What type of items are still profitable in SL these day?

[Charli Infinity]

Since the market is now saturated with full perm meshes.

Lots of clothes, shoes, accesories, furnitures & etc. made from full perm meshes selling for very low prices like L$10-50.

 

What's still profitable in SL?

 

 

[Parrish Ashbourne]

Making full perm mesh, or making things you can't buy as full perm mesh.

Any thing with great branding, marketing, and advertising.

Giving away tons of free stuff to attract renters, or attract traffic and then advertisers to your blog.

Listing items on the marketplace with lots of keyword spam, but only works if your all ready a top selling store, and depends on what key words are used, for example LL won't remove an item that's flagged if it's listed as both formal and casual, and LL seems to think that all items are "steampunk, tiny, gor, goth, vampire, fantasy, furry."

LL dosn't give us any statistics on what sells, so know one really knows, if we knew it would all so be over saturated.

 

[Nox Vought]

Hair mostly I believe when done well and if you get a following big enough I could see nice profit. Clothes you can find cheap but if it's really well done people will pay more, look at Foxes/Birdy for example, a bit pricey but exquisite texturing so worth the lindens spent.

 

[Tari Landar]

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Charli Infinity wrote:

Since the market is now saturated with full perm meshes.

Lots of clothes, shoes, accesories, furnitures & etc. made from full perm meshes selling for very low prices like L$10-50.

 

What's still profitable in SL?

 

 

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It depends entirely on what one defines as "profitable". For a great many creators, simply having their products out there, being enjoyed, is actually profit enough. Despite what some might think, even lower priced items can make money for a creator, with the right audience. For example, if you price your outfit at $500L, and I price mine at $50, both using the same mesh template...I could still very easily outsell you, speaking of net profit alone. In fact, it's likely, more likely sometimes, that I will actually outsell you. That is, if I know what I am doing. (this is merely an example, I don't really sell clothes, lol).

How one goes about making a profit, is how one can determine whether or not a product will be profitable. Don't discount the folks who charge less, merely because they charge less.  You also shouldn't assume those who charge more, are actually making much of a profit either. In either case, one could make, or not make, a profit. It's not necessarily just the product itself that determines profit. Even with a saturated market, because let's face it, the clothing market has been saturated since near day one, even with the building advances we have seen. That's a market that will always be saturated. Yet, people still make a profit, regardless of their price schedules. 

What you should really be asking yourself, if you're looking to make a profit is things like..."what do I want to create", "what do people want", "what am I willing to do, to make a profit", "how much effort am I willing to put forth", "do I want to make a lot, or just break even"...and other such questions. Ask, and answer, and you'll know what product(s) will work for you. 

As a hobbyist, who once used sl as a rl income, I create what I want, when I want, and enjoy whatever rewards I get from it. I don't put forth the same efforts I once did, mostly because I neither want, nor need to do so anymore. I still, however, make a profit, and will until the day I close my shop. I'm a small fish, and have been since the day I started creating. I've never been a big fish. I've never charged a lot for anything. I don't need to use sl income as rl income anymore, but if I wanted to, I could. It's not a matter of what I can create that will generate the most income, but what efforts I put forth with the things I already create.

Anyone that tells you that you cannot possibly make an income in sl, is likely either failing(or failed) at doing so themselves, or hasn't enough business sense to go through the process logically. Is it easy? Not usually. Most things in life worth doing aren't typically easy, though.

Honestly, if you're looking for a specific market that brings in more income, you're asking the wrong question. There isn't one, even if people think there is. There are a lot more folks that make profit in markets people seem to believe aren't profitable than most want to admit(because of the previous reasons). If you looked at my store, you'd assume I make next to nothing. Most people do. You'd be entirely wrong.

[Nefertiti Nefarious]

I'm still covering my SL expenses, and making a pittance for RL, with inexpensive 1-prim decor and inexpensive textures because there are far more people who want a cute decor item for 9L than want someting elaborate for 900L.

 

Something like Tari's Tinfoil Top Hat ... quirky, inexpensive, copiable and plain fun.

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/TLD-Tin-Foil-Top-Hat-100-Mad/3093995

 

 

[Poenald Palen]

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Parrish Ashbourne wrote:

Making full perm mesh, or making things you can't buy as full perm mesh.

Any thing with great branding, marketing, and advertising.

Giving away tons of free stuff to attract renters, or attract traffic and then advertisers to your blog.

Listing items on the marketplace with lots of keyword spam, but only works if your all ready a top selling store, and depends on what key words are used, for example LL won't remove an item that's flagged if it's listed as both formal and casual, and LL seems to think that all items are "steampunk, tiny, gor, goth, vampire, fantasy, furry."

LL dosn't give us any statistics on what sells, so know one really knows, if we knew it would all so be over saturated.

 

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No, they basically dont. But....

A while back there was an info graphic about in world stats that mentioned hair as the biggest seller.

It doesn't say if it is profitable or not, and there are lots of demo's of hair and I have heard (not stats, just reading some peoples comments) that about half of the people shopping seemed to be using them. So, maybe this is not very helpful lol.

But, if you are still interested, that infographic was around a year or two ago and was maybe a year in review or birthday post. I can't find it real quick, but it was blogged right here on the SL website.

I think the old stats used to point out that very few people made more than a few dollars a month. The ones that did where suspected to be the larger brands in thier industries, people who run land (land lords or "barons") and maybe a few people running services and items related to that (thinking business products and things that have web based connections, like the breedables and business items like subscribe-o-matic) so....that is what I can remember. 

This was then, so what is working now? I really don't know and besides actually getting feedback from people who do sell items. Cars, which is what I did, seem to sell very little for me but I am out of the loop and my products are aging. A few dollars now and then. I don't have an in world store, it would eat all the money up and then some because my products are not new enough and don't seem to have compelling reasonsn to buy other than price and few of those types of cars around. Cars have a steeper learning curve, though you can learn the basics and just buy scripts and poses and not learn that stuff. They can end up using almost every kind of skill needed for content creation: Building, mesh, animation/poses, sound, scripting, particles and texturing. It takes a long time, so I presume it is partially a labor of love, love of a challange, tinkerers/DIY intrigue and a simply a extension of a fascination with cars/vehicles for most.

I have seen the new arms and feet from Slink all over the marketplace, as well as the applier thingies. Those seem pretty hot and I imagine the creators of those systems and products are doing O.K. with them. Not rocket science to model some hands and forearms, but the issue with testing and adjusting them to get them just right and then getting a good few builders to back it in order to make it a sort of standard or runaway success is the 80% of it really. matching the skin tonesn of popular sking makers etc. can be time consuming as well. Anything easier would have 50+ competitors.

[alaynadelrey]

Doing what you like to do will also be more profitable than other things, all else being equal, because you'll be more motivated to put in the time and effort to keep your skills sharp and do a good job on the little details. Whether that means creative use of mesh for furnishings, or scripting new items, or drawing your own clothing textures, or whatever.

If there's a poorly filled niche you could possibly capture that market; you'd be working with a smaller market, of course, but you'd have fewer competitors than if you went for something that 100 other sellers are already doing and doing well. What would you want to buy, but have trouble finding?

[Parrish Ashbourne]

I think this might be one of, or part of the chart you were talking about, you might have to scroll down to:

Second Life Metric:/inworld profits

http://gridsurvey.com/economy.php

Things have certainly changed.  I think now development time is the biggest reason I'm not profitable any more. I use to make 2 to 4 items a week, now it's one every 6 months for the more advance projects. My best selling items are still very simple things I made 6 years ago, that I never thought would have sold well. 

 

[Spica Inventor]

'Price pumping' in general is the single biggest reason why overall profitability is as low as it is in S.L. The income from pixel land model emphasis is at the very heart of the problem.

[Codex Alpha]

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Charli Infinity wrote:

Since the market is now saturated with full perm meshes.

Lots of clothes, shoes, accesories, furnitures & etc. made from full perm meshes selling for very low prices like L$10-50.

 

What's still profitable in SL?

 

 

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Originality. Innovation. Creativeness. Uniqueness. That's what.