Over the last few months Ebay.com has received some pretty bad press from hiking up their fees and the hassles and poor user experiences of Paypal. It makes me wonder are there any major Ebay competitors, utilizing the newest technologies and community interfaces, up to the challenge of dethroning the king? It surprises me that we have not seen any major sites push their way to creating a threatening competitive advantage. Why have we not seen a well capitalized major competitor to Ebay? So I did some digging and came up with the following sites that may someday give Ebay some serious competition and maybe even a run for their money.
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Jeff Bezos founded Amazon.com, Inc. in 1994, it was launched in 1995. Located in Seattle, Washington, Amazon was one of the first major companies to sell goods over the Internet. During the crash many people became skeptical about their business model, as they were primarily focused on books. They quickly shifted into other consumer products and expanded outside of the US. In 1997 they did their IPO at $18.00 a share. In the early 2000’s they were maintaining a financial deficit but eventually became profitable. In 2005 they were listed in the S&P 500 and are now sustaining healthy growth.
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Google Product Search helps shoppers find and buy products across the web. It works best employing sellers currently established ecommerce sites and then utilizing Google Product Search as a information organizer and checkout tool. As a seller, you can submit your products to Google Product Search, allowing buyers to quickly and easily find your site and products. Currently this is not an Ebay killer as it displays Ebay results in their search results, however they may choose to further their vertical depth in the future.
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You can use Yahoo! Shopping Web Services to search a database of millions of products and thousands of merchants. Yahoo! Shopping has recently been gaining ground and has some unique user interface features that make for an enjoyable experience. Yahoo! Shopping operates in a similar way to Google Product Search in that it utilizes a horizontal search structure across pre-established ecommerce websites.
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Craigslist is an online community that has been consistently gaining new ground in online shopping for local communities. Their interface is rudimentary but the community has roots with the early internet and has become one of the most popular sites on the web. Ebay does own a 25% stake in Craigslist so they will never be an Ebay killer, although they are worth a mention here as they could be a major competitor for local commerce.
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Aroxo is still in private Beta so there is not too much known about them. According to them, People love buying and selling online, trading with each other, doing deals, getting a bargain, shifting stock. We think we’ve found a better way to do it, something which is faster and cheaper for sellers. And which not only gets a great price for buyers, but saves them hours of searching.
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Radicalbuy is a new age style auction/commerce site that utilizes Facebook to generate interest and a seller population. Utilizing the millions of members on Facebook, you can list an item and have it visible to all Facebook users instantly. After you list an item, others can post your listing on their Facebook page to earn commission!
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Wigix has gone down the path of combining their own social networking infrastructure with with creating a commerce and auction community. Wigix is the new way to buy and sell online. It’s a socially-driven marketplace, where you can communicate with like-minded collectors and traders. Get a live pricing history for each item and negotiate prices intelligently. Social communication encourages informed buying.Stop buying in a Web 1.0 world, and start buying with the strength of your friends and fellow owners!
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BuyItSellIt is a new style of commerce community that allows current sellers to establish a site to sell and market their product. This will most likely not be an Ebay Killer, but it could pull users away from Ebay to create their own site and utilize Google Product Search and Yahoo! Shopping.
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Alibaba focuses on a B2B commerce platform. Alibaba.com is the world’s leading B2B e-commerce company. It connects millions of buyers and suppliers from around the world every day through their marketplaces. They form a community of more than 32 million registered users from over 240 countries and regions.
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ubid is an ecommerce platform that has been established to help name brands promote and sell their excess products directly to the general public. uBid.com is your inside connection to excess inventory from the world’s most trusted brands. Even the best products don’t always sell out in stores, so when our trusted selling partners have excess inventory they sell it with us at prices far below retail.
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Possible New Competitor:
gWallet is a site that has not been launched in beta yet, but will most likely make a splash in the ecommerce community. gwallet is the next generation shopping destination for the online consumer. gwallet will help revolutionize the way consumers shop, transact, and interact with merchants. As this is the product of Gurbaksh Chahal, who just sold Blue Lithium to Yahoo! for $300M, it will most likely gain immediate traction.
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Ebay has become a powerhouse in the ecommerce industry and has done everything in their power to stay at the top. It will be interesting to see what will transpire over the next few years and which players will be able to carve a niche and hold onto it. Utilizing the networking capabilities of pre-established communities (such as facebook or myspace) will most likely play a major role in their success. A company like RadicalBuy, mentioned above, seems to understand that but they will need more to differentiate themselves to provide a more defensible long term position. Let’s just wait and see what happens. . .
Here are some other sites that may pose a threat, but currently do not present any serious problem for Ebay.
If you know of any others worth mentioning let me know and I will add them!
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September 25, 2008