eBuy.com seeks ISP Parnerships

This new e-commerce Application Service Provider hopes to find ISP partners to help distribute its product.

by Jeff Goldman [October 2, 2000]

Steven J. Robinson's construction company had already helped build the Getty Museum and the Ronald Reagan Library when he decided to focus his efforts on creating the e-commerce ASP eBuy, at http://www.ebuy.com. He contends that building a museum and building an ASP aren't all that different. "It's another form of building," he explains. "It's like building highways."

eBuy is a brand new entrant into the already crowded e-commerce market, but it's got some significant strengths; among which, Robinson notes, "We have a big-sized name: 'eBuy.com' is pretty damn good." He may be smaller than most, and he may be later than some, but he's doing everything he can to stay on top of the competition. In order to do so, he's combined an easy-to-use e-commerce application with a mall-like online shopping portal, and he's basing the whole effort on developing a large number of partnerships with smaller ISPs.

Building stores
eBuy is an Application Service Provider offering a web-based e-commerce solution called ezStore. The application sits on eBuy's servers and is offered to customers on a rental basis for a monthly fee. Pricing is based on the number of products sold, so a smaller store is cheaper to run than a larger one.

Ease of use is a key aspect of eBuy's offering. The ezStore setup program takes the user through an impressively speedy five-step setup process which uses templates to launch an easily customized e-commerce site. Similarly, larger merchants can set up their own mall-like group of stores that share one database, using the comparable ezMarketPlace application. There's a full-featured demo of the ezStore setup program available online at http://www.ebuyexchange.com/Demo/index.asp.

Once a merchant's store is set up, it's managed through a group of administration web pages, accessible online with a username and password. The administration pages are essentially an online management application for the store, encompassing a broad range of spreadsheets that cover everything from interactive records of merchandise sold, to a customer newsletter management system. Credit cards can be accepted either through the merchant's processor of choice, or through eBuy's own system.

Virtual mall
The e-commerce application itself is just the beginning of Robinson's offering. Merchants who use ezStore to set up their e-commerce site also have the option of linking to eBuy.com's own home page, which is set up as a virtual mall divided by location and by category.

Robinson's hope is that as more and more merchants use eBuy to build their online stores, the eBuy.com mall itself will become a popular destination for online shoppers. And there the leverage of a solid domain name comes in handy. Robinson notes, "Within six months, we've got a million visitors, and we just keep on getting them."

A number of shopper-friendly enhancements are already in place. Merchants linking with the eBuy.com mall agree to donate a portion of proceeds to charity through eBuy's "Living With Hope" program. eBuy.com's home page also includes a number of customer-friendly links to news, weather and other information pages. And when the new .shop domain name kicks in, the mall will also be found at Ebuy.Shop.

But Robinson hasn't stopped there. He's also purchased hundreds of domain names that begin with eBuy-from eBuyFlowers.com to eBuyTravel.com-which he'll use to delineate sections of the mall, further aiding merchants in attracting shoppers to their stores. So a merchant who builds an e-commerce site with ezStore ends up with three locations off the bat: their own independent site, a home on the eBuy.com portal, and a third location within an appropriately named section of the eBuy.com mall.

ISP partnerships
To get the word out to merchants who want to build online stores, Robinson is counting on developing a network of relationships with smaller ISPs. And at no cost to the ISP, it's an extremely attractive option.

An eBuy ISP partner can offer its customers a web-hosting package that includes eBuy's online e-commerce solution, fully branded to look and feel like the ISP's site. The ISP then receives a commission on all fees that the customer pays to eBuy. Marco Cordon, eBuy's CTO, notes, "We have a very ISP-centric application."

The addition of a branded e-commerce solution to an ISP's site can do wonders in terms of customer attraction and retention. Robinson explains, "Because we manage the data and the storage, we pretty much have the keys to the kingdom, I think."

He adds, "Customers aren't going to want to look anywhere else. They'll have a neat little deal with the ISP to rent their store and the software, and along with the ISP charging a little fee for Internet access, everybody's happy."

—End