Ann Otoole

I am seeing far too many sales all of a sudden. Take it from me. If you down price yourself into cheap territory you just screwed yourself. If your business cannot make your tier then downsize to SLM sales. Sales have a very negative effect when your customers stop buying until the next sale. Sharks smell blood in the water. Much like how the freebies and hunts pretty much screwed the pooch for SL but what could anyone do with LL rigging the GSA search to support their friends and alts? Well the GSA search is gone and the new search works right so all those freebies and hunts need to be minimized so they are an occasional treat.

The SL economy is not crashing but there is definitely a earthquake/ground shift in progress as a whole new set of residents are coming in and they are not necessarily into what seemed popular last year.

IMHO

Lord

Cheap 'Cool' Clothes and Avies, oh, and Weapons that give a performance advantage ?

Also add: Team or group games where the members of the group pay together for huds and equipment for new members...anyone notice Bloodlines survival after all its been through ?

Darien Caldwell

I really don't see how the concept of 'too many sales' can exist. Truthfully.

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Eboni Khan

A single store having a sale if they please isn't an issue. Most big stores have an annual or semi annual sale or run promotions.

People keeping blaming LL, but really merchants are just pricing themselves out the market. You can't support a business on a sale day mentality. You need constant sales every day, not just on promo days. All marketing principals don't apply to SL, but some do. A promotion should only be used to balance out sales, every now and then, it should not the the corner stone or crutch of your business. If your sale day is your best says day and it carries your business, you are doing it wrong. SL has few barriers to market entry, and few fixed or variable costs, making it extremely easy for anyone to undercut you.

Constant sales days that tell people nothing in SL is worth more than L$50 is a problem. It has been going on for the past 2 years and now we have a whole "generation" of residents that think it is the absolute norm.

I can understand some markets in SL adjusting, pre-fab homes have trended way down since the old days since so many people can build, but the people in the top 5% of builders can still charge basically whatever they want, and they don't have to play the marketplace promo pricing game.

Nothing is going to stop it until it forces enough people out of business that the people left refuse to do it. The economy is just eating itself to the bottom.

Because of costing, SL doesn't have the normal market stabilizers. In real life a store might have to have a sale, because they can't afford to keep the inventory. They can't always have a sale though and sell items at a loss because they have fixed costs. In real life if you are constantly running at a loss, you exit the market. People who are in SL not to make money to cash out, just to cover tier and maybe a little light shopping can run at a loss indefinitely. There are no market forces to stop them, until they stop making tier.

Ann Otoole

Yea. Bloodlines and their 30,000+ members was driven out of LL's forum by the 20 or so holier than thou trolls shitting on everyone. LL makes a vampire forum and the cartel goes after it with a vengeance demanding it be shuttered.

A few of them appear to be missing now.

But bloodlines isn't coming back to the LL forum. LL should have been permabanning the hateful trolls blatantly violating the TOS/CS out of the gate.

SimonLeo

She doesn't mean someone selling a lot. She means too many people putting their product on sale (read discounted price).

A wise man ones said:

"If you need to put your products on sale, your business(model) might not be as good as you think."

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Get the land you want!

Ann Otoole

Also I did indeed go to the e! sale. (it is for a good cause) People were soiling themselves over the L$1 deals lol. I only bought one thing on sale. I got some of the new stuff though.

Darien Caldwell

Got it. now the post makes a bit more sense. I only ever put things on sale once, it was for Christmas, and it wasn't to drive sales, it was to get into the holiday spirit.

If you have a good product and solid business plan, you don't need sales, in a virtual world. RL stores have sales to liquidate old stock, in SL you just hit 'Delete'.

Sredni Eel

I generally put one item on sale per week, when I feel like it, or remember, but most of the time people just buy stuff full price.

Hell, I'm lucky if I remember to change the items in my MM boards. Half the time I have the same thing on those boards for weeks on end. Heh, could be why they never lock. It also might end up in people being frustrated enough to just buy the item.

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Aribeth Zelin

I stopped doing sales - mostly because how I did them was the first week or two of a new product, I'd sell it for 10 lindens, then after it would go up to its normal price.

The only other sales I've done I didn't sell stuff, so didn't bother.

On the other hand, I don't charge very much for my stuff either - I tried to base on others, but when even a listing didn't net me any sales, I gave up and just lowered stuff so maybe it'd sell. But this didn't happen until marketplace - the listings worked in old xstreet. >.>

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Eclectic Wingtips

This is the first sale ive done in like a year I think? And the sale items are old stock. Its a chance for me to get people in to hopefully buy the full priced stuff.

I need the money in rl at the moment and this is a way to help that ( ive also started a second sl business to help selling clothing templates on my alt)

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Astolat Dufaux

I have a few different "sale" promotions I do in my inworld store to get more people shopping there instead of on SLM.

I decided awhile ago that there are certain types of shoppers who are just never going to change their ways -- freebie hunters, hunt hunters, clearance sale shoppers, "I'll only by it if it's 50L or less" customers.

Being in a "niche" market in SL isn't going to pay RL bills, so I've tried to think of ways to cater to as many kinds of shoppers I can, and I think it works pretty well for me.

Example: I always try to have a 10L or under giftie for the FabFree group (20,000+ members), I do the Sixty Linden weekend promotion, I have a "new releases 50% off first week" to generate interest in new products.

Right now I have more than usual going on at the same time, because it's Halloween, which is my favorite holiday, and I see it as a way to give out customer appreciation type gifts as well as bring in people who might not ordinarily shop at my store.

I'm looking at my sales figures for the weekend and I see people buying all kinds of different price points -- people I know to be freebie/cheapie hunters are also buying 100L+ items.

So I don't know if I'm reinforcing the idea of customers expecting discounts -- I don't think I am, because I'm still selling a lot of regular price items too.

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Joshua Nightshade

Are you allowed to do that? I thought they had carried over the obnoxious policy from SLX that forbade you from offering items in-world at a lower price than on the marketplace.

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Ann Otoole

If they catch you then they can make trouble. However some people flaunt it in LL's face and LL shows ass and does nothing.

Cat Cotton

There is no such thing as too many sales. Those marking their prices very low are out to make a buck, by any means. I don't usually see them in the forums worried about the morality of doing so.

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Astolat Dufaux

Oh shit. I don't know.

Reading again what I wrote (and not backpedaling, I swear! ), I should have clarified that I am primarily promoting to people in my update group and other shoppers groups, who mostly seem to shop inworld.

When I went back to look at my past sale promotions, most of the times I had new items sale inworld, I didn't get around to listing new items on SLM until after the inworld sale is over -- my new products don't exactly go flying off the SLM shelves right away, so I don't put a lot of priority on getting them up first thing.

But the Sixty Linden Weekends promos -- I've never actually noticed if anyone else in SLW marks their items down on SLM too. Hmm.

Ah, well. So I guess if someone wants to take this opportunity to get back at me for something I said here that pissed you off, here's your chance.

Evil String

I was bashed by one not long ago in this forum.
And I didn't bother to reply, cause it was not the right time and honestly I just couldn't care less.
Losers rarely impress me.

Joshua Nightshade

I think it's an asinine fucking policy, personally. Completely protectionist. If you can't get people buying happily on your shitty marketplace don't penalise those who want to do so in-world.

It's to force you to go through their commission.

Astolat Dufaux

Here's all I could find on the subject of pricing (source: SL Marketplace Listing Guidelines)

(bold words are mine)

To me, that means you are intentionally raising the prices on SLM, probably to offset the commission fees.

The prices on everything I sell inworld and on SLM are always intended to be the exact same price -- I just occasionally have specials (like for Sixty Linden Weekends) that I only offer inworld.

Astolat Dufaux

And I don't mind paying the commission. But I'd like to give people an incentive once in awhile to come to the inworld store, too -- that's supposed to be the point of having the grid in the first place, right?

Aribeth Zelin

I should do a sale at some point - and honestly, I've stuff on marketplace that I no longer offer in world, and stuff inworld that hasn't ever been offered on marketplace, or that somehow got unlisted and I never bothered offering it again.

Ann Otoole

But you are allowed to discount your items on SLM as compared to in world. This sort of thing defines the LL Commerce Team. Racketeering is their credo.

Cat Cotton

TBH If LL isn't willing to go pull the obvious DCMA Disney shit off the SL shelves in SL. I highly doubt they are watching merchandise on the marketplace and iw for any differences. Take the TOS for what it's worth; a mere suggestion. Only ppl following the rules are the one who don't break them. pfft on them.

AshaSekayi Ra

You are probably right that LL doesn't go searching for pricing discrepancies. But, if your competitor reports you, then they will check out the claim.

Ciaran Laval

I spoke to Pink about this, and how it was unfair to not allow people to make allowances for the cost of doing business on the Marketplace, she suggested that wasn't the intent, it was to do with rival marketplaces and people charging much lower prices there above and beyond commission but there was no official statement about it.