Interesting Post - something to chew on...

[*artsbanquet*]

Thought-provoking post from the Pheebay forums. Thought I'd post it here and see what you all thought.


OK, not a great deal of response to the original question but I will offer a view.

This wont be popular and may go over the heads of some, but let me try.

The question was aimed at the owners of, and sellers on, St Elsewhere auction sites. Both have a vested interest in wanting more people to sign up and use these sites. So where will you attract new customers from?

The answer is quite simple but the marketing is all wrong at the moment in my opinion.

For the vast majority of sites the customers you want are on eBay. For every customer currently on your St Elsewhere there are at least thousands, if not millions on eBay.

But at the moment it seems the St Elsewheres are trying to attract people from anywhere BUT eBay. I think this is madness.

Visit pheebay (or any similar boards) and you see all the usual suspects doing all the usual eBay bashing. Fair enough you may say.

But now put yourself in the head of a reasonably happy eBay user. IS he or she interested in hearing constant rehashes of negative comments about a site he/she is using? Probably not. Will they register here to continue hearing the same old tired criticisms (most of which apply more to St Elsewheres)?

Ladys and Gentlemen. eBay needs to be your friend because they have virtually all of your potential future customers.

Now, if you follow my reasoning so far, put yourself inside the head of a happy eBayer. What does that eBayer want to hear? Does he want to hear the message from you that is virtually saying; "You are a moron for using eBay"? No. That is the last thing you say to a potential customer.

Now if that eBayer were to hear a message that that sounds something like; "I applaud your success at eBay and hope you will see the benefits of using XXXXXXX.com also, in addition to eBay, as this should help control your costs and increase your margins". Far more appealing to the potential customer.

I could go in to this in a lot more detail as marketing is my background. However, I really do think we collectively should rethink how we project ourselves to eBayers. If we can't attract them to pheebay, if we can't respect their views because they're different to ours then, fair enough, carry on as it is but don't expect to get too many new customers signing up to your favoured St Elsewhere.

[slinkyri]

extremely interesting

[Rednosty]

Scary! As they have a brain! This is a very good point.

[Barrattess]

Wow...that makes total sense to me....now thats scary :-)

[madelaine]

So "I sell the same stuff on ebid but it's cheaper than on ebay" is a good line?

[merlin]

Couldn't agree more.

In fact it was the regular bashings I got from the KT Ebid Diehards that eventually persuaded me to pack up and leave.

I downgraded to silver and left my stuff to rot here a month ago.

Every time I complained about slow sales you guys told me "my lack of sales was my own fault".

AND YOU LAID INTO EBAY AT EVERY TURN !

You reported my posts and I got 2 KT bans. Some of your would be falling over yourselves to QUOTE me so you could keep the evidence to report to G&M.

The more critical I became - and admitteldy I went OTT a few times in sheer frustraton - the more you laid into me or Ebays Fees - the more I thought "oh well I will stick where I am". 400+ feedback in 5 years over there. It aint me ! I sell fine over there, so why stick about here listening to you bash it.

I could easily name a dozen others I have seen come and go since I joined.

I dont care about the fees. Like the VAST MAJORITY I am a small casual seller. I'm not running a business. I am only selling stuff that would otherwise go to the local charity shop - I don't have time to "promot my store" or run huge personal campaigns promoting Ebid globally for G&M unfortunately.

So next time someone new here starts a thread along the lines of "things are slow". For pitys sake LEAVE THEM ALONE !

i can`t remember bashing you ( will put it on my to do list )
seriously some times i can be in a state where i need to earn quick money and i want to just sell on here all the time ( hence i get very frustrated ) we were promised some advertising 4 years ago by g&m
it has never happened , this does make me angry has the amount of promoting we do far outweighs what the actual site owners are doing
this is not right we are putting our money and time into this site but getting practically nothing back

but i will say we must be doing something right as sales are picking up ok not by a lot but every sale is a good sale now all we need is a few bidding wars

[merlin]

Merlin_Man I would consider it a personal honour to be bashed by your good self.

I agree - The sites owners need to do a lot more. They spend a lot of time removing negative postings. If they were a bit more proactive there would be probably be no negative postings to remove.

We were promised PR a couple of months ago but G&M continue to hide behind lack of revenue as a "no publicity" marker.

Yet they can spend £10's of thousands on hardware and a site revamp which imho has changed very little.

I too really wish the guys would wake up to the fact that they are running a BUSINESS not just maintaining a Website.

Meanwhile the Ebid diehards shout "things are getting better" when really we are just riding the wave of the rest of the ONLINE BUYING MARKET which is up hugely Year on Year.

I very much doubt our share has increased any more than market growth has permitted.

hey i`m a die hard ( what a way to go ) it is as you state a business ebid is a ltd company any company needs to advertise jeez even shops on the high street advertise my wifes small company advertise ok it is all done via email or fax but once every 3 months they send out what offers they can do cheaply

[Cocksparrer]

Merlin_Man I would consider it a personal honour to be bashed by your good self.

LOL so you should be honoured, now assuming St elsewhere is here ???

Then we are in trouble if the Greedbayers have found a brain cell be it one or half of one. Whats the point of listing an item on Greedbay & another site both at different prices. Oh the mind boggles.

[damian_steele]

Incidentally Gazza has been reading this thread for 6 hours now.....

No, Gazza had this page open on his computer screen for some hours. It doesn't mean that he was either reading it or even sitting in front of his computer.

[Rednosty]

Let common sense Rule!

List on here as the fees are so low but When you need a Cash Injection list over there! Easy.. Its what I do and I also keep my eyes open for the cheap isting days! BUT you can't list the same item on both sides and say I have the right to withdraw at any time! (If I see that I don't bid) NOW can I HAVE A BASH please........