A new startup is being billed as the marketplace that will rival eBay. Launched in public beta today, though apparently only open to US residents, Wigix is aiming for the Buy It Now, new items end of the market. The site, whose name stands for “want it get it exchange”, offers a stock exchange-type price matching mechanism, where buyers and sellers can add their desired prices for items, and the system will notify both parties when there is a match. Wigix will offer a ticker showing recent transactions and prices, hoping to entice browsers to become sellers.
No fees on items under $25
As has become the norm with eBay competitors, there is no fee to list on Wigix. Items sold for under $25 are fee-free even when sold. From $25 up, there is a downwards sliding scale for sellers:
- $1.50 for a sale $25 – $100;
- $1.50 + 2% of the amount above $100 for a sale $100 – $1,000;
- $21 + 1% of the amount over $1,000 for a sale of more than $1,000.
Buyers will – unusually – pay $1.50 per item themselves. This pricing structure obviously tends towards the higher end of the market.
But members also have the opportunity to earn money from the site, without needing to sell a thing themselves. Those who add new products into Wigix’s Amazon-style inventory, will earn 5% of the site’s transaction fees when items are sold from that listing. There’s a great opportunity for someone with a large database of products there…
Members can also become category experts, overseeing product submissions, blogging, posting on forums and dealing with other members’ queries: creating community around their categories. For a fairly hefty time committment, these members will earn 1% of the revenue from their category.
PowerSellers wanted
eBay PowerSellers will be able to import their catalogues into Wigix, and they say that from July, the site will offer store fronts.
I must admit, I’m more impressed with Wigix than with pretty much any “the next eBay” I’ve ever seen. Concentrating on higher-end consumer products rather than trying to take on the breadth of eBay’s marketplace, looks like it may attract experts in the relevent categories, as well as serious buyers and sellers. It’s a shame they’re limiting it to US residents at the moment, but perhaps that will change in time.
10 Responses
I have to say, I gave up after a few short minutes. Very complicated process.
Feddy, that’s what I thought. It is too time consuming for both buyers and sellers at first glance.
I just don’t think it will get much traction. I may be wrong.
Hmm. Seemed pretty straightforward to me 🙁
What potential sellers *won’t* like are the Amazon ads on the view item pages, however.
I’m still unsure how pleased buyers will be when they’re charged to buy… Why would I want to pay a fee to be able to buy?
Sue, yeah those Amazon ads sure looked out of place didn’t they.
Chris, that is certainly a non-starter making the buyer pay a fee.
Frankly, I would expect the buyer fee to get dropped. Or for sellers to be given the option to include it in their own fees (wow, what an eBayish move that would be 😆 ) …unless it’s just added on to the item price and the buyer never sees it as a seperate item?
*wishes some VC provider would chuck US$5m+ at me*
Anyway – personaly I think it is doomed to failure, as stated its a concept buyers are not familiar with, all they want to do (in my opinion) is either :
Buy it now as in Amazon/eBay or any other shopping website process.
Bid auction style – generally close to auction end to replicate real life auctions.
I wish them well, but guess much of the US$5m will be spent on advertising – all to no avail, sorry for those investors.
Well I quite like the site and have contact them about selling on there and they say I can as long as I have a paypal account and take into account shipping cost to the US and I offer free worldwide delivery on the stock im thinking of selling on there!
Will keep you posted to see what happens
Stu
That’s interesting, Stu – thanks for posting. I went to register and there wasn’t even an option to choose the country, just US state and zip code. Keep us posted on what happens. 😀
Yeah will do, just had an email which confirmed that I could sell on there even tho im not a US resident and their ‘extreme sellers’ team is going to contact me, sounds painful!
But im willing to give anything ago after all these problems with ebay, which are still not sorted!!! ahhhh going to have to move to smaller business unit next month as I can’t sustain the overheads here now, plus there is only two of us rattling around in this place now!! lol
Stu