On January 28th , eBay announced a large number of changes designed to strengthen their Marketplace and increase buyer and seller confidence. Of the many new policies outlined, one of the more major changes will be to the eBay feedback system. Starting in May, 2008 sellers will no longer be able to leave negative or neutral feedback for buyers. This was done, according to eBay, because a majority of buyers are limiting their bidding and muffling their feedback for fear of retaliation by sellers. This is designed to instill more confidence in future buyers, as well as provide a more accurate representation of sellers performance.
All of these changes announced roughly a week following the announced retirement of eBay's CEO Meg Whitman, and the hiring of former Marketplaces President John Donahoe.
Despite the immediate backlash of negativity surrounding the feedback change, eBay continues to announce more adjustments, some of them showing a speck of light at the end of the road. eBay will be lowering the insertion fees anywhere from $0.05 to $0.80, as well as other store-style listing and gallery photo fee changes. There will also be between a 5% and 15% discount for sellers with higher feedback and buyer satisfaction ratings.
Another major change to the site is coming in March when eBay will be implementing a new default sort order to buyer searches called "Best Match". This was developed because, as eBay had acknowledged, it can be really hard to find things on the site. The feature uses a proprietary algorithm developed by eBay to attempt to show the buyer the best options for his search. One of the factors that will be used to determine the rankings on the search results is the Detailed Seller Ratings (DSR) that the seller has earned in the past 30 days, giving better sellers with higher Exposure in search results.
Only time will tell how these changes will affect eBay businesses in the long run. As eBay attempts to balance the needs of buyers and sellers to make the marketplace more healthy and robust, Auction Inn will continue to provide top notch services and quality items, and respond to the changes in ways that keep our buyers coming back. We only hope the rest of the eBay Marketplace can.
With a very successful 2007 fundraising year, we at Auction Inn are very excited to begin an even better 2008. With the turn of the New Year, we have also made a few changes that will make Auction Inn’s “Next Generation Fundraising” platform even better than before. To help support many of the non-profit programs we work with, we have been fortunate enough to enlist many local organizations that helped to raise awareness and visibility of our fundraising drives last year, including radio stations 101 The Rose and Smooth Jazz Radio. These stations, among other contributors, were keystones in our Next Generation Fundraising efforts, and we are very happy to welcome them back.
In 2007 our Non-Profit partners raised a total of $91,097.70, with $37,698.00 coming from commercial donations alone. We would love to help any other interested non-profit organizations have another thriving year, generating funds from the simplest, most up-to-date fundraising drive within the community. Please feel free to contact Auction Inn via phone, email, or fax to set up a meeting or to schedule this year’s fundraising event. We have already begun developments with many other local businesses and non-profits, so secure your date while it’s still early!
With the 2008 fundraising year already begun, Auction Inn has once again teamed up with Smooth Jazz and 1010 The Rose radio stations to promote our upcoming events. For each of these fundraisers, community members can come to one of the designated locations and submit items for donation and sale on eBay.
On February 23, Clare House will be hosting their event at the Turkey Hill on Centerville Road.
On March 8th, Domestic Violence Services will be holding their fundraiser, tentatively at the Barnes and Noble in Red Rose Commons, Lancaster. Please feel free to visit the organizations’ websites below, or call 888-TO-THE-INN for more information. We are very excited to host these fundraisers, and look forward to the community participation each one will bring!
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Services of Lancaster |
If you belong to a local nonprofit group in either the Lancaster, Harrisburg, or York, PA areas, and would like more information about our fundraising options, please feel free to contact us at 888-TO-THE-INN!
With the beginning of 2008 also came a fresh set of faces for the WORK-ABLE job training program in Lancaster! This session we will be working with 3 new trainees, all with an abundance of talent and potential. Each month we will feature one of them; this month we sat down with Moszell.
Starting just last week, Mo is new to the entire Boys and Girls Club/Auction Inn partnership. Born in Houston, TX, Mo moved to Northern Philadelphia shortly after, finally making his home in Lancaster about 6 years ago. In coming to the WORK-ABLE training program, he is hoping to obtain his GED then begin taking business classes at HACC. Mo is most looking forward to working in the Accounting Department of Auction Inn, saying he enjoys the challenge that working with numbers provides him. In the short time he has been here, he is already growing to enjoy working on eBay. "I think the whole idea of eBay is really cool.” When Mo’s not at work, he is listening to music and enjoying one of the many sports that he is interested in.
Again, we are very happy to have all of our trainees here for this season’s orientation, and as always will do our best to give them the experience and know-how they need to move on to fulfilling careers within the community!
Recently, a former graduate of the WORK-ABLE job training program, Ciara Pagan, was awarded “Teen of the Week” in the Lancaster New Era newspaper. This award is given to local teens who go the extra mile in the educational and extra curricular activities. Currently Ciara is the school class president, as well as on the basketball and track and field teams. She has been working on raising money for her class prom, as well as being a consistent leader in sports. We are very proud of the achievements Ciara has gained in her youth, and look forward to seeing her name in lights in the future!
