Poll: would you pay more than 50L for an ad with new search?

Well I think it depends upon your market. In land, they work, or they did anyway. I could send out cheap land rental ads and get a stream of interested renters. Product wise they haven't done a lot for me, I think this is because I'm rubbish at writing product ads. Where's Cherry when I need her!

I think placing classifieds in the new search should be included in our monthly Resident fee, not an additional fee of any kind. Listings could be shown in random order.

At first many join basic for free, then move onto $9.95 per month to be a Resident, then comes buying land, tier fees, L$10 per texture upload, etc etc.. Just how much are we willing to spend to belong here? We're being tested on that question I think.

Next thing you know we'll be paying L$10 to use the search button. How about another L$10 to IM a group? lol.

Land and property rental lend themselves well to browsing straight, without filtering. Clothing and skin does not lend itself to straight browsing, unless, like Colette, you put a lot of products out individually in new products or shopping, with pictures.

Honestly, I just cracked the nut and got to #1 for apartments. I am ashamed that it comes out like that, but whatever. LL will probably change the algorithm, but who knows if it will be for the better.

Why are you ashamed Miss pops up on my hippotech and forum cartel Im's and confuses me by talking about vendor issues and forum cartel banter at the same time? If you've cracked it, more power to your elbow. Good luck to you.

You're right about land being more of a filtered market, this is why I voted yes to paying more than L$50 for a classified, I know they work and hope they will continue to work!

I think it depends upon your market, my core income is land and I believe people will continue to look for land. I don't need to throw in words like "Sex" "hot dirty porn" and "Cherry will beat you with a spork until you agree to be dominated" to get my land rental classifieds higher in the search.

However my stores, bleh, I'm rubbish with attracting traffic for them.

lol Ciaran.

I am ashamed because it shouldn't be this way...I paid for my visibility, and I should have gotten it to the appropriate degree without having to diddle with it as much as I did.

The economic stats page says LL made L$22,183,062 last month on classified charges.

I find it hard to believe that they're going to just drop this US$83,000/month cash cow..

Well said!

Well, never underestimate the power of a stupid idea.

Can you please define relevance for me in this context? How do I make my rental plots ad more relevant?

We have two searches now? Old and new? So confused...

Searching the classified tab and searching all classifieds returns vastly different results. You can make your ad more relevant the old fashioned way... very little substance but hammer it with your desired keyword.

I think people are going to want to be in the top 8 classifieds now because of how they show up when you first open the search tab. So the high end of the spectrum will probably grow. Anyway, I think this will cause a lot of dissatisfaction for those who are attempting to buy their way into the top 8. So I suggested the following on jira:

http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SVC-1013

It's a good start, Keiki, but the next 2-3 pages of ads are valuable too - it's not a terrible thing to get kicked out of top 8 in my opinion, because page 2 is just as likely to be browsed. I like the idea of weighted randomness, though.

YOU ARE SO RIGHT!

I couldn't figure out what you were talking about at first, when you first posted this, and even when I tried it just now, to make sure I wasn't just misunderstanding you - because I didn't realize that the "All" could be filtered by "Classified."

Which then bears NO RESEMBLANCE to what the regular classifieds do!

Now what the heck?

What is the best way to be found in the "All ---->Classified?"

And why on earth would they be wanting to shoot themselves in the foot by providing a whole nother classified on the FIRST tab (the "All" tab) that has nothing to do with the amount paid for it? it makes no SENSE.

I mean, if they want to have an "All" that is full of everything plus the kitchen sink in this big, incomprehensible jumble, fine! But why create a whole new classifieds that are just as mysterious, using the classifieds WE PAID FOR to do it, and then put that up front?

Why oh why do they do these things. Things with LL have just gotten totally bizarre. Surreal, and ridiculous.

I mean, it's like someone is CONSTANTLY digging into the walls of your house and reconnecting all the electrical wiring or something. So forget about reading or whatever you wanted to do, you're always trying to figure out where they hid the electricity this time!

What on earth is the POINT of having a tab called "Classified" under "All" if it doesn't function the way Classifieds do, by price?

And how on earth DOES it function?

No wonder you posted this poll. I'm at my wits end with this nonsense.

coco

Actually, when I think about it more, the top 8 SHOULD be done by price, and the body of search all classifieds only should use the weighted randomizer.

People pay for visibility and at some point it SHOULD be guaranteed - no ifs, ands, or buts about it. If someone edges you out, you have a choice - equal or better them the next time.

But since the main body of search returns results that are "relevant" then more weight should be afforded to those who choose to pay for visibility in the body of the main search.

The problem with the top 8 as it stands now is that it would be quite easy to pay an amount which should get you in the top 8 and then only minutes later have someone come along and pay 1L more and push you out of the top 8. You are guaranteed nothing.

Of course it's not an absolute guarantee. You have a choice of what you want to pay. If someone comes along later and edges you out, that's life. Life isn't fair. You have a choice to edge them out or just up the ante next week. This is how it works in real time systems. But if you pay for visibility you should get the level that you pay for. If someone pays more, that is part of the game, but you shouldn't be edged out by a 50L ad when you are paying thousands.

You were the one insisting people get what they pay for, and the current system doesn't even come close to guaranteeing that.

There can be a minimum to qualify for the top 8, to make it so that every last ad doesn't show up. Even if there isn't a minimum, if it's weighted based on how much you pay, a 100,000L ad will show up 2,000 times for every 1 time the 50L ad will show up. That's much better than being edged out completely because someone pays 1L more than you do, minutes after you paid.

Actually, real time systems (i.e. the Yellow Pages) are NOT rated on a weekly basis. They're rated on a yearly basis. Given that a year is a super long time in SL, why don't we bump Classified payments down to once monthly, as opposed to once weekly? That way people could actually judge just how a Classified affects their business, rather than wrangling for top dollar 8 spots? One week is hardly long enough to make a long-term trend value judgement.

The guy who pays more to get to the top should not be edged out by someone who pays less - no matter how much less. The guy who pays more would be shafted in your scheme. I am not egalitarian at all about this issue - if you want more visibility, pay for it. If you get edged out, so be it - do better, pay what you are comfortable, or get out of the game. If you don't want it enough, that is just how the cookie crumbles.

Oryx, the thing is that classifieds are published immediately, not yearly or monthly. How terrible would it be for a new business to not be able to advertise the moment they open their doors? How much tier should they waste?

I have an ad that I pay 2001L for. I get what I pay for - that is a moderate level of visibility on page 1 of the classic search in my desired category. It is nowhere near the first ad, and never will be. But it's not pages deep, either. It is a level I am comfortable with. New search shakes that up and gives people who paid far less a chance to trump me - and that's not right. You want the visibility, do like a business person does and pay for it. I am not pissy about someone who pays 2002L and maybe gets onto page 3 of featured ads instead of me, and pushes me off to page 4. He got what he paid for - greater visibility than me. That is fair from an objective point of view. If I want it badly enough, I will do better. I do not expect anyone to hold my hand. I am a businesswoman, it is my responsibility to take care of my business. And that is the nature of competition.

Cristalle,

No, you're right, I completely agree. I was just thinking about the real time comparison that somebody made. The person who pays the most SHOULD get the highest billing. It's the same in any RL magazine or newspaper. You pays the money, you gets the big picture. It's only fair. You think the Wall Street Journal says "Oh gee, Mr. Smallpants wants to be on the first page! Let's put him there, even though he only paid $100, compared to Mr. Bigpants, who ALSO wants to be on the first page, and paid $100,000?" HELL NO. Classified is Classified is Classified. I'm really upset that LL tried to level the playing field on this one.

No I wouldn't. LL messed tons of ads when I use to them so I quit using them all together.

The current situation is a little like this. Say you had room for 3 ads on the front page of your website. You set up an auction to take bids and told the potential advertisers that only the top 3 get on the front page. The auction goes off and the top 3 are selected. The part that makes it unfair is that not only are you collecting the bids from the top 3, but you are keeping the money for all the other bids too. I'm sorry if I bid 150,000 for a front page ad and I don't get that front page ad, I better get my money back.

If you don't like my first idea how about this. Every week there is a separate auction of those top 8 ads. You make a bid. If you are in the top 8, LL keeps your money and puts you in the top 8 and guarantees that spot for a week. If you are not in the top 8, you get the money back and you can place a regular classified at whatever level you like.

This is a fair idea. Of course, all this would be obviated if they would just return classifieds in paid order and scrapped the stupid featured ads thing.

Which is what I wish they would do. Now, how can we get them to do that?

coco