EVERYONE PLEASE READ! We need marketplace info.

As someone who wasn't around for the old marketplace and is used to DoA, I'd say my biggest problems are the number of items in a section being misleading because many of them are pending/expired, and not having larger/clearer pictures of the items being sold. Maybe something like they have where sold threads go in their own section would be good?

Also, while I like the idea of sellers listing a bunch of little things all together, I would also like to be able to see all the heads/bodies up for sale without having to search through different threads. And the "shopping" section should be part of the Marketplace, or at least the WTB/group orders/member shops subsections.

While I'd definitely like to see most dolls/bodies/heads with their own listings (or at least kept in their own categories), I would absolutely love to see something more like DOA's marketplace. I also really like how there's a tagging system (color coded too!) for Sold/Active/WTB threads. This marketplace is shiny, but doesn't feel as easy to use as that one. I wasn't here for DD's old marketplace, so I can't offer any feedback on that.

I'd also love to see the expiration deadline go out the window. 

Edited January 19, 2021 by KingyoNingyo

On 1/17/2021 at 6:40 PM, Monty said:

I also have been frustrated that the current system doesn’t allow feedback unless it was via the actual marketplace.

Yeah, that bothered me too. I bought something from Cauldroness, and couldn't leave feedback because it wasn't a marketplace sale.

The other thing that is a bit confusing to me is the way the marketplace isn't in the shopping section. When I first went to look for it I searched the shopping section over and over a few times before it occurred to me to check the menu bar. It's fine to have it on the menu bar for quick access, but imo it should be in the shopping section too.

I'll make a general observation that activity on the forum does seem to have died down over the last month, but that may be driven by the fact that we're coming up on a year of shelter-in-place, and we just went through a holiday season where people couldn't travel or visit family. I'm guessing at this point that a whole lot of people may be suffering from depression, isolation sickness, and general melancholy. It may be hard for folks to motivate themselves to do hobby stuff, and it's probably also limited the money people can spend on expensive doll items.

@BeyondTime Nailed it for me, sadly. I'm currently suffering from a rough bout of depression. These days I can barely bring myself to get out of bed, let alone browse forums and list the two dolls I need to get rid of for sale.

17 hours ago, NeeP said:

For instance. When I look at the Smart Doll category, it says there are 21 ads, but when I look closer, there is only 1 active advert.  

I share this frustration as well. I get excited there are listings but when in fact you check, there aren't any or very little.

2 hours ago, Veravey said:

I share this frustration as well. I get excited there are listings but when in fact you check, there aren't any or very little.

Typically I only remove those if the original poster puts in a report asking for removal. Maybe I am just doing it wrong and should just remove them once they are expired. 

55 minutes ago, BeyondTime said:

Typically I only remove those if the original poster puts in a report asking for removal. Maybe I am just doing it wrong and should just remove them once they are expired. 

Oh gosh, I wasn't meaning to blame anyone. I figured it was just a setting somewhere on the admin side and that the site automatically did this. 

43 minutes ago, Veravey said:

I figured it was just a setting somewhere on the admin side and that the site automatically did this. 

I didn’t take it as blame, I was actually putting it out there in case @Averis or @baldylox needed to tell me I should be more proactive.  

I think the old marketplace was better for smaller items, but for large one-cost items like a whole doll, the current setup is superior, but I am not sure if it would be possible to have both.

17 hours ago, BeyondTime said:

Typically I only remove those if the original poster puts in a report asking for removal. Maybe I am just doing it wrong and should just remove them once they are expired. 

That would help, or maybe send a message to the poster giving them a certain amount of time (2 weeks? IDK) to renew the expired advert before you delete it.

2 hours ago, monkeypizzasonic said:

That would help, or maybe send a message to the poster giving them a certain amount of time (2 weeks? IDK) to renew the expired advert before you delete it.

I don’t think they can renew them, it always seems like they make a new one and ask for us to delete the old one. 

2 hours ago, BeyondTime said:

I don’t think they can renew them, it always seems like they make a new one and ask for us to delete the old one. 

Correct, you cannot renew them, you need to make a new one to replace the old one.  This ensures the piece has been sold and no changes have occurred.  If they have then those can be reflected in the new listing.  As for deleting the old ones, the forum self deletes those in 7 days after they expire.  So when people message us about deleting old listings, I just ignore them because the forum deletes them anyway.

 

21 hours ago, BeyondTime said:

I didn’t take it as blame, I was actually putting it out there in case @Averis or @baldylox needed to tell me I should be more proactive.  

I actually have no clue on that one.  That's definitely an Averis question.  😉 

 

 

Billy

48 minutes ago, baldylox said:

As for deleting the old ones, the forum self deletes those in 7 days after they expire.  So when people message us about deleting old listings, I just ignore them because the forum deletes them anyway.

Is there something that prevents this process when a listing is marked as pending/expired then? I don't even check the marketplace that often, but I know that some of the DD head and full doll listings have been there for a while. They all have both the pending and expired tags.

 

I agree with Cauldroness and others who preferred the older marketplace layout WAY  better.

As a seller it was easier to list things and edit what had sold and adjust prices or pictures with the old layaout and edit what had sold.

As a buyer I loved the old layout better too as you could see everything a seller had listed in one place and that made it easier to buy multiple items without going on a epic quest through multiple forums or threads.

 

I have only listed in the New marketplace a couple of times and I hate it, it requires much more work and you have to pay attention to when the ad expires, it is just a lot of hassle when I can list more easily in other places, even doa is easier to use .😅

 

2 hours ago, Jezrah said:

Is there something that prevents this process when a listing is marked as pending/expired then? I don't even check the marketplace that often, but I know that some of the DD head and full doll listings have been there for a while. They all have both the pending and expired tags.

Yea... there's stuff in there thats starting to come up to their birthdays, or even past them.

So I do find the approach of ignoring all deletion requests, if they happened to be made by people who have their stuff in this limbo state a bit curious. since in the long run if you ended up selling lots of stuff on layways, and your posts ended up regularly in the limbo state it would make you look like you couldnt actually get a deal together, or into completion.

Like it or not, to me this comes off as a unintentional encouragement to take your business elsewhere.

also I recall a request for a one-click turn around option for posts that didnt sell in the feedback thread when the new version started ... that would also be a bit turn-off, if you had to re-enter your listing if everything just goes poof when the timer expires, as people are reporting.

Yes, you can keep a text backup on your own computer, but you only need to be dissapointed once, when there are apparently easier options available.

1 hour ago, finnleo said:

So I do find the approach of ignoring all deletion requests, if they happened to be made by people who have their stuff in this limbo state a bit curious. since in the long run if you ended up selling lots of stuff on layways, and your posts ended up regularly in the limbo state it would make you look like you couldnt actually get a deal together, or into completion.

For the record, I always take care of them when I see the requests, so they aren’t being ignored.

I didn’t realize they were supposed to clean up after 7 days though, and if I had known that I might not have paid attention to those requests either. 

It’s possible the forum’s recycler process isn’t working, or needs adjustment.

It sounds like we’re only getting requests for a percentage of the expired ads, so it would be better if auto clean up worked. Alternatively, if auto cleanup won’t work on ads in certain states, then we need to know about it so we know to remove them manually. Imo we’d also need a written guideline that says your expired ad will be deleted after X number of days. 

1 hour ago, BeyondTime said:

and if I had known that I might not have paid attention to those requests either.

Ultimately the trick question with this is, "At what point do I start to investigate problem reports, that should not be a problem?"

... but I come from an ex aerospace line worker perspective.

I vote for the return of the old marketplace. My principal reasons are the expiration of the individual ads, because I put much time listing it and after the renewals, you can’t renew more and need to relist again every item, small or big. Also the browsing experience of currencies other than $ was blank (like in other category) and you must state the price again in the written area because it’s not show by default.

Other reason is the feedback, linked to a completed ad, was a complex method comparing with the old feedback system (that like monty says, allowed commissions too). In the new feedback, if seller doesn’t change the ad to completed ad, you can’t never leave bad feedback (or any feedback).

For the changes of the marketplace I would love one post with all the items and terms reunited. This one is more categorized and everything is on their place, but the need of relist every pair of eyes that had expired is a little tiring so that’s my reason I don’t sell in here anymore.

 

Old marketplace was way better, this one is too confusing and like others have said I can sell quicker just listing on IG stories than going through all the hoops here

8 hours ago, Singer Yuna said:

In the new feedback, if seller doesn’t change the ad to completed ad, you can’t never leave bad feedback (or any feedback).

Oh wow, that is a worrisome side effect of the current system, I never thought of that. It's certainly not good if people can get out of bad feedback by not closing the ad and designating a buyer.

I spoke with Averis again about the self deleting thing the marketplace has and it seems that on the last update, that specific function may not have updated properly, he's looking into it for us.

When I said I was ignoring deletion requests, I didn't mean I would see the topic and just delete it immediately.  I *always* open every PM and message or email that is sent to me.  I read them all for sure.  But when I get a seller sending me 9 or 10 PM's and every one of them is asking to delete old listings, it's easy to know what they're all about before I even open them.  With the setup on this MP, it's not as easy to delete as you'd think.  So that's why I just let the forum delete them instead of me doing it.

When talking to Averis about this, he said that if the majority of forums users wanted the old setup back then we *could* reinstate it.  It would take some time but not too much.  And since it seems that's what people are wanting, I'll go ahead and tell him about it and we'll start that process.

 

I appreciate everyone's input on this and I'm glad to see all the great points brought up about the good and bad of both MP setups.  Thanks!

 

 

 

Billy

25 minutes ago, baldylox said:

I appreciate everyone's input on this and I'm glad to see all the great points brought up about the good and bad of both MP setups.  Thanks!

I appreciate you guys asking instead of just assuming and making changes. Makes me happy I made this my doll forum home.

I wasn't here for the old marketplace, and I've only used the new marketplace as a buyer. There was a learning curve, but it worked. 

On my model train forums, the marketplace thread are auto locked.  Once the OP posts, it is now a locked thread.  This keep people from having discussions on sellers posts, keeps people from bumping posts and so on.  But I believe the OP can update the post in things sell.  This then I believe moves the post back to the top.  And posts are only deleted once the seller changes the thread name to include the [SOLD] tag.  This has greatly reduced the moderation the admins had to do in the marketplace and made it much more effective.  Perhaps look at doing something like that here.  There really is no reason to bump your post is you clearly list what you have for sale as the forum search function should bring it up.  And if your sales post does end up beyond the 3rd page then no body wants them at that time, or you may be asking too much and need to change your listing which will move it to the 1st page.  AS for seller and buyer communication, it is done via email, so you need to include your email in your sales post or have it visible on your profile.  They don't have PM's on that sire like we do here, so here you can also use PMs for contact.

ATTENTION!

 

Averis and I have looked at all the comments here and decided to go back to the old style marketplace!  The old one will be deactivated and all listings there will be deleted.  There was no way to move them over to the new section so we apologize for that trouble. Here is the link to the new MP:

 

https://www.dolldreaming.com/forum/74-marketplace/

 

Please read the rules I posted there before you make any sales posts.  If you have any questions please PM one of the mods and we will help you out.  Thanks again for all the input and comments!  Now let's see how this new old thing goes!  😉 

 

 

Billy