Selling on Xstreet just got more expensive

I noticed that one too, Ralektra and blinked as "over here" BIAB is kinda looked down on and seemed to be considered, at least by the one or two posts I saw referring to BIAB "over there" as a wonderful business model.

We must have been there about the same time....lol.

Well yeah, they kinda are, late next year. I mean, they're going to limit the total amount of memory that can be used by scripts according to parcel size, just as parcel size determines the number of prims available. It's going to be a pretty generous number for most users, but it poses a scalability limit for an application like this, if it were to take on something approaching the million or so listings now on XstreetSL.

(If the http-in stuff were faster, I could almost imagine a weird "search" algorithm where merchant servers were responsible for returning their own relevance for each search query; then the central search processors would just have to remember all the merchant servers to query. That would be massively parallel, all right, and spread the memory requirements scalably, but with all inter-sim script comms throttled, they'd never be able to satisfy more than a handful of searchers at a time.)

On the other hand, if this only needs to scale to a few thousand listings, this all may not be a problem, as long as you've got enough land to support the script memory required.

I hear ya, but I understand there are quite a few people who like to shop on those web sites when they simply can't be in-world.

Believe me, I try to keep my scripts self-contained in-world whenever it's at all possible, so I consider that an inherent advantage of your approach. It's just that it imposes some limits, too.

I would settle for a website with a really good search engine that only gave you the clickable SLURL of the location where you could go and buy the item. Really, really simple.

No off-world commerce to have to worry about, no way LL could screw with the web site, no delivery problems, etc.

It would actually encourage in-world commerce.

Hell, shoppers would not even need the ability to make an account on the site as there is nothing avatar specific. People can use their browser book-marking for favourites.

Only merchants uploading details of their products would need an account and stats could be based off people choosing the advert and/or clicking the SLURL (not extremely useful but would serve as a basic indicator of how many people are being referred via the site etc. Any extra stats could be gathered by inworld vendors).

Merchants could be charged a reasonable registration fee which might include some limited basic advertising (perhaps for 10-25 items, mostly to give freebies a chance and to stop the site being swamped with rubbish).

Premium advertising types could be purchased to boost the visibility of products - similar to how SLX/XStreet Bold/Featured and Homepage items work but also upgrades to the amount of basic adverts you can have. Premium adverts would get more visibility and listing priority over basic listed items.

Merchant accounts should be able to load up credits on their account using inworld terminals and use that credit to pay for their fees.

Non-payment of fees would mean that adverts are just not displayed, once the account is back in credit and paid up, the adverts are displayed again. Maybe accounts that are persistently in the red for a significant period of time could be terminated, obviously reminders would need to be sent during this period.

Merchant accounts should have to login once per month or something so that the account has activity. Accounts that don't show activity for the required period would have their items yanked from the display. This is to stop people setting stuff up and leaving it forever, possibly leaving SL even or selling their land and not updating their SLURLs. Relisting items on an account that has not had activity for the required period should be as simple as clicking a link.

Get the really, really basic stuff right like this and SL inworld commerce will be much improved.

SLX/XStreet didn't need all that extra crap in my mind - you cannot even buy anything unless you are inworld to receive it any way so all that commerce stuff only really serves to recoup the commission on the sales.

Which is the only weak spot on the idea. Financing the web site without commissions might be problematic and without the e-commerce stuff you obviously cannot collect commissions.
However the site is much simpler to get working without the e-commerce stuff and so that might help reduce costs enough such that membership and speciality paid premium advertising might be enough. Whoever runs with the idea would have to see if the costs and potential revenues are worth it.

BTW I give anyone permission to use my idea if they think there is enough merit in it.

Both from a merchant point of view and a consumer point of view I would be using a site like this if it existed today.

I would use it in a new york minute besides I've known you for years and trust you to do it honestly.

Sure you can. For freebies, what's the worst that can happen... you don't get your freebie because your IMs were capped? Well, sheesh, it was a freebie, wasn't it?

I was going to post a thread earlier asking if there were any catalogue sites, based on the fact that some people say they browse Xstreet then go to the inworld location. However the drawback I see is that someone will push and push for being able to get delivery from the page, that would be a constant feature request.

I do think there's a market for a more feature rich advertising portal.

You must be pulling my leg, as I credit you with more foresight and sense than to be this narrow sighted.

I can only assume as you must be pulling my leg, you are after my rather new and very nice rose-vine design stockings. Be orf with you, you pesky ferrit, my stockings are staying on my legs

I *never* shop on XSL when I'm in-world, even when I'm buying stuff with actual money. Because I've got better things to do with my time when I can actually get in-world. So I guess I'm honestly missing something here. Why can't you go shopping online when you're not in-world, particularly for freebies?

They're easier to get other ways anyway.

OK, so I credited you with a little more foresight than you have

Here is what I used to do from work where I cannot get into SL. I would go and look at all the lovely shiny things on SLX that I wanted to buy and mark them as favourites. Then when I was in-world, I would go find them and buy them, preferring to give the creator the whole money and not the same amount minus the commission but sometimes, just sometimes for convenience I would login and buy those favourites from SLX.

Where did I say that you couldn't send yourself the SLX freebies whilst offline? Of course you can and there is no risk. You call that shopping? Sheesh, men

The point is, no way would I trust off-line delivery for stuff I actually pay money for.

Sorry about that! I'll go an fix that for anyone else. I plead forgetfulness!

*mutters* I knew I was forgetting something.. at least it wasn't the charity stuff in RL.

Edit: Fixed. Blah.

These days I don't get in-world often enough or long enough to waste any of it waiting for stores to rez... sometimes I'll stop off for coffee and pastry at Panera to use their "free" wifi because it's the only time I'll get a shot at going in-world that day.

that's like the best idea I've heard all year.

Thank you

I know that sometime in the future XStreet and inworld Linden accounts will be linked. It was suppose to have happened months ago. My guess is that when that big negative $L ballance starts appearing in the inworld accounts after the fees start, a few of those pro-Linden posters may change their mind.

Apparently lots of folks can buy from work (on SLX) even if they can't login to SL itself. For those of us who don't have computer-driven jobs, SLX, or whatever it's called these days, is completely superfluous. I come home from work and login to SL. Not to SLX. I'd rather spend time inworld shopping than cruising around on the boggled-up-mess that SLX has become.

I'm betting that anyone willing to fork out $$$ for the required system, connection, and video cards for SecondLife would rather spend time inworld than out, in this economy.

I do use SLX for search; unlike in-world search you can see the actual product (once you finally find it. They really need to fine tune results. If they did, it wouldn't matter how many unrelated items exist there.)

I used to also used it to shop, send gifts, etc. Sometimes I just didn't want to move about SL. From now though I will try to use it only for searching, then I will look up the person in world.

Some things only exist on SLX, but so far I haven't had a need for things like that. I'm talking about sculpty makers and things like that.

i've come to realise only a percentage of items are sold on Xstreet that are represented in-world....that's even with a million items on the website! This latest LL policy will eventually cut down the listings by 50% I reckon.....and become even less useful for me personally.
I used the old SLEX for researching products...and then buy in-world. The only things i tended to buy from XStreet were gifts/presents.

I actually like (Gabriele's) Catalogue idea....listing pictures & descriptions of your products and a slurl to your store, which is how i used SLEX anyway.

It's easy to measure the benefits of Xstreet listings....you can set a different landing point inside your shop from a XStreet slurl and have an visitor tracker placed on the landing zone.
I would prefer if all commerce stayed inside SL....I know most will disagree with this!

I hope someone with the time and know how grabs this and runs with it.

If it has a better seach engine than xstreet and inworld, HELL YEAH!!!

Seconded.

It's not that I disagree with the comment. It's just that I see more uses for having a web-based shopping system too. Usually, I'd just browse via XStreet and go in world to buy.

That is 99% of how I use it too ... it is a better search capability than what we have in-world. Three exceptions to how I use it though:

1) I am getting a gift for someone and the store does not sell transfer items. Usually this happens when the rez day party is in an hour so dropping a notecard on the creator then waiting is usually not an option.

2) In some cases an item will be discontinued in-world before it is taken off of xstreet. Like when a fave store rotates their inventory or sells their land.

3) Once in awhile I will be at an event that I absolutely can not leave and need something (like a texture). I know exactly what I need, my avatar just can not up and go shopping right then.

What makes for a good search? (disclaimer: I'm asking because I want to make sure the search in my world-wide store covers what people want)

1. Keyword search? Pull up all items that match one of the keywords typed
2. Boolean searching with AND/OR?
3. Ability to search items for a particular vendor or category only?
4. Etc...

How do you like to sort?

1. By creator?
2. By price?
3. By popularity?

Do you agree or disagree that ratings and reviews are either representative of products quality or easily gamed?

Agreed. Most of my Xgreed use was searching for items for which I would later go in world to view prior to purchase. The only times I purchased from the web were for very low cost items or from sellers from whom I had bought before and had expectations of quality and customer service.

I'd be more than happy for a web based catalog that had great search and filter functionality.

Rime

A quick list off the top of my head:

Search by price ceiling and/or floor values
Search by seller name
Keywords - any of/all of
Feature toggles: permissions, color, gender, ...
Hierarchical categories to limit search

To combat search gaming how about a 'Report this item' option if it is returned for a totally unrelated search?

Rime