Interest and promotions related to Enthusify I would assume should have had a non-trivial impact on listing rates over such a short time. I know I almost listed a few things just to kick the tires...and some may have listed because of the gift cards.
Those promos were mostly over by the time that 14-day test occurred. But you are correct that there are a lot of factors involved, and that is one reason I said a longer test to get better data would be interesting.
How high was/is the fraud rate with regular thread-based listsings? I ask because unless it is higher than the premium/commission Enthusify charges, the aggregate financial benefit to the community in switching to it may be little, zero, or negative (instead of 1 person getting ripped off for $300, many people pay $1200 in fees).
The number of incidents reported to me, and the $ value involved, has become very substantial in the last year. And that's just what people report to me. Every time one surfaces publicly others step forward to confess that they were taken too. I think most people are somewhat ashamed to admit they've been conned.
At this point Enthusify's fee is comparable to a normal PayPal transaction with buyer protection. There isn't a premium for the escrow service.
Since implementing, the only reports of real problems I've heard were related to someone who was trying to get people to go around Enthusify.
http://www.nsxprime.com/forum/showthread.php?p=1646611#post1646611
That said, for higher-ticket items I have been known to use paypal in buyer/seller mode (with 3% fee and buyer protection) instead of personal transfer mode (no fee, no protection) to have some shot at recourse. However, having dealt with PayPal for other reasons my faith in their mediation is pretty low. Enthusify may be better in this regard.
That's about where I stand. I guess we'll see when someone has a dispute over an Enthusify transaction. Forcing new accounts onto the platform appears to have had a significant deterrent effect, because a few serial scammers seem to have -- at least temporarily -- given up. So it may take a while to put the escrow system to a real test.
Anyway, I understand some of the reasons for this system and my point isn't to poo-poo them. I would avoid, however, brushing off concerns that folks have.
It is certainly not my intent to brush off any concerns. If you feel I have, please bring them to my attention and I'll try to give them better consideration. I have said repeatedly that I will not continue to run a Marketplace with the rate of fraud that had developed, and that is the only thing that is non-negotiable. Beyond that anything is open to constructive discussion.
Looking back at this thread, I've corrected some misunderstandings about fees and Marketplace activity rates, and have repeatedly asked people to elaborate on vague criticism without much follow-up. That is very frustrating. Shawn, why don't you like it? Please let me know. I value your opinion, but I can't give it proper consideration if you won't explain.
I don't necessarily like the idea of being locked into a fee system as buyer or seller.
Given that the fee is currently 3%, and PayPal takes about the same, what payment system have you been using for sales/purchases on this site to have no fee? By check? PayPal as a gift? Something else I'm missing?
I suppose the bottom line is if the system adds more value than the amount of the fee.
While I can't say definitively that $X of fraud would have occurred without it, looking at the loss rate for the last 12 months I can say that it certainly appears Enthusify has already probably saved members far more than the cumulative fees everyone has paid.. This is the apparent deterrent effect I mentioned above. So maybe just forcing new users onto it is the solution.
Going off on a tangent... I think a majority of stuff I've "sold" on Prime had a price of $0 (plus actual shipping). How do "free" listings work in this system? (This is another case where a more-intelligent shipping pricing mechanism would be good.)
Good question which I see Chad already responded to. It may not currently be perfect for all scenarios (another mismatch is listing a car for sale.. 3% is too much; I'd love to see an easier way to create a mass of listings for someone selling a bunch of parts at once; a way for people to "shop" and then "check out" might be cool too) but it seems at least workable. If free item listings are important to folks perhaps it can go on the feature wish list. It's still new and evolving rapidly - but it already appears to be doing pretty well in some areas I consider key.
Another area of concern I have is "wanted" listings. That is the second main vector scammers are using to take money from people on this site. I believe "wanted" listings are on Enthusify's product roadmap, but I'm not sure what the implementation will look like. I hope it will also be useful for us.
Anyway, as I said, feedback from everyone is welcome. To be useful, please make sure it is constructive and specific. Because I am going to implement something, in some way, to address this fraud problem. If I don't know specifically what people don't like about a given system, I can't ask the developer to address them, or know what to look for in an alternative system.
