Is it all over for eBay? – Auction site traffic drops massively
EBay has been on the slide for a couple of years now. In an effort to change its core business, it has made numerous changes to how it does business in that time. The problem is that those changes have been wholeheartedly rejected by its users, and traffic has dropped massively in the last six months.
When I first ventured on the Web in those dark and distant days when dial-up Internet connections still felt fast, eBay was one of the first sites new users visited. It was cool, popular, fun, and exciting. A site where you can buy and sell your old tat, and either get a bargain or make some money; it seemed to be the very essence of this new-fangled Web thingamajig.
But eBay has changed beyond all recognition since then. There are still bargains to be had and money to be made, but the whole site looks and feels more like any other e-commerce site than the online flea market it once did.
Those small sellers, once the bread and butter of the site, have been moved aside to make room for the big sellers. The fees and feedback system were changed, Paypal became the dominant method of payment, promoted at every turn, and the site generally started to lack the frontier feel it once had. And users weren’t happy with this new direction.
Now, the inevitable has happened. According to The New York Times, referring to an AuctionBytes study, eBay’s traffic has dropped substantially in the past year, and particularly in the past six months. EBay’s visitor numbers are now lower than Amazon, which was always seen as the auction site’s nearest competitor.
Between May 2007 and May 2009, eBay lost around 14 percent of its traffic. Nielsen figures paint an even murkier picture, with total page views in May 2009 a full 32 percent less than in the same month last year.
It’s unlikely to all be over for eBay. After all, the site still boasts of 51 million users, which is a good figure by any company’s standard. But some serious work needs to be done to take the site on to a new level. The fun has gone out of it, and the brand awareness and early buzz along with it. If the company doesn’t act fast to turn the situation around then I doubt the traffic will bounce back anytime soon.
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July 11th, 2009
I actually closed my eBay Store this year, something I never thought possible even a year ago. I had reached a point where I was paying more in listing fees keeping the products up each month than I was making. eBay has no one to blame but themselves as they have run people out the door on fees alone, never mind that idiotic change to feedback where only buyers could leave it.
July 11th, 2009
“After all, the site still boasts of 51 million users, which is a good figure by any company’s standard.”
Ebay counts ID’s (I have 4 ID’s myself) many Ebay users have several IDs. So, if you disregard some of those 51 million users as being extra ID’s and you take out the thousands – perhaps millions of users who no longer bother with Ebay because, frankly, its become a PITA…what have you got left? Is it any wonder that Amazon (still small compared to mega-giant Ebay) can easily by-pass Ebay in page views? Ebay’s core is dying. John Donahoe and his crew are responsible. The board of directors are brainless idiots. I see no success at all in this picture! Ebay has become stagnant with the same losing management team and useless board of directors – there is no place else to go but DOWN.
An 11 year Ebay seller.
July 11th, 2009
Ebay & Paypal have no one but themselves to blame.
Their greed and outrageously high charges are nothing less than a stupid slow suicide.
July 11th, 2009
eBay sells nothing but services, no physical product. The vendor pays for hosting of the listing for their product and mandatory payment processing through PayPal.
eBay offers very little in the way of customer service to sellers below the level of Platinum PowerSellers ($25K per month)
I don’t care how many more sales I get on eBay, if each one pays eBay/PayPal a greater share of the proceeds than I get, it is not worth the effort.
Of 50 million registered users if one assumes that half have multiple IDs even if they only have two there is an immediate 25% shrinkage. 50% might be more realistic.
I visit eBay, I do price comparisons, contributing to page view counts but have not bought or sold there in a year.
July 11th, 2009
The writing was on the wall when eBay & PayPal became one. I’m just surprised it’s taken this long.
July 11th, 2009
Last time I even tried ebay the site was so messed up and loaded down with spyware and tracking garbage the pages wouldn’t even load.
For the most part I quit using it after that big hack job when the credit card numbers got posted on their forums. They lied.
July 28th, 2009
I ALSO CLOSED DOWN MY STORE,AND WILL BE MOVING OVER TO ECRATER.COM
I AM TIRED OF THE HIGH FEES AND PAYING THAT 12%
YEP,EBAY IS SLOWLY KILLING THEMSELVES,AND THEY ONLY HAVE THEM TO BLAME.
IT IS NOW CONCEDERED ONE OF THE WORST ONLINE AUCTION LISTED.
ALOT OF THE FORUMS WILL TELL YOU THAT.
NEVER AGAIN,EBAY WILL I COME BACK TO SELL ON YOUR WEBSITE.
August 7th, 2009
Money is the root of all evil. Ebay executives are greedy SOBs. I too have taken my wares elsewhere.
August 9th, 2009
The mafia doesn’t even take that big of a cut. Sheesh!
August 14th, 2009
I am now looking for alternative sites. Ebay fees you to death. I’m paying more than I’m bringing in sometimes. If you have a problem,they don’t even respond. I’ve been waiting two weeks,4 emails & 2 phone calls.(put on hold after being transfered.waited 10 minutes)
August 17th, 2009
Tried to play with them about two months ago.. First time in at least six, seven years..
Got into my account, just needed to reset the password.. Then hit the message you need to reverify yourself or something like that so I clicked the requisite buttons.. No answer 24 hours later so I tried to go back into my account and contact them again..
GONE. Totally wiped off the site..
Was it something I said..?
Starting to think so.. Two things come to Mind..
Back in ~2000, I sent at least one email scolding them that I saw a serious problem in being able to see my password as part of URL at the time.. That never changed that I noticed at the time then a few years later I heard about them getting hacked somehow, just never heard the details.. I couldn’t help but wonder..
If not, then maybe.. Recently read that one of the $$’d folks with the company.. was playing pretty heavy in politics.. THAT would do it..
Too.
Their loss.. I was thinking of starting a business and found a very nice, seemingly dependable resource at their site.. Have opted elsewhere since (not to mention making sure I let others know, also, where appropriate along the way).. :WINK:
August 18th, 2009
Yes I have see big drops in site traffic as well. It may also be the economy. At the start of the month people have money towards the end it slows down. This is bad sign in many ways for whats to come. Thanks Primeonly27.com
September 8th, 2009
It is all over for eBay traffic continues to drop to record lows, they are just about finished this will teach John Donahoe, eBay (EBAY) CEO are lesson in management,
A. You do not make drastic changes to eBay in the middle of an economic crisis.
B. You not hike advertising fees is middle of an economic crisis.
C. Listen to the sellers they are not as stupid as he thinks. (or as he is)
D. Fix the RSS feeds to Google
E. Any one performing like Johnny would have been fired long ago
Fix the feeds you Stupid Idiots
google-base is not reading ebay feeds because google-base
has added and changed several of their attributes and values
but ebay did not update their fmt=g feed information; rather,
ebay decided to upload items on behalf of their customers.
Check out the crap they are telling the sellers all leis and excuses.
(Counters don’t lie people do) http://www2.ebay.com/aw/announce.shtml
In my humble opinion eBay will have a takeover by mid 2010 and I do hope Johnny finds him self un-employed.
As he needs to feel the pain he is giving to eBay sellers just because he is on a big salary, does no make him intelligent his performance speaks for it self.
All I would like to say to him is.. “Donahoe your fired”..
October 4th, 2009
Yup! Ebay blows, now with the new changes on items i used too get 500+ hits end with only 100 hits. Ebay is over. All the sellers hate them and buyers only come for the flea market clearance crap thier site is congested with.
October 7th, 2009
Love this Blog tells it like it is.
John Donahoe’s Latest announcement he is going to brake up eBay and PayPal
What do you think comes next I say the sale of PayPal and the death of eBay just follow eBay stock prices I say SELL SELL SELL before its to late..
October 14th, 2009
Ebay has sucessfully earned the loss of my business. What a royal pain in the a$$ it has become with the worst, most ignorant, ill-informed, and NON-UNDERSTANDABLE customer service I’ve ever experienced.
Not to mention the greediest and most subversive business tactics this side of a 3rd rate car salesman.
Bye Chumps…see you in hell.
November 24th, 2009
I agree with everybody here, the eBay’s fees is killing all the sellers. I have a small business that selling some products on eBay and the fees is a really big problem. Even thou I’m new to eBay as a 2 years seller now, but I do see the point that the traffic is dropping. Every body know the economic is going down, but eBay still charging high fees on everything. Lets think, eBay charge 8-12% after we sold an item, and then we have to face PayPal fees which end up eating all our profits.
For example, I bought a product of $13 and trying to sell for $18. eBay then charge $0.35 for listing, and then around $2 after its sold. PayPal then charge around $2, so the total lost is around $4.35 which make my profit is only around $0.65 left. Yup, its sucks!!
December 8th, 2009
I only did ebay part-time and made about $600 per month. Now I make $0-40 per month on ebay. Sad but true. I thought things were suppose to get better after October 1st. Well, I guess it did for the big companies that us little guys can’t compete with. Ebay took the fun out of bidding by encouraging buy it now. Now, what happens is that people don’t buy right away because they think they have plenty of time or you have plenty of that particular product. Right now I’m just selling enough to pay postage for my Amazon and Half.com accounts. Forget ebay I’m doing very well creating easy products with my niche creator website. Good bye ebay.
December 16th, 2009
One huge correction the biggest repeated misquote of all time – money is the root of all evil. Not true, correctly quoted its “the lust of money is the root of all evil.” eBay lusts after the money and that is their downfall.
eBay no longer provides value for the money given to them for advertising. I’ve been selling on eBay and online for over a decade, I’ve sold literally millions and millions of dollars of product on and off eBay. At one point I was making $2000 or more a day in real clear profit after fees. Good money for a two person operation. $2000 per day seven days a week and twice on Sunday.
eBay kept lusting after the money and lost sight of who their customers are. eBay’s customers are the sellers not the buyers. The high fees charged to sellers has finally killed the site. The buyers and bidders are not eBay’s customers they are my customers and the other seller’s customers.
Now eBay is a stale ghost town of the same tired stock photos, low quality, low priced products. There’s no profit in it and no fun in it. I closed my eBay store as the profits tanked along with the page views. I used to get 1200 to 1300 page views on a $1000 product in 7 days. When that happened it had a 1 in 3 chance of selling. Now the same product gets maybe 100 to 120 page views and almost never sells on eBay.
My eBay related profits dropped from about $50,000 to $70,000 per month to less than $2,000 That is why eBay is doomed. There is no point in selling on their site.
January 4th, 2010
I agree that it is dying I remember I could pay for things via post now I have been forced into Paypal. it just needs to think what is important to the users. I think listing fees may vanish in the future.