“It's funny, all my friends say somehow you've ended up in a job that is perfect for you, because you're a shopaholic and you love fashion,” says eBay Australia and New Zealand Head of Fashion, Jo-Ann Hicks. Hicks worked with seek.com.au and Boston Consulting before joining eBay. Her passion for fashion certainly doesn’t go to waste in her new role, which includes helping brands embrace the power of eBay’s fashion gallery.

New product on eBay

New products on eBay isn’t a new story, but many still associate the site with collectables and auctions. In fact, the majority of stock sold on eBay is new. Almost 80% of all fashion sales on the site are new items, and 60% are sold at fixed price. Part of Hicks’ role is sharing the potential of eBay with mainstream retailers. “When we tell them 42,000 fashion items sell every day on dot com dot au, they sort of flip,” she says.

Demographic

eBay refer to the demographic as ‘the fashionable individual'. They skew female, are 18 – 35, online savvy, love to mix and match brands and different price points and are triggered by deals and sales. “It's almost a blurring between community and content, they're likely to talk about a promotional sale by social media or an image of a celebrity wearing a certain brand, or a fashion brand that has just launched,” says Hicks.

Search

The advantage of eBay is that as customers specify what they’re looking for via search, so it’s very easy to see which brands would be successful in eBay Fashion Gallery. “We saw people searching for all these mainstream brands and products that we didn’t have the supply of.” says Hicks. As early as 2008 consumers were searching for new clothing online, and as many retailers didn’t have online stores, they were turning to eBay or overseas outlets.

Brands are now taking notice. “They find out how many times their brand has been searched and the sales for that brand. Naturally a lot of them think, ‘wow, I'm missing out, I'm missing out on an opportunity,” says Hicks.

Customise

Brands can customise their eBay Fashion Gallery page to complement their existing website. “It's quite different from the eBay that you're used to,” says Hicks. “It's a lot cleaner, uncluttered, very retail-like, as easy as possible for the consumers to look through all the listings and then click, check out the item page and buy it on the eBay system. The navigation (on the top or the left) how it's laid out, how it's presented – that's completely up to the brands.” eBay Fashion Gallery currently plays host to Witchery, Alannah Hill, Herringbone, Katies and MIMCO amongst others.

Is online competition?

Some brands still see eBay as competition. “In the last year we've had better traction going out to the market saying, ‘actually we're not competing with you, we're another channel, we get six million UVs a month, you have to be on this platform and the shoppers are there to shop,’” says Hicks, who believes that shoppers are now accustomed to online shopping and that demand will only increase.

As more and more consumers move online, they become more savvy about what they look for in that experience. “For a consumer, it's a consistent integrated experience, particularly if you're a shopper and you're shopping on the Witchery eBay store, or the Witchery site on in the [physical] Witchery store, you expect the same level of service experience. You're not thinking, ‘oh I'm shopping by this model.’ So as a consumer of the content, or the experience it has to be seamless, it has to be integrated.

Hicks says the same applies to publishing, “I presented to the Vogue team last week, it was really interesting, and the editor of Vogue sits across both digital and print, so she doesn't treat it separately, it's her one team, she sits over both.”

Best Match Algorithm

eBay’s best match algorithm is used to select which listings are presented to shoppers for each given search. Relevancy is a large factor, but beyond that a seller’s freight charges and sentiment of reviews play a significant part. “We want to promote and showcase the best so that customer has a much, much higher chance of having an excellent experience,” says Hicks.

“If you're a seller that's got no feedback or reviews in the system, or you're just a terrible seller, you'll be demoted. Or if everyone else is offering free or very low shipping and you charge really, really high shipping that's not a good customer experience, so you'll be demoted from best match.”

Listing

How items are listed also plays a huge part in shoppers finding the garment they need. Clear and preferably multiple images, sizing information, and prompt answers to enquiries will attract and engage shoppers. “Put yourself in the shoes of a customer, would that listing be attractive? Is the price right? Is all the information I need there?” recommends Hicks.

Future

The year ahead is a busy one for Hicks, growing Fashion Galleries, including more brands, expanding merchandising, encouraging the community of shoppers, and exploring the possibilities for channels like social, mobile, and e-magazines. ”Our aim, our vision is to be the number one destination for branded fashion,” she says.

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Twitter role:

Featured: eBay: @ebayau Jo-Ann Hicks: @alphasite Witchery: @witcheryfashion

Article by: Lou Pardi: @loupardi, @smkapac