The second month of 2015 was a tough one for online marketplace eBay, which saw its signature online auctions sales fall by 26.2 percent.
“Auctions are not convenient, and they’re really only good for a niche part in today’s e-commerce world,” ChannelAdvisor CEO Scot Wingo noted on the precipitously falling numbers. “This trend has been going on for quite a while where auctions are waning with consumers. As e-commerce has gone mainstream, people are less into it for treasure hunting.”
Wingo noted that the recent trend among shoppers online has been pointedly away from the deal-hunting type satisfaction that eBay auctions (and possibly online flash sales) bring to consumers. Instead it seems customers are opting for direct sales.
And direct sales have been more of a trend on eBay, where direct sales numbers were up by 8.6 percent.
However, with a same store sales rate of 5.5 percent, eBay missed ChannelAdvisors e-commerce growth rate baseline last month. The trend has seen more year-over-year sellers moving to Amazon, which offers fulfillment services that include free two-day shipping for Prime members.
