Q & A session with Silkfair

This is the Q & A session from the presentation given by Silkfair (coursey of LegendsOfBatman)

Question: is this site mainly for power sellers?
silkfair: No, it’s not mainly for power sellers. we have sellers that put up 1 item, and sellers that put up thousands and there are facilities that help to reduce listings. for example, if you are selling shirts, and they run all different colors, sizes, you can create a pricing template, and handle the various combinations within 1 listing. 
Question: I’m finding the video option interesting, how will this work?
silkfair: *MSG* the video – yes. we take in various formats, and convert to flash streaming so, pretty much like youtube except we don’t decrease your resolution of videohttp://www.silkfair.com/forum/thread/868
so, when you list an item, depending on whether it’s antique or vintage, the time period field is different; antique period is something like this: 17th century, 18th century, Adams, Charles, Empire, etc… whereas Vintage, it’s like: 1870′s thru 1970s, Edwardian, Victorian. but what we would like to see is – antique to be an actual dated item from that period whereas vintage is of a particular period style. so, if your toy is 1970′s, there isn’t really an antique period for it but, you can mark it probably as Collectibles and Vintage. if you don’t see a time period that really fits, there is also a tag field that you can define your own period and that will be rolled in as searchable within the search engine, and from a tag cloud but we think the periods we offer is pretty comprehensive, if we’re missing something, please let us know of course, definition of vintage for wine/cigars probably needs to be treated differently; but it should work for cars, toys, clothes, jewelry, crafts we do have outdate/obsolete Antique category listed in our category tree. We will be moving items within there to the new identification method along with handmade goods

Question: what are the fees?
silkfair: *MSG* the fees – sales fee – 3%, no listing fees

Question: any limit on listings
silkfair: no limits

Question: how many pictures do you allow?
silkfair: 4 pictures for now, plus 2 videos per listing. We don’t charge for video right now, but will most likely have to charge for bandwidth usage fee
the video facility – not much different than youtube, except we don’t decrease resolution

Question: you mentioned “Double blind feedback”. Can you explain this in more detail
silkfair: yes, double-blind feedback works as follows :
when a transaction completes, both parties can initiate and generate feedbacks. But neither party can see the other person’s feedback until both feedbacks are completed that’s to cut down on predatory/retailiatory practices Once one party initiates the feedback (which really should be the buyer), a countdown begins the other party would then have 2 weeks to complete, before the feedbacks locks down once locked down, then the feedbacks are visible. So, feedbacks are visible either 1- when both parties completed, or 2 – feedback period expires

Question: And the detailed ratings?
silkfair: as for detailed rating, there are a few descriptives that pertains to the sales experience and the buying experience
once a feedback is given, there are still methods for either party to post comments to the feedbacks to hash out issues and others – can comment

Question: so there are no options if an unfair feedback is given? if resolved, can feedback be retracted?
silkfair: if both parties agree to retraction, our support can handle retraction we haven’t put in a mechanism for auto retraction, but that is possible.

Question: Can the sellers also accept checks and money orders?
silkfair: yes, cash, checks, money order, revolution money exchange in regards to PayPal and GoogleCheckout, as I mentioned, there is an integrated payment processing , so, if you familiar with dealing with merchant accounts for credit cards, similar concept applies where you can authorize, capture, credit , cancel transactions from within the order and all order processing and order communications are captured in history within the order. there is also a facility where you can set your order processing for immediate payment right out of shopping cart checkout, or requires order approval; so, for cases where, let’s say you are offering customized orders, you can first review orders before accepting order and payments

Question: As a small time seller, I have always hated ebay’s combined shipping option. I never figured out how to use it accurately. You mentioned Silkfair will integrate combined shipping. Is there a way to make sure s/h is accurate for multiple orders in place?
silkfair: yes, we would need to go thru various scenarios of shipping; but if you play with our shopping cart, you’ll see that it’s quite flexible

Question: Are links within the listings to your own website allowed?
silkfair: *MSG* links and email contacts are scrubbed automatically by the system. but since we are offering custom shops, we will be doing other methods to help with independent shops

Question: My worst fears with combined shipping is, I sell a heavy statue and a comic book, and the buyer gets charged $1.75 combined shipping.
silkfair: then part of the situation would need to be having the ability to set up exceptions. I think that’s part of the specifications that’s been developed so far
Question: Is there a method for choosing countries one sells to?
Silkfair: no, but we do ban certain locations certain countries and ISPs are banned right now

Question: In the invoicing can changes be made by the seller? ex. discount or coupon
silkfair: we’re working on coupons right now
but currently, there is a order modification function
and the way it works is as follows :
let’s say you recieved an order, and you figured out that it will cost you extra because buyer changed his mind on the ship-to location
from within the order, you can press a button, and request an increase in charges that will notify the buyer seeking his approval he can either approve, decline or ask you more questions via that request if approved, then the new charge will appear, and you can transact on that; there is also a facility for you to issue credit from within the order and that doesn’t need a buyer’s approval you issue it, and the buyer gets notified so, from the order, you will see tabulation of all the various charges, credits and you can also leave notes within the order for yourself, or communicate with the buyer from within the order

Question: I know our economy plays a big part but how is the traffic and sales going with your site?
silkfair: it’s much depends on the product. For example, the category that moves well are electronics and most of that is triggered by search engines; and what we’re finding is, text based searches dominates the shopping. well, it appears that buyers just want to search very specifics so, we’ve been cautioning sellers to pay a lot of attention to what’s written up in listings. google accounts for 90% of search engine traffic to us, and the rest adds up the 10% of search engine traffic

Question: How many search engines is Silkfair tied to?
Silkfair: we don’t even know – they spread but the most important one is google; there are sellers that makes multiple sales daily, because of that. From what we see in stats, at least for our site, yahoo trails very far behind, same with MSN, AOL; it all varies. The whole search engine topic is a black box , but, we added the meta-tags for shops and listings so that each seller can get involved if desired. if nothing customized, then our system create default entries no charge for store / shop. But for custom / independent shops – there will be a monthly subscription fee but will be substantially lower than all your current options 

Question: Do you find your seller using this option frequently? And, how are the fees looking to be structured in regards to videos?
silkfair: *MSG* not yet – we don’t promote that function with videos – what we’re expecting – is to tie in with bandwidth usage we don’t have the actual pricings in line, but for example, let’s say that you have a budget of $5 a month for video you would then set a cap for that, and the videos won’t go over that budget, which can be either a cap on individual video, or overall budget. the charge will be x cents per y MB/GB
Question: and if you need, you could buy more bandwidth
silkfair: right

Comment: That would be a great tool.
Silkfair: say for instance you are selling a vintage radio you can show thru video that it is in working condition at the time of listing
for example there was a seller, selling this wooden box from the pic – it looks like a simple wooden box but he uploaded a demo video and show how that box was actually a puzzle box, intricately made a big difference between the pic vs the video

Question: Someone asked about how sales are. I’m going to be more specific, and ask what are current sell through rates and, what does Silkfair plan to do to help increase that number?
silkfair: it depends. As I mentioned, it varies greatly dependent on the sector / product. Electronics moves daily. And what we think is causing that is – it’s easily searchable whereas other items, the lack of name recognition of product and generic description, makes search much more difficult

Comment: Electronics seem to move on all sites
silkfair: that’s probably because it’s easily searched so, here is an example; buyer looking for a bargain, goes to google, search for iphone vs buyer looking for jewelry, a necklace, but what gets entered for search?
so, all marketplaces – have the same dilema, because none of the marketplaces controls the keys things , which are Products, Prices
silkfair: *MSG* for Silkfair, we’re looking at things from 2 different angles
1 – for Silkfair, independent shops are our highest priority. The reason being, it benefits everyone. I ask you a simple question – you set up your business in eBay or any other venue – what’s the real incentive for you to promote that business? afterall, it’s eBay, or Silkfair, or whatever other venue but your shop is yours you promote yourself for yourself so, it becomes a win-win situation.

Question: Ok, back to the back end of that question; What are some specifics Silkfair is planning to do to help gain exposure for sellers, and in turn, itself?

Comment: well at eBay it is no longer yours
silkfair: right, it’s never been yours at eBay. you have that big eBay logo hanging over you and you look for alternatives, so, maybe you look at yahoo but cost, customizations, and then you still need to work on being in some marketplace well, for any marketplace – it’s detrimental to have sellers put external shops into listings; it diverts the traffic out of the site; so, for us, we’re looking to provide the path for sellers – start off with a shop that you can grow with

Question: And, you basically said its “our shop”
silkfair: right, it’s your shop; your looks, your brand, logo, images, html, css
you own the domain and just instruct the isp or whoever that you registered with to forward that domain to silkfair.com and we handle the rest
the difficulty you find with alternative venues is the old chicken/egg situation.
everyone is looking to target at being the eBay alternative. As mentioned, we didn’t start off like that. Our goal has been to help people get into ecommerce with lowest barrier of entry first. The marketplace is simply an aggregator

Question: Ok, so this leads me to a whole new direction then One day I plan to start up my website again. Some of it may include a place to shop; but, there will be a chat room, similar to this, blogs, discussion boards, etc. how would this integrate with silkfair?
silkfair: in Silkfair, every shop gets a mini store chat, a blog and your own forum it’s all bundled in. you see many people having disjointed sites – they set up a free blog, and then link in some store function. We’re trying to offer the full solution. we have a seller that told us – he’s a programmer by trade for a gaming company and he knows he can program his own site, but why would he want to go thru the difficulties so, he’s been sticking with Silkfair, as he evaluated all the alternate solutions, and came to the conclusion that we’re heading in the direction that best suits him, so, that’s why I mentioned, over the long haul, we target the casual sellers, which has completely different needs

Question: here’s one on the customer service issue. you mentioned SF has feedback and has changed things based on that feedback. That means SF listens to the community.
silkfair: we like both good and bad feedbacks. hate to say it – but actually pay more attention to the bad ones.
Question: Can you share some of the methods of customer service SF uses? Silkfair: can you be more specific?
Question: I suspect email; but is there phone support or live chat. Something for more immediate “I need help NOW” type of situation? usually when I need to get in touch with support, FAQs dont cut it, and email is too long a wait
silkfair: that’s understandable. There is a possibility to implement some form of online support, but we haven’t heard of such needs. Facility can be easily implemented, but we need to be considerate the resource requirements and demands; it’s been all emails, except during the earlier days, when phone support were provided to some sellers. what we’re aiming at is – to actually reduce support requirements. For example, if an issue frequently occurs, that tells us something is wrong. So, we try to re-program or clarify to reduce the incidence. so, one example is – questions relating to payment setups. So, we developed tooltips into the store profiles, which helped. most of the earlier questions has been evolving around setups and order processing but from the questions, we changed the system and texts. so, for example: simple thing like this – we used to call that earlier example of pricing template – we called it pricing profile that confused a lot of people. well, what was understandable for us, was confusing to others. so, simple change of the word ‘profile’ to ‘template’ – stopped the questions ; and as part of that change, we implemented tooltips – where it’s a little icon next to potentially more confusing areas, and you can click on it, and it pops up with instructions.
another thing that was confusing before was the capability to handle immediate payment vs approved orders; we were used to merchant account terminology – which calls it ‘real-time authorization’ and ‘non real-time authorization’ in terms of credit card payment. so, we used it, and it created a lot of confusion in orders. so, we changed it to a more understandable terms, and created default settings and detailed instructions

Question: you mentioned detailed ratings? Do you in anyway educate the community on these ratings?
silkfair: communication can be initiated from within the order. So, if you send a reminder notice, as soon as the buyer opens up the order, it will prompt for payment. so, let’s say that order wasn’t paid for, you go into the order, send a simple note – something like ‘hi, please check this order you placed’. The buyer gets the email notification, clicks on it, gets into the order, and the system will prompt for payment.

Comment: other than eBay all other venues can have the sellers but buyers need to find them
silkfair: right and no venue is going to make it when the venue can’t provide what the seller really want of course, I’m not talking about casual sellers who’s looking to unload some excess stuff; that’s a different topic all together, and those types of selling can only be benefited with high volume of established traffic, such as on ebay / craiglist.
silkfair: a buildup of a venue is a chicken/egg situation and there is a first mover advantage, which obviously has long past so, can’t do it trying to chase after the established it has to be very different, as I mentioned, we saw a different problem, a different opportunity for everyone we first experienced the difficulty of US market channels, which led us to consider the difficulty for most in getting started with own ecommerce business and as mentioned, from what we see, we first built up the core engines to handle 2 solutions:
1 is the independent shops – which is ultimately what every serious sellers want
2 – is the marketplace – which just helps everyone; for us, both are tied together and one will lead the other and of course, we learned of the segmentation needs we didn’t know in the beginning of how some segments are neglected

Comment: well, i think sellers all want the same thing: casual or”powerseller”: buyers.
silkfair: *MSG* well, the eventual hope will be the same but the methods/strategies are different if I’m looking to sell off my old camera, there is no way I’m going to put in any energy into promoting it

Comment: One thing that is different, even from a year ago, is that many sellers are blogging, which brings traffic to these other venues
silkfair: as for blogging – it’s difficult too – as you are a single producer, and that’s when an aggregated blogging can help. but here is the thing, you know and I know that any effort in promoting your shop at some venue – it’s still not really yours. if there are changes, your shop is stuck there, and you have vested interests. what if you blog at 1 place, and the weight of your blog is boosted because your blog is aggregated with others? and your blog directly hooks in within your site with your products and it’s portable
Response: l place is my main blog
silkfair: right, but if you look at the larger sites, blog is a supplemental tool. the shop is the main site not the other way around. right now, many sellers have blog as main site – because blog is easily set up; but what if your shop is as easy as that? and has the blog built in? and forum?
silkfair: well, that’s what we’re offering. where your shop is your main site with the blog operating as a educational tool, and forum for customer support. so, for the time you would have a cup of coffee, you get the whole thing kick started and in return, you buy my teams a couple of coffee a month.

Question: Ive been told that implementing shipping calculators these days is very difficult; in the old days, it was rather easy are the calculators set up for dimensions as well as weight?
silkfair: *MSG* there has been changes so, yes, but it’s a necessity. right now, the shipping templates are customizable, but are not tied to the shippers, but the new integrated shipping calculators will be based on the shippers’ API specifications, so, you will have the choice to either make your own, or use the integrated

Question: Oh, this reminds me of another thing prnting shipping labels; is there anything implemented to make printing labels easy?
silkfair: *MSG* we don’t have that right now. actually – I think you are the first talking about it. just made a note on that; we’ll add that to our to-do list
Response: probably will become more visible as people begin boycotting paypal
silkfair: that should not be too bad. we already generate orders to be downloadable in acrobat pdf format.
Response: one reason I am sticking with paypal is they offer the ability to print and pay for postage and print shipping labels but, just having the ability to print labels from the site is good
silkfair: we’ll check out for printing specifications. as mentioned, since we already generate orders in pdf, we just need to reduce and focus on the ship-to and have printing dimension specifications

Comment: *MSG*The one thing I don’t like about PayPal is their “Don’t want to deal with it” attitude; meaning, buyers are doing chargebacks and keeping the item to boot
silkfair: that would be a problem with direct credit cards too.
Comment: the only difference is, the credit cards dont encourage buyers to cheat the sellers
Comment: So many horror stories out there all the buyer needs to do is show proof of a tracking number sending back an empty box
silkfair: that’s a much more difficult situation; if you look at how international transacations are done, although cumbersome, goods are not shipped till paid for. Goods are paid for when inspected and accepted. Unfortunately, there is no such process for smaller items online

Comment: Before I forget Albert you have done a fine job on your presentation I am very impressed
silkfair: thanks
Comment: yes you did SF a great service

silkfair: before I forget, I mentioned earlier that we don’t currently do auctions, but will do implement when the right time comes; the reason being, auctions are time-sensitive, and very much dependent on a critical mass Comment: yes sellers like both options
silkfair: it won’t work until that mass is built
Response: real bidders like the thrill of an auction
silkfair: *MSG* understand; but for the actual auction to work, you need mass; that’s why we didn’t start with that; it would be shooting ourselves in the foot trying to start with an auction site

Question: do you have “make a offer” option?
silkfair: no, not right now. but that can be made if there is a need
Response: it is nice to see you have your options open
silkfair: just noted down “make an offer” option we’ll make what sellers / buyers need , to make processes flow; buyers are tougher – as there are absolutely no feedback or second chance
Question: are the buyers verified?
silkfair: sellers are verified via credit card verification, but buyers are not. however, we present the source of the buyer and seller, meaning, where the buyer is really from based on IP address info; so, if you are a buyer claiming to be at New York, but you came in from let’s say Nigeria…. you will see it, right in the order, and also in the user profile

Question: Do you have limitations on what a buyer can spend?
silkfair: *MSG* limits? – no that’s really at seller’s discretion. likewise, sellers info also displayed, same with where feedbacks originated from. so, if you have a seller or buyer with a cluster of feedbacks all from 1 spot, then you need to consider. if you want to carefully review all orders, you can set your order so that you need to approve first
Response: but not until the time of purchase? example I don’t want anyone seeing my info until they have purchased something

Question: Are buyers members of silkfair, or are they anyone?
silkfair: buyers need to register. the location info – are visible prior to purchasing. Buyers needs ways to assess and sellers – needs ability to assess also. better to cancel an order that’s risky if someone try to bypass, using proxies, we spot that too

Question: Do the listings have an end time?
silkfair: *MSG* yes, you can have several choices, and each choice is pretty long and you can deactivate 1 or in bulk at any time, and reactivate at any time so, by default, I think first option is maybe 180 days and the other options are longer

Question: I really haven’t seen it anywhere but do you have bulk edit? example you want something added to your description that would pertain to all. I’ve really never seen anything like it but there has been times 100′s of listings needed the same info updated within the auctions
silkfair: bulk editing on some, but we need to build it to include more fields . there is currently also a CSV editing. the desc we need to build into the online bulk editing; we have sellers that’s been using the csv – as they have programs that manage the listings. if you are a reseller – listings do include supplier and part number fields so that when you have order that comes in, it will be displayed right on the order, so, you don’t have to translate and figure out what part to get.
we recently added in ISBN ISSN fields to prepare for sellers with sales of books and DVDs
Comment: my favorites are vintage christmas, advertising tins, and my love salt/pepper shakers.
silkfair: we also just created a vintage section the way it works is, you tag your listing or your shop as vintage, and when you are in vintage section, all searches are filtered so that only vintage items appear; antiques are separated and handled the same way, with ability to mark the antique period and vintage style period. similar sections are made for Collectibles, earth friendly goods. We also just made special identification available for shopping by occasion. we just released those 2 sections about two weeks ago and now starting to spread the words

Question: how is antique….and vintage? how old does an item have to be to be designated as antique….or vintage
Question: Is your question how do you determine between antique and vintage? if I have a toy from the 70′s….or 80′s….is it vintage and from the 20′s is it antique?
Response: Yes.
Silkfair: antique is from an actual period, whereas vintage is more of a style dated of a period. let me give you a link

Question: in the collectible categories, do you have certain makers? such as Lefton, enesco etc?
silkfair: no – none defined. But we have provide a field for serial numbers ( can be singular, lists or range) for that purpose silkfair: *MSG* and there is a field for Brand/Manufacturer which will operate as a tag cloud hat’s under Glass & Pottery right now.

Question: this sounds similar to buyitsellit venue you can make a category china then break it down to Syracuse, Buffalo, Homer Laughlin etc. 
silkfair: we are trying to keep a simplified category tree, but the Syracuse, Buffalo, etc – all can be inserted into listings, and become searchable the search mechanism is a filtering mechanism. so, let’s say you go into vintage, and search for shirt, that yields too many results, then you apply filter and that works in your shop’s search as well

Question: Do you require signing in? Some sellers are lazy and don’t enter their stores unless they want to list or have a sale. example ioffer requires you to sign in at least every 2 weeks
silkfair: no such requirement. that requirement seems like it’s just to force traffic for the sake of having traffic. I don’t see any other purpose other than to try to keep sellers engaged/beef up traffic
Response: true. I certainly will check out silkfair

Question: how long has it been up on line?
silkfair: we launched a year ago

silkfair: I hope the major questions and concerns were addressed?
if any questions/concerns, please feel free to contact us.

LegendsOfBatman: Thank you very much Albert
silkfair: thanks everyone for your time. Looking forward to seeing you again.
LegendsOfBatman: you did an excellent job in presenting silkfair
silkfair: thanks