Marketplace sales way down: how are yours doing this month?

[Leonard Omizu]

I am the alt... my main doesn't want to admit defeat just yet, but is despondent!

Just small fry in the pond, but sales were pretty steady...

This month however has been dire, despite new and seasonal listings. Even the usual freebies are not selling as much. Inworld sales are about the same as before - so closing in on Marketplace sales which used to be 95 percent of all sales.

Coincidentally, I was just listening to the UK news and hearing that retailers here have had a tough time this month too...

Is anyone else having a bad October in Second Life sales too?

[Rya Nitely]

Well, not knowing what you sell it's hard to say what your problem might be. You say you do seasonal. My sales are up, and I do seasonal. 

Edit: If I look at what my stores are selling right now it's the seasonal things, so without them my sales would be way down.

Edited October 29, 2017 by Rya Nitely

[Leonard Omizu]

Thank you Rya.

Really thought I had mentioned that, evidently not..... My main sells home and garden stuff and a mishmash of other things - not clothes or avatar accessories though.

Those sales are way down, unfortunately the seasonal ones (old and newly listed) haven't taken up the slack in my main's case.

I am pleased to hear that you are doing well though - going to have to send the main on her way to make better stuff now (ouch, the main just hit me!).

[Bitsy Buccaneer]

Friends have been talking about their sales being down too, both inworld and MP, and how friends of theirs are struggling as well. I didn't get the September/October upturn I sometimes see, but that could be down to vagaries in RP tastes and such. Are we not overdue for another Roman epic blockbuster?

So not much to add, except that some others have seen their sales drop too. Hoping things improve for all of us.

[ChinRey]

For me there is hardly any difference in total sales the last three months, it's amazingly stable. It's possible that I have fewer but bigger sales now than I used to though.

[Chic Aeon]

I am and H and G gal also and things have been normal for me on the Marketplace. 

MUCH has to do with how many people have bought items lately as that put you higher in the listings where folks can SEE you (hence have a chance to buy). So possibly a small slump turned into a bigger one because of that.

I do venues also and have a store so all that contributes, but it seems like the Marketplace is pretty much the same as it has been.  

This comes up pretty regularly and with about the same result when a "poll" is taken :D.

 

 

[Bitsy Buccaneer]

Shrugs. I wonder what that whole group of people are doing wrong then.... Plus Leonard.

As for myself, I have such a long list of possibilities the question is which ones are actually relevant.

[Pamela Galli]

I have long known this: as time goes on, the accumulated inventory of products for sale increases while the number of buyers slowly decreases.  We have seen how the reduction of demand and growth of supply has reduced prices, in some cases by half or more.  That’s just how things are in SL.  People can still do well, but over time, overall, given the same amount and quality of output, sales figures will slowly decrease. There are exceptions, of course.

Edited October 31, 2017 by Pamela Galli

[Pavon2]

On 27.10.2017 at 2:53 PM, Leonard Omizu said:

I am the alt... my main doesn't want to admit defeat just yet, but is despondent!

Just small fry in the pond, but sales were pretty steady...

This month however has been dire, despite new and seasonal listings. Even the usual freebies are not selling as much. Inworld sales are about the same as before - so closing in on Marketplace sales which used to be 95 percent of all sales.

Coincidentally, I was just listening to the UK news and hearing that retailers here have had a tough time this month too...

Is anyone else having a bad October in Second Life sales too?

Sales went down also because there is some maintenace going on all the time. This last two weeks almost every day there was something going on. All the Database, Scheduled and now also more often Unscheduled Billing Maintenances as well as Restarts affect the sales. 

[iamyourneighbour]

Still selling like crazy, if anyone tells you that everything that can be made have been made, they are lying. 
If it's there and you can make a better one, make a better one and siphon on the $$$. One thing I have noticed thou, correcting your product description seems to send the product backwards in ranking somehow, now I don't really update items anymore once they are on the market and attracting autonomous sales.

The product icon is very important since people hardly read the product page, they just look at the product icon to decide if they want to buy. That's why you have people buy products that are apparently broken despite six 1 star reviews on a product released by someone that never logged on again. A lot of bad reviews also means.
 

1. There's high demand for that particular item

2. That demand is not being met properly

3. You can possibly make a better one 
= Profit

Most people do not look past the few pages of a search, so getting to the first few page is the start of the game, if the product is solid it will continue to attract sales which keeps the ranking without a lot of input from you.  Getting someone to click into your product page is a precursor to purchase, no matter how wonderful the product is you most likely will not get sales if you have a terrible product picture.

Edited November 8, 2017 by iamyourneighbour

[Malinda Quartz]

I'm here to also say my sales have dwindled quite a bit these fast few weeks for reasons unknown, other than thinking that the sl pond dried up for me. I've never relied on Second Life as a main income, but it's been a really good augmentation.

I'm just a creator trying to sale what I create. For the past few years people have been buying my products but like chewing gum maybe my stuff simply lost it's flavor. I kinda knew this would happen eventually, just feels bad it happened now.

Maybe If I'd got access to someone's storefront to put in some lucky chairs of what's mine could help their traffic and boost me back up in the zone so I could afford to pay them weekly rent. Otherwise I'll I can do is create more things in some public sandbox, upload them and see who bites.

[Leonard Omizu]

Thanks everyone.

Apologies for not replying earlier.

Interesting to consider that Marketplace maintenance may have affected sales. But then why my main's and not others, such as Chic and ChinRey...

At the start of November, things picked up on Marketplace... my main was stoked. However the last couple of days have had very few sales...

The inworld shops' sales remain pretty steady (never had many sales there anyway).

I remember the update bug but haven't tried recently to see whether it sends my products back to the end of search - I am a bit loathe to test this!

Really hope that sales will pick up again. And that everyone will be able to have a nice Christmas.

[Juppyj Alter]

 

.

Edited November 15, 2017 by Juppyj Alter

[ChinRey]

On 11.11.2017 at 7:14 PM, Leonard Omizu said:

Interesting to consider that Marketplace maintenance may have affected sales. But then why my main's and not others, such as Chic and ChinRey...

It may be because we rely on different marketing strategies. Chic uses events and blogs actively to tell people about her work, I don't really have a marketing strategy at all - it's all word of mouth and people seeing and liking my works inworld. I can't speak for others beyond that but to me at least the Marketplace is a place to sell, not to promote. So unless it goes down completely, any changes there won't affect my sales very much.

 

On 11.11.2017 at 7:14 PM, Leonard Omizu said:

At the start of November, things picked up on Marketplace... my main was stoked. However the last couple of days have had very few sales...

I see that trend almost every month. Sales peak the first few days, then they drop off towards the middle of the month before they slowly rise again. THis month is unusual though, it started off at a normal level but has remained fairly stable. The stipulated income for November is more than 25% up from October. I doubt it will end up that high but it's still far better than the 2-5% increase I usually see from one month ot another.

 

On 11.11.2017 at 7:14 PM, Leonard Omizu said:

The inworld shops' sales remain pretty steady (never had many sales there anyway).

I don't even bother keeping separate statistics for my inworld stores except on some special occasions and it's been a while since I've had time for that. My main stores should sell enough to justify the tier. My satelite stores are always dead losses but that's ok, I keep them mostly to support some places that deserve supporting anyway. (On a side note: one thing I have noticed is that one the few occasions I have joined an event, the profit has never been from the event itself or from MP but from increased sales at my regular inworld stores.)

To really bore everybody here to death: I have five different product ranges I keep as separate as possible and also have three other sources of SL income. If I break down the figures into the different categories:

• Furniture is stable but hardly significant. It's never been big to me. I did some low lag, low prim pieces years ago because I needed them for myself and my tenants and then I've made a more elaborate piece every now and then - sometimes because some friend asked me to, sometimes because I needed it for some special event or build and sometimes for the joy of building. I sell a piece every now and then like I always have.
• Full perm meshes are one of my biggest income sources (after houses and rentals). Sales figures are increasing slowly from month to month and this month is no different.
• Scripts - ready made scripts for sale in my store that is - I probably should have done more about that. At the moment, the few scripts I have for sale generate so little volume it's hard to see any trend at all. Insufficient data.
• Garden and Landscaping - stable but I think that counts as an increase since they're out of season at the moment. I don't usually do "season specific" content - I simply haven't got the time for it - and general G&L is of course mainly summer related.
• Houses - always my biggest source of income and also the one that accounts for most of the increase this month. My houses are focused on high performance (low LI, low lag and high LoD) and most come in themed sets so I mainly sell to people building larger themed areas (role play sims, complete rental communities and such). I don't really know how the market for individual stand-alone houses is.

 

• Commission builds - I haven't had one for months and from a purely commercial point of view that's just as well. The ones I accept are always fun and great challenges but very time consuming and I can't bring myself to charge properly for all those hours.
• Commission scripts - I think there is a really good market there for good scripters but I've never had time. My income from that sector has doubled this month but the amount is too low to really matter and it's all because one client and friend who pays percentages of her income rather than a fixed fee, has become more active recently.
• Rental income - increases by a percent or two every month and has done so ever since I opened Greater Consiton for tenants. I don't advertise my rentals very much but people stumble across them every now and then and some lke them well enough they want to stay.

 

On 11.11.2017 at 7:14 PM, Leonard Omizu said:

Really hope that sales will pick up again. And that everyone will be able to have a nice Christmas.

Thank you and the same to you!

[Leonard Omizu]

2 hours ago, ChinRey said:

It may be because we rely on different marketing strategies. Chic uses events and blogs actively to tell people about her work, I don't really have a marketing strategy at all - it's all word of mouth and people seeing and liking my works inworld. I can't speak for others beyond that but to me at least the Marketplace is a place to sell, not to promote. So unless it goes down completely, any changes there won't affect my sales very much.

 

I see that trend almost every month. Sales peak the first few days, then they drop off towards the middle of the month before they slowly rise again. THis month is unusual though, it started off at a normal level but has remained fairly stable. The stipulated income for November is more than 25% up from October. I doubt it will end up that high but it's still far better than the 2-5% increase I usually see from one month ot another.

 

I don't even bother keeping separate statistics for my inworld stores except on some special occasions and it's been a while since I've had time for that. My main stores should sell enough to justify the tier. My satelite stores are always dead losses but that's ok, I keep them mostly to support some places that deserve supporting anyway. (On a side note: one thing I have noticed is that one the few occasions I have joined an event, the profit has never been from the event itself or from MP but from increased sales at my regular inworld stores.)

To really bore everybody here to death: I have five different product ranges I keep as separate as possible and also have three other sources of SL income. If I break down the figures into the different categories:

• Furniture is stable but hardly significant. It's never been big to me. I did some low lag, low prim pieces years ago because I needed them for myself and my tenants and then I've made a more elaborate piece every now and then - sometimes because some friend asked me to, sometimes because I needed it for some special event or build and sometimes for the joy of building. I sell a piece every now and then like I always have.
• Full perm meshes are one of my biggest income sources (after houses and rentals). Sales figures are increasing slowly from month to month and this month is no different.
• Scripts - ready made scripts for sale in my store that is - I probably should have done more about that. At the moment, the few scripts I have for sale generate so little volume it's hard to see any trend at all. Insufficient data.
• Garden and Landscaping - stable but I think that counts as an increase since they're out of season at the moment. I don't usually do "season specific" content - I simply haven't got the time for it - and general G&L is of course mainly summer related.
• Houses - always my biggest source of income and also the one that accounts for most of the increase this month. My houses are focused on high performance (low LI, low lag and high LoD) and most come in themed sets so I mainly sell to people building larger themed areas (role play sims, complete rental communities and such). I don't really know how the market for individual stand-alone houses is.

 

• Commission builds - I haven't had one for months and from a purely commercial point of view that's just as well. The ones I accept are always fun and great challenges but very time consuming and I can't bring myself to charge properly for all those hours.
• Commission scripts - I think there is a really good market there for good scripters but I've never had time. My income from that sector has doubled this month but the amount is too low to really matter and it's all because one client and friend who pays percentages of her income rather than a fixed fee, has become more active recently.
• Rental income - increases by a percent or two every month and has done so ever since I opened Greater Consiton for tenants. I don't advertise my rentals very much but people stumble across them every now and then and some lke them well enough they want to stay.

 

Thank you and the same to you!

Thank for that very full expose, ChinRey! My main truly is a small fish in comparison. 

It's really helpful to read and is making my main consider her strategies - especially keeping product lines apart - albeit in the same store, rather than separate ones. Even browsers probably don't want to look at everything in a shop, no matter how interesting it might be.... :D. She is awfully eclectic and maybe needs reigning in a bit (/me cracks the whip).

Sales volume continues to be down since the early November "blip". However, starting this thread has helped my main, both from the point of view of support that's been shown and getting her thinking about new approaches.

Thanks to everyone who has contributed.