eBay needs a new interface and a clue
Bob Morris @ Feb 19th 2008 12:01 - Category: Unfiled Tags: eBay
Hadn’t sold on eBay in a while and just listed a sale with has seven photos(shameless plug:Japanese porcelain lithopane Dragon tea set.) This took several tries because the archaic, kludgy eBay method for posting an ad kept mangling the content.
I added the photos, then calculated shipping charges, only to come back to discover the photos were gone. Grrr. Re-added them, changed something else, and then discovered it now listed both sets of photos. Tried to delete the dupe photos and couldn’t. They kept coming back, even when they were confirmed and shown as being deleted. Except for the final two photos, that is - the delete button wouldn’t work at all with them.
Oh, during all this, it would delete the ad copy at random intervals too. Thanks so much for that.
Contrast that brain-dead interface with Amazon. The Amazon interface is easy to use, powerful, and unquestionably delivers them vastly increased sales. Plus they are always improving it. eBay, OTOH, has barely changed anything in ten years.
Perhaps eBay thinks they own the auction market so they don’t have to update their interface to something modern and not error-prone. They would be wrong. The tech world is filled with dead companies who thought they were secure and didn’t or couldn’t change.
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Cheryl on 19 Feb 2008 at 2:26 pm #
You may not get much action on Ebay this week anyway. Because Ebay does think they own the auction market - they have changed some of the fees and rules so that there is a strike this week - no buying, selling or listing. It will be interesting to see how many were actually involved and what the effect was.
Bob Morris on 19 Feb 2008 at 4:17 pm #
Aargh. Didn’t know the boycott was this week.
I used to have a business selling rare rock and roll records mailorder (this was before the Net) so I know something about collectors and dealers. My guess, maybe a 5% drop in eBay traffic (if that), if a collector or dealer sees something they really want, they will bid on it.
We shall see. If not, I’ll wait a few weeks and re-list it.
DJ on 20 Feb 2008 at 10:28 am #
I wish I’d known about the boycott, too. I just bought some items on which I’ve been working for two weeks with a seller– I hope he ships!