eBay Bids Farewell To Global Insights Manager Lamont Jones Amidst Shifting Corporate Priorities
Global Insights Manager, Lamont Jones, has announced his departure from eBay, saying his role had been eliminated due to "shifting priorities" at the company.
Jones made the announcement in a LinkedIn post today, reflecting back on what he's accomplished in the last 4 years leading brand operations and consumer insights - including VIBECHECK, an initiative aimed at helping eBay's executives connect with Gen-Z customers.
This was Jones' second go around at the company, having previously worked in eBay's Seller Protection Team as a Marketing Program Manager in 2013 before moving on to roles at Microsoft, Google, and Meta/Facebook before "boomeranging" back to eBay in 2020.
The move comes as eBay continues a strategy and priorities shift that began earlier this year with mass layoffs and the departure of Chief Business Strategy Officer, Stefanie Jay.
Liz Morton
Since that time, the company has been pivoting away from the exclusionary "high value buyer, focus vertical" strategy Jay brought with her in 2021 and back toward consumer to consumer selling that has historically been the foundation of eBay's success.
Those C2C efforts have ramped up quickly in the UK as part of what eBay calls the "fix the fundamental aspect of UK Win back plan", dropping private selling fees across most categories and expecting to bring in buyer fees and managed shipping in early 2025 to "remonetize" that market.
Liz Morton
C2C initiatives were a main topic of interest in yesterday's Q3 2024 earnings call, with weak Q4 guidance raising questions about pressure from fee-free selling lowering revenue estimates during the all important holiday shopping season.
Liz Morton
As part of the C2C pivot, eBay also put their media contract up for review in April, looking to move from a decentralized market-based model to a more centralized model and possibly indicating that the marketing insights they had been receiving for the last 4 years were not moving the needle in the way they had hoped.
Dentsu’s iProspect was chosen in September to handle eBay's global media efforts and a new campaign, titled Things. People . Love, that centers around pre-loved fashion with a C2C appeal was recently launched to a very positive reception.
Liz Morton
CEO Jamie Iannone also faced questions on yesterday's call about increasing competition in some of these core categories, particularly Collectibles and Sneakers where Fanatics and Walmart have both been making strides to take market share - with the help of some ex-eBay talent along the way.
Liz Morton
He also faced questions about growth of sales from China, particularly in Motors Parts and Accessories categories - but eBay doesn't just face competition for buyers from overseas sites like Temu and TikTok, increasingly they're also recruiting Business Development talent from eBay as well.
Liz Morton
The decision to eliminate the Global Insights Manager position seems to have taken Jones by surprise as he's sporting the "open to work" logo on his LinkedIn profile and doesn't appear to have another role already lined up.
eBay has not responded to request for comment about the decision or the "shifting priorities" that preceded it at the time of publishing.
cwi
