Category Archives: Catalyst

Review – eCommerce Summit ECMTA PeSA 2008 vs Catalyst Pinehurst 2008

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The eCommerce Summit in New Orleans wrapped up the event today with a Habitat for Humanity volunteer workshop.

Habitat

More than 100 of the over 500 eCommerce Summit 2008 attendees and journalists who attended this year's 3 day long conference in New Orleans, dedicated time and elbow grease to help this worthy charity build homes for people in need in New Orleans. Final numbers have not been tabulated yet, but at last count the event raised over $80,000 for Habitat for Humanity.

eBay Donation Habitat

On the first night, Frontier Marketing (one of the main sponsors of this Summit) presented a check for over $30,000 to benefit Habitat for Humanity. Frontier requested $1.00 donations from each active customer and over 15,000 customers joined the cause. To make the gesture twice as impressive Frontier offered a dollar for dollar matching donation. Frontier, together with their customers raised over $30,000 to help Habitat. eBay surprised the crowd prior to Lorrie Norrington's keynote address with a $50,000 donation for Habitat in the name of all eBay sellers. In addition, Genco Marketplace donated many fine prizes for a silent auction benefitting Habitat as well.

ECommerce Summit

eCommerce Summit vs. Catalyst Pinehurst? Catalyst

Recently (yesterday while in the NOLA airport via a Twitter Tweet from a friend) I was asked to compare this year's Summit event with the recent Channel Advisor Catalyst conference held in Pinehurst, NC.

On the surface one could say two events do not match up - based on the premise that Catalyst is primarily sponsored & promoted by a single multichannel solutions provider and the eCommerce summit is sponsored by two connected trade organizations with additional corporate sponsorship from multiple solutions providers. There is an overlap of sponsorship for each event, yet each event had a different look and feel.

Some points of comparison are available to informed observers, I am sure many of my readers could easily chime in with comments regarding the differences, I met with many of them at both events.

The initial impression: Continue reading “Review – eCommerce Summit ECMTA PeSA 2008 vs Catalyst Pinehurst 2008” »

eBay Ink – New Blog or Same ole eBay? Usher Lieberman Thanks for Trying!

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After posting my most recent article about eBay North American GM Stephanie Tilenius and her answers to my Digital Download questions at Catalyst 2008...

I wanted to be sure I was not too harsh and had presented the case from a sellers perspective fairly.  I am not an eBay basher and would prefer to work towards positive change if change is needed.  Change is not always needed, but change usually comes in any case. In an effort to confirm my thoughts as they were presented in my previous post, I went surfing the web looking for blog posts and news articles... Continue reading “eBay Ink – New Blog or Same ole eBay? Usher Lieberman Thanks for Trying!” »

eBay Changes Story on Digital Download Situation – eBook Fraud or Feedback issue?

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Stephanie Tilenius eBay GM

eBay Speaks & Answers Questions at Catalyst 2008

eBay's new North American General Manager is the very capable Stefanie Tilenius. Stephanie came back to eBay from PayPal, eBay's cash cow, and now finds herself in an unenviable position during this particularly tumultuous time of transition for eBay and its new management team & philosophy.

At Catalyst 2008 in Pinehurst, NC many questions were directed at Stephanie about the recent changes in fees, DSR's (especially DSR's) and other matters very near and dear to sellers' hearts.

It seemed as though the sellers (and customers of eBay) wanted to hear some sort of indication that eBay recognizes the role sellers play in the entire picture. eBay has an incredible system, but without the sellers' involvement, the system may not be so incredible anymore. Continue reading “eBay Changes Story on Digital Download Situation – eBook Fraud or Feedback issue?” »

Catalyst 2008 Wrap up – Part One – First 2 Days eCommerce, Social Networking, Scot Wingo eBay & More

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Whew,

What a way to spend three days in North Carolina! Catalyst 2008 was a informational bonanza held at an unbelievably beautiful and historic resort. There was more to talk about than the accommodations or the hosts.  I have approximately 30 pages of handwritten notes compiled from the three days of sessions and meetings at Catalyst 2008.

I also had quite a flight delay due to weather last night so please excuse me if I do not get all my thoughts out in this one post.

Let's just summarize the Highlights and I will go into greater detail in future posts.

Highlights:

Day One

  • Meeting Joe Schaefer and the people from Jellyfish.com (a Microsoft acquisition) on the ride to Pinehurst from the Raleigh-Durham International Airport on a shuttle provided by PayPal.  Jellyfish is a new way to use pay per action advertising and I think anyone interested should check them out. Nice people too!
  • Keynote Speech - Chris Imegima - Nike - Seeing the magical ethos of Nike and how they can use the significant power of branding and celebrity to push forward innovation in marketing and design was a pleasure. Hearing all of the self promotion marketing speak was less than impressive, as I have already stated. Nike is a wonderful brand and I am certain everyone in the room (which was also filled with wonderful brands) could have learned something from Nike; I am just not sure we were privy to any actionable information or could apply what Nike is doing to any other brand or eCommerce operation. Afterall, is Catalyst not an eCommerce event?

Day 2

  • Scot Wingo - Keynote of Day 2 - ChannelAdvisor Update - Scot obviously has a handle on the pulse of eCommerce. His presentation on day 2 was more than about the status of ChannelAdvisor; the presentation covered almost ever aspect of online sales and eCommerce, trends, predictions, profits and possibilities. This was a no-holes-barred review of the year past and the future for not only ChannelAdvisor and their clients, but for the industry as a whole. Main points included:
    • Shopping via search is 41% of gross while direct to site is down to 20% and dropping.
    • People find products through search.
    • Amazon is increasing sales
    • Yahoo is increasing in search,
    • eBay's decline has leveled out.
    • Comscore Q 107 is showing a slowing of eCommerce trends, yet ChannelAdvisor clients has seen a 19% increase year to year.
    • Scot Wingo sees plenty of growth for multi-channel merchants - "Don't listen to pundits"
    • eBay only sellers - "Missing out on 75% of the pie"
    • Google = 60% Market share in USA / 80% Rest of the World - Search is very important as is long tail and Google checkout showing a bump in click through rate.
    • Older Comparison Shopping Engines declining in traffic & importance while new CSE 2.0 sites like Jellyfish, Ciao & Pronto are growing fast.
    • eBay - GMV growth slowed to 8% vs 20%, active users NOT growing, fixed price is growing and top buyer issue is shipping. eBay growth is slower than eCommerce and changes are bountiful.
    • Amazon - Growth is faster than eCommerce, Amazon Prime is primary factor and Amazon.com growth is up 40 - 50% year to year.
    • Major Announcement - Buy.com and CA form partnership - No integration fees for CA customers with full access to 11 million Buy.com customers.

As you can gather, Scot's speech held a great deal of information and for a non-shorthand note taker, I think I gathered most of the important points here. There were more, to be sure, but overall I think the tone was positive and factual, not self-promoting...a real refreshing change from standard CEO type presentations. Scot seems more the analyst type than a self promoter - he shows the facts and follows the information. This may be why his CA products are so well received. With the data ChannelAdvisor includes in their products, it is hard to argue with the value.

  • eBay - See my last post about eBay's presentation with PayPal - I will write more about some of the details from this presentation in a detailed post on another day. The highlights were few and far between but not all was lost. I will keep you posted.
  • Social Networking - a panel discussion including representatives from Buy.com, Canvas on Demand and Abe's Books. In summary, my impression from this discussion was that the panelists had not seen a significant bump from social networking marketing. The general consensus seemed to be to not invest a great deal of time or money into social networking unless you have a clear plan and see real benefits. Some social networking efforts have paid off, especially opening up your eCommerce website to the use of customer generated reviews. Reviews drive sales and create dynamic fresh content for SEO. Another point: If you plan on populating sites like Digg, Stumble Upon or Twitter with your own content, be transparent. Do not submit content without a clear understanding for the reader regarding your association with the product. Finding conversations about your niche and joining is a recommended practice.
  • Life Cycle Model Small Business Infant to IR500 - Scot Wingo moderated a discussion including several merchants who started with very modest beginnings and have grown online businesses into major brands.

"eBay is a Firehose." said Bill Frische of Dyscern. "No channel provides more traffic."

The consistent message from this panel is all of these sellers continue to use eBay, even when the other channels and their own websites provide a great deal of revenue. eBay is still a great place to find traffic and new customers. You must know what sells where and how and never keep stock longer than 28 days; older stock is sold on eBay. All of these sellers sell internationally.  With the dollar what it is, you must sell globally.

Best Investment - "Make your own website." - Jacob North SophiaStyle.com

"EBay is training wheels for eCommerce" - Scot Wingo

Worst Investment - Shopping.com (Source asked to not be quoted)

Overall this was a very informative panel discussion by sellers who have been there and done that.

In my next post, I will get into detail regarding the rest of Day 2 and the insights provided by Mr. Vince Monical of Google, plus the very interesting 10 person focus panel of local Internet shoppers from the surrounding Pinehurst community in our next post. Day 3 was very interesting with a "Pimp My Site" demonstration put on by fellow eBay stores designers Debbie Levitt, Andrew Main and Jeff Dyksen and it ended with a great presentation as the final Keynote with Ben Ling of Facebook.

Also look for a more in depth article on our sister blog Allbusinessauctions about the creative ways companies like 3balls.com and Fleegolf have used the power of trade ins and trade up merchandise to build a business based upon eBay and eCommerce. Coming Soon.

Catalyst, Day Two Quick Report – eBay – Google – Scot Wingo

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It is now almost the end of Day 2 here at Catalyst.  I have a great deal of information to share, but alas I am due at the resort club for a special dinner.  I am in my room just doing a quick freshen up before dining at the famous Pinehurst Club.

In summary for day 2, I will say that Scot Wingo presents himself as a straight shooter across the board, not that anyone would think otherwise.  The entire keynote presentation he made this morning was well thought out and included real meat for online merchants.  Later Scot presided over a forum-type of presentation giving a synopsis of how several ChannelAdvisor client companies had grown their online businesses from "Infancy" to full "Adulthood" as Internet merchants.  One notable comment by Scot was, "eBay is like training wheels for eCommerce."  Very Interesting...

eBay & Paypal combined forces for a presentation which revealed a certain nervousness from Stephanie Tilenius, the new head of North American operations for eBay. It is obvious that eBay has suddenly realized that merchants are actively seeking new channels to sell goods.  A great deal of anguish over recent and some long term problems at eBay was expressed by the audience in the question and answer period after the joint speech. Stephanie Tilenius indicated that we have yet to see the end of drastic changes at eBay and said, "by this time next year we will not recognize eBay.com compared with how it looks today."   Interesting yet cryptic quotes.  To be fair, I should say that Stephanie's handling of the questions which were presented by less than friendly voices was both calm and well thought out.  But no specifics were given to sellers which would allow them to allay fears over the recent and coming changes at eBay.

Google's presentation later in the day by Vince Monical, head of Google's eCommerce and Analytics team, included a lot of interesting facts about the methodology of search.  A great deal of emphasis was placed upon the effectiveness of the site's analytics product, Google site comparison and the multitude of eBay "Cloud" apps which can be run from any computer anywhere, like Google Docs & Spreadsheets.  The effectiveness of Google checkout was also touted but it did not seem as though the audience had been sold.  In fact, the last session of the day included a 10 person focus group of local citizens in Pinehurst, NC, who shop online.  Not one of those people raised their hand when asked if they were familiar with or would prefer Google checkout over any other type of checkout.  Several members of the focus group were familiar with PayPal however.  Some work needed there for Google.

There is still so much to cover and write about today.  One main thought though...if you hesitated about coming to Catalyst for any reason in the past - maybe because you thought it was just a sales pitch for ChannelAdvisor - put that thought out of your head.  This conference is worth every penny of admission.  The ChannelAdvisor people, from top to bottom, seem to honestly want to help online merchants improve with solid information.  There are many views expressed here, and not all of them coincide with what could be expected from a rah rah self-promoting conference, which this is not.  And I can say that I am simply glad that I spent my day here today.

I have only covered about 1% of the notes I jotted down in today's sessions. More is available to write about for sure, including real commentary about social networking marketing, small business life-cycle models for Internet sales, eBay based trade up programs used very successfully by online merchants in the Golf category and much more.

Stop back by and I will try to put into words all I learned today, but for now I must get to the dinner and try to absorb even more useful information from the people attending and presenting here at Catalyst.   

ChannelAdvisor Catalyst @ Pinehurst Day 1 Complete – Quick Notes

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Catalyst is the name of the ChannelAdvisor conference held once a year each in North Carolina, London, England & Queensland, Australia. 

As most of you may already know, ChannelAdvisor is a very large and diverse multi-channel management solution.  The conference named Catalyst is much more than a sales pitch for ChannelAdvisors various online sales solutions.  At Catalyst, attendees find service and solutions providers covering a complete spectrum of ecommerce and online merchant business.

The solutions presented are from eBay and Paypal to Google, Overstock, Hosted Solutions, Frooition, AsWas, American Express, ShipWorks and more.  The business of doing retail business online is covered at this conference.

PinehurstWe all arrived at Pinehurst, the fabulous golf resort in the Sandhills of North Carolina (originally built in 1895) and were greeted by the very gentile and accommodating staff.  I spent the afternoon settling into my room in the Manor (built in 1923) and checking out the shops & restaurants in the village at Pinehurst. 

The first day's event schedule was consumed mostly by a Golf tournament event. 

The opening keynote speech featuring Chris Shimojima, VP of global electronic commerce for Nike, started at 6PM in the Grand Ballroom of the main historic Carolina Hotel at Pinehurst.

Mr. Shimojima's keynote was a fine example of Nike marketing.  It highlighted two of Nike's newest products and marketing programs, Nike + and Nike iD. 

The point of the speech was apparently intended to inspire the audience to look for innovative ways to reach a target audience.  While that point is quite valid, in my opinion the speech was more of a marketing spiel for Nike and less an inspirational or educational effort meant to teach the audience how to succeed as marketers in new and innovative ways.  I say this because the two examples Nike presented here (Nike +, a custom shoe configurator) and (Nike ID, an electronic device which tracks runs and provides feedback via the Ipod and your computer) could only be accomplished as marketing programs by a company such as Nike with a development and marketing budget to match.  

When I presented this point to Mr. Shimojima after his speech in open question form, he responded that Nike does not have a large marketing budget.  I found his response to be a bit off base, especially after just witnessing the presentation which highlighted a 6 year development time on one project, multi-million dollar "test" marketing retail locations in Tokyo, New York City and London, and endorsements from movie and TV stars and professional athletes including Tiger Woods. Could this indicate Mr. Shimojinas presentation may have a more appropriate audience on Madison Avenue?

I appreciate ChannelAdvisor's efforts to bring the attendees of Catalyst a real powerful example of how innovation can help a company succeed, but unfortunately in this case the presenter spent more time promoting his own products than sharing real actionable techniques with his audience.  This may have been a bit of an overshoot, a missed-the-runway sort of presentation.  The audience is here trying to learn how to build a business into something like Nike.  The Nike Corporation did not start out with the resources it has available today to innovate in the marketplace.  Maybe a more down to earth example of real world success from a peer or possibly newly minted eCommerce success story would have been more appropriate, rather than hearing words and a sales pitch from the mountaintop of one of the ultimate brands in the world.