Speakers from eBay and PayPal were invited by Mal Brough MP, Federal Member for Fisher (located in Queensland) to keynote at the Future of Online Retail forum on the Sunshine Coast last week. 

Around 100 business owners living and/or working in the electorate of Fisher  joined  in the very atmospheric shearing shed at Aussie World to hear from Carolyn Breeze (eBay Australia), Brian O’Donnell (PayPal Australia) and Paul Greenberg from National Online Retail Association (NORA).

Carolyn and Brian spoke about online retailing trends including the importance of having a mobile optimised website, the power of social media referrals and recommendations, how to use data to learn more about customers and their path to purchase, and the compelling export opportunities available to businesses of all sizes through global marketplaces like eBay.

The presentations were followed a lively Q&A session which discussed the heavy dependence on transport infrastructure, high speed Internet access and shipping costs in enabling ecommerce to succeed.