Is Ebay Pushing "Live" Too Hard?
Summary: bricklanebargains initiated a discussion about eBay's shift toward live auctions, which now dominate the main page, raising concerns about the impact on traditional listings and smaller sellers. simplyessential_uk agreed, expressing frustration with eBay's direction and the AI-generated thumbnails, while jonatjonatjonat noted users' dislike of AI might not affect the platform's strategy. sheba-knows-best and technthread discussed the possibility of the live auction trend being a fad, noting eBay's zero selling fee incentives and challenges with similar platforms. silvertrowe1 expressed reluctance to shift their small business toward live auctions despite eBay's persistent offers, and padanpcparts recalled similar models like QVC, showing disinterest in eBay Live.
About 6 months ago, I received an email invite from an Ebay customer agent to participate in live auctions which I initially ignored due to workload. Shortly after I started seing adverts for live auctions everywhere on Ebay`s main page. Since the inception of Ebay, the main page was always dedicated to product suggestions based on a users buying history but its mostly about live auctions these days in all kinds of different categories from toys to collectibles, clothing to coins, pokemon cards to watches whether you are interested in those or not.
Eventually I sat through a few live auctions in my category which is branded used clothing and would like to share my observations.
In the clothing category, for example, most live auctions are organized by large scale sellers who basically want to move their unsold stock with a few designer items placed in between in an effort to attract attention. I noticed that many of the live buyers are resellers themselves who are looking to source items for their own Ebay stores which is great for them of course. Most items go for a few pounds, some of them for way less than what they would normally fetch if listed in the traditional way. This natually comes at the expense of traditional listings and smaller sellers like many of us (you don`t often see the big boys commenting in Ebay seller forums) since Ebay allocates significant site traffic to live.
Is Ebay pushing it too hard and wasting site traffic in the process? Are they a bit too worried that they`re left behind Whatnot in that segment and now trying to catch up like they did with Vinted by scrapping fees for private sellers which eventually caused a big mess (businesses disguised as private and all other related issues)? I wonder what everyone is thinking.
padanpcparts
·1 month agoI've never been less interested in anything such as LIVE selling in my whole life. We've been here before with QVC haven't we?
jonatjonatjonat
·1 month agoBit of a duff argument. QVC has been running for over 30 years and according to their last set of accounts still has a turnover of £500m
Which would suggest there’s an appetite for live style selling platforms. Just not for everyone. Such is life.
silvertrowe1
·1 month agoI've had untold phone calls and emails trying to get me to join live.
They're basically offering no fee's for 6 months.
Sounds great but this is a side hustle for us and we are very happy with our small business.
We keep telling eBay this but they seem deternined to turn us into Amazon.
We work at jobs full time and would like a little bit of time to ourselves at least.
But eBay do seem to be pushing Live hard.
The resellers I know who are trying Live won't be continuing once their offer ends and they have to start paying fee's.
Most of them went into whatnot in a big way and soon gave that up.
I suspect this live auction business model is for just a select few
sheba-knows-best
·1 month agoI suspect it is a fad.
I was offered zero selling fees for 3 months to give it a try - which no doubt helps explain the take-up. Whatnot ( a year or so ago) offered free selling fees (I can't remember for how long) and no returns. ie buyers were offered returns but Whatnot took the stock back. (Which actually didn't help their case with me... whilst I hate the increasing returns rate, the idea of some of my gems either going in landfill or being bought up wholesale for pennies doesn't appeal to me either.)
I don't blame ebay for pushing LIVE - if at the moment it is what people want - ebay needs to be go-getting. But I suspect it is a fad because I can't see how it works with anything other than buyers to resell (who need very very cheap to make a profit themselves). I mean - even with today's endlessly scrolling hordes - there is surely a limit to how many videos you can sit through waiting for the right size brand, item, size, condition right? And whilst I am focusing on clothes (my own sector) I suspect most categories have the same demanding requirements...
The most successful LIVE I've seen was by Barnardoes for JELLYCAT teddies - they were selling at a higher priced used than they are new (and they weren't the rare ones). Dunno - something to do with the sad discarded teddy faces combined with a charity made people generous? I've always wondered how many poor little rabbits were returned from their new forever homes...
I agree ebay is pushing it hard... but I think buyers will be distracted by a few Live auctions for a few minutes... and then give themselves a shake and go and search for what they really need. Or else whilst playing a live auctions on one device, they will also search manually with another. IE if they want a NIKE hoodie - they will play a NIKE LIVE auction but also search whilst they are half watching... if they do this, then hopefully we all get a possible bite of the cherry...
technthread
·1 month ago · EditedI’m going on WN to sell, one thing that concerned me was I bought something that was INAD and got an instant refund. No return, no human review. I spoke to another seller and basically that’s because WN eat the refund. Can’t really complain at that albeit the unjust refunds are rife and too many of those are an account risk for the seller.
Sellers refuse cancellations there too. I’m not sure how I feel about that, I guess I’ll deal with it when it happens to me. I think it is partly as some buyers have cottoned onto the fact they can buy an item and then get an entry into buyers giveaways and then if they don’t win those they are eager to get their money back.
I’m not sure about eBay Live. I lose interest quickly, sellers seem less connected with the chat and it has been laggy when I have gone on. The same seller on WN might get my attention for a few hours if I’m free but if I see them stream over here I don’t really bother with it. That may be my issues with eBay clouding my view, I have spoken to a few sellers who prefer eBay Live and ditched WN.
The charities on here have such a captive audience it is amazing to follow their auctions. They achieve prices that beggar belief at times.
Just a point on this topic in general, it is easy to hear other sellers say it is a race to the bottom and everyone is losing money on these lives but I have been following a few sellers to get some inspiration and there are strategies to make profit and still give buyers good deals. eBay live for example, surely the sellers who are currently sticking to the traditional buy it now and promoting heavily can do a live with zero fees and take 20/30% off their eBay BIN prices. I have heard some sellers say they have had items taken from their shop and auctioned on a live end up getting higher bids than the BIN was. Unless it’s a case of not wanting to be on camera I think sellers should give it a go. Especially some of you on this forum, you have knowledge in your categories that automatically set you apart, buyers really like it if they are learning something along the way.
simplyessential_uk
·1 month agoIve just logged in to one and watched - First a banner on the top saying "no cancellations and no refunds" - Really?
and lots of comments on the bottom saying "Ebay didnt take my bid" but they were selling perfume and couldn see it in original boxes etc - Not sure if it was my PC but no sound either - just looked like a car boot knock off sale - Is this what Ebay want to push - Shocking.
simplyessential_uk
·1 month ago · EditedI tend to agree- thankfully my products arent really suited to this low price, fast auction selling environment but Ebay seems to struggle knowing what it is - Its not Whatnot or TikTok, Its not Vinted, Amazon or Etsy - but yet it wants to keep trying to emulate them all in small parts so just looks like a poor relative of the original formats - I dont want to see AI created thumbnails promoting "Live at" with ads all across my front screen, Im not interested in people and wanna-be influencers selling off their tat - I know my Ebay is Dead at the moment but it just needs to get back to being "good" and a "go to" for something and Live autions are not it.
bricklanebargains
OP1 month agoThose AI created thumbnails are really annoying :)
jonatjonatjonat
·1 month agoI actually think its the AI thumbnails that appear to irk users on here the most. Do wonder if those who hate AI avoid pubs or shops that exclusively use AI posters for their artwork! because most pubs these days use AI for their posters!
Live will obviously be pushed hard because ebay want their new feature to succeed. If sellers drop off and stop using it - it'll disappear. It won't be because of bad sentiment on the forums thats for sure.
simplyessential_uk
·1 month ago · EditedYes those AI generated posters really erk me - My daughters is an artist so she gets really annoyed and boycotts anyone who uses them