TulipTools Internet Business Owners and Online Sellers Community

I again have to agree with the Angel on this.
That is the sad reality at the bay anymore.
All the sellers competing for less dollars from fewer buyers.

I also hate it when some who where oh lets say “selling pantyhose last month”
and not doing too well… and see that guys like me are doing well
in my little niche start trying to sell similar items in an effort to get my buyers. :blinkie:

I HATE "copycat" sellers.

But the GOOD news is that more and more are going to websites to buy
and I do so love having a website and watching the biz continue to grow don't you?

Quote:Also if competitors use this to price their items then it just feeds into the whole flea market mentally

...and can cause selling prices on some items to plummet when sellers try to outlowprice [new word ] their competitors. I've seen sellers on Amazon who were using automatic pricing tools engage in pricing wars with each other and quickly drive prices down to a penny on some books and CDs because they just had to offer the lowest price.   

Since average selling prices for many products are already lower on eBay than elsewhere (including Amazon), any further downward move in prices is going to put many ebay sellers out of business (if they continue to rely on eBay for 100% of their sales).

Quote: Head out to Yahoo!, Overstock.com, and Amazon, and you will find consumer-to-consumer auction platforms. However, they have never been as lively as eBay and probably never will.

Yahoo and Amazon's auctions aren't as lively because both company's realized several years ago that the future of ecommerce was fixed price not auctions and so they created Yahoo Shopping/Stores and Amazon Marketplace.  Its taken eBay several years to realize that most buyers prefer fixed price.

Quote:***New: eBay Marketplace Research. Information Service for Buyers and Sellers*** 

02 December, 2005 | 06:48PM GMT


We know that sellers need information to run their sales efficiently - for instance, the price an item is likely to go for on eBay, or what types of items buyers are searching for. Likewise, buyers want to know the price they can expect to pay for an item they're considering purchasing. We're happy to announce that you can now get this kind of information based on activity on eBay's sites with our newest service, eBay Marketplace Research.

eBay Marketplace Research will help you understand overall listing, selling, and searching trends across the eBay site, and give you the information you need to become a more informed buyer or seller.

Some of the features of eBay Marketplace Research include:

• the ability to analyse key information like the average sale prices, average start prices, and average Buy It Now prices of items

• the ability to explore the top keyword searches on eBay by category and by related keywords

• charts to help you see buying and selling trends in the eBay marketplace

• access to completed items data going back up to 90 days

You can find out more about eBay marketplace Research and subscription fees here.

The best marketplace "Research" for feebay items already exists for FREE.

Look in your categories and see what others are saying in forums all over the net.

Hey ebay here's some marketplace "Research" for you.

More scammers are moving in.

Buyers have left in droves over that last couple of years.

The search manipulation tools you allow "some" to use has eroded your search engine.

Your site loads for most slower than the time it takes to go to the mall and back.

You have created an aura of miss trust between buyers and sellers.

Your glitchhancment teams have and continue to screw the site up even worst.
(if that is possible).

Overall analysis:
Your site just plain SUX and getting worst every day.

I know I've missed at least a thousand other marketplace "Research" analysis points.

Maybe other have some input.

Update on this recent eBay product launch 

eBay added a Marketplace Research board:

http://forums.ebay.com/db1/forum.jspa?fo...1000000020

The 5 most recent topics when I looked at the board:

Quote:MARKETPLACE RESEARCH STILL NOT WORKING 

eBay Market Research take too long to search 

problems in subscribing

MARKETPLACE RESEARCH BASIC SHOULD BE FREE 

Database Corrupt: Top Keywords Searches

Another typical glitch infested eBay product launch  : 

I did some eBay Marketplace Research.
I'm writing a book about it.

I need a title.
Any suggestions?

[quote author=xppman link=topic=1223.msg11068#msg11068 date=1142670904]
I did some eBay Marketplace Research.
I'm writing a book about it.

I need a title.
Any suggestions?
[/quote]

"LSOSB" or "Lieing Sack of Sh.IT Bastards" would be perfect titles for an eBay related book. 

LSOSB sounds about right.
I'll give you credit for the title and plug your off ebay websites too.

A related article:

Quote: One of the most-searched venues on eBay hasn’t been a particular product or product category, and eBay users don’t go there because they are looking for an item to buy or sell. They’re looking for information—for what items already have been searched or sold on eBay, when, and at what price.

It’s the Completed Listings area of eBay.com and it’s been attracting a growing volume of traffic. In September 2005, eBay users conducted an astonishing 40 million searches in completed listings, first searching on a product, then clicking the Completed Listings box in the left navigation bar for a sort on sales that have been completed, then manually sifting through lists of transactions for intelligence on how the eBay marketplace is behaving and clues to guide selling or buying strategies. Responding to 40 million searches a month, eBay in October launched an offering that organizes historical transactional data into a service called Marketplace Research...

full article: http://www.internetretailer.com/article.asp?id=18776

related topic:
Terapeak Seller Specific Research: get detailed reports on any eBay seller
http://community.tuliptools.com/index.ph...986.0.html

[quote author=Angel link=topic=1223.msg4679#msg4679 date=1131810608]
I hate the fact that ebay makes it so easy for people to see how much i'm selling and making (especially competitors).  That info is nobodys business but mine yet ebay puts it right out there for the world to see.  Im sorry but im from the old school of "stay out of my face and stay the hell out of my business"   
[/quote]

Angel, this is probably the biggest reason, out of a list of at least ten, that I won't do business with ebay ever again. Who in their right mind would open their books to anyone in a real business? Nobody! Not unless you're selling your business and already have a deposit with a sale contingent on viewing your books.

Every time I found a unique product that worked for me on ebay, I had competitors within a couple of months, or sooner, due to their open book policy. I have always been amazed that almost nobody raises a stink about this. I used to bring it up a lot until I realized that nobody else cared.

Even if ebay fixed everything else on their site (yeah, right), I would never come back because of that one reason.

~Bob

PS.
[quote author=xppman link=topic=1223.msg11068#msg11068 date=1142670904]
I did some eBay Marketplace Research.
I'm writing a book about it.

I need a title.
Any suggestions?
[/quote]

"Lose Your Competitive Edge with Ebay's Communistic Policies.. A Doctrine for the New Age" by Pierre and Meg