This week in the Bloggosphere and beyond … grab an early mince pie and egg nog, take a break from decorating the tree, and treat yourself to a round up of the week’s news and events …

Bloggosphere

There’s been not so much a shake-out, but more of a re-ranking of e-commerce blogs these last few weeks.  The pre-Christmas selling season seems to have graded who are sellers that blog, and who are bloggers that sell, as well as separating journalists that blog from bloggers that are hobbyist journalists.  What am I waffling about?

There’s been a distinct trend, for around three weeks now, displaying the seriousness with which the online selling community regard their online editorialising.  Some high-traffic bloggers have had very little worthwhile output, which leads to suspicion that they are overwhelmed with servicing the real-life side of their Internet (and off-line) selling.  Others appear to have the logistics side of business so well organised that they’ve increased editorial output during the busiest selling period of the year.

Stalwart professional reporters have plodded on as usual, despite having to restart “proper” news-hunting since eBay’s announcement volumes went dead in mid-November.  That last point has certainly sorted the men and women from the boys and girls in the bloggosphere’s “journalistic” sector.  Even the briefest of skimming through most of the well-known blog indexes will show evidence that some “gurus” have not been out news hunting, nor reported sideline stories related to their main subjects.

I recognised the same trend at this time last year, but didn’t comment on it – perhaps this is the part-time e-commerce-journalist’s equivalent to the mid-year “silly season” for mainstream media, the period when Parliament is closed for summer recess, and they have to report on any old topic to fill column inches and broadcast minutes?  In reality, no such problem should face online reporters – especially those who are sellers.  Where are all their stories about how successful their seasonal marketing has been?  Or has it not?

AbeBooks don’t often get a mention on the BuildaSkill Blog, though there are a few posts about them in our forums and they have their own discussion board here on BuildaSkill.  That’s “my bad”, because the AbeBooks blog regularly publishes best sellers lists (copied to their discussion board in the BuildaSkill forums) that are useful for online book sellers.  This week they published the top 5 list for 2008 compiled by Canadian playwright and First Fiction book reviewer for The Globe and Mail, Jim Bartely.  I’m sorry to say I’ve never heard of any of the titles, nor their authors, which emphasises the need for book sellers (and myself) to read our forums for stock recommendations.

Is it a play on the name of SpamHaus (the global-reach anti-spam emails organisation) or just being trendy?  A new blog has appeared to monitor eBay’s Diamond Level PowerSellers and whether or not there is any underhandedness regarding the feedback they receive, plus whether or not adverse feedback disappears from their record.  DiamondHaus is currently monitoring Diamond PowerSellers Altrec, BUY, shoplet, SmartBargins, and ToolUp.  SmartBargains ignominious opening feedbacks are under discussion on several sites including TameBay.  It’ll be interesting to see how consistently DiamondHaus maintain their reporting.

Someone once said the world would be a boring place if everyone was the same, to which I add that it would be a dangerous one if there was no-one who agreed with you.  Reader’s know I’m a big fan of Randy Smythe already.  Randy was once eBay’s biggest seller and continues to be a key independent in online selling.  He is also a voice of reason and considered criticism.  This week in his MyBlogUtopia he’s been examining carefully the new MAP (Minimum Advertised Price) ruling and implications for online sellers.  He’s also pulled VeRO into the equation, and has found a beautiful paradox in eBay’s actions regarding going to Washington to lobby against MAP.  Read everything he’s posted this week – it may protect your business, and some of it will certainly give you a well-needed belly laugh at eBay’s hypocrisy.

There are times when I wish blogging was not so easily accessible to all.  I received an email late in the week, from a blogger who normally covers IT technical subjects, regarding a completely off-topic subject in one of their blog posts.  Christopher Price’s post concerning How you can help destroy the eBay DSR system has got to be one of the most ludicrous ideas I have ever seen on any blog or forum post.  He’s advocating all buyers leave all sellers consistent 1.0 DSR scores to undermine and invalidate the system.  IF a concerted campaign was mountable, then it should be to have every DSR left as 5.0 – in this way there would be no “early tranche” of suspended sellers.

Using Mr Price’s method would result in 25% or 50% of the small sellers being suspended before eBay even twigged anything was happening.  No Christopher, you are putting the cart before the horse with your suggestion.  The only way to fight DSRs is with a plan that ensures no seller (good or bad) gets suspended or penalised, that eBay always has to pay the maximum FVF discount at invoice time, and that neither eBay nor any user can use DSRs as a method of differentiating between sellers.  Using the “full marks” route will also so severely screw up Best/Worst Match, that the system would have to be dropped.

For perhaps the best post on the internet concerning the underlying problem with DSRs, read an early-year post “Did eBay tell the Buyers? Despatch or Delivery Time?“on eBay seller GazLanNaThai’s eBay My World blog – I’m continually surprised how long it’s survived on the site without being pulled by eBay.

Update - I’ve just spoken to Gaz, and he’s agreed to having his post put onto BuildaSkill “for posterity” – he’s going to try to find a route to add the original readers’ comments from the eBay version, as BuildaSkill comments as well.

Blog quote of the week

Randy’s got it again this week, discussing flaws in the eBay VeRo program, he stated -

My main point in recent posts, that apparently wasn’t clear enough, is that manufacturers are now going after sellers who are breaking MAP (minimum advertised price) or who sell product on eBay when the manufacturer has expressly told them not to. While they have the right to protect the value of their product and their pricing, using VeRO to do that is an abuse of the program and has nothing to do with intellectual rights or copyright. It is my position, that if eBay wanted to stop it, they could. So the “our hands are tied” defence is poppycock. They would rather get the PR benefit from a Dog and Pony show in Washington DC standing up for the rights of sellers.

Tell it like it is Randy, it’s why I love reading your blog.

Discussions & Forums

The BuildaSkill community are busy this month collating one of the biggest lists of online selling venues on the Internet.  Our forums will be filling up with site reviews between now and the New Year, and sometime in January, it will enable us to add “all the world’s venues” to the directories section here in the blog.  If you have anything to contribute to the lists, please pop across to the forums, register, and add your posts – the more people who join in, the more useful the end results will be – to everyone.

International

The UK is to chair the next G20 financial summit in 2009, following on from November’s meeting in the United States.  It will be held in London on 2 April, and Barack Obama is expected to attend the summit following his inauguration in January.  The first G20 summit convened to deal specifically with the global economic crisis, took place in Washington, DC on 15 November.  World leaders agreed to a 12-month moratorium on protectionist measures, and pledged to look in detail at plans for the reform of international institutions such as the IMF.

The German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, also spoke out against trade protectionism in a speech on 27th November, at the 10th German World Bank Forum in Frankfurt am Main.  She also reminded the audience of the need to continue poverty reduction and the fight against global warming, and called upon China and India, as the world’s fastest growing economies, to begin sharing the burden of all the challenges.

The heat is really turning up against protectionism as winter approaches.  Pascal Lamy, Director General of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), in a recent address in Doha, Qatar on 29 November 2008, said “Aid for Trade is important, but the big prize lies in the success of the Doha Development Round”. He urged everyone to send “a signal of urgency in delivering on trade and on aid.”  His most damning statement came midway through his speech (full transcript here in the BuildaSkill forums) -

In the current economic conditions there may be a tendency to embrace inward-looking policies that put domestic interests ahead of international cooperation.  In tough times, it is too easy for politicians to blame the foreigner for the nation’s ills, shutting foreign products out of the market and slashing foreign aid budgets.

I do hope eBay, and eBay users, are listening and transposing such statements onto how they run their marketplaces and businesses.  If it were in a blog post, that statement would be my blog post of the year.

Money Matters

UK Secretary of State for Business Peter Mandelson and Consumer Affairs Minister Gareth Thomas have secured agreement from the credit card industry to help borrowers struggling with their credit card bills over the coming months.

Exchange rates continue rising and falling faster than Marilyn Monroe’s white frock over a subway grate.  Sterling is trading at long term lows against many currencies, and the US dollar has recovered slightly to around where it was a year ago, but still way down against 4-5 years ago.  The Aussie dollar, for several years a steady climber, has now fallen back sharply.  Even the Euro is weakened compared to the start of the year.  All of which is not helping international sellers, and has severely increased their admin load for tweaking prices.  I forsee a lot of the bit-players currently cross-border selling, pulling back to domestic shipping only, during the next few financial quarters.

Online Channels & Venues

OnlineMediaBuyer, the website for advertising professionals discussed some stats in the Amazon v eBay battle for dominance.  They provided a beautifully concise summary of all the Nielsen data that AuctionBytes have published over the last few weeks.

On their part, AuctionBytes started the week with a great round-up of data sources for the same battle of the giants relating to the Black Friday and Cyber Monday weekend’s sales performance, on and off line, including revealing data figures from PayPal and how they had the best of it all with “transactions were up 34% on Black Friday compared to 2007 with a 26% increase in online payment volume”.  There’s a lot of useful numbers in Ina’s report – read it slowly, with a pen and paper to hand.

Suppliers & Services

In case you missed the announcement in Site News mid week, I’d just like to nudge Sunday Papers readers that a new page was added to the blog Directories list.  “The BuildaSkill Online Bill & Payment Processors and Money Transfer Services Directory” … short name “Payment Processors” … features over 3-dozen companies in version 1.0 with links to their sites, to the relevant discussion board in the BuildaSkill Forums, and a brief description of each company and what they offer.  Over time the page will be expanded, both in details per company, and in the number of companies.

Hundreds of low-income UK families are getting early access to Home Access via a new project from Virgin Media in partnership with the e-Learning Foundation and UK online centres.  The project will see free fibre optic broadband go into the homes of 500 low-income families from schools and colleges across five cities, backed with free training sessions for parents at local UK-Online centres, covering general computer and internet skills, safety and security.  The Home Access scheme – announced by Gordon Brown in September – is piloted in Oldham and Suffolk, and this newer project will take place in Bristol, Birmingham, Liverpool, Nottingham and Newcastle.

Webifying

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is apparently doing during the economic crisis what eBay should, but isn’t.  SEO companies are reporting they are so overwhelmed with job offers, that they are turning away work and declining acceptance of new clients.  That’s exactly what sellers would have been doing on eBay if the current global economic meltdown had arrived two, or even three, years ago.  With the volume of sales on the site back then, it would have been impossible to handle all the extra bargain hunters, who now seem to not be arriving in the droves expected.

Thus it is that Roderick Ioerger at Marketing Pilgrim has blogged about SEO firms have such full order books they are refusing new approaches from online sellers desperate to revitalise their traffic and sales.  Roderick also cautions against an expected wave of “Boys from the Black Stuff” amateurs appearing, spouting that TV show’s catch phrase, “Gizza job.  I can do that.  Gizza job.”  A case of “Caveat emptor neticus centurii“?

World Affairs

The Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly’s Committee on Economic Affairs and Development (PACE) has issued a dry but stern warning that democracy may be under threat if the economic downturn persists.  They have also expressed grave concern that human rights may be adversely affected in many countries and stated about the G20 Washington Summit, “The committee deplores the fact that this action plan makes no reference to protecting the social and economic rights of citizens in a period of crisis.”

Looking Ahead

The Christmas tree needs put up here – happy reading everyone.

Ed