Bill Cobb's eCommerce Keynote and other news...

It's a big week at eBay.  About 250 top eBay sellers have convened in Burlingame, a suburb outside San Francisco not too far from our headquarters in San Jose.  They're here for the 2007 eBay eCommerce Forum, the second such event hosted by Bill Cobb, President of eBay North America, and other eBay leaders.  This event has become a venue for sharing eBay news and priorities with the selling community.  Yesterday, Bill Cobb delivered his keynote address, which has been made available to the whole community via a recorded webcast.  You can also read about the highlights in his general announcement that followed the event.  There've been several themes in the news shared over the last couple of days, and I doubt any of them will come as a surprise to our experienced members.

Trust & Safety

First, times have changed since the early eBay days -- the internet has evolved a lot, and so, too, have the fraudsters.   (Think the internet equivalent of an arms race, where as sites get smarter about security, the fraudsters do too.)  Bill made it clear that eBay is taking a more proactive approach to Trust & Safety, which sometimes means sacrificing transparency in favor of increased security.  He mentioned projects like Safeguarding Member Ids, as an example, as well as behind-the-scenes efforts to step up protections against counterfeits.   

It's all about the buyers

Another theme throughout the sessions is the fact that eBay and its seller community need to work together to improve the buyer experience.  Sellers know this too -- Buyers have so many more choices online than they used to, and this competition has driven up expectations.  Bill talked about eBay's priorities in this area -- to simplify the site, make finding easier, and build in more of the fun/excitement that have always differentiated eBay and made us special.  He also talked about holding sellers to higher minimum standards and mentioned the elimination of Private Feedback for sellers, new cross-border trade requirements, and a new requirement that all newly registered sellers offer PayPal, which is the safest way to pay on eBay.  (Bill made it clear that this change does not impact anyone who is already registered.)

Feedback gets an overhaul

One more thing to mention here -- Feedback 2.0.  Bill said that the Feedback system will be changing later this year.  Feedback 2.0 adds to the current system, allowing buyers to rate sellers on specific aspects of their transaction.  The average score for each of these aspects will show up as Detailed Seller Ratings on a seller's profile.   Please note:  We know readers will want to know more about Feedback 2.0, so the Chatter team will be interviewing senior policy manager, Brian Burke, about these plans.  Please check this blog regularly!

I hope you'll take time to read Bill's announcement and listen to his webcast.  There's also some good blogging out there by others -- Scot Wingo has done a nice job of highlighting the main topics of discussion in each session.  And Ina Steiner had a personal interview with Bill Cobb and Rob Chesnut, which she just published today.  Check them out!

I'm sure readers have some opinions on eBay's priorities and initiatives... please share them on our board.  We'd love to hear your thoughts.