eBay invite.........

[bimm_corp]

Received an email (not through eBay's email system) with an invite to join a live webinar about joining "eBay US Customer Support Services". Email was titled "Earn money helping other sellers on eBay". Went to the link in the email and the page appeared legit. Anyone else get this email? TIA.

[valueaddedresource]

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@mcdougle4248 wrote:

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@nuclearomen wrote:

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I don't see how, how many people really need help making a listing? Is it really that hard? Maybe just me, this whole thing is just silly. But hey, if it works and helps, then fine, whatever, great. 

---

@nuclearomen  that was my thought as well.  It seems to me that most of the complaints we see about the listing process have more to do with it being a tedious process, or some technical issue that makes it not work right or something like that - not necessarily that people don't understand how the listing form is supposed to work or the "best practices" that eBay is already pointing sellers to on the form itself or their existing help pages.

Maybe there is a great need for the kind of hand holding through the listing process this program will provide and we just don't typically see that as much here in the community? Having that help available directly from the listing form might give some interesting insights into exactly what kind of obstacles and friction points sellers face in the listing process.

---

I wonder whether or not the introduction of the "New Listing Form" will generate questions and requests for help.  I don't have the new version available yet on my account, so have no pro or con thoughts regarding the ease of use.  A few other posters have indicated that they do not like it at all and find it cumbersome and not user friendly at all.  

ETA:  I registered for the program.  Curiosity got the best of me 🤔 

---

@mcdougle4248  that's a good point.  I haven't experienced the new form yet either but have heard similar "reviews" from those who have.

You are right that it will probably create questions and requests for help.  That does cause me to wonder though.....what happens if the seller asking the question is using/looking at a different listing form than the Expert has seen before? 🤔

And going further than that since presumably the intent is to eventually expand this program to other topics, if eBay is going to continue with "phased rollouts of new experiences" without announcements (like we've seen with MP), how can the Experts stay on top of the game and make sure they are giving relevant answers when what the new seller may be looking at or experiencing is something completely different than the Expert may have experienced?

Good luck with the program and I hope it satisfies your curiosity.  😊 Hopefully they expand available topics quickly - I think that is going to be critical for keeping Experts engaged, both from the perspective of it not getting boring and also from the perspective of offering enough opportunities to make the potential rewards worth the time and effort.

[dhbookds]

I registered for the program. Curiosity got the best of me

Good for you.........!!!

So much neg speculation, I was afraid it would scare people off.....  I would have also, if I'd been asked, lol

[mcdougle4248]

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@mcdougle4248 wrote:

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@nuclearomen wrote:

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I don't see how, how many people really need help making a listing? Is it really that hard? Maybe just me, this whole thing is just silly. But hey, if it works and helps, then fine, whatever, great. 

---

@nuclearomen  that was my thought as well.  It seems to me that most of the complaints we see about the listing process have more to do with it being a tedious process, or some technical issue that makes it not work right or something like that - not necessarily that people don't understand how the listing form is supposed to work or the "best practices" that eBay is already pointing sellers to on the form itself or their existing help pages.

Maybe there is a great need for the kind of hand holding through the listing process this program will provide and we just don't typically see that as much here in the community? Having that help available directly from the listing form might give some interesting insights into exactly what kind of obstacles and friction points sellers face in the listing process.

---

I wonder whether or not the introduction of the "New Listing Form" will generate questions and requests for help.  I don't have the new version available yet on my account, so have no pro or con thoughts regarding the ease of use.  A few other posters have indicated that they do not like it at all and find it cumbersome and not user friendly at all.  

ETA:  I registered for the program.  Curiosity got the best of me 🤔 

---

@mcdougle4248  that's a good point.  I haven't experienced the new form yet either but have heard similar "reviews" from those who have.

You are right that it will probably create questions and requests for help.  That does cause me to wonder though.....what happens if the seller asking the question is using/looking at a different listing form than the Expert has seen before? 🤔

And going further than that since presumably the intent is to eventually expand this program to other topics, if eBay is going to continue with "phased rollouts of new experiences" without announcements (like we've seen with MP), how can the Experts stay on top of the game and make sure they are giving relevant answers when what the new seller may be looking at or experiencing is something completely different than the Expert may have experienced?

Good luck with the program and I hope it satisfies your curiosity.  😊 Hopefully they expand available topics quickly - I think that is going to be critical for keeping Experts engaged, both from the perspective of it not getting boring and also from the perspective of offering enough opportunities to make the potential rewards worth the time and effort.

---

Your points are valid and I have been thinking along these line, too.  If the question is outside the area of expertise, I guess that is when the Expert would click on the Pass button on the question or refer it CS chat if the question is account specific.  

[go-bad-chicken]

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@mcdougle4248 wrote:

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@mcdougle4248 wrote:

---

@valueaddedresource wrote:

---

@nuclearomen wrote:

---

---

I don't see how, how many people really need help making a listing? Is it really that hard? Maybe just me, this whole thing is just silly. But hey, if it works and helps, then fine, whatever, great. 

---

@nuclearomen  that was my thought as well.  It seems to me that most of the complaints we see about the listing process have more to do with it being a tedious process, or some technical issue that makes it not work right or something like that - not necessarily that people don't understand how the listing form is supposed to work or the "best practices" that eBay is already pointing sellers to on the form itself or their existing help pages.

Maybe there is a great need for the kind of hand holding through the listing process this program will provide and we just don't typically see that as much here in the community? Having that help available directly from the listing form might give some interesting insights into exactly what kind of obstacles and friction points sellers face in the listing process.

---

I wonder whether or not the introduction of the "New Listing Form" will generate questions and requests for help.  I don't have the new version available yet on my account, so have no pro or con thoughts regarding the ease of use.  A few other posters have indicated that they do not like it at all and find it cumbersome and not user friendly at all.  

ETA:  I registered for the program.  Curiosity got the best of me 🤔 

---

@mcdougle4248  that's a good point.  I haven't experienced the new form yet either but have heard similar "reviews" from those who have.

You are right that it will probably create questions and requests for help.  That does cause me to wonder though.....what happens if the seller asking the question is using/looking at a different listing form than the Expert has seen before? 🤔

And going further than that since presumably the intent is to eventually expand this program to other topics, if eBay is going to continue with "phased rollouts of new experiences" without announcements (like we've seen with MP), how can the Experts stay on top of the game and make sure they are giving relevant answers when what the new seller may be looking at or experiencing is something completely different than the Expert may have experienced?

Good luck with the program and I hope it satisfies your curiosity.  😊 Hopefully they expand available topics quickly - I think that is going to be critical for keeping Experts engaged, both from the perspective of it not getting boring and also from the perspective of offering enough opportunities to make the potential rewards worth the time and effort.

---

Your points are valid and I have been thinking along these line, too.  If the question is outside the area of expertise, I guess that is when the Expert would click on the Pass button on the question or refer it CS chat if the question is account specific.  

---

I'm curious to know how that will work exactly. If as you say you click pass and a new seller is sitting there at their desktop waiting for an answer, is their question immediately passed to another waiting Expert Seller for their turn at trying to answer a new seller's question? Or is that new seller left to their own devices if another Expert Seller is not currently available at that time?

I do realize that its early days and that you probably do not have an actual answer right now but do check in from time to time and let us know how its going. Best of luck with the program, I wish for you nothing but great success.

[divwido]

I received one, but then we were told that the meeting wasn't set up for people from California, so I decided it was a giant waste of my time.

[valueaddedresource]

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@divwido wrote:

I received one, but then we were told that the meeting wasn't set up for people from California, so I decided it was a giant waste of my time.

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@divwido that's very interesting.  Only thing I can think of is maybe something to do with California's AB5 "gig worker law"?

I'll admit I'm not super familiar with it outside of some of the news articles I've seen about it, mostly in regard to Uber, Lyft, etc.

[go-bad-chicken]

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@divwido wrote:

I received one, but then we were told that the meeting wasn't set up for people from California, so I decided it was a giant waste of my time.

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Are you saying that sellers located in California can not attend? Do I understand you correctly?

[valueaddedresource]

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@go-bad-chicken wrote:

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@mcdougle4248 wrote:

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@mcdougle4248 wrote:

---

@valueaddedresource wrote:

---

@nuclearomen wrote:

---

---

I don't see how, how many people really need help making a listing? Is it really that hard? Maybe just me, this whole thing is just silly. But hey, if it works and helps, then fine, whatever, great. 

---

@nuclearomen  that was my thought as well.  It seems to me that most of the complaints we see about the listing process have more to do with it being a tedious process, or some technical issue that makes it not work right or something like that - not necessarily that people don't understand how the listing form is supposed to work or the "best practices" that eBay is already pointing sellers to on the form itself or their existing help pages.

Maybe there is a great need for the kind of hand holding through the listing process this program will provide and we just don't typically see that as much here in the community? Having that help available directly from the listing form might give some interesting insights into exactly what kind of obstacles and friction points sellers face in the listing process.

---

I wonder whether or not the introduction of the "New Listing Form" will generate questions and requests for help.  I don't have the new version available yet on my account, so have no pro or con thoughts regarding the ease of use.  A few other posters have indicated that they do not like it at all and find it cumbersome and not user friendly at all.  

ETA:  I registered for the program.  Curiosity got the best of me 🤔 

---

@mcdougle4248  that's a good point.  I haven't experienced the new form yet either but have heard similar "reviews" from those who have.

You are right that it will probably create questions and requests for help.  That does cause me to wonder though.....what happens if the seller asking the question is using/looking at a different listing form than the Expert has seen before? 🤔

And going further than that since presumably the intent is to eventually expand this program to other topics, if eBay is going to continue with "phased rollouts of new experiences" without announcements (like we've seen with MP), how can the Experts stay on top of the game and make sure they are giving relevant answers when what the new seller may be looking at or experiencing is something completely different than the Expert may have experienced?

Good luck with the program and I hope it satisfies your curiosity.  😊 Hopefully they expand available topics quickly - I think that is going to be critical for keeping Experts engaged, both from the perspective of it not getting boring and also from the perspective of offering enough opportunities to make the potential rewards worth the time and effort.

---

Your points are valid and I have been thinking along these line, too.  If the question is outside the area of expertise, I guess that is when the Expert would click on the Pass button on the question or refer it CS chat if the question is account specific.  

---

I'm curious to know how that will work exactly. If as you say you click pass and a new seller is sitting there at their desktop waiting for an answer, is their question immediately passed to another waiting Expert Seller for their turn at trying to answer a new seller's question? Or is that new seller left to their own devices if another Expert Seller is not currently available at that time?

I do realize that its early days and that you probably do not have an actual answer right now but do check in from time to time and let us know how its going. Best of luck with the program, I wish for you nothing but great success.

---

@go-bad-chicken  in general, after going through just the initial onboarding stuff, it looks to me like this is more of a "ticket system" than a "live chat" system.

The UK case study was showing they are averaging < 3 minute response times, so it doesn't sound like sellers are waiting too long for responses - though of course that doesn't give a lot of detail.  That could just be time it takes to get a response that says something to the effect of "let me look into this further"?

[no_zero369]

@mam98031 

Is one correct to take it from your posts and apparent knowledge of the program, that you are one of the developers? Have had input from the mentor chair or are one of the early adapters/enrollees?

Inquiring minds wanna know???? 😋 😁😍 🤔 😇👍

[no_zero369]

@valueaddedresource 

eh, I'm going the other way with this.

Helping people list things is one thing, making successful sellers is another.  Sure helping "anyone" be able to list items is of value to eBay.  Boosts the numbers for investors - GMV listed on site and perhaps GMV sold.

But you are setting sellers up for failure if you do  not "force" them to read and understand the MBG!  If they do not understand how to set up their "business" in regards to returns, etc. then helping the less capable list is nothing more than leading sheep to slaughter.

Most of what we deal with as Community volunteers has nothing to do with the listing form and everything to do with "selling."  There is such a universal blindness of that fact that selling on eBay IS a Business and needs to be treated as such.   Teaching someone to list is kinda cruel if they aren't capable of it independently and you aren't going to give them the requisite tools.

I mean we have a thread here that keeps going over something as minor as recognizing selling is income and a taxable event.  But yet we want to make it easier to list?

[glasser]

eBay has done something like this several times over the years in different forms.

Raise you hand if you remember eBay University. eBay had experts (both employees and others who had written books or eBay or were known on other ways) travel the country and conduct day long seminars for beginners and seasoned sellers. It was actually quite a good program and allowed users to actually personally interact with eBay.

They then morphed that into basically licensing others to be trained and deliver the curriculum in the hopes they would make a business out of training folks on eBay. Thinks that's long gone.

They also did eBay Live! for several years and as educational program/ trade show. Well attended.

If you know eBay history you know the first customer support person taken on as eBay employee was someone who was doing a fantastic job helping people on the boards. Bonus point if you can name that person. 

Customer services is always seen as loss center. An expense with no revenue. I think that's a mistake. Seller and buyer success on eBay is in the companies best interest. Proper investments in education and CS will yield better results for everyone and the shareholders too.

Instead of reaching out to people to answer questions, why not hire some experts (who obviously they don't their CS folks are) to either participate in training CS folks or in full time well paying jobs. Expertise is worth something. More than $1.20 a question. It's not the time to answer the question, it's how much time invested in gaining the expertise.  If they need this expertise so badly, pay up. 

[no_zero369]

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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The UK case study was showing they are averaging < 3 minute response times, so it doesn't sound like sellers are waiting too long for responses - though of course that doesn't give a lot of detail.  That could just be time it takes to get a response that says something to the effect of "let me look into this further"?

---

Not waiting too long?  3 minutes is a LIFETIME to the 'want it now", everything is on the 'net, ADD types that dominate society these days.  After 35 seconds of waiting they' be off to look for answers on ASK or some other SM.

[go-bad-chicken]

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@go-bad-chicken wrote:

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@mcdougle4248 wrote:

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@mcdougle4248 wrote:

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@nuclearomen wrote:

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I don't see how, how many people really need help making a listing? Is it really that hard? Maybe just me, this whole thing is just silly. But hey, if it works and helps, then fine, whatever, great. 

---

@nuclearomen  that was my thought as well.  It seems to me that most of the complaints we see about the listing process have more to do with it being a tedious process, or some technical issue that makes it not work right or something like that - not necessarily that people don't understand how the listing form is supposed to work or the "best practices" that eBay is already pointing sellers to on the form itself or their existing help pages.

Maybe there is a great need for the kind of hand holding through the listing process this program will provide and we just don't typically see that as much here in the community? Having that help available directly from the listing form might give some interesting insights into exactly what kind of obstacles and friction points sellers face in the listing process.

---

I wonder whether or not the introduction of the "New Listing Form" will generate questions and requests for help.  I don't have the new version available yet on my account, so have no pro or con thoughts regarding the ease of use.  A few other posters have indicated that they do not like it at all and find it cumbersome and not user friendly at all.  

ETA:  I registered for the program.  Curiosity got the best of me 🤔 

---

@mcdougle4248  that's a good point.  I haven't experienced the new form yet either but have heard similar "reviews" from those who have.

You are right that it will probably create questions and requests for help.  That does cause me to wonder though.....what happens if the seller asking the question is using/looking at a different listing form than the Expert has seen before? 🤔

And going further than that since presumably the intent is to eventually expand this program to other topics, if eBay is going to continue with "phased rollouts of new experiences" without announcements (like we've seen with MP), how can the Experts stay on top of the game and make sure they are giving relevant answers when what the new seller may be looking at or experiencing is something completely different than the Expert may have experienced?

Good luck with the program and I hope it satisfies your curiosity.  😊 Hopefully they expand available topics quickly - I think that is going to be critical for keeping Experts engaged, both from the perspective of it not getting boring and also from the perspective of offering enough opportunities to make the potential rewards worth the time and effort.

---

Your points are valid and I have been thinking along these line, too.  If the question is outside the area of expertise, I guess that is when the Expert would click on the Pass button on the question or refer it CS chat if the question is account specific.  

---

I'm curious to know how that will work exactly. If as you say you click pass and a new seller is sitting there at their desktop waiting for an answer, is their question immediately passed to another waiting Expert Seller for their turn at trying to answer a new seller's question? Or is that new seller left to their own devices if another Expert Seller is not currently available at that time?

I do realize that its early days and that you probably do not have an actual answer right now but do check in from time to time and let us know how its going. Best of luck with the program, I wish for you nothing but great success.

---

@go-bad-chicken  in general, after going through just the initial onboarding stuff, it looks to me like this is more of a "ticket system" than a "live chat" system.

The UK case study was showing they are averaging < 3 minute response times, so it doesn't sound like sellers are waiting too long for responses - though of course that doesn't give a lot of detail.  That could just be time it takes to get a response that says something to the effect of "let me look into this further"?

---

I am wondering for the sake of the new seller if this will  be a potential point of friction/bottle neck, with them attempting to learn through the world flow of the listing form?

And who knows I may end up being the new seller enlisting Expert Sellers like @mcdougle4248 when it comes to using the new listing form. 😄

[mcdougle4248]

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@go-bad-chicken wrote:

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@mcdougle4248 wrote:

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@mcdougle4248 wrote:

---

@valueaddedresource wrote:

---

@nuclearomen wrote:

---

---

I don't see how, how many people really need help making a listing? Is it really that hard? Maybe just me, this whole thing is just silly. But hey, if it works and helps, then fine, whatever, great. 

---

@nuclearomen  that was my thought as well.  It seems to me that most of the complaints we see about the listing process have more to do with it being a tedious process, or some technical issue that makes it not work right or something like that - not necessarily that people don't understand how the listing form is supposed to work or the "best practices" that eBay is already pointing sellers to on the form itself or their existing help pages.

Maybe there is a great need for the kind of hand holding through the listing process this program will provide and we just don't typically see that as much here in the community? Having that help available directly from the listing form might give some interesting insights into exactly what kind of obstacles and friction points sellers face in the listing process.

---

I wonder whether or not the introduction of the "New Listing Form" will generate questions and requests for help.  I don't have the new version available yet on my account, so have no pro or con thoughts regarding the ease of use.  A few other posters have indicated that they do not like it at all and find it cumbersome and not user friendly at all.  

ETA:  I registered for the program.  Curiosity got the best of me 🤔 

---

@mcdougle4248  that's a good point.  I haven't experienced the new form yet either but have heard similar "reviews" from those who have.

You are right that it will probably create questions and requests for help.  That does cause me to wonder though.....what happens if the seller asking the question is using/looking at a different listing form than the Expert has seen before? 🤔

And going further than that since presumably the intent is to eventually expand this program to other topics, if eBay is going to continue with "phased rollouts of new experiences" without announcements (like we've seen with MP), how can the Experts stay on top of the game and make sure they are giving relevant answers when what the new seller may be looking at or experiencing is something completely different than the Expert may have experienced?

Good luck with the program and I hope it satisfies your curiosity.  😊 Hopefully they expand available topics quickly - I think that is going to be critical for keeping Experts engaged, both from the perspective of it not getting boring and also from the perspective of offering enough opportunities to make the potential rewards worth the time and effort.

---

Your points are valid and I have been thinking along these line, too.  If the question is outside the area of expertise, I guess that is when the Expert would click on the Pass button on the question or refer it CS chat if the question is account specific.  

---

I'm curious to know how that will work exactly. If as you say you click pass and a new seller is sitting there at their desktop waiting for an answer, is their question immediately passed to another waiting Expert Seller for their turn at trying to answer a new seller's question? Or is that new seller left to their own devices if another Expert Seller is not currently available at that time?

I do realize that its early days and that you probably do not have an actual answer right now but do check in from time to time and let us know how its going. Best of luck with the program, I wish for you nothing but great success.

---

My understanding is that if I select PASS on a question, the question is still available for other Experts to respond to.  There is a tick down timer on each question, so it appears as though there is a limited time (I saw 5 minutes during the webinar) to respond, so not to keep the seller waiting on an answer.  If the question is outside of the topic we are allowed to answer, we can select FORWORD which will refer the seller to CS.

[nuclearomen]

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@nuclearomen wrote:

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@go-bad-chicken wrote:

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Exactly!

As @acc756 posted above

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All that is based off a notion that would imply $1.20 is what would be paid out...the truth is that $1.20 is the maximum that would be paid out, not a guaranteed amount. It's stated as up to $1.20 per answered question... what it fails to mention is a minimal, which potentially means could be $0.01. I highly doubt anyone will be making $14+ an hour "helping" people in this program, in fact, it's absurd to even enlighten the notion of it. Sure people will make some pocket change, but the reality is no one will put in that time to make anything worth mentioning... if they do I feel sad for them when they can be devoting that time to making 3000% more just selling or working a normal job. 

Help being limited to making a listing doesn't leave much room for need for this program either, hate to say it, but if one can't figure out how to make a listing, especially with the simplified tool, maybe they shouldn't be selling at all...it's pretty self explanatory to begin with. Even if they can't, I have no interest to hold their hand in an age many people don't even know how to address an envelope. 

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@nuclearomen  @go-bad-chicken - I caught the "up to" language as well on that initial registration page.  Interestingly though, if you go through the onboarding/quizzes, the "up to" is not there.  Here's one example, but throughout this whole section, every reference is to $1.20, not "up to".

It will be interesting to see which one of those is correct. 🤔

---

@valueaddedresource I didn't go through the onboarding, but yes, the initial page at signed up did use the "up too" language. One issue I seen immediately when I got the first invite for webinar was the extreme lack of information, basically a mail saying a new program and a link that brought you to sign up. That was one part of my decision to cancel the registration I submitted. Knowing how ebay is on "information" this wasn't exactly a surprise, yet how do you expect people to commit to something with ZERO information? Further, that email contained direct email to brian burke - which I mailed and asked for more info...never got a response... again, no surprise. However, I still feel that the idea someone will make $14+ an hour doing this is rather far fetched and likely misleading. Like I said, people will make some money sure, wouldn't count it as solid income though.