Ask HN: What do I do?

[stuckk]

Hello HN.

I launched a website yesterday called Classfy. It's basically a marketplace that is open, free and easy to use.

After launching. I sent out a few emails to the people who had signed up before launch. Many of them came and looked around and left. That was expected since this is a marketplace and there were only a few items for sale. Some of them posted items for sale.

Now I don't know what to do. Do I keep coding, adding features, improving the UI. ( I want to make it look like pinterest). Do I try and get more people to signup and post, stuff for sale. This is the first time I have built something on this scale and scope.

any tips? suggestions?

[paulsutter]

The most important decision a startup makes is to choose your customer definition.

It looks to me like you have chosen "anyone who sells anything on ebay" as your customer. The problem is, even if you could personally meet with each one of them, they'd probably still choose to list items on ebay because there are more buyers on ebay and they are likely to get a higher price.

There are lots of ways you can go. None of these are particularly good ideas, but hopefully they can help you think of a great idea based on your strenghts:

- You could choose a specific category that Ebay does poorly. Ebay has vacation lodging, but AirBNB is kicking their ass in that area. Ebay has arts and crafts, but Etsy is doing crazy well.

- If your advantage is an easier UI, maybe you can build an easier-to-use front end to list or find items on Ebay. Even for this, you might choose some specific target customer. Maybe old people who are nontechnical. Maybe young people who think Ebay is uncool.

- Here's a question, how can sites like policeauctions.com and propertyroom.com exist? wouldn't it be smarter to list all those items on ebay where you can get a higher price? Steal their customers and do something easier, list the items on ebay.

Whatever you do, dont try to compete head-on with Ebay. Ebay will always be a better Ebay than you. Choose one thing they are doing poorly, and do it great. Imagine if Etsy or Airbnb tried to expand to do everything ebay did. That would obviously suck. So be more like them.

Happy to brainstorm.

[stuckk]

I think you are 100% correct on going against eBay.

We don't want to do that even though it may look like it.

Through some research and suggestion of others. We found out that there are lots of transactions taking place on the internet on no particular platform. They are done on forums, Facebook, twitter(as Status update)..ect. The reason why they don't sell on eBay is because eBay takes too much time and has too much hassle and it's expensive. I used to be an online seller. But never on eBay. I used to flip websites and offer my services on various SEO forums. There are hundreds if not thousands of communities that sell their stuff in their own forum section. They do this because it's free, simple and quick. I agree that pulling people away from eBay only based on the simplicity and being free is going to be hard.

That's why we are open to pivoting to the particular category that might use our site the most. For example if the bitcoin community starts using Classfy more than others, we will become a bitcoin marketplace. If people start selling car parts on classfy then we will pivot to that category.

However I love the idea of becoming a front-end tool for eBay and mixing the results with listings on Classfy.

[calbear81]

Hey Stuckk, did you decide on what you wanted to do with your site?

The hardest part is to build enough momentum to have a viable marketplace otherwise you're stuck with a chicken and egg problem where no one posts because no one's buying and no one's buying because no one's posting.

I have a novel idea that I'm happy to share (and work on if you're interested) and that's a classifieds marketplace with REAL identities. I've sold and bought many things on Craigslist and Ebay over the years and I've come to value and appreciate people who don't give me the runaround or try to scam me. I think a lot of the good folks who I do meet when I buy or sell feel the same way about anonymous online classifieds. I personally always feel uncomfortable inviting complete strangers to my house to demo an item I'm selling w/o knowing a bit about who they are and if they're a known scam artist.

Some sites like Replyboard are trying to solve this with reputation and ratings for classifieds sellers but to a large degree they are hidden behind screen names and such. I would love to buy and sell locally to REAL people who are willing to back the stuff they sell with their name/identity. How would I do this? I would require two concurrent identity logins > Facebook & LinkedIn. I know this will limit the number of people who would participate but you would be surprised at how many "professionals" fit into this group.

Let me know what you think and best of luck with Classfy!

[kaolinite]

Why not ask questions about things related to your website on forums, etc, so it seems like you're not advertising when in reality you are?

That was a joke ;-)

First of all, nice site. Not sure what market you're aiming for but I for one would love to see the death of ebay. How did you get those products on there? Are they yours? Friends?

Consider putting your site on here: http://www.betabait.com/

Maybe you could get in touch with a few local charity shops (or any shop really) and ask them if you could photograph their products and put them on your site? That's how Zappos got started :-)

[stuckk]

Some of them are mine and my friends but most of them are just people who had signed up before.

What we are aiming for is a place to sell your stuff. Hassle free and simple. Most people hate eBay because it's overly complex, restricted and expensive.

I think that's a good idea. Going to stores and selling their products. If I actually sell some items, then I can tell the manager and maybe they can start doing it themselves

[calculus]

Marketplaces are hard to launch.

Try to be the leader in your district (post tracts, talk to people, geotargeted ads), then be the leader in the others nearest districts, then you city, then...

[stuckk]

Thank you. Never thought about that.

[debacle]

Suggestion: I hate the scrollbar-within-a-scrollbar thing. Either lock the window height so I don't get two scrollbars, or don't limit the height of the scrolling div.

[stuckk]

Gotcha. Will fix that ASAP