Should Google Buy eBay?

by: NetWatch

This has actually come up before, most recently a couple of months back during the Icahn-eBay standoff. What's surprising is that Google hasn't entered the auction and BIN market. They already have everything in place- the deep pockets, the search capabilities, it would be a natural. Why haven't they done it yet?

by: COH

Only if they throw out ALL top management - IMMDIATELY upon signing the dotted line.

I'd rather Google (OR ANYONE!!) create a NEW 'eBay' and replicate the eBay of old.  They way eBay is now, just a new owner won't change anything - EVERYTHING will have to be fixed in the software, search engine, etc.  It would be MUCH easier to just start a new marketplace that is RESTRICTED to collectibles/antiques/OOAKs ONLY and has a robust, viable Auction model.  I want a site that REPLICATES what eBay started out as.  When sales were hot, and it was known as the Online Garage Sale.

Drop Shippers and sellers of new stuff have LOTS of other resources to utilize.

Hell - I wish eBay would just spin off the collectibles to their OWN site.  Can you imagine the Live Auctions they are brining back??  HA HA!  They said they aren't even going to place the Live Auctions in a special area - just pepper them in with everything else on the site- including the millions of chinese entries.  Good luck with THAT, Invaluable!

by: Puck

''Would you dare eat Soylent for two weeks?''

I'd be afraid that some Stanford MBAs would decide to improve ROI and begin making it out of dead people.

by: Philip Cohen

Clearly, the eBay supplied “PreyPal” pie charts indicate that although >30% of PayPal’s revenue comes from eBay transactions, ~50% of PreyPal’s profit comes therefrom (that is, on-eBay transactions are more than twice as profitable as off-eBay transactions), indicating that PayPal’s off-eBay operations are problematic, as one might expect from such a clunky operator when it has to stand on its own feet—at places like Home Depot—LOL …

http://www.ecommercebytes.com/cab/abn/y14/m05/i14/s01

So, much of the “value” of PayPal is reliant on and indeed forever “locked up” in eBay transactions. Outside of eBay, “PreyPal” is problematic; regardless, eBay and “PreyPal” are indeed an ideally suited couple, and should be allowed to keep each other company on their journey to the sewage farm …

Regardless, do all these analysts not realise that “PreyPal”—and all the other pretenders: Amazon, Apple, Google, et al—are little or no more than Credit Card Merchant Account operators (via their own retail bankers), as are the great majority of the retail merchants of the world? Google could get into “payments” for their own operations just easily as Apple and Amazon have done, simply as a credit card merchant, without wasting their money on buying all the problems that come with the clunky “PreyPal” or, heaven forbid, eBay …

eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking ... http://bit.ly/11F2eas

by: juliawww

LOL Puck...what makes you think it isn't made out of dead people? (That is a joke!! Please, anyone reading take note..a joke).

Netwatch you have a sharp eye...Ina was one of the ones who wrote about it; I found this post by her after I wrote this one: "Would eBay Improve Under Google Ownership?" http://www.ecommercebytes.com/C/blog/blog.pl?/pl/2013/7/1372726713.htm
l

by: juliawww

Another thought...I was pondering if it would be awkward for Google to create such an entity from scratch, only because in the beginning it would basically be a small marketplace, and then need to grow from there...but they could call it ''Google Garage''... or how about GBay lol? GSale?  

by: COH

'Fleagoole'.  (Flea Market Google...)

'Boogle' or 'Boogoogle' (Boot sale Google for the UK market!)

'Gargoole' (garage sale Google, complete with cute Gargoyle mascot!)

'Swapoogle'  (Swap meet Google)

'Bidoogle' (Auctions On Google)

You can see I have thought about this a LOT.

by: JoyfulA

Google makes billions from its ads. If it ran its own marketplace, eBay or otherwise, wouldn't it be in competition (or seem that way) to its ad buyers? Auctions, OOAKs, maybe antiques might seem OK, but BINs? They wouldn't want to risk killing the goose laying the golden eggs.

Google did have a payment system for a while but dropped it.

by: tb

Google certainly has deep pockets, and don't get me wrong, eBay is as evil as they come, but would you really trust your business to Google? They almost never finish anything. Many things they start then abruptly end (Google Checkout).

You think it's hard getting anyone to understand your question at eBay? See if you can even CALL anyone at Google! For Checkout's short existence, they have never had a number to call for assistance.

Google? No thanks. Amazon? I can maybe see them doing a better job than Google.

by: elpereles

If Google buys eBay. It will be the same attitude. eBay needs powerful competition no other manager.  

by: juliawww

Tb interesting idea re amazon. Hm I don't know. ebay is still different enough from amazon; I feel like it's better to sell x on azon and y on ebay. I think it's good for sellers to have apples and oranges. (Nice metaphors lol). That's assuming amazon wouldn't dismantle ebay too much.

Maybe you can't get the phone answered at google because the employees are in a nap pod or getting a massage. ;)  

by: comet

@JULIA--

The reason you can't get a phone call answered at Google is--they apparently do not HAVE phones.  OR--at least not ones the PUBLIC can access to CALL them.  Just TRY finding a phone number ANYWHERE on Google or elsewhere FOR Google--better then I have tried and failed.

They must have SOME way of communicating with their ad placers but for the REST of us--not so much.

At least--I cannot BELIEVE I am even THINKING this---ebay has a half assed Customer "Service" division.  It doesn't WORK well but it is there and sometimes the stars align and our needs get met.  Rarely.

I see Google buying ebay as just about as healthy as Time-Warner and Comcast---incest is illegal still right? Didn't we force the BREAK UP of Ma Bell for the EXACT reason we CANNOT let TW and CC get together?  

Not to mention that I expect ebay would just be a "Jewel in the Crown"  and left to it's own devices with the SAME BOD and CEO etc. If I thought for one minute that they would take on the PROBLEMS endemic at ebay---yes that I could get on board with.  As is--nope!

Ebay NEEDS  robust competition from at LEAST one other site preferably more than one.  However they have sued and squashed and bullied MOST other sites to their untimely deaths.  And BONANZA and the other "Auctions"  sites--well there is deafening SILENCE from them as far as advertising and driving CUSTOMERS to their sites.  The ONLY place I have EVER seen advertising from was Ruby Lane---which sells higher end items that are nice but spendy---and even there I have seen little lately.  

Bonanza
Ebay
eCrater
11 Main

Where are they now?  Do they attract YOUR attention as a buyer OR a seller? Have you EVER seen any kind of promotion of them?

Nope?

Anyone?

Hello?  

by: Rexford

Careful what you wish for.  There are a lot of young "gotta make my mark" MBAs at Google too. I am finding these days that the bigger and more powerful a company is, the more arrogant their management is.  

As for Google, isn't that where Stephanie Tilenius went to work, with eBay's playbook in hand?

by: wallflower

Google may be even stricter than ebay. Wouldn't want that.

by: Moonwishes

>>Should Google buy ebay?<<

Goodness no, the internet might implode!

by: Moonwishes

>>Bonanza
Ebay
eCrater
11 Main

Where are they now?  Do they attract YOUR attention as a buyer OR a seller? Have you EVER seen any kind of promotion of them?<<

@comet - I'm an ecrater seller with over 4000 orders to my credit, so yes it has attracted my attention. From the get go there we were told we had to do our own promoting. Which I do. Which is why I most likely have the sales I do while others at times whine and complain about lack of sales on ecrater and some of the other venues. I think many sites wanted to be like the ORIGINAL ebay, not the MBA destroyed ebay.

by: Rexford

Love moonwishes term "MBA destroyed eBay".

So true.

by: FREDDY

I would see major problems if Google purchased ebay.  Also, why would google spend billions to acquire ebay. ebay that is sinking fast so why invest in the Titanic???

The other sites, Amazon, etsy, Bonanza ecrater etc. will pick up the customers of ebay. They have been doing it slowly for some time now. What the lame brains at ebay does not realize is that where you sell items and make money from is where you will also be buying stuff from. Obvious with the ploys of ebay that the are hurting for legit buyers, but they never can figure out the sellers are also main buyers. When ebay ''upsets'' its sellers, they just lost buyers in addition.  I don't think you need an MBA to figure that out.  

by: iheartjacksparrow

Should Google buy eBay? No. The problem I see is that eBay now has such a bad reputation among sellers, and a lot of buyers, that the name eBay is going to be forever attached to the JD-run eBay of today. If Google started a new site it would take a while to become competition for eBay, but eBay didn't start as the mega-million-dollar monster it is now. With Google's capability for advertising, and incentives, maybe free listings for six months or a year if you're one of the charter member sellers, I do think they would be eBay competition quite quickly.

In closing I would like to state: SOYLENT GREEN IS PEOPLE!

by: Mr. Me

NO! eBay is JUNK..... Google should build their own venue, free of eBays stench!