Hard work ain't enough anymore...

Thank you very much Colette.

Some giant flash ad for some movie dropped down and covered up your pic on the 2nd or 3rd link. I dont have any extensions running in Firefox- perhaps you're blocking ads and I'm not.

I'm not seeing any indication that Pelthar Beaton makes and sells skins in Pelthar's profile.

Or forum signature ad.

Seems like there should be ads in both places.

I don't know, it might be, that would explain why I never thought about using anything else. I'll keep that in mind, maybe I'll check Snapzilla next week. Thx for noticing.

The classified I have for my store is in my profile for sure, I took down everything else as I'm making big modifications right now. (Actually there's a huge "Coming Soon" sign in my store too.) The forum signature is a good idea, one more thing on the "to do" list. Thx for the tips.

You mentioned "exotic" skins. This might be a good niche to try to work. It's still fairly rare to find decent hispanic/asian/black/middle eastern/etc skins on the market. Yes, they exist, but aren't nearly as prevalent as the "pretty white people" skins.

Sin Skins does a pretty good job when it comes to Asian skins and shapes and Chip Midnight's black skins are great too. Latin is very tricky, but that would certainly be a good direction, and if everything goes right, my next skin will be a latin girl.

I never thought that it works, but prim eyelashes really make a difference.

It's been a long road, but I think it was worth it.

I started from here:



Now she looks a "bit" better:



I'd like to say a big thank you for everybody involved in this thread, it was really inspiring, plenty of great ideas, actually it will be very useful for all upcoming skinmakers, who read it later.

I know there's still a very long road ahead, and I can only hope that I proved, I have the potential to go all the way.

Note: I still need to finish all the combinations of the different make ups, and upload all the stuff, so if anybody wants to check a demo out, will have to wait until Monday, hopefully I'll have everything ready by then.

I am very picky with skins. Try making my own but haven't got one done yet. I've bought 4 skins from RaC for my main and my alt. Love them. Currrently I am wearing a CS skin and I like it the most. I went to your store earlier, bought 1 dark magenta and 1 natural Suzanne demo with free shapes, tried them on. I quite like the eyebrows and the details around the nose, the eyelashes looks a bit messy at the top though.....I still like my CS skin more.

One thing I'd like to point out to you, is I found the freebie shape that comes with the demos can really put your customers off.......I wonder if you did it on purpose coz it's just a freebie? It doesn't look pretty to me at all and it has huge feet, big butts. I don't know if it's because I view them on a wide screen monitor...but the shape I made myself looks much nicer (no offense and it's just my personal preference).

Here's some screenshots I took so you can see the difference. Hope it helps. Forgive me if I said something that makes you feel bad, English isn't my first language. Good luck with fixing your harddrive ^^"

That looks like a demo shape to me, where the designer will deform parts of the shape so you can't use it, but the important features are left alone so you can see what they look like.

The OPs problem is Expecting instant Success based solely on haveing (In his opinion) a better product.
A good product is only a Small part of market Success. Exposure, and availability are other factors, But one of the MOST important things to keep in mind (and the OP already touched on it) is the fact he is entering a market that already Boasts a large number of highly skilled competitors who already own a Large Portion of the market. Their names are known, and their product has a reputation. Think of it as Coming up with your own Luxury Automobile, then Attempting to tyake a Piece of the market owned by Rolls royce, BMW, and Mercedes. Your car MAY be better than theirs, But it is Their name that is Synonimous in peoples minds with "Luxury Car". It isn't hopeless, These people ALL had to Start Where the OP is Now.
Unfortunately, these days people seem to want Instant Validation, Instant Gratification and Instant Profits, they don't seem to understand that No one Starts at the Top, Everyone had to WORK their way up to it. It has always been that way in RL, and it's Always been that way in SL. No Product just sells it's self, you MUST promote it, and if your already doing that, and you aren't reaching your market, Change market Stratagy, and Try harder.

A friend of mine from the Mid West has a favorite saying she inherited from her GrandMother;
"If you can't Run with the Big Dogs, Stay on the Poarch."

Angel.

Angel, with all the respect, I never said that I wanted immediate success. I was looking for REASONABLE attention and success, based on the advertisments and former success of my shape shop. (Sorry for caps, couldn't find out how to underline it) As I said before, I was not looking for thousands of $ the very first week. My goal was (and actually still is) to earn about 200$ every month this year.

Now I know that my product was not as good as I thought it is, but I improved it a lot since then, and finally I have others opinion confirming that the skin will be worth its price now. There was nothing wrong with the advertising, the product itself was the problem.

First things first, the Suzanne skin was my very first try, and it has quite a few issues. I was able to fix most of those, but I'd definately not compare it to a CS skin.



Jodi, no offense, but you look like 25kg on that picture in your shape, and if that was the RL you, I'd send you to check a doctor immediately. I like women who look a bit more healthy if you know what I mean. It's a matter of personal taste, I'm glad you've found a shape that you like.

Stephanie's also right, mine's actually a demo shape, the foot size is set to 100 to stop people using it every day (I'm thinking about finding a different method too, maybe I should tweak the ears.)

Here's how it looks with my new skin:

demo shape:



normal shape:



As for the HD, thx, no solution yet, but we're working on it.

I'm afraid i beg to Differ, If you are Not getting the marketing results you desire then there IS something wrong with your advertising. What you are saying amounts to "The Operation was a complete success, but the patient Died anyway". Your product is Good, and there IS a market out there for it, so the problem IS your ability to Connect with that market. That is the Purpose of Advertising. If your Current marketing isn't Working, Not getting you the returns you are hoping for then Examine and Impliment Other Stratagies, but be prepared to Stick With it, and Work At it. Others have done it and they possessed no more resources than you have now.
"If the Wine is Sour, Pour it out".
If what you have isn't working, CHANGE IT.
Event based marketing is not a bad idea. Tie your new line to a related Event that will expose, and showcase your product, Tie it to your Older line of Product, Entertain a Large group, and get them Talking about you in a new way. (GOD I HATE THIS PHRASE, but here it goes) Think Outside the Box. Come at your market From a New Angle. Ads in the Forums, Ads in the Classifieds, Banners and billboards everywhere, that's just Spam and people Tune it out. I'm aware people advertise their products in their forum Signitures, but i can't say i have Ever given it a Glance because I'm Innundated with Similar Ads everywhere. It just becomes the background noise surrounding the things i am looking for. What are you going to show me that makes you STAND OUT?

BTW, don't worry about Capping in odd spots, i've been known to do it Occasionally (Lol)

Good Luck.
Angel.

LOL back when the shape industry was new.

Id considered the demo shape huge feet idea but decided agaisnt it.

LOL

Its funny to see it in actual pictures.

Angel, 6500L$/week in the very first days is actually a fantastic result for a pretty bad product. When I opened this thread, I thought that my skin was top class. 6500L$ wouldn't be good for a top class even, even if it's the very first week. But that's not the case, the only guy who thought that the product was high quality was me, and only me... So, sorry, but you're missing the point.

To go with your example, I made my own car, I want to break into the luxury car market, I set my prices high, but my car is actually a VW Käfer. No matter how well you advertise, nobody will exchange his Jaguar to a VW for the same price.

Luckily, there were people in this thread who pointed me in the right direction, and I have a few opinions that the new version of my skin will be good enough to be a potential threat for the competition. If my sales will stay the same after putting the new skin out for the new price, then you can say that my marketing was wrong.

We'll see. On the other hand, I really appreciate that you're trying to help, I checked your ideas, I might use a few. Best wishes.

I'm very attached to my current shape and skin, but the other night I saw a new type of skin an avatar was wearing and it was the first time I have considered buying a new skin. Yours look good too. Skins should continue to improve, but convincing people to change skins may meet resistence.

But if one avatar stands out in a crowd as the best skin, then people will be inspecting that avatar and going out in search for that skin and buying that new skin eventually so, keep at it and once you have enough people wearing your skin then other's will see it . IMO that would be the best advertising.

absolutly.

And SL 'is' RL in the sens we have the opportunity to make real cash and as such businesess are ran and managed just as a RL bussiness is.
You have to speculate to accumulate. ESP when your new. Campers modelling your skins for example? Which will drum up traffic AND get your store up the list at the same time.
I am not the best texture artists in SL or indeed my store but my strength lies in marketing and promotion. I know how to run a business and run it to success.

After 4 yrs almost, Im now successful but only became so after 2.5 yrs of joining SL.

For the first 12 mths of opening my store I made only enough to allow me to play SL w/o having to buy L$ then word of mouth brought me a lot of customers I remember the week it happened it was so obvious...suddenly I knew I had 'made it'
But before that I would buy land nest to already busy stores, leave the walls down and no roof to attract passers by that was my ONLY source of sales. We didnt have campers back then and I was no where on that list to be seen.

Success does take a LONG time..a long long long time...and if you got ANY sales in your first week thats good trust me.

I think your expectations of running a business in SL is inflated and I blame LL for marketing SL as' the place to make and sell L$ ' like its a sure thing. Nothings a sure thing.

Also as already mentioned, skin is now a saturated market. Old skin designers are feeling the squeeze as new and sometimes better designers move into the market.

Added to that there is a massive increase in theft of skins now being hacked and sold as ' Full Perms business in Box' deals all over SL 95% from No Payment On File accts.

Naughty / Lost is one store thats been hit hard over & over and I believe X2 now also is a victim were their full range of male and female skins being sold with full perms to thousands of other ' want to make a quick buck and dont want to earn it' noobs who buy them with the sole intention of selling them on to even more noobs on the same principle.

End result? Makes the original skins worthless in your own store/s


THATS LL'S FAULT pure and simple

I have banned ALL No Payment On file because of the massive increase in theft.

Months ago It used to be the occasional yard sale now its ALL bib stores and there's been a sharp incline in the issue. And again, most of the theft originated from Brazil sims and No Payment On File accts.

Ive not had any problems with LL to date but then most ppl I catch do remove some with a lot of arguing but eventually they remove. To date Ive only issued 3 DMCAS and all 3 IMd to say they had removed b4 LL actually acted.

Just my experience learn what you will from it or totally ignore t.

NB:
This is not to say ALL No Payment on file accts are thieves. Just the confirmed theft is 99% from these types of accts.

Finally, it seems that I'm ready to open my store to the public again. I'll still need to make a few more posters and such, but the new and improved skin is out for sale. I made a final tweak to the mouth based on Nika's suggestions, and I think it was worth it, the skin looks more realistic with the new mouth.

Still a lot of advertising to do, time to get a lot of attention. We'll see how the new, improved skin will sell.

Thx for all the tips and kind words!

Wow this is really nice




I dont like the "natalie 2" though, perhaps that shape just doesnt compliment the skin as much as "natalie 3"?

Anyway, good job

I'm in your store right now ... landed in front of a poster .. clicked on it expecting it to sell me a demo ... nothing. Tried 5 posters in all before the small pics at the back of the store rezzed.

Make it easy for your customers to give you money Even if it's just for a demo, don't make them hunt around to find it. Why not sell a demo from every poster in your store?

Now I've focused on those small pics, I see that each one has a tiny DEMO sign .. so I have to get a demo of every one, individually? Usually I buy a demo of a skin tone or a make-up group and expect to get several skins each time. I don't see any option to do that.

I also find the text on those small pics hard to read ... it's not your fault that textures blur in SL but if you know they do, you have to take that into account. I have a 19" screen and I'm peering closely at it to see what the text says! If I just happened on your store without this thread, I wouldn't bother.

Look at the way CS and Nyte 'n Day organise their sales walls. All the variations of one make-up are in a line or a group so you can pick them out easily. You have a pic (the same pic) and a sign at the end of each row that says "buy all the make-ups in this row" but they seem to be an arbitrary grouping. What is it about those make-ups that makes them a "package"? You haven't told me and I can't see them clearly enough.

These are just instant perceptions from a reasonably savvy consumer/business owner. The face IS very pretty and I look forward to trying it on my shape Good luck!

Note: This is my opinion only.

I am basing this on the pictures, I haven't been to the store or purchased demo's (but I might)

Based on pix alone I would go for the subtle shaded one (pictured in quote), Purely because thats what I prefer, I think you did pretty good on both for someone who was a beginner, I have never tried skinning but as a content creator I know how much work goes into products, The price is also by preference for most people, I paid $2500L for skin along plus $1500L for shape.

Its all based on peoples preferences, My only suggestion to you is to try and cater to every ones specific needs, (easier said then done) when doing a skin make 2 versions of it, 1 subtle and 1 not so subtle.

Take care
Nat

Hi Isobel, your observations are spot on, the product should virtually climb in to the buyers basket, and that's not the case in my store yet. But the thing is, I just got ready with the skin and I wanted to reopen the store as quickly as possible, so I didn't have time to arrange everything perfectly. (Plus there's Monday Night Football - I'm a sportsfan, you know...)

By the way, I have a 21" screen, and if you never say that you have a 19" screen, I'd never figure out why everyone keeps saying that they can't read my texts - I was able to read all of them, but now I know what was wrong. Luckily, I also have an old 14" screen, so I'll use that for control from now on.

I had the make-ups of the former version of my skin grouped exactly like you mentioned, didn't have time to do that just yet. I'll also make a demopack available at the end of every row and column, I can save quite a few prims this way, and I'll definitely need it, if I want to get more skintones out there.

Thanks for the tips and compliments, and I hope you're going to like it on your shape too.

Ehm, actually the shape is the same, I think it's the make up - hair - eye combination that makes the difference.

Anyway, I'm glad you like it, thank you for the kind words, maybe I was able to surprise you in a good way in the end.

Thanks for your opinion, Natalie (beautiful name, btw) , I appreciate it. Unfortunately I don't have a big enough shop to put all versions out, cause I could actually put at least 6 totally different versoin of the same skin.

There are skinmakers who do that, like X2 for example - they have Soft Fusion (subtle), Fusion (normal) and Hyperfusion (detailed). On the other hand, they have an Island to do that. Hopefully I'm going to have one sooner or later.