eBay Bucks Beta Program Part 3

In my last post, I stated that some people have an irrational view about eBay and the eBay Bucks program. They feel that the program is pointless, and they feel that the program is designed to help the large sellers rather than the small sellers. I can certainly understand the suspicion, since all of eBay's recent changes have been to the detriment of the small sellers.

Since I am one of people who has been invited into the program, I am going to show you what I see on the item pages of both the large and the small sellers. EBay has no larger seller than Buy of Buy.com. Here is a screen cap from one of Buy's items:

Click on the image so that you can read it better. Notice that right underneath the ending date and time is the logo for eBay Bucks with the statement, "You'll earn $0.12 in eBay Bucks."

I then found an item listed by a small seller:

This item has the logo in the same place with the message, "You'll earn $0.50 in eBay Bucks." I next decided to compare the above items to a higher-priced item. I searched for Nancy Drew and sorted by highest price first. I found this item at the top of the results:

This item was listed by a small seller. It also has the eBay Bucks logo in the same location with the message, "You'll earn $5.34 in eBay Bucks." The reward is much more impressive here since the auction is at nearly $300.00.

What this means is that all listings have the promotion for eBay Bucks. The promotion is better for high-priced items than for low-priced items. It has nothing to do with who is selling the item. The only people who cannot benefit from this program are the buyers who do not wish to use PayPal. Using PayPal is a requirement of the program, so people who do not use PayPal will receive no eBay Bucks.

Many small sellers buy their inventory on eBay and resell it on eBay at a profit. Those sellers will benefit from this program once it is available to everyone. Since their inventory is purchased on eBay, they will receive coupons based on those purchases which will help make up for some of their eBay fees. There is nothing bad about this program except from the perspective of buyers who do not use PayPal.