Fulfilment By EBAY?!! Amazon FBA’s Competitor MUST Get This Right If They Are To Compete

Kev recently got an Instagram message from Shawn, who says this...

"Rumours ebay are going to copy amazon fba. You heard anything? And will you take part?"

So, in this blog post, we are going to explore the ideas of Amazon FBA's biggest competitors. Going off of what Shawn said, back in 2019, Kev remembers seeing an article from eBay, saying eBay are going to launch their fulfilment service - fulfilled by eBay.

Here is the link if you would like to read this: eBay Article

Kev remembers at the time, thinking that is what eBay need to do, because Amazon FBA completely changed the landscape as we know, over the last decade they have just continued to scale, scale and scale, because they have changed the industry. Being able to take control of seller's shipments, and seller's orders in-house, it allowed Amazon to build their infrastructure, to offer that same-day delivery and next-day delivery. Amazon FBA has completely revolutionised the industry. 

Amazon VS eBay

Back in history, eBay was always the first choice. If you ever wanted to sell something online back in the past, the first option was always eBay. However, the problem with eBay was, you listed something, you listed an item which you wanted to sell, and when you got an order, you would have to go to the post office and ship it - this is why Amazon FBA was revolutionary - because you didn't have to do this anymore. As a seller, it then made sense to sell on Amazon, because the traffic on Amazon was insane. 

eBay had been sort of left behind over the last decade, as Amazon had continued to grow. 

Answering the Question

Kev remembers reading about eBay going to copy Amazon back in 2019, but it starts to ask a question a lot more significant, especially us as eCommerce and Amazon FBA sellers. Who can compete with Amazon long term? A company like eBay who has got the infrastructure, they have got the brand and people know about eBay. If they are ready to adjust and have their own fulfilment by eBay service, all of us would consider that, we would have a look what is involved in it, and we will diversify from Amazon onto eBay, especially if they do their fulfilment by eBay service. 

Amazon, as you know, they have always seen the customer as their number one priority - they do everything that you have seen in history, everything that comes from Amazon is all about the customer.

How can we provide the absolute best service possible for the customer each and every time; even if that is at a detrimental of Amazon themselves, or us as third-party sellers, whether that is refunds without question and the mentality of the customer is always right. 

What Is the Potential Of Amazon Long Term?

Amazon need to start changing their approach. What I mean by that is they need to start seeing sellers as customers, too. Us as sellers, we are also making Amazon money, and we are also supplying their products. A significant amount of Amazon's business is from third-party sellers, and the amount of third-party sellers coming onto the Amazon marketplace, we are customers of theirs. 

If they are not careful, Kev's thoughts are, they are very quick to make a change which hurts sellers, but is to the benefit of customers, or they are very quick to removing listings and to suspend Amazon seller central accounts. Amazon are also really quick to act where we are left scrambling, and if there is anything that is going to hurt them long term, it would be if there were a competitor, who could really understand the relationship between third-party sellers and see the same as a customer, being able to act with the balance of our sellers are customers, as well as the sellers are customers, and everything we do has to be in synergy, in terms of alignment to all parties. If this means, instead of being quick to make a policy change which affects absolutely everyone, being able to communicate a little more, explaining what is going to change and how it is going to affect the way you are going to sell long term. 

From an Amazon account management point of view, someone from Amazon are developing more resources to be able to communicate with us as sellers, and not just answer support questions etc, but actually selling questions - not just driving the price down or inactivating your listing because of pricing errors. 

If a competitor long term is able to get this right, whether it is eBay, Amazon or another company, then in Kev's personal opinion, Kev believes that it would have a significant pull from a large portion of Amazon sellers then they would be wanting to check out another marketplace. 

Further reading:
How To Recruit & Train Your Virtual Assistants

Should You Just Follow Others In Building Your Amazon FBA Business?

How to Find the Right Warehouse