Silk Road forums
Discussion => Silk Road discussion => Topic started by: gotti on May 24, 2012, 05:19 pm
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Hi.
I'll be entering the SR marketplace as a vendor (been one IRL for years) sometime in the next week after I finish stocking up on what I'll be selling. With all of this talk about buyers' activism for escrow use, some vendors requiring FE unless you have X amount of transactions, and some people getting ripped off, it's become a little less clear on how to best establish myself as a new vendor who's trustworthy. Being that I'll be selling a relatively high-value item, I don't want to risk getting scammed, either.
What do you guys recommend?
My loose plan so far is:
- Start off with small listing, highly discounted, escrow for everyone. Do this to establish some trust and a little reputation and feedback. Once these orders are completed, transition to...
- Escrow cool if you have over 10 transactions; FE if less.
- FE required by all if ordering more than 3 units of each item (each item is a specified qty of pills)
Is this fair? What's the community take on this?
I've done a lot of online sales (legit); always on email; always ship on time; flexible with buyers; etc, so I think in those regards (along with the stealth shipping method I've devised) should be good to demonstrate I'm available and helpful, but it doesn't quickly establish trust as a vendor once I start off...only after I've established myself do these qualities really begin to show their value.
Looking forward to your thoughts and advice.
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Set up 10 freebie samples for forum thread responders. This shows you are serious and is an investment in your business. This will give you 10 guaranteed positive feedbacks to start off.
Then run highly discounted sales for the first few weeks to a month.
Then crank it up.
If your shit is any good and you're not a complete asswipe, you will be good to go.
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When a user has placed an order, you get to see their buyer stats. I would suggest staying in escrow ALWAYS, unless the user has less than, let's say, 5 transactions under their belt. Until you've established good feedback and ratings, you should not even attempt to get people to FE, as you will lose a fair amount of potential customers that way. You'll want to also keep an eye out for refund rates of buyers. If they have a large refund percentage, you may want to consider asking them to FE.
Even experienced buyers avoid FE, as it's the easiest way to be scammed.
So again, STAY IN ESCROW, until you're established. Then only require FE for buyers with less than 5 transactions under their belt.
Good Luck! I look forward to seeing you rise as a vendor here. If you offer legit, quality product(s), you will make a name for yourself in no time.
One last word of advice: CUSTOMER SERVICE! I have seen legit vendors fail due to poor communication and problem resolution. If a package gets intercepted by customs or jacked by a postal worker, you'll do good to discuss a refund with the customer, or a reshipment.
I don't think I need to tell you how important good, discreet packaging is here.
Cheers,
~Toker
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Thanks for the advice, guys. I found this nugget in the SR seller's guide, so looks like I will be going escrow for at least the first couple dozen transactions...
NOTICE: If you are a new vendor, you may not ask your customers to finalize their orders and release payment to you before you ship, a practice known as "finalizing early". If you do this, you will lose your selling priviledges. Once you have completed 35 successful transactions and have been a seller for at least one month, you may ask your customers to finalize early without reprocussion. In no way do we support finalizing early in general and this rule should not be construed as support for finalizing early for more established vendors.
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Sell good quality product. Good packaging. Quick turnaround. Allow buyers to stay in escrow. Have good communications. Check silk road regularly.
That's pretty much it.
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You are not allowed to ask for FE until you have been a vendor for a month and have over 50 transactions
so your choices are right now either sell to people who have 5 or more transactions or don't at all.
I chose to sell to people who had more than 5 transactions, but now I don't let people who have less than 10 transactions stay in escrow. Then again I have almost 200 completed sales, another 14 in transit.
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Nice try DEA :)
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Nice try DEA :)
Nice name ;)
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Seems simple enough. I will stay in escrow and keep the power to the buyers since it's us that power the community. Thanks for the advice, all.