Introducing 'The eBay SuperHero Challenge' for our Seller Community

[sapana@ebay.com]

Hi, this is Sapana Gupta from Community Development team. I am here today to share about an interesting program that we are launching for our Seller Community.

Our Seller Community has always displayed exemplary behaviour when it comes to helping fellow sellers. Be it helping in setting up the eBay business of a new seller, clarifying doubts of established sellers, or just supporting each other in the hour of need, our community members have always been generous in guiding and helping their fellow eBayers. Over the time, the helpful sellers become respected members of the Community and Heroes for the sellers they have helped.

To honour all our Heroes and to say a BIG Thank You to the SuperHero, eBay brings you ‘The SuperHero’ Challenge!

What is ‘The SuperHero’ Challenge all about?
This challenge aims at inspiring the SuperHeroes of the eBay Seller Community to guide a team of sellers to new heights in their business, stepping in to help with trading tips and tricks, market advice and all their other superpowers. The most successful Hero will thus be crowed ‘The eBay SuperHero’

How will the Challenge work?
Step 1: eBay invites high performance established sellers (a.k.a. Heroes) to take the challenge of becoming a SuperHero
Step 2: eBay invites high potential new sellers to become the team member of the SuperHeroes and get super-exclusive insider info on how to grow your sales and expand your business
Step 3: The SuperHero uses his business acumen, to ensure that his team does maximum successful transactions on eBay and generates maximum positive feedback in 3 months time.
Step 4: All the successful Heroes their top performing Team Members and ‘The SuperHero’ get fabulous prizes!

How to participate in the challenge?
All the chosen SuperHeroes and their team members will receive invitation to join ‘The SuperHero challenge'. If you are the chosen one, you can also join the ‘The SuperHero challenge’ by clicking here. The challenge will be open from 1st November 07 to 31st January 08.

To know more about the program, Click here or read the FAQ section. If you have any question, clarification or request, please feel free to write to us at superhero@ebay.com or post on this thread.

Regards,
Sapana Gupta
Community Development Team

[jaipur_fashions]

:_|I am sad 😞 I am not eligible..I do not have 200 feedbacks 😞 :_|

Sapana, tell me one thing, if I have 200 or more feedbacks by the time contest starts (November 1st), will I be eligible to participate ??

Awaiting your reply

[adit999]

WOW !!! Good luck to all the people who are eligible for this contest. All the best 🙂

Warmest regards,
Adit.

[krishnaindia]

I like the idea and I am sure it is going to be fun .

Sole criteria of 200 feedback though seems a bit harsh. Measly 10% conversion just can't be a criteria by itself. There could have been some more optional criterions like item-sales ratio or monthly sales or may be even something based on guides/blogs/comments published for seller communities.

I heart goes out to sellers like JaipurFashion who are so close but not there yet. You might be invited ! So go for it.

Let the best team win.

My top ten watch-for list:

1. The FAQ just says that equal number of members in each team to maintain uniformity . I am a bit skeptical at this stage as how the teams will be divided based on what they sell.

2. Will we see a progress chart as how teams are doing from time to time ?

3.Will there be a separate threads assigned for each team to see what suggestions are being discussed within team . How else they are communicating? All team memebers should get a blue label for the duration to something similar as pink for ebay employees . That way we all know when team member speaks on that thread . Audiences can also root for a team with their suggestions.

4. Since points are only on Paisapay,will the teams be allowed a special discounts for their goods if the buyer agrees to pay by Paisapay ? Tactics what people employ
will be an intersting read if we get to know them.

5.Most of the time we love to hate our leaders. So will there be any change of team entertained once the game starts rolling ?

6. There may be some brilliant sparks seen within the losing teams and they get nothing because there would be some non performers responsible for their debacle . Any plan to award them ? This fact is not clear from the faq. I hope I am wrong here.

7. Will there be any say for the team members as which team they would like to join ?

8.Why just PaisaPay ? Why not Paypal ? Paypal is after all an eBay company . So international sellers will be marginally at loss where Paypal is a prefered way for our buyers abroad.


9.Not many 200+ FB sellers are active on forums or other community services so they are not a 'known' figure . They actually are busy guys in doing what they do best - they sell and make money ! Can the team members see a CV/Resume of their heroes before hand similar to member spotlight ?

10.The prize money Rs 4975 for each successful team member is a mysterious amount. So is it for the people to guess the right price of something ?





I am going to out this evnt 'on watch' very closely.

Gear up guys ! Let us all learn as how to play this game. Just remember, eligible heroes, if there is a problem for you it is exactly same for other teams as well.

So come on, be a sport !

[indconcepts]

Hello Sapana,

I fail to understand that why aren't all the Power Sellers allowed to be eligible for SuperHeros.

The one criteria for SuperHeros is ....

10% and higher conversion rate (CR)

I don't think many are aware of this criteria.

It is the number of successful Listings divided by total number of Listings ....then multiplied by 100.

The catch here is that this figure is attained by collecting the data since the time of registration.

ebay forgets that there was a time when the conversion rate for most of the Sellers used to be just 2% - 3%.

I feel that the CR should be calculated for the last 2-3 months and not since the time of registration.

This would not only make more and more Sellers eligible to take part in the contest but increase the ebay revenue many folds.

Let the competition be amongst 100 - 200 Teams and not just between 8-10 Teams.

Keeping the same Criteria would be just obliging the Sellers selling Internationally .... which ebay has been always doing. .


best regards

Umang Midha

[sapana@ebay.com]

Hi jaipur_fashions,

Since this is initiative is a small way to Thank our sellers we will like most sellers to be part of this initiative. If you are keen to take up the challenge, and are able to meet the criteria by the start of the program, we will certainly want to accomodate your request. I will request you to drop a mail to superhero@ebay.com with your request.

All the best!

Regards,
Sapana

[sapana@ebay.com]

Hi indconcepts,

I believe by asking a Hero to train a set of new sellers and grow their business is a very challenging task. The sellers who take up this challenge need to be the ones who are completely aware of the secrets of a sucessful eBay business. Else, it will not be fair on the Hero to expect him to achieve the task nor will it be fair on the Team Members who will look upto the Hero as their eBay guru.

To your point of calculating conversion rate of past 2-3 months: conversion rate of a small period will not neeccecarily be an accurate picture of the business acumen of a seller. For example, if I have listed 50 items in last 3 months month, and sold only 5 items, my conversion rate will be 10% but I wont be the right person to guide a new seller in establishing their eBay business.

Regards,
Sapana

[sapana@ebay.com]

Hi krishnaindia,

Thanks for your wishes and being excited about the challenge! To answer some of your questions, which could also be in mind of other members:

Will we see a progress chart as how teams are doing from time to time ?

Yes, we plan to have a team scores on the hub page itself. We plan to add lot of fun elements as well. So stay tuned.


Will there be a separate threads assigned for each team to see what suggestions are being discussed within team?

Team members will be able to communicate on boards as well as other mode like phone mails etc. While it is their chice, we will certainly provide them with a dedicated thread, which they can make their discussion area.

Will there be any say for the team members as which team they would like to join ?

There are lot of things involved in creating a team, especially location, category of interest etc. Therefore eBay will need to take the decision on teams. Members can send in their requests and we will certainly consider it, but eBay will need to take the final decision.

Why just PaisaPay ?

Becasue we get informaiton only on PaisaPay and can figure out the winners based on PaisaPay transactions. Since Paypal is not in India, we do not have any window on their transacitons. However the team prize of 15,000 (SuperHero gets if his team collects 200 or more feedback) is not dependant on mode of payment.

I hope the above throws more light on your questions.

Regards,
Sapana

[gizmozindia]

Dear fellow sellers,

We would like to know from our fellow sellers as to what is their conversion rate.

I am sure many sellers would not like to share this info but can be helpful to all if the conversion rate from different sellers is known so that every seler can work towards increasing their conversion rate.

Regards

GizmozIndia

[jaipur_fashions]

Sapana, I have already dropped them an email but havent heard from them yet .