Bio Engineer Archive
Thread: If you run a BE shop, how did you get it started?
However that doesn't directly answer the question about setting up a shop. I don't have one (wish I did but have too many other cool things to put the points into) sometimes.
I'd ask the question on your galaxy board since successful BEs there may know your market better and the good ones are usually free with advice.
When I started out I sold cheap pets and in the description I put : "This pet can be used as a statue in your house." That seemed to work pretty well for me, seeing as the pets I made, at first,sucked and would be useless in a fight. I also made tons of cheap pet stim A's and B's. Those sold really well. I'd price out other BE's near me and I'd make mine cheaper so people would keep coming back to my vendor. Of course, as I got better at BE and used better materials in my products, I slowly raised my prices. Now, as a Master BE, I run a very competitive shop, I think. Every once in awhile I will go check out the competition and see what other BE's around me are pricing their stuff and adjust my prices accordingly. I don't want to be undercut by other BE's in my area.
Also, a good rule of thumb is keep your vendor stocked if you can. If people keep coming to your vendor and it's empty all the time, then they will stopcoming back. Another bit of advice is maybe try to get into a mall or someplace with other vendors. If those vendors have regular customers, then they will check out your vendor since they are already there checking out the other vendors. You might get a regular customer from someone who otherwise might not have looked at your vendor.
Well, good luck with your vendor.
1. Do your homework. Read the boards, study the recipies and make the best possible product you can.
2. Get at least 50 pets on your vendor (I have seperate vendors for PvE/PvP-Npc Pets)
3. Tell every Ch you see about your well stocked vendor.
4. NEVER EVER LEAVE YOUR VENDOR EMPTY!
Tips for running BE vendors:
1) If you can put your vendor in a mall or in a place with other types of vendors, do it, it will help you. If not, and you want traffic, try to put your shop near other popular shops or as close to the "no build zone" of a major city as you can (Corellia, Theed, Bestine, etc.)
2) Try to offer the most variety that you can (e.g. stims, vit packs, tissues, pets, pet food). A person coming to your vendor to buy one thing will more often then not also buy another if you have a good number of offerings. For example a chef may very well be coming to buy BSN but you can be certain he'll take a peek into your pet vendor for a good non-ch pet and some stims and supplies while he's there.
3) Your stock will largely dictate your success. There is no bigger turnoff to a customer than a poorly stocked vendor.
4) Stock first, then advertise. Here's a really good way to get customers: sell some nice stims or vitality packs on the bazar. Then when they are sold, send a really nice email to the buyers with an inventation and waypoint to your store. Don't do this unless you have a well stocked vendor however as it will hurt more than help if you do. Other ways to advertise: use your server trade forum, and post your store waypoint in your bazar listings.
Sending a buyer a follow up email is not exactly spamming them, I however know vendors who send constant email updates about their stores - this is spam as I'm on their mailing list because I bought something from their vendor and they feel the need to tell me everytime they sneeze.
I usually send a mail that says somethin along the lines of
"Thank you for shopping with us. If you are looking for similar items at the same low prices why not check out our vendors just a few hundred meters south of anchorhead.*WP attached*
I send that once then never bother them again. I have had quite a lot of regular customers that way and not 1 single complaint
Well, I'm sure some people are like you and don't appreciate it and just delete the email. Cool. Nothing lost. You won't get 100% of the people to visit you, in fact 25% would be a tremendous success.All I can relate is my own experiences in this matter and those experiences are this:
Some of my very very best most loyal customers first visited my shop because of an invitation they received after buying stims from me on the bazar.
I buy *tons* on the bazar (resources mainly) but I am fortunate enough to have some people who supply me with resources directly (dropping them off on my vendor). Of the people that do that, 90% of them were as a result of spam they sent me after I bought their stuff on the bazar. And many of these folks I've developed friendships with.
When I buy something I consider to be good, I *want* to know where I can get more. And if people send me a waypoint to where I can get more there is an almost certainty that I'll visit there are some time or another.
P.S. The 0% achiever explains your stance on this Albion, lol
Albion_DeCrappa wrote:
send a really nice email to the buyers with an inventation and waypoint to your store.
In other words, send them spam? No offence to you at all, but I hate when people do this in my RL e-mail box, and I hate when they do it in my g-mail box. Unsolicited e-mail is unsolicited e-mail no matter which way you look at it. It's better to put the waypoint either in the title of the object or the notes of the item on the vendor. For instance I like to name my Pet Stims "P-StimC (37/1182) (Vdr:-701,324 Corellia)".
Message Edited by ArthurDentOnBria on 04-13-2004 03:16 PM
I finally broke down and put up a small house and vendorabout 3weeks ago... just the generic vendor machine you get at Business 3 (which I dropped again right after placing). My shop is near my home, not really near any player towns or player run malls, but what I did seemed to work, this past week I made almost 3 million in vendor sales, all pets (I only make tissues for special orders, and don't really enjoy making tissues).
The following helped me....
Slap your name and shop coordinates on the pet/petstim/tissue when you create it, i.e. A Gurrcat - CL 25 by Vraell (Master BE Shop -3915 6131 Theed). I had to do this out of necessity really, other BE's were buying all of my stock and reselling it for at least double what I was selling for, when I didn't have my "brand" on the items. The other reason to do this is....
Keep at least one really good pet on the bazaar at all times as an Auction, preferably in a high population city, such as Theed or Coronet.Really good non-CH pets andpets with 60% kinetic are great for this,I get at least 4 tells a night, asking if I have these in stock on my vendor. And with your shop location stuck right on the item, many people will visit your shop straight away. I also keep at least 5 or 6 pet stims and pet vitality packs on the bazaar at all times as well.... what the heck, with your name and shop location on the petstim, the people buying them will see your name every time they heal their pet.
State somewhere on your shop or vendor that you take custom orders. I've had many people order a custom pet, and come back and buy several more in the next few days, and they tell friends who usually pop in as well.
Keep your vendor well stocked. I keep at least 6-10 non-CH pets and 12+ CH pets on my vendor at all times. I'm sure you've traveled to vendors on the planetary map only to find it empty, near empty, or full of things no one in their right mind would purchase... I know I hate that, most people do, I think.
I hope this helps. And for the record, I've never sat in a city and spammed the location of my shop... I find that quite distasteful and annoying. But that's just me 