Founder here...open to any questions you might have. Thx.
136 karma · joined January 27, 2016
sellff.com
ron.michel@sellff.com
The current ad-tech model needs to change and is due for disruption. Advertising is everywhere and it’s out of control. There seem to be more ads than ever, in every medium and in every square inch of surface area. In most cases, the ads are unwanted and not even relevant.
Our attention is being stolen and massive amounts of money are being wasted by companies with a legitimate interest to make sales. The bottom-line is that consumers are being victimized by the constant bombardment of advertising. And the companies that sell products/services, who need to build awareness and grow sales, are being taken advantage of by the ad-tech giants.
A new model is needed and we are actively working on a solution called Sellff Offers. This solution allows sellers and buyers to connect directly, without the middleman. Sellff Offers inverts the current ad-tech model in three significant ways: [1] Opt-in, [2] Privacy friendly, and [3] Pays cash rewards.
Here is an example Offer [ https://sellff.com/$/ron.michel/offer/ewVkr ]. You choose whether to view the Offer. Your data and activity is not collected/shared/sold if you view the Offer. And, you are compensated for your time if you decide to participate in the Offer.
Complaining about the current broken ad-tech model does not help to fix it. You need to take action to bring about the change you want to see. If you have an interest in building a new digital marketing/promotions solution, we would like to speak with you. Regardless, we are very excited to see the growing consumer awareness of the dangers of ad-tech and the interest in alternatives ways to connect buyers and sellers.
User Choice Ads: no (platform decides) Offers: yes (user decides = opt-in)
Privacy Ads: no privacy (your data belongs to them) Offers: total privacy (no info collected)
Rewards Ads: no reward (platform keeps all value) Offers: cash rewards (paid by seller)
Participants Ads: seller -> ad platform -> buyer Offers: seller < - > buyer
Disclosure: founder of sellff.com. We created Offers to facilitate a more effective and honest way for buyers to connect with sellers.
https://sellff.com/$/ron.michel/post/200
Any help is welcome. Feel free to connect on sellff.com or via email [in profile]. Thx.
[I think] Crowdsourced opinions are an excellent way to make informed decisions about products/services. A great example is using Amazon.com for competing products:
Product A: 5.0 star rating | 32 reviews Product B: 4.5 star rating | 5,264 reviews
Which product would you weigh more heavily when making a buying decision?
Keep in mind that SELLFF is positioned as a Professional Network. Any response or feedback will be relative to you, in a professional capacity. This might include the quality of the service you provide, your communication skills, did you finish the job on time, etc.
Also, any reputation you earn as a seller works in your benefit when you consult with others as a buyer. People want to work with other people who they have confidence in. This is true on Uber,Lyft and AirBnB, where both parties "rate" each other.
I think a digital reputation is a vital part of a healthy marketplace.
So, there is no direct way for a member to "manipulate" the TRU Score:
- Your activities on the site contribute to your TRU Score
- The community reaction to your activities will contribute to your TRU Score
- If a member invests the time to develop their profile and is active on the site, those activties [if viewed positively by the community] will contribute to an increased value for the TRU Score
I believe this is a fair, appropriate and transparent way to derive a score. My belief is that our members will not only rely on the TRU Score in making decisions. Instead, they will also review other parts of the member profile. In the same way you might look at a Yelp or Amazon review.
Guessing that you do not make decisions based solely on the star ratings when buying a product or choosing a service. But that you might also read some of the reviews and look at images of the product/service. Thank you for taking the time to comment and share your thoughts.
Please give us another chance later today or tomorrow as we work to restore the services. Thank you for your patience.
Thanks to HN "Who wants to be hired" I was able to connect with 3x amazing devs in Croatia who built the solution. I have learned so much from HN over the last couple of years. Lots of value in this community and grateful to be a small part of it.
To anyone who is interested in comparing the differences, you can find 100's of links from your favorite search engine.
If we step back a moment and look at this objectively, we are only focused on matching buyers and sellers. It's a marketplace for people who sell/offer services and people who buy/need services. For a marketplace to function, there needs to be access to information so that both parties [buyers and sellers] are on an equal footing. Else, one party would have an advantage over the other.
Everything we are doing is focused on making the buyer/seller interaction easier and more efficient. It seems the TRU Score is a concern evident in many of the comments. Yet, how is this different [or worse] than star ratings on Yelp, Amazon or any other rating service. Other than the initial calculations that comprise the score, all changes in the scores are based on the community of members.
I believe many members of SELLFF can obtain significant value if all they do is post "services offered" and "services needed." The application will "match" the parties so they can interact and decide if working together makes sense.
Is SELLFF different? Yes, in some ways [Ex. trading shares of people]. But isn't that part of the opportunity when creating something new? Why do the same thing as everyone else is doing? Do you really feel fulfilled when you follow or like someone? Does the opportunity to "invest" in someone appeal to you? Do you see any advantage?
Is SELLFF better than existing solutions? Maybe? Can SELLFF to iterate to meet the needs of buyers and sellers. For sure! Is SELLFF a social credit system. No, not even close.
For many of the reasons you stated, we chose a much larger range of values. So, instead of 1-10 or 1-100, we selected 100 - 1,000 with a starting value of 400.
In anything we do, there is the starting point from which you determine if adjustments are needed. If the TRU Score is deemed to be in error or unfair or inaccurate, we will make the needed changes.
It is also worth noting that people who are selling services and trying to reach new customers are looking for new/better ways to connect. It is our belief that SELLFF can become an additional, valuable option for these providers. Instead of having a reliance on the mega platforms that might have already lost out trust.
As is true in the real world, when making decisions about the people to work with, we all use a variety of inputs.
We would consider SELLFF to be successful if it helps you to discover and connect with trustworthy people who meet your criteria for the person/people you want to meet. From there, the decision is yours. Use the TRU Score as an additional data point in your decision making, not as the final determination.
I would consider this to be accurate whether you are promoting/selling your services or if you are a buyer and looking to hire a service provider.
A percentage of revenue is I think a fair option. I am not referring to the previous comment about 30% [or even 10%]. I hate fees as much as the next person and taking a giant cut of your customers income is not the way to grow a business.
Also, as it relates to zero-cost, using your Visa card is free to you, but not the merchant. However, those fees are being included in the price you pay for the products/services.
A question for you: If you are making $100 per month from a service, what is a "fair" price for you to pay to continue having usage of that service? - Are you OK to look at ads, so long as your cost is zero? - Are you OK to pay $5.00 per month, so you do not have to look at ads? - Or, do you prefer to have no ads and pay a % of your monthly income that you generate from using the service?
Also, at this time, the service is zero cost. We are launching so that people might interact with the service and provide the type of feedback you are giving us. Any startup is, in many ways, a giant experiment.
We are looking at many different revenue models. However, we will not go with the traditional model we see today, where "we" are the product. We feel just as strongly about that as you do.
We are confident that better revenue models exist, that can support our service, without spying on our members, selling out their personal information or placing arbitrary monthly fees that are inconsistent with the value provided.
Not to "hate" on LinkedIn, but we are interested to explore other ways to build a marketplace that makes it easy for buyers and sellers to interact.
A group of people that might deliberately attempt to manipulate the system would be relatively easy to identify. Obviously, that would not be acceptable behavior.
At launch, all trades are 100% liquid and you are free to BUY/SELL as many shares within the limits indicated. Each trade moves the price up/down 0.01. I do not consider that to be necessarily worthless however.
The share price and trades reflect actual member activity and sentiment. It's an indication of interest, that was not available before. Why would you buy shares of another members profile? Why would they buy shares of your profile?
Until today, you could follow or like. Now, you have the option to invest. However, you are free to not invest any of your "trust tokens" [superficial points]. You could, if you like, only use SELLFF to perform discovery and direct communication of other members who may choose to participate in trades.
We thought the trade feature would be an interesting experiment, to see how people would react if they "could" invest in each other, just like stocks. This is a first version and we will need to see how things develop.
I appreciate you taking the time to comment. Is exactly the feedback I was hoping for as we work to build this marketplace solution.
We are adamant about exploring and discovering new models which do not involve traditional advertising or selling/sharing of member data.
We are also realistic and realize there are expenses to providing this solution. So, monetization is a requirement to keep the doors open.
A question for you, assuming this service becomes successful. [1] What would be a reasonable price to pay for promoting your services and being able to easily connect with trustworthy professionals?
- Is $1.00 per year fair? - Is $10.00 per month reasonable? - Is a % of revenue you generate a better model?
SELLFF offers multiple ways to support other members. You can write a review and go into details of your connection with another member. Buying shares of another member is an additional, low-friction way to show support. It's fast, easy and provides the added benefit that your investment might increase in value. Any investments you make are an input to your TRU Score. So, if you make good investments in other members your TRU Score will increase...even if your profile shares are not being traded.
A couple of other items to consider: [1] The TRU Score is updated 1x day [2] The TRU Score is a very slow moving value [3] As designed, it would likely take years for a member to make it above 900 [4] The TRU Score is primarily based on your activity on the platform and the community reaction to that activity [5] Outside of the algorithm used, we do not have any direct influence on the TRU Score
Additionally, we are not suggesting that the TRU Score is the absolute measurement of trust or reputation of a person. Instead, it is an additional data point that you can take into consideration when deciding if you want to work with someone. Or, if they want to work with you [both parties have their own TRU Score].
At time of registration, all members start with a TRU Score of 400. Therefore, even the most trustworthy/reputable person on earth will almost certainly have a lower score than you, if you have been on the platform for some time.
I welcome all suggestions on how you think we could be more transparent in determining the TRU Score. We all benefit if it were easier to make better decisions about who we choose to work with.
As mentioned earlier, the focus is making it easier for buyers and sellers to interact, while maintaining privacy. I remain convinced that there are effective ways to monetize the service without going the traditional advertising route that is so common today.
For sure, billion dollar businesses have been build on the current model. My hope is that we can advance to a new model, where we do not sacrifice personal privacy for the sake of accessing a useful service. To be determined if we can be part of that new solution.
Until we can get to the next step, we provide this: [1] https://sellff.com/terms [2] https://sellff.com/privacy
Also, my assurance that our intentions are good and that we will try very hard not to screw things up. Additionally, would welcome any suggestions you have for how we could meet this higher standard of trust you are looking for. Thx.