Multiply Marketplace Closing on May 6, 2013

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After less than 6 months of being a dedicated e-commerce service, Multiply had suddenly announced that it will be closing its marketplace service on May 6.  This announcement came amidst several complaints both from sellers and buyers regarding various issues on their payment system.

Multiply's Announcement

Multiply's short-lived dabble in online selling was a great revolution of trying to foster honest selling and buying experience online.  Sellers had the option of using Multiply's escrow service that would accept payments from buyers thru Multiply system.  As a reward, sellers would gain points that would allow them to ship the items to the customer free of charge.

Several sellers had issues of not receiving the payment on-time since Multiply had a hard time disbursing the payments back to the sellers who should receive them.  For the buyers, the experience led them to believe that the sellers renegade on them and had turned scam after not receiving the items they paid for.

Where to sell?

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Now that you already have your chosen merchandise, the next big decision is where best to sell them.  This question is not about a place that you can locate around the neighborhood.  A place that you have to rent or lease.  It's a free spot on the vast internet that you can claim and name as your own.

There are 3 sites that top the list of online sellers.  Ebay, Facebook and Multiply.

eBay, with its auction format attracts treasure trove seekers of every kind.  Selling is easy since the site showcases the items fairly and is sold to the highest bidder (anywhere).  That being said, there’s hardly any big need to advertise your product before anyone finds it.  A simple SEO, descriptive title and good photo is all an eBayer needs to sell an item here.

Facebook is now the 2^nd choice, a spot held before by Multiply.  The big reason is that a seller can create her own Fan page and invite one and all to like that page.  Those who did will automatically see on their wall anything that the seller would deem to show off on her page.  It’s broadcasting to the highest level.  As human nature goes, the more buzz an issue would get, the more people would be intrigue to see what the buzz is all about.

Multiply, nowadays is a site driven by online sellers.  Its original purpose was to let users interact with each other by connecting each ones pages of photos, blogs and what-not.  It is now a place to parade stuffs to sell; with albums after albums of treasures that you won’t normally see elsewhere.  Multiply even gave in to the demands of its users and implemented the order form widget, which before was banned.