eBay: Bottom Is a Few Months Away
In my August post here I suggested and predicted eBay's (EBAY) John Donahoe:
Give the bloated 16,000 staff count a crew cut. Take the GE (GE) approach and just take 20% off for starters and get the existing people aligned against things that will grow the business. See above on what that is – ahem, not Skype. Of these, lose the public relations, investor relations and marketing teams. They've all failed to convince Wall Street that this stock has legs so just start over. If not, Carl Icahn may start it over for you.
I was a few percentage points off as the company announced just 10% layoffs on Monday, but perhaps that may be why Wall Street gave what you yanks like to call the Bronx cheer for its multi-headed announcement with a nice trim to the stock to the tune of 7% -- pushing it down to its all time low at the close of trading. But I was pretty accurate about the communications organization as ValleyWag noted yesterday with senior vice president of PR Alan Marks (formerly director of media relations at Nike) has cut his staff only to add more VP's.
Not sure from what rock that thinking comes from considering how poorly he manages his underlings who feel free to send his memos to the free bloggers like Owen. ValleyWag tells me he actually snapped at his team saying they sit and wait for permission instead of doing their jobs. Wonder if they asked for his permission to send his War and Peace-like missive out? Or if he said, "Just Do It?!"
Enough Silicon Valley blathering. Here's my next gem of wisdom for the future of eBay:
- Q3 numbers will be a non-event, but I suspect Q4 guidance to be lowered. [Insert Wall Street boo here.] The company more or less foreshadowed that saying this is a very "tough retail climate" going into the holiday season.
- StumbleUpon will be sold at a loss probably by the end of this year. No need for searching on eBay if user traffic is flat.
- Skype will be on the selling block for early 2009 as Donahoe focuses on all things eBay. The dial tone business is not for the tone deaf.
- The stock will remain on the "cheap as hell" list looking up at being a "value" for the next 18 months as Donahoe toils with what clearly is a turnaround story now.
Bringing my armchair MBA back out, I believe Donahoe is doing the right things to right the ship. Focusing on the things he and the management team know best, cutting costs associated with headcount that doesn't drive sales, and slowly breaking up the 3-legged conglomerate Meg Whitman whittled. Wall Street doesn't buy the story, so do the tough things that unlock shareholder value. It's not a popularity contest running a public company, and by the level of negativity around eBay now I'd say Donahoe is taking the right steps.
For investors looking for a cheap stock this holiday season, eBay is certainly that. But the bottom is still a few months away. Skype needs to be sold and more jobs need to be cut before Wall Street props this dog up again. Hold on to your cash in this credit crunched economy.
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This article has 48 comments:
- Bob C
- 68 Comments
Oct 09 03:47 PMDo you get paid to write this crap??
Donahoe tried to make eBay's customers, the sellers, walk the plank. Instead they have been, and still are, abandoning the the rat infested ship in record numbers.
You Are right about its shares not being at the bottom yet, but Enron shares will look good by the time Donahoe floats off in his golden lifeboat.
- Chaug
- 1 Comment
Oct 09 03:58 PM- Bob C
- 68 Comments
Oct 09 03:59 PMI just checked your Bio, and see that you don't have a full time job.
Try selling on eBay part time for one month, and then report back to us about your warm and fuzzy feeling about John Donahoe.
- 1les2les3les
- 3 Comments
My Website
Oct 09 04:37 PMThe right ship, nay lad your history should remind you of the Titanic!
- redbaron
- 156 Comments
Oct 09 04:42 PM- User 269960
- 11 Comments
Oct 09 05:07 PMBTW, I was a 10+ year seller who helped make Ebay the great auction site it USED to be. Now it's a mountain of B.S. I don't foresee it ever becoming viable again. They have flipped the finger to us all and we will not forgive and forget. I hope the ship sinks with all the management freaks onboard.
- Patricia013
- 53 Comments
My Website
Oct 09 05:23 PMYeah - he's righting the ship SO much its in danger of turning completely upside down!
Tell you what I foresee...I foresee a healthy company that merely needed tweaking mismanaged to the point where it self destructs. I foresee John Donahoe gone by the end of Quarter One 2009! Let's just see which one of us are right ;-)
- auntyebay
- 3 Comments
Oct 09 05:24 PM- NYM Arts
- 18 Comments
My Website
Oct 09 07:01 PMI Rule My World : nymarts.com
- hobo
- 8 Comments
Oct 09 07:39 PM- Bob C
- 68 Comments
Oct 09 07:46 PMClasses would improve Mr MBA Dan's writing skills, but what do you suggest for his thinking, research, and common sense skills?
Least I forget, his math skills. He suggested a 20 percent employee cut for eBay back in August, and after a 10 percent cut claims he was just a few percentage points off.
Dan would fit right in with eBay's upper 'no clue' management.
- User 276637
- 1 Comment
Oct 09 09:59 PM- pwrsellr
- 18 Comments
Oct 09 10:21 PMIf disgruntled Ebay sellers who either garnered extra money by selling part-time on Ebay or it was their entire livelihood were able to claim unemployment and would count in the unemployment numbers...who can judge how much it would spike the numbers.
Analysts: Look at ANY blog comments surrounding the current state of Ebay in ANY forum and see how many [sellers] are in favor of the "ebay platform" vs how many are angry and disgusted. When you get that ratio, delete the positive ones that have obviously been planted by Ebay employees and relook at the ratio again.
THEN you will see why the US market for Ebay is tanking. With Ebay's old business model, it would have been PROSPERING from the economic downturn because MORE SELLERS would have been putting MORE ITEMS on Ebay for sale to make ends meet.
Oh...when you are looking at number of listings, make sure to discount the MAJOR LISTING SALES currently going on vs last year AS WELL AS the corporate sellers who don't have to pay listing fees [where there weren't any last year]. Ebay used to run 3, maybe 4 ONE DAY listing sales...now they have fire sale listing sales lasting the rest of the year.
Where else can A+ be a "passing grade" and A be a failing grade"? According to ebay with their new rating system where buyers can rate sellers, "ships quickly" is a 4 grade [an A] and ships VERY quickly is a 5 [an A+]. an average of 4.3 will get you to not be able to list for 30 days. And they don't tell the buyer what differentiates "quickly" from "very quickly". I ship the same day paid communicate that I do, and send a confirmation tracking number that same day yet I get 4.6 on shipping time, That's a lot of 4's. How can I do better than ship the same day paid? I have free shipping yet I get 4.7 on shipping and handling charges DSRs. How can I do better than free? That's the frustration of good sellers that are trying.
In its heyday Ebay used to tout three things: 1) That a winning bid is a CONTRACT between buyer and seller that BOTH had to honor. 2) Whenever there was an issue or a challenge, Ebay would say we are only a venue and have no control over the transaction between buyer and seller. 3) That the Ebay site was a level playing field between buyers and sellers and between Mom/Pop small sellers and behemoth corporate sellers. All played by the same rules.
Now: A winning bid is a contract that ONLY THE SELLER has to honor. The buyers can demand [and get] any number of concessions from the seller by threatening to leave bad DSRs...all they have to do is call the seller so there is no MY MESSAGES or email record. Ebay will do nothing. Also we sellers get to LIE about the buyers all we can leave is POSITIVE FEEDBACK even if they are unreasonable, even if they ignore payment terms and pay 30 days later when the auction states payment due in 10 days. What's the point of leaving coddling feedback? We sellers dont even know from other sellers when the bidder never pays but leaves negative feedback!
The we are only a venue thing HA! Ebay now controls HOW something is listed, HOW it can be paid for, WHERE the items show up in search, HOW MANY items can be listed [regardless of how many are paid for to be listed}, and that buyers can only rate sellers.
Think of it this way...WHAT LANDLORD of a bricks and mortar retailer tells a retailer what credit cards to accept, what items to sell, that you have to coddle buyers regardless of how they act ion your store or how they treat your inventory. And tells the retailer how much they can charge for shipping and handling. How long before that bricks and mortar retailer moves to a more resonable siteor goes out of business.
In essence, this is what Ebay is doing as a landlord to sellers with these changes.
An example of the land mine field Ebay is throwing at sellers?
1) As of this month sellers are ONLY allowed to accept Paypal.
2) Paypal rules/regs require that you accept ALL APPROVED FORMS OF PAYMENT offered through Paypal
3) Echecks are a form of payment Paypal offers that must be accepted by sellers if bidders pay with that form of payment.
4) Paypal requires a seller to HOLD SHIPMENT until PAYPAL SAYS the echeck has cleared
5) Ebay has a "Shipping Time" DSR with no parameters set for buyers to rate sellers
6) When you HOLD SHIPMENT buyers will lower your DSR on shipping time
7) DSRs are rated on a 1-5 system, whole numbers only
8) 4 is "Ships Fast" 5 is "Ships very fast"
9) According to Ebay rules, ANY DSR under 4.3 will cause you to no be able to list for 30 days
10) So all you need is to follow the rules, hold shipment until cleared by Paypal and get a couple of 3's on DSRs on shipping time and you won't be able to list for 30 days. Or as an alternative, you can ship immediately and if the payment bounces, Paypal will tell you you're not covered because you didn't wait to ship until cleared to do so by Paypal. In which case the seller will have lost the cost of the item, profit and shipping totally.
11) Even if you manage to avoid being thrown off the site for 30 days thing, your future listings will be buried in BEST MATCH because your DSR's will be under the Ebay average...which is boosted by all the heavy hitters such as BUY.COM that Ebay is wooing.
Untenable Catch 22 for Sellers...Sorta makes you want to stay with Ebay and sell doesn't it?
It is no longer a level playing field: a) Buyers can leave negative and neutral feedback for sellers but sellers cannot inform other sellers by feedback when a buyer cheats them or doesn't honor their committment to the ebay contract when making the purchase. Buyers can leave subjective and anonymous DSRs about sellers with impunity sometimes causing sellers to NOT BE ABLE TO LIST FOR 30 DAYS and the buyers can just MAKE UP A REASON to do so. [Ebay gives buyers no parameters [or ultra weak ones] for what the DSR levels mean and how to rate sellers. Getting slammed unfairly by buyers can also make listings unfindable by other buyers through BEST MATCH EVEN THOUGH sellers PAY THE SAME FEES to list their items. b) Small sellers now have different rules and fees from corporate sellers so the corporate sellers can undercut the Mom and Pops because their fee structure is enhanced.
So the Mom & Pops sellers can no longer compete and are getting slammed by unscrupulous buyers in DSRs so they are leaving taking with them the unique cutesy items that made Ebay a fun place to shop for buyers. Without the unique cutesy items, the good buyers are leaving too. And as mentioned above the positive word of mouth has been replaced by decidedly negative word of mouth from these disenfranchised sellers.
Sellers will leave and wont buy either. As they go and the Ebay broken and draconian search engine keeps the buyers left from finding their unique treasuresI hope the new management can sleep at night with their handiwork.
And yet Ebay, who cannot field a decent customer service department that CARES that could rid the site of bad sellers AND buyers, spends tons of money changing ITEM pages and MY EBAY 4-5 times a year WHEN IT DOES NOT NEED TO BE CHANGED. And I betcha the 1000 layoffs announced this week are in Customer Service! BTW when is the last time Amazon changed its pages? Putting lipstick on a pig with these superficial changes doesnt change the fact that its a pig.
You think LAST YEARS Ebay Live, which used to be a cult-like positive cheerleading event, was a disasterwait until THIS YEAR! Ebay may have to PAY sellers to show up to a venue that people were once treating like a Yankees/Red Sox World Series event.
And with all of the above enhancements sellers are asked to pay fee increases up to 43% to 100% and are now required to use Paypal only thus eliminating the 20% of buyers who ONLY pay by money order or check. Oh! and as punishment for Ebays not accepting Google Checkout, EBAYS searches have been lowered in GOOGLES BEST MATCH further hurting sellers AND buyers! Hah!
Ebay will implode.
And the only winner will be Donohoe and his Golden Parachute.
- 123
- 30 Comments
Oct 09 11:23 PMEbay is a great brand. To all the sellers - if you leave, where will you go? You need Ebay more than Ebay needs any one of you. Sad but true.
It is now a holding company but all of its businesses virtually print money.
Right now, you strip the cash out and the company is selling for $16B. It will make about $2.4B of cash this year. More next year. That is a 15% yield.
- pwrsellr
- 18 Comments
Oct 09 11:56 PMSellers are either going to other sites, starting their own websites or doing other things. Between Ebay and Paypal fees I used to pay upwards of 22% of my sales...$12K a year. Ebay will probably get $2K in fees from me this year. I've moved on. I've replaced the income and now work less hours. I used to ENJOY the Ebay experience. I probably made less than minimum wage for the number of hours I put in...but I met great people [my customers] and had 100% positive feedback through 40000 customers worldwide over 9 years.
I recommended people to do Ebaying [either buying or selling] as I was recommended by my friends originally. Not anymore.
I disagree.
Ebay WAS a great brand.
Based on the stock price, it looks like Ebay DOES NEED its disenfranchised small/medium volume sellers. The 800 lb gorilla is finding that as the sellers go so do the buyers. And all the tweaking done by Ebay won't bring them back.
- Anonyn999
- 2 Comments
Oct 10 02:21 AMi'm using craig's list to sell my stuff now.
i miss what Ebay used to be.
- Boulevard Bikes
- 2 Comments
Oct 10 03:40 AMI've been selling on ebay since 1998, Ebay has totally lost it with all the new changes and especially the DRS ratings system, ebay is trying to model itself after walmart, they have given all power to the buyers, which may sound good if your a buyer but as a seller it's ridiculous, 1) because most of the items sellers are selling are used, they are not already boxed up and ready to ship out the next day so the customer can recieve in within 3 days, and if they are unhappy they want their buyers to be able to just send it back and get a full refund, well most items are or were auction format, and used items are used, and they are not boxed and ready to ship out, some items like we sell, heavy machinery, tooling etc etc, require arrange truck shipping, motorfreight, or UPS, many require special one off packaging or crating, this cannot be accomplished in just one day. Example, I had one buyer purchase an item for me, I informed them the post office would out of the blue print mailer box that this would ship in, we ordered the boxes, 10 days still no boxes, re ordered the boxes, 10 days later we got them, then we shipped the item out, communicated with the customer via email the whole time as to why the delay, customer said no problem wasn't in a hurry, then after the customer gets the item they leave us very poor shipping time remarks, kills my discount at the end of the month. Ebay woud do nothing as always, another customer we shipped 10 wire crimping pliers he bought in a USPS flat rate box for 15 bucks, plus I through in an extra pair or crimping tools, we charged 4 dollars more for handling packaging all 11 crimpers, as stated in our listing the total shipping price with handling, then the customer leaves us with bad shipping cost marks, I'm like you gotta be kidding me?, if they would have went UPS or regular US mail it would have cost him 28 bucks shipping. I could go on and on with examples, check my ebay feedback under boulevardbikes, the author of this article is out to lunch. Ebay is going down the tubes, don't belive me, check their stock on yahoo finace today, check the insider transactions too, you'll see Meg Whitman dumping tons and tons of her stock in the last 16 months to the tune of about 500 million dollars, what does that tell you?, also look at the key statistics and you'll see ebay stock is being shorted considerably, I would bet their stock goes to 10 bucks or less here soon, or junk status, really a shame how they have run a great company into the ground and ruined a lot of sellers lively hood that made ebay what it is, myself included, were moving our stuff to our own website and off ebay, we have a near perfect record too but the headaches are just no longer worth it, support from ebay??, that's always been a joke, powerseller status?, another joke, now I understand under some of the new rules they are gonna make manditory Paypal payments, wouldn't that be illegal?, again don't believe me, check out what their stock is doing and what the insiders at ebay are doing, they are selling their stock big time, what does that tell you?. Boulevard Bikes
- ebayinwonderland
- 8 Comments
Oct 10 08:22 AMIs that simple enough to understand? No MBA needed. The sellers operate on common sense and integrity, not what pleases the Street or silly analysts that have never been a long term seller on ebay.
Then again, most of us understand that.
- Dan Buchannon
- 4 Comments
My Website
Oct 10 10:03 AMHowever, I write about the nuts and bolts of the stock that is represented by EBAY INCORPORATED, not the auction format.
Cheers,
Dan Buchannon
- 123
- 30 Comments
Oct 10 10:04 AMCan any seller on here specifically, with numbers (not emotions), describe why Ebay is no longer a good place to sell? Can you please quantify what actually changed and why it costs you more, or whatever, to do what you used to? I've the comments on here but they seem frivolous; OK so you have to take paypal and you have to accept all forms of payment-what is the big deal? I just don't see what Ebay did that is so bad. Again, please quantify, no emotions.
Sellers, please convince me that you're right and I'm wrong.
- DownWithEbay
- 26 Comments
Oct 10 10:22 AMSince Donahue has done virtually everything in his power to rid the site of auctions, casual sellers and small businesses as well as all the really unique, one of a kind type sellers favoring large volume sellers exclusively, fixed prices and free shipping only....it will be very interesting to see the massive decrease of buyer traffic going to ebay over the holidays and upcoming year.
Heck, in the 6 years I sold on ebay, I generated roughly 9000 sales, and at least 1/4 of those sales were from part time ebay sellers most of whom no longer buy or sell on ebay since J. Donahue has purposely undermined any and all small volume sellers.
Heck, even the large volume sellers are leaving at an alarming rate. According to sellerdome.com 35 out of the TOP 100 ebay sellers either no longer do business on ebay or at least have NOTHING listing on the site now. Pretty sad when just on a few short months Donahue and his posse of diruptive innovators have managed to drive off 35 percent of the largest sellers on the site. Based on my research studying sellerdome.com and poking through many of the individual sellers/businesses in top 100k nearly 45 percent of the top 100k sellers no longer have anything listed on ebay.
Ole J Donahue fails to realize that many of the 10s of 1000s of small businesses and the millions of casual sellers he's purpposely trying to drive off in tiers are also the same loyal community members that ONCE did a susbstantial ammount of shopping on ebay...many of whom are now doing their shopping at other sales venues or choosing to shop locally rather than feed the 800 lb greed monster. Not only have many community members CHOSEN to stop buy on ebay since J Donahue radically disputed the site, but those same folks are going back into their local communities speaking ill of ebay detering alot more folks from buying and selling on ebay.
As long as Donahue is in charge of ebay marketplace, I anticipate active memberships.
I think the average analyst doesnt even consider just how many of the large mass merchandisers on ebay merely use ebay as a platform to drive more and more ebay buyers to their websites once they've made the intial sale on ebay...so that they can avoid having to pay hefty ebay commisions and can use their own merchant account check out that more often than not is less costly than using paypal for every payment transaction. Heck, Our company was a small scale bronze power seller only doing about $4,500 worth of business on ebay monthly. But, now that we have our own website and storefronts on several lesser known auction sites, we've contacted been gradually contacting our 9000+ ebay customer base (at least 400 steady repeat customers) informing them of our new website and storefronts offering a 10% coupon any any purchases...our new store sales are steadily growing.
Multiply that out by the literally 1000 of other small businesses that are setting up a storefront off ebay and contacting all their previous ebay customers about their new online store...and that has and will continue to equate to a significant percentage of ebay's previous shopper base no longer shoping on ebay.
Ebay anticipated a small percentage of us small businesses would stop doing business on site. I dont think they ever envisioned just how many 1000s of small businesses would actually leave ebay and TAKE their customers with them.
Auctions arent a dying breed....Ebay is!
- pwrsellr
- 18 Comments
Oct 10 10:55 AM1) Ebay used to have a 1% discount on ALL FEES not just Final Value Fees if you had their monthly fees taken directly from your bank account. I had the 1% for 7 years. 6 months ago they announced that within 24 hours the fees would be gone. My costs then went up $100 a year
2) Within the last 18 months, the Post Office has raised IT'S costs to sellers...an average of 20%. My postage costs went up $2400 a year. Ebay has just instituted maximum fixed costs on my category, If I left my starting price where it was I would lost $7000 a year based on their maximum costs I would be allowed to charge. Instead I have to raise by start prices which cost me an additional $3000 a year in initial listing fees.
3) I have been selling on Ebay 7 years. For the first 5.5 years, I could count on like clockwork, my sell thru percentage. I did my research, had my starting prices competitive with other sellers and along with what the item had been selling for on Ebay. I COULD COUNT ON SELLING 33% OF THE NUMBER OF ITEMS LISTED. My wife and I would marvel on how that would happen EVERY TIME even though the titles changed. Now, through "Best Match" and DSR's my sell-thru at best is 17% and averages about 12%. Example...I used to list 500 items for a week. I would sell 170. List 100? I would sell 35. Now I list 200 and sell 25. All because of "Best Match" and DSR's and Corporate Customers being placed first. And that's when I had LEGITIMATE S/H charges in the listings and 100% feedback!
4) When there was two way feedback, I would have 2 non-paying bidders maybe a month...and I could block bidders who obviously were troublemakers as seen in feedback they received from others. Now I have 5-10 a month and they threaten me with bad DSR's unless I allow them to pay on THEIR TERMS. It's not so much the money lost [$50-$150 more a month lost] but the TIME it takes to chase these poeple, communicate and file reports with Ebay. So I am getting MORE NPB's on LESS LISTINGS.
5) I have projected that my TOTAL FEE COSTS as a procentage of sales and including listing costs for items that don't sell will rise 20% this year. And that is totally due to Ebay fee changes, S/H caps and sell-thru deterioration based mainly on BEST MATCH search engine. And my customer service is impeccable...but my DSR's and therefore Powerseller discounts don't reflect that.
I could go on and on. But I've spent enough time. Ebay wants the big corporate sellers. Donohoe does NOT want a "flea market" platform that had been the success of Ebay over the years. He wants what Amazon has. When a marketplace leader starts emulating the competition instead of staying ahead of it like they had in the past, they are doomed to failure. When they don't LISTEN to their customers [the sellers] they are doomed to failure.
The buyers are leaving [as Donohoe naively or egotistically states] not because of the potential of retaliatory negative feedback by sellers but because the small sellers with the unique items are being forced out. So Donohoe's tact is to lambast the sellers and make them impotent with higher costs to make the platform more "buyer-friendly&q... Except who knows that? Are they advertising that? The angle is all wrong. You attract more buyers by having more sellers selling items buyers want. With more sellers prices stay more competitive. Ebay should spend their resources creating a Customer Service department that GETS RID OF the scam sellers AS WELL AS the scam buyers.
I am not saying by any means that all buyers are bad. Quite the contrary. But neither are all sellers bad.
Ebay was once unique and at the top of their game. No longer. Pretty soon they will have just a bunch of selling conglomerates selling same-o items that can be found anywhere.
They are on a downward spiral and I am saying that without emotion.
- pwrsellr
- 18 Comments
Oct 10 11:16 AMI lost a 10% discount last month because ONE BUYER decided to give me the lowest mark on communication. I sent an email within 1 HOUR of his winning bid to thank him for his business and give him payment details. I sent an email within 1 HOUR of his payment beinf received thanking him for the payment and providing him a tracking number for his shipment. I shipped his item [actually took it to the post office] within 1/2 hour of his payment and confirmed shipment. And yet he gave me the lowest score on communication. Why? Because I didn't leave him [positive] feedback IMMEDIATELY upon receipt of his payment! [Note: leaving feedback immediately or at all is NOT a requirement under Ebay rules and the buyer never communicated with me that leaving immediate feedback was an issue for him].
So I sold him an item costing $10, shipped immediately and his DSR's cost me $20 in lost discounts against Ebay fees. Net profit on this transaction? Minus $10 + shipping.
It's this kind of stuff that gets sellers emotional.
- Bob C
- 68 Comments
Oct 10 11:29 AMTry selling on eBay for one month, and then report back to us 'emotional sellers'. Your interest seems to be only in the share price. Repeat over and over to yourself:
THE SELLERS ARE EBAY'S CUSTOMERS, THE SELLERS ARE EBAY'S CUSTOMERS.
Donahoe has turned eBay's wine into vinegar.
- pwrsellr
- 18 Comments
Oct 10 11:36 AMI appreciate your thesis. But you don't get it.
You say: " My analysis is based on management's management of that business, not specific experiences or offerings to sellers." and "my story. It has nothing to do fees, seller ratings and the like which I am sure are truly providing you with angst that is reflected in slowing growth in marketplaces organisation."
It has EVERYTHING TO DO WITH "fees, seller ratings and the like" and "Management's management of the business".
As mentioned above from others in their comments, Ebay has no inventory and sells nothing. They are a PLATFORM. If unique sellers all leave, then buyers will leave. If buyers leave, then there is no one on the platform. Then Ebay collects no fees from their core business ...Paypal, Ebay's cash cow..Paypal's performance declines because they are not getting fees off of Ebay sales. [Yet I admit Paypal has expanded their base to other sources of income such as virtual cashier and other websites].
The outcome may never be 100% but the DIRECTION caused by management changes at Ebay is NOT helping the future outlook for the core business. And it's NOT about auction vs fixed price either.
And THAT won't help the stock price because year over year performance of the EBAY PLATFORM will decline.
Ebay has destroyed the positive word of mouth cheerleading that once was their biggest asset. You can't BUY that.
- pwrsellr
- 18 Comments
Oct 10 12:01 PMIf Ebay had not ticked off its customers, the sellers, and they had instead embarked on a path to ENHANCE THE SMALL SELLER EXPERIENCE instead of treating them like the plague, and trying to attract more buyers directly, Ebay would be thriving now and wouldn't have needed to cut costs [so drastically] and lay off 10% of its workforce. Conversely to my last comment...more small sellers with their unique items, more positive word of mouth...more positive word of mouth, even more small sellers...more small sellers...more buyers...UPWARD SPIRAL, Better year over year results, higher stock price. DUH!
Suppose URBAN OUTFITTERS, a current retail darling, decided to shun their base...the hip young crowd and moreso would start to knock them in their advertising, customer service and assortment...because in management's mind, these hip crowd's PARENTS had more disposable income. So they aimed all their promotions to the PARENTS, patted down every young hipster that came into the store and charged them more.
What do you think would happen to their business?
Lest you think that it's not the same comparison...suppose all the changes in direction were dictated BY THE LANDLORD of the mall where Urban Outfitters was located??????????
NOW DO YOU UNDERSTAND?
- hobo
- 8 Comments
Oct 10 01:40 PM- Patricia013
- 53 Comments
My Website
Oct 10 03:14 PM- pwrsellr
- 18 Comments
Oct 10 04:08 PMStock Performance:
1 month -31.2%
3 month -43%
6 month -49.7%
1 Year -59.9%
What does that tell you????
1) Shareholders...some are sellers and are fed up?
2) Shareholders who are NOT sellers are reading Ebay blogs and threads and are mortified?
3) Many many disenfranchised sellers ARE ALSO BUYERS AS WELL....GONE!
There has to be a reason that forces are burying a stock of a company with such a great balance sheet. And it isn't just the current financial meltdown doing it...it has been happening for a long while now.
I am no professional analyst [and (disclosure) I don't own any Ebay stock nor am I shorting it] but if Wall Street looks 12-18 months out and this battering is what's happening to the stock isn't there a problem here?
123, Mr Buchannon and other analysts...CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?
- Dan Buchannon
- 4 Comments
My Website
Oct 10 07:09 PMYou are absolute correct when you argue it from your small seller point of view, but the market and business have moved away from that. My perspective is from the macro -- to be inclusive of every potential piece of revenue and income stream that this entire business that EBAY stock is represented by. Sorry if that pains you but that is why I write for stock oriented blogs, not seller or buyer community blogs.