eBay Still Testing Feedback Changes
By: Ina Steiner
Fri Sept 18 2009 14:22:04
Remember back in May when the eBay blog interviewed Brian Burke about some new feedback tests? (Here's a link to the article which has a screenshot of one of the formats they were testing.)

Apparently eBay is still testing different feedback formats. An alert reader sent me a screenshot of something he encountered when leaving feedback today. At the top, it reads:

Try a different way to leave feedback
We've listened to you, and we're working hard to make Feedback more useful to buyers and sellers. By responding thoughtfully to these questions, you're giving us great insights that will help us improve. When you're done, you'll have the option to leave Feedback the regular way.



In May, Brian Burke said that the system eBay was testing would apply to both elements of the existing Feedback system, conventional Feedback and DSRs, but he said no changes were pending or planned for this year.


http://blog.auctionbytes.com/cgi-bin/blog/blog.pl?/comments/2009/9/1253298124.html


More tinkering. They must not be getting rid of the small sellers fast enough.

I don't know about that. Looks more to me like they are trying to guide buyers into leaving more useful responses by providing better guidance on the questions, maybe. I think for the above, more than just yes/no might be better, but then I tend to see all things in shades of grey.

Meg&Co let it go for so long that they must have realized they need to monitor the entire site better and see just whats going on. Under Whitman nothing happened but fee increases and an overall degradation of the site. Like it not, JD and his cohorts are trying to fix things, rather than letting it wither on the vine like Meg was. This kind of research and testing is critical.

CS

>I think for the above, more than just yes/no might be better, but then I tend to see all things in shades of grey.

Purple: Because you are a thinker. Congrats! No surprise here but worth a mention.

Only Zebras, real old movies, and daguerreotypes~often kinda silvery if held at an angle but that fact is unimportant now~ are black and white~ not even Good & Plenty candies are perfect: they injected those disgusting but pretty pinks.

Perhaps if they find a way to "hook" that "guidelines" screen to the related DSR scales it might improve things. DSRs and FB might become more useful and informative and fair if they ask a question rather than just say shipping 1-5 stars.

I wonder if they have one for communication and if it says anything like

Was the description complete and informative?
Was the item correctly classified?
Did you need to ask questions about this item?
Were your questions answered?
Did you enjoy using eBay's communication system?
Would you have preferred direct contact with your seller?

cohibastore.com wrote (View Post): › Meg&Co let it go for so long that they must have realized they need to monitor the entire site better and see just whats going on. Under Whitman nothing happened but fee increases and an overall degradation of the site. Like it not, JD and his cohorts are trying to fix things, rather than letting it wither on the vine like Meg was. This kind of research and testing is critical. CS

You forgetting all the "for security changes" that meg&Co and then Meg&Ho made to ebay. Looks like more of the same to me just changing the chant, as how will they get the big companies in if they keep going on about security problems, even if it is just to scam their users out of money?

I don't know about the yes no thing, I suppose the basic question a buyer should be asked has a yes no answer, and it would save all this carp.
Would you buy from them again?

The problem with that is they're still all subjective answers to questions that are easily quantifiable. It's the same basic problem that they've had since the DSR roll-out.

"7 days to receive item" would be more useful than "satisfied with the time" for example. $3.50 shipping media mail is more useful than "shipping cost is reasonable." These could simply be calculated from paypal data and paypal shipping (or additionally endicia/stamps.com/click&ship with minimal effort)

Very good points!

Quote: › Only Zebras, real old movies, and daguerreotypes~often kinda silvery if held at an angle but that fact is unimportant now~ are black and white

You left out Michael Jackson.

To me they are still missing the point totally or they are just proving the point that it is no more than more of the same of trying to make more out of their customers.

If you look at the last two questions on there, the one about well packed and the last about the cost.

The cost of shipping is on about how heavy, how far and size, but does not bring the how well packed into it. So they create a cost that is going to have to be added into the ebay charges realm.

It just seems that every time they do anything it is always in ebays favour