Question
Here's an article from StartupJournal.com about negative feedback on eBay and online:http://www.startupjournal.com/
How Online Retailers Go The Extra Mile for Clients
By SARAH E. NEEDLEMAN
In the world of online retailing, you can't see your customers, but you can hear them roar.
Online entrepreneurs running their own sites and sellers on auction sites, such as eBay.com and Overstock.com, are sometimes at the mercy of unsatisfied buyers who post critical comments about a product or sales transaction. On the auction sites, buyers rate sellers, and the scores are published with comments for anyone to see. Customers of single-site retailers can post negative comments on online newsgroups or blogs.
On the Internet, tales of customer dissatisfaction "can spread like the flu," says Tim Ferrante, co-owner of gameroommagazine.com, an online magazine-subscription and book retailer, and part-time eBay merchant in Land O' Lakes, Fla. "A dissatisfied buyer can go immediately to an online newsgroup and regale all participants with his horror story," he says.
Disputes sometimes can be resolved online. That's what happened in April 2004 when an irate customer of insound.com, an alternative-music sales site, posted a critical comment about the online retailer on a blog called randomlyhumming.com. The New York-based company posted a warm explanatory reply, which prompted the customer to write another comment apologizing for his original post.
Insound's president Matt Wishnow, 30, says he Googles his company name regularly to learn what people are saying about it online. He also gets feedback straight from buyers who sometimes send e-mail complaints about their purchases. After a customer-service representative replies with an apology e-mail, those same buyers often become loyal customers, he says. "The minute they get confronted by someone who is personable and wants to help them they turn in to jelly," he says.
Online-auction sellers also can apologize to unhappy customers, but sometimes the damage can't be repaired. After every sale on eBay, for example, buyers and sellers are asked to rate their dealings with the other person, plus offer a brief opinion. If a negative comment is posted, anyone considering a transaction with that buyer or seller can read it.
The ratings, called "feedback" scores, are all-important to many eBay users. The scores are cumulative and appear beside every eBay member's name, along with the number of transactions used to determine it.
A buyer leaving a negative rating risks receiving one back from the seller, or vice versa. Since the scores are cumulative, one negative rating won't do much to hurt the score of a member who had dozens of positive transactions. But it can destroy the rating of a member who's only made a few sales or purchases.
Mr. Ferrante always gives refunds to his eBay customers to keep his positive feedback score 100%. He's been selling his personal collection of entertainment memorabilia on the auction site since 1997. "Feedback is the foundation on which you can make any and all claims of credibility," he says. "It's your identity, your firewall." He estimates he loses about $200 a year in refunds to unhappy customers who buy from him on eBay and his personal Web site.
Some sellers find they can't avoid negative ratings, no matter how hard they try. Buyers new to the site and unaware of the importance of feedback are most likely to give negative ratings, says Jan Ovshani in Houston, who has been selling his original oil paintings on eBay since November 2003. In May 2004 he noticed a flaw on a $48 painting he was about to ship to a new eBay user. He couldn't send a replacement since the artwork was original, so he gave the buyer a full refund, including shipping fees, and apologized via e-mail. The customer, who had completed only three prior eBay transactions says Mr. Ovshani, never replied and left negative feedback, despite accepting the refund.
Mr. Ovshani, in turn, left the buyer negative feedback, which lowered the person's feedback score by 30%. Mr. Ovshani's score dropped by less than one percent and is now 99.5% based on 379 transactions. Negative feedback doesn't have to remain permanent on eBay. It has a mutual feedback-withdrawal service that allows buyers and sellers to remove feedback left for one another. Of course, both parties must participate for this to work. Mr. Ovshani asked his unhappy buyer to complete such a transaction, but the buyer didn't reply to his request, and the negative feedback stayed.
EBay also will remove negative feedback for buyers and sellers if the comment breaches its feedback policy because it contains obscenities, personal-contact information, links to other Web pages and other violations. eBay and other online-auction sellers and buyers who receive negative feedback also can use SquareTrade, an eBay company that helps merchants and buyers resolve disputes about sales transactions. The parties can work out their disagreement by using a password-protected tool to communicate online. A mediator with SquareTrade also may make recommendations on their dispute.
SquareTrade's fee for successfully resolving a complaint is $20. In some cases, SquareTrade will remove negative feedback if one party refuses to participate in the resolution process.
On eBay, buyers and sellers have 90 days to leave feedback. eBay seller Allison Burton-Parker in New York waits until the 90th day to post a negative rating about a nonpaying or "deadbeat" customer, hoping the person won't have time before the deadline to retaliate with a negative rating for her. Ms. Burton-Parker, 32, is an advertising executive who has been selling designer shoes and clothing part time on eBay since 1997.
When she receives a negative rating, she puts another comment about the person on her feedback page, but she says she isn't certain it's ever read. "Most people just look at the number of negatives you have. They don't necessarily scroll down and read comments showing the person was a deadbeat bidder," says Ms. Burton-Parker.
They mention the mediation process on eBay to get negs removed which, from my experience, is bs. I had a guy leave a neg for me by accident and he and I both sent eBay emails explaining what happened but eBay would not remove the neg unless we went through mediation. $20 and the time involved was not something my buyer was interested in so the neg is still there.
-y
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I believe they are also mistaken about the number of days to leave feedback. You can leave feedback for as long as the auction is in the system which can be 90 days or longer, unless they've changed this again recently.
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I don't understand - is there a real point to the article? Is it provide good customer service or else you could be negatively reviewed by an influential blogger? Your store is going to come up before any review of come up any way.
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I think the article helps to get seller to understand that they are now sellers with repercussions if they don't meet the customers expectations.
I have seen more than a few sellers who are having fun at eBay and selling but have no customer service skills.
Customer service is very important in keeping your business open.
I think the more new sellers are educated about how important great customer service is the more customers will be happy with purchases and fewer potential customers will be scared off by bad experiences.
I have heard seller stories of :
I'm not wasting a call to help out this person
All sales are final
Items packed in garbage
I only ship once a week
A number of customers come across these novice sellers and never return to e-commerce.
Then we all lose out.
with the internet not only does an unsatisfied customer tell his/her friends at lunch about a bad sales experience they get to tell a forum or chat room and let hundreds or thousands of potential customers know not to shop with a particular seller or internet company.
Hmm maybe I could expound on this theory and write an essay?
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Customer service works if you have the financial resources and people power. If you do not have the profit margin or time, you can still have a successful business without providing customer service. It depends on the kind of market you're and how you decide to compete. If you are in a high profit margin industry, customer service is everything. But if you compete in an industry that is driven by price, customer service is a factor but price is usually what people are after. One shoe doesn't fit all.
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tekgems- I think the point is that bad customer service can hurt you regardless of the type of business you're in. It's true that your site may come up in a search before some blog review but what if someone with a popular blog gives a negative review of your site. Anyone who reads that review will avoid your site. On the flip side, if the blog gives you a good review then you may get customers that never even did a search.
There are also sites like eopinions.com and bizrate.com that let people rate online retailers. It would probably not be good for your business to have a bad review on those sites.
Then there's eBay. I don't buy much off eBay but when I do I usually research the price elsewhere. I often find things cheaper on Amazon and I'm usually gonna go with a company that has a reputation to protect even if the price was a bit higher. But when I do buy things on eBay I actually read the feed back. If I see feedback like "Fast shipping..." or "excellent communication" I'll usually pay a bit more than a cheaper auction with less sparkling feedback.
My feedback on eBay has statements like "Super fast shippng", "Excellent customer service", "Finally, an honest seller on eBay" I think that helps my sales.
To Craftworks point, customer service does not have to take a lot of money. You don't necessarily need a receptionist and an 800 number. Simple things like follow up emails, quick shipping in proper packaging and occasionaly kissing up to a problem customer can really make a difference.
Also, some customers like to get a rise out of sellers and a syrupy response thanking them for their kind letter can really iritate them
-y
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I feel that I provide excellent service and spend virtually nothing to do it - except my time. I check my email at least every hour, and I ship within 48 hours of receiving payment - usually the next day and sometimes the same day if payment arrives before the postman does.<p>If a buyer is unhappy for some reason, I do my best to make it right - frequently all they want is to be heard.
<p>Selling online is my full-time job, so I consider it nothing more than doing my job to be on hand to answer emails, solve problems, package carefully & ship promptly.<p>I have had many buyers tell me specifically that they appreciate my fast response to emails. As a buyer - that is the number one area where I feel online sellers fall short. I have sent multiple emails to one of my vendors, attempting to place an order. She hasn't returned my messages, and has lost my business as a result. <p>The purpose of the article I think, was to point out that even though online sellers can act fairly "anonymously", they are still subject to customer complaints and their repercussions.