Mickey Vandeverre Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 I can't believe that you are buying into discussion of WHAT YOU CANNOT DO. Shocking! I've placed WHAT YOU CAN DO here - and frankly, it's tiring. If her products were not as exciting as they were, I would not have bothered - she has GREAT PRODUCT! It bothers me to watch 20 or more pages convincing someone what they CANNOT do! Right now, Rene is telling Josh what he CANNOT DO. Josh knows what he CAN do! Incoherent ramblings - for the birds - drunken statements - fine, if that's what ya'll accept - RUN WITH IT! Sure makes my jobs a lot easier. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Madeliefste Oh Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Marina Ramer wrote: So again this brings no business for us or LL and for LL this is a business in the end so they should help th epeople who bring them more money, us sellers , not freebie sellers. Freebie sellers should be gone form market or at least as minimun to be forced to pay an uploading coherent fee on this market. You choose to operate on an open platform, where both hobbyists and professionals put their creative eggs. The essense of the problem is that it is getting harder for the professional to compete with the hobbyist. But LL has never made any difference between a hobbyist and a professional merchant. And I doubt they will do so in the future. Now imagen that that they do as you want and forbid all freebies and dollarbees on the marketplace. It will only be a temporay solution for the essence of your problem. Within a few months you will be back to ask them to forbit all 2 to 9-dollarbies from the marketplace, because those don't bring LL any money since they don't generate any fee cost, and they are pretty much in your way on the marketplace. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gavin Hird Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Madeliefste Oh wrote: Now imagen that that they do as you want and forbid all freebies and dollarbees on the marketplace. It will only be a temporay solution for the essence of your problem. Within a few months you will be back to ask them to forbit all 2 to 9-dollarbies from the marketplace, because those don't bring LL any money since they don't generate any fee cost, and they are pretty much in your way on the marketplace. Not necessarily. It depends how this is handled. Again pointing back to other successes that has both free and paid-for content, the Apple App Store (and iTunes also), LL could choose to define minimum prices for items that were not free. In the app store that is $0.99 and a simmilar band could be established in L$ for the marketplace. Combine that with a requirement to enlist in a developer program to be able to trade on the marketplace. This enlistment should have a cost, and must be renewed on a yearly basis. This would clearly both serve to remove old content from merchants that had left SecondLife (or no longer paying the listing fee.) In addition it would block or discourage players who spawns alts who are listing free content more or less for the sport of showing off their ripped goods, or play destructive in the market. It could also make it more attractive to hunt for free items in world, increasing in-world presence and visitors to in-world merchant locations. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mickey Vandeverre Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 I'm not done with you! Lots of coffee. In the 20 pages of time, that you all have sat here, and talked about everything that you CANNOT DO....each one of you could have set up a twitter account and added 100 followers. Even with ZERO followers you can use hashtags. In that time - anyone could have designed a product that would compete in a 100L or less market. ANYONE. If you think you are losing to that market, then get your azz into that market - at least on one product out of 300! If you think that your stuff is so hot that you are not going to fool with that market, at least make an accessory item. One teeny weeny little add-on accessory item. .....during that time I could have built a whole new business in Second Life and added 10 twitter accounts to promote it! And it might be CHEAP product! I don't see from any searches that is necessary - but you all have probably convinced at a minimum of 100 other merchants in town (during the course of 20 pages) To SLASH THEIR PRICES. Duh. People watch - I'm watching - if did not know better - I would have gone right into my marketplace page and adjusted prices. THAT'S WHAT YOU ACCOMPLISH when you do this. Shooting self in foot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luna Bliss Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 I'm trying Mickey... I started acting like an auctioneer in my group, announcing prizes I gave out... "Betty Boop just won 100 $L, and Betty Bop just got a gift certificate for 500 $L!" "Get your FREE camping spot in the beautiful Bliss Gardens Park below the store!" ... and a bunch of people left my group Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Madeliefste Oh Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Gavin Hird wrote: Madeliefste Oh wrote: Now imagen that that they do as you want and forbid all freebies and dollarbees on the marketplace. It will only be a temporay solution for the essence of your problem. Within a few months you will be back to ask them to forbit all 2 to 9-dollarbies from the marketplace, because those don't bring LL any money since they don't generate any fee cost, and they are pretty much in your way on the marketplace. Not necessarily. It depends how this is handled. Again pointing back to other successes that has both free and paid-for content, the Apple App Store (and iTunes also), LL could choose to define minimum prices for items that were not free. In the app store that is $0.99 and a simmilar band could be established in L$ for the marketplace. Combine that with a requirement to enlist in a developer program to be able to trade on the marketplace. This enlistment should have a cost, and must be renewed on a yearly basis. This would clearly both serve to remove old content from merchants that had left SecondLife (or no longer paying the listing fee.) In addition it would block or discourage players who spawns alts who are listing free content more or less for the sport of showing off their ripped goods, or play destructive in the market. It could also make it more attractive to hunt for free items in world, increasing in-world presence and visitors to in-world merchant locations. Yeah, sure they could... the only point is we are not talking about Apple, but about LL. I'm afraid that it is just not in the culture of the compagny to think in that way. LL is the kind of compagny that publishes its own code, so others can start their own grids. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sassy Romano Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Madeliefste Oh wrote: Yeah, sure they could... the only point is we are not talking about Apple, but about LL. I'm afraid that it is just not in the culture of the compagny to think in that way. LL is the kind of compagny that publishes its own code, so others can start their own grids. Not entirely true. Remember, Pink Linden tried to get a listing fee put into place and the merchants were split over it. Some felt it would be a good idea, others absolutely hated the idea. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gavin Hird Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 I think a per-item listing fee will not go down so well with many merchants because some of them have large collections of varieties of basically the same item (such as color). Such a fee could seriously disadvantage these merchants. A fee for the right to trade would work better IMHO. Such a fee should also include certain other advantages like you have in real developer programs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sassy Romano Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Yes there are different ways it could be offered but then there'd still be outrcy from either side. a) It's not fair, I have to pay to list my items, I can't afford the $100 fee (change price to whatever suits the debate) b) It's not fair, i'm a professional merchant, it's my RL income, others *only* have to pay $100 to compete. Thats's a simplistic view of course and yes there is scope for all sorts of different models though some would argue this already exists in the form of listing enhancements and that those that want to pay for extra visibility may do so. Others argue it makes no difference if you do etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rene Erlanger Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Most of these Freebies or ultra cheap items...even the ones containing copybotted content...will mainly affect & target the most popular keywords and most popular sectors as those are the places that will generate most transactions/ hits, reviews and maybe TP's to any in-world Store. I doubt any (or many) talented creators are likely to create freebie items that are specifically aimed at something like "Mexican food" or "Lime Green Glass" or "Wine and Cheese"...as these are all obscure "Search terms" which won't generate many hits in any given month. One is unlikely to see Freebies under any of these "obscure" keyword phrases as it doesn't serve it's purpose. I would want my freebie out there in front of as many eyes as possible....to generate as many hits and Transactions as possible, as it will increase the "viewing" of my entire Store and bring the rest of my collection of products into play. Freebies need to hit popular keywords to do that...not obscure ones! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Madeliefste Oh Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Sassy Romano wrote: Not entirely true. Remember, Pink Linden tried to get a listing fee put into place and the merchants were split over it. Some felt it would be a good idea, others absolutely hated the idea. Pink was a labbie that at least tried to listen to merchants. But because of the way LL communicated with residents (office hours, by that time) she mainly communicated with a small group. The call for listing fees came from this group, and Pink supported it. And indeed that rose a lot of protest. So that brought LL to a point where they had to decide which direction to go with their merchant community. It's clear what they have chosen. Just let it be how it is: same rights for everyone who uses the service. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gavin Hird Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Madeliefste Oh wrote: Just let it be how it is: same rights for everyone who uses the service. Everyone will have the same rights regardless of a fee or not. The same ability, perhaps not, but that is a different discussion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luna Bliss Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Though I've had an account @ Twitter for some time I just posted my first tweet, and also informed everyone that I'm eating a sandwich...let's see what comes of this. Will this show up in Google or what? I don't understand.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rene Erlanger Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Mickey Vandeverre wrote: And before Rene gets here and starts 10 pages of no one is buying over 100L - that's a complete crock. Even if it were true, then you need to adjust your pricing for the market. But it's just not true. I told you before, that your ramblings are out there for the Birds.....as i never said the above once. (please provide a link if i did) My comments on these forums tend to be of general nature .ie Second Life as a whole enterprise....and that means both Marketplace and In-world markets. I don't really shop on Marketplace, I might use it to search some products though (ironically the obscure ones).....and then go in-world and buy it from the Creator's mainstore. I actively support the in-world economy and not Marketplace. I signed up over 5 years ago to join a unique 3D Virtual World environment.....and not a 2D shopping website. It's for that reason i don't spend much time cracking the Marketplace search engine....like i did repeatedly In-world. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Madeliefste Oh Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 But I must admit, since last year, there is a different kind of wind blowing. They approach it as 'protecting the tools from grieving', but you see new steps, very small steps, but they still leave a footprint. You must be five days old to upload something to the marketplace. You must be verified to become able to upload mesh. And now for the Linden Reams the are even announcing a "creators" program. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mickey Vandeverre Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 --- Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tari Landar Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 You know the most simple solution that would please most(can't please them all) would be to put BACK the category for freebies that we had in all previous versions of what is now MP. But the lab is chock full of....erm, people, who don't think things through too well, even after they break things they still don't think it through. I LIKED having that category before, as both a merchant, and shopper. Of course back then search wasn't borked beyond recognition either. But still, even if that freebie category weren't split into subs(I'm sure if they implemented it again, it would..but we'll play pretend) you'd still be able to find the free items you're looking for...if you're in the market for them. Of course this working would be dependent upon two major things...1-search working correctly, and 2-the lab getting some folks in there that actually know what they're doing and are willing to put in the work/time/effort to make MP better without making it some exclusive club you need a special knock to get into.....and stuff But then we've been asking for this since MP came to be, and knowing their track record, this won't change. Won't stop us from asking though. Ok, won't stop me from asking. I would gladly put up hundreds more free products on MP, if there were a category for them specifically. A lot of the stuff I give away for free, or lower cost anyway, are things that will either benefit others in some way(not just a cool thing to have, but actually benefit, they typically are components useful for other things these folks will own) OR they are things I've only just learned how to make/still getting my feet wet on. Most of the free stuff I give away, I do inworld too, not on MP. I like sharing these things with others, at little to no cost, because it helps me as much as it does them. Experience, as a creator, is a good thing. But I can create til the cows come home, it won't do me any good if I can't/don't get them out there to others. That's one place where a lower cost on an item that's likely not worth top dollar, comes into play. Lower cost=more enticing for some=more exposure for me=more opportunity for feedback=more opportunity for growth..and that's just a small list of the ways it benefits me. It benefits those looking for low cost stuff too. It's really a win-win for a lot of us. Much in the same way that some creators give out gifts is very beneficial to them. It gets them out there. My skills are minimal, I'm getting better, but I don't expect to be at the top of the professional ladder anytime soon. But I AM scaling it, I AM climbing it, and offering both freebies and low cost items is just one tool that aids me along the way. Like it, or leave it, no skin off my nose, but we all gotta start somewhere. We can't all charge top dollar for less than stellar stuff, and get away with it. I don't knock folks who charge what I personally believe is way more than they should, so I don't think others should knock my prices simply because they don't agre, or don't appreciate me giving stuff away(and I'm still not clear on exactly how that's hurting all of you-general you of course). Hmph. One of these days my skills will be top notch, then, and only then, will I actually be any one person's competition and worthy of being worried about, lol. I'm not in some race for first place here. I just want a spot, just one tiny spot. The same as every other merchant. Most of the people complaining, from this thread that is, are clearly making a decent chunk of change(or could, if they aren't currently, if they put more work into it) simply based on what they offer. They offer some great stuff, so there is no reason why they couldn't make more. There's also no reason to worry about the folks under you on the ladder who are nowhere near your rung! I'd like to say this "no more freebies" mentality only existed here, in sl that is, but that's not the case. I used to own a business that dealt primarily with handmade items. It started off with small things, like diapers, cloth napkins, totes and things of this nature. Eventually I added in other things, bath accessories, health and beauty items, candles, toys.. you name it, we likely created it. But the business didn't get out there to the public without the help of marketing tools. Freebies are simply another marketing tool. When I first started sewing diapers, I sold them very cheap, or gave them away. They worked wonderfully, but they were definitely not the best in the beginning. Giving those things out to people got them in my store, got my name out there and let people get a good idea of what it was I offered. I got all kinds of flack from other WAHMs. That's one cut throat and difficult industry to deal with. Women can be really relentless when they want to be, or when they feel challenged(men can too, don't get me wrong, but most of my fellow merchants were women). For some reason people believed my offerings were somehow, all on their lonesome, going to take down this whole sector(a few closeknit groups of WAHMs). Far from the truth, though I was their competition, in that right. Still. My freebies didn't harm anyone, or any business, I wasn't on their level anyway(at first, eventually I was, lol til rl economy 'bout sucked me dry and had to close up shop). The same way they aren't harming people now on MP or in-world. I just don't get this whole "your freebies are killing me". No, your inability to get your business to do what you want it to do, is killing you.My freebies hurt no one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rene Erlanger Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Mickey Vandeverre wrote: Right now, Rene is telling Josh what he CANNOT DO. Josh knows what he CAN do! Incoherent ramblings - for the birds - drunken statements - fine, if that's what ya'll accept - RUN WITH IT! Sure makes my jobs a lot easier. Your problem is that you have GRAVE difficulty understanding people's postings on these forums. :smileymad: Again in my reply to Josh.....where did I post "WHAT HE CANNOT DO".?.....please anyone on this forum help me locate these phrases that i supposedly wrote in my reply to Josh. I stated that his initial comment was too generalistic.....as each SL market sector behaves differently, which is true. I went on to explain that the SL economy changes over time. ... partially due to certain events or LL policy changes and highlighted an example with current in-world traffic! You're wierd!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mickey Vandeverre Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Rene Erlanger wrote: Mickey Vandeverre wrote: Right now, Rene is telling Josh what he CANNOT DO. Josh knows what he CAN do! Incoherent ramblings - for the birds - drunken statements - fine, if that's what ya'll accept - RUN WITH IT! Sure makes my jobs a lot easier. Your problem is that you have GRAVE difficulty understanding people's postings on these forums. :smileymad: Again in my reply to Josh.....where did I post "WHAT HE CANNOT DO".?.....please anyone on this forum help me locate these phrases that i supposedly wrote in my reply to Josh. I stated that his initial comment was too generalistic.....as each SL market sector behaves differently, which is true. I went on to explain that the SL economy changes over time. ... partially due to certain events or LL policy changes and highlighted an example with current in-world traffic! You're wierd!! I don't give a rat's azz. I'll be WEIRD spelled correctly on PAGE ONE, with product to sell.... While you plant your NORMAL azz on page two without anything to sell. (your marketplace page is in the dust, btw) There ain't NO PAGE TWO. by the way. DONE. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rene Erlanger Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Gavin Hird wrote: Madeliefste Oh wrote: Now imagen that that they do as you want and forbid all freebies and dollarbees on the marketplace. It will only be a temporay solution for the essence of your problem. Within a few months you will be back to ask them to forbit all 2 to 9-dollarbies from the marketplace, because those don't bring LL any money since they don't generate any fee cost, and they are pretty much in your way on the marketplace. Not necessarily. It depends how this is handled. Again pointing back to other successes that has both free and paid-for content, the Apple App Store (and iTunes also), LL could choose to define minimum prices for items that were not free. In the app store that is $0.99 and a simmilar band could be established in L$ for the marketplace. Combine that with a requirement to enlist in a developer program to be able to trade on the marketplace. This enlistment should have a cost, and must be renewed on a yearly basis. This would clearly both serve to remove old content from merchants that had left SecondLife (or no longer paying the listing fee.) In addition it would block or discourage players who spawns alts who are listing free content more or less for the sport of showing off their ripped goods, or play destructive in the market. It could also make it more attractive to hunt for free items in world, increasing in-world presence and visitors to in-world merchant locations. Very good post and i kind of agree with this. I still don't believe that Second Life requires a food mountian of Freebies to be a successful platform, as several other VW' Platforms have shown that they can grow their membership during a recession without having freebie content. A disclaimer before the Madhatter twists my quotes.---->.I'm not reliant on Marketplace income, so whatever is occuring on MP right now does not impact me, other than losing traffic for In-world shopping activities....but that's more to do with LL marketing MP inside the SL client, than anything to do with Freebies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Toysoldier Thor Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Madeliefste Oh wrote: Sassy Romano wrote: Not entirely true. Remember, Pink Linden tried to get a listing fee put into place and the merchants were split over it. Some felt it would be a good idea, others absolutely hated the idea. Pink was a labbie that at least tried to listen to merchants. But because of the way LL communicated with residents (office hours, by that time) she mainly communicated with a small group. The call for listing fees came from this group, and Pink supported it. And indeed that rose a lot of protest. So that brought LL to a point where they had to decide which direction to go with their merchant community. It's clear what they have chosen. Just let it be how it is: same rights for everyone who uses the service. So some of the facts posted here from the 2009 Pink / Colossus Freebies Roadmap fiasco were vague but far from explaining the facts that happened that November of 2009. As I was clearly one of the Forum Leaders of the anti Freebies Roadmap hords and was one of the last ones to be a pitbull on Pink/Colossus's butt to the day in late May when Colossus had to officially announce that the Roadmap had to be shelved... and the one that organized the famous POPCORN PROTEST for the office hour that everyone attacked Pink's team in December after the announced roadmap.... I think I can add to this story. First of all what ticked off a lot of Merchants was that prior to the formal Colossus bombdrop, Pink's team made it known that her team was looking for a solution to address "CLUTTER" in the Xstreet. Clutter to Colossus was the growing amount of listings in Xstreet that were basically orphaned. Outdated, merchants not even around to support them, etc. At that time, there was very little priority or concerns from most merchants that LL had to deal with all the freebies or low priced listings. It was talked about but by far it was not the level of concern and discussion that it has come to be since the FREEBIES Roadmap showed up in Nov 2009. But if a reasonable solution could be created to deal with both, great. At the time I was actually a rare supporter to help Pink / Colossus to promote the idea of potentially coming up with a reasonable solution. I was the founder of the SL Merchants Group and we had many discussions there about the possible options. I was the one promoting that all we needed was a reasonable minimum commission charge for all xstreet sales - i.e. 5% commission or $3L - whichever is more. There was some disagreement of this minum fee but generally I think if this solution would have went forward - it would have been feasible to deploy and agreed to by most. The other idea was to charge a reasonable annual listing anniversary listing fee ($10L) - not much at all but just enough that if a merchant was not around to pay it when the listing came up for renewal, the listing would be suspended. If after a year of being suspended these listings would clearly be considered CLUTTER and the listing would be deleted from Xstreet. The size of the fee was not important - it was that the fee had to be paid. Abandoned listings would not have anyone to pay the $10L fee so it would deal with the clutter. All was looking good and many Merchants like me were even will to support the released Roadmap if it was reasonable and it was targeted to address the primary issue of Clutter and reduce Freebies to those that had VALUE to be a freebie. Then in November Colossus dropped his Freebies Roadmap bombshell. First, it was not primarily targeted to addressing clutter but moreso it was going after the destruction of all freebies. That is why he even called it the FREEBIES ROADMAP. Second, the roadmap was more of an attempt by LL to gouge all the Merchants - even those that didnt have clutter nor a large portion of low value Freebies. My memory is a bit rusty on the details, but LL came up with a MONTHLY Listing fee, minimum charges for listings below $50L, and an fee for promotional listings. Basically LL could have easily released a roadmap with a strategy that had very reasonable minimal fees that would directly target the clutter and abuse of freebies but instead they decided to put in place what was coined (by me) as a huge tax grab and that i referred to as the CLUTTER TAX. Colossus's roadmap with all these complicated charges also had another major issue that many of us technical I.T. Merchants detected.... that LL would not even be able to successfully deploy all these complicated tax rules into the oudated xstreet platform. We all predicted LL's team would ultimately fail. Well after that announcement, Pink's entire team went into complete Black Ops. Her team refused to post on the forums, she cancelled office hours. The few office hours she held - no one was allowed to bring up the progress of the Roadmap or the Clutter tax. After several months of no noticable progress from Pink's team on a roadmap they predicted to deploy into production in 30 to 60 days, and after my hounding Pink's team constantly.... in May of 2010 Colossus had to finally announce on the forums that they had decided to shelf the roadmap. The real reason they backed out of the Clutter Taxes and the roadmap had NOTHING to do with LL listening to the massive outcry from Merchants and the significant noticed exansion of the small micro xstreet sites at the time that saw their listing / merchant counts triple in size right after the roadmap was announced. The reason Pink's team shelved the deployment of the Clutter Taxes was because - as predicted - the LL Development could not figure out how to make xstreet actually execute the complicate rules / taxes that Colossus came up with. So.... that is much more details to the history of the 2009 FREEBIES ROADMAP. Reasonable very low cost fees like a $3L minimum commission on all sales and a very small annual listing anniversary fee was all that was needed and could have got generally good support. LL GOT GREEDY and DESTROYED the idea. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rene Erlanger Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Madeliefste Oh wrote: Sassy Romano wrote: Not entirely true. Remember, Pink Linden tried to get a listing fee put into place and the merchants were split over it. Some felt it would be a good idea, others absolutely hated the idea. Pink was a labbie that at least tried to listen to merchants. But because of the way LL communicated with residents (office hours, by that time) she mainly communicated with a small group. The call for listing fees came from this group, and Pink supported it. And indeed that rose a lot of protest. So that brought LL to a point where they had to decide which direction to go with their merchant community. It's clear what they have chosen. Just let it be how it is: same rights for everyone who uses the service. For my part....i would be satisfied if LL created a "Content Creator Directory" ...and that in order to list products onto Marketplace they would have to provide RL name and address..and those details should be verified. This will make Merchants accountable when uploading products that breach copyrights or copybotted content or the unuathorised selling of full-perm items (i.e Textures,sculpties etc) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luna Bliss Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Well Mickey I can't say if excessive marketing works for me personally, but it seems to help your business. And you are definitely increasing expossure for SL in general so maybe we should all network more outside of SL. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Toysoldier Thor Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 I can say with my own experience that formal marketing & advertising have been of very little value to me. My main factors for the continued success of my products have been: awesome word of mouth leads from several of my well respected customers whom are also amazing merchants in their own rights... like Luna, Marcus Inkpen, Xtasy, and countless others I cant thank enough for their business and promotion of my products they have used. My informal guerilla marketing techniques, the ones that dont cost anything. Many of you might not believe or agree but by me being a highly visible Merchant Forums poster / contributor (even though I have a very strong reputation for being a huge critic of LL strategies, policies, actions, mistakes) has shown clear direct sales results. In fact I think Luna herself can attest to the fact that she generally discovered me and my landscape products because she wanted to know more about who this Toysoldier guy is thats being such a harsh critic of LL (and being attacked by the Dartagans of the world at that time). Dart is much better now The other factor of my success is because my products are targeted toward my fellow merchants and some of SL's top quality sim landscapers (for commercial or personal use) that have a high level of respect and regard for value products. Having products that target this "prime" target market has been a Godsend to my success. My free DEMO Pack on MP. I sell this free demo pack 3 times for any one of my other paid landscape products. I have a sample rezzable sculpty from each of my packs. This has generated a lot of my sales. Finally... and I will toot my own horn... the landscape products I created are high quality artistically sculpted packs and both pre-sales support and my after-sales service is a critical component of my business. I will do what ever it takes to address any potiential customer's questions / concerns and I will be as quick as possible to address the few problems I get from my current customers. As such, I never pay LL for any listing enhancement services. I dont pay for any adboards inworld. I dont put out a penny to advertise my store or products. In fact, I admit I have been very lazy in my SL Merchant life in the past 18 months as I have not created a new pack since August 2010. I put about 5 hours a month to run my SL business. So... as you can see.... agressive advertising and formal marketing have not be any factor in my success. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rene Erlanger Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Mickey Vandeverre wrote: How many pages of search terms do you analyze each morning? How much product do you have listed across the web? How many retail venues are you selling product in right now? or ever? I've got about 2000 products up today. I analyze search terms every morning. Do you? lol - just crazy rants-----> You don't think you can compare the two? ebay and etsy and bonanza and sl? You sure can. There's very little competition at all on SL web site. You want to talk about competing - you go get yourself an ebay or etsy account. There are no one word terms on that list above. There will be a few on my etsy acct, You know why? because the obscure terms and in-house networking sent so many hits to my pages that it automatically shows up on page one in a google search, and then I snag a very very very general term, being a little teeny weeny tiny business competing against huge corporations for those terms. I don't think that you have any clue what you are talking about on keyword selection. I'm using Second Life or Marketplace Searches......why should I care about ebay or etsy or whatever??? _____________________________________________________________________________ You're are ranting away again like a mad woman and could have saved yourself a lot of time just correctly reading previous messages!! As you can see from my message directly above yours, I do not focus on Marketplace......i've stated that several times already!! Why would i want to test 2000 Keywords on Google????? I do however test a fair number of keywords for SL In-World Search on a daily basis. In the hope that it might sink in this time!! "I don't really shop on Marketplace, I might use it to search some products though (ironically the obscure ones).....and then go in-world and buy it from the Creator's mainstore. I actively support the in-world economy and not Marketplace. I signed up over 5 years ago to join a unique 3D Virtual World environment.....and not a 2D shopping website. It's for that reason i don't spend much time cracking the Marketplace search engine....like i did repeatedly In-world. You're using me as your punch bag.....so that you can publicise the things you do and how great you are at marketing.....post after post after post.....and you need someone to play your "Patsy" to justify your "how good am I" postings......and that victim has become me!! I told you on another thread, that my main SL ALT has Twitter, Facebook and Flickr accounts (over a year now), but i use it for other purposes and not SL. This is not new Technology -lol For all your rants and pearls of wisdom...the bottom line, your increased Marketplace sales wasnt enough to prevent you downsizing your Lands in SL. I believe you can only squeeze so much juice out of the Lemon! Seriously do you think the majority of SL residents use the main www.Google to search for Second Life products? Lol that's the funniest suggestion i've heard all day! I suggest you do an in-world survey Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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