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CDs? You’re joking.
By Scott Ryan | March 30, 2008
I’ve listened to John Thornhill’s interview. John has said the eBay changes will cause, “A massive gap in the market” and that “gap will be filled by physical products”. He may see an opportunity for himself in the short term. But my immediate reaction to his comment is, “What ‘gap’”?
Take it from the standpoint of a customer. NOTHING HAS CHANGED. As a customer, you will still be able to search eBay for ebooks and get results for DIGITAL DOWNLOADS.
The results are simply in the eBay classified ad format instead of an auction format.
So there’s no feedback mechanism in play. But as a customer legitimately looking for information NOW, I DON’T CARE. I am looking to buy information for the information’s sake, not to play games with boosting feedback.
If anything, as an eBay customer, I WELCOME this as a step in the right direction, as an attempt to improve the legitimacy of the feedback mechanism. What did I say in an earlier post? I was out to do what I could to establish my first auction and establish my legitimacy starting with zero feedback, avoiding the bogus approach of boosting my feedback through buying crap just for the sake of what can only be called counterfeit feedback.
“Ooooh! Great buyer! ‘Prompt’ payment! Would sell to again!”. What bullshit. It’s that kind of crap that turned me off to eBay for years. Ever since I attempted to buy an old book on Turbo C and the seller was behaving like they weren’t there. I “won” the auction, but there was NO response from the seller. I attempted to contact the seller. Again no response. So finally I received a message from eBay saying that since x number of days had passed, the transaction had been canceled. So I did a “copy/paste” of the exact phrasing of what eBay had said and put it in a feedback comment for the “seller” and gave them a neutral, NOT a negative, but giving them “the benefit of the doubt”.
And then I was shocked to see the seller, leave a NEGATIVE feedback for me, saying all in caps like they were shouting, “DON’T BUY FROM THIS PERSON! THEY ARE A FRAUD AND A THIEF!”. Interesting comment about the “BUY” since all I was trying to do was make a purchase. I wasn’t selling anything.
But that experience turned me off to eBay for years. Why should I do business with a business (eBay) that permits such bullshit to take place? The seller, after every couple hundred sales, seemed to “go off the deep end” and leave someone who had a legitimate gripe an insane comment like some kind of “revenge” negative feedback, sounding like they forgot to take their meds.
From that experience I learned firsthand the feedback mechanism to be nothing more than a game, quite detached from reality. And therefore, my future purchases were to occur at AMAZON. And THAT’S what eBay has been attempting to address these past few months with their changes regarding feedback. They want customers like me BACK. Good luck with that eBay. You’ve got a long way to go to step out from the shadow of Amazon.
Pulling the rug from under the sellers of crap to remove them from the feedback mechanism was long overdue. John Thornhill now talks about packaging his items into a “home study course”, taking advantage of a “MASSIVE opportunity”. Sidenote: I refuse to use the word “massive”. I got burned out on that word from years of reading Ewen Chia’s copy.
Fine, go ahead John. Present your “fantastic” offer (that one’s for Lee McIntyre). One of your competitors will buy your CD, study it, then put a clasified ad up on eBay saying,
“Why pay shipping charges? Why wait? You can have my wiz-bang ‘home study course’ RIGHT NOW and you SAVE MONEY. No HASSLE!”
What’s the prospect going to do, John? I know what I would do.
And the idea of appealing to those STILL with “dial up” access, offering them a CD as an alternative. Well, go for it, John. I think it’s admirable you want to meet the needs of… what is that now,.00001 percent of the BUYING market? Now THAT’S a niche for you.
I don’t make these comments as some kind of “expert seller”. But, like many others numbering in the millions, I do make these comments as a potential buyer who knows what they want. THAT I’m an expert at! And what I want is valuable information NOW at a price I can afford. If you can give me that you’ve got a sale. And if you’re asking me to buy a CD, thinking that CD media somehow makes it more “valuable” from my POV, then think again.
Have you noticed how Netflix has “Watch Now” buttons appearing next to movies in your queue? It is a TREND. It is a response to the marketplace where people do NOT want to wait a day or two for the DVD to arrive. Why should they? You want to make them wait?
Go for it! You will LOOSE MARKET SHARE!
Perceptions change. Information is information. Sell me speed. Sell me value. You are not going to sell me on the “sneaker net”. You may as well package it on “eight-track”.
One last thing for this post. I am married to someone who has been a successful Powerseller of used books. She goes “way back” to the days of half.com not being part of eBay. My wife also attended with our son the first eBay convention held in Anaheim. While for myself, I have not been on the “frontline”. I have had the luxury of acquiring intimate knowledge about eBay transactions, feedback and customer relations vicariously through my wife for many years. She is a PRO. You can look her up: OCEANBOUNDBOOKS. While her selling has been rather quiet this first quarter of 2008, one site where she still routinely sells a book or two every few days is… you guessed it, Amazon!
Topics: eBay Journey | 2 Comments »
March 30th, 2008 at 2:03 pm
Nice writing style. Looking forward to reading more from you.
Chris Moran
March 31st, 2008 at 11:47 am
Interesting post, although I don’t entirely agree with everything you say.
I agree with Chris, though, I also enjoy your style of writing
Paula Brett
http://www.PaulaBrettBlog.com