Up until today, we’ve not considered Shpock to be a marketplace but that has all changed with the addition of all-new buyer protection, in-app digital payments are made in-app and a new ‘Buy Now’ button on listings. The new Shpock marketplace user experience is currently in staged roll-out and will reach 100% of the UK user base within the next few weeks. Plus, don’t overlook the fact that buying and selling on Shpock is free, although there is Premium Membership with the option of Promoting Items in the app.
Shpock has evolved into a transactional marketplace, facilitating the transfer of funds between buyers and sellers, much like more conventional marketplaces. This means buyers and sellers no longer need to rely on cash-in-hand exchanges when using the marketplace and can make and receive payments digitally within the platform. Shpock keeps payments safe, ensuring peace of mind for buyers and sellers.
The Shpock marketplace has more than 10 million active users and over 2 billion page impressions. It is one of the UK’s most dominant shopping apps, with regular #1 rankings in the Google Play and Apple App stores in the UK, Germany and Austria. Top categories range from electronics, fashion and furniture to specialised interests such as cars and property.
New Shpock marketplace Buyer Protection
Shpock’s new Buyer Protection guarantees customers can get their money back in case of issues with delivery or the item’s condition. It covers purchases up to £1,000, and if you don’t get the item you were expecting, you’ll get your money back, although you only have three days to let Shpock know if something isn’t right – less than the mandatory 14 days under business to consumer buyer protection laws.
New Shpock marketplace Buy Now button
Shpock users also now have access to a ‘Buy Now’ button, so you can buy and sell items instantly without the need to haggle. Just click the button, pay digitally through the app, and have the item delivered to your door.
New Shpock marketplace Delivery options
For sellers, listing items on Shpock remains completely free, and can be done in a matter of seconds with the Shpock app. Sellers can now include delivery options for parcels in different sizes, so now everyone across the UK is a potential customer. For those that like to keep things local, there’s no need to worry as items can still be marked as collection only. To make things easy, shipping with Parcel2Go is available in the app.
With these new features, Shpock has evolved from a local-only classified ads platform to a marketplace for buyers and sellers anywhere across the country. You’ll see the most relevant items when you search, not just the ones closest to you. New Buyer Protection meanwhile ensures you won’t get any unwanted surprises when buying on Shpock.
New Shpock marketplace Wallet
Finally, the new Shpock introduces a brand new ‘Wallet’ feature where users can keep track of their current and pending balances from the items they sell. You can have your cash paid out any time to your designated bank account.
“At Shpock, we have always listened to feedback from our community of buyers and sellers and used their insights to make our platform better and better. Today’s new features mark our biggest evolution yet, transforming Shpock from a local way to buy and sell from your neighbours, into an open yet secure online marketplace. As we move away from a throw-away culture, Shpock is the perfect platform for buying things you’ll love, while giving things you used to love a new lease of life.”
– Esteve Jané, CEO, Shpock
Should you use Shpock for business selling?
There are two main problems you’ll face using Shpock for your business – Listing and multichannel management. Currently it appears that you would have to list one item at a time and there are only single quantity listings available. Also with no multichannel management integration you won’t be able to double list inventory on multiple marketplaces and Shpock and have inventory depleted when you get a sale, plus of course any sales on Shpock will have to be manually processed.
Despite these drawbacks, with a 10 million consumer audience, Shpock might be a consideration for listing distressed stock or returns as it’s already known as a marketplace for used goods so consumers will likely be receptive to distressed stock. Worth giving a try to dispose of distressed stock, what we’d dearly love to see are tools for bulk listing and integration with multichannel management platforms to truly unleash Shpock as a realistic alternative marketplace.
2 Responses
The Classified Ads sites are pretty useless for the likes of us, as we live in such a rural area.
However a direct checkout is something that would change things. However if Facebook has direct checkout ( when it eventually does) it will be the real player not Shpock.
It is eBay that will become the distressed stock as that is the marketplace in decline and overpriced.
I have just sold an item on the Shpock app where the buyer used the “buy it now option”. the funds were sent to my new Shpock wallet where they are showing as a pending payment, as I understand it when the buyer receives the item they will confirm and the funds are shown as my available Shpock wallet balance. Well the item was shipped and the buyer did their bit, but the payment is still showing as pending. I have contacted Shpock customer support, but as of yet no response other than the usual automated reply “were looking into it”. I can not find anything helpful on the app regarding the Shpock wallet, payment or how to link your bank account and nothing to confirm if their is a delay in the balance changing or when the funds can be withdrawn.
What should have been a simple sale has turned into a frustrating waste of time which I am still trying to resolve. I would advise not to use this option going forward and would strongly recommend either paypal or cash in hand payments through Shpock as it seems there is very little support for buyers or sellers using the Shpock wallet method.