
Younger Millennials and Gen Z haven’t flocked to eBay in the same volume as audiences who remember when the marketplace launched and catapulted to popularity. 35–64 year olds make up 61% of eBay’s audience. The average session duration was just over eight minutes. With numbers like this, the impact of eBay’s marketplace cannot be denied.Īs of September 2018, eBay was the second most popular ecommerce property in the U.S.

eBay has also heavily invested in several successful companies like PayPal (acquired by eBay in 2002 the companies split in 2015) and StubHub (acquired in 2007). The peer-to-peer business model on which eBay built its platform connects buyers and sellers, but eBay earns money through listing and transaction fees and marketing services. In the past year, eBay generated over $10 billion in revenue. In December of 2018, eBay garnered 109 million unique visitors, putting it behind only Amazon Sites and Walmart in the thick of the holiday shopping season. Of shoppers surveyed in 2017, 16% say they shop on eBay about once a week or more. These listings aren’t all posted by individual online sellers anymore, either, with large and small businesses alike creating eBay stores to take advantage of the marketplace’s high traffic. While eBay started out as a marketplace primarily focused on vintage and collectible items, today you’ll find that the majority of items listed are brand new. Here are a few more reasons why you may want to consider getting onto eBay. That alone is reason to at least consider the pros and cons of standing up an eBay store as one of your sales channels. eBay Statistics to Make Any Seller’s Head Turnīy 2020, analysts predict that 40% of the online retail market worldwide will be through online marketplaces. You can find anything from collectible baseball cards to brand new cars on eBay.

In the past decade, however, eBay has shifted more towards fixed-price “buy it now” listings, which encompasses most of its sales.

Its initial focus was on connecting buyers with online sellers of used or collectible items in auction-style listings. Though Amazon sees about three times the annual gross merchandise volume (GMV), eBay is still the second leading marketplace in the U.S.ĮBay was founded by Pierre Omidyar and, unlike Amazon, it was built to be a true peer-to-peer online marketplace. Online marketplaces keep growing in popularity as an ecommerce strategy.įrom a seller’s perspective, they are capitalizing on an existing flow of traffic to get their products in front of more eyes without having to first increase brand awareness.įrom a buyer’s perspective, it functions much like a big-box store - it’s a one-stop shop for everything they need, and the presence of competition can help keep prices low.įounded in 1995, eBay was one of the first online marketplaces – and it has remained a major player ever since.
