eBay.co.uk, the UK’s number one ecommerce site, is making it easier for its sellers to meet the growing demand for fixed-price goods on the site, and for its 15 million monthly visitors to find them more easily, with innovations to its fixed-price offering announced today.
Alongside its famous auction-style sales, eBay hosts a growing fixed-price or Buy It Now marketplace which globally accounts for 43% of the value of total sales.
The changes, which come into effect on 24th September 2008, will give buyers and sellers even greater choice in how they buy and sell. They include:
Investing in fairer listing and success-basedselling fees: Reducing up-front ‘listing fees’ for fixed-price sellers to offer all their stock to buyers on the site, and moving more fees to the back-end, so they’re paid only when an item has sold. As a result, the majority of eBay sellers will see their overall fees go down. This follows similar up-front fee reductions for auction and fixed-price listings made in March 2008.
Free Gallery photo: removal of the fee to feature a picture of an ‘item for sale’ in search results. Currently 70% of listings on eBay.co.uk use the Gallery feature.
Better Buy It Now: Creating more prominence for fixed-price listings in search results alongside auctions, so that buyers have a more vibrant and relevant choice of what to buy and how they want to buy it.
“eBay connects buyers and sellers,” said Clare Gilmartin, Director of Marketplaces for eBay in the UK.
“Alongside the magic of auction-style sales, buyers increasingly want the convenience of shopping for great value, often new, items at a fixed-price, and that is fuelling a big growth in the number of large and small sellers using eBay in this way.
“Today’s improvements will remove barriers for sellers, so they can make the most of this opportunity and offer even more goods for sale on eBay.co.uk,” said Gilmartin. “That means even greater choice for buyers, and in turn, greater success for sellers.”
eBay estimates that there are 178,000 people in the UK earning a primary or secondary living or running a business on the site.
“We now have a more tailored offering to fit every size of seller and business model, from a mum cashing in on some old baby clothes, to an ‘at-home entrepreneur’ building an SME business, to a retailer with a large and varied stock,” said Gilmartin.
“Auction-style listings are ideal for sellers who are unsure about the value of their item, have something that is unique or in high demand, or are willing to start at a low price and let the market decide the final value. And they’re great fun for buyers as well, often resulting in fantastic bargains.”
“Buy It Now is ideal for sellers that have items with a clear and competitive market value, are commodities or where they may have multiple quantities of the same item to sell.”
Fee changes and increased protections
The improvements to fixed-price selling are accompanied by several other changes to eBay.co.uk:
Rebalancing to success-based fees: Front-end fee reductions are balanced by increased back-end fees (Final Value Fees) across auctions and fixed-price sales, meaning fees are more heavily weighted to when an item sells.
o Final Value Fees will remain lower for auction-style listings than for fixed-price sales to reflect the differently weighted insertion fees
o All sellers can now get Final Value Fee discounts between 20-40% based on their sales volumes and quality of customer service
o eBay.co.uk will see a reduction in its overall fee revenues as it invests in greater opportunities for sellers
Increased cover and protections with PayPal: Every item on the site can now be bought with PayPal, and from the end of September buyers will have unlimited protection. Sellers will enjoy similar coverage should things go wrong with their buyer.
“We are re-investing heavily in the eBay.co.uk marketplace to ensure that buyers feel more confident than ever shopping and spending with our sellers,” said Gilmartin.
For full details on the changes to fixed-price selling, fees and protections on eBay.co.uk, please go to: www.ebay.co.uk/buyitnow08