Open House with Ambareesh Murty, Country Manager - eBay India, 8 Oct 4–5 PM

[sapana@ebay.com]

On Ambareesh's behalf:

Hi Everyone

This is Ambareesh Murty, Country Manager of eBay India and I’d like to invite you to an Open House discussion with me on Thursday, 8th Oct 2009 from 4-5 PM IST.

At the outset let me say a big thank you to our buyers and sellers for your enthusiasm and commitment towards making eBay a great place to buy and sell; it is through the efforts of our members like you that eBay India has consistently been chosen India’s most preferred online shopping destination.

You’d be happy to know that our motto of providing Lots of Safe, Easy, Deals has resulted in strong business growth, some of the key steps in 2009 towards improving our user experience and growing our community further have been:

1. The marketing team has been busy driving new buyers to eBay India through partnerships with exciting high profile celebrity events like auctions linked to ‘Tere Mere Beach Main’

2. The effective use of eBay India coupons has helped generate trial thus helping us convert many more of our visitors into buyers

3. High impact marketing promotions have helped us deliver great value to our buyers, thus ensuring that an ever increasing part of a buyers overall spending is now on eBay

4. The recent launch of Global Easy Buy has further helped us increase variety for our buyers; Global Easy Buy gives our buyers access to a large pool of international items delivered conveniently at their doorstep

5. We’ve always believed that the key to having happy buyers is having happy and successful sellers; this year we’ve invested in our sellers’ success by enhancing our Category Management activities; the Category Management team has successfully ensured that they reach out to more and more sellers to help build a great business on eBay

6. To broad base seller success we initiated pricing changes like the removal of max cap; this change helped us increase visibility for the more sellable items. Further, to improve the return on investment for our shop sellers, we’ve made product changes to ensure that their shop listings get greater visibility in core search results.

7. Feedback disputes were a concern area for most of our members; to provide a fair dispute resolution process, we launched Community Court last year and as many of you might have already experienced, Community Court has successfully achieved its objective with more than 85% of cases getting resolved successfully

That said, we continue to seek areas of improvement so as to provide and deliver to a seamless marketplace experience for our buyers and sellers. I look forward to discussing your suggestions towards further improving our user experience and also answer your eBay related questions during the Open House discussion. You can post your questions in advance on this thread, or join me on 8th Oct at 4 PM for a live discussion.
See you on the 8th!

Regards
Ambareesh Murty
Country Manager – eBay India

[indconcepts]

Hello Mr. Ambareesh Murty,

It's great to see you on Community Boards.

There is no doubt that ebay is becoming a house-hold Name and more and more Buyers are flocking the site with confidence and faith.

Not only this .... even the New eCommerce start-ups know that the right place to tap the Reputed and Leading Online Sellers is ebay where they can easily get in touch with the Sellers and invite them to join their Portal.

I have some Thumbs-Ups and some Thumbs-Downs for you to review.

Thumbs-Up

1. Buyers eagerly await for ebay's Discount Coupons.
2. Many more Indians now recognize ebay as the leading Online shopping site.
3. Buyers are learning the ebay culture.
4. Sellers Sales graph is moving North.
5. Marketing Team doing a good job by promoting other than Tech Categories.
6. Customer Care Support is better than before.


Thumbs-Down

1. Power Seller programme is dying.
2. ebay's shipping integration programme and appointment of Authorized Logistics Partner is taking too long.
3. After the introduction of iPIN by RBI, chargeback risks have gone down considerably but there is no sign / intentions of reducing the PaisaPay Fees.
4. Turbo Lister is the backbone of selling on ebay but the support for this Tool is zero.
5. There is No MRP Policy on ebay and many Sellers don't hesitate to sell Branded Items above MRP for which Buyers are unaware.


Last but not the least .... there have been a number of Workshops in the last couple of weeks. Am sure these are for general interaction and not a sign of some major change coming on ebay.

Awaiting eagerly to join you on 8th Oct at 4:00 p.m .


best regards

Umang Midha

[snrama]

Hello Mr. Ambareesh Murty,

Its nice to see you at community forums. I totally agree to the points mentioned by Mr.Umang.

Some of the points I need to mention, priority wise:

1. Reduction of PaisaPay Fees as we are now paying quite a high prices for stores, listings, etc.

2. Payment Gateway: We need as much as payment methods like provided on Indiatimes, etc.. This request has been raised from many members several times.

3. EMI: Buyers need 1 year EMIs and offers from other banks like Citibank other than ICICI Credit cards. This will increase sales and eBay.in will be the first to introduced it in the e-commerce websites

PS: I couldn't participate in the recent discussions due to personal issues, but hoping to see a new eBay which sellers. ---------------
With Regards,
Navaneeth (snrama) 😉

[accessoriesmasters]

hi murthyji

nice to see you on boards

i agree with most of the points with you but still one thing ebay india needs is to tie up with most other banks for online transfers as indiatimes and others have.

If paisapay fees are not reduced its ok but bring more payment gateways so we can get more and more sales.

rest am happy with ebay growth.

regards
yogen

[amitava123gems]

Dear Mr Murthy,
Sellers of ebay india suffer from trauma. You should arrange for psychological counselling.
Also I need services of a good astrologer,preferably a nonseller.
This I am writing because,you must have noticed,there are few specific issues.
Thanx,
Truly,
Amitava

[rajawadu]

Well Sir,
everything is look good on surface but my suggestion is pleeeeeeeeese do not changes ebay policies on daily basis because daily changes in policies in name of offering so called great buyer satisfaction will not help in long run and it will drive away good sellers from site.

One more request is to offer same respect to buyer and sellers.

Samin

[mixwelgavhane]

hi mr.murthy,
As you have started new GlobalEasyBuy system you should also insert some small ebay features to it. You should include 'watch item','ask a question to seller' and some other features.

Now let's talk about some ebay policies. First you should reduce the PaisaPay fees and PaisaPay should not be compulsary.

I will try to join you on the above given time.

Thanks,

[amitava123gems]

Dear Mr Murthy,
I forgot to mention in my earlier posting that items listed with ILF,shows at .com and not at .co.uk ..But I understand,you cant help,because that is policy of individual sites.The purpose of spending extra buck is lost.
Whereas,direct listing at .com shows at .co.uk by default.Who is to blame?In fact,none.That is again policy of individual ebay sites.
Snobbery may be.But that is part and parcel of individual policy of ebay sites.Who cares for indians!!!
Thanx,
Truly,
Amitava

[kotias]

Hello,
The launch of Global Easy Buy is totally based against the basic fundamentals on which ebay runs.

why has ebay bended this rules to such an extent ?
1. No Negative feedback can be left
2. No item significantly describe as disputes can be raised for any transaction ?
3. Item cannot be returned ?

ok international boundraises and custom formalities understood..but what abt FEEDBACKS , why cant a buyer express his buying experience here ???????

Pl explain.
Thks

[indconcepts]

Hello,

It's astonishing that any rule can be bent ..... where ever ebay feels so.

All basic ebay policies go for a toss ..... when revenue generation becomes the first priority.

Global EasyBuy may be affecting lots of Indian Sellers as money is being drained out to International Sellers.

Would like to know if similar arrangement is being made for Indian sellers also whereby they also have an opportunity to sell Internationally without the fear of Negative Feedback, Item loss and money loss.


Speaking on the other side ....

Global EasyBuy is the correct, legal and tension free way of doing Cross Border Trade in which ebay has an involvement on a large scale. (All legalities, International Laws, By-laws and Custom Duties are taken care off)

On the other hand most of the un-aware Indian Sellers are doing the Cross Border Trade illegally. (Here ebay tells us that they are not aware of any legalities involved and they only provide a platform for International trade) .


best regards

Umang Midha