How Do You Make Most of Your Sales?

[Prokofy Neva]

I'm going to put a poll inworld for people to answer anonymously on a poll that gives me no voter data, but I thought I'd ask here, too.

How do you make most of your sales?

1. Gatchas -- machines in your store or at an event

2. Merchant events -- rounds of fairs like Collabor88,  Fameshed, The Chapter Four or Arcade, etc. with a limited time.

3. Marketplace

4. In-store purchases from search, word-of-mouth, serendipty

5. Customer groups, i.e. you post a notice of a product in the group with a landmark, and people TP in and buy

6. Customizations - you make a bespoke item on demand from a customer for a higher price

[Gunner Grun]

I'd say I do 50/50 store and marketplace. There has been a lot of times the customer would be standing right next to the vendor at the store and still buy it off the marketplace as their standing there. 

[Chic Aeon]

I make the most from gacha events, then marketplace and inworld sales -- other non-gacha events (I do have a choice in that but ones that are not gacha) are sometimes very good and sometimes not so much. It depends mostly on the venue (I have tested with similar products :D) .

 

I don't do customs or have a store group so the last two are out. 

[Rya Nitely]

Inworld and MP are about 50/50 for me. None of the others apply.

[Tari Landar]

MP and custom work

[femhalf]

This might be off-topic, but what about resellers and affiliate programs?  Anybody know if those are worth pursuing?

[iamyourneighbour]

Marketplace weights about 90% and gets pretty handsome sales daily. I have some retail objects laid across points of interest in world but those generate no more than 10% of total sales.

Gachas do roll in whale cash but I prefer to let people have better items, at better quality at better price vs existing products. I simply go around look for overpriced, badly optimized products and make a better and cheaper one. There are plenty, especially something with a lot of bad review is a cash cow since you know there are demands and those demands were not properly met. 

Edited January 23, 2018 by iamyourneighbour

[Claireschen Hesten]

22 hours ago, femhalf said:

This might be off-topic, but what about resellers and affiliate programs?  Anybody know if those are worth pursuing?

I've dabbled with them over the years and not really found them to be worth it if you are thinking of making them your core business people would rather buy direct from the store over an affiliate vendor though i seem to remember from the ones i've had if you bought something from the vendor you'd get it cheaper with commission paid back

[Chic Aeon]

On 1/21/2018 at 6:58 PM, femhalf said:

This might be off-topic, but what about resellers and affiliate programs?  Anybody know if those are worth pursuing?

While I haven't done this, I understand from the gacha community as well as posts on the subject that "smart" (or maybe lucky too) gacha resellers do well. But like most retail, it all depends on the person and the energy expended. It is a way for those not into creating to have a store or play at it. Either way it can be fun --- or lucrative.  I have never thought that reseller shops were all that likely to be profitable. I have no personal info on that though. Seems like most have disappeared over time. There were TONS maybe seven years ago. That says something I think. Again; no personal experience

 

[Pamela Galli]

About half MP, half inworld. More or less. A lot of people find me on MP then try out the merchandise inworld and buy there.

I do regular inworld promotions to my mailing list (I do not have a group), except when I take a break. I don’t do events etc. because I like to be totally in control of all possible parameters of marketing. I only do custom work if someone comes up with an idea I love and that would not take three months to make, which is very rare. 

When I started, it was because I liked making a certain style of stuff, and I liked playing store, and I decided my business would be founded on creating and selling what and how I liked, to like minded people.

[Bitsy Buccaneer]

My inworld store does well in search for "Roman art". I have inexpensive items for peeps looking to furnish a RP dwelling and pricier things for art collectors and stuff in between that mostly gets ignored these days. People who spend more time shopping tell me that my work is amongst the very best in the niche. I am utterly OCD about authenticity and quality for my main store.

That is the entirety of my marketing strategy.

[iamyourneighbour]

6 hours ago, Bitsy Buccaneer said:

My inworld store does well in search for "Roman art". I have inexpensive items for peeps looking to furnish a RP dwelling and pricier things for art collectors and stuff in between that mostly gets ignored these days. People who spend more time shopping tell me that my work is amongst the very best in the niche. I am utterly OCD about authenticity and quality for my main store.

That is the entirety of my marketing strategy.

I have to check that out lol