eBay President Reveals How the Site Will Get Social [VIDEO]

 By 
Pete Pachal
 on 
eBay President Reveals How the Site Will Get Social [VIDEO]

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eBay has a new look that serves its master plan: to go beyond being the place buyers go when they already know what they want and become a destination to browse.

The site's Pinterest-inspired redesign, which gives every user a personalized "feed" of products up for sale, gives eBay a big tool in its quest to re-invent itself as place for window shopping. Devin Wenig, president of eBay Marketplaces, says it's just one part of the site's new features to make shopping more personal and social.

Soon to come: custom feeds that are designed by the users themselves, which they can share with friends or post publicly -- similar to Amazon's product lists. For instance, someone could come up with a feed that shows nothing but Star Trek memorabilia, or designer shoes, or classic Apple products. Besides being useful for specific buyers, the tool also gives "tastemakers" to create a presence on the site.

Of course, the idea of sharing lists, profiles or anything else wasn't what eBay's legacy users had in mind when they signed up for an account a decade ago. Wenig says he realizes this and that privacy is a foremost concern of the site. By simply using the new feed, users won't lose any privacy protections, he says.

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