Merchant Archive

I started harvesting resources for a shipwright and selling them at a very very very low price. Let me say, we have a good deal going. But then I decided to start harv'ing resources for retail sale in addition to my orders. I setup my bulky terminal and have millions of units in stock. I spammed for a day - no sales. I posted to the trade forum - no sales. I put out one unit for display on the floor of every resource I have - no sales. I can't even sell the BER10 harvestors I have on the vendor :? (scratches head). I'm confused. I have no idea what to do except sell these resources piece meal at the bazaar. Ironically if I did they would sell and sell for more money. :?

In my spams and posts I've been listing my prices (0.75-5cpu for resources, 20k+ for mineral harvs, 40k+ for chem, flora, gas harvs) and the categories of resources I have in stock, not the specific names and stats. On my harvs I also charge 1 credit per cred maint and .5 cred per unit power. I don't think my prices are expensive. I mean the only resources I sell for 5 cpu are the one's listed in the top 10 of their cataegory.

My intention was to setup a custom order vendor. You think this is what's killing sales? I put a 100k stack or a stack of my remaining stock of a resource on my vendor and let's say it's a grind resource. It's listed for 7500000. The purpose is, it is for display primarily to indicate to the customer the CPU. 7500000 = .75 cpu. The customer, if interested, would send me an email saying hey I want 100k of that one and 50k of this one and so on. I package it and they pick it up. I mean I spelled out how I run my vendor on a bag in there. There's also another one right in front of the vendor asking them to read it.

ATM, Two weeks of sales = 0 orders

I welcome any advice. Thanks

You think putting the resources in small stacks of, say 100, and pricing them accordingly would be better? Then people would see 100 units for 75 instead of 100000 units for 7500000. Just an idea that popped into my head. (I'm trying to keep the custom order thing alive.)

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Thryss wrote:
I started harvesting resources for a shipwright and selling them at a very very very low price. Let me say, we have a good deal going. But then I decided to start harv'ing resources for retail sale in addition to my orders. I setup my bulky terminal and have millions of units in stock. I spammed for a day - no sales. I posted to the trade forum - no sales. I put out one unit for display on the floor of every resource I have - no sales. I can't even sell the BER10 harvestors I have on the vendor :? (scratches head). I'm confused. I have no idea what to do except sell these resources piece meal at the bazaar. Ironically if I did they would sell and sell for more money. :?

In my spams and posts I've been listing my prices (0.75-5cpu for resources, 20k+ for mineral harvs, 40k+ for chem, flora, gas harvs) and the categories of resources I have in stock, not the specific names and stats. On my harvs I also charge 1 credit per cred maint and .5 cred per unit power. I don't think my prices are expensive. I mean the only resources I sell for 5 cpu are the one's listed in the top 10 of their cataegory.

My intention was to setup a custom order vendor. You think this is what's killing sales? Yes
I put a 100k stack or a stack of my remaining stock of a resource on my vendor and let's say it's a grind resource. It's listed for 7500000. The purpose is, it is for display primarily to indicate to the customer the CPU. 7500000 = .75 cpu. The customer, if interested, would send me an email saying hey I want 100k of that one and 50k of this one and so on. I package it and they pick it up. People like to buy what they need when they need it, most do not want to wait for next day to return to where they have been to do a pick up. And alot are in the mind of 'and when will they be on' not everyone plays every single day, andcustomers know that.
I mean I spelled out how I run my vendor on a bag in there. There's also another one right in front of the vendor asking them to read it.What the vendor hasis what people look at, not notes and signs, most 'read me firsts' are ignored..its the content of the vendor they want. Our decor and dislays and read mes and look heres are noticed, but by those very select few (who usually turn into great customers)

ATM, Two weeks of sales = 0 orders

I welcome any advice. Thanks

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Thanks a bunch for your input you two .

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Thryss wrote:
I started harvesting resources for a shipwright and selling them at a very very very low price. Let me say, we have a good deal going. But then I decided to start harv'ing resources for retail sale in addition to my orders. I setup my bulky terminal and have millions of units in stock. I spammed for a day - no sales. I posted to the trade forum - no sales. I put out one unit for display on the floor of every resource I have - no sales. I can't even sell the BER10 harvestors I have on the vendor :? (scratches head). I'm confused. I have no idea what to do except sell these resources piece meal at the bazaar. Ironically if I did they would sell and sell for more money. :?

In my spams and posts I've been listing my prices (0.75-5cpu for resources, 20k+ for mineral harvs, 40k+ for chem, flora, gas harvs) and the categories of resources I have in stock, not the specific names and stats. On my harvs I also charge 1 credit per cred maint and .5 cred per unit power. I don't think my prices are expensive. I mean the only resources I sell for 5 cpu are the one's listed in the top 10 of their cataegory.

Right off the bat, having dealt with starting and maintaining over 30 different product lines in the past month alone (for other players), I can tell you're not conifdent in your marketing. Let's examine the items that indicate that to me and you see if there's room for improvement.

• Had a good amount of shipwright sales (market is good focused on retail sales to pilots then).


• Decided to sell resources in addition to final products (where's the customer development? You have an entirely different consumer for these two product lines).


• Spamming and forum posts produced nothing over a two-week period (Two weeks means nothing to me. I can sit for two weeks and accomplish more by simply watching profession tags and approaching people in conversations)


• Set up your bulky vendor (How anyone can honestly set up a bulky, which indicates no Advertising III or appreciable sales structure for the items and expect to compete in a [mostly] impulse market is beyond me. You either have to have extremely high value products that are very rare or a well developed consumer base to do volume sales with just Artisan 3).


• You note that BER 10 harvestors don't sell well. Having sold thousands of them, I would say that people could care less if they have maintenance and/or power on them that you want torecoup. Mediums just do not sell well for the serious harvesting players, they only sell well when you have a lot of startup people that cannot afford heavies. The game is too matured for that market to thrive.
  

I'd also come up with a strategy based upon setting up lines of communications for sales with established crafters. Go to them and tell them you will supply X on a regular basis.

My intention was to setup a custom order vendor. You think this is what's killing sales? I put a 100k stack or a stack of my remaining stock of a resource on my vendor and let's say it's a grind resource. It's listed for 7500000. The purpose is, it is for display primarily to indicate to the customer the CPU. 7500000 = .75 cpu. The customer, if interested, would send me an email saying hey I want 100k of that one and 50k of this one and so on. I package it and they pick it up. I mean I spelled out how I run my vendor on a bag in there. There's also another one right in front of the vendor asking them to read it.

ATM, Two weeks of sales = 0 orders

I welcome any advice. Thanks

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If you've had 0 sales in two weeks nothing is killing them, they're dead.

Also "CPU. 7500000 = .75 cpu" is wrong. 100,000 x .75 = 75,000 mate. 7,500,000 on a 100K block is 75 cpu. If this math is really reflected in your product pricing it could be a great insight into why no one is buying at that price.

The type of resouce orders you appear to desire is based more off of personal contact than bulk advertising, IMO. Email crafters that you think might be customers and start a mailling list within game to them specifically.

Fivo Asia

Message Edited by Cafa on 03-11-2005 09:50 AM

Thanks for clueing me in about the market for med. harvesters. I was wondering why I havent sold a single one of those... I sell plenty of everything else, especially homes (I can't imagine why). I have already shfted production away from harvesters and into homes, but I guess I won't bother worrying about it now. I will make harvesters again when I can make a decent heavy.

I don't nother stocking any archi or shipwright resources at the moment. You wont make any money selling them the metals they need in bulk; thier voluminous needs prevents them from making it worth your while (same thing with ore and archis). If you really want to make cash on resources stick to medical stuff. That makes a pretty penny and since buffs wear off, you will see plenty of repeat clients.

As for the stack size, I would reccomend offering a variety of sizes. Even noobs have to buy resources and will not likely be able to afford 200k stacks, at least not on impulse.

I run a large mining operation. In fact, it might be the single largest mining operation on all of Gorath, and I do it alone. I'm not part of a guild or a player city. I just try to practice sound business fundamentals and learn from my mistakes.

In the beginning, I was much like you. Someone told me that resources was a business that was securing him around 2m per week. Since I hadn't seen 1m in all of my game time, I got into it. I made a lot of mistakes in the beginning and I got tripped up quite a bit, but I'm rather successful now. They key to that is, as I said before, sound business fundamentals.

I've read your initial post and I can think of a few things that may be wrong with your shop/business setup, but if you give me a waypoint and server, I'll visit your shop and let you know what other troubles could be there that you aren't seeing.

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Smart_Darwin wrote:
I don't nother stocking any archi or shipwright resources at the moment. You wont make any money selling them the metals they need in bulk; thier voluminous needs prevents them from making it worth your while (same thing with ore and archis). If you really want to make cash on resources stick to medical stuff.

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This couldn't be further from the truth. I will be the first person to admit that a large portion of my mining company profits come from architects. They buy, and when they do, they buy in bulk. This week, for example, I harvested 1,604,000 ore that will be sold on my mining company vendors. I had an approx cost per unit of that ore that was under .5cpu. I am going to sell it at 2cpu and believe me when I say that by the end of the week, it will all be gone. Architects will buy it all. That's a profit of 2.4m credits on that ore alone.

I have seen a large decrease in shipwrights visiting my vendor because a) the JTL craze is virtually gone and b) there is little profitability left in shipwright. During the JTL rush, though, shipwrights made me far more wealthy than any other profession.

Message Edited by RamondChappell on 03-20-2005 08:58 AM

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Thryss wrote:
You think putting the resources in small stacks of, say 100, and pricing them accordingly would be better? Then people would see 100 units for 75 instead of 100000 units for 7500000. Just an idea that popped into my head. (I'm trying to keep the custom order thing alive.)

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The smaller stacks might sell better, but I don't always do it, because one it adds to my total vendor item limit and two because I don't expect weekly or even daily sales from my vendor. I sell a mixture of resource stacks, some in 100k bricks and others broken down. It really depends.

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Smart_Darwin wrote:
Thanks for clueing me in about the market for med. harvesters. I was wondering why I havent sold a single one of those... I sell plenty of everything else, especially homes (I can't imagine why). I have already shfted production away from harvesters and into homes, but I guess I won't bother worrying about it now. I will make harvesters again when I can make a decent heavy.

I don't nother stocking any archi or shipwright resources at the moment. You wont make any money selling them the metals they need in bulk; thier voluminous needs prevents them from making it worth your while (same thing with ore and archis). If you really want to make cash on resources stick to medical stuff. That makes a pretty penny and since buffs wear off, you will see plenty of repeat clients.

As for the stack size, I would reccomend offering a variety of sizes. Even noobs have to buy resources and will not likely be able to afford 200k stacks, at least not on impulse.

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