eBay Courts Private UK Sellers For Media Spotlight With Paid Case Study Opportunity
eBay is looking to recruit private sellers in the UK for a paid case study and opportunity to share their selling journey through eBay’s marketing channels and media outlets.
The company put the call out on LinkedIn recently, saying "Every sale has a story. What’s yours? We’re calling on eBay sellers everywhere to share their journeys! The hustle, the highlights and the lessons learned."
The post linked to a Google form for sellers to fill out for their chance to be featured in future eBay marketing campaigns and media placements, managed by global communications and PR firm Edelman.
Share Your eBay Selling Story
We want to shine a light on the incredible people behind eBay’s seller community. Do you use eBay to fund your passions, support your hobbies, or save for meaningful milestones like moving into a new home or planning a wedding? We’d love to hear your story!By sharing your journey, you could feature on eBay’s marketing channels and with media outlets who celebrate people successfully selling online.
If this sounds like you, complete the short form below for the chance to be selected as a paid case study. We’ll be in touch if your story is a fit for any upcoming opportunities...
...These opportunities are paid, and the team at Edelman will also manage this process with you...
...By completing this form, it is not guaranteed that we will use your story for this project. This opportunity is only open to Private Sellers on eBay.
In addition to requesting name, city, and seller ID, sellers who wish to be considered for this opportunity are asked to answer questions like:
- How long have you been selling on eBay?
- What kinds of items do you typically sell on eBay?
- To your best estimate, how many items have you sold on eBay?
- How much have you earned on eBay? (Total or monthly average)
- What has been your biggest or most suprising sale?
- Are there any hobbies, activities or life milestones you've funded from money made on eBay?
While the form itself does not specify if sellers must be in the UK to qualify, the LinkedIn post being shared only on the eBay UK profile and the fact that eBay has a lot riding on the success of their Consumer to Consumer (C2C)/private seller initiatives make it clear that UK sellers are at least the main intended target of this offer.
UK sellers cheered when eBay announced they were getting rid of selling fees for private sales last year, but they quickly discovered that "fee-free" selling didn't exactly come without a cost as payouts were slowed, usage of Simple Delivery managed shipping became mandatory for most items, and buyers have balked at paying Buyer Protection Fees, especially on lower priced items.
eBay has been forced to tacitly address at least some of the pushback they've received from private sellers on these issues, recently expanding opt out for Simple Delivery for certain items priced at £20 or less as well as restoring faster payment processing times to qualifying private sellers and tweaking the Buyer Protection Fee calculation with updates to lower costs particularly for lower value items under £20.
Liz Morton
As an example of just how vocal sellers have been about these issues, you can find many posts in the eBay UK community forum with hundreds of responses airing complaints and concerns about how these policies have impacted private selling on the platform - not to mention the many posts which have been unfairly censored and removed.
Liz Morton
In that light, it's clear eBay is looking for positive private seller "stories" in an effort to do some damage control with this Edelman managed PR campaign and it will be interesting to see if eBay discloses in the resulting marketing and media placements that participants in the case study will have been paid for their participation.
If not, it wouldn't be the first time the company blurred ethical lines with paid promotions.
Liz Morton
It also will not be the first time that eBay has sought to influence the media narrative about the company as eBay has a long history of hiring communications roles specifically to "protect eBay's reputation" by "leveraging media relationships to elevate eBay’s brand and reputation...fostering relationships with key media... [and] placing executive profiles, bylines & speaking ops that further the company narrative."
Liz Morton
eBay also signed an exclusive deal with New York Times-owned The Athletic to provide sports trading card and memorabilia content, prompting reader skepticism and questions about journalistic integrity and ethics.
Liz Morton
And more recently, the company advertised an opening for a Crisis and Financial Communications Manager to "manage and enhance eBay's reputation" with a "history of developing, pitching, preventing and securing high-impact media coverage."
Liz Morton
That part about "preventing" high impact media coverage was particularly eyebrow-raising considering the last time eBay became concerned with such things it resulted in a cyberstalking and harassment campaign targeting journalists Ina and David Steiner in effort to influence reporting at EcommerceBytes and unmask the identity of Fidomaster / unsuckEBAY, an anonymous source who also sparked the ire of top executives at the company.
Liz Morton
Seven eBay security employees were charged criminally and pleaded guilty to multiple federal felonies, and an going civil case also includes eBay as well as ex-CEO Devin Wenig, ex-Chief Communications Office Steve Wymer, and ex-SVP Global Operations Wendy Jones, saying communications from the very top egged on the harassment.
Records from the ongoing lawsuit in this matter also showed Wenig and Wymer discussed how they could "eff with" Ina Steiner by promoting a list of seller blogs and websites that did not include EcommerceBytes. Notably, many sites on that list just happened to provide more favorable coverage of eBay in general and Wenig's leadership as CEO in particular.
Wenig, who previously served as CEO of Thomson Reuters Markets before joining eBay, was also apparently no fan of the Wall Street Journal, with comments in this case showing a stark contrast to his pro-free speech public persona.
At Code Conference 2016 hosted by Recode, Wenig was asked for his thoughts on the controversy then brewing between Gawker Media and PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel, coming down very clearly on the side of press freedom against billionaire tech interests saying "I side with a free media & a free press...we've got to be really careful that powerful voices don't knock down what I call divergent points of view."
But knocking down divergent points of view is exactly what Wenig had in mind for dealing with reporting he didn't like, even going so far as to suggest, among other strategies, that eBay could work with friendly outlets to flood the internet with positive stories that would drive EcommerceBytes further down in search results.
While eBay says they did not act on the suggestion, court documents reveal Wenig reacted positively to the idea and at least wanted to consider moving forward with that plan, even going so far as to ask Wymer's predecessor, Dan Tarman, if popular UK-based ecommerce news outlet TameBay (now ChannelX) would accept a "quiet investment" from the company to be a "serious blog focused on serious seller issues", "independent for all outside purposes" and "neutral in all respects."
It's telling that even if they did not go ahead with it at that time, eBay apparently believed it would somehow be possible for a site to be "independent" and "neutral" while also receiving "quiet" funding from one of the companies they cover - something most outside observers would say are fundamentally opposed concepts.
It's also probably worth noting that Edelman is infamous for their "astroturf" campaigns - which is a fancy name for creating fake "grassroots" organizations which are really frontgroups for industry/corporate clients.
For example, it was discovered the Working Families for Wal-Mart group, which purported to be an independent effort led by Wal-Mart employees and a blog called "Walmarting Across America" were actually campaigns created by Edelman on behalf of the corporate giant, not organic grassroots activity.
Guardian Staff
There's also the "Grossroots Multiplier" software Edelman has used for over a decade to "convert average citizens" into pro-oil "true champions" in perennial PR war between Big Oil and environmental groups like Greenpeace.
Brian Merchant
Given that history, sellers could be forgiven for being skeptical that Edelman and eBay really are just looking for grassroots seller stories and this won't just be another carefully manicured astroturf campaign.
The fact that this latest Edelman-led PR effort will place eBay seller stories "with media outlets who celebrate people successfully selling online" gives the impression the company already has friendly media lined up and waiting, again raising questions about whether any such coverage will disclose any investments or conflicts of interest they may have and/or that the sellers being featured are being paid to tell their stories.
In the journalism world, paying for an interview, a practice often referred to as "checkbook journalism", is largely considered unethical, as it can corrupt newsgathering, damage a journalist's objectivity and raise conflict of interest concerns and many reputable news organizations explicitly prohibit the practice for that reason.
While there are other forms of "advertorial" media where paying people for their stories is more common and acceptable, there are usually very strict regulatory guidelines around disclosure, especially in the UK which typically has higher consumer protection standards than the US.
Given the various job postings and media deals over the last year, it appears that current Chief Communications Officer Gigi Ganatra Duff may be pursuing at least some of the comms strategy previously recommended by outside PR advisors consulted by her predecessors.
If so, that means it's more important than ever for sellers, market analysts and investors interested in what's really going on at the company to seek out truly independent media sources, free of corporate influence and conflicts of interest.
And on that note: a reminder that Value Added Resource is 100% independent and reader supported - no sponsored content, no ads, and no compromises.
