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I recently got in a huge fight with a friend of mine
because I noticed her shop items were WAY too expensive. It's the kind
of thing I get seriously ticked off about. So-o, I've decided to make
yet ANOTHER NP-making article. This time, focused on "the shop-keeping
way."
It's more reliable than the stock market, anyway.
A lot of people think opening a shop is a great way to
strike money. It is. But you just don't open a shop and everything's fine.
Here's tips on making a shop... my way.
1) Get PROFITABLE Items
Faerie paintbrushes, maps, Codestones, and Faeries are very profitable
items. So are a lot of battle items. Figure it out. As long as you at
least get 500 NP profit from what you bought it for, it's worth selling.
I once had a friend who bought chocolates from the Shop Wizard and sold
them in her shop. That's barely 5 NP profit. Get something WORTHWHILE.
I'm not saying that you have to sell "what sells". I'm
saying you have to sell what is profitable. Sometimes they mean the same
thing. Sometimes they don't. For example, Stone Snowballs don't "sell".
But if you use the lowest price on the Shop Wizard, it will.
2) Use the Shop Wizard!
I don't give about the crap that says you have to sell something 20NP
below the Shop Wizard. Sell it the lowest possible. Give or take 20 NP,
it doesn't make much difference. Hundreds? Thousands? THAT'S what gets
people coming to your shop. Look, if you're selling a wand of the Air
Faerie for 74999 and the second lowest price is 75000, a lot of the people
who are buying the thing don't really care.
3) Buy low, sell high
Just don't sell TOO high, okay? As I said, use the Shop Wizard, it's only
a click away and you won't have to guess what price you put something
at. My friend was selling a lab map for 70,000 NP. No one's going to buy
it. Some dumb rumors have been saying if you leave an item in a shop long
enough, someone will buy it. No matter how expensive it is.
Think again.
People will buy something if it's 200-300 NP below Shop
Wizard price, or something of the sort. If you can't stand losing 200-300NP,
you're being overly greedy. Yeah, seriously. All you can buy with 200
NP is food and toys and some other basic nessecities. Not saying food
is BAD, but... ugh! It'll be like donating something to the Money Tree.
Let someone off easy.
4) DON'T use contests
I say this because I've earned hundreds of thousands of neopoints WITHOUT
contests. And you can make hundreds of thousands of neopoints WITHOUT
contests, too. Why would you need to have a contest, anyway? If your prices
are right, you wouldn't have to make people come to your shop.
5) If you DO want to make contests...
Don't, don't, don't make those scam-like contests that say "Whoever buys
the most lipsticks for 500 NP gets a Faerie Paintbrush!" or "Raffle! The
more you buy, the better your chance!" Because you know what? Those are
the most commonly used scams in shop contests. I'm not saying your shop
contest is a scam. I'm saying it's very.. umm.. unpopular. Get that?
6) Don't go upgrading your shop hysterically
The pure thoughtlessness in this always amazes me. Large shops are not
these magical things that automatically bring in more visitors. Besides,
you don't NEED 200 items in a shop at one time. If you're actually selling
something, things SHOULD sell out fast, and then the shop size won't even
matter. It just slows down visitors. Sure, it's a different thing if you're
talking about using a gallery, but we're not... right?
7) Make your shop tolerable
Just because YOU have a DSL line, doesn't mean the rest of the world does.
Don't make your shop take 10 minutes to load. This means don't put a MIDI
in your page, don't mess with style sheets that make the text fuzzy, don't
make those annoying popups that jump in our faces and say, "Welcome to
my shop!" and don't use slow-loading counters. Why? Because those are
just useless web trinkets, and we can do without them. How would you feel
if the index page of NeoPets had a popup that jumped in your face and
said "Welcome to NeoPets!"? *jeesh* You people aren't THINKING.
Conclusion: Everything here is purely my opinion, and
it was inspired by the way people put their overpriced junk in their shop
and waited a week for people to buy them. Here's the REAL way to earn
money from using a shop. It's been proven, and it works. And don't go
yapping at me saying that I don't know anything about shopkeeping, because
I _do_. Is it harsh? Yes. Is it difficult? Of course. Is it true? Absolutely.
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