What Do Customers Prefer in Item Permissions?

[Czari Zenovka]

I've been rethinking the permissions for items I sell - home furnishings and novelty/gift items and would love any feedback on what you, as a customer, prefer. 

Many of my items I have listed as no-copy/modify/transfer.  My thinking on this is two-fold:

1.  When I was new to SL I enjoyed having transfer permissions on items I purchased so that if I no longer wanted the item, I could either give it to someone or have a yardsale.  (That also was what eventually prompted me to begin my own little business.)

2.  My products are priced relatively low so that if someone wanted more than one of an item it wouldn't be expensive to do so.

Over time in my own experience as a SL consumer, I find that I prefer having copy permissions vs transfer.  I like knowing I can store a fresh copy as a backup.  If I mess something up by trying to modify it, I have a fresh copy.  Since starting my business I don't resale items anymore, at least not very often.

So, would you prefer to pay a little more for a product and have copy/no transfer perms or do you prefer no-copy/transfer and why?

Would this be true as well for items you might wish to gift to someone (thinking here of holiday type gifts)?

Thank you in advance to anyone who responds. :)

[emmettcullen93]

thinking of items people buy from me i find they like full perm. but i would sell furnature or something bigger than gestures for a no modify no copy no transfer. as to insure that they cannot use my product as there own. unless i was to make it for there use to make there own objects. if i wanted to have them use it for there reuse and sell my items as there own i would make it custom just for them. the perms would be full perm just for there situation.

[Summer Tison]

My preference is modify, transfer and no copy. I visit a few stores that give the option of modify/copy no transfer or Modify/transfer no copy, which I think is great for customers to decide which options they prefer.

[Perrie Juran]

/me laughs

full perm 

But of course I know that's not what this is about.

Modify absolutely always.

The issue of making something 'copy' so a person has a back up comes down to customer service.  If it is no copy/transfer, if I screw it up it would be a matter of whether or not you'd allow me to exchange for a new copy.

I hadn't really thought about this before, but I wonder if this could not be automated?

Overall, Mod/Copy is my preference.  But I do hate when I have something I no longer need or use that  I can't gift someone with it.

[ROB34466IIIa]

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Perrie Juran wrote:

Modify absolutely always.

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Seconded.

[emmettcullen93]

what if you create a custom one of a kind item?

[Conora]

i prefer copy/mod couse i like to mod pretymuch everyting i buy.

[Charolotte Caxton]

Generally, I prefer Mod Copy No Transfer

I like to customize my stuff and have a back up for when I mess up

I haven't had occasion to gift or resell

If something is no mod no copy transfer, I delete it if I can't make myself like it.

I do like the idea though of selling stuff you no longer want, like at a yard sale. I may try that some day.

 

[PeterCanessa Oh]

Modify always.  There's really no reason to stop people changing the size or colour of something, inserting or removing scripts and other contents.  Resize/colour scripts are a pointless waste of sim resources.  I'm a hypocrite though because I don't sell modifiable scripts.  If they're modifiable they're full perms, so no point.  Note also that sculpt maps, other textures, sounds, animations, etc. can't be modified.

Preferably copyable.  i) for backup, iii) for multiple rezzed instances, iii) SL is just too flaky to risk rezzing and moving-around no-copy items. iv) 'when' there's a delivery-failure getting it or I mess it up the creator isn't going to mind giving me another copy.

Transfer, no-copy for gift-type things because you're assuming your customer will be giving them to someone else as a present.

@ emmett - a) if it's one of a kind and the person who bought it screws it up it serves them right, b) SL won't let you set something no-copy AND no-transfer, it has to be copyable, transferable or both.

[Deltango Vale]

My preference is mod / transfer / no-copy

[ROB34466IIIa]

Ask the right price for it to refrain from exclusive modification rights in the future

If you want nobody to modify it ever better keep it to yourself.

ETA : /me slaps his forehead. Dur .. and if it' s a one piece you set it to 'no trans'  of course.

[Senobia Xenga]

Mod perms matter to me. The rest, eh.

 

Maybe I want the thing bigger, pinker, bolder, lighter, darker, smaller. And you just don't offer that kind of selection in the item I bought.

 

As I buyer, I don't see why so many creators are hell bent against giving mod perms. Prim parts on clothes are THE WORST about being no mod. Cuffs and collars and skirts - you know, one size does not fit all so if those parts are no mod, the outfit is rendered useless. Money wasted. Word of mouth advertising from a disgruntled customer. It's a downhill effect.

 

As a creator, I always give mod perms. If I don't, it's an oversight and I will totally regulate that siutation when brought to my attention.

[JohnMiddlefield]

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Czari Zenovka wrote:

I've been rethinking the permissions for items I sell - home furnishings and novelty/gift items and would love any feedback on what you, as a customer, prefer. 

Many of my items I have listed as no-copy/modify/transfer.  My thinking on this is two-fold:

1.  When I was new to SL I enjoyed having transfer permissions on items I purchased so that if I no longer wanted the item, I could either give it to someone or have a yardsale.  (That also was what eventually prompted me to begin my own little business.)

2.  My products are priced relatively low so that if someone wanted more than one of an item it wouldn't be expensive to do so.

Over time in my own experience as a SL consumer, I find that I prefer having copy permissions vs transfer.  I like knowing I can store a fresh copy as a backup.  If I mess something up by trying to modify it, I have a fresh copy.  Since starting my business I don't resale items anymore, at least not very often.

So, would you prefer to pay a little more for a product and have copy/no transfer perms or do you prefer no-copy/transfer and why?

Would this be true as well for items you might wish to gift to someone (thinking here of holiday type gifts)?

Thank you in advance to anyone who responds.

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As a customer of home furnishings, I resent the "no-copy" setting. It gives me the impression that that merchant is stingy, and I am unlikely to buy from that merchant because of this, even though I understand that my impression may not be right; but remember, I said IMPRESSION - it is simply a gut reaction.

[Couldbe Yue]

For the first year or so of selling stuff I used to offer a choice of transfer or copy (but not both of course!).  What I found was that they sold pretty well equally, so when i found I had to make a choice about which sets of perms to offer because of the time it used to take to change the perms (back in those days there was no bulk perm changer in the edit object window) I went for transfer. 

Personally I prefer to buy transfer and that goes for clothes and prefabs too.  I know that I'm almost alone in this but it does mean I try to keep those transfer clothes sellers in business

modify of course is taken as a must. 

[Dillon Levenque]

Mod above all.

Copy is really nice for some things (landscaping stuff, for example) but probably the bulk of my items are clothing and with the link feature in Outfits copies aren't quite as important.

Someone mentioned being able to choose at the outset mod/trans/no copy vs. mod/copy/no trans—that would for me be the best of all options.

[JeanneAnne]

i prefer to be able to give stuff away .. i dont like it when 'share' is greyed out

Jeanne

[Polenth Yue]

I prefer copy items. To the extent that I'll only buy a transfer item if it's a very special item. I've brought transfer game boards for example, because there aren't equivalents that are as good. But an item like clothing or a sofa... there's always another vendor offering a similar product with copy permissions.

In my own business (I sell garden stuff), I experimented with offering some items as transfer. I very rarely sold any, so it wasn't worth it. Most people who wanted to buy gifts used the marketplace. I went with the flow and added in-world vendors where people could buy copy items as gifts.

[Rya Nitely]

As a merchant selling items as copy will save you many headaches with failed deliveries etc - just hit the re-deliver button. With no copy items you will always wonder if you just gave it away free.

As a customer I prefer clothing as mod transfer. If it isn't mod it will frustrate me into hating the item. And it's always nice to pass clothing to alts or friends.

Almost all other items I prefer as copy mod. And some items just have to be copy. For instance, boats get stuck at sim borders or scripts become corrupted. You need to be able to rez a fresh copy.

 

 

[Tiffy Vella]

Copy/mod. With Marketplace options for gift giving.

I love being able to adapt hair to different outfits, and hats/accessories..and popping the right hair into each folder. same with shoes (why do shoe sellers so rarely allow mod permissions?) Any modifiability is golden, really, and a deal-breaker for me if not allowed. Pet hate is resize scripts as an only option.

We have this discussion a lot

[Ceera Murakami]

Copy OK, Mod OK, no transfer is my preference, with some way to buy the item as a gift to someone else with those perms for them.

I very rarely transfer items - usually only when I've decided I will no longer use an alt, and maybe I have a no-copy, transferrable thing that another of my alts could use. Over all, I couldn't care less about transfer permissions. I would rather buy an item as a gift, for direct delivery to someone else, if I want to give someone something.

No mod is becoming a deal breaker for me. I can't count the number of furniture items that I have bought and then either discarded or ceased using because the scale was wrong for my avatars, and there was no way to make the couch smaller, or make other adjustments like turning off fullbright, or eliminating unused scripts. Hair and prim clothes have to be mod, or it's no sale, period. No resizer script that I have seen can make an item fit my avatar as well as I can do on my own if I could simply mod the blasted thing. Most of them can't possibly work for fitting hair to a furry avatar, with a prim head that has a different shape than a Human, and ears in a different position.

Copy is critical if you are going to modify - so you don't mess up the only copy you have. It's also extremely valuable for making the same prim skirt or hair usable for various avatars within a single account. For example, my main account has child, teen and adult sized versions of Ceera as a Human, a vixen, a wolf, and many other species, by a variety of avatar makers. The range of adjustment necessary makes having unique copies adjusted for each form the only way to go.

[Czari Zenovka]

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emmettcullen93 wrote:

thinking of items people buy from me i find they like full perm. but i would sell furnature or something bigger than gestures for a no modify no copy no transfer. as to insure that they cannot use my product as there own. unless i was to make it for there use to make there own objects. if i wanted to have them use it for there reuse and sell my items as there own i would make it custom just for them. the perms would be full perm just for there situation.

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Thank you for responding, emmetcullen   It sounds like you create animations to sell to other merchants for use in their products, in which case full perms are necessary.  For the type items I sell to end-users either copy/trans perms are generally used with or without modify, depending on the product.  I have done some custom work by request and then use whatever permissions seem applicable to the situation.

[Czari Zenovka]

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Summer Tison wrote:

My preference is modify, transfer and no copy. I visit a few stores that give the option of modify/copy no transfer or Modify/transfer no copy, which I think is great for customers to decide which options they prefer.

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Thanks, Summer   I love the stores that offer the choice of permissions as well, although I have only seen it, thus far, for clothing or avatar items.  I'm wondering if at least offering both on the Marketplace for now would be beneficial and will think on that for my store.

[Czari Zenovka]

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Perrie Juran wrote:

 

Modify absolutely always.

The issue of making something 'copy' so a person has a back up comes down to customer service.  If it is no copy/transfer, if I screw it up it would be a matter of whether or not you'd allow me to exchange for a new copy.

I hadn't really thought about this before, but I wonder if this could not be automated?

Overall, Mod/Copy is my preference.  But I do hate when I have something I no longer need or use that  I can't gift someone with it.

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On the full perms thing, I had a woman send an IM to me once when I was offline saying she would like to purchase my drapes with full perms and to give her a price.  That was it.  No introduction, why she wanted full perm drapes, etc.  Pulled up her profile and it appeared that she sold prefab homes.  Ok, that would explain the full perm thing but her approach still put me off and, especially knowing nothing about her, I really didn't want my items potentially turning into freebies across the grid.

There were several different "stores" listed in her profiile.  Went to the first one and immediately received a "you are about to be kicked" message from a security orb.  Very nice touch for a profile location listed as a store. lol  Second landing spot - a ton of boxed freebies for sale.  RED FLAG!!!!  Third location - ok, I see what looks like prefab homes for sale, walked toward them and smacked into a banline.   This merchant has a curious way of offering her products.  I sent a cordial note back to her thanking her for her interest but I was not interested in selling any items full perm and then mentioned that I saw she offered freebies at one of her locations.  I received a huffy reply that she has been part of SL since beta, wanted to use my drapes to sell with her prefabs (that apparently no one can get to inworld to see), would never offer them for free but if I didn't want to, fine.  Okkkaaaayyyyyyy.

Back to the subject at hand - agreed on modify; I'm pretty sure all my products have that.  The pros and cons for copy or trans are a toss up.  I used to prefer copy but now I tend to lean toward copy.  As for customer service, I would absolutely give another copy of a no-copy/trans item to a customer but, in my experience, the customer contacting me for that could be slim.

One item I sell that is copy/no trans are the above-mentioned drapes so people can buy one set and make as many copies as they wish for their homes.  I have the perms clearly marked in my inworld store as well as on the MP.  I can't tell you how many people have purchased 2-6 copies of the same color.  In each case I contacted the person and refunded their money for the excess items.  Other than being amazed that a merchant would actually do that, the responses I received for purchasing more than one copy were: I didn't pay attention to the permissions, the MP (all these were MP sales) didn't seem to take my first order so I tried again, What??? I bought that many sets??? - you get the idea.   I did have a few people that said they realized later they didn't need more than one set but were embarrassed to contact me.

From that experience, I'm wondering if customers would contact me if they needed another copy or purchase from someone who offered copy/no trans.

I appreciate your input.  Still deliberating.

[Spica Inventor]

Give me mod/copy permissions or give me death! hehe

[Czari Zenovka]

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Conora wrote:

i prefer copy/mod couse i like to mod pretymuch everyting i buy.

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Thanks for your input Conora   I agree, I mod a lot of what I purchase as well, so for me that's a given.  Ok...a vote for copy.