eBay Brand Image & Audience Scores

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admonkey
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eBay Brand Image & Audience Scores

Post by admonkey »

I was reading several Q4 brand analysis reports this morning (yeah, I'm a party animal) and saw a few things that might be of interest to people here:

eBay's Audience scores (the number of people churning through looking at items) was down -3%, year over year, in December '08, to 77.9MM. (By comparison, Amazon.com was up +10% to 71.4MM).

eBay's Brand Advocacy (people who talk up your company to their friends) was down -6 points in index scoring, from 45 to 39. (By comparison, Amazon.com was up +7 points from 38 to 45).

eBay's top Brand Tags (the words people use to describe a company when asked) were "bid, buy, cheap, cr^p, fun, junk, money, scam and shopping." (By comparison, Amazon.com's were "awesome, book, buy, cheap, convenient, everything, shopping and smile.")

Not good news for Brand eBay.

And you can see how the Q4 Brand Scores translate into Q4 revenue and income numbers (eBay's revenue was down -7% and income was down -31% in Q4 vs. Amazon.com being up +18% and +9% during the same time).

Anyway, it's interesting to monkeys living in the ad jungle. :lol:
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Post by slidingaround »

ebay is the devil! Actually il put Paypal in the same catergory also!
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Post by cybernigel »

I'm sure it's just a coincidence that ebay is run by right wingers and amazon is run by lefties.

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Post by sas »

I like your analysis and think ebay should be worried but the recession is the cause in my view. I wonder if in the heyday of ebay (say 2 years ago) if the brand tags were the same as the ones cited in your analysis. I think your correlation with brand tags and end result (income) cant be inferred as a 1:1 when comparing the two companies because they are such different types of companies. ebay is completely a reseller and amazon prob (though I dont know to be true) makes most its money through its own items they sell as opposed to ebays buyer/seller relationship where scams do exist more. ebay is not mass consumerism while amazon is (e.g. my mom couldnt figure out how to buy an item on ebay but she did on amazon) so the customers are different (ebay’s are tech savvy to some degree).

Also, McDonalds often has low scores on taste of their food but are seeing record breaking sales. I bet if you looked up McDonalds brand tags they would be words like: cheap, quick, easy, etc. So brand tags might not be the end all be all but I don’t discount their power.
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Post by password »

eBay is not very well run, IMO.

Speaking of eBay, heard on NPR today that Meg Whitman is running for gov. of CA
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Post by admonkey »

sas wrote:So brand tags might not be the end all be all but I don’t discount their power.


Brand Tags aren't the end all be all; I didn't say they were (though they tend to be the most easily digested brand score for non-marketing types, since words mean things). It's the combination of the various brand linkage scores that point to eroding brand image, and eroding brand image, nine point nine times out of ten, will result in declining sales.

eBay's woe's can't be placed solely at the feet of the economy, either, as Amazon's sales and revenue reports show. Play up the differences all you'd like, but both are solidly classified as online retailers, with an ever-increasing amount of cross-over business plans between them. (Just as Amazon followed eBay and has opened up their service to 3rd party "stores," eBay has plans in the works to create hub and spoke distribution centers where they will sell (online) and distribute merchandise directly, bypassing their army of 3rd party stores and auctions.)

A strong brand image-- or at least one that's based on service, value and selection-- serves to inoculate, at least to a degree, companies from the effects of economic downturns.

eBay's brand image isn't up to the task.
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Post by sas »

admonkey wrote:brand linkage scores that point to eroding brand image, and eroding brand image, nine point nine times out of ten, will result in declining sales.

Yeah I am with you and think McDonalds might be the 1 out of 10 with junk for a product that just does great because of their ease and speed of distro. If ebay were as easy to use as say amazon it would be great but the high learning curve (i.e. what are - dutch auctions, shill, reserves, paypal non seamless integration w ebay, etc) makes ebay such a different model - hard to use and access for the common mom out there. My mom tried to buy something but failed after not understanding it all - thankfully I bought her the item. So If ebay focused on their core competency (auctions) they would be a lot better. ebay trying to do what amazon does is not going to work. They need to make the quality better. More stringent agreements with the sellers and the scams would lessen and brand val would go up. Thanks for posting this!! I am taking a grad school class now and we were talking about brand value the other day and I think this is such cool stuff. Post more of your thoughts re this as you see more trends and correlations! thanks!
Last edited by sas on Tue Feb 10, 2009 2:22 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by admonkey »

sas wrote:Thanks for posting this!! I am taking a grad scool class now and we were talking about brand value the other day and I think this is such cool stuff. Post more of your thoughts re this as you see more trends and correlations! thanks!


I normally post advertising and marketing-related stuff here: viewtopic.php?f=11&t=6613
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Post by conartstudio »

admonkey wrote: but both are solidly classified as online retailers


call them what you will but ebay is not an online retailer, they don't sell anything other then provide a service. ebay offers a service to individuals and retailers to auction or sell their merchandise.

comparing revenue of ebay and amazon is like comparing the revenue of a taxi company and a car dealership.
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Post by admonkey »

fribhey wrote:
admonkey wrote: but both are solidly classified as online retailers


call them what you will but ebay is not an online retailer, they don't sell anything other then provide a service. ebay offers a service to individuals and retailers to auction or sell their merchandise.

comparing revenue of ebay and amazon is like comparing the revenue of a taxi company and a car dealership.


The business community disagrees.

The "service" eBay provides is charged out as the "margin" Amazon makes on their sales as a discount retailer. The only difference is, you're doing the work for eBay in acquiring, warehousing, marketing and shipping merchandise whereas Amazon has people staffed in warehouse and shipping operations and takes an even deeper hit when they offer free shipping (as opposed to you eating the cost on eBay). (As a slight tangent, Amazon books their free shipping as a marketing expense, not an operational expense, and that consumes, by far, the largest portion of their marketing dollars.)

The biggest difference is in control over operations and its effect on consumer perception and brand identity, not in the nature of the two companies. Amazon has much more control; eBay has to rely on hundreds of thousands of individual sellers to be honest, fast and professional (good luck with that one), and each transaction moves the brand perception dial one way or the other, even if it's in miniscule degrees. (A little like how a bad Amazon employee in a shipping warehouse can damage the brand perception of Amazon, only with fewer people in place for Amazon, the control is easier to manage.)
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Re: eBay Brand Image & Audience Scores

Post by JVB »

This has been a long time coming. eBay and Paypal both have the absolute worst customer service I, or anyone I know, have ever experienced. Eventually, it was going to catch up to them.
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Post by scud80 »

i don't really understand why ebay has gone in the direction it has. it used to be awesome (i might even go so far as to say fun), and has just gotten more draconian with the policies and expensive with the fees year-over-year. they're trying to force the experience into a retail shape, but it doesn't fit there very well and the parts that do (giant powersellers) often generate ill will. that's corporate culture in general though ... profits first, consequences a distant second.
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