Creating a two-sided service based marketplace

[Scuderia]

Hi i'm looking to build a website which allows people to find cleaners in their area. So a marketplace for those seeking cleaners. Which requires both customers and suppliers to work. I'm looking for advice on what kind of marketplace scripts/platform i should consider.

I have seen scripts like these - http://customers.agriya.com/products/marketplace-quote to create the site. I'm not sure whether i should build this based on a script already been created or create the marketplace from scatch.

I'm not a programmer, but have 5-10k to spend on a programmer for this project. Any advice would be very much appreciated. Or advice on where i can get answers to these type of questions would also be appreciated (don't mind paying).

Kind Regards,
Scuderia

 

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[throttleforward]

I'd avoid paying that much for a script until you get a market validation for a minimum viable product. For my two sided market MVP, I used a Wordpress theme with the Private Content plugin, modified for <$200 by an awesome outsourced coder from Bulgaria. My site has generated converted leads, so I know the system can be built quickly and cheaply for testing purposes and be successful in the marketplace.

Ultimately, in my experience your problem will not be building the site, it will be understanding the needs of the service providers. For instance, I assumed that my service providers would want me to send them leads. I was actually wrong, they wanted something else instead, and felt they had little to no difficultly finding leads cheaper than I could find and send them. I had to adjust my approach based on their feedback.

Have you talked to the cleaners about what their lead generation needs are?

 

[Bandy]

Hi,
we are currently doing the same, just for educational purposes.
We worked with one of the Agriya scripts (not the exact same one).
Although there are some really bad reviews about them online, we gave it a try.

This is what we learned:
- Agriya is willing to help and offers a good support (we usually had response after a day)

- It most likely won´t work out of the box; be aware that it might take some time and some setbacks until it works properly

- It took 3 months until the site is now finally working as it should (the delay is not only on Agriya, but also on us!)

- Customizing the script can be quite hard, since java developers are harder to find (our product was based on java, don´t know for sure about yours)

- You will need a different hosting solution for a java based marketplace (we use Jelastic, slightly more expensive)

- To edit the script you will have to install it on a local machine (on your computer).
This is still not working properly on ours, so we are still not able to edit the script. Make sure you have a good programmer who understands java + webdesign to some extent. (Otherwise you will need to coordinate two guys to edit the site.) (* I only know for sure for java based platforms, you might have to check this one out for your product!)

- we talked to a java programmer; he told us that the script was low quality code

Bottom line: You get what you pay for.

We considered building it from scratch. Talked to some developers locally -> 40k - 50k € and 8-10 months development.
We tossed that idea really quick... Thats why we decided us for the Agriya product.

Don´t get me wrong, Agriya offers a lot of features that are great to have at a low price.
The support is dedicated and willing to help, although it may take some time until the issue is fixed.

If you have any further questions regarding Agriya, just let me know

@throttleforward
This sounds interesting. Would you mind sharing some more details with us?
We looked into Wordpress and are now again, since we aren´t sure where the Agriya script will takes us (time and moneywise).

We found a really good theme, but didn´t manage to finde a way to build a two sided MP. The only possible solution for us is to receive the information and put it on our website ourselves.
Have you found a way to let them create their content themselves without giving them access to the wp-admin backend?
Would be really interested in what your site looks like (PM?).

Best regards,

Andy

 

[throttleforward]

I used the Responsive Pro theme with the Another Wordpress Plugin (with design modifications to the plugin). obxfun dot com is the site. People can fill out their requirements, create a private login, and have their posting published all automatically.

 

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