How brutal is the initial setup of a two-sided marketplace? Would this workflow work?
I have an idea regarding the sale of user-submitted items on a marketplace. Does this workflow have any possibility of working?
- Seller clicks "Sell" button on website.
- Seller is provided a Typeform form (or other product) with basic questions: Seller Name, Email, Product Name, Few product-specific questions, Price
- In the form in Step 2 is a required option to upload a photo of the item to be listed. The item would not be added to the marketplace until the submission is approved, in order to prevent illegal and/or inappropriate photos from being posted on the website without human approval or interaction.
- Product gets added to marketplace and is now public for site-viewers to see and purchase.
- On product listing, a Buy button allows a buyer to purchase the item. Buyer completes checkout form with Name, Address, Payment details, etc. (standard stuff really).
- Email is sent to Buyer thanking them of the purchase. Email contains some additional information.
- At same time, Email is sent to Seller notifying them that the product has sold and they are cleared to ship the product. Email contains some additional information.
In addition to question in title, is this something that can be wired up in Shopify/WooCommerce/Other Big Platform, with me manually (or automatically) tracking who the seller of the product is in the back-end, or is this a roll-your-own solution requirement?
I looked at sharetribe - it’s definitely one of the quickest ways to get up and running, but it isn’t cheap when you’re just starting out. There are WordPress marketplace themes which are cheaper but probably require a little more effort and know how.
For me, the most time consuming (and difficult) part is marketing as you need to acquire both buyers and sellers. So thinking about channels early on in the process is a good idea.
I'd second this option as I've used Sharetribe for years (and teach a course on setting it up...although it is quite simple to do yourself).
If you're worried about users submitting illegal or inappropriate photos, you could use their Verified By Admin feature and you can also block users.
I've looked around for Wordpress two-sided marketplace themes but most don't do the best job of combining shopping carts/shipping costs. Options here include Marketica, Makery etc (just search for marketplace on Themeforest).
As for Shopify, you could check out the Multi Vendor Marketplace app and see if this suits what you're looking to build.
Side note: Was going to include links to the above but not sure about the link policy. You'll be able to find them quickly anyway.
Sounds like a very typical marketplace workflow. These systems already exist. So my question...
Are you looking to create marketplace software, or, are you really interested in getting your very own marketplace up and running quickly?
If you're in the latter camp, and you'd like to start a marketplace of your own...
WooCommerce already has a really well-supported marketplace plugin that you can just add and start onboarding your sellers. Just add it in, configure the basic options, and get started. (https://woocommerce.com/products/product-vendors/). There are also a ton of other, third-party Woo plugins that will allow you to set up a marketplace.
Another amazing option is ShareTribe, which is the easiest, most hands-off way to make a marketplace. And it's super customizable.(https://www.sharetribe.com)
With either of those options, you can be up and running before tomorrow morning.
That will free you to focus on things that matter more than writing the marketplace software from scratch and spending a ton of hours working out all the kinks. You can use all the time you saved doing the crucial work of marketing your marketplace, acquiring sellers and buyers, and really validating if people need the kind of marketplace you're envisioning.
Hope that helps!
Hi Ken, thank you for the reply and suggestions.
My goal was the latter, which as you accurately described was the desire to get my own marketplace up and running quickly. I will check out the woocommerce and sharetribe options you recommended, and then circle back with you!
Funny enough, I am not at all interested in developing marketplace software. My goal with a startup is to optimize every step of the workflow to exact details, so that I can architect a hands-off, automated solution to the business. I'm an efficiency junky and I spend more time browsing sites like Zapier for inspiration, than I do actually building anything ;)
I'm not aware of any option that could be any more hands-off than Sharetribe for running a marketplace. I think you'll find their articles and guides useful, as well.