Second Life Brands: Here’s Why It’s So Hard to Give You Linden Dollars -- Plus Three Ways to Make it Much Easier (Guest Post)

Whiskey Monday is an acclaimed SL artist; follow her on Twitter @Whiskey_Day 

Dear Makers of Amazing Things in Second Life,

Let me start by saying: I LOVE YOU. I would not be in Second Life without you. I could not do what I do without your inventive, beautiful, well-crafted creations. Thank you for all that you do. I enjoy shopping for and collecting the imaginative items you sell. I want to support your work! 

When I can find you. And when I finally find your store, if I can find the item I’m searching for, even better. Because it’s not that simple, is it? Many of you make it tough to shop in your store. 

Please, please, please – I’m begging you – make it easier to give you my money. 

I keep a notebook of cool things I see, and who created them. If I’m wandering a sim and see a nice plant, I don’t want to leave right that moment to go buy it. So, I inspect it, note the creator (for our purposes here, let’s call the item maker SuperStore69), and then carry on exploring. 

Later, after I’ve been abused over the phone by yet another client who thinks the universe revolves around them (off you fuck, Chad), I want some retail therapy. I flip open my SL notebook and see my note about that plant at SuperStore69 and that’s just the ticket! What could make me feel better? Gimme plant.

Second Life Search is shitty, but it’s still where we start. I open Search in my viewer and look up SuperStore69. Nothing. Nada. Zip. But I want the plant. So I open SL Marketplace in my browser, and I type in SuperStore69. In this case, YAY, there they are! But no plant. 

So I click the link for the in-world Store...

"Wait I'm just here for the new ficus plant, why are you trying to eat my face?"

And there’s a SLURL; so handy! And yet, when I teleport I find myself falling through space and then landing on either land for sale or a new cannibal RP sim and running from a hungry mob. I’ve nothing against good RP, but I’m on a quest for the damn plant and at this point, it’s personal. I am not giving up. 

So I TP home, brush off the stench of flesh, and look back at the Marketplace listing. There’s the maker’s name, PokMak Resident. Alright. Let’s search again. There is the profile, yes, I see you value your SL family and I shouldn’t fuck with them, duly noted. 

But where’s your store? Picks! Yes! There’s one for SuperStore69, complete with a landmark. But do I trust it? What choice do I have - I’m on a quest. I need the plant. So I jump.

Lo and behold, there’s an actual store here. What a treat. I wander around and more often than not, I buy more things than the one item that started my quest. But in this case, that adorable plant in the cute planter – nowhere. I’m desperate now, so I try area search. Nada. Nope. Room to room to room until – aHA, the gacha room. Of course it’s a gacha item. 

We’ll leave my quest there because I am slightly embarrassed by the amount of money I spent getting that plant. But I got it. And let me tell you, SL Store Owner, you’re lucky. Lucky that I finally found you and didn’t give up, because most people will. Sometimes even I do.

Some of you make it so difficult to give you our money! How can you make it much easier? Here’s three must-dos:

Whiskey Tip #1: Brand Your Store and Items With Standard, Searchable Text

If your store has odd characters in it, like ~{baloney}~ then all I remember is baloney. But that doesn’t come up in Search, because it wants those odd characters, too. 

If your store name is a common word that will return a bazillion hits in search, like maybe it’s “drEss” or something, I’ll never find you. But if your store also has crazy characters that I can’t even read, I will never buy your thingamabober, ever. And don’t even get me started on upside down letters, I don’t even know how to type those, much less find them in search. 

Whiskey Tip #2: Update/Include Your Shopping Landmarks Everywhere, Especially in Social Media

If you have old, out of date Landmarks at the MP or in your Picks, do you expect me to get the LM by osmosis? It was hard enough to find you in the first place; why make this a puzzle? Ain’t nobody got time for that.

Many of us also use Flickr to find items. If your in-world store name is Stoned[confU$ed], but your store Flickr account is Dooby, how does that help me find you? I’ll tell you: it doesn’t. Oh, and also, leave a LM to your store in your Flickr posts! That seems so obvious but 99% of you don’t. I know Flickr has some rules about links, so at least name the sim? I dunno, a trail of buds, something. 

There are so many things you could do to make our shopping experience easier and create brand loyalty, but I don’t have time for them all here. And I know that the tools you have in SL are limited. For now, at the very least, please help me find your store. Keep your LM’s up to date at MP, in your profile, and in search. Leave better clues in Flickr. 

Whiskey Tip #3: Put Yourself in Your Customer’s Shoes -- From Start to Finish

Have you ever tried searching for your own store? Try it! Would you fight cannibals to find it? Apparently I would, but I’m special. If you can find our own store via search, next step is to do some shopping. Is it easy to find what you might be looking for? Ask a friend to find an item; ask for their feedback. Don’t assume we’re all having a great shopping experience just because you’re making sales. It’s often because we’re (I’m) stubborn, not because you’ve set up a good experience for us. 

I have money to spend in SL; I hope to be able to spend it on your amazing items. Help me out, okay? 

Xoxo

Whiskey

Images created by the author

Comments

[ron hays]

I totally agree!

[tankgirl]

Dunning-Kruger

[TY]

Now these are the types of posts we need more! Thank you so much! :)

[cygnoir]

I agree completely. Thanks for the post!

[Kaylee West]

In absolute agreement here. Trouble is many sellers have no real selling or marketing experience. Maybe the author could do some in world workshops for interested sellers (at a fee, of course)?

[Honey Crisp]

I totally agree too. Nothing worse than living with the frustration of not being able to buy that *thing* you want because the creator has a weird store name that I can't find!

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

All of this. What's sad is that these problems have been an issue for YEARS, ever since I joined SL and probably from before too.

I generally give up at the "item is a gacha" point.

And for Flickr users, there's no restrictions on linking and promotion for Flickr Pro users.

[Mondy]

Another thing that I find annoying is when creators only sell certain items for a limited time or to group members of their store, but they don't give any indication about it. I saw someone wearing an item I thought looked amazing and looked for it on the marketplace. No sign of it so as I'd bought something from the creator before I went to the inworld store. Naturally it had moved since the last time I had been there. Did a profile search and used their picks to get to the store, tried an area search and found certain colours but not the one I seen the person wearing. Checked the flickr and saw the one I wanted was released months ago. Sent a note to a csr and received a reply a day later that the colour I wanted was *only* available to store group members. I had to pay to join the group, TP to another group member area and then find the store gifts and *exclusive* items. That's ok, I got what I wanted, but make that information obvious in the first place! The original flickr had it listed as a release for a shopping event but nothing about it being made an exclusive item after that.

[Matilda Soon]

I agree with all the Tips 100%!
Thank you for sharing your thoughts!