Rene Erlanger

lol- it generated a bucketload for LL though. I think the highest i ever saw it....was an advert touching 600K...thats like over 2000 USD for one week. The guy (or girl) must have been a RL millionaire!!

Good post Madeliefste.....that's pretty much how it went. Lost years!! Shame i can give you a "thumbs up" smiley! (they don't have one!)

Networking via Social Media

LL did not plan to have an inworld economy, they just stumbled upon it.....or more to the point, it's pioneer Residents spotted the opportunity to buy and sell items within the platform not LL....plus the GOM incident. When LL released Land to its residents, it was the Resdients who in turn spotted the opportunity of the Land rental market.. Since those days, LL have made a concerted effort to profit from very business activity somewhere along the line. You could not flat fee Classifieds as you would not be able to determine rankings for any given keyword. I suppose you could randomise the listings if everyone is paying the same....that way your advert gets a spell near the top of the Listings as does everyone else.

Your comment is far too generalised.....each market sector within Second Life has different behaviour patterns. You can't compare the state of the Fashion sector with say that of Combat weapon systems. Its not as straight forward.. Most seasoned Merchants have witnessed the evolution of the Second Life economy over the years. With each major change to it, you can attach specific reasons or LL policy changes that directly impacted it. As an example....the development of this Marketplace and then shoving it under people's noses inside the LL Viewer, has contributed to traffic moving away from in-world shopping ot Marketplace. Lots of sims and lands and stores were closed during 2011....many Designers have left SL and some are big names. Tell me who is left on the Quad sims?

Dartagan Shepherd wrote: Solution to improving the economy is to get rid of the "economy" for sensible flat fees and lower tier. Less sinks. Can't see that happening in 2012 to the degree that it's going to provide the necessary stimulus it would take to recover in 2012. i don't understand that highlighted section......how to improve the SL Economy is to get rid of it?

There are 27 million SL accounts since 2003, with 20000 new sign-ups each day (new users + Alt accounts) That's the current run rate. About a million Avatars login per month About 850,000 are residents that login more than once per month (which suggests 150k to 200k new accounts logged in just once into SL and then leave, never to return) about 475 k + spend 1 linden dollar or more in SL during month about 200k spend over over 2000 L per month, it suggest about 25% support the grid (200k out of 850k), by either buying Lindens or generated via an SL business (Pay LL tiers or EO rents with in-world sales) Missed opportunities.....I believe Second Life could have been much bigger in terms of active users ...thats if Second Life Grid could have scaled to accommodate the extra growth. Some ex-Linden employees seem to think that it would not scale....and LL knew that. Maybe that's the reason LL never spent any large amounts of money on Marketing & Advertising like IMVU and some of the VW's or Games. I think there are workaround solutions if the existing Grid could not scale to acccommodate huge growth. They could split it onto 2 Grids and use the Open sim Interportability system to get from Grid to the other....so in theory they could have 20000 sims on each Grid with 60-70k peak logins in each. They do have 2nd login Grid already ....with the Beta Grid.....so it could be done, just need the system to Transfer from one Grid to another inside the Viewer and not having to log out.

I voted about the same!

You should be just fine...as you're in a pretty niche market. I pity those involved in Fashion or the Avatar related products....kind of swamped...plus the Freebies/ Dollarbies on top

Madeliefste Oh wrote: When it comes to login-numbers, my opinion is that a part of it is what we would call 'fake traffic' in SL. They have for example about 20 Facebook-like, Farmville-like games out there. You have to login to be able to play them. You don't have to go in world at all, you play them in a browser window and they are very populair. Not only do these games pump up the traffic number, they also take money out of the in world economie, since people can buy items that are hard to get in those games with IMVU credits. Not sure about that...its like logging into these forums or my Account page or Marketplace.....i would not expect ti to count towards the login numbers of the standalone Second Life client. IMVU's growth curve is well documented....they have a younger user base......as per my graphs on this thread, there are more kids , teenagers & youngsters that log into Virtual worlds/ games than over 25's which Second Life mainly attracts. I think Linden Lab realises that.....hence why they allowed Teenagers onto the Main Grid. They were hoping for a growth boom......that never came!

Madeliefste Oh wrote: Rene Erlanger wrote: Firstly, freebies could impact your business in a big way . Let's say we had a talented Sculpty creator like yourself, creating similar items to you, but had the selling principles of Alicia.....i.e make them all free to the public. It's my guess, .you would certainly feel the effects of lower sales....unless you were an ace Marketeer. When I would come across such a merchant, I would have a talk with him. I would try to convince him of the value of his talents. When he is really talented I would try to get him interested in working together. I could invite him to release his works under my brand. That brings him a customers base that is prepared to value his talent for what it is worth at the current market, and for me it stops the undercutting of my prices. For both a win-win situation. That would be a very good solution.....as long as they buy into it. There are some talented creators in SL that believe that all items should be free throughout SL and not interested in making money....so it's not so clear cut sometimes. I remember running into such a creator way back in 2007...she was selling quality Avatar products which she created and was selling them at just 1 Linden dollar each. We spoke...but there was no convincing her that those products were more valuable than her pricing......she wasn't interested in turning it into a profitable business (Well it might have been profitbable but she did have a large slice of land!)

Chelsea Malibu wrote: Common products like those I and many others sell are going to be tough in the future. Unique products like Sassy makes will always do well since they are niche and proprietary in many ways. I agree with the above paragraph.....there are certain areas one could still excel in SL in terms of sales. Niche sectors, unique products, innovative products, breedables and Games are the way forward in this current market of stagnant growth. I'm not sure one could make SL products entirely free.....LL would still incur hosting & maintenance costs for their Marketplace website without earning any commissions. They could charge to list Freebies...but .who would really bother uploading their free products and then pay LL to do so??? Not many are going to pay Tiers or rents to place a shop and load it with just Freebies....even current Freebie centres have some products set for sale at low (or normal) prices in amongst their stock.....or surrounded by shop rentals on the outside of the Freebie zone Would LL give you free land to host a shop of Freebies? ....that would be a lost of Tier income to them. Heck, have a freebie shop at ground level and a skyhome up top......lots would join in that racket for Free land.!!

Madeliefste Oh wrote: Now even when someone in this pool you are all fishing in, decides to get himself a free christmas table, he still will have his premium stipend or the hobby money he allows himself to spend in SL in his pocket. He is maybe lost as your customer, but he is not lost for the market. He simply will spend this money on another item in another shop. Freebiesellers don´t play a role in this proces, they are simply not after the available money in SL. I don´t know your segment of the market, but basicly that doesn´t matter for most of us are in the same position. The number of items available is growing faster then the willingness to buy. The only solution to save each and everyones business is substantial growth of SL: This growth didn´t happen in three years now. If you want your income to grow, or at least to stay stable, your only option is to start eating from the plate of your competitors. And in the meanwhile be very carefull that they are not eating from yours. 2 points i'd like to comment on. Firstly, freebies could impact your business in a big way . Let's say we had a talented Sculpty creator like yourself, creating similar items to you, but had the selling principles of Alicia.....i.e make them all free to the public. It's my guess, .you would certainly feel the effects of lower sales....unless you were an ace Marketeer. Your very last paragraph is so true....the key is the growth in SL's consumer base, which it hasn't managed to do since 2008. The pie is the same with more mouths to feed.

Hi Medhue ...long time no see! I did say IMVU was an inferior VW product. i spent a bit of time in their Rooms. I also participated in their Forums to try and figure out how it all works. Yet, having said all that plus your more detailed analysis.......it just goes to show that a VW platform can still grow year on year without the requirement of Freebie products......now compare that to Second Life. Despite all the quality free products around the Grid, it's still not enough to grow it's concurrency. The SL content economy model is flawed.....as we have 2 cultures and 2 economic models clashing. You either make all of SL products free or you have a proper managed supply & demand Merchant economy. (like IMVU as an example).....having both of them in direct opposition doesn't work (more noticeable due to SL's lack of growth). Second Life always had Freebies since day 1 , but generally they were of inferior quality to the products that were available for purchase......that all changed at the start of 2008 with BIAB's (many of which contained copybotted products)....and it continued to erode from there.

Madeliefste Oh wrote: Rene Erlanger wrote: IMVU derives most of it's income from their Catalog shopping site, and subscriptions to upgrade to VIP status (you can select your own name then and not "Guest"...plus you're allowed to be a Developer and use their creation tools.) IMVU says something different: "IMVU generates most of its revenue from the direct sale of virtual credits, used to purchase virtual goods such as clothing, animations, room decorations, hairstyles and music." (source: imvu.com/about/faq.php) But IMVU has a complete different system. You can not only sells things you create, but you can also allow others to make derivatives of your product. (You can compare it with the full perms sellers in SL, they allow others to add their own creative work to the original.) But in IMVU the system works so that the one who made the original also gets paid a royalty when the second creator sells the derivative product. The original creator is the one who decides what the height of the royalty fee is. By the way, also interesting to know, the CEO of IMVU has a background as marketeer. ahh...so basically printing money. I forgot about that! I had thought it was from their Catalog commissions/ tiers. Yes that would make sense....it's a bit like the Federal Reserve -lol I think the IMVU CEO and their Board did a splendid job in growing their product....when you consider how it compares to Second Life. In general most Virtual Worlds games/ environments including the likes of Habbo Hotel have all grown over the last 3 years. The 1st graph shows growth in the Virtual Worlds by age group 5 to 25 yrs old. The 2nd graph shows the same age groups by continents. So all the more reason to be baffled, that all these type of VW's grew durng the last 3 years......yet Second Life hasn't!

Well, that's fine..I miss you too! lol Most of your forum ramblings are out their for the Birds ........It's incoherent mumbo jumbo!!

Nefertiti Nefarious wrote: Rene Erlanger wrote: IMVU has proved that one can grow it's membership in a worldwide recessionary period. They didn't just grow by a small percentage....but a massive 300- 400% !!! IMVU's current logged-in members today are about 65,000 ... their "millions" of members is because anyone and his/her dog can and did create a free account. They also support the freebie accounts on the backs of the content developers and paying accouints - like their "18+ content pass" so you can see naughty bits. As for the number of Facebook likes they have, they bought them: 500 credits for liking them. http://www.imvu.com/earn/credits.php The good and the bad of SL is that anyone can create without running it past a committe like the IMVU content committee. http://www.imvu.com/catalog/web_info.php?topic=mature_content_policy shows that they even dictate the permissible size for unaroused manly bits! Come on Nef , you and i know logins vary during the course of the day, depending on the Platform's demographic membership. It's peak logins are around 150k......i took a peak very late last night and it had 110k logins (not during peak hours) I think its good that IMVU Owners keeper a tighter lid on what products can be submiited onto their shopping site......look at the mess we have here on Marketplace with copybotted content being sold. Linden Lab could take a leaf out of IMVU's book imo.

Dartagan Shepherd wrote: Speaking of land, not sure if you heard they had a fire sale on private regions in october. I forget the details, no setup fee, first month tier free or something. Made a comment here after the fact about it not being wise. From what I understand, they sold 600 sims. ACS dropped 200 sims. Posted again that this was not wise and that it would continue to bite them further. As of yesterday another land baron reports that they dropped 70 sims last week as a direct result of that fire sale. Keep on dipping into the "economy", what do the uninformed resi's know? Marketplace commission needs to go completely. It is the only way you'll focus on the features that users ask for fully without your own agenda, which is not in line with your customer/merchant needs. Shouldn't have acquired the thing in the first place, it was never your money. Then we could deal with our own and reason with them to focus on delivery and important issues rather than how products rank in Google and Facebook and how advertising is laid out.... and all of this without at least the sales charts we used to have. yep Dartagan......that October promo sale was one of the 1st things i heard about, upon my return to Second Life. I know a lot of Atlas member Estates (SL's biggest Estates)...wern't happy, in fact very angry!! They lost quite a few tenants to LL's promo! LL have once again directly interfered with their customer's business environment...but this time it were the Land providers. I tend to agree with your Marketplace comments.....my actual all-time favourite SL shopping site was "SL Exchange" when it was owned Apotheus Silverman it had decent shopping listings, real estate listings, auctions, currency exchange and a very vibrant Forum community split into various categories. I felt it had the right balance between off-site and in-world shopping opportunities.

I have one of the longest running malls in Second Life.....6 years this January. I've kept the rates the same throughout i.e 5L per prim (e.g. 200 L for 40 prims). Once upon a time that was at the cheap-end of mall rentals....nowadays with the way in-world shopping activities are heading, it's nearer the expensive end. Historically the 2 malls (Fetish & Gothic) that are joined together....were always full with Renters. (over a 100 rentals) In fact I normally had a small waiting list, so it was never a problem keeping both sides full. I'm in the process of re-working those Malls (i.e. for search engines & Classified ads).....and might have to revise my pricing along with the overall model....and maybe include commission based Renters instead of flat rental fees. The tide turned when Marketplace was given prominence in the SL viewers and traffic shifted away from in-world shopping. (Mar-Apr 2011) I've look down the list of ex-Renters....and noticed most are out of business or have left SL ..or closed down their Mainstore and no longer creating items to sell. It's very sad to see...instead of having a vibrant in-world activity...we see more commercial areas that are void of Avatars (traffic) and become Ghost towns.....not to mention the lost of some very talented creators. In the good old days when both Malls were always full of Renters...if any spot became available, I'd either refer to my "waiting list" notecard or approach particular creators that I'd like to see in the Mall. Those days are long gone....and beggars can't be choosers. I didn't allow re-sellers or BIAB vendors. The Malls were successful for a very long time, as I actually spent a fair amount of money on marketing & advertising. I had about 10 classifieds running each week with different landing points around the Malls (and I'm not talking 50 L adverts....it was a mixed bag with some nearer 2000 L pw and some around 100 -200 L pw). I cut 110 plots of land, so that each Renter could have their own logo, unique keywords and landing point. That alone cost 3300 L in Search fees each week....that's when 144 -256 sqm parcels were visible in All Search ranking lists. Yep, so even with all 110 rental spots full (nearly 400 USD p/mth in receipts), I was running the Malls at break-even level as I was spending 40 -45k p/mth on Search fees and Classifieds. On some occasions I tried Radio advertising, Magazine advertising, 3rd party website listings...hosting games inside the Mall. My actual profit came from 5 nearby residential home rentals on the same sim.....as it all blended in with surrounding forests and lakes etc. Again the home rentals were normally fully occupied.....so the entire business model for that Mainland Sim ( 1.25 sims actually) worked well for a good number of years. Ahh...the good old days of vibrant activity in-world! :smileysad: PS Throughout the 6 years, I never used false traffic methods like campers or Traffic bots..I was only interested in attracting real shoppers, so I never had 10k or 20k traffic units showing up in Places Search. However most of the Renters were able to make decent sales with a lot less traffic units because those that TP'd into the Malls were invariably genuine shoppers willing to spend money.

Snow Frostwych wrote: Rene Erlanger wrote: Snow Frostwych wrote: OK, after reading a few things about IMVU, comparing their growth to SL is not quite right. For one, they do not have "land" or "tier", they sell (for lack of a better term) "chat" environments, rooms and such. Not really someplace you can explore like in SL. Since there is not any "land" needing rented or tier paid on, merchants have no "land" cost. No land, no inworld store, no prims needed, just items in the IMVU catalog. Which means cost of doing business in IMVU is much less than SL. Two, their platform is web-based. No viewer required to download which makes it easier to use. All in all, IMVU is mainly virtual chat. I can see it appealing more to potential users since it's easier, cheaper, & less complicated. What'scomplicated is their credit system. I read intructions on how to become a "developer" and that looks like it more hassle than it's worth. Honestly, I don't think comparing the two makes much sense as the only thing in common is VR & avatar customization. The platforms & purposes are totally different. Now comparing marketing, yeah SL sucks, no one will argue that. It's not like for like...but it is a 3D virtual environment and it has certain similiarities...in that you're able to create content (similar content actually) and sell it on website. There are Content Creators ( a very small pool) that create & sell in both IMVU and Second Life. Some of their top creators in IMVU earn a lot...but it's a complex system of how that income is derived. No, the costs are greater as IMVU take a larger slice of the sales price through their tiering system.....there are not land tiers or Room tiers....hences it's loaded into the Products equation. For the purpose of growth curves it's an adequate comparison They call them "Rooms", but it's not just a room...it will be whole plot of land (standalone) and will have a house etc on it. lol - if there was something dead similar to SL (not privateers Open Sim Grids)...run by a proper company, i would dread to see what Second Life concurency figure would be like! Half maybe? Thanks for the clarification, Rene. Sounds way too complicated for me, I have a short attention span. Can it really be more expensive though, what is the cost of developer membership vs premium member for SL? While they have higher "fees" taken from sales, equate that with having to pay SL land tiers every week plus upload fees? Is there any upload fees in IMVU? Well with SL land tiers, it probably mean SL is more expensive....but it seems that lots of Marketplace Merchants are no longer keeping shops in-world or just really small ones.....in which case SL will be a lot cheaper than IMVU. I'm not sure about upload fees....as i don't create in IMVU.

Are you drunk? I mean seriously?You're sounding dafter with each post you make as well as getting more personal! Did i not mention in a previous post (or 2 in fact)....that i noticed foot traffic (or TPs) were down by 50% in-world even with similar top positions in the ALL Search system....and deduced that traffic must be going over to the Marketplace Search instead. I also spoke to other Content Providers who confirmed, that.a good portion of traffic had moved over to Marketplace. Well let's see now...all my residential sims are full and therefore a healthy profit, and all my commerical lands with my shops are holding their own, although not as profitable are pre-Mar 2011....so overall a cashing out profit. These forums are used to discuss such matters & opinions on the SL economy....my disdain has proven spot on. No growth in SL for 3 years, 900 Estates sims less than this time last year......and a ton of commercial lands abandoned or downsized. Who's your Daddy? :matte-motes-sunglasses-2:

Snow Frostwych wrote: OK, after reading a few things about IMVU, comparing their growth to SL is not quite right. For one, they do not have "land" or "tier", they sell (for lack of a better term) "chat" environments, rooms and such. Not really someplace you can explore like in SL. Since there is not any "land" needing rented or tier paid on, merchants have no "land" cost. No land, no inworld store, no prims needed, just items in the IMVU catalog. Which means cost of doing business in IMVU is much less than SL. Two, their platform is web-based. No viewer required to download which makes it easier to use. All in all, IMVU is mainly virtual chat. I can see it appealing more to potential users since it's easier, cheaper, & less complicated. What'scomplicated is their credit system. I read intructions on how to become a "developer" and that looks like it more hassle than it's worth. Honestly, I don't think comparing the two makes much sense as the only thing in common is VR & avatar customization. The platforms & purposes are totally different. Now comparing marketing, yeah SL sucks, no one will argue that. It's not like for like...but it is a 3D virtual environment and it has certain similiarities...in that you're able to create content (similar content actually) and sell it on website. There are Content Creators ( a very small pool) that create & sell in both IMVU and Second Life. Some of their top creators in IMVU earn a lot...but it's a complex system of how that income is derived. No, the costs are greater as IMVU take a larger slice of the sales price through their tiering system.....there are not land tiers or Room tiers....hences it's loaded into the Products equation. For the purpose of growth curves it's an adequate comparison They call them "Rooms", but it's not just a room...it will be whole plot of land (standalone) and will have a house etc on it. lol - if there was something dead similar to SL (not privateers Open Sim Grids)...run by a proper company, i would dread to see what Second Life concurency figure would be like! Half maybe?

Mickey Vandeverre wrote: You are commenting on ... "Missed Opportunities???" For Real? After you just went through everything that you are NOT doing? Jeeze...can't you comprehend what i'm saying....or do you have difficulty in reading??? I'm not talking about myself.......I'm talking about Linden Lab. I believe Second Life could have been so much bigger and popular than what it is now. ...and i put that down to missed opportunities by LL Board. Unless you're calling "no growth" for 3 years a success story??.

Mickey Vandeverre wrote: Where are the Abundance of Freebies on the marketplace? I've asked you that several times - give me examples of a keyword where every single item on the first page of search is dominated by freebies. That still won't prove anything , just suggests that market is not the best one to compete in, if you have no drive and no gumption and no marketing in place. Or it suggests that you should use other keywords. You're using that for your argument, over and over again. Where is it? You must learn to read.....i did not say Marketplace as..I meant the SL Grid, that's all I care about.!!! I particpate in a 3D virtual world and that's what I signed up for.....not a 2D shopping website! However, I can see that there are 162k items are listed between 0-10 L on Marketplace...so that's about 10% of all products that are real cheap or free. There are still far more products set out for sale on the SL Grid than Marketplace and that includes Freebies too.

Mickey Vandeverre wrote: Didn't you say that you've been gone for a few months? How can you assess everything if you've been gone? Ralph??? Is that YOU? Yes, but i know a lot of business folk in-world.....so i got the run down.....plus I back-read a lot of stuff.(LL blogs & forums) I've been back for about 6 weeks...enough time to see what's happening with in-world foot traffic. I got tipped off about their latest Search engine and did some additional research....so didn't take long to get back most of my top keyword positions. People are still buying in-world, otherwise i wouldn't manage to keep all my commerical lands. I did come back in a nick of time though.. plus a lot of my residential sims were emptying out! That was the first area i tackled....it took me just over 2 weeks to fill them all up again! I had to hustle big time!