eBay has added ChatGPT to auto-generate listing descriptions from a single uploaded photo, as well as auto-filling the Item Specifics section of listings – a picture literally painting a thousand words.
According to eBay CEO Jamie Iannone, sellers would soon be able to pre-populate categories and item specifics from a single photo, “enabling them to spend less of their time inputting inventory and more on growing and managing their businesses”.
He says: “We are in the process of integrating the ChatGPT API into our core listing flow and will soon launch a beta release of a plugin that enables sellers to automatically generate text for their item description based on known product attributes.
“Generative AI has a number of exciting use cases outside of descriptions and we’re exploring numerous potential applications across our marketplace that can enable truly magical customer experiences.”
eBay has operated a Core AI platform for a number of years, ramping in Q1 further ramped up development with they say substantial results, according to ChannelX.
While the move promises to make uploading items more rapid for sellers, it does throw up some worries. Chat GPT can only use what it can find online, so there is a risk that it could use existing listings from competitive sellers to create new listings. There is also the risk of it publishing inaccurate information.
