Lucky Chair/Board/Etc groups

It sounds simple to me: Sculpties are useless to me if they aren't full perm. Only as a preview a free set of sculpts with no trans on them, for free, might be usefull to see them before buying.

But in Lucky Chairs, Midnight Mania boards and so on, people expect usable stuff.
IF you would deside on returning one of these things, don't do your sculpts in there, but maybe stuff people can use, that also show the possibilities with your sculpts.

I sell houses, I use 3rd party sculpts for stairs and so. Third Party textures etc etc.
For me, a set of sculpts for free but no trans, is great to see the product, but absolutely not worth the effort to wait for untill my letter comes up.

Your business: I would've tried the MM board instead of the chairs. And use no trans on them. That's just my oppinion. People then CAN tp in, click, and TP out. But if they like it and want to use in their builds, they DO need to get back for the full perm version.

I see many sculpters sell in 2 ways: personal version and builders version, asking more obviously for the builders version. Might be an idea for you?

I co-own a club, which is also attached to a mall (big surprise there). Recently, I convinced the other owners to put up a MM board in each of the stores (so far only one store has one), and inside the club. We are using the MM boards to drive in a bit of traffic. One of the stores also has lucky chairs. As nothing in the store costs over 5L, if people are coming for the freebies only then they're either broke or really cheap

If the people buy stuff at the store, that's just a bonus. At this point, the word of mouth is pretty important.

I had the MM board at the club placed right under the events listing board, and since those MM boards always take longer to rez than anything else inworld, these people will probably be standing there reading about our next event.

Will they show up? That remains to be seen. I do know that when I'm out slapping MM boards, if there's something at the store I like, I'll buy it. In fact, I've landmarked a few stores in the past two days that I will go back to for some pretty cool stuff they have for sale.

Not everyone in MM groups (or lucky chairs groups) are just out for freebies, you know.

Vern Jules said in this thread that he/she was posting with an alt, for purposes of this forum.

Erm Sling is referring to Clarissa I think here, Treasure.

Yes, that was clear.
Then Vern later posted to comment that the Profile of another poster did not indicate that they were a business owner.



Vern -- posting as an alt with a profile that did not indicate 'business owner' -- *assumed* that the poster in question was not an alt of someone who ran a business, or did not have an alt that ran a business.

Not that it was a relevant point to make anyhoo..

Hmm.. though they do generate traffic, when I put my chairs out, it was with the primary thing of drawing people into the store. I thought long and hard about it before I invested in the chairs. If traffic were to go away, they'd still be there too. There were other considerations in why I chose the chairs.

1. They are a great way to give out free samples without the word "DEMO" on them.

2. Although they are free, they aren't freebies. The dresses in those chairs can also be found for sale in the shop. This also stops the freebie jumpers, who take and forget about what they took.

3. People do look about while waiting for the letter to change. I've found that most of my chair campers look about at my new stuff or watch me build dresses.

4. It does increase my sales. I've had ladies IM me telling me the love the dress they got from the chair and had to go buy the other colors of it.

5. My repeat customers and new customers can be social while waiting. I've had the ladies sit and chat about things related to the Victorian era or other stores. I've also chatted while SL is behaving badly. I try to set my entry point to be as inviting as possible to socializing.

Those were the first things I considered, long before traffic even came to mind. Plus, unlike camping, the chairs don't tend to cause problems for the neighbors as long as you set the chat down to a reasonable range.

Yep, intent is everything.

Vern, Vern, Vern. Resident Answers is not a forum reserved exclusively for people who conduct business in Second Life. By posting in this forum you are blanket asking all Second Life residents for their answers/opinions/beliefs on this topic.

As Clarissa is in fact an SL Resident, otherwise she wouldn't be able to post here at all, she is eminently qualified to answer a question which you have chosen to direct at everybody.

And as other people have pointed out, sure you did inform us that Vern is an alt of another (unnamed) avatar. However, Vern Jules is clearly not a business owner according to Vern's profile. Therefore according to your logic, you know no more about business than Clarissa does. If her profile doesn't show that she owns a business can you prove that she doesn't have another account which does? Can you prove that she has no RL business experience? You assume a whole lot by slamming her and telling her that she's not qualified to answer your question (which as I said before you have directed at everybody) just because you don't see the kind of information in her profile which you have decided must be there in order to make her qualified.

Epic fail.

Plus and possibly most importantly, she's a customer. A consumer, who shops. Who buys content. As am I. I am not a creator but I sure know how to shop in SL. That alone should make my opinion valuable to a content creator/business owner. Seems like the opinion of a customer would be terribly valuable to a business owner who requires customers. Their patterns, what they do and don't do, like and don't like, should be paramount?

So........ in your opinion, if someone does not own a store in SL, they do not DO anything except "flit around" and maybe give opinions.

Interesting attitude, there.

The problem with a lot of business owners is that they think only other business owners can offer good suggestions about how to do things, when often it is really the consumer that can give the best advice because the consumer is the one buyer your stuff, not necessarily other business owners.

I do love the fact that they are so sure of their opinion that the don't even have the balls to use their real store-owning avi name for this.

And once their attitude blew up in their face, hasn't been back either.. guess I will just need to read the profiles of the larger sculpty shops out there looking for a egotistical entry, and then not shop there.

Naturally I felt I had to toss in my two cents due to a friend linking me to this. I've been a long time resident and active member in SL. I do not own a store but I work as staff for multiple ones and have RL degrees in business and accounting (sorry I don't list all that in my profile XP)

Gonna try to break this down simple for ya.
Now the point is that the person who set out the boards and prizes CHOSE what they did. They had full knowledge of placing out and purchasing the lucky chair/board/whatever and knew the prize they were putting in. Now what they didn't know what how people would react - naturally. Now the problem is was maybe they didn't do their research in advanced and see how lucky chairs and the community they mostly house act. Probably should have done that, but oh well. Now to flip out and blame people for doing what they normally do for chairs seems absurd and I can tell from the people who I know who have read it and may have no replied. You've already lost customers because of claiming them as 'scammers'.

Maybe your original intent wasen't that, maybe you both had some grand and glorious idea for what would occur with your lucky chair/board/whatever. But next time you delve into some new marketting plan. Research it a little more and it could help prevent issues like this, maybe get to know your clients and see what they would want, maybe even read blogs or check out groups that normally watch or bring traffic to these sorts of things.

All in all, don't blame the people who were doing it. Maybe just blame it on the lack of a little more consideration and research that was not planned on being put forth or wanted to be put forth.

I also got a link from a friend,(big hugs to that friend!!!) and here comes my 2 cents worth. Well, actually it is more than 2 cents worth since my first job in SL was a business consultant. I was begged to come to SL to do business consulting because so many people had good ideas, but no idea how to run a business profitably.

I was a business consultant for over 20 in RL, and have consulted on nearly every aspect of business from tax planning to marketing. I ran a printing company and participated in virtual image/object creation business activities (before SL existed). Many years ago i was actually President of APCIS (American Production and Inventory Control Society) for my state in the USA. (and if you feel compelled to read my profile in SL you will find I do have a few businesses)

I am also a HUGE shopper. Many times i have seen something i loved on someone else and asked them where it was from.. and many times following the informational exchange i have gone to that store and bought everything i liked there, spending thousands of lindens on my first visit. Following up with futures visits there for sales, new releases, and marketing events such as hunts or gifts. That being said, Here comes the "opinion" part:

~If lucky chairs and boards are used properly you WILL attract freebie groups. You should hope you do. When you INVEST in marketing (ie.. giving away usable samples) the majority of the sales you will get is from either word of mouth or someone seeing your product on, or owned by, someone else and liking it. I have yet to see someone tossed from a gourmet food shop for taking more than one sample or calling their friends and telling them to "taste". The goods you put in a marketing effort should reflect what you can do, NOT what you are willing to part with for free. If you give away poor examples of your work in hunts, chairs, etc... the secondary sales will never come.

Please remember participating in a hunt or having a lucky chair DOES NOT create sales. Creating / providing QUALITY goods or services and getting your business seen DOES. (the getting your business seen is the marketing bit).

Manipulating traffic numbers does not create sales.. it just brings your name closer to the top of certain types of searches.. big deal. Everyone (pretty much everyone i should say) knows those numbers do not reflect quality of a business.

In summary .. these devices are for marketing. Your skill makes sales. Marketing tells people about your skill. Do not think of what is given to the public as a loss. Investment is more accurate IF you put samples of your skill out there.

Oh and before you start flaming my post... please note i never stated i was a grammar or spelling teacher. Try looking at the idea behind the writing, and the good intent.