eBay introduced new seller tools at its OPEN25 seller event last week aimed at helping sellers “save time, improve profitability, and build trust with every sale.” Here’s what’s new:
AI Assistant for Messaging – a tool that drafts suggested replies to common buyer questions about item specifics or shipping using the information already in listing description and order details. Reponses are not sent automatically; sellers have time to review, edit, or dismiss suggestions and write their own to ensure accuracy. This should be a big time saver dealing with buyers that don’t read the listings.
Offers in Messaging – buyers and sellers can now negotiate offers directly within the messaging thread, including sending, receiving, countering, and accepting offers without switching screens, all while tracking past offers and messages in one place. The update aims to make price negotiation easier and help sellers close more deals through a more seamless buying experience. Love this one!
Track Your Costs – introducing an optional “Your Cost” field in the listing flow for sellers to input, update, and manager their product costs. The goal is to help sellers make smarter pricing decisions without needing to reference a separate spreadsheet or tool. The built-in cost can also be used to help plan promotions, adjust ad rates, and price inventory, and it feeds into the seller’s earnings page for reporting. This one makes me a little nervous what eBay is going to do with that information. Mind your own business how much I paid for my item.
Inventory Mapping API – brings eBay’s AI-powered listing capabilities to sellers who operate at scale. The API can generate optimized titles, item specifics, descriptions, and more, same as what the AI can do when adding an individual item.
Seller Item Not Received Protections – aiming to help sellers when delivery delays leads to claims that the item wasn’t received and unexpected refunds, only for the item to arrive a few days later. Moving forward, eBay will reimburse the seller for the item cost and remove any negative feedback left as a result of delayed delivery. Did you read the word “item cost” correctly? What about the markup / profit?
Automated Feedback – beginning in September, when a U.S. seller uses a tracked service, delivers on time, and no issues are reported, eBay will automatically leave positive feedback for the seller if the buyer hasn’t already done so. This will be great for new sellers to earn a positive seller rating faster, given that eBay says only one in three buyers leave seller feedback.
Open Banking – eBay integrated Open Banking into its Seller Capital program to give sellers faster and easier access to financing. The update allows sellers to securely share real-time financial data with eBay’s lending partners, who in turn can make more accurate lending decisions that can expand eligibility, increase approval rates, and improve loan terms.
Good stuff eBay!
