
Did anyone notice that immediately after eBay missed its numbers last quarter they jacked up the seller fees? Their customer reps claimed that one had nothing to do with the other and that fees were increased to provide us sellers with more advanced services. Uh huh.
I've stopped selling on eBay because they've been taking 15-20% of everything I sell.
Re:Also... (Score:3, Informative)
And why would an Amazon Marketplace customer not be able to enjoy it, if they bought an item from you?
Amazon requires shipping within 2 business days. And the shiping costs are fixed, so no eBay adverts of $10 laptop with $500 shipping (exaggerating here a bit, but you know what I mean).
And I've seen Amazon IDs (selling mostly books) feature domain names, which makes it pretty clear that the seller exists as an independent site as well.
Re:eBay is a JOKE (Score:1, Informative)
Actually, you can still pay via Credit Card.
You do need to give them your bank account info to become 'verified' or whatever, but when you pay via Paypal you can still choose to pay using the Credit Card you initially set the account up with. It just defaults to your bank account.
Re:eBay is a JOKE (Score:1, Informative)
As I found it much easier to deal with a bank the one time I had a problem with a seller.
The few times I have used paypal, I dont view the transaction as secure in any way, so am prepared to possibly loose the money. Hence I am much more choosey about what I'm buying.
Re:phishing (Score:2, Informative)
Always just go to amazon.com or ebay.com and navigate to the page you want. Phishers have gotten quite proficient at sending fake invoices to sellers that look just like the real thing.
Barrier to Entry (Score:2, Informative)
And on a more personal frustration, I abhor Paypal. I won't rehash all it's issues, but my basic question is if Ebay is owned by Paypal, why not make everything more transparent???? Why so many separate fees and deductions?
So if Google is working on a Paypal competitor, I CANNOT wait! As for buying from independent sellers on Amazon - I've never had any problems, and the whole process is pretty smooth. To give credit to Ebay: single best use of Ebay - buying second-hand CD's!!!
Amazon's Marketplace has it's problems too. (Score:3, Informative)
One problem with the Amazon Marketplace is that it isn't as obvious as it should be that you're not buying from Amazon. I'm sure Slashdot readers can tell the difference but I couldn't send a friend or relitive there and expect them to notice.
Another problem with the Amazon Marketplace is that the feedback doesn't give you any clue to what the other person bought. As it turns out many scammers build up positive feedback by selling high volumes of nearly worthless goods (used/crummy dvds etc) and then suddenly switch to selling more expensive items. I thought at first maybe this was just an isolated incident but when I looked into it more I found hundreds of sellers following the same pattern. I've been on Ebay since some time in the 90's and never been scammed but managed it on my first try at Amazon.
Happy to See EBay Taste the Sword (Score:3, Informative)
Although they've provided a useful service, they've made a point of suporting all sorts of liberal issues, which just seems holier-than-thou. Its a goddam e-fleamarket.
I don't care that you want tri-sexuals to be able to get married, government-paid sex-change operations, govt. money for my pet's sex change operation (my cat Felix is really a Felicia) and so on.
Amazon and Google have the sense to keep politics out of their business model.
Also, the article didn't mention Craigslist, which is really killing Ebay -- Craigslist is free.
Re:Be Warned! (Score:3, Informative)
PayPal dicking you over? Go over their heads and call the credit card company for a charge back. You get the money credited back to your account by the credit card company and PayPal now has the 3 ton gorilla credit card company going after their money. You get an email from PayPal asking about the problem, but it's out of their hands.
Re:I don't know about other people... (Score:5, Informative)
When he would pay me, he would send approximately $150-250 through PayPal. This occured 8 times.
When I received the funds in my PayPal account, there was never any indicator of how he provided funds to PayPal, nor did I think I should care.
Approximately 6-8 months after the last transaction, I logged into my PayPal account prompted by an e-mail I received from them.
My account balance was -$1300 and some change. After calling PayPal to figure out what happened, I found out that the client had disputed the charges.
He worked out of his home, I called and reached his wife. His credit card had been stolen and he charged back any transactions he didn't recognize.
When I called again to reach him, I couldn't seem to communicate what had happened. (He was rather non-technical). He thought that other charges he saw on his account were the ones for me, but these were checks he had written for another matter. He refused to "double-pay me."
So, since PayPal doesn't bother to check with merchants or ask any questions whatsoever before charging back transactions, I'm out some $1300.
I call PayPal, they tell me they need proof of shipping. The funds were sent and labeled as 'for services'! I questioned this, and they seemed confused, and then said they needed proof of shipment, again.
I'll let you draw your own conclusions from this story. I'm tired of writing, but google around and see how MasterCard or Visa handles chargebacks with their merchants. PayPal is NOT a financial institution, by any definition.
Avoids emotions, plays to bidder stupidity (Score:3, Informative)
1) You avoid emotional runups. You can't have much of a bidding war in twenty seconds.
2) Most people do NOT use the maximum bid option to just say how much they are really willing to pay. They may be willing to pay $50 but bid only $20. Why? I don't know. What I do know is that it means I can get something for $21 instead of $51 (or not at all since I'd rather get something cheap). That's why so many people feel pissed off when they are sniped, because they gladly would have paid more. I usually just bid my maximum - but if possibly I try to do it in the last thirty seconds to not let lowballers have much time to figure out what happened. If I get outbid by a better sniper, I don't care - because I've bid as much as I want and someone else is quite welcome to pay more if they wish!