The commerce revolution is upon us and eBay is helping retailers and consumers make the transition to digital, eBay Marketplaces Head of Strategy Paul Todd said Monday at the first annual Atlantic Live Silicon Valley Summit in Mountain View, Calif.
Todd told the assembled crowd of journalists, businessmen and technologists that consumers are getting accustomed to the “ratcheting of experience” and are therefore expecting newer and better experiences all the time. To meet these expectations, eBay is rolling out programs like eBay Now, which guarantees local delivery in roughly a half-dozen cities, in usually an hour. But eBay Now isn’t just a boon for consumers, it’s also a benefit to smaller retailers who don’t have the infrastructure to offer quick local delivery.
“We want to be the platform that gives those retailers those capabilities that they either can’t develop themselves, or would find incredibly hard to do themselves,” said Todd. He noted that eBay’s platforms can also provide brick-and-mortar stores previously unavailable data – Are they high-end shoppers? First timers in the store? – about their customers.
To wrap up, Todd asserted that eBay is actually one of the first sharing economy companies, to jump on a popular Silicon Valley concept.
“The concept of temporary ownership was embedded into the DNA of eBay,” he said.