RSSEBay drops listing cost of Buy It Now auctions
By Tim Conneally | Published August 20, 2008, 4:04 PM
To remain competitive as user activity levels off, eBay has announced that Buy it Now sales will incur a reduced flat fee for an extended listing period.
Online auction service eBay charges its sellers twice for each transaction: once for listing the item (called the insertion fee) and once after the item has been sold (or the final value fee). Effective September 16, sellers will be able to insert 30-day Buy it Now auctions for 35¢, a 70% reduction in listing cost, according to eBay.
What's more, that single 35¢ fee can be applied to an unlimited number of identical auctions.
This year, eBay has experimented with marketplace reconfiguration to stimulate activity on the site. But many sellers have expressed discontent with eBay, as it appears to be gradually moving away from the auction model it pioneered.
Sales of Buy it Now items on eBay have grown approximately 60% per year, according to reports, and now constitute just under half the total value of all goods sold on the site. But competition for eBay is stiff. This year, some of the most formidable retailers like Wal-Mart, and Amazon unveiled new transaction styles this year that overlap slightly with eBay's model.
While eBay is not exactly suffering, there's an increasing body of evidence indicating that the marketplace's relevance is slowly drawing to a close. After last quarter's earnings were posted, Steven Ju of RBC Capital posited, "What remains to be seen is whether or not the company can drive meaningful growth." In light of this, eBay mentioned a series of upgrades to its site that will take place through November, in addition to the amended listing fee.
"as user activity levels off"...that should state "as users get sick of being ripped off".
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|Is ebay even considered an auction site anymore? I haven't bought anything other than buyitnow for years. Probably just the type of stuff I buy, though.
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|There used to be good deals on it, but there are so many people now competing it's much cheaper to just buy from a regular store. Especially when you consider shipping charges.
Though eBay is still good for hard to find stuff that you really can't find anywhere else. Need a floppy drive for your TRS-80 Model 4 or a tube for your 1946 Philco radio? You can't get them Wal-Mart, but you can find the most obscure old junk imaginable on eBay.
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|The link in my story goes to Wal-Mart Classifieds, which DOES offer old and obscure junk. Unforunately, it only has a 1942 Philco Radio up for you:
http://walmart.oodle.com...ole-Radio/862563575/usa/
And no TRS-80 goodies either, but C-64 and Vic20 fans are in luck:
http://walmart.oodle.com...ilford-CT/746698840/usa/
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|Ha, nice. To be honest I just skimmed over the article and didn't even see Wal-Mart mentioned. I was just using it as an example since it's the most popular retail store. Looks interesting though, I hope it takes off. Anything to compete with eBay is great news. :)
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|Well, as a seller, I have never once auctioned anything on eBay. I think the whole auction thing is kind of stupid except for a very small range of rare/scarce items that people would actually have a reason to "bid" on competitively. About 98% of the stuff on eBay that is sold at auction now, really shouldn't be. It should be sold as a Buy It Now. The only scam here is the idea that people ever should have been encouraged to sell common, readily available stuff at acution in the first place. Kinda dumb.
I think this is why you are seeing sites like eBay lose ground quickly to free community bullitin board sites like Craigslist. If Craigslist wanted to, they could put in a few little tweaks that would put eBay out of business over night. Personally, if I was running Craigslist, I would put those tweaks in place and put eBay out of business just to prove how easily it could be done.
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|I see we agree. I agree about Craigslist, they could do some very simple things to reduce the spam/noise levels to be a top 10 site, and make ungodly amounts of money, even without ads.
Are there any alternative sites to craigslist that follow the same model? Might be a potential market for such a thing.
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|There's Kijiji, Ebay's answer to Craigslist for local advertising. Oodle has a promotion deal with Wal-mart. Backpage is also similar. There are probably countless other online classifieds that are only serve a local area.
So far I haven't had much luck with any of the alternatives. At least in the are I live in the volume of traffic for the alternatives to Craigslist are very low.
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|What, you mean their brilliant plan of screwing over sellers hasn't been going that well?
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