Unseen Economy; A Retrospective Look At Shetlink Classifieds

[Ghostrider]

I have no problem with expecting trade/business paying for Ads, and the "Xmas Special" price IMHO is a reasonable "middle ground" charge within the reach of just about any size of established business. The way I see it, trade/businesses exists for one reason only, to make the owner(s) a profit, so why should Shetlink contribute gratis to the furtherance of someone else's business, and they'd get next to nothing for the same spend with the alternative local media medium's ads which have all been paid for only for a long time.

 

There's no doubt a whole telephone directory worth of other "enhancements" that could be incorporated to improve the 'selling experience', but from where I'm sitting I'm not seeing any of them being really practical/workable without some form of "policing" from 'da management' - sooooo, that's one for 'da management' to come back on. Is this a viable possibility, or just a good in theory but unlikely to be justifiable in practice idea.....I'm thinking "chicken and egg", but....

 

Finally, I would be very wary of being "inspired" by, or adopting any ebay stylee "system" without much research, and long and hard consideration - WYS is not necesarily WYG over there, at spin and PR they excel, but for doing what it says on the tin, well, perhaps not so much. Again, we're back to businesses and making profits, ebay's profits are their No.1 priority a long away over any others, and their actions fully reflect that.

[Colin]

I have no problem with expecting trade/business paying for Ads, and the "Xmas Special" price IMHO is a reasonable "middle ground" charge within the reach of just about any size of established business. The way I see it, trade/businesses exists for one reason only, to make the owner(s) a profit, so why should Shetlink contribute gratis to the furtherance of someone else's business, and they'd get next to nothing for the same spend with the alternative local media medium's ads which have all been paid for only for a long time.

 

There's no doubt a whole telephone directory worth of other "enhancements" that could be incorporated to improve the 'selling experience', but from where I'm sitting I'm not seeing any of them being really practical/workable without some form of "policing" from 'da management' - sooooo, that's one for 'da management' to come back on. Is this a viable possibility, or just a good in theory but unlikely to be justifiable in practice idea.....I'm thinking "chicken and egg", but....

 

Finally, I would be very wary of being "inspired" by, or adopting any ebay stylee "system" without much research, and long and hard consideration - WYS is not necesarily WYG over there, at spin and PR they excel, but for doing what it says on the tin, well, perhaps not so much. Again, we're back to businesses and making profits, ebay's profits are their No.1 priority a long away over any others, and their actions fully reflect that.

 

 

I would think that it is much more complicated than just 'requiring' a business user to register and make payments.  Some business users may decide to sell items which are privately(?) owned and not part of their general business activities.

There would also be the added problem of administration and collection of any fees due.

 

IMHO, such a scheme would only be possible if all business advertisers were obliged to register with their real name/address and were to agree to paying a small amount towards the costs.  This would, of course, not stop anyone from trying to 'cheat' the system but, such users should be fairly easy to spot.

 

Going down the Ebay/Paypal route would be fraught with issues such as, requiring some kind of 'official' go ahead in order to charge for certain activities.  All very time consuming and expensive to maintain whereas the current scheme, which only asks for 'voluntary' contributions, seems to work up to a point.

 

Why not charge all users a small fee to register?  This will do away with most of the  administration etc and Shetlink would then become a business(of sorts) but, it would put everyone on a level playing field and would, almost certainly, get rid of the spam adverts we see from time to time.

Edited December 17, 2013 by Colin

[petergear]

Regards charging for adverts, even if you only took a fixed amount of 3p per ad for the "domestic" adverts, it would make a big odds regards your server / development costs.  Every 33 ads, would be another £1, it would soon stack up.  The 3p contributed by the individual being next to nothing, so everyone would (presumably) be happy to pay?

 

To avoid high transaction and admin overheads, and to streamline the process of setting up adverts, you could maybe have a system where people "buy" credit up-front (in, say, £3 units) to top up their seller account with.  It would take a hundred three-pence sales to whittle away at £3.

 

Just as an aside - From the buyer's perspective, something I would love would be a "saved search" facility on Shetlink, like-wot ebay use, to alert sellers by email when something tasty turns up that they've been looking for.  I never have the time to trawl through the Shetlink classifieds regularly enough, unfortunately, but there's a huge range of hellery that I'd love to be alerted to, if and when any of it does appear in the listings!  Again, you could charge for this, say, 10p per "saved search"?  I would be very happy to pay this.

 

Likely tae tak' a peerie coarn o' time tae code onything lik dis though!!!  Volunteers...?!

[petergear]

PS, this probably isn't the right place to post this, but I'd just like to say a quick "thanks" to everyone who works behind the scenes to keep Shetlink going, for the benefit of mere punters like me.  Great effort!  

[Colin]

To avoid high transaction and admin overheads, and to streamline the process of setting up adverts, you could maybe have a system where people "buy" credit up-front (in, say, £3 units) to top up their seller account with.  It would take a hundred three-pence sales to whittle away at £3.

 

Good Idea but, I would say 10p per ad pre-paid with a minimum of £1 spend would be more like it.

Edited December 18, 2013 by Colin

[petergear]

I personally would be happy to pay more than 10p per domestic ad.

 

But, in setting rates, if it was me, I wouldn't want to scare sellers away to the "free" advertising options elsewhere.  So, would suggest starting any domestic fees at a very low rate, so that people can get used to the idea, and then possibly gradually increasing it (5p per ad equals £1 for every 20 ads) to see what effect it has on sales.  I don't think 3p would curb the number of adverts significantly, but I suspect 10p might.

 

More obviously though, charge different rates for posts in different categories.  50p for vehicles?  Â£2 for property sales?

 

The reason I suggested the £3 unit for credit, is that PayPal don't half sting you for each transaction charge....!

[petergear]

Also, different rates for different categories, allows for zero charge, for posting in "free / recycling".  

[tooney1]

I think its fine charging for trade ads/situations vacant.

 

Another revenue stream could be charging a fee for an advert to be featured (top of list, bold) like gumtree does. But I would keep the basic offering free, otherwise users will just go elsewhere (facebook classified pages).

 

More manditory information would be useful - location, maybe photo. Folk also often forget vitals when selling e.g. a car or house - dont know if its possible to offer guidance notes or a default template by category for example?

[johno6998]

Hi - would it be possible for the "expired adverts" to remain in my folder for a longer period before being deleted. I have spoke to a few folk who (like myself) have not sold something and then a few months later decided to try again but the adverts gone and you have to download the whole thing again. Maybe 4 months or so before deleting. Just a thought.

Great website by the way - keep up the good work

Cheers

Johno

[admin]

^^ Yes, indeed. 

 

Shetlink are happy to announce that we have moved to a brand spanking new server. This will see a more stable platform from which Shetlink can be served and continue to 'connect Shetland'. This has gone on in the background and has been essentially seamless.

 

This has been possible only through the continued interest in Shetlink Classifieds, kindly donations, and from the introduction of the Trade / Commerical and Situations Vacant sections. Thank you to all those users. Shetlink aims to continue future development for the Shetlink Shetland online community.

 

With the new server in place we have, for the meantime as we view server load, stopped archiving old classifieds. This will enable people to go back in time and access their classifieds as per your query johno6998.

[Claadehol]

Would it be possible for people to somehow encourage people who have several pairs of shoes, for example, to sell, or several dresses, to put them on one advert.

That would minimise the quantity of ads, and would make the ads faster too scroll through when looking for something of interest.

Well, for me anyway!

[Vik]

Shetlink is inviting me as a regular user to add some feedback so when I click on it all I get is the opportunity to reply to an ongoing topic????

 

Wanted to say the old system used to let you search all ads by (whoever) which allowed you to cut & paste an old lapsed advert & copy it into a new one - I canna see if this is possible now - not very user friendly so come back old Shetlink!

[trout]

From the drop down where your name is you can access your expired adverts from your classifieds manager:

 

http://www.shetlink.com/index.php?app=classifieds&module=manage&do=expired

[BigMouth]

I think that no-one should quibble over a small fee.  Even if it was just a quid an ad.  All those quids would add up.  More for commercial ads of course.

 

It would be nice if Shetlink acknowledged donations (privately) by email.  I have only given a few times, but I don't think I have had a thank you.

[shetlandpeat]

It is difficult to work this I would think. You may need to set up Shetlink Ltd. I have had responses to any donation I have made in the past, though I believe that those making money from this free service should be asked first. I think a pound may be too much though. Folk may migrate to Freecycle or similar schemes. There is also a FB site that folk can buy and sell in Shetland that will never charge.