eBay has raised its full-year sales and profit forecasts as the recent changes to its e-commerce platform attracted more customers and the firm also increased its advertising revenue.
Facing intense competition from Amazon and Walmart, eBay has shifted its focus towards promoting listings program and payments business as well as towards making its platform user-friendly through the introduction of grouped listings and personal recommendations.
More than 800,000 active sellers took advantage of the promoted listings in the first quarter, helping more than double advertising revenue to over US $ 65 million, the company said.
Chief Executive Officer Devin Wenig reiterated that the company was reducing third-party ads that are not accretive and remained on track towards a US $ 1 billion advertising revenue opportunity.
The results come as eBay is in the middle of a review of its StubHub and eBay Classifieds businesses following activist investor pressure.
The firm has also agreed to appoint two new directors to its board as a part of an agreement with activist investors Starboard Value and Elliott Management.
EBay’s shares rose 5 per cent in extended trading after the company also beat first-quarter revenue and profit estimates. The company raised its full-year revenue forecast between US $ 10.83 billion and US $ 10.93 billion, and its profit to be between US $ 2.64 per share and US $ 2.70 per share.
The net revenue rose 2.4 per cent to US $ 2.64 billion in the first quarter ended March 31, beating analysts’ average estimate of US $ 2.58 billion, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.
EBay also maintained that active buyers grew 4 per cent to 180 million in the reported quarter. However, the company’s gross merchandise volume, which is the value of goods sold on its websites within a certain time frame, fell 4.2 per cent to US $ 22.59 billion.