Hi Guys, I've been marketing Webmasters Marketplace for a while now and its doing kind of OK and recently has seen a surge in use, but its yet to hit critical mass. I have been advertising heavily and offering incentives to try and get sellers to post their listings, but its not progressing as quickly as it might. I could do with some input on where I might go next with marketing the site, I think the site has a great chance of becoming a true competitor to flippa, I just need some ideas on what can be done to take it to the next level. All ideas are very welcome! Thank you for your time Phil
Very nice site. i too attempted to compete with sitepoints marketplace at one time but lacked the resources to fund it correctly. I particularly like the flippa rippa promotion . Ill start with the very first thing I looked for. Why I should choose your services over flippa. I.e what is the sites unique selling point (USP). Because sitepoint (flippa) had a couple hundred thousand members to work with when they launched and I assume you dont have that luxury . Whats your traffic like? Do you get much from the search engines? There are some pretty decent keywords that you could target. Only thing I could think of is some sort of free tool that website buyers and sellers would use that requires a sign up to boost your membership numbers. Anyway good luck. PM me if you want any more info about what worked and didnt work for my venture
Maybe make some kind of competetion, like list a site for sale and have the chance to win a professional designed website
Posting to classified ads might help. I've done that to the sites I'm marketing now which offer products and services. Post a free ad in www.TarGro.com and even to any other classifieds site. That will add up to your traffic and reach the precise audience you want.
One small point, add a price column for the listed website like flippa does, because price is the most important part of the trade, and with the price mentioned directly in front of you, and if it is good, it'll give incentive to the user to make a point and look for more info.
You got a decent project I've used it and it's very good. I would recommend to continue developing it. At this moment you're doing really bad for keywords sell website(s) buy website(s) I think you need to focus your attention to get higher ranking in SE for these terms
Posting on classified sites will definitely help. I posted a couple of ads on some classified sites like- http://freeclassifiedhub.com htp://locanto.com and many more.. and got very quick results promoting my services for webmasters
Mate if i was in your shoes, i would go with a mass google adwords campaign, most clicks would be valid and you would pick up plenty of new customers.
good advice there I would also implement revenue share and a monthly prize for : top user in $ spent top user that sold top $ in websites/products ... I would also consider using craigslist Good luck
You could target Google ads so they show up on Sitepoint forums where most flippa users post so they know there is an alternative. From my perspective reviews by Sitepoint users of flippa are very negative. You just have to capitalize on that.
Maybe you could do a mouth or so of free listings to get so traffic going. Most of the complaints I hear about flippa is the high fees. I think their fees are unrealistic and they will flop, people just need an alternative with better fees and traffic. Better fees and traffic.
Posting free listings isn't what gets members using a marketplace. Sellers want the exposure and they will pay for it if they think you can provide good leads. If you have low traffic levels, you really need to focus on improving that.
Flippa does run a very impressive business. I have an interview lined up with them, I'll be sure to share it with you when I finally get it posted.
Thanks for all your comments guys @akdiver - Thanks for your kind comments on the site, and thanks for the PM's. @coolrohit222002 - Yes, a competition is an idea, and we are seriously considering this, as cash in king so that will probably be the prize @zinghana - You might be right there, we put a lot of cash in to advertising banners etc, without much from it, so Adwords is certainly something may increase our expenditure on. @dogtraining-guides.com - Thanks, yep, prizes and competitions seem to be a great promotional tool. @Darkness - Heh, I like your thinking here, though not sure Sitepoint wouldn't block the ads pretty quick! Might give it a go though @valendino - Thanks, yep, a popular method! @averyz - Thanks, yes, we currently give $50 in free advertising credits to every sign up, so there is plenty of free listings for anyone who wants them. But even that doesn't get them running to us... @dcristo - Yes, this is the critical point of our problem, we cant listings without traffic and we cant get traffic without listings... a tough one to overcome! @Ascendancy - Great, when you talk to them, maybe you can ask them how concerned they are about the threat from my site Thanks to all for the ideas so far. If anyone else has any other ideas I'd be very happy to hear about them! Phil
If you want the honest truth, flippa.com will not be concerned at all, they run the market and will do until someone really has a crack at it, and unless you have xx,xxx + to spend. Good luck! I run www.flipperpoint.com it's going well upto now, but theres a limit to how much work 1 person can take something, flippa.com will have a big team, were as it will take you 2-3 days to get one thing done, it would take them a couple of hours. There always infront!
Gain more trust and relevant traffic than flippa, and you will not only compete, but you will win! + people who want to buy websites.
It will take a lot of time and money to compete with Flippa Dont forget they are owned by Sitepoint one of the biggest and most trusted webmaster forums on the internet