by Katie Muldoon

Do you know how lovely it is to pop on a Web site and quickly and easily track all the purchases you've made from that site over time? Probably not, as there are only two product-selling sites that I know of that allow you to access information about your past purchases: Drugstore.com and eBay.

Recently I wanted to buy another color of a pantsuit I'd bought from an apparel catalog. Looking through current and past printed editions and searching on the Web didn't help me find the style I wanted. A product listing could have cut this search time to seconds and help assure the accuracy of the find. Even if a cataloger no longer carries the item, a cross-reference to something similar might garner a sale that otherwise would not have been.

Want to understand what e-tailing can teach you about your catalog business? Start buying and/or selling on eBay. The first thing you'll immediately notice is the unbelievable ease in customer communication. If there's a question the consumer has, eBay has thought of it and answered it before it's even been asked. Because half the time consumers don't even know they have a question, eBay posts relevant questions and options right next to the task that's under way.

We all can agree that this degree of communication is the ideal, but too many of us believe it simply isn't possible to know what customers want before they do themselves. eBay proves how wrong this way of thinking can be.

One of my favorites is the Re-list option positioned on the same line as the notice of an item you'd tried unsuccessfully to sell. It doesn't rely on consumers to have the sense to re-list; it plants the seed right away. This strategy lets you re-list the unsold item once more for free. If it sells the second time, the insertion fee for the re-listing will be refunded to you. If it doesn't, another insertion fee goes into eBay's pocket.

eBay also makes sure every transaction is as accurate as possible with sensible prompts. One example is the line that appears right under the clickable info on what you have won or didn't win (winning is the marvelous name eBay uses for buying). This line reads, "Your preferred ZIP code will be shown to the seller to calculate shipping. Please verify."

Presto! The seller can calculate how much the shipping might be-one more detail efficiently under control. To offset some buyer antagonism about shipping and handling charges, it might make sense to replace the outdated P&H chart with a rate sensibly based on the buyer's location. I've observed at focus groups that one of the major irritations over the postage-and-handling issue is the unfairness of a P&H chart that's based on the dollar amount of the purchase, not the weight and distance shipped.

The nifty Feedback function lets customers report on you...and you on them. Something like getting customer endorsements, this goes further in that it's part of the process. No one really wants to buy from you, or sell to you, unless you have good feedback. The way to stellar seller credentials? Sell more (paying more commissions), of course. PowerSellers even get special treats, such as a Power Seller Lounge at eBay Live!, a conference of classes and panel discussions that help eBay merchants become better sellers.

Customer involvement is evident in everything eBay does. The eBay Live! conference this year asks attendees to be part of a poster contest: "Community members can express what it means to do it eBay by entering the 2003 poster contest. The winners of the contest (judged by a panel of eBay employees) will have their posters displayed at eBay Live! And the grand-prize winner of the poster contest will receive a trip to this year's event in Orlando, FL." Wouldn't it be energizing to see art created by the direct marketing agencies on display at a DMA catalog conference?

Once you've sold something, eBay automatically notifies the buyer for you. But it doesn't end there. With your permission, eBay also can include cross-sales of only your items in that buyer notification. Sending a confirmation of an Internet order is pretty routine for catalogs these days; including cross-selling in it isn't and should be.

Along those lines, if you have shown an interest in an item and go onto your "My eBay" area, up comes "More Items You Might Like," showing current options in the product category you expressed interest in. Everywhere you go on eBay are cross-sells.

Click on an item to look at it in detail and eBay, unlike most Internet sites, doesn't let you hang there. At the bottom of the page is the simple but quite useful question, "Where can I take you?" complete with three options, such as going back to the last item or heading to the home page.

eBay has its own store of logoed goodies, too. (I can't understand why most catalogs don't brand themselves by offering products with their logo.) With fun category titles like "Wham bam fam" and "Neato collectibles," it's easy to believe these items are must-haves for eBay fans, who understand that eBay is more than a company-it's a way of life, with a dedicated, almost cult-like following. What can we catalogers do to get such a following? Maybe get on eBay and learn.

Every person in the catalog business should buy and, preferably, sell something on eBay. The experience will give them some much-needed firsthand interaction with customers' needs.

When was the last time (or the first) you actually styled a product, took the photo, wrote the copy and determined the selling price and shipping method? When have you answered customers' questions about the item for sale, wrapped up a package and efficiently sent it off to its new owner?
As you go through the selling process, you will not only get in real touch with customers, but you will come across other eBay techniques that just might be adaptable to your own business.