Amazon Growth Accelerates as eBay Slips in July (AMZN) (EBAY) (ECOM)

ChannelAdvisor Corp (NYSE: ECOM) CEO Scott Wingo offered the following update on eBay (Nasdaq: EBAY) and Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN) sales metrics for the month of July:

Today we are releasing July 2014 SSS data for eBay, Amazon,Google Search and Google Shopping/PLA. ComScore recently reported that US e-commerce grew at 11.8% y/y for the desktop which translates to 13.1% y/y with mobile included so that is the baseline for 2014 growth.

Here are the y/y SSS results for July 2014, the first month of Q2:

July 2014 SSS Results

• Amazon - Amazon's July SSS came in at 40.4%, an increase compared to June’s 34.4% . Amazon has increased its y/y growth rate every month so far in 2014 - a very impressive performance. We have Amazon details further in the report.
• eBay - eBay's July came in at 9.7% down from June’s 12.3% and below the e-commerce growth rate, indicating that eBay continues to face headwinds from the Panda action and breach episode. Further in the report, we have details of the eBay internals.
• Other 3PM -3PM continued strong growth in July coming in at 39%. While this is a decrease fromthe 47.8% recorded in June, these channels are a bit more volatile in m/m performance than larger more established channels. @39%, they are growing 3X e-commerce which is quite impressive .
• CSE - Comparison Shopping Engines came in at 9.5% for July up from June’s 6.7%.
• Search - Search came in at 7% for July a decrease from June’s 20.4% y/y growth. Later in the report we have more search details.

SSS Chart

The following chart details the SSS data for July 2013 through July 2014: (click to enlarge)

eBay Details

eBay's SSS for July was 9.7%. To get a feel for what is driving the marketplace's performance, here are the interior data points for the month:

• eBay auctions - Down 8.2% y/y.
• eBay fixed-price - Up 12.8% y/y - a decrease from June’s 18.4%, which puts this key part of eBay growing in-line with e-commerce.
• eBay Motors (parts and accessories) - P+A was down again in July coming in at 8% compared to June’s 10.5%. This brings P+A's growth rate below e-commerce and is the slowest SSS we have recorded since February 2013's 6.8%.

Here are the TTM (trailing twelve month) trends on these eBay internals. (click to enlarge)

Amazon Details

Last month we released two new data points around FBA:

• Percent FBA - This measures the % of Amazon GMV through the ChannelAdvisor system that was fulfilled through FBA and tracks it on a y/y basis. For July 2014, 38.2% of Amazon GMV was FBA (therefore 62.8% was NOT shipped via FBA). That was up from July 2013 where 29.8% of the GMV was FBA. That's a 8.4% increase y/y in FBA as a % of GMV. As we head into the holiday, it will be interesting to see the trends in this data point.
• %FBA non Amazon - Here we look at the total bucket of FBA-driven GMV and look at the % that was not fulfilled for Amazon sales (website, other 3PMs, search, cse, etc.). In July 2013, 1.3% was non-Amazon fulfilled. Then in July 2014, we saw this grow 47.7% to 2%.

It will be interesting to track how these FBA related metrics change as we head into the ever-critical holiday period.

Supplemental data for Search

Here are the July Search internals: (click to enlarge)

Note: these are all y/y SSS comparisons (July 2014 vs. July 2013).

Search SSS increased 7% for July. Search was a mixed bag this month. AOV was up to $157.35, a 6% y/y increase. Conversion Rate (CR) improved 8% to 3.25% but CPC was down 7% due to the headwind of mobile traffic. Total cost was up 1%. While clicks were slow at 3%, the conversion rate increase led to an increase of 18% in orders.

Supplemental data for Google Shopping

In September 2012, we introduced a new set of data around Google Shopping. Here is the July Google Shopping/Product Listing Ad supplemental data:

Overall, Google Shopping came in at 40.8% y/y increase, a decrease from June’s 47.8%%. The Conversion rate was down 9.5%, but AOV offset the CR headwind with a 8.9% y/y increase coming in at $107.83. Looking at the data, it appears that PLAs are now also feeling the mobile conversion rate headwinds from mobile traffic and Google is counteracting that by showing higher priced items.

Golf update

In May we provided a look into the golf category and due to timing were not able to provide an update in June. Here is an update on the golf category including the June and July data. As you can see, overall at least for eBay and Amazon the golf category had a turn around in July. Amazon was particularly robust growing 42.8% y/y.

Conclusion

July started Q3 with strong results for most of the channels we track. As we get into Back to School Season in August/September we will have our first view on how Holiday 14 is setting up. This year we have another compressed holiday so we should also expect to see promotions start early this year. Stay tuned!

You May Also Be Interested In

• Fisker (FSR) files form 10-K, sees more job cuts, reiterates going concern doubts