2 ms·

So what's the business model? These sorts of listing aggregators (like pc parts sites) have a perverse incentive to always allow those that pay to get top plac

So what's the business model? These sorts of listing aggregators (like pc parts sites) have a perverse incentive to always allow those that pay to get top placement. I'm genuinely interested in a business model for this stuff that can support fair placement. Flat subscription fees on the vendor side needs to first solve the chicken and egg problem. Flat subscription fees on the customer side doesn't seem likely to work. Communicating that your service is really really different because it does not have shady business practices is a hard sale at best. Look at how free to play games thrive versus more ethical business models. I want to work on solutions to these insidious businesses that seem so commonplace today but I don't know a model that could work.

zentiggr 6y ago
Typical aggregator sites so far, don't have customer-side "flag this product" or "flag this tag/category as incorrect" feedback. Allow buyers to push back against bogus, overtagged, or miscategorized items and that aggregator will gain some serious reputation over Amazon and any other venues in the same niche. And I mean meaningful pushback - not "it's flagged and will be online still until reviewed by the scarce human team gets to it" but "it's flagged and offline until humans review it and reapprove or flush it". Sure there will always be trolls who flag anything and everything but they can get banned as users under existing abuse terms. Imagine how quickly Amazon would get flushed clean of bogus listings if user flags pushed them offline until Amazon staff could verify and relist them... they'd have to prioritize restoring actual useful items, or at least start seriously policing the worst actors on the supplier side to stem the tide. Losing "good" items in a sea of flagged bad ones would also be a secondary incentive to clean house and keep it that way.

zentiggr 6y ago

Typical aggregator sites so far, don't have customer-side "flag this product" or "flag this tag/category as incorrect" feedback. Allow buyers to push back against bogus, overtagged, or miscategorized items and that aggregator will gain some serious reputation over Amazon and any other venues in the same niche. And I mean meaningful pushback - not "it's flagged and will be online still until reviewed by the scarce human team gets to it" but "it's flagged and offline until humans review it and reapprove or flush it". Sure there will always be trolls who flag anything and everything but they can get banned as users under existing abuse terms. Imagine how quickly Amazon would get flushed clean of bogus listings if user flags pushed them offline until Amazon staff could verify and relist them... they'd have to prioritize restoring actual useful items, or at least start seriously policing the worst actors on the supplier side to stem the tide. Losing "good" items in a sea of flagged bad ones would also be a secondary incentive to clean house and keep it that way.