Marketplace Concept

[Cake]

Hey all. I'm sure I'm not the only one who noticed there were one or two topics that sprung up recently regarding a collector seeking a certain Sonic item. It got me thinking just a bit about the idea of a marketplace forum.

Given that this is a community that revolves around a specific gaming franchise, and also has a large amount of artistic members, I feel that opening a marketplace forum for the purpose of people advertising items they are seeking to buy and sell would be a fantastic idea.

On top of the above mentioned factors, the SSMB also has a diverse membership, from all ends of the planet, meaning that certain members say in the UK might have or lack access to items that someone in North America might have or lack.

Also, it might give the artistic community a better chance to thrive here on the SSMB, if a marketplace system were set up to better advertise commissions. How awesome would it be if you could find a gift for that special someone while cruising the SSMB? Just create a topic advertising the items you want to buy or sell (1 Want, 1 For Sale topic per member), and if you catch the interest of someone, work out the details and bam, it's done.

Any thoughts?

[Dr. Good Girl]

That sounds cool. I would vote for that idea, but wouldn't you get an equally advantageous chance of buying items on ebay, Amazon, etc.?

[Cake]

That sounds cool. I would vote for that idea, but wouldn't you get an equally advantageous chance of buying items on ebay, Amazon, etc.?

Yes and no. In terms of finding certain merchandise, I'd say yeah, Amazon or Ebay would be the way to go. On the other hand, though, in the case of artwork comissions or especially rare pieces of Sonic merchandise, the marketplace would be more ideal, simply because the SSMB has amassed a large number of hardcore Sonic fans who would be more likely to possess said items.

Also, I'm not sure if Ebay/Amazon have a "Looking for: "______" please." system. Sure, you can browse what's up there, but say you put out a request, and a member sees it and realizes "Damn, I have that lying around in the back of my closet, and this guy wants to pay 30$ for it." well, a sale might happen where normally that item would never have made it out of that closet.

I'm not suggesting we implement some kind of crazy system to handle this, either. Most transactions would likely start here, but then perhaps go beyond SSMB to Ebay or Paypal.

[Tornado]

I'm a member at another forum that does one of these (Hardcore Gaming does one too, I think), and from what I can tell they work pretty well. My question would just be whether there would be enough demand for one.

[Indigo Rush]

Sounds like a fairly solid idea, actually. I don't know how many members would participate, though. It'd be nice to see it flourish, if ever initiated.

[LATER BUDDY]

Sounds like an awesome idea, but I can see a lot long list of "want please" compared to the "buy please" list. In other words, there will be a lot more topics springing up left and right on how they are looking for a certain item, compared to the amount of topics where people actually set up to sell something.

That aside, I really do like the idea. Judging from topics I've seen in the past with pictures of people's pictures of a ginormous collection, I wouldn't doubt that it could work well. Plus the artist thing really perks my ears up. Not sure if I myself would sell anything, but anything to improve the Sonic Showcase is a thumbs up in eyes.

Don't go filling your heads just because I have a shiny yellow banner under my pretty picture; this is just my opinion on the matter, XD. Just need to justify for the people that don't know how different the red and yellow/orange banners are, X3.

-Blur

[Cake]

Sounds like an awesome idea, but I can see a lot long list of "want please" compared to the "buy please" list. In other words, there will be a lot more topics springing up left and right on how they are looking for a certain item, compared to the amount of topics where people actually set up to sell something.

Ah, but that's also where the art aspect comes in. People advertising their prints, keychains or what-have-you will no doubt help to balance the topics out.

[The Conductor]

The Doctor Who forum I frequent does this, and it is fairly succesfull. I could easily see it working here, I'm usually looking for an artist to commision stuff for me so yeah...I would like this.

[Blue Blood]

SSMB used to have a section dedicated to Sonic merch but during the forum shrinking a while ago it was collapsed and merged with Sonic discussion. A specific marketplace would be a nice idea, though if it's specifically for Sonic merch then why not expand it to cover discussion instead of just buying and selling? It seems like there's more and more interest in that sort of thing here from several of the members.

[Cake]

SSMB used to have a section dedicated to Sonic merch but during the forum shrinking a while ago it was collapsed and merged with Sonic discussion. A specific marketplace would be a nice idea, though if it's specifically for Sonic merch then why not expand it to cover discussion instead of just buying and selling? It seems like there's more and more interest in that sort of thing here from several of the members.

Sounds like a good idea to me. I'm just throwing out the base concept here, I'd be happy to hear more ways to change and improve it. In the end, it's down to staff decision, I'd guess though.

[Nemain]

I am from the Video Game Memorabilia Museum forums, and trading and selling is a large part of what we do. We even have feedback threads for transactions. I must admit this works better in smaller communities as everyone knows each other really well, but I see no reason why a marketplace wouldn't work here as well. These things all had to start somewhere! You'd just need to be sure to set out clear guidelines from the start of what is expected.

[T-Bird]

Well, being the merch hog I am I think I better have a say.

I've had discussions with other staffers about starting something similar up on here as I know a lot of you are quite die-hard collectors but have limited access to the world of Sonic stuff. I usually get my buddy in San Diego to send me US stuff, but I imagine he's getting fair sick of it, so it would, and I agree with you cake, be awesome to have someone stateside finding me stuff and sending it over without the huge mark-ups that come associated with ebay.

Had initially thought of this as a thread, but a whole forum section would be nice, wouldn't it?

I forsee two problems.

1) How would trades go about? I do consider myself a pretty good judge on the price of Sonic merch and I'm usually spot on with my appreciations, but I'm often miles out, and some pieces of merchandise can be worth hundreds of dollars - and I'm not too happy with the idea of people selling things for a mint on the forum as a regular thing; that's kinda what ebay is for. Finding two items of equal worth that two people own and wish to trade is going to be a pretty hard job. I guess a possible solution to this is to perhaps use this as a conduit for people who are interested in something, and then having the negotiation in a private chat. This leads us to the second problem...

2) Reglation. It would be virtually impossible to manage and control what people wanted to buy and sell - in particular if someone doesn't pay or doesn't send an item. Again, the only other way around that would be to have some hub in the middle to moderate what was happening.

My solution is this. How's about this for two threads:

1) A merch thread - I think it's about time we started that back up again, aye? I'll get on that later and have it stickied. A thread for people to show off collections, post pics of rarities, and for people to post updates on stuff they've seen for sale / at toyfairs etc...

2) A trading post - I'll have a chat with Dread about this, but I think a small scale trading thread wouldn't be a problem, but we might have to limit it to just interest; you can express interest to trades on the thread, but negotiations are done elsewhere via email. I don't see any reason why if people want to sell things, you couldn't list them on ebay and post the link into the forum - that way you can a) get more publicity for the stuff you want rid of, and get a fair price.

I'll have a word with Dread later about this, until then feedback is always welcome on ideas.

T

[Nemain]

At VGMM we also have appraisals threads and a feedback thread for transactions. That way the price of things can be evaluated and discussed by people who have a good knowledge of X/Y/Z. The feedback thread is also rather like Ebay, we simply post our experiences with the people we have dealt with. There is a large element of trust but so long as it is known that sales are being made no-one can be accused of slander or falsely villified, and likewise a bad buyer/seller won't get away with it. If need be PMs on VGMM can be monitored and thus full evidence provided for Paypal, appropriate forum action taken, etc... Is there scope on here for this should a bad mishap occur between two parties? I think it should be made public who's buying or trading in any thread so it is a known entity of who is involved in buying and selling. After all, it was only recently that Ebay stopped showing you who'd won an item. I don't mean necessarily discussing WHAT they are buying or how much stuff is (after all, if people knew I was buying X plush and Y figure for $1000 that's a bit of a security risk), but at least reply and note interest publically in a thread. If a transaction is entirely PM, you do run the risk of not having a leg to stand on if it goes wrong. Always better to have outside awareness.

The merch/trading posts are nice ideas, as is the idea of a new subforum. Why not also have individual for sale/trade/want threads where each member may separately post what they have to sell? I imagine a merch thread would be quite high volume both in terms of number of posts and the length of image heavy posts, so selling posts may well get buried under excitable fans ripping open large YJA packages and showing their enviable wares to us all.

To conclude, what I would like to see would be the following:

1) An appraisals thread for discussion of prices and valuations.

2) A general discussion thread for new purchases and new things seen for sale (shops and Ebay), etc.

3) Individual threads for people wanting to buy, sell or trade, with public showing of interest in items before taking it to PM for the nitty gritty.

4) A section where people could ask for help in getting exclusive items from other countries at a fair price (preferably face value + shipping). I've done this several times for others before and would be happy to put my name forward again for this.

I'd love to see this work. I've traded and sold many a time on VGMM and not once had a problem that couldn't be worked out with simply keeping updated (our postal strikes have been about the only thing that went wrong, and that's hardly my fault!). Will be watching eagerly for news.

[Blash]

I think this would be a great addition to the forums, I would definitely make use of it once in a while. Do what Nemain suggested, then this would work out great. We have a system almost exactly the same thing at Ultimate Guitar and it's worked out pretty well for that place.

[Tornado]

2) Reglation. It would be virtually impossible to manage and control what people wanted to buy and sell - in particular if someone doesn't pay or doesn't send an item.

Not to sound condescending, but doesn't PayPal and a little common sense prevent this from being a problem?

[novelty]

Sorry, but using Threads are really a hassle. If you posted a thread about something important, then you would have to LOOK through the posts for the information(because the search toolbar does not work well).

[T-Bird]

Not to sound condescending, but doesn't PayPal and a little common sense prevent this from being a problem?

Not to sound condescending, but I know many SSMB users lacking one of those prerequisits.

Lots of great ideas in this thread - keep your eyes open for the near future!

T