eBay has some major changes queued up that will impact sellers. On Friday, a top executive revealed to shareholders that eBay would be rolling out a new feedback system. And the same day, it sent an email to sellers informing them it was pulling access to Store traffic reports, to be replaced eventually by a different reporting system.
News about the pending changes to feedback came during eBay’s annual shareholder meeting when an investor complained about “factually incorrect” Detailed Seller Ratings two buyers had left him. DSRs, as they’re called, give buyers an opportunity to rate sellers anonymously on a variety of criteria such as item as described and shipping costs.
Head of eBay Marketplaces Devin Wenig, who takes over for John Donahoe as CEO in the third quarter, said eBay raised standards as consumer expectations have risen, but was aware of what he called “buyer abuse of sellers, and irrational feedback.”
Wenig revealed that the median feedback score on eBay was 99.7 – “we probably can build a slightly better system,” he said. As for timing? He mentioned revising a replacement system “as we roll out toward the end of this year and next year.”
News of changes to the Stores traffic reports came in the form of an email on Friday in which eBay stated, “Starting June 30, you’ll no longer be able to access Store traffic reports. Later this year, we’ll introduce new features to replace the current Store traffic reports.”
When we asked a spokesperson from Adobe (which acquired Omniture) if it had decided to stop powering analytics for eBay Stores, and why, she was unable to comment on the issue at least until Monday, if at all.
More details are available in the following blog posts:
eBay to Roll Out New Feedback System (EcommerceBytes Blog)
eBay Pulls Traffic Reports Leaving Sellers in the Lurch (AuctionBytes Blog).
