eBay 2020 Q2 growth is now predicted to be somewhere in the range of 23% to 26%. This is amazing news from a marketplace who’s growth has faltered in recent years and in the US has even seen contraction. Additionally, eBay are reporting 6 million new or reactivated buyers now using the platform.
It’s a long time since we’ve seen eBay report anything other than single digit growth and, if the marketplace can continue the trend, bodes well for the future.
Compare this new eBay 2020 Q2 growth forecast with the actual Q1 financial highlights and you can see just why 23% – 26% growth is off the chart:
eBay 2020 Q1 Highlights
- Revenue was $2.4 billion, down 2% on an as-reported basis and up 1% on a foreign exchange (FX) neutral basis.
- Active buyers grew by 2%, for a total of 174 million global active buyers.
- Gross merchandise volume (GMV) was $21.3 billion, down 1% on an as-reported basis and remaining flat on a FX-Neutral basis.
- Marketplace platforms delivered $2.1 billion of revenue, down 1% on an as-reported basis and up 1% on a FX-Neutral basis.
eBay 2020 Q2 Growth forecast
- Strength in global gross merchandise volume (GMV) seen in April has continued through May, and the Company now expects full Q2 volume growth rates to land between 23% and 26% as compared to the prior year period.
- All major verticals are accelerating significantly compared to previous quarters, including Home & Garden, Electronics, Fashion, Auto Parts and Collectibles.
- Demand strength is driven by increased organic traffic, better marketing efficiency, and higher platform conversion.
- Active buyer growth is accelerating, with approximately 6 million new and reactivated buyers added in April and May.
- More sellers are joining eBay through efforts like Up & Running. Since March 2020, tens of thousands of small business sellers have been added to the platform.
There is little doubt that most of this performance is entirely due to the coronavirus pandemic but, unlike competitors such as Amazon, eBay were uniquely positioned to benefit to the maximum extent possible. Amazon have 100s of 1,000s of employees running fulfilment warehouses doing actual work, whereas eBay’s business is to enable millions of small businesses to do the heavy lifting whilst a relatively few employees oversee and manage the technology. This lowers the risk for eBay as for every business or retailer who had to shut down during the pandemic there was another standing in the wings that had never sold on eBay before ready to sign up – or more accurately for many forced to sign up as their physical store was ordered by governments to be temporarily closed.
eBay have put a huge marketing program in place in the US calling June ‘Traffic Month‘, to proactively driving traffic to your listings. This is eBay’s time to capitalise on the unexpected growth and even with high street retailers reopening it is fully expected that many consumers will continue to spend online. eBay’s job now is to make sure consumer don’t just continue to spend online but that they spend on eBay.
7 Responses
Without the emergency Covid19 ebay would have been in the abyss.
So basically because amazon suffered, highstreets were closed and a good deal of the population where stuck at hoem for months, Ebay did well!
WOW! Amazing…. all we now is this situation to continue forever and Ebay will be back at the top.
Meanwhile in reality land…. This actually highlights just how badly ebay was doing without the virus. Hardly something to sing and dance about.
If you look beyond ebay and amazon you will see that all the other market places out there also did really well, alot of them far exceeding ebays gains.
Sorry but i don’t see anything to cheer about here…. Ebay is still relying on the same old tired model it has been for years. Spiced up with daily glitches, pages that display very differently depending on which link on the page you use, regular ‘oops’ messages, and, well we all know the list that could follow.
Just as a comparsion… my sales for March to End of April were up over 200% on last year… but i won’t be cheering how wonderous I am, after all what I had was a perfect setup for my business, of hot weather and everyone home… Not something i could personally arrange, so all i did was capitilise on it rather than put it down to something i had actually caused..
I went and missed 8 weeks of it also :(…
A lot of eBay biz did have to close down also and we have been greatly effected by the downward performance of the likes of Royal Mail.
I still am not sending anything overseas and everything on an extended dispatch time on 24 hour post in the UK. Royal Mail are still proving to be a challenge with one pick up here in the morning which basically rules out same day dispatch.
Amazon have YES all the staff and logistics and set costs to deal with, but I would still say they were the 1st point for most people.
The supermarket lot I drive for are patting themselves on the back as the online delivery is up 600% I wonder why that is????
There was a lack of choice so I hope eBay actually recognise that.
Things like the £1 days are good and does allow me to shift items that would never go near eBay normally due to the high fees so I hope we see more of this.
I have said for years Amazon has so many set costs which eBay does not and they really could lower their FEES in a price driven economy but they just seem to put them up, and drive people to Amazon
A lot of accounts will get reactivated, people will have just been bored, many will have lost jobs and need to sell things to just eat. Facebook marketplace will not have been used as much due to lockdown.
Plus 80% of your income for the 10 millions on the furlough scheme is still a big dint in people’s disposable income this will all follow through later on and judging by this weekend’s sales, and we all know companies like BA are about to abuse the furlough scheme to sack staff and reduce their pay and working conditions.
So the likes of eBay are going to have to work super hard to retain customers. It is not 2008 anymore people have more choice.
I have declared every penny I have made online and offline over the years “Thanks” for your observations anyway.
Plus I do not see where I was really complaining about eBay.
I made a few observations that is the point here on Tamebay is it not.
Plus I just said they are going to have to work super hard to retain that business and the £1 deals were a good way to compete. In my sector high value does not always mean high margins, hence promos like this are good.
Thats not a lot in comparison to etsy, etsy store is up 300% ebay store is still down 19% yoy, the extra 26% im sure isnt to do with extra sales, but more the fact of the managed payments, the PYL which is still broken and no one will answer as to why that ad blockers still block all listings using it. so maybe an extra 10% traffic and the rest in extra fees