It’s Time For Many eBay Sellers To GROW UP!
“They just can’t get as worked up about poverty in other countries, for example, when they are not sure they will be able to pay their own bills since Ebay trashed their businesses.”
This is a direct quote from a recent post on the eBayInk blog.
As most of my readers and listeners know, I love eBay. Much of the time I don’t like eBay very much, but I still love the site. eBay has allowed me to support my family for the past 11 years. Selling on the site, conducting educational programs for internet marketing, working at eBay University for nearly 2 years, and now our ebay & Beyond: Basics To Business radio program.
Most of my listeners and readers also know that I am not afraid to speak out when eBay changes directions that I feel are a detrimental to the marketplace. I encourage dialog and expression of concern by community members so that management will know where we stand on issues that may effect our businesses.
What I fail to understand are comments such as the one quoted above. People,,,, GROW UP!
You are the owner of your business. You and you alone (or your partners and stockholders) MUST make decisions based on your business model and not on what eBay or any other site is doing! Change is constant and inevitable! Just look at GM. Yesterday GM announced the closing of 4 assembly plants making SUV’s and pick up trucks because of the changing market due to oil prices!
Grow up people! If the changes that eBay has and will be making do not fit your business, you and you alone must decide what you will do with your business to make it profitable and grow. Business owners must not allow another business to dictate their future! Whether it is eBay or Amazon, or Overstock.com ,or ETSY.com, or any other marketing channel, it is your responsibility to ensure these venues fit into your business model or you must move on!
I will defend your right to express your opinion or concerns to my grave, but after expressing your opinion or concerns, do what is right for your business! Continued complaining will almost certainly not help your business accomplish it’s goals. Continued complaining takes time, and energy away from what should be your main objective, making your business grow!
eBay is making changes that it feels are necessary for their business to remain viable. Good, bad or indifferent eBay is changing, changing in ways we would never have imagined 10 years ago.
Either live with the changes and make them fit your business or move on. Plain and simple!
The Future Of The Small Ecommerce Seller
Volumes have been written regarding the future of e-commerce as it relates to the “little guy”. The explosion of the internet has made millionaires and even billionaires out of dot com entreprenuers. Men and women that had a dream, and the drive to develop and execute ideas. Establishing their businesses in garages, basements, living rooms and kitchens around the world, the one thing these people have in common is that most of them started out as a one or two person operation.
One of the most frequent questions I field in my ecommerce courses is ” Can the small seller still get in and make money on the internet or is it too late?” The answer in my mind is a resounding YES, however this answer comes with caveats.
The route that many of us “old timers” took back in the late 90’s and early in the new century has become much more crowded and even gridlocked as we have moved into the new century and beyond. Back in the day as the popular saying goes, there was very little competition. The number of available venues could literally be counted on one hand. Sites such as eBay (and a FEW others) allowed the Mom & Pop sellers to market to the world and build a worldwide business. As we moved into the new century, established businesses began to take notice of the internet and the trememdous opportunities it offered to commerce.
The small sellers began facing tremendous competition as traditional Brick and Mortar (B/M) businesses started to realize the internet was not a fad, but a viable and yes necessary marketplace.
Today the Mom & Pop, as well as small and medium sellers face tremendous competition from the corporate world. To be successful, the “little Guys” must be competitive in all aspects of ecommerce marketing. From price to shipping to service and selection, the small seller needs to do it better than the corporate competition.
eBay is changing direction from the small seller to corporate accounts. Yes eBay can still be used as an integral part of marketing, but certainly should not be the only venue or channel used. Amazon.com offers a great marketing channel for larger businesses with quantity of merchandise but does not really fit those with low quantity numbers or the onsey twosey seller. Overstock.com is offering a similar service but again is more focused towards quantity sellers.
Many new marketing channels are now working hard to attract disenchanted small ebay sellers who have been disadvantaged by the eBay search changes or don’t fit into the Amazon.com type model. In order to begin a new business on the internet, sellers will have to do their research. They need to know their product, the demand for the product, and the best venues from which to market from. Knowledge is power, and having the knowledge to make an intelligent decision on how best to market your items will provide the small seller the best opportunity to succeed.
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