Auction Blog

Today eBay's search engine has been down all day (see screen shot below).

The good news is that the paid-search advertising seems to be running just fine.  Maybe this is just a test to see how the site monetizes with 100% ads vs. all those annoying listings+gmv and what-not? 

What's also interesting is since the home page is very search driven it's causing all kinds of wacky behavior there too.

I'm getting increasingly concerned that all of the changes plus the influx of fp30 listings plus bugs upon bugs that are taking weeks to fix have so destabilized the search code that eBay can't get it stable for Q4.  Wait, we're in Q4…, ok, Thanksgiving++.

(Scot rips hair out and bends finger nails back knowing tomorrow's GMV report is going to be really really bad).

My advice to sellers - go buy some Yahoo! keywords in the US if you want some eBay exposure. While search is down they are getting all the traffic you paid listing fees for.

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eBay’s search has been down all day - this can’t be good for Q4

When eBay pre-announced that they would come in at the low end of their Q3 revenue guidance and on the high end of EPS, most Wall St. folks started to think more about Q4/09.

Personally, I was impressed with this performance given some of the GMV slowness we saw on eBay and was wondering where the revenue+profits would come from to hit those numbers.  Today eBay announced Q3 results here and the answer is what I had guessed (hint - it isn't GMV).

In the marketplace business, revenue was up 4% y/y.  GMV was down 1% y/y and here's the catch - advertising was up a whopping 127% y/y.

I don't know what the FX-adjusted GMV was, but won't be surprised if it's ex-fx down 4-6% y/y globally and I'd bet 10% in the USA.

The bulk of this comes from the increased monetization of eBay pageviews with banner ads, skyscrapers, home page placements, and the increase of paid links on the site.

I want to do a lengthy post on this after the Q3 dust settles as I (and many sellers) scratch our heads on why eBay is taking such a short-term view of these ads and really sacrificing GMV (and placement that sellers have paid for) vs. removing the buyer-distracting ads and

The way we're going, I'm very concerned eBay will become an advertising site with some GMV on the side and that's definitely NOT the way to fix this marketplace.

Q4 looks very light
The street has Q4 at $2.3bn/.43 and eBay's press release has guidance of $2.02-2.17 and .39-.41.  The stock is getting hammered down to $15 and lower in AH trading, but we'll have to wait and see what analysts think and also if eBay gives any view into 2009.

More to come
I'll have some more thoughts after the conference call. Here's a tip - you can see the presentation already here.

SeekingAlpha Disclosure: I am long google and eBay

Credit:
eBay’s Q3 results first impressions…

There was an under-the-radar post to a oogle blog that caught my attention because it mentioned Youtube and ecommerce in the same post. I read it a couple of times and then this really got me thinking:

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I’ve seen the future of Youtube and it is…. a marketplace?!

Back in 2006, eBay implemented the infamous Yellow Button debacle that I hate with such passion, I can't discuss anymore and refer you here for details.  Now I'm hearing from sellers that eBay recently updated the way invoicing works and there is much concern this will become YB2.0.

“Hey, i'm really excited to get this item, but I'd like insurance, do you offer that?”
“I emailed 2 days ago about the item, I want to get it here quickly, but would like insurance.”
“HELLO, DO YOU OFFER INSURANCE”
“Please cancel my order your customer service stinks.”
“CANCEL ORDER”
“*C*A*N*C*E*L******”
(seller then files UPI, believing the buyer isn't paying, buyer promptly leaves seller neg, all 1's on DSR and orders the item somewhere else online because of frustration shopping on eBay.)

Read the original here:
Are eBay invoice changes Yellow Button 2.0?!

Earlier this week I reported on the confusion around media shipping caps.  I heard definitively from eBay that these go live on 10/9 (tomorrow) with some potential delay for things to roll to all the myriad eBay servers.  I'm hearing that TSAMs are still telling sellers a variety of different dates, but this is the official word from San Jose. (TSAMs are in SLC).  My guess is we'll know it's live when SYI effectively enforces them and the API does as well.  We'll check periodically on this through tomorrow and report when it has gone into effect. Note that it will be on the listing side, not live listings as I understand it, so one strategy might be to do a flurry of listings in fp30/stores with the old S+H to give yourself effectively a 30 day extension on this if needed.  Check the original post if you want details on the caps, etc.

The rest is here:
Flurry of eBay policy updates - shipping caps, return policies and more - oh my!