Marketplace listing fees

[ralph Alderton]

Marishka Ixito says :

'but it strikes me as rather odd, that a company that's obviously ultimately interested in profit (LL) would be willing to support an endlessly growing database of merchandise (the marketplace) that doesn't charge a "listing fee" in any shape or form to prevent people from listing junk.'

"Quoted for truth"

But seriously folks there is no organic natural death of stale and non selling products in the current system. So is the marketplace just going to become an ever expanding mountain of dross, destroying the visibility of good products and good creators.

In RL product death is a natural part of the retail evolutionary ecosystem. Products don't stay on the shelf forever for very good reasons.

Poor quality products that don't sell should not be taking up valuable shelf space.

The current situation is not healthy

[Darrius Gothly]

---

ralph Alderton wrote:

But seriously folks there is no organic natural death of stale and non selling products in the current system. So is the marketplace just going to become an ever expanding mountain of dross, destroying the visibility of good products and good creators.

In RL product death is a natural part of the retail evolutionary ecosystem. Products don't stay on the shelf forever for very good reasons.

Poor quality products that don't sell should not be taking up valuable shelf space.

The current situation is not healthy

---

You better sit down ralph ... I agree with you. There truly does need to be some form of "culling of the herd" take place in the Marketplace Inventory.

In a RL marketplace, the store owner looks at what is selling and what is not, what products "earn" their place on the limited shelf space ... and then removes what has not earned that place. But in the Marketplace, there is no real physical limit on shelf space, no taxes paid for carrying inventory, so there is very little incentive to keep the products fresh and competitive.

But I agree with you, we do seem to be reaching a point where the products on the shelves "feel" stale, seem stagnant and need a good shaking up. This is why I support the initiative to automatically unlist any item that has not sold in three months.

There has been a lot of controversy about how much time to allow before delisting something. I chose three months for several reasons, including the fact that it is a short enough time to catch and unlist most Seasonal items. Yes, you heard me right .. to unlist Seasonal items. (If you still have Seasonal items listed three months AFTER the end of their selling season and they haven't sold, it's time to pull them down so they will feel fresh when you relist them just before the season comes around again.)

Listing fees will just impose a barrier to selling that doesn't need to be there. But unlisting stale items costs nothing except a bit of time to relist and thus keeps the doors open to sellers of all skill and resource levels.

But the one point of this plan I must adamantly insist upon is ... Merchant Notification Via Email. The Commerce Dev Team MUST ensure that the Merchant is notified by email for every item delisted (whether by automatic means or because of a Flagged Item review). As we see now, delisting items and then simply posting a comment on the Merchant Dashboard is insufficient.

FWIW: I am still receiving less than 20% of the Sales Notification emails for products sold. Some people get none at all, some get every one of them. Whatever the cause, it means there is a problem in the email system they are using. Once they fix that, then they will be able to add notifications when Flagged Items are delisted. And THEN they can implement a reasonable system of delisting stale products.

[Rya Nitely]

Yes, there needs to be some regular effort from merchants to keep their listings active, not the 'list and forget' method that exists.

Now to kick things off towards a cleaner, fresher marketplace we should have a one off compulsory clean up. Make everyone do it, and then the 3 month thing.

[Darrius Gothly]

---

Rya Nitely wrote:

Yes, there needs to be some regular effort from merchants to keep their listings active, not the 'list and forget' method that exists.

Now to kick things off towards a cleaner, fresher marketplace we should have a one off compulsory clean up. Make everyone do it, and then the 3 month thing.

---

Sounds good to me. Pick a date .. preferably about 2-4 weeks from now. Send out email to every merchant of record listing the items that are "Stale" (haven't sold in the previous 3 months) and explaining that on the date chosen, the items mentioned in the email will be automatically delisted.

After that initial sweep, once a month run a check and delist anything with no sales in three months .. AND send a notification email to the Merchant.

I can support that methodology. As long as the changes are documented via email to the Merchants, I will support it wholeheartedly.

[Rya Nitely]

Or lets just start over. Clean slate. Make everyone relist everything :smileyvery-happy: Now that would be fun :smileyvery-happy:

[Darrius Gothly]

ROFL!! Sounds good to me.

OFFICIAL Linden Lab Statement: Starting today at 5am SLT, everyone has 3 hours to rebuild all your listings (as we're going to delete them all and make you start from scratch). Any listings not done by 8am SLT will be forever locked out and the related items in your magic boxes will be deleted from the boxes and your personal inventory.

Because we FEEL like it!

 

PS: That's a JOKE people .. calm down. I'm just being foolish!