COSMETICS BUSINESS LIVE
EBAY
MARKETPLACE Speaker Beth Alexander
THE RISE & IMPORTANCE OF THE
Marketplaces remain the number one and number two e-commerce websites in the UK. Not only that, but they’re both within the top ten most used websites in the UK, including the BBC’s and the government’s, which shows you the sheer scale of them. eBay has over 20 million buyers in the UK: 26 million to be
exact. That’s almost every household in the UK having an eBay account. We sell a make-up product every four seconds and 81
lipsticks every hour. If you are a brand or a retailer, I’d urge you to have a presence on a marketplace, if not now, then definitely in the next 12 months where we know it’s going to be a bit of a challenging environment. It is worth noting why marketplaces have grown so big. It goes without saying that the pandemic hit a few years ago. And because of that, we saw the high street shrink and online grow. But, ever since 2019, we’ve seen online grow every single year and across every single age group, so much so that 80% of the UK now shop online. As the pandemic hit, many small and medium businesses
struggled to get all their business online. It is hugely expensive and you need a lot of manpower. This is where marketplaces came into their own. It allowed them a really easy and cost- effective way to scale their business online versus getting their own website. Equally, it gave them a huge reach. So those small and medium businesses that came onto eBay UK during the pandemic, almost overnight, got a reach of 26 million buyers. Then there’s Gen Z. Gen Z is a digitally-native shopping tribe.
They have grown up with the worldwide web and they’ve never known a place without it. Because of this, they’ve really challenged the accessibility and the way of shopping online. That’s led to advancements within this. We saw the rise of mobile commerce and same day delivery
– and this is them [Gen Z] really pushing technology advancements in this area. But not only that, they have started to see consumption as a
form of their individual identity and a part of their social values. So they started to demand that brands and retailers live-up to the social values they affiliate themselves with. It wasn’t enough any more to just have a great product. You needed to really speak your values and what you stood for. Lastly, it goes without saying that everyone is very time poor,
so convenience is king. That’s where marketplaces come in: it is a one stop shop. More than 50% of marketplace shoppers shop because they can get everything under one roof versus going from website to website. So, in a nutshell, what are the benefits of a marketplace? On eBay you get instantly a huge global customer reach: 138 million customers straightaway. Not only that, but you get a full set of controls – you decide pricing and promotions – we are
cosmeticsbusiness.com
essentially a virtual high street. And not only that, you also get huge cost efficiencies versus scaling up your own website. On a marketplace there are so many different shopping
tribes and you can target your comms towards whoever you want to target. And if you have a store, you can target all your comms towards your followers. Equally, for buyers, they get an unparalleled amount of
choice. They get strong value – marketplaces are synonymous with value due to the sheer breadth of range that we have – and this is really important for UK shoppers who are very value-centric. And lastly, they get great functionality. One on eBay
specifically is, if you decide to purchase a luxe handbag or an expensive pair of trainers or watch, we have an authenticity guarantee service where we have a team that will check it is the real deal.
EBAY & SUSTAINABILITY The marketplace should be part of your sustainability agenda, if it is not already. We have partnered with some of the major UK brands on their sustainability agenda. Dyson, for example, has a hugely successful business on our
platform, where it has a really amazing refurb service. If there is a broken part, Dyson fixes it in its warehouse then it resells it on our platform with a year’s guarantee. It gives the buyer confidence when they’re going on eBay and buying a Dyson product. So, how are these marketplaces going to evolve? Well,
values are really taking centre stage; 40% of people now want to filter by values when they’re shopping by brand, or by product. They want to know what social cause it is giving to. So here at eBay, we listened
to what our shoppers were saying and we have created, with our small and medium businesses, a platform within eBay where people can shop by social cause based on what is really important to them, whether this be the environment, supporting women in business, etc.
December 2022 33
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80
